When Work Gets in the Way

This is my busy season at work. It starts around September and runs through April, but January through March is the busiest. That means I am under a lot of stress at this time. And I usually roll with it fairly well.

This past week something happened that put stress into the overload mode. Work got in the way of work. I had to put all my projects aside and deal with this issue. It was the single most important thing going on - for me and my supervisor. And it wasn't writing related, although it did involve a lot of proofing. It was financial. That other part of my job that tries to make me indispensable.

Now I am behind on my deliverables for the event next week. I also have deliverables due for the Science Olympiad (SO) meeting on tomorrow afternoon. They need to be proofed/edited so they will be ready to go out in early March. OMG! Math in Action is next Wednesday and SO is only a month after that!

I will get everything completed on time. I worked ahead on the SO documents when I had some slow time. I learned that gem from the former director. I have been doing SO now for ten years and I have internalized so much of what I do that the alarm on my internal clock goes off sometimes in the middle of the night if I should happen to forget something.

What I have been doing with the Math in Action and SO documents is updating the looks. I've also been working with the web guys to put most of the forms online. That looked like it would be a real time-saver, and it does help, but I've realized I need to work more closely with the designer.

My database for Math in Action requires I use specific field names because of a software package that automates the transfer of data from my database into one used by SAMPI. SAMPI is a group at WMU that crunches the data and creates a report for the Michigan Department of Education. I can't change my field names. So I download the online data into an Excel spreadsheet, make some changes to the field names and fix some of the data formats so I can import it all into my database. It takes time.

Right now I've been feeling more like a technician than a writer, and that will happen from time to time. But I'm over the hump and getting back into the writing, editing, and proofing mode. I have some confirmations to write and email, I have evaluations to update and print, and I have the program for next week mostly completed.

All in all though, I'd rather be busy. I am more efficient when I am busy. This week, however, has been a little busier than I like.