EIGHTEEN

Last year I got to work on a project all by myself. It was glorious! No writers, no editor, no artists, no manager . . . nothing. Just little old me and a fellow at MIT. We held meetings over the phone and he sent me disks through the mail. I put the book together using my own discretion, design, layout . . . everything. Probably considered dry by most, it was more like a novel than anything I've ever worked on. Very text heavy with no images, just a lot of graphs, plus some very extensive indeces. An index is a very tricky thing to do properly, and although not as visually exciting as lovely coloured pictures, it is giving me some really in-depth experience with the software. This book is a crown on the glory of my portfolio.

No one wanted to touch it because the book is politicial dynamite; called the Administrative Inventory it is an assesment of the institution. Effeciency and all that. The whole place is horrified that their complete lack of work ethic is going to be exposed, bringing wholesale job cuts. I laughed when I called some department or other to gather data or get information; I could literally hear the person freeze up over the phone. If I had some problem and asked the editor upstairs she almost ran out of the room at the mention of the project. The artists didn't want to help me, even Jack is kept his distance.

It was fantastic. Nothing I have ever worked on here has gone this smoothly, from the moment I walked in the door. The MIT prof and I reached a good level of understanding from the very beginning, we kept to the deadline -without trauma or nightmares (almost un-heard of in this place)- and answered each others' questions easily enough. At 300 pages the book was a detailed analysis of almost all of the institutions functions. As I was getting closer to finishing people would drop by my desk and 'casually' ask what his conclusion was. Well, as casually as a person can ask something when their heart is beating powerfully in their throat. Although I generally don't read the content of the project I work on I did scan a few choice pages -and the graphs were pretty clear- ; his conclusion wasn't nearly as scathing as I would like it to be. In fact it was almost downright complimentary! Too bad, there was a few heads I would have really liked to see roll.

When the book came out it literally flew off the shelves of our distribution centre. Of course the media got their copies, but I have never seen anything we ever produced garner so much interest within the institution itself. I guess everyone had to see for themselves that their jobs were still safe. I'm really proud of the work I did on that book; it remains in my portfolio to this day. Since I didn't have to deal with any artificially created disasters of my co-workes I was able to go through the text with a fine tooth comb. Every line ends in glorious symmetry within it's paragraph, every chart sits in logical position to the accompanying text, all index entries are properly tagged and referencing the correct page(s).

I should have known it couldn't last.

Since the previous year's was so complimentary to our institution, this year's version sees an unprecedented level of "co-operation" amongst the staff. That means that the whole place wants to get their fingerprint on it. Luckily the editor upstairs bared her spikey teeth and has held off the raging incompetance of the technical writers'. In fact she is keeping her own writers' at bay, hording the editing of the project to herself.

I tried to dissuade her, "I'm not sure it needs an editor Karen, we did it last year without one and it went quite smoothly. No one has found any glaring errors in the copy."

"Well I have to make sure it meets with company standards." My voice has no weight, plus I can see she is almost orgasming herself at the thought of being involved.

Fear creeps into my soul at the realization that all of the joy will be sucked out of it this year. When I speak to the MIT prof I can hear the tiredness in his voice; we're back to the old story of duplicating work, wasting time because people forgot to mention certain vital things, falling behind the deadline, etc. etc. At one point he asked me why suddenly there are all these people involved, I couldn't bring myself to answer truthfully; that I work in a black pit of despair. That all normal laws of reason are twisted beyond recognition; that he must has spoken to all the wrong people last year because this is what it's really like around here.

But my horror doesn't end that, of course not! Equal measure must be exacted for the freedom I had last year, and it's name is Fiona. Jack has decided that, in order to save time and to keep all other projects on schedule, Fiona and I are to 'share' this project. That means that I will do the lion's share of the work while she will publicize herself as working on this high-profile project. We've split the work into chapters, and she will do the graphs while I do the index. I know that she will not be as attentive to the line breaks as I was and it's frankly making me quite insane. One time I saw her 'measuring' something on the screen in portions between her thumb and forefinger. I mean she held her hand up to a section, measured the distance then checked it against the corresponding sections. Crazy. There's are rulers bordering the sides of every PageMaker document; Petra and I are in there in 2000% view making sure everything matches up. No wonder when I pick up projects from Fiona I have to staighten everything!

I'm trying to resign myself to this circumstance, telling myself that it doesn't matter what happens with the book this year because I still have last year's under my belt. No one has to know, in the future, that there was another, messed up version, released after the one I will be showing. But it's very difficult to disassociate myself. Last year was so problem-free and this year is so typical that I can feel the bitterness seeping into my soul.

At this point my only consolation is knowing that Fiona will likely do her usual; end up taking so much time off for various reasons that she will be pulled from the project. I'm hoping I'll have enough time to go through the chapters she already did, when it happens, to fix everything up to my liking.

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PS: I've taken these three days off of work, because I need a break, and to coincide with the lowest tides of the year (and a full moon, if that has any mystical significance I do not know). I've been on the tidal flats every day looking for eagles, they are there but not cooperating as far as being photographed goes. I got shots of some, and some other cool things that I will share when they are processed.
At one point, yesterday, two eagles were 'fighting' right above me; I couldn't get any shots of it, I guess the aperture was flooded with light so the shutter wouldn't open. shitfuckpiss. I got a shot of them farther in the distance, but was in a raging bad mood after that. Nothing that a nice lunch of sushi couldn't solve!
Apparently I'm not the only one with this genuis idea, because the beach has been almost as crowded as on the weekends. Lots of people have taken these days off specifically for the low tide. No one else with a camera though. Also it seems that every elementary school in Vancouver has decided to treat it's students to a day at the beach before summer starts. Bastards, I don't remember ever getting to go to the beach for school!
Right now it has just started pouring and looks to turn to a thunderstorm later. Hopefully it'll still be gross tomorrow morning so the beach will be deserted except for me and the wildlife.