birthday sob story & lazy Saturday

I didn't write on my birthday, the day itself was horrible (in my mind), but the evening was very nice. I felt strange about proclaiming to my co-workers that it was my birthday, but I now wish that I had. Whenever it is someone's birthday at work they get us a treat. I thought they just had a list that they kept track of, but it sounds like people are just supposed to make sure it happens on their own. I feel like a brat writing about this, the whole day I felt childish about the whole birthday thing. I think I wanted some recognition without saying anything which I know is ridiculous, especially since I'm fairly new to the job. Anyway that wasn't the main reason the day was bad, it mostly had to do with the new computer system and my slow methods of counting and finding drugs. I am usually very accurate but the pharmacist was getting stressed and wanted to know where some orders were since I was falling behind. In my stressful hurry I handed her the wrong drug. She noticed right away and let me know so of course I felt really guilty and stupid on top of being stressed out. The other employees had used a system similar to this new one before I began working there, plus they have the benefit of knowing what they are doing, so to show me once or twice what to do and leave me to it felt unfair. The whole look of the system is different, it used to be kind of pretty with a big list and a white background. Now it has a black background with an 80's feel to it. I think it's called bitmap font. Later on I had the delivery guy intensely telling me that some orders needed to have already been done by now, that did not help them be done "right now." I wish that my coworkers knew that they were only hindering my performance, I do not function well under stress. Some is good, a lot is bad, especially coming from multiple sources. Immediately after lunch I became very dizzy and felt as if I were on a ship as I walked around. Luckily they had stuck me in back at this point so I didn't need to get anything done quickly. I downed a bunch of water and eventually felt better. When I got home the floodgates opened and after somewhat recovering I poured out my troubles to Dave. Before I had been able to speak poor Dave thought that something seriously bad had happened. After finding out the damage he was able to comfort me and convince me to go out for dinner instead of trying to figure out how to cook the ribs (I don't know a lot about meat). I got calls from my family and Dave's. We were too full to eat cake after Chinese buffet, but we did start the train game and finished it the next night. Next year I don't care if it comes off as crass or obnoxious, I'm just going to announce that it's my birthday, I'm going to be proficient at my job, I'm going to blow out candles, and I'm going to go into it knowing it will be great, and maybe whatever wacked out hormones were making things worse will be more level.

So now that I'm finally done complaining, I want to talk about my new hippy phone. Since we are on a family plan and some of the family is getting new phones, I decided to go ahead and get one too. I liked my old phone but the battery had a shorter life than it used to. I like the full/qwetry keyboard and fun noises the phone makes. Let me explain why I call this the hippy phone. There are a few preset screen savers, the photos depict earth, grass, a polar bear, an eagle, a waterfall, lily pad, a recycling bin, and even a wind turbine. The ringers have names such as "soft beams of sunlight, night essence, heartbeat of the wild, a word of the brave, and a breeze of sea." The ringers range from new age yoga music with some bird sounds thrown in to some middle eastern sounding techno with wolf howls. My favorite to mimic is one with an eagle screech followed by the sound of distant drums, it's called "Across the sun." Despite my mockery of the "green" element, I really do like the phone and the fact that it's green (in color). I don't know how much I'm really helping the environment out, but it can't be any worse than any other phone. I will have to add some of my own photos later.
I have been been remiss in writing thank you letters, and it's almost a week past my birthday. For a couple years I would finish the thank you notes before my birthday, but my standard MO is to wait until afterward so that I can get both "thank yous" into one card. Instead of getting things done I am typing this, playing with my new toy (phone), and reading other blogs. Now it's so late that I need to get dinner ready, Dave and I are bringing dinner to my grandma. She sometimes complains about the food selection at her home so for Christmas we gave her "coupon cards" to cash in for meals that we can bring to her. She decided to cash in a salad coupon tonight. I am happy that she called to do this since the gift would be pretty lame if she never cashed it in.