Awesome!

Currently Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog By Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion, Felicia Day, Simon Helberg see related

So, this morning, I had a rather clutzy morning.  This morning, when I was setting up for our second plane, I forgot one little step, a quite important step, but a small step nonetheless.  I have to hook up the ground power and then I set up the air cart to blow warm air in the plane and warm it up.  Before you set up the air though, you have to vent the plane.  Just pop open the handle on the cargo door or something.  Well, I forgot to do that.

Now imagine a plane that is completely sealed up and then imagine hooking up a hose and forcing air into the plane (pressurized cabin).  Seems it might build up a little pressure, aye?  Believe me, it does.  So I go to open the boarding door and I'm having a really hard time getting it open, then I hear this hiss of air.  I figured out immediately what happened, so I tried to get out of the way, but it came down waaaay to fast, so I got beaned by the door pretty good.

UPDATE:  So, I kept waffling about whether or not to go to the doctor.  Towards the end of my shift, I noticed that I was a little lopsided and having big mood swings, so I decided I ought to go.  I didn't want to go to the emergency room (remember this is on a Sunday), so I decided to go to an Urgent Care Center.  I didn't even get to finish filling out the paperwork.  They told me that if it happened at work, they couldn't even see me.  They told me I had to go to the emergency room.  I decided it really wasn't worth it, so I went home.  I really wanted to go home and take a nap, but I'm not that stupid, so I kept myself awake until church.

On the way to church, I started having a headache from the pressure and my neck started hurting, it didn't go away during church, so I decided to go to the emergency room after all.  Mostly, I was nervous since I live by myself and I was getting paranoid about sleeping, so I wanted to make sure everything was okay.  I decided to go to Grace (which used to be Highland) because I figured it wouldn't be busy.  Mind you, this is the specific ER I was advised to go to when I went to the Urgent Care Center.  I went in and after 1 1/2 hours, I finally got to get in a room, I saw the Dr. quickly (this is how they get around the promise that you will be seen by a Dr. in 30 mins., they just keep you in the waiting room until the Dr. is ready). Except for the guy who got me registered, who was really nice, everyone was very condescending.  About 15 mins after I was seen, a nurse came in to tell me that the Dr. deemed it not an emergency (duh, the reason I didn't want to go in the first place) and that if I wanted to continue with the visit, I would need to pay $200.  Otherwise, I just needed to go to to a clinic tomorrow (Monday).  I explained (very frustrated, and I'd lost it by now, I was bawling out of frustration) that I went to the clinic, they wouldn't see me and told me I had to go to the emergency room.  I had already explained it was worker's comp, no luck and I didn't have $200, so I just went home.

Today I went to work, yesterday, after I hit my head, I worked another 7 hours on the ramp, including loading 127 bags on a charter flight.  I figured since I was on ticket today, I'd be fine.  I knew I would feel it more, but figured it would be fine.  I woke up and my neck, back and shoulder (only the left side) were very stiff, and every time I picked up a bag, it really didn't feel very good.  My headaches got worse, and by the 3rd flight, I was starting to have dizzy spells.  I finally got a list of providers I could go to (a total of 5).  I tried to get someone to come in for me so I could go to the Dr., but no dice (we were already short 2 people).  I made an appointment with the Dr. listed as having a family practice.  I went to the address listed and it was the Wound Care Center.  I went in just to check and sure enough, the Dr.'s name, address and phone number were correct, but specialty was wrong.  As I don't have any kind of wound (sorry Chris), I had to start from scratch and finally went to the Urgent Care center listed on the provider sheet.

I finally was seen there and so after almost 30 hours, I finally get diagnosed with a concussion (once again, duh, but now my bases are covered if anything happens down the road) and since I worked 2 full shifts since I had the accident, he couldn't really tell me not to go back to work, so he made it as hard as he could.  He said I couldn't lift anything more than zero pounds and couldn't stand or walk for more than 10 minutes.  I talked to my boss and got him to let me come in anyway since we are already down by 1 person tomorrow and 2 people on Wednesday.  As long as I get cleared on Wednesday, all is well.  Otherwise, I will have to go on leave of absence.

So the next 2 days, I have to sit on a stool at the ticket counter, so it's going to be interesting, I can't go to the gate, I can't pick up a bag, and I'm going to just look like an incredibly lazy person.  At least I don't have to go on LOA though.

