Annoyed

I shouldn't be blogging right now, but considering the fact that this computer is so blasted slow, I need something to do while I'm waiting between records. Besides, what are they gonna do...write me up? Fire me? I've already put in my notice, so that would just mean I'd be able to quit working that much sooner without feeling guilty. I've been in a rotten mood since I left the house this morning. Part of it is because I so dread having to come in here, but there definitely were a couple of contributing factors this morning.

The first thing that got under my skin was the traffic in Fayetteville this morning. I honestly do not understand the way a lot of these people around here drive. There's a four-lane freeway that runs between Fayetteville and Fort Bragg that I drive every morning. The speed limit is 55mph. Now I'll be the first to say that I have a bit of a lead foot since living in Europe for five years. OK, that's an understatement. If I don't set my cruise control, I'm driving 80mph before I realize it. Hey...I drive a European car...they're built to go fast! Anyway, one of my pet peeves is people who drive well under the speed limit. So here I am on the freeway where the speed limit is 55mph, and BOTH lanes of traffic are moving at 45mph. So here I am yelling at these people to DRIVE THE SPEED LIMIT as if they can hear me! Yeah, I'm a bit nuts. I have the same issue out on Business 95, though, so I avoid that stretch of highway when at all possible.

So obviously, by the time I get the hospital I'm extremely aggravated. Then I make it to the Medical Records room, where I usually work, and find out that the work station I usually use is being used by someone else. I'm a contractor (black sheep as far as some of these folks around here are concerned) and don't have my own work station. They have auditors here this week (which is also what I do), and these auditors I guess have priority. Whatever. So I come back upstairs to drop off the folder of work I had just picked up a couple of minutes before. Then I find out that a couple of the girls who work for the same company I do are out today, so I'm able to use one of their computers. I've been hearing how the girls who usually work on these computers complain about the trouble they have. Let me tell ya...I can understand why now. It's driving me absolutely insane how slow this thing is. The system I have to use to pull the records from my audit is slow enough. It's the military's electronic medical record system, and it holds all the records of service members and their family members from the time it went live. It went live in different areas at different times, but I think most places are using it now. Anyway, it has been a thorn in my side ever since the clinic I worked at in Germany started to use it. Add a slow computer to the mix, and it makes it even worse. There's a serious lag time between records, especially if the record I need to audit isn't one of that person's last four visits. I don't have an option to just choose the next four visits. It's either last four or all, and some of these folks have LOTS of visits. Oh well, I guess I should be glad that my trip out here wasn't completely wasted. At least I'm able to get something done, although not as much as I usually can in the same amount of time. I just keep telling myself: 20 more days, 20 more days.

I'm so ready for 2pm to get here. Then I can go home. I hope the kids are in a better mood than they were yesterday (they started fighting before they even walked in the door). After homework, they have to get their mess cleaned up if they want to go to their school's Sweetheart Dance tomorrow night. They say they really want to go...let's see if they show me.