Today I had my first taste of don't-know-how-long-I-can-work-here. Nothing close to making me want to leave, just a sense that, if things go on like this all the time, I will want to leave sooner than 'eventually.'
It's about arranging for travel. I'm supposed to go to South Dakota in ten days. I'm supposed to get a government charge card. I'm supposed to charge my hotel on that card. I'm supposed to get a special rate at the hotel when I use the government card. Don't have the card, and that's not even the rub. Here's the rub: there seem to be at least three, perhaps four people who have small pieces of the full information needed to answer the question, "When and how will I get the card?" No single one has all the information, nor are any of them entirely sure who the others are. It's like an effing computer role playing game, where you wander the landscape initiating conversations with the random characters you bump into. "Excuse me, mighty sorcerer, do you know anything about my charge card?" "No, you silly dwarf. Ask the innkeeper." "Excuse me, inkeeper..."
I think this might be a characteristic of working for the federal government. This place I work for, Harpers Ferry Center, is part of the larger National Park Service, which is part of the larger Department of the Interior, which is part of the larger Executive Branch, and the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone. There are purchasing regulations and labor laws and ethics issues and security procedures, and they're all governed by different subsets of other organizations. Depending on what I'm doing, I have to follow procedures that connect HFC to a bunch of other functions and to a bunch of layers. Yeesh.
Joe'll be here day after tomorrow and everything will be better.
.
It's about arranging for travel. I'm supposed to go to South Dakota in ten days. I'm supposed to get a government charge card. I'm supposed to charge my hotel on that card. I'm supposed to get a special rate at the hotel when I use the government card. Don't have the card, and that's not even the rub. Here's the rub: there seem to be at least three, perhaps four people who have small pieces of the full information needed to answer the question, "When and how will I get the card?" No single one has all the information, nor are any of them entirely sure who the others are. It's like an effing computer role playing game, where you wander the landscape initiating conversations with the random characters you bump into. "Excuse me, mighty sorcerer, do you know anything about my charge card?" "No, you silly dwarf. Ask the innkeeper." "Excuse me, inkeeper..."
I think this might be a characteristic of working for the federal government. This place I work for, Harpers Ferry Center, is part of the larger National Park Service, which is part of the larger Department of the Interior, which is part of the larger Executive Branch, and the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone. There are purchasing regulations and labor laws and ethics issues and security procedures, and they're all governed by different subsets of other organizations. Depending on what I'm doing, I have to follow procedures that connect HFC to a bunch of other functions and to a bunch of layers. Yeesh.
Joe'll be here day after tomorrow and everything will be better.
.
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