Working From Home

Remember...
Many a good face...
Under a ragged hat.
Master Chen Hai Yang

I'm at home today with a raw throat, another victim of the terrible colds that everyone seems to have at the moment. It starts with a sore throat and usually develops into a full-blown flu that can last up to 2 weeks. Our Medical Centre has been packed solid most days with sick people. Both Carly and Alex have had days off school, and people from work have all been sick. I'm taking the day off from work in the hope that it won't develop into anything worse. I can't afford to be sick.

I went in to work this morning to let them know I wouldn't be in, and grabbed a survey that I've been working on for the last couple of weeks that has been haunting me. It's been the first thing on my mind when I wake up in the mornings. It's a survey for the Department of Planning that all Councils have to complete, asking questions about all the development applications lodged last financial year. Just getting my head around it has been a major problem.

I worked on it all Friday afternoon, all day Monday, and half of yesterday, and thought I'd finished it until I showed it to our Manager for Planning and Development and he started questioning the figures I had come up with. I discovered that I'd done it wrong and was devastated. After looking at it again today, and another half a day of working on it, I've finally finished. The amendments weren't so bad after all. We had to divide all the applications into categories, and I'd put some where they shouldn't have been. Then work out net, mean and median times for approvals, (lots of maths) and development costs. I feel quite relieved now I don't have to worry about it again until next year, when it should be much easier.