Woke up at 0630 to the alarm clock.
Wound up napping for several iterations of the snooze cycle.
Got dressed around 0700.
Crashed again 0714.
Zoomed out to work at 0738.
Got to work at least somewhat on time.

Found that there was no official lead monitor for Sunday I (the morning shift), and furthermore, that all four of us monitoring today were wearing black shirts, and the other three were wearing blue jeans (I was wearing a black skirt). Found that the priority sheet (the list of who's had recent problems, and who's new) was lost, or at least unfound. Someone found a marked-up one in the recycle, and applied whiteout and the copy machine.

Break always feels early on Sundays. I had lunch with othercat and the pseudo-lead monitor. The pseudo-lead monitor for today was one of the cute girls, the one whose voice must be in one of the holes in my hearing, so I always have to ask her to repeat things. She's going to Anchorage for a month to see a friend. Mr. Bitter was on hand, and when she mentioned Anchorage, he got animated and shared a fish story with us -- sea lion, barracuda, and much cuteness. I guess that's one thing he is good for: fish stories. It was really a nice story.

othercat and I had much cackling over lunch. The pseudo-lead monitor was sort of left in the dust, because there's a certain way that people who have known each other for a while and who've read each other's LJs and been in the same fandoms can communicate, and it baffles people who don't know the shorthands.

I think I got about 20 monitor reports done in the 5.25 hours I was working. Not sure. That's around 4 an hour, and the top spiffing speed they want us at is 5 an hour. I'm getting there. It's sure as Eris better than the 3 an hour I pulled my first day. I'm learning how to prepare my sheets while I'm monitoring the one so that I can just pull up the next one and be good to go.

Cleanup was a little hairy. othercat was going to wait for me, but cleanup always is long and evil. The research peons were released at 1400. I dragged out after cleanup at 1445.

Not only do you have to clean up from the previous shift on Sunday I, you also have to set up for the next shift. Cleanup was not so bad. Setting up for the next shift was a little rough. I didn't know half what to do, but the two experienced monitors helped us...

Ran into Motley on the way out. She had Dew caps. Ran into trystan_laryssa, Loren, and dustraven on the way out too.

Hugs were exchanged, and I let them know that the Rules Lawyer Monitor and I hadn't clashed, actually. We haven't seen too much of each other, and also, there's evidently quite a bit of power difference between a research peon and a monitor. As a research peon, a monitor has quite a bit of power over one. As the newest monitor, the Rules Lawyer Monitor is only one of the senior people in the department, furthermore, one who is taken with a grain of salt and occasionally mocked behind her back.

It doesn't hurt that I'm good at subtly kissing up without looking like I'm kissing up. Not kissing up, per se, I suppose, but being quiet and respectful and eager to learn and slightly puppyish though better at staying out of the way. (People who know my human side are very, very wary of that side of me.) Roll over, present throat? It's pack behaviour, whatever it is, and alphas respond well to it. I'm a leadership switch, a beta, and can take leadership if I feel I really must, or accept it if there's someone better. In some of my personal life, I simulate alpha a lot better.

Came home. Collapsed. Called Darkside. Roommates were still out. Spent subjective minutes/years on the phone with Darkside (objectively, about an hour), and talked about politics and friendship, golf, computers, divorce, and the like. Hard drive, soft drive, floppy drive. Shooting buckets of golf balls. Me worrying madly. So many things left to tell him... foot in mouth and shoving harder, that's me talking about Jez...

Roommates came home. Everyone hungry. Headed to new Chinese buffet resteraunt to test. Verdict: good. Secondary verdict (mine): Panda Gourmet on the corner where we get our orange chicken is still better, and I think we want to support them a little more.

Lunatic cleans room more: puts out old VCR, and a small box of junk to recycle.

Lunatic crashes.

I still lust after his bookshelves. They're tall, dark wood, with shelves that are at least a foot deep. They're probably heavy as hell. They have gaming books and assorted hardbacks and random miniatures, IIRC, in front of the books.

I love him, and I really love his bookshelves.

Geeks on a blind date Warning: Mush.