In which it feels like Saturday
Sep. 10th, 2010 07:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zeborahYou know how you wake up on Saturday morning and you think, "Hooray! I don't have to be stuck in that same old building all day doing things I don't want to do; instead I can go where I want and do what I want to do!"
Today felt like Saturday because I could finally go to work.
(Oh guys, as I type this, Boots is sitting on my lap for the first time in almost a week, and she's licking my nose.)
Before I get to the work thing, I should mention that, having gone to bed in my spare bedroom, I managed to sleep sound all night - indeed so soundly that I didn't wake up until my alarm clock went off. Then I started getting ready, pausing briefly to crouch in the corner of the bathroom for an aftershock which, it later transpired, was two earthquakes striking simultaneously from two different directions, could you even make this stuff up? [ETA: Oh, apparently this was a Schrödinger aftershock or something, and has now resolved itself to a single quake.]
So I took my bus and chatted with the busdriver who knows me, and as we went through not-quite-the-centre of town (because the centre of town was still cordoned off) he pointed out this chimney and that roof and that building and that façade and so on, like a regular tour-guide. Some I'd seen on the news, some I hadn't.
At work I signed in at the checkpoint and got issued a pass to wear. Met colleagues and we went to one of the safe libraries to go through the list of what publishers are offering us to tick the things that we want. Then we talked about things we need to communicate with users and then we had lunch and I talked lots with colleagues, which was wonderful. And then I stayed with the IT people to work through some website pages.
Finally I went back to my own branch (via the check-in point so they knew where I was) - everyone else there had left except one who showed me around briefly. It's, um. <attempts to match words to scope for a while and gives up> Let's call it a mess. We can deal with it but it'll take some weeks or so I should think. But level 1 is pretty much okay so that part can open next week. And my office is fine, and my colleague watered our potted mandarin plant which is also fine.
After checking out I took a different bus home, through the suburbs. Mostly they're pretty normal. Then we hit Dallington and the streets are suddenly lined with silt and traffic cones and portaloos, and roofs have been replaced with tarpaulins, and doors are sprayed with "No go" and labelled with the dreaded red stickers. And then we came around the corner and I blinked and thought, "This isn't that far away from my own house."
When I got home I found that the guy who I'd asked before the quake to trim some hedges and trees had done it today, except he seems to have forgotten one. It wasn't that important so I won't bother saying anything. You know, it's just on the "Really, who cares?" list (as, indeed, so many things are these days).
I have emotions, I just don't know what all of them are. (Earthquake: Trauma and Stress makes me nod a lot. Sometimes I think I'm basically normal. And sometimes I think I should be normal. But I'm not. I'm tending strongly towards "okay" but I'm not normal except compared with fellow Christchurch-folk.)
By the end of the day it didn't feel so much like Saturday as like Friday evening after a long week. Coincidentally the calendar seems to agree with this. But it was a very, very good day.
Today felt like Saturday because I could finally go to work.
(Oh guys, as I type this, Boots is sitting on my lap for the first time in almost a week, and she's licking my nose.)
Before I get to the work thing, I should mention that, having gone to bed in my spare bedroom, I managed to sleep sound all night - indeed so soundly that I didn't wake up until my alarm clock went off. Then I started getting ready, pausing briefly to crouch in the corner of the bathroom for an aftershock which, it later transpired, was two earthquakes striking simultaneously from two different directions, could you even make this stuff up? [ETA: Oh, apparently this was a Schrödinger aftershock or something, and has now resolved itself to a single quake.]
So I took my bus and chatted with the busdriver who knows me, and as we went through not-quite-the-centre of town (because the centre of town was still cordoned off) he pointed out this chimney and that roof and that building and that façade and so on, like a regular tour-guide. Some I'd seen on the news, some I hadn't.
At work I signed in at the checkpoint and got issued a pass to wear. Met colleagues and we went to one of the safe libraries to go through the list of what publishers are offering us to tick the things that we want. Then we talked about things we need to communicate with users and then we had lunch and I talked lots with colleagues, which was wonderful. And then I stayed with the IT people to work through some website pages.
Finally I went back to my own branch (via the check-in point so they knew where I was) - everyone else there had left except one who showed me around briefly. It's, um. <attempts to match words to scope for a while and gives up> Let's call it a mess. We can deal with it but it'll take some weeks or so I should think. But level 1 is pretty much okay so that part can open next week. And my office is fine, and my colleague watered our potted mandarin plant which is also fine.
After checking out I took a different bus home, through the suburbs. Mostly they're pretty normal. Then we hit Dallington and the streets are suddenly lined with silt and traffic cones and portaloos, and roofs have been replaced with tarpaulins, and doors are sprayed with "No go" and labelled with the dreaded red stickers. And then we came around the corner and I blinked and thought, "This isn't that far away from my own house."
When I got home I found that the guy who I'd asked before the quake to trim some hedges and trees had done it today, except he seems to have forgotten one. It wasn't that important so I won't bother saying anything. You know, it's just on the "Really, who cares?" list (as, indeed, so many things are these days).
I have emotions, I just don't know what all of them are. (Earthquake: Trauma and Stress makes me nod a lot. Sometimes I think I'm basically normal. And sometimes I think I should be normal. But I'm not. I'm tending strongly towards "okay" but I'm not normal except compared with fellow Christchurch-folk.)
By the end of the day it didn't feel so much like Saturday as like Friday evening after a long week. Coincidentally the calendar seems to agree with this. But it was a very, very good day.
