Nuro-seez. I Haz Some.

Maybe I'm being a big giant baby, but I stayed home from work again today. This will be my third "sick" day from work since I started my job in the middle of February. I hadn't noticed before, but now it seems a bit excessive. Especially given that I'm still a temp and don't get sick pay. But what can I say? I feel like crap.

Don't worry it's not the same horrifying, pissing-blood thing that I had before. This time my neck and shoulders hurt. It had kind of been hurting all weekend, and I was doing a really good job of ignoring it and carrying on doing all my weekend chores, laundry, mopping, etc... Then yesterday morning as I turned my head to look behind me as I was backing out of the driveway to go to work, so as not to accidentally crash into the decorative boulders at the end of the driveway or run over the neighbor's dogs or errant toddlers - something bad happened to my neck.

It didn't make a cracking noise or anything but the pain was so excruciating that I screamed and sat there for a minute or two trying to remember how to breathe.

I blame this and all of the other joint and back pain that I typically experience on my fucked up ankle. Yes, those are both of my feet in the picture. I've got one adorable and normal looking foot and one constantly swollen and nasty frankenfoot. My right ankle has been fused and as a result I walk super funky which can cause all kinds of back, hip and knee weirdness.

I went to work anyway and continued on as if it were a just any old normal work day - for a robot. It hurt when I lifted my arms, it hurt when I turned my head in any direction, it hurt when I typed - it just hurt.

I did the most important things I needed to do and then took off early for home where I could arrange my bed pillows just so and swallow a muscle relaxer (or seven) and not move for awhile.

Now... here is the thing and I've written about this before; I feel like a big giant baby girl liar-head baby. Could I have gone to work today? Technically? Yes. Without a doubt. I feel a lot better than I did yesterday, but I do still hurt. I intended to go to work and even showered and put on make-up and everything. But when I started to fasten the hooks on my bra - I knew I was in trouble.

I think the reason that staying home feels wrong is because for the last 5 years or so I didn't really have a job that I could call in sick for. I was on the road. You can't call in sick from the road, so I used to suck it up and work when I was sick or in pain and I did this no matter what. The clients I was working with had been waiting (most typically) several months for me to be there. Most of them had closed their business for the day (or week) in order for me to do my thing. I would have felt terrible to have not shown up and then been sick all day in a hotel room in a strange town.

So I worked no matter what.

When I wasn't traveling I worked from home - and how do you call in sick when you are already home? On one occasion I did actually call my boss and ask her to cancel all of my appointments for the day, but mostly I just worked anyway and then whined about it later.

I think a lot of my failure to enjoy the indulgence of a sick day is due to previous corporate culture that frowned upon sick days to the point where people were boasting about coming to work while ill. In a not dissimilar fashion to what I have just done in the above paragraphs.

Now that I have a more normal type job, where I go to an office every day and I'm not star attraction (it's marvelous - my phone hardly rings at all) I think I just feel a little more free to indulge myself in a sick day or three. Plus the corporate culture is one where it is not only NOT frowned upon to take a sick day - people seem happy that you have stayed away and are not spreading your ick all over the place.

Are you still reading this piece of shit blog post whereby I try to convince myself that I'm justified in staying home from work today? Well I hope I'm happy because my neck has begun to hurt again while I've been typing this.

In conclusion, hey Me, leave me alone and stop judging me! Oh, wait!! Could you hand me the remote before you storm out? Oh, and fluff my pillow - pretty pleeese?

Pay No Attention To the Man Behind This Curtain

I didn't tell you this before, but I have a major job interview tomorrow.

Major.

I really want this job.

I would be happy to have any job at this point, but to get a job in my field for a large corporation where I would be performing a function that I spent the last several years of my life striving for and learning to perform well and get paid to do, in a beautiful and professionally designed building with atriums and shit, that's really more of a state of the art educational facility, well that would be really nice. Did I mention that it pays about 35% more than my last job too?

Friday night my back started to feel like it was on it's way out.

Sometimes, because my leg is so screwed up and I walk funny (my limp is either barely noticeable or my friends and loved ones are really good liars) I get these crippling back spasms. I can usually tell when they are coming on and walk on eggshells and try to do lots of stretches until the moment either passes and I recover or I spend the next 3 or 4 days flat on my back crying and braying in pain like a big jackass.

I have spent most of this weekend doing everything in my power to recover before 1pm tomorrow when I have to put on panty hose, a suit, tasteful jewelry and a big giant smile and spend 2+ hours trying to convince 3 people I have never met that I'm amazing in every way and perfectly suited to manage their web based hoozie whatsis and teach a class or two.

I'm way more convincing as a fabulous human being when I don't walk like a slow motion robot and punctuate every movement that involves lifting my arms with a horror movie scream.

MDH has been very helpful to me this weekend by picking things up and getting me stuff when I need it. A couple of times he has held my hand when I need a little support getting up from the sofa or out of bed. He even rubbed the small of my back a little without me even having to ask. He's been a real life saver, but I don't think it would be appropriate for me to bring him with me to my interview tomorrow. Maybe if I cover him up with a sheet they won't notice him.

There is no way I'm cancelling. No way.