Big Busy Day

[snoozefestaudio]

34F and clear, this afternoon, going down to 22F.

Okay!..

My alarm went off at 10AM, and I jumped right out of bed, and started the coffee.

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Emissions & Registration

I went straight to the car, after getting ready, and it was off to the emissions testing center out in Naperville, just past Eola Road.

Not many cars there, and I only had a five minute wait.

Passed emissions!.. and then renewed the registration, got the sticker, and put it on my rear license plate!

BEAUTIFUL!

From there it was off to the Building & Grounds office, which is only a mile from the emissions testing center, so that was nice.

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Building & Grounds

The lady at the front desk was new, and didn't recognize me, but as I was telling her that I wasn't able to log on to the employee portal, Janet, the office manager, overheard from her office.

Janet called out, "You should be using your GeoStaff email as the username."

I told her, "I.. don't know what that is."

"Well, how do you get into the work order system on your work phone?"

"What work phone?"

So this visit turned out to be the most pivotal move of the day, because there was all kinds of BS that should've been taken care of months ago, when I moved up into the maintenance department... that was just never done!

I was there for over an hour, but with Janet's help, I now have my correct login ID, and a new password, for the employee portal... and my phone number and Gmail address are now in the system to use for authentication purposes.

In addition I updated my living address with both GeoStaff, and the union... both of which still had me on Jackson Street.

And then I did get my W2s.

Janet's gonna look into the work phone situation too!

I was supposed to have been given Scott's phone after he retired, but it never happened... probably due to the confusion surrounding the move from custodial up to maintenance.

Mark, my manager at Potawatomi, works for the school district, not for GeoStaff.

Don is technically my immediate Geostaff supervisor, but Don oversees the entire maintenance department for District 420, works out of the Building & Grounds office, and is essentially a ghost, he's so busy all the time.

Don in fact was not at the B&G office today, and Janet couldn't get in touch with him because... he's so busy.

Mark should've been able to deal with the work phone situation himself, but not if Scotts phone went back to Don, to get reconfigured for me.

So... somebody dropped the ball somewhere, but it's not clear who, or how.

Still... Mark knew I should have a work phone, and that I didn't!

So why didn't he do something about it?

My personal theory is that Mark didn't want me to have a phone, giving me access to the work order system, because it would allow me to be too independent?

Like... he thinks of me as some greenhorn kid who's only there to help Tom, and I have no need for a work phone, and no business using the work order system.

So... it's nice that Mark's gone for a while, and that Janet's gonna be working with Derick to get me that phone, because it means by the time Mark returns, I will be a lot more independent, on the job, and he won't be able to put the genie back in the bottle!

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City Hall

After a quick stop at the BP to get smokes and a few new lighters, it was over to City Hall.

I found out from the woman there, that indeed, I should've gotten a bill for the parking garage in January.

She was surprised my card was still working!

So I paid up, for JAN, FEB, & MAR today, and I'll have to remember to pay for the next quarter at the start of April... cuz apparently they can't be trusted to send the bill to me!

So... yeah!.. lots of ball dropping going on, at GeoStaff, and City Hall!

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Allerton Main Office

I was back in the building around 1:30PM, and went downstairs to the office, to find Alex at the desk, who explained that Fernando was off today.

I told Alex how I was interested in upgrading to a 1BR, and he turned his monitor to face me, with a list of seven different 1BR apartments coming vacant in the near future, a couple of which were at the other buildings on the island.

Here in the tower, there were three... one on the 5th floor, one on the 8th floor, and one on 12!

So unit 1202, comes vacant at the end of THIS MONTH... and I told him that's the one I'd like to take.

And he'll let Fernando know, and Fernando will get back to me!

It's not clear whether I'll need to submit new paystubs or not, but if so, I now have access to the portal to get them!

--<>--

Unit 1202 will be exactly like 1702, where I lived back in 1999.

Armada refers to the 02 units as, "Bentons," and Alex referred to it as, a small 1-bedroom, but compared to the studio units... it's plenty big enough!

Here's the current studio apartment I'm in...




And here's the Benton...



The livingroom & kitchenette side of this unit are nearly the same square footage as my entire studio, right now!

The bedroom & bathroom side of the unit are smaller than this studio, but not by much!

So, it's not twice the size of this studio, but damn near!

And raw square footage isn't the most important metric, here.... the bathroom's the same size as the one I have now, which is fine... and the bedroom's plenty big enough for my little twin bed and dresser.

The big wins here are;

1. The 6X7 kitchennette with more counter space, an actual oven, and a full size fridge!
   
   
2. That way bigger closet, in the bedroom.
   
   
3. Two windows!
   

It does face west, so I'll have to say goodbye to my view of the trains, but... it's worth it!

It's also on 12, so... one floor higher than I am now, which is great!

So... we shall see!

--<>--

With any luck, by March, I'll be more independent at work, with my own phone, and I'll be living in a unit big enough to truly call my home for the next decade!

But all of this today goes to show that the huge transition that began last spring, isn't really done yet!

This studio apartment really has been a temporary refuge, while waiting for the permanent apartment to materialize.

And I've been working at Potawatomi for 8 months, but without access to any of the systems I should've had!.. so... not really a full fledged maintenange guy.

And meanwhile, there's been all that stuff in the storage unit, out beyond the bean field, waiting to be dealt with.

So if I move in March, then I'll get most of my stuff out of that unit, and sell what I don't need, like the blinds, landscape lights, and the lawnmower.

And then if Colleen and Brian show up in May to get the rest, we can be done with it.

°¦}




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