Murphy's Law

Anything that can go wrong will go wrong, that's the way it goes right?

That's the way it's been since my editor left for vacation last Thursday. On Friday morning, just as I was getting out of bed to shower and come to work, the power went out. Given that I live only a half a mile from work I assumed (correctly) that they had no electricity either. I got into work after showering by scented-candle light (ambiance and a sweet-smelling bathroom, you can't go wrong) and discovered the source of the outage was a tree that took down a pole and wires behind our building by the railroad tracks. I waited around for a good five hours before declaring the day a lost cause and going home.

Once I got home, I still had no power, so I spent the afternoon and early evening vacillating between relaxation and depression. I don't mind sitting at home alone with a few candles lit (and by a few, I mean about 20), but I've decided I can't live without my TV/DVD player. Luckily, Doc rescued me by taking me out to dinner and by the time we returned home at 9:30 p.m., power was restored.

Since I don't have Internet access at home, I spent the rest of the weekend mentally preparing myself for the week ahead, especially after losing an entire day of writing/processing materials. On Monday, I came into the office, booted up my computer, and was immediately alerted to e-mail server problems. Instead of fighting with my mail program, I tried to check my alternate e-mail, only to discover I couldn't so much as access Google. Immediately, I felt it... The waves of nausea washed over me as I tried to consider my options. What were my options? It was Monday and I had just two days to pull together an entire week's newspaper. And without e-mail, there was no paper.

Yesterday was moderately successful — I got a lot of processing/writing/editing done — if you discount the fact that I waited a good four hours to obtain one of my police logs. We can't not run our police log; it had to get done, which means I made a nuisance of myself badgering the poor emergency dispatcher until someone faxed over what I was looking for.

That brings us up to today... Wednesday/Production Day. Today marks the end of my first week in charge and I can barely look back on the last several days without wanting to vomit or cry, both of which would be completely inappropriate at my desk at work. It'll have to wait til I get home.

Just six more days of hell.