Currently The Christmas Trilogy (3CD/DVD) By Trans-Siberian Orchestra see related

For Kenneth, Dann and Leann

Currently Listening Beethoven: Mass in C; Elegiac Song; Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage see related

EDIT:  This was only supposed to be the last 3 paragraphs, but when I started to mention fact that I had 2 seventeen hour days back to back, I went into rant mode.  Feel free to skip it all, but especially until the last 3 paragraphs where any of the funny, typical me stuff that made me post this in the first place are located.

The last couple of days have been interesting.  Monday, I went to work at 5:30am, and a bunch of flights had cancelled in Amarillo so we were oversold on all our morning flights by about 3, and we were also shorthanded.  We ended up being okay on all of the flights I worked ticket for, but the one I was at the gate, when I asked for volunteers, I had 9 people almost say yes, but none of them committed, so I had to deny boarding to the last 3 to check in. 

(side note:  If you are ever flying, please remember to get your seats assigned when you buy your ticket.  If there are none available, then make sure you come early to the airport to get them.  Fifteen percent of the plane is blocked until 24 hours prior to departure, but you can come to the airport any time after that to get them assigned.  Even if you have a seat assigned, make sure you are checked in by at least 30 minutes prior to departure so your seat is not dropped.  If you have a bag, some airports have cutoff as early as 40 minutes prior to departure and you will not be able to make your flight if you arrive after that, even Lubbock's cutoff is 20 minutes, and that's being done checking in, not arriving.  If you get to the airport early like you are supposed to, your life will be so much easier.) 

The person who was downstairs kept coming up and giving me a hard time about not being able to check in 70 people by myself and keeping up with 2 self-service machines (which I was keeping the line moving really well) and sending all the bags that were 10 feet away down the bag belt at the same time, because after all, there were only 2 of them downstairs (there are only 2 scheduled, there are only ever 2, and they still usually will come up to help us when we are swampped) even though there was only1 of me and usually there are 3 scheduled on the ticket counter. 

Then, starting on the 12:35 flight, we ended up taking a delay on every flight.  We were down to 3 ½ people (one injured who would have been able to go home, but only 3 other people) but still should have been able to turn the planes on time, but one thing after another went wrong.  It was something different on every single flight, from the fact that none of our ground equipment works, and on some flights, the borrowed stuff also didn’t work, to weight and balance issues, to anything you can name.  I had to write a report on each of the delayed flights, so even though I was supposed to get off at 8:15 pm, I was still finishing up at 8:45.  Since they were going to be short for the last flight, and neither of the people closing had even been here for 6 months, I stayed to work the last flight since it was due in about 20 minutes.  Now, they would have been fine working by themselves, but it’s really hard to close with just 2 people, and I just hated to leave them to fend for themselves in case anything else went wrong.  So, I got done about 10, but when I left, I had a friend in a tight spot, so I didn’t get home until about 11.

Yesterday, I also had to be at work at 5:30am, it was raining, but I didn’t put on my boots because they always feel so heavy, and I wasn’t going to get home until 10pm.  Besides, I was going to be upstairs at the ticket counter, so I just wore my tennis shoes.  Walking from my car to the terminal, the parking lot was flooded, so before I was even clocked in, my feet, shoes and socks were absolutely soaked.  I was in a whiny mood (bet you couldn’t tell that), and just wanted dry feet.  I got to take lunch about 12:30, so I found some dry socks, filled my shoes with paper towels and put them in front of a fan.  I was so happy, by 1, they were fairly dry.  Then 2 hours later, the realization that we would be down 2 people (out of 5) meant I was going to have to work on the ramp, outside in the rain, so much for finally getting dry.  I wore my rain gear and managed to stay pretty dry except for the lower 8-10 inches of my pants and of course MY FEET. 

Most of the afternoon was uneventful except for the fact that I was soaked, except for one event.  We were handing valets up to the jetbridge, I handed the first one up, then reached for the second, and as I was standing, I felt something hit me.  I looked down and there was someone’s suitcase.  From talking to my manager later, the one grabbing the valets, I had been sure he had the bag, but apparently it had caught on the rail, so when I let go, it was just balancing there.  When he went to grab it, it knocked it back down.  Thankfully, it was one of the lighter bags, probably only 20 something pounds, but it still didn’t feel good.  We finally finished, and after sending the last plane out early, got to leave at 8pm. 

Then I had rehearsal for Chorale (our Beethoven concert is on Saturday, you should come) until 10pm.  So needless to say, I was feeling pretty miserable.  I had called my mom about some stuff and was complaining about how very cold I was while I was running across town to pay a bill that was due first thing this morning.  About 3 blocks from my house I realized, oh yeah, I could have turned on the heater in my car, might have helped.

Yes, I’m still Kaci, all the way through.