Half way through the week, and I want to throw the laptop through a wall less than I thought I would. It would be a lot less if I’d get more calls that were actually my problem instead of the department whose job I can’t fully do. If I can just make it to Friday evening, I can blow off steam working on my yard, because I am not doing the whole thing in one day Saturday. I have wrasslin’ all day Sunday, and I’ll be damned if I miss Kenny Omega walking out at Wembley Stadium as World Champion. That is important to me, thus, I want to have that yard finished Saturday afternoon. I won’t be busy, it’s not supposed to rain, and it isn’t supposed to be that hot either. It’s Week Zero, Ohio State doesn’t play until the fifth of next month, there aren’t any “can’t miss” level games happening yet, mostly just “here’s football” until Labor Day weekend. Thus, my venting my frustrations with work will happen as I walk around in squares with a lawnmower. I had thought my long weekend would make me less irritated at my job, and it did, but, I am still irritated with it. Don’t get me wrong, I like what I do, I like being told by clients “man, I wish I had talked to you three hours ago!” when I fix a problem that my desk, and a client’s internal desk has jerked them around on all day. What I don’t like is being tasked with things I can’t fix, or having to go behind people and fix problems they could have, but dumped off on others. Did I give my usual “there is nothing here” note on two Tier 2s case updates that I wound up inheriting today? You bet I did. Your notes suck, I have nothing to work with, get up on my level please. It’s frustrating, and I know I sound like a broken record, because I would get lit up for bad notes, and I have gotten lit up for bad notes in the past. It’s why I’m so picky about documentation, because the next person who gets your case, or if someone else has something similar come in, will only have it harder with nothing to go on. I can’t fix the problem if I don’t know what it is, and the client doesn’t have the words to tell me what is going on either. It is our job to find the issue, diagnose it, troubleshoot it, and either fix it, or get it to someone who can. I take meticulous notes on cases, document what I see as I go, I live in my notepad, and have way too many screen captures of client screens documenting errors, to the point I have to delete them occasionally because they’re clogging my laptop up. I’m not asking everyone to be me, just giving me something to work with! I think my long-standing battle with someone in another department has finally broken through a little to where even he has legible notes now! Why can’t others give us something usable? Why can’t my own team have usable notes! …I need the weekend to get here. Or at least to stop stressing about other people’s bad notes and weak documentation. Mowing my yard Friday night sounds better and better all the time in regard to blowing off steam from other departments, as looking at my yard will stem that aggravation. Or maybe I just need to take multiple chill pills. I just take my work very seriously, you know? Because if I don’t, who will? I don’t take a lot of things seriously, but when it comes to my continued employment, no, I have a level of quality and dedication I need others to meet, the same I expect out of myself. If I’m on the clock, I may be goofing around between calls, but when it’s time to go, time to do the work, no one takes it as seriously as I do. I have my things I want to hit on, confirm, do my usual spiel, but if I’m messing up somewhere, tell me! I need that feedback! I got dinged on a call a while back for not sounding like I was listening to the client’s issue before I confirmed their contact, so what did I do? I started fixing that, let them explain the issue, then made sure I got their information. That helps everyone! Not just me! The client feels like we’re listening to them! We know the issue going into troubleshooting! All those things build from cleaning up one little thing! I dwell on this stuff, it keeps me up at night when I have a call go sideways and I know I messed up on it. I can’t just pack it away and treat the work as disposable, I take what I do seriously. Maybe too seriously, but, I’d rather care too much than not enough. I flip off my laptop constantly, I gripe between calls to no end, but ultimately, making those clients happy, taking care of them, that lets me keep a roof over my head. It’s just aggravating when it keeps happening, and I can’t do anything about it. I’ve been at this job for ten years now and every time I try to do something about it, the people who aren’t doing the documentation expected of us, just keep not doing that. Every boss I’ve had knows my frustration, shares that frustration, but it does not change like I want it to. I’m not asking for miracles, just basic troubleshooting and documentation when I get a case from someone. That’s all I want.