Week following Oct 23, 2011

Monday, G made some amusing comment about us "singing as the Titanic goes down."

We received this email from one of our biggest fans:  "The news today comes as a surprise, and not a good one. Since you have been here for as long as, or longer than, I have been, from my perspective I am losing an institution."

This made me think about how so many things we had come to think of as "ordinary" have left our life.  We pay to check our baggage, and for headphones, meals and blankets on airplanes now.   Many items have left the shelves even if you're willing to pay the skyrocketing prices for them.  There's less choice now.  Everybody's "old life" is being taken away, not just mine.  Greece, or for that matter any country in Europe, will never be the same.

By Wednesday, we had had this same conversation several times:

User:  Who are we going to run to with these emergencies when you're gone?
Us:  You're going to have to contact Fargo, North Dakota.
All:  (Looking miserably at each other with nothing more to say).

I gave an attorney a 20 minute training session on how to number his document, after which he rapid-style lectured me (as is his wont) regarding the latest and greatest in music (going to each site on his computer as he talked), and something about his carefree innocence prompted me to ask, "Are you aware the doc center is closing?"  No, he hadn't read the email.  Guess what he asked me?  "You mean I won't be able to get help from you guys any more?"

By Thursday, I wondered where all the work was?  Oh yeah, it's going to Fargo, North Dakota.  The firm has several people already sending their work there to test it this month, which is why we got a month's notice.  Duh.  So, that's what "outsourced" means.  Somebody else is doing my work.  Oh.  Duh.  Oh.  Duh.  OH.  It keeps sinking in more and more.

So, what I want to know is how is Fargo, North Dakota handling TOAs?  Let me tell you about TOAs. I have a thing or two to say before leaving the saga of my career behind me forever.

To begin the saga about TOAs, I have to begin with RoAnn.  RoAnn was legendary.  Every office manager and every doc center in town knew RoAnn, first name only, like "Cher" or "Madonna."

I was an underwriter in training at an insurance company, where I had started out as a Sycor operator. (I just did an internet search for "Sycor" and nothing came up, so clearly that technology is so obsolete as to not even have any record in human history.  Boy, is my life a myth!!) Anyway, I had climbed my way up through rating on the second floor to underwriting on the third floor from the basement where I had started out as a Sycor operator.  Insurance was deathly boring and I wasn't making that much more money.  RoAnn is the one that told me "the secret."  I don't know how I ended up with her phone number, but God bless whoever sent that lunatic my way.  She told me to go to such-and-such temp agency and take their free Vydec course.  She said all the lawyers in town were using Vydecs and there weren't enough Vydec operators.  I learned the Vydec, and additionally RoAnn gave me a crash course showing me exactly the types of things I would be asked to do in a law firm and how to do them, including TOAs.  I took a 4 hour course, for a nominal fee, from some bimbo (imagine an "all business" Marilyn Monroe) that showed me the mechanics behind assembling the documents that were being created by people with law degrees.  The temp agency sent me to engineering corporations, while RoAnn found me my first job in my first legal document center.  It was exactly as RoAnn taught me, and I did well.  Most doc center operators had 2 or 3 jobs and we all hired each other round the clock for work on Vydec, IBM, Wang, NBI and eventually WordPerfect when pcs took over.

One day RoAnn was contracted at a firm, needed an evening coordinator, and thought of me.  Well, it was a step up, why not?  Well, for one thing because she and this firm were crazy (this was the firm where the "Document Center Incident" took place that I have yet to write about).  But I didn't know that at the time I accepted her offer, and brought my best friends with me so they could get raises working for a crazy firm, too.  This sounds idyllic, but once I was in charge my best friends would stop chatting when I came in the room, stuff like that, and it was horrible.  I had to fire my best friend when she had a bipolar episode and wigged out (instead of doing the work, she copied the requests, and returned them as completed).  Meanwhile, I was learning that RoAnn was nuts.  I think her contract had been to set up a document center and convert to NBI from System 6.  Remember those 8" floppy disks?  Well, we had to print out all those disks before they could get rid of that monstrosity, and Ro kept taking those disks home and not bringing them back.  Never explained why.  She eventually was fired, and never got the $5000 bonus for completing her contract.  I demoted myself, got all my friends back, and avoided RoAnn for the rest of my life.  Last I heard she was going to law school.

