Almost every assignment I have gotten this week is "I need to know the elements of _____." Fill in the blank. Whether it has to do with life insurance, or with equitable subordination or with easement interference ... no one knows the elements.

Today, I do not want to be at work. We're leaving for my parents' house to see my sister pretty quickly after we all get home; I have yet to pack. Beloved takes care of his own self, but the girls need at least guidance.

Then, this a.m., I realized for the first time that I'm not just packing them for a weekend (which is no big deal, and my mom keeps jammies for them at her house, so all I needed was clothes ...) but for over a WEEK. I'm meeting my ex on Monday afternoon and passing the girls off until Saturday.

I am also very excited about seeing my sister. This makes the day already seem neverending.

It's cold outside.

When I got to work, I did my usual routine - coat on the back of the door, boot up the computer, bag on the ground, change my shoes (from my excellent treaded hiking boots - perfect in our iceworld - to my cool Dansko Mary Jane heels with the double strap). Breathe. Drink coffee. Hear strange ripping sound. Feel cold wood on elbow. Huh?

Was my cuff unbuttoned?

Of course not. My shirt is torn. Starting below the elbow - about 2 inches from any cuff seam or placket, all the way to approx 3 inches ABOVE the elbow. A 7 inch gash. In my shirt.

Not on a seam. The shirt isn't tight. It fits nice and loose - it's a button down blouse with french cuffs. It's a name brand. It has stripes - purple and black against an off-white.

What seems to have happened is that the fabric on one of the black stripes got all brittle. (I bought this shirt around Thanksgiving-time). You can feel a difference between the black stripe and the other stripes next to it, as well as between it and the other black stripes.

I think it just .... disintegrated.

But I'm at work. I just got here. It took close to an hour to get here. I do not keep a spare wardrobe in my office, as many of the attorneys here do. I have nothing to change into. I cannot take 2 hours to go home and change! I have too much to do!!

That's another reason why it's a bad day - people are not slowing down with the assignments and the questions and the rushes. I'm feeling like I'm never going to finish the things I have to do. NEVAH!! Really, after today - I have 4 days.

But back to the shirt. Fortunately, I have a sewing kit in my desk (god, that is so NOT Zuska, to have things in the eventuality of emergencies - I never am that .... prepared. Or mature. This is not the first time it came in handy though - a button popped off a suit jacket a couple weeks ago, and I was able to tend to that, too.) I took the sewing kit and went into the bathroom, locked myself in a stall, stripped down to my bra, and sutured my shirt (no staples! that would be lazy). Fortunately with the stripes and the blackness, you can't really see it unless you look for it, and no one will do that. But it killed 20 minutes.

And while I was gone (from 8:35 to 8:55), someone called me and left me a message saying, "Hey, can you call me as soon as you get in? Thanks." I wanted to say "I was here! I was here! I was just in the bathroom, sewing my shirt!"

I have been working on a certain large project at work that is not going well. I'm having a hard time figuring out what the partner wants, and every time I follow instructions as to organization and analysis, I'm later asked why I did it that way, it doesn't flow right. I keep putting off the next go-round, because I am discouraged and daunted. But it's a big thing I need to finish before I'm done here. I am thinking that I'm just doing it MY way this time. Perhaps if I'm not trying to follow the outline of someone who isn't immersed in the material, and just has a vague idea of what's going on, everything will be stronger. I need it to be stronger, because the confusion is making my writing suck, and it's all around a shitty situation. Ptooey.

Now, let's just throw in the final element: email exchanges with the ex wherein he insists that I procure for the girls ice skates in their proper sizes before I leave town. Which is 30 minutes after I get out of work. Wherein he also insists that he has no time to do laundry during the week that they're with him, so they better have enough clothes for a 9 day trip. And they better have spare gloves, because it's cold.

I wish I could be home. And I wish that Beloved was home with me, and that we could be checking the weather on t.v. and listening to music and telling each other things we read on the news in between packing and cleaning in preparation for our trip. The girls can be home, too, if they want, but they can't be fighting with each other, and I think it would be best if they were in their room, either packing their own selves, or reading or writing, or something like that. They can come out and share with us what they've read, or ideas they've had, but they can't come out demanding attention for nonsense. Because I'm in no mood for that today. And they can't be wailing about how unfair it is that I'm making them pack their own selves.

You know what? They should stay at school ;) We'll pick them up later.

posted by Zuska @ 8:58 AM

0 Comments: