Karla Noyes' Captain's Log Series

I’ll be taking a break from composing these Captain’s Logs. Last week I researched how to write a screen play, then how to write a novel and one of the take-aways was: establish a regular time to write. And since I have to be quiet while Kevin’s sleeping I’ve got this perfect time! Probably 8 hours a weekend. I’m going to use it to finish-up my History of the Blue Wing Inn booklet for publication next fall, complete with photos from other sources. I may need to do some crowd-sourcing for funds to help me get it printed, so you’ll hear from me about that J Work goes well. My office is a zoo but the monkeys are hysterically happy. I admit to becoming a little touchy as my supervisor critiques my presentations. He always has one encouraging thing, like ‘you’re getting better,’ but nit-pics everything else, some of it is useful, like getting rid of ‘ums’ and ‘ahs.’ I can do that. I pride myself on being ‘coachable’ but it turns out I have a bit of a limit (remember, Karla, you love t...

Fire, I hope this isn’t going to be a recurring theme… Last Saturday around 5pm the local utility turned off the electricity to thousands of homes and businesses. For us, they turned it back on Thursday at 2:30pm. Five days without electricity. It wasn’t too much of a hardship, we still had running water, unlike people with wells who need power to run their pumps, and we had natural gas so we had hot showers and hot food. Strange how often I turn to the microwave, and the light switches in the dark. I had my little battery-powered lantern and carried it everywhere with me like Little Red Riding Hood’s basket. We have our battery & solar powered emergency radio, and solar powered battery-pack for charging cell phones. Fortunately, we still had cell phone coverage - our emergency communication device (as long as the cell towers have power) - my only tether to the outside world. We received our best news from one or two Facebook groups that offered links to emergency and information...

“Come now, luxuriant Graces, and beautiful-haired Muses.” Sapphos This month we had two executives appointed by our governor: Administrator, and Deputy Administrator. I attended the swearing in ceremony. The crowd was exuberant in their appreciation. The administrator is the colonel I wrote about previously (“No… sir!) and has been acting administrator for 4 months. She had been coming into our office and high-fiving everyone; she announces herself loudly, “Hello, People!” She usually does this on Fridays for sure, when we’re wearing our themed clothing (purple, pink, superheroes, cartoon characters or rock concert T-shirts) but I think her schedule is full and she missed us Friday, or, well, we missed her. I don’t have any experience with the deputy administrator, except that she, too, is retired army, something like the highest rank for a non-commissioned officer? Since this is a political appointment the governor could have put absolutely anyone in these positions, former mili...

This week a 90-year old woman came in the office on her little scooter, frail, dejected and rather grey, like a wilted flower. She had been getting calls from Social Security threatening to cut her off. Her case manager listened to her with sympathy (and nothing else.) I was thinking “Scam!” the case manager in the cubicle behind her, said sotto voce “Scam.” Finally, the really loud, and very friendly, woman in our office went up to her and told her she was being preyed on by scammers, and not to give any information to anyone over the phone. “Remember when Henry passed, Social Security did everything by mail.” She left, still wilted and frail. The next day she wheeled in, very bright, full, smiling and loudly announced she’d gotten a call from someone who said there was a warrant out for her arrest! She was tickled pink that someone thought she’d done something to be arrested for. She left us quietly chortling and proud. (and wary of scammers) You may know that our electric compa...

Work's going well enough. My supervisor and his wife trained dogs for competitive obstacle courses and I think it's influenced his management style - in a good way. Yesterday he laid out a plan for the things I'm expected to become proficient in, with a time-line. It's a relief to see a written plan so we all know the expectations. My concern is that he has slid me into data entry of outside medical invoices and it's incredibly time consuming (and not the best use of my skills, except for 'attention to detail') but I gave the responsibility back to him when I asked him to prioritize what he wants done and when. I'm happy to apply my time wherever he wants and he can experience what is doable. I like him a lot. I think he's one of the best manager I've had and I think his experience training dogs contributes to his effectiveness. He hasn't slipped me any doggy treats, yet. I brought my penny collection (pennies taped to paper sorted by y...

I swear, my work-life reads like a county song. Last week I attended a new employee orientation where a couple of people in management spoke. Our acting Executive Director, a 33-year Army veteran, retired as a colonel, is about 5’7”, built like a string bean, couldn’t weigh more than 100 pounds but she got that commanding voice, “Any questions?!” I think the answer was supposed to be “No… sir!” But I haven’t been in the Army and I did have a question. “Yesterday I overheard the brother of a resident say that he’d heard a nurse say something that sounded like she was stealing his money. What should you do if you hear something like that?” I was expecting an answer like, “go to your supervisor” but she, and the head of licensed care who was there, said they wanted to hear more about it. Later, my (long suffering) supervisor called me into his office and asked what I thought of the orientation. I told him it was great, I really ‘got’ the sincerity and genuine caring of management and to...

I was given a tour of the Member Services building and saw the 6 lane bowling alley, the PX (nice little store with just about anything you’d need, including ice cream), the TV studio, the Music Recording room, the bulletin board with flyers of the organized outings, keep in mind the Lincoln Theater abuts the building with lots of entertainment for the small, but wealthy, community of Yountville. The last stop was the Allied Council office. I met the secretary, L____, and picked up a menu for the resident’s cafeteria. The day was organized to honor Native Americans with special talks and presentations along with Trout, Buffalo Burgers and wild rice. L____ said she had some Native American ancestry, a great grandfather, “I’m so glad I didn’t inherit his nose!” I asked her if she’d had her DNA sequenced, yes she had, through Ancestry, and a long-lost nephew had contacted her. I boasted that I found two half-brothers. She replied quite enviously, “I don’t have any half-siblings.” I felt...