Ok, so, as I mentioned, everything I ever learned about TOAs, I learned from RoAnn as part of a 4 hour course.  TOAs are "Tables of Authorities."  What they are is an index of every legal cite found in the document, listed under separate categories of cases, rules, statutes, etc. separated into state and federal. This means you have to actually know what a legal cite is, and know how it's being used in the document, because just existing in the document doesn't necessarily mean it goes into the table.  Assuming you have found a correct cite for inclusion, you have to code it.  It's the most complex coding you can do in a document. There are endless ways you can have picked up every cite and still generate a faulty table just because you missed something in the coding.  The coding takes hours to do, and the TOAs are always a crashing rush because you can only do them on a final document, and attorneys work on their documents right up to the filing deadlines.  If those TOAs don't get done and the deadline gets missed it is always the operator's fault, never the attorney's.

To be fair to my current firm, which I have referred to as "Firm Fairyland" in previous posts, it is the first and only firm I had ever worked for that supported the doc center when there were mistakes in TOAs, and the attorneys were held responsible for the final tables.  This has been reason enough for me to feel I worked in fairyland.  Our new national document center manager had encouraged sending TOAs out of state when we needed help.  This got the job "off the books," but it would inevitably be returned to us to do it again correctly, so they were really something we could never get help with. 

Here's the thing:  The only people with the knowledge to recognize a correct cite is a lawyer.  Legal secretaries and paralegals are supposed to, but they mostly don't.  The rare ones that do just "never have time" to do the coding. Over the decades I've seen various software come and go, macros created at various firms, all sorts of tricks and programs to generate TOAs, but they all missed too many cites to be relied upon.  I have seen, even been part of, all sorts of training sessions to teach people how to code for TOAs, but they never do it after they learn it.  It's just too hard for them.  So, document centers have been the default experts on TOAs since forever.  I have never done one with confidence, and I can't tell you how happy I would be to never have to do another one.

Maybe now you understand why I'm wondering how Fargo, North Dakota is handling TOAs.

In other news, I have been in a senior meetup group that has mostly turned out to be a little old ladies club.  We had a meetup yesterday that was the best one so far.  Four other women I had not met before came, and were just the people I needed to meet.  One was a petsitter (always good to know one of those), another gets medical insurance for people like me that want an alternative to COBRA.  When I expressed concern about my housing situation, another timidly confessed that she hadn't wanted to reveal that she lives in senior housing.  She thought we would look down on her.  But once she said that we all were interested in how she did that, and what she said changed my life.  She said once you turn 62 you can sign up at any rental office of any apt. building for senior housing.  It's a HUD thing.  She signed up with all the rental offices in the marina.  She had to wait 2 years, but she has a 2 bedroom apt with an ocean view, and she pays a third of what Ted and I are paying for our apartment, and we both turned 62 this year.  Another lady in the group also found this information valuable, and was even more distraught than me and I hugged her and that turned out to be just what she needed, just a hug.  I feel really lucky to have met all of them.  I feel like I made 4 new friends, and learned so much stuff about being a senior.  It's still sinking in that I'm a "senior" too.  

Week following Oct 16, 2011

The title of today's page is an example of how we name our archive folders in the document center.  It seemed like a fitting way to count down the remaining weeks to its extinction.

So this weekend I got to catch up with my life a little bit.  I really wanted to sleep late Saturday, but cousin Phil was insisting on taking me out for my birthday (it's "Tradition!" - which song he may have even sang at me) and I had already canceled on him last weekend, so I literally rose for the occasion, we ate and celebrated, after which I stopped off at the market (a hugely valiant effort), stuffed the food in the frig and finally fell back into bed.  I would nap a couple hours, wake up depressed and fall back to sleep, or wake up refreshed and fall back in bed exhausted after only brushing my teeth or feeding the cat.

