I spent most of Monday and Tuesday politiblogging.

Beuhler is on vacation and it took some doing to make the bits of work I did have waiting stretch out enough to give me a reason to get out of bed in the morning for both days. (In fact, I succeeded in stre-e-etching the work so well that I managed to forget to do some of it.)

That all changed on Wednesday.

There's this project. A meeting we're planning for some Do-Gooders. I don't...didn't...know much about it. It's Sassy's problem, Buehler told me. Sassy and the California Gal are handing all of it, so don't worry your pointy little head over the details. Fine, I thought. If Sassy in NYC and the CