A Day In My Life

AM
7:00 Wake up call. Convince myself that my pants do NOT need to be ironed therefore I can lay in bed another 15 minutes.
7:22 Finally get up and stagger to the bathroom for a shower. Throat and eyeballs seriously dry due to keeping air conditioner fan on all night to drown out sounds of strange hotel.
7:45 Check email. Still covering for vacant office job, as temp I spent two days last week training decided not to come back this week. Run reports and forward ever-increasingly desperate pleas for help from other people in department to new temp, who has not been trained at all to my knowledge.
8:30 Get in car to drive to first appointment, supposedly 15 minutes away.
8:55 Drive up and down street three times before finding appointment's address. Not my fault, none of the buildings have numbers and the company I am seeing just moved in and hasn't purchased a sign yet.
9:10 First appointment over! He had no complaints with my company, which left us with little to talk about. Review directions printed from Internet to second appointment. Looks to be about 40 minute drive.
9:30 Must find someplace to get off highway and go in opposite direction, thanks to stupid directions printed from Internet which told me to go East on a road that runs North and South.
9:40 All turned around and going correct direction this time.
10:30 Directions from Internet do not mislead me again, and I arrive at appointment's address. Unfortunately there is nowhere to park. Circle block twice (much to the amusement of some nearby construction guys) before deciding to park along street in nearby residential neighborhood and walking back the two blocks. Hope I don't get towed or a ticket.
11:45 Second appointment over. Did not get towed or a ticket. Meeting was with guy who's been dealing with my company for about 8 years, so spent most of time gossiping. Also he showed me his new office, which is in an old house that still has all the original kitchen appliances. They have a pink refrigerator! Awesome. Second appointment guy knows third appointment guy, so got real-life directions that I hope will be better than Internet directions.

PM
12:15 Stopped at Burger King for bathroom break and to look at map. Stupid real-life directions from guy didn't tell me which way to turn when I reached highway and as usual I chose the wrong way. Decided to go ahead and eat lunch since I was there (spicy chicken tendercrisp sandwich - YUM! I've loved this sandwich ever since Burger King had the commercial with the guys in the office, and one of them ordered this sandwich and then kept saying in a really high voice "I'm SPICY!" So now every time I get this sandwich I say to myself "I'm SPICY!")
12:40 Called next appointment for THEIR interpretation of directions to their company. Directions include the sentence, "Turn right at the light just after the EXOTIC DANCERS' CLUB." Excellent.
1:30 Found appointment with no problems, thanks to their excellent instructions. Company appears to be a junkyard. Am extremely glad to be wearing old shoes. Find a clear space in the debris to park my car and quickly check phone messages. None. Loves it.
1:45 Tour of facility that turns out to be a recycling center/paper mill. The process of recycling paper is disgusting. It was easily 110 degrees in there, and steamy, and I can't even describe the smell other than "gross." Inspect some plastic material that I'd like to purchase and they say they'll sell it to me. Am introduced to office pet - large frog who occasionally escapes and has to be caught by slamming a bucket on top of him (upside down of course - the bucket, not the frog) because he's too slippery to catch by hand.
2:15 Merge onto Pennsylvania Turnpike and am pleasantly surprised at how little traffic there is. Normally I am nearly killed when driving on this road (every time) but today it is almost empty.
2:25 Receive phone call from supplier who didn't get some piece of paper faxed to her. Assure her I will take care of it, though I don't know how since no one is working in the office any more except temps who haven't been trained. Final appointment for the day is cancelled due to that guy never returning my call to confirm appointment. Decide to head for hotel.
2:30 Am nearly killed by crazy woman at toll plaza. I guess she didn't appreciate me merging into her lane, with my blinker clearly on and plenty of room if she had been going anywhere near the posted speed limit of 35. She actually leaned out of her window and shouted at me. Crazy Pennsylvania drivers.
3:30 One mile away from my exit and all lanes of traffic are at a dead stop because people don't know how to merge.
4:00 Check into hotel. Receive phone call from panicked co-worker regarding inability of temp to do anything he's asked of her. Assure him that he's not the only one, and I'll try to get to the office on Friday to take care of anything that hasn't gotten done.
4:15 Call bestest friend/co-worker to bitch about stupid office temps who don't know how to do anything, and clueless boss who doesn't realize what a problem this is. Bitch some more about other people from work.
4:30 Take shower to get rid of paper mill/junkyard smell in hair.
4:45 Receive call from bestest friend/co-worker asking me what entrée I'd like for dinner at recycling conference next month. Decide on the prime rib.
5:00 Check email. Forward more panic-stricken messages to the new temp, but all messages are returned as undeliverable. Hope this temp hasn't quit, too. Discover address change I asked LAST temp to do a week ago was never done, so my supplier's check was sent to the wrong address. Forward this message to the only remaining person in the office, although he's asked us repeatedly not to email him things of this nature, as it is NOT his job. He needs to get over himself and think of the TEAM until the current job-crisis is over.
6:00 Ask guy at hotel front desk for menu from local Chinese restaurant. Order general tso's chicken and watch Charmed on TNT. Episode where Phoebe and Cole are supposed to get married, but Cole is the Source of All Evil so he has to trick her into getting married in The Dark Way so they can conceive an evil child that will rule the Underworld. Not one of their best episodes.
6:30 Dinner arrives.
6:35 Burn tongue on innocent looking red pepper. Finish entire bottle of Pepsi and all of fried rice in effort to put out flames.
7:00 Log onto internet to check local SPCA for adoptable yellow labs. Instead stumble across What Kind of American English Do You Speak? Answer: 60% General American English, 25% Dixie (Yay!), 10% Upper Midwestern (where did THAT come from), 5% Yankee, and 0% Midwestern. This leads me to Who's Your Inner European (Your Inner European is Italian), What Personality Disorder Are You (You Are Possibly Borderline Schizophrenic) and How Normal Are You (You Are 75% Normal, Really Normal.)
8:15 Start to watch tv, but have gotten so used to Tivo that watching normal tv without being able pause, rewind and fast forward is unbearable. Decide to wait until I get home to watch new episode of Scrubs.
9:00 Call boyfriend. Discuss dog's daily bowel movements and eating habits. Listen to him bitch about work. Bitch about MY work.
10:05 Say goodbye to boyfriend and run to bathroom for near Bathroom Emergency. Some people I know can pee while talking on the phone, but I am not one of them.
10:15 After 15 minutes of channel surfing decide nothing is on so take trashy romance novel out of purse and settle down to read a few chapters.
10:30 Hey, this is getting pretty good.
11:45 Oh man, I can't believe it's so late but I just had to find out if Lucinda married the arrogant billionaire who ruined her family's fortunes just so he could get her to work for him as an indentured servant to keep her father out of the poorhouse, all because he (the billionaire) had fallen in love with her 15 years ago when she was just a teenager who didn't know any better than to not realize the gardener (now a billionaire) was madly in love with her. Call front desk to request wake up call at 7. Go to sleep.