One of those days
Today was totally one of those days that could have gone better. Not that there was anything overly wrong with it, it just could have gone better. You know?
It started out with a meeting at work that was long and boring, but we did get cup cakes and a chocolate cake because it is Ryan and Trudy's birthdays this weekend (nothing starts the day off better than having cake for breakfast). After the meeting I had to work on my schedule which was frustrating because they are taking two of my guards which will make me short three guards (yes, I'm already short one) and they won't tell me who I'll be getting as replacements because they haven't gone through their life guard training and they don't want to give me names of people who may or may not be able to swim much less save other people who can't swim. So we'll see how that all works out in the next couple of days after training happens.
The last two days it has been raining a lot so all the chemicals in the pools are messed up. That means I have to spend a decent amount of time at each pool today fixing the chemicals. Normally that wouldn't have been a problem, but since I spent so much time in the office today I felt rather rushed all day because I knew that I NEEDED to go to all ten of my pools today.
And then Main Street happened.
It used to be that I didn't have many problems with Main Street. Today I looked at it, didn't even get around to testing the chemicals because I knew that their was no chlorine and that the pH was high. How did I know this? Because of all the little black dots that were covering the bottom of the pool. Those little dots are black algae an that is BAD. There should not be anything GROWING in the swimming pools. If it was a lake I'd be like "whatever" but it's not, it's a pool and people are going to be very unhappy about it. I figured I'd work with the pH first because all I had to do for that was pour in a couple bottles of muriatic acid. Simple, right? It was simple, until a tiny bit splashed on my hand. I headed into the bathroom to wash my hands and the next thing I know I'm locked out of the pool area. I can't get in through the women's bathroom, I can't get in through the men's bathroom (silly me saw that the door was unlocked so I locked it because it's a liability to leave those doors unlocked), I couldn't get through the safety gate because I had locked that behind me to keep anyone else from coming in behind me, and the keys to unlock all these doors/gates were on the other side of said doors/gates. Had it been a different day I would have called the property manager and said "locked myself out, please unlock the doors for the guard tomorrow morning, sorry for the inconvenience." BUT because today was today, it wouldn't have mattered since my car keys were sitting on the same table as the pool keys. I tried to pick the locks of all the doors I could find. I couldn't do anything about the gate being locked though. I finally sucked up my pride and called the property manager and told him about my situation to which he said he'd see if one of his guys was around a key. Twenty minutes later no one had shown up and I was really starting to think about how I was going to have to call my parents and say "Uh, can you bring my spare to me?" Earlier this season the property people took our keys so I had one of my guards scale the 7 foot fence, and it was not easy for the 6+ foot guy, so how on earth was I going to manage it? Well, there was a tree close to fence that is super not strong looking, but I thought "huh, might as well try it, I have nothing else to do." Did I mention that the top of this fence has pointy spikey things on top of it? Because that plays a vital roll in what is about to happen. I pulled myself up the tree (and was pleasantly surprised that it could hold my weight) and wedged myself between the tree and the fence. My next thought was that I can kind of sit on the top of the fence, but as soon as I managed to get my body that was the spikes kept poking me in very uncomfortable places. So not fun. So I climbed down and attempted to climb up a different way, but alas, there wasn't another way to climb the little tree. So once again I attempt to climb up the tree with my back facing the fence. This time I say a little prayer and I climb higher than before (to branches that really looked like they would break if too much weight was put on them) and ended up high enough that I could place my foot on top of the fence between the spikes. I figured I was golden then. All I had to do was pull my other leg over the top of the fence and then slowly lower myself down. Except my shoe got caught between the spikes and I had to take if off before I could lower myself. And then as I thought I was golden (for the second time) my sweatshirt got caught on one of the spikes and I spent a minute or two wondering if this was a bit how it felt to be hanged since my feet could barely touch the ground (well, they could have if I completely abandoned all hopes of not ripping my sweatshirt, but I wanted to save it if I could) and then I lifted myself back up some and struggled to release my sweat shirt which, amazingly enough, wasn't damaged at all.
I was super proud of myself for making it over. It's not every day that I have to scale a 7 ft fence. I have to say that I'm really amused by the fact that I've had to break into two of my ten pools. I wonder how long it's going to take before I have to break into the other eight. And now I'm starting to plan out how I'll do it... you know... if I need to. ;)
I had to take another group of guards to another pool op's class tonight which meant I had to run around like a crazy person to hit up all my pools before I needed to pick up the guards. I did manage to make it to all the pools to collect their time sheets so I can have my pay roll in on time tomorrow, but I didn't get to fix about half the pool's chemicals. That was annoying, but I guess that's what tomorrow morning's for. The other annoying this was that after I had picked up the guards I got a text message saying "oh wait, just kidding, the class has been canceled for tonight, we'll try to reschedule it for Sunday." Which means I could have had an extra two hours in my pools and I didn't have to drag my guards outside in the yucky weather and I wasted their time. I hate wasting people's time. If I waste my own time I don't care so much, but causing other people to waste theirs? I hate doing that.
