Spent the majority of my day at the VA hospital - no crisis or anything, just followup on both the arthritis & my recent surgery. Got my stitches & pin pulled out (interesting sensation there, let me tell you), and some antibiotics since there is a minor but not unusual infection where the pin was at. It was apparently a VERY busy day for the hospital - I had to park at a lot almost ten minutes walk away, and was behind 60 other people in line to get my blood drawn at the lab for an example. So ended up taking about 5 hours to get everything done there, but fortunately all ended well. Next followups a month down the road & progress being made on both ends fortunately. Though yes, I had to hit the painkillers when all was said & done, plus I was starving and dehydrated by that point. Fortunately I learned long ago to take a book on journeys like this, which let me finish one that had been pending.
After that fought traffic on the way back to "my" side of town & hit the grocery store for some supplies. Then made it home in time to get a bit of a chance to talk with my wife & play with Jacob before cooking a nice dinner for everyone. Then, a bit more family time with everyone & bundling them off to bed...
Having given it a several week rest break, I also reconnected a hard drive I had that was going bad & got it stable long enough to get the last of my saved info on it - nothing critical but nice to recover it before trashing...
So then, I get a text message from my boss to all of us... We have all been anticipating some promotions & transfers coming soon & it turns out his name is on the list to switch to a new area & group of people. Unfortunate for us, as he has been a good supervisor for the past several years - knowing who he can trust, giving us leeway to do our jobs without micromanaging, and shielding us from a lot of the bs that flows down from above... Unfortunate for him as well, in that we quite honestly made his job pretty easy & his next crew won't be quite the same. But, all these things happen in an organization such as this & you just make the best of it.
Well, as I am taking care of a couple of phone calls as we all discuss what to do to say thanks for his work, I get a message to call one of the other lieutenants - the one who is in charge of the bomb squad among other things (one of my side duties). We had one of our two full-time guys get promoted & I have been chosen to not only take his spot, but to get his bomb dog along with it. Now - this is something I knew could happen in the unit - it had been discussed when the recent group including me had joined up, as obviously they wanted to make sure we were OK with it. But, I also know a couple of the other guys were much more vocal in "wanting" the dog position than I was - I certainly am not against it, but I like my road job as well & just being a part-time tech... Still, for whatever reason, I have come out the choice on this one.
Not complaining by any stretch - the family and I have discussed it & everyone agrees it is good. It will be a bit more of a stable schedule for a while, and a good career move for me to broaden my experiences. Plus, in all honesty, I need a new challenge - like I said, I love my road job, but I've been doing the same thing for six years now... and I know I've been a bit complacent about it lately. Pretty much the only challenges there are the ones I am giving myself... combined with the bad guys of course, but the job in & of itself has become "routine" - which is only a short step from "boring and lazy" - and that is dangerous.
This ended up longer than I planned & I still only said half of what I had to - but I will wrap it up with this.
So - a good change coming, but I am unsure of what a lot of it will entail. Not flying blind without a rudder, but definitely going to have a lot to learn and change in both work and my home life as I adjust. Not sure what I will be keeping & what will go by the wayside as I shift roles, but I know it will be interesting.
I look forward to sharing it with you all.
7 comments:
WOW! What an update! Glad to hear the pin came out ok. I've never had pins, but having staples removed tickled me so much it was actually painful. Post-op areas are so weird!
Will the bomb dog come to live with you? A friend for Dakota?
Oh, and why so surprised about being the number one choice? After all, you are vastly superior to other mere mortals... :) Love ya! Amy
Congratulations! Sounds like something definitely interesting to be doing.
See...that's why Amy is much better at this "wifing" thing than I am. She's all...congrats, you're awesome! And I'm all...wow, two dogs--guess we're going to be pulling overtime with the pooper scooper! :D
Sean My daughter had pins in her big toes......the Doc pulled the first one out and right there in the Shriners Hospital my then 13 year old girl said quite loudly "F**K....that hurt"
the Doc blanched
Stay safe with the BOOMs
fd
Amy - yes he will live with us, still ironing out the details on how that will work - but they will put in a kennel and everything. And that is true regarding my position in the food chain...
Chad - much appreciated sir!
My love - you are just looking forward to the laughs of me actually having to train the dog instead of winging it like I did with Dakota!
Doug - surprisingly I didn't let any expletives slip free, but that may also have had to do with the fact I was going "Cool - that looked neat." Just enough of a med geek to be dangerous...
and for me at least, the booms have never been the issue - it's going to be the whole K9 thing which is a new arena for me to learn.
K9? How cool; yet I would be afraid to become too attached to a new partner of that persuasion. I'm sure there's training, but the whole concept seems like it could be as rewarding as heartbreaking & vice-versa. Good luck; I for one cannot wait to hear more.
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