Yes, I'm alive....

but my job is killing me. I just don't have the energy to think another thought at the end of the day. If this is how it's going to be now that they Love Me, I understand why my former boss burned out and left. It's driving me nuts.

It's motivated me to get off my ass and resume my real estate home study, so I can get my license back and go do something much more relaxing than development - because, damn. Right now I'm the Dumping Ground of Everybody's Problems, including things that were broken long before I got there and which nobody knows how to fix. Give it to Catherine, now it's her project. I'm too old, smart and burned out to be the respository of all the crap. Yesterday I got the "I think you're one of the smartest people in the company" set-up to open a discussion of my new duties next week - no good can come of that. I don't want to be one of the smartest people in the company. I want to be one of the dizzy bitches who gets paid as much as (or more than)I do to do rote, monkey-like tasks all day.

I think I want to go sell condos to Active Retirees in Palm Coast.

Oh, and I re-injured my bum knee and I've been limping around all week. It starts to feel better and I do something stupid like forget it's annoyed with me and twist it in my sleep or pivot getting out of a chair and Owie. It's getting better, and by Monday I think it will be fine.

Oh, my God. while I'm writing this (and drinking coffee and catching up on recorded Stewart and Colbert episodes) the dogs asked to go out in the backyard. Okay, it's light out there, that's fine. A few minutes later I went to check on them. They'd found - and cornered - the baby possum. The poor little thing is so tiny, only about 8 inches long nose to butt. Dudley was just curious - Murphy I'm not so sure about - it's a rodent intruder in his yard, Yorkies, remarkably enough, are descendants from ratters, and he definitely was hearing the voices of his ancestors, telling him to kill it. Fortunately for the possum, he had no idea how to do this.

So I scrambled out there in my bare feet, with my sore knee, and shrieking like a banshee - I get all shrill and hysterical when I think an animal is about to be hurt - grabbed Murphy and yelled at Dudley to Leave It - Dudley did, very reluctantly - and herded him into the house with repeated shrieks of Leave IT! I'm sure the neighbors appreciated this, since it's not even 7 a.m.

Now I have to figure out what to do with the little orphan. It has to be an orphan* - mama possum wouldn't allow a baby that small to wander on its own like this, and we've seen it three times so far, always alone. Dudley is talking and crying at me, because he likes the little possum and wants to go see him again. Dudley can nag like nobody's business, dancing on his hind legs and making a variety of sounds that get damn close to actual words. Murphy is exhausted from protecting the homestead from Dudley's new friend. Damn, I do not need this.

*Edited - I did a little research and s/he could be a young juvenile. Either way, it's small and has decided it likes my yard. I'm hoping Murphy getting in its face may change its mind, but Murphy got in its face the other night and it's still here.