Shake your fist harder, boy!

So... last week was sucktastic (which I'm pointing out specifically, just in case the picture above was a bit too subtle).

I've asked around, and it seems that with only a few exceptions, the sucktasticness of last week is a universal truth. It's as though the cosmos were out to get me and an unholy confluence of horribleness (in which I have a Ph.D.) descended upon me... and just about everyone else.

By Friday, I was so utterly and completely spent that I was crabby and angry and surly and frustrated and punchy. A fine way to spend a week, to be sure.

The reasons for my disconcertion were many-fold and largely boring to anyone who doesn't work where I work. For those of you who do, you can sympathize with the agonizing, gut-wrenching, cry-worthiness that comes with renewals that have literally more than a dozen random consent forms. The protocol that finished me off not only had I think 17 bizarre consent forms, but it had two protocol summaries. Not sure how that's even possible, but there they were. Oh, and there were about two pages of sweeping amendments, just to make me want to kill myself even more.

Ammon was also suffering under the burder of amendments and simply couldn't decide if he wanted to curl up in a little ball in the corner or punch somebody. I recommended both.

Anyway, the reasons behind the wrath are beside the point. The real crux of this largely pointless post (which I'm posting largely because Flavia accosted me about posting more often--love ya, F!) is my dear, dear mother who continually makes me laugh and manages to make it allll better.

She called on Friday afternoon (when I was at my all-time punchiest) because the TV wasn't working or something. She seemed to think that I could diagnose the problem without looking at the TV. Well, not being quite as delightfully Dr. House-ish as I'd like to be, I was unable to fix things without actually being there to troubleshoot in person, and I was in such a crabby mood that I was unduly snippy about the whole thing (although I did answer the phone with a depression-laden whimper that made the rest of the coordinators giggle, so not all was lost).

I felt bad for curtly and exasperatedly (which is actually a word, much to my surprise--it's getting harder and harder to tell, what with the number of made-up words I use on a regular basis--"awkarditity" anyone?) telling her, "I don't have any idea what's wrong. I'll just have to fight with it when I get home..." I explained that I was having a horrendous week and the conversation proceeded as follows:

Me: "I'm at my wit's end. Everything is just horrible. This week has been completley quit-worhty from beginning to end and now I really just want to kill some people. I feel like I'm gonna cry. I just don't even know what to do."

And then my mother, in her most supportive, matter-of-fact, chin-up little soldier voice says, "Well... go kill some people..." As if that were the obvious, logical way to solve my problem. :) If she were the kind of person to use endearments, it would have sounded little something like, "Well, now, sweetie, just kill some people and you'll feel allll better. There you go, dearie. All fixed."

Thanks, mom! I feel so much better! Always so supportive! :) Honestly though, her response to "I want to kill people" was so funny that it really did make things a little better. She followed it up with an offer to go look at some puppies, so things really started looking up.

Looking at puppies helped a bit, but it still took me about 6 hours to decompress on Friday. It was just one of those days where even the simplest, most innocuous questions feel like a personal attack.

"Hey, do you know what time it is?"

"I don't know! How should I know?! Why would you ask such a thing!? I kill you!"

I'm hopeful this week is better. Lunch on Saturday always puts me in a good mood, so hopefully that carries over till the end of the week. Besides, it can't possibly be worse, right? Right?!