Oh well. It's like I said. Today wasn't a really bad day, it was just an eventful day that could have gone a bit more smoothly. And I finished my payroll so I don't have to do it tomorrow *does a happy dance*
It started out with a meeting at work that was long and boring, but we did get cup cakes and a chocolate cake because it is Ryan and Trudy's birthdays this weekend (nothing starts the day off better than having cake for breakfast). After the meeting I had to work on my schedule which was frustrating because they are taking two of my guards which will make me short three guards (yes, I'm already short one) and they won't tell me who I'll be getting as replacements because they haven't gone through their life guard training and they don't want to give me names of people who may or may not be able to swim much less save other people who can't swim. So we'll see how that all works out in the next couple of days after training happens.
The last two days it has been raining a lot so all the chemicals in the pools are messed up. That means I have to spend a decent amount of time at each pool today fixing the chemicals. Normally that wouldn't have been a problem, but since I spent so much time in the office today I felt rather rushed all day because I knew that I NEEDED to go to all ten of my pools today.
And then Main Street happened.
It used to be that I didn't have many problems with Main Street. Today I looked at it, didn't even get around to testing the chemicals because I knew that their was no chlorine and that the pH was high. How did I know this? Because of all the little black dots that were covering the bottom of the pool. Those little dots are black algae an that is BAD. There should not be anything GROWING in the swimming pools. If it was a lake I'd be like "whatever" but it's not, it's a pool and people are going to be very unhappy about it. I figured I'd work with the pH first because all I had to do for that was pour in a couple bottles of muriatic acid. Simple, right? It was simple, until a tiny bit splashed on my hand. I headed into the bathroom to wash my hands and the next thing I know I'm locked out of the pool area. I can't get in through the women's bathroom, I can't get in through the men's bathroom (silly me saw that the door was unlocked so I locked it because it's a liability to leave those doors unlocked), I couldn't get through the safety gate because I had locked that behind me to keep anyone else from coming in behind me, and the keys to unlock all these doors/gates were on the other side of said doors/gates. Had it been a different day I would have called the property manager and said "locked myself out, please unlock the doors for the guard tomorrow morning, sorry for the inconvenience." BUT because today was today, it wouldn't have mattered since my car keys were sitting on the same table as the pool keys. I tried to pick the locks of all the doors I could find. I couldn't do anything about the gate being locked though. I finally sucked up my pride and called the property manager and told him about my situation to which he said he'd see if one of his guys was around a key. Twenty minutes later no one had shown up and I was really starting to think about how I was going to have to call my parents and say "Uh, can you bring my spare to me?" Earlier this season the property people took our keys so I had one of my guards scale the 7 foot fence, and it was not easy for the 6+ foot guy, so how on earth was I going to manage it? Well, there was a tree close to fence that is super not strong looking, but I thought "huh, might as well try it, I have nothing else to do." Did I mention that the top of this fence has pointy spikey things on top of it? Because that plays a vital roll in what is about to happen. I pulled myself up the tree (and was pleasantly surprised that it could hold my weight) and wedged myself between the tree and the fence. My next thought was that I can kind of sit on the top of the fence, but as soon as I managed to get my body that was the spikes kept poking me in very uncomfortable places. So not fun. So I climbed down and attempted to climb up a different way, but alas, there wasn't another way to climb the little tree. So once again I attempt to climb up the tree with my back facing the fence. This time I say a little prayer and I climb higher than before (to branches that really looked like they would break if too much weight was put on them) and ended up high enough that I could place my foot on top of the fence between the spikes. I figured I was golden then. All I had to do was pull my other leg over the top of the fence and then slowly lower myself down. Except my shoe got caught between the spikes and I had to take if off before I could lower myself. And then as I thought I was golden (for the second time) my sweatshirt got caught on one of the spikes and I spent a minute or two wondering if this was a bit how it felt to be hanged since my feet could barely touch the ground (well, they could have if I completely abandoned all hopes of not ripping my sweatshirt, but I wanted to save it if I could) and then I lifted myself back up some and struggled to release my sweat shirt which, amazingly enough, wasn't damaged at all.
I was super proud of myself for making it over. It's not every day that I have to scale a 7 ft fence. I have to say that I'm really amused by the fact that I've had to break into two of my ten pools. I wonder how long it's going to take before I have to break into the other eight. And now I'm starting to plan out how I'll do it... you know... if I need to. ;)
I had to take another group of guards to another pool op's class tonight which meant I had to run around like a crazy person to hit up all my pools before I needed to pick up the guards. I did manage to make it to all the pools to collect their time sheets so I can have my pay roll in on time tomorrow, but I didn't get to fix about half the pool's chemicals. That was annoying, but I guess that's what tomorrow morning's for. The other annoying this was that after I had picked up the guards I got a text message saying "oh wait, just kidding, the class has been canceled for tonight, we'll try to reschedule it for Sunday." Which means I could have had an extra two hours in my pools and I didn't have to drag my guards outside in the yucky weather and I wasted their time. I hate wasting people's time. If I waste my own time I don't care so much, but causing other people to waste theirs? I hate doing that.
Oh well. It's like I said. Today wasn't a really bad day, it was just an eventful day that could have gone a bit more smoothly. And I finished my payroll so I don't have to do it tomorrow *does a happy dance*