LeeAnn lost another boyfriend this week - that's the sixth this year.
Monday: LeeAnn came in 7 minutes late - she got on the wrong bus and it went the wrong way so she had to get off and walk to work. Her excuses are getting better, but apparently the truth was that she'd had another fight with the boyfriend last night, got up late and missed the bus.
AJ called us together for the morning meeting and said he'd decided over the weekend to implement a "self-monitoring" policy. From now on we all have to monitor what we do during the week and then be able to discuss our personal progress, needs and strengths at the Friday morning meeting. After he'd gone we all decided that we'd all have training needs, and see if he's going to be prepared to pay for them.
Tuesday: All the office plants Donna took over are doing real well, and my little fern plant is too. I told her yesterday it had started to get bumps on the stem and today she looked at it and said it looked like it was going to flower. I told her I'm not ready to handle flowers just yet, but she said I couldn't stop it. Amy said if my fern plant was going to flower why hasn't Andy's second plant flowered yet, and Donna and Fiona agreed maybe he wasn't watering it correctly. It's beginning to look a little tired now, and some of the leaves are dying at the top. LeeAnn and I exchanged glances, then she just put her head down and carried on working.
Amy's red leaved fountain plant has still got that spiky stick growing out the middle - it's growing slowly but it's still growing. I said about it and Amy said she didn't know, but at least it wasn't going to flower like mine, and she wouldn't like it if it did as she's allergic to flowers. I said hey, I'm not happy about the fern flowering either. Donna said I should be pleased if it does as it just shows I'm looking after it properly.
She then spent about five minutes convincing Amy that when she said mine was flowering because I looked after it, she hadn't meant Amy's red fountain plant wasn't flowering because she'd been mistreating it.
Wednesday: LeeAnn came in and told us all she threw her latest boyfriend out last night, and the neighbors called the police again as he wouldn't leave. Two police in a patrol car came out, and one of them was the one she'd bitten by accident the last time. She told us all he seemed a little nervous and said he'd stay in the car - the other one said he'd get out, but he didn't need to as the boyfriend decided he'd go after all.
The big printer wasn't working after the lunchbreak again. Walked over, pulled Mike's mobile charger, plugged the printer back in. It didn't start up.
I crawled under it, and made sure it was plugged in - it was. Took the plug out and put it into another socket - nothing. Tested the fuse - it's OK. I even flipped the power switch a couple times. Still nothing. Opened it up as much as I could and checked everything checkable. Nothing.
Finally gave up and called the printer helpline. We've got a service agreement so it's no big deal, but it'll be a day or so before they send someone - and I hate giving up. Mike came over and asked if it was his fault. I said why, what did you do? He said nothing - I'm going out, I've got an appointment, then he picked up his case and ran for it. I don't know what he thinks he's done, but I'll find out.
Thursday: LeeAnn came in 7 minutes late again today, she said she saw her ex-boyfriend hanging around when she went home last night, and she thought he was still around until early morning so she couldn't sleep. It turned out it wasn't her boyfriend at all, her neighbors' son had parked his bike under an overhanging tree and it was so dark she thought it was him - she didn't know it was just the light until she looked out early this morning. Donna said if he was bothering her she should call the police herself, but she said no he wasn't. She had expected to see him waiting for her when she left work last night, but he wasn't. When she'd stayed up last night it was because she was wondering why he was sitting outside under the tree instead of coming to the door.
I got a message from the printer service people to say they'd be in on Monday, so I told everyone we'd not have the big printer until then. They all moaned about it - I said sorry, but you all have to use the little printer instead and the big one's switched off until the engineer gets to look at it. Amy said oh she'd sent a couple things to it already this morning and was that why they hadn't printed off yet? She asked me if I could just switch it on until they'd printed off and then switch it off again, but I said no.
Andy's second plant (the one LeeAnn planted on him) is definitely giving up. It's dropped a lot of leaves and Andy said it's a shame - he wouldn't mind having another one like it next year even though it never flowered and he didn't get any tomatoes from it.
Friday: We all tried the "more training needed" routine at the morning meeting, but AJ just got that hunted look again. He told us all that he understood we all wanted to do the best we could for the company, and he'd also understand if we wanted to make that commitment to our futures here by studying in our own time. When James said was the company prepared to pay, he said he thought the whole point was that we were making an investment in our futures. We all waited until he'd gone back to his office, then decided that he meant no, the company wouldn't pay.
LeeAnn was too quiet during the lunchbreak, and after AJ left for the meeting at Head Office she rang a couple friends of hers to find out if they'd seen her ex-boyfriend around, and looked pretty upset when she rang off. Donna followed her out to the ladies washroom, and came back to tell us all LeeAnn'd found out from the last call that he'd gone off to Birmingham without telling her.
LeeAnn was coming out when I left and I said are you OK? She said yes, she'd decided she was better off without him, especially if he was going to go off like that. I said see you Monday and she said she supposed so, and I felt a little guilty so I offered her a lift home. She said oh OK, and when we got to her place there was this bike outside and a big guy sitting on the wall. I said oh, is he a friend of yours? and she went red and said yes that's right - thanks for the lift, see you Monday.
read 00/11/06-10 or read 00/11/20-24 