Oy, such a week I had.  My manager couldn't even smile at me.  The receptionist did smile at me, which was eerie because she never had before (not because she's unfriendly, just too frazzled to look up). A paralegal I had barely ever conversed with reduced me to tears in the lunchroom.  She inquired about each of the doc center operators and I thanked her for her interest, because she was more inquisitive than anyone else had been.  She exploded into a rampage of appreciation for me and the doc center that was so emphatic ("couldn't have done her job without us, and don't think we won't be missed") that she left me in the lunchroom a crying mess, where I thought I would have enough time to regain composure before anyone else entered, but I didn't. The hostess found me and became terribly concerned before I had a chance to run into the bathroom and clean up.  All week long I have been hearing an earful about how things will be after we're gone.  Entertainment won't send their work out (even the doc center never had access to their documents, much to their own constant annoyance).  A paralegal gave me an extremely well thought out analysis of exactly what will happen without the document center.  Two attorneys told me they would be a reference (against firm policy). The office was like a morgue.  I'm wondering if it will continue to be this glum all the way to 11/11/11?  It all made me want to run home and find my tin foil hat.

And, don't forget, this is all deja vu to me.  I'm still reeling from the big life change of David dropping dead.  I arranged my whole life around my job, so now my life is arranged around nothing.  It is easy to say that I could find another job - in fact, I have easily said it, and our old manager already emailed and regaled us with stories of horrible operators he has suffered since leaving us, and let us know what he had available at his firm which was basically nothing.  But, I can't enter that pressure cooker again.  I have an anxiety attack just thinking about it.  No, I've been rode too long and hard to do it any more. The decades of TOA tension is reason enough to run screaming from ever again getting another doc center job, but the last few years of schedule changes, no raises and refused vacations have finally caught up with me.  I've been running on fumes pretty much since David died already.  Whatever kept me pumped at work has died.  I have no mind left.  

G started taking a bag of stuff a day home, and I followed suit.  So, now I reach for pen trays that are no longer there - something is rearranged every day.  My old familiar cubicle had been like a private office because nobody could see me back here.  It is up against the proofing tables that run along the back wall, so I had a lot of space for all my personal projects (the proofer was laid off years ago).  It was heaven.  I really had a dream job.  I'm really glad I wasn't escorted from the premises by security and had time to say goodbye, apparently sometimes to people I hadn't even known were my friends.

But, it's sinking in.  I'm REALLY retired.  I really can do anything I want for the rest of my life.  I'm finally free to become the crazy lady with 100 cats that never leaves her house.  I can really do this.  I can live the creative life I have always wanted to.  I can read and draw and write and bead and cook or travel or do nothing all day.  How long have I wanted to do that?  Since high school.  Now's my time!  Yay.  I'm so blissed out.  I just wish I wasn't so depressed about it, and I wish it wasn't so hard to get through big life changes, and I wish I had a boyfriend.

Today I told all this to a guy that called me from a dating site, who is also a recluse.  I asked him what he thought the odds were of one recluse meeting another recluse on a dating site?  He didn't think the odds were that high.  We have a date next Sunday night, which he's already calling "our first date."

Announcement Day

The email announcement was long and fascinating. Clearly we can't provide this kind of 24/7/365 service:

"In partnership with the General Counsel's office, we created a solution that exceeds our internal security and client confidentiality requirements. These requirements apply to both the people at Integreon, as well as firm data. Background-checks, conflict-clearance and non-disclosure agreements are required for anyone working directly on our account. In addition, our operators will be located in a separate and secure physical space within Integreon's facility in Fargo, ND, with a number of monitoring and reporting procedures in place." 

And, clearly, those in charge prefer order to the chaos that currently exists:

"For our users, the new platform will offer immediate benefits.  Currently, our users are partially responsible for directing their work into the centers by using one of seven email addresses, three phone numbers, three fax numbers or a limited web form (or contacting their preferred document center employee directly).  At implementation, this will be streamlined into one email address, one phone number, and one fax number which can be reached by anyone with an email address." 

This is what greeted me when I walked in this morning, next to G's photograph du jour:

G is behind "The Scream" trying to explain style separators over the phone.  The caller probably doesn't realize that it is a customized application that will be gone when the Document Center closes.

