This was it. This was my last week of work before I turned in and began my preparations for the coming fall semester. I wasn’t going to let anything distract me, or take me away from the work that had fueled me all summer. Whoops, my doctors appointment is on Friday in the middle of the day. Well then, I’m sure the good doctor won’t take too long, and I should be back before the work day is out. The doctor took 2 hours to see me. By the time I got back to the office after my appointment, everyone had gone home for the day. I had said goodbye before I left, but I still felt like there was work undone. I still feel as though work is undone. On the Monday before my departure, I was calmly working, and now I must entertain myself for the next two weeks before I can leave Naples and get back to Deland and continue my studies. I have of course, notified my supervisor and my old team of my situation and that they can call on me to do anything they need done, at least until I depart. The split was quiet, and although I did not have a going away party, everyone did give me a very kind good bye when I left for the doctors. I was able to meet our new accountant before I left, however, and she seems like a fine addition to the team. I don’t really have any regrets, [cut by NW]. My team will do just fine without me.

For my second to last week at work, I kicked it off by missing the first two days of the week. Even though I only meant to miss Monday, a flight cancellation knocked me back a day and subsequently increased my waiting workload. Regardless, I returned fresh on Wednesday with zero jet lag, because I only flew from Colorado. I know, my parents visited my brother and then I do the same with my mother the next week. My parents felt that it was important for me to visit my brother before I went back to school, and although I had some fun in Denver, the entire time I felt a nagging reminder of the ever present work pile awaiting me. I sincerely hope I will be able to slow down at some point, as this is getting somewhat tiring. I do find my work fulfilling, but being ever aware of work unfulfilled manages to overshadow this completely. I wish that at some point in the future, that I can forget and remember at will, if so only that my tired mind can rest. I don’t think or even want a life of endless luxury, I just think that I need something to fulfill me, and something to make me money, and if those two are one and the same, I’ll be all the happier. Regardless, I believe I will always need something to occupy my conscious mind, as I have seen what a lack of “food” can do to it. Whether this is through video games, or freelance work, or school work, this cycle of receive, complete, return is essential to maintaining a proper handle on my mind.

This week was very slow in the beginning, and sped up rapidly towards the end. I should have expected this outcome, and I did, so I was well prepared for the large mass of work dropped on me upon my return to the office on Thursday morning. As I said in week nine, I was out for the first three days of the week so I could keep an eye on my dogs. I wasn’t exactly resting while at home though, as I was kept slightly busy by the drip of work through my assigned email. A couple times a day, I got a new assignment, and even though they barely kept me for a half hour each, it was something to work on. When I returned on Thursday after my time off, I was greeted and given a pile of sample tiles to deliver across town. By the way, Naples has a street specifically for stone and construction businesses. Those types of businesses aren’t limited to that area, but its pretty much where every single business named “Stone”, “Florida”, “Works”, or “Design” are located. I have kindly requested that my coworkers who provide me with tasks, to please only give me the address so I cannot be confused as I drive down a busy street looking for Naples Stoneworks, not Florida Designworks. Both of those are real places on the exact same street.

Much more of the same for me this week. I’ve noticed that my general responsibilities have shifted slightly. Although I still take care of much of the accounting input, I’m being consulted less and less on designer choices, which I believe are instead being posed to the new designer. Out of consideration for her, I won’t name her or any of my other coworkers. I genuinely wonder how much longer the downtime will be for me, because its already substantially increased since the new girl has been here. I have heard from my supervisor that we are looking at new accountants soon, so I will have much more downtime after whoever gets hired arrives. Hooray. I am looking forward to a somewhat substantial work pile when I get back though. I will be working from home this Friday through the Wednesday of next week. My parents will be out of town, and I need to stick around and make sure the dogs don’t shred the house while I’m away. Those two have an alarming propensity for destruction, and they usually get off scot free with little more than a belly ache from whatever paper they eat. Lest my dogs turn the house into a literal doghouse, I elected to stay home and watch them. I will be doing online work though, arranging housing tours, as well as a few choice documents that my supervisor wants me to work on while I’m out. I expect working from home to be very little of disturbance to me, as I worked well enough throughout 2020.

Finally, a week without much chaos. For the first time in a while, it’s properly quieted down around here. We hired a new designer in the meantime, and she has been integrating nicely with the rest of the team. We are still looking for a new accountant, but the workflow hasn’t been too overwhelming. There isn’t much to say about this week, other than that I learned more about scanning and publishing bills. Ill always find something to occupy myself on though, so the burden of keeping my brain entertained is no longer entirely at the behest of someone else. I genuinely can’t understand why tasks do not take as long with me. Im unaware if I’m simply underworked or I have an abnormal capacity for work. Whatever the answer, I think it best if I treat these traits as a boon in the workforce.With proper management, I believe I could be even more productive. I am doing all that I can for this company, which means that sometimes I will have to sit and wait for my coworkers. I think of my job as sort of  “trimming the fat” of the company on days that I’m here. Just cleaning up whatever needs to be cleaned, or helping a coworker with tasks, is just a part of the job. A larger part of the job is patience, the patience to know when to help, and the patience to listen to coworkers who are tech illiterate and need help operating their own office printer that they’ve had longer than I’ve been there. But, you help the people who need help, and that’s my job.

This was an extremely hectic week, right from the get go. Unbeknownst to me, our resident accountant and HR representative had received a better offer for her employment on the Friday prior. Come that Monday, she had accepted it and was no longer working for us in any capacity. Without any warning, we were suddenly down a person, and as the intern, I picked up the slack before anything could go wrong. I have some new duties now, but they mostly boil down to data entry, printing and scanning documents, or just general IT, which is easy enough for me. This definitely changed how my mornings in the office went down, because before it was maybe a slow trickle before the lunchtime rush, but now, I usually get emails asking me to address things before I’ve left the house in the morning. I actually don’t mind, it just makes for more boring afternoons. The majority of the workload is now in the morning for me, and I feel like it just keeps me going and distracted until either lunch or they run out of stuff for me to do, which is a daily guarantee. I have noticed my workload steadily increasing bit by bit, so I hope something will be able to keep me occupied for a full workday. It has happened before, but it is rare. It only happened because there was a repository of receipts that I had to clean up before the day was out. I was occupied with other projects until about 2 that day, so when a coworker asked me to save and print receipts, I actually had to put it on the backlog, where pending projects go. I haven’t been able to use it all summer, but now I finally can. With that task, I was the last one out the door, and it was still only 4 when I left.

I believe this is the first week that I’m ever missing work. In my previous jobs, when I wanted to call off, I just did. I was nonessential enough for day to day operations that no one would really notice the workflow change if I was out for the day. This was not an option for my job this year. If I want days off, it is still a rather simple process, I just need to ask a little in advance. Regardless, missing a Monday despite being in a different state felt quite weird. I had a fair stack of work waiting for me the next day, and although I happily completed the stack very handily, there was a lingering feeling of incompleteness for me. I had triple checked that everything was complete, and it was, but I was paranoid and since I hadn’t been there on Monday, I ended up spending a couple extra hours hitting my checklist and retracing my workflow, only to find that I had done it perfectly the first time around. I would rather be safe rather than sorry, and since I was already done for the day, it was no harm done. The Thursday after I got back, there was another house to be photographed for Kuula, so it was right back out the door after I got in for the day, and after a few minutes, I was at the job site, the Berglund Residence. They’ll be moving in within a few months, so I was largely there for record keeping and visual documentation. Within a few short hours, I was done and back in the office.

I know there are a lot of very different companies out there. I’m aware that many of them choose to treat their employees poorly, in order to cut costs or boost profits. After being treated like an actual person, I think that many companies are ignoring or simply choose to disregard the increased productivity from a happy workforce. I see so many of my peers complaining about poor working conditions, bad pay, rude upper management, etc. genuinely day to day. I count myself rather fortunate to have a job that not only provides a day to day structure, but also provides a large number of amenities for day to day working. Water jugs for free water, free snacks, daily catered lunch, and donuts on Fridays add up to an extremely satisfying job. It genuinely doesn’t matter to me that I’m not the best paid in the world, I don’t care when they take care of this much stuff for me. But for many employers and those in upper management, then if they see I’m not paid as much, they think they can get away with paying their employees less than that and not provide any of the amenities I get. There needs to be a genuine ebb and flow in the grand scheme of a job. If the job doesn’t provide in a certain area, I’ll expect it to excel in another area to make up for its shortcomings. Thankfully, this site provides a truly obscene number of amenities. It’s genuinely not like I’m poorly paid either, I’m promptly paid and the rate is quite competitive. Combined with the amenities, its quite the diamond.

While this week was not nearly as slow as last, there were a few slow points, which I suppose is just normal. I usually like to get work done as accurately as possible, this obviously leads to me not having to ever redo something because I do it right the first time. But with this methodology of working, then there is the danger of being “off-task” for too long, simply because there is nothing to work on. But, obviously, that description does not account for all the work that is accomplished, albeit early. For example, I was asked to do a weekly photography shoot-not of the staff, but some of our current customer’s job sites. I was told to find a good 360 degree camera and software that would let our customers easily tour their job sites with a full 360 degree view. After much deliberation and several stupid-expensive cameras being shot down by my boss, we landed on the GoPro Max as our camera, and Kuula Tours as our software. For my first field assignment, I was given the camera, the address, and a floor blueprint with markings for the “mandatory” spots, which is just where my supervisor absolutely wants a picture taken. However, I was truly given freedom for any other spots I thought needed a snapshot. After a 15 minute meeting in which I learned the majority of what I needed to look for, such as exposed pipes, wiring, etc. It’s rather pertinent to note that many of these sites are in the process of being constructed, so pipes and other things aren’t anything to worry about. Many of the team just like to have confirmation that the pipes have been laid there and laid properly. As for me, it took just over and hour to finish and I was happily trundling away and taking photos the entire time. Tour’s attached below, I’ll be ASAP with week 5, sorry for the delay.
https://kuula.co/share/collection/7v9FT?logo=0&info=0&fs=1&vr=1&sd=1&initload=0&thumbs=1