Kickin' ass, takin' names, and... ... ...filling out paperwork?

We all filed into Employee Orientation this morning bright and early at 9 am, faces shining with enthusiasm.

Okay, *my* face wasn't shining with enthusiasm, but I'd just spent an hour and ten minutes in Big City Traffic, going through a part of the Big City that Google Maps doesn't even bother to update, the construction is so bad. Leave early, kiddies!

The nice lady from HR was calling names and handing out badges. I already had a badge, so I didn't worry when my name wasn't called. I didn't worry when I didn't have a package from HR; after all, I'd filled out all that paperwork years ago when I was first hired.

Nor did I worry when all of the stuff the nice lady from HR was going over seemed familliar. After all, I'd done yearly refreshers on this stuff for seven years.

It wasn't until I went up to the nice lady from HR to ask a question over the lunch break that I got concerned. "Why are you here?" she asked. "You're not supposed to be here. We called you and told you not to come."

"Yeah, I know," I replied, "but the education department called me that same afternoon, after you did, and told me to disregard and to show up anyhow."

She looked puzzled. Eventually, we figured out between us that there had been a misreading of something somewhere, and that the folks in Ed thought that I was actually new, while the folks in HR knew I wasn't, and therefore, I got to go home early. It was kind of a pain to have to get there, but the trade-off is that I start clinical rotations a week early now, in order to make up hours. WAHOO!

I can actually get back on the floor. (Can you believe I'm saying that? No, I can't either. That's why I was asking you.) I can actually get back to dealing with people with bits missing. I'm excited about that, strangely.

The important work-related lesson I learned today was this: Even the best of institutions sometimes screws up. I have a fairly common, unremarkable name, and with something like eighteen bazillion employees in the system already, and another hinty garillion coming in every month, I was bound, eventually, to be mixed up with another person with the same name. I'm honestly a little surprised that it took this long to happen; after all, there are three of me at my dermatologist's office, for cryin' out loud, and two of us have the same birthday.

For now, I'm going to use this extra time to do normal, every-day things like mow the lawn and pet the dog. At least Max never gets me mixed up with anybody else.