it was beige...

...as Grace Adler would say. That's how I'd describe my first week at my new job - nothing exciting or horrible. Just...beige. I went through the usual meeting the rest of staff (and of course, I won't remember two-thirds of the names for awhile), HR orientation and paperwork, getting office supplies and setting up my desk, and getting my feet wet in some of the work I'll be doing. I spent most of the week reading about patient health literacy and editing and revising patient education messages (200 of them, and more to come!) - that part was interesting enough, and it does make a nice change from having to write high-falutin' text for physicians.

The company is going through quite a hiring spree at the moment (two other people started the same day I did, a few others started last week or within the month, two more start next week) because they went from four clients to sixteen clients in a short span of time. Consequently, they are bursting at the seams in their current office space, and the new space (in the same building on the same floor, thank goodness) won't be ready for six weeks. So temporarily, I'm sitting with the programmers on a different floor, which is a bit incovenient seeing as my boss and all the people I'm going to be working closely with are all on a different floor. They're an extremely quiet bunch, which is just as well since we're all in cubicles. I was definitely spoiled at my last job with the luxury of a private office for six years. Here, only Director/VP/CO-level people get offices. Sigh.

A couple of weird things - one of my new co-workers is someone I went to elementary school with, and some of my former co-workers from a company I worked for about eight years ago work in the same building on the same floor I'm on. Why does this happen to me?

Things feel a bit scattered-brained and rough around the edges for a company that's been around awhile. A lot of right hands not knowing what left hands are doing, and so many people still on their learning curves. They'd known I was coming for two weeks, yet no one got around to having a computer or a phone set up for me. I nearly had to wait a week for a computer, but my boss put some pressure on the IT people, so I got one by the end of my first day. I won't get a phone until sometime next week, though. The training so far has felt like a lot of "oh by the way" stuff and very last-minute and jumbled. Supposedly, there's more formal training at the beginning of August.

This company is very programming-heavy. The writing that I do is the end stage of the data they wrestle with. The clinical people comb through medical guidelines and write out rules for determining what meds a patient should or shouldn't take or what tests they should have based on their medical history, and the guidelines change yearly as new studies are done. The programmers run the rules through their very complicated algorithm to match the rules to patient populations. Once they determine if a patient population is large enough for a patient education message, that's where I come in and actually write the message based on the rule, and attempt to make it sound as friendly and unscary as possible. The messages are then published and sent to the patient populations that need them. Nifty, huh?

And I have never seen a company so dependent on spreadsheets! It's like some kind of rampant addiction. They're everywhere - a spillover from the programmers and their raw data and testing, I imagine. Of course, Excel is my weakest program and an editor's worst nightmare. They also use the dreaded SharePoint, which could be worse if I hadn't been forced to use it at my last job, so I'm at least somewhat familar with it.

So losing Hunny last Saturday and having a beige week at work has sapped all my energy, even though I've been in bed super-early all week (I'm in bed writing this on my new laptop - yes, I did buy it like I said I would). My cat, Lyra, has been somewhat subdued all week, especially when she sees me cry at odd moments. She's not used to being completely by herself during the day. I think she liked Hunny more than Hunny liked her. I may get her a feline friend at some point in the future, maybe the beginning of next year. Certainly not right now, though. I couldn't bear it. I'm trying to psych myself up to take the open bag of dogfood to the animal shelter for donation.

I've only been able to muster enough effort to move Audrey Hepburn's Gardens of the World to the top of my Netflix list earlier in the week, and I've been watching the episodes for color and for calm and the pretty British voices (Michael York does some of the narration), and now I REALLY want a garden of my own, but I'm settling for buying a copy of the DVD. The tulips episode alone is worth the price.