Then End of the National Document Center

We found out this morning that we've been outsourced.  I was sharing a super rush (the most unstable document I have had in my entire career) with the Doral doc center when we received word that they were about to go into a meeting with our national document center manager.  On my end, the office and human resources managers interrupted my mad rush with no concern, closed the door, and sat down looking very hang dog at me and G.  Since the first thing out of the office manager's mouth was "this is not good news," I figured it wasn't going to be good news.

So, I have been forced into early retirement today!!  Life doesn't get any more exciting than this. Thirty or so national document services specialists are being outsourced by Integreon.  I had thought of applying with them but they require a college degree (my stints at every city and community college within a 50 mile radius of my metropolis resulted in only an AA degree).  My last day will be 11/11/11.  I'll have a chunk of money from severance and over 9 weeks of accrued vacation, plus I'll get unemployment and let's not leave out the whopping $30 a month pension David left me, so soon I'll be off to see the world.  First stop, South Africa, via New England to visit family there.  My blog should get exciting now!  Any more excitement and I'll really lose my mind.  I was freaking out all day today.  I couldn't believe the document I had to work on today.  I mean, my concentration was basically absent.  I had thought of seeing if anyone else was available to work on that devil document, but I figured everyone else was probably freaking out also.

Well, except for the Silicon Valley operator, who was never part of the center.  She just crashed our party.  I kept her secret.  She saved my butt a time or two.  My James Bond life is over now.  I'm going to publish the Document Center Incident soon, and then leave that life behind me forever.

They are going to announce the closing of the Doc Center to the firm tomorrow.  Oh boy, won't that be fun!?

Sunday morning

Had a wonderful conversation with my daughter on the phone today.  We both finally got brilliant at the same time and figured out that - duh - we should just turn the video off of skype and then we can actually talk, and having figured that out, we can talk every Sunday, and it won't cost us anything, which is good because we are both broke.

So, here she is starting a new life over after being thrown off Mothership and losing her business thereby, and being basically unemployed and homeless in the street with her toddler, and here I am starting my new life over after having jumped Mothership myself, and my husband dropping dead, and finding out who I really am without him.  I'm finding myself, and finding out that I'm not who I think I am, so I'm in a perpetual state of "starting over."  I dress differently than me, and like different things than me, and love way more people than I do, and who am I anyway?  There are so many things I would like to be doing, is staying here going to my job every day really it?  What is holding me Here, really?  So, this morning decisions were made.  Within 2 years either she will be here or I'll be there.  Knowing that makes getting to sleep so much easier for both of us.

Meanwhile, ok, this is why I don't really worry about her.  Along with the horror stories of life as a broke, homeless unemployed single mother with no geographically convenient support group whatsoever, also come stories like this:  she is building her own house and having trouble with the decorations.  My granddaughter doesn't relate to the princess decorations she put up, so she has to update them with Dora the Explorer.  She spent 45 days at an Act for Change event, at which she made 4 lifelong friends and her daughter had a ball, and for which she created a Facebook page for daily following and gave the volunteers a way to stay in touch for the rest of their lives, for which I asked if she got paid?  Uh, no, she didn't get paid.  She sponsored the event.  Okaaaay.  And we wonder why she's broke?  Well, as it turns out, oy, she's such a mensch.  She's organizing her money better and ... actually, she's doing what I've been doing - learning to set aside money and plan how to use it.  She was actually able to afford the dentist when she was dying of pain with a toothache.  That's big.  When I come to visit no, I won't be sharing a room with the kid or sleeping in her office, but she has an actual guest room.  I don't know how we do it.

She's such an inspiration.  She told me she reads my August blog post every day.  Huh? I forgot what I wrote.  We both LOLed.  We even said to each other on the phone as we were laughing "LOL."  I'll have to go see what I wrote and see if it gives me daily inspiration.  

Meanwhile, I can stop worrying that my granddaughter will grow up before I meet her.  Two years will be plenty of time.

And while on the subject of babies, I got to Skype with Viv while I was in Miami.  She runs around and chatters now and has beautiful long black hair. But this is the most recent picture I have from June 2011.  She's standing!

Her grandma told me this story about her: She calls fish "sh" and giraffes "ff" and ducks "ck".  You get the idea.  So, when she saw a swan, you know a duck with a long neck, it was a "ffck." "Look ma, a f*ck!"