i've got a badge but i'm not a badger
Jul. 6th, 2005 03:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hathycolDo you know how I found out about the London Olympics? I spent twenty minutes making a toilet shine just to hear the announcement. Given that for the last two days I've managed to get 12 loos done in 40 minutes, this probably shocked everyone. However, the toilet I was cleaning was the ensuite of a room that had a service user on, and the TV was on.
So I walked in to the room with my little bucket of cleaning utensils and my superbly unattractive pink gloves on. "Hello... um... *checks door for name* J!" (Alas, confidentiality and am not allowed to mention names on public forums. It's on my contract and everything.) "I'm just going to clean out your toilet, is that okay?"
Predictably, there was no answer - the level of learning disability is so high in the residents that we'll never get a response other than possibly a shout or noise. I will also apparently learn to pick up what all these mean for different people, but thus far I'm going on levels of agitation. Since I just got a sort of crooked grin from J, I wandered on into his bathroom and slowly unscrewed the bleach. The man on the news burbled a bit. I squeezed the bleach under the rim. Then I let it soak.
Agonisingly slowly ("I'll be done in a minute, J, honestly!") I pulled out the toilet brush (that's a different rant for a different day) and slowly brushed the loo. There was continuing of a speech. I flushed the toilet and scrubbed a bit harder so there wouldn't be green stains down the loo the next day.
I continued to scrub the toilet, doing Seat Duty the slowest I've ever done it. I heard an evelope rip and paused. Stood up with toilet brush in hand, carefully angled over the toilet because, um, drips.
"And the 2012 Olympics go to..."
*drip drip*
"LONDON!"
I danced carefully around the toilet with my toilet brush in hand. I would have spoken to J but he was asleep, so I danced a solitary dance.
That's another story to put in the autobiography, I think.
I'm actually enjoying this job, solitary toilet-brush dancing aside. Perhaps it's the lck of customers, but it's not bad. The only downer is that fact that I slashed my little fingers on a mop-bucket yesterday when I dropped the sharp bit and it took a fewlayers of skin off it. I didn't put it in the accident book so now I can't even claim if it goes septic and I die. It hurts. Wah.
On the bright side, I had the following conversation with my manager as I as doing the outside windows of the lounge:
"Colleen! Have you been on a break yet?"
I have, actually, taken breaks the last two days, but they've ben shifty and sort of unofficial. "Erm, no." I checked my watch and panicked. "I still have the other lounge and the dining room and the toilet to do..."
"Oh, it'll all get done eventually. Go and have a brew."
I followed orders and went into the kitchen, made a cup of tea (and made a mental note to mop the floor tomorrow) and stood there awkwardly and gulped it all down, because I really did have loads to do. A bloke wandered in.
"Go and sit down!"
"No I have loads to do and not a lot of time to do it-"
"It'll get done. Go and have a sit down."
"No because there's really a lot to do andnonone'scleanedinaboutaYEAR-"
"You'll get digestion. You have a right to a break!"
"I'm here for four hours. Legally, I don't."
"Yeah, but morally you do."
At which point I was herded out the kitchen and sat down in the lounge. I nearly died of shock. This is why I like this job - not only is it an actual challenge, it also comes with a disregard to the nasty habit of treating low-grade employees like dirt. It's refreshing, frankly.
In other news, I have now exchanged money. Surprisingly, they take Euros on the planet of the Daleks. Who'd have thunk it?
~Hathy_Col~
So I walked in to the room with my little bucket of cleaning utensils and my superbly unattractive pink gloves on. "Hello... um... *checks door for name* J!" (Alas, confidentiality and am not allowed to mention names on public forums. It's on my contract and everything.) "I'm just going to clean out your toilet, is that okay?"
Predictably, there was no answer - the level of learning disability is so high in the residents that we'll never get a response other than possibly a shout or noise. I will also apparently learn to pick up what all these mean for different people, but thus far I'm going on levels of agitation. Since I just got a sort of crooked grin from J, I wandered on into his bathroom and slowly unscrewed the bleach. The man on the news burbled a bit. I squeezed the bleach under the rim. Then I let it soak.
Agonisingly slowly ("I'll be done in a minute, J, honestly!") I pulled out the toilet brush (that's a different rant for a different day) and slowly brushed the loo. There was continuing of a speech. I flushed the toilet and scrubbed a bit harder so there wouldn't be green stains down the loo the next day.
I continued to scrub the toilet, doing Seat Duty the slowest I've ever done it. I heard an evelope rip and paused. Stood up with toilet brush in hand, carefully angled over the toilet because, um, drips.
"And the 2012 Olympics go to..."
*drip drip*
"LONDON!"
I danced carefully around the toilet with my toilet brush in hand. I would have spoken to J but he was asleep, so I danced a solitary dance.
That's another story to put in the autobiography, I think.
I'm actually enjoying this job, solitary toilet-brush dancing aside. Perhaps it's the lck of customers, but it's not bad. The only downer is that fact that I slashed my little fingers on a mop-bucket yesterday when I dropped the sharp bit and it took a fewlayers of skin off it. I didn't put it in the accident book so now I can't even claim if it goes septic and I die. It hurts. Wah.
On the bright side, I had the following conversation with my manager as I as doing the outside windows of the lounge:
"Colleen! Have you been on a break yet?"
I have, actually, taken breaks the last two days, but they've ben shifty and sort of unofficial. "Erm, no." I checked my watch and panicked. "I still have the other lounge and the dining room and the toilet to do..."
"Oh, it'll all get done eventually. Go and have a brew."
I followed orders and went into the kitchen, made a cup of tea (and made a mental note to mop the floor tomorrow) and stood there awkwardly and gulped it all down, because I really did have loads to do. A bloke wandered in.
"Go and sit down!"
"No I have loads to do and not a lot of time to do it-"
"It'll get done. Go and have a sit down."
"No because there's really a lot to do andnonone'scleanedinaboutaYEAR-"
"You'll get digestion. You have a right to a break!"
"I'm here for four hours. Legally, I don't."
"Yeah, but morally you do."
At which point I was herded out the kitchen and sat down in the lounge. I nearly died of shock. This is why I like this job - not only is it an actual challenge, it also comes with a disregard to the nasty habit of treating low-grade employees like dirt. It's refreshing, frankly.
In other news, I have now exchanged money. Surprisingly, they take Euros on the planet of the Daleks. Who'd have thunk it?
~Hathy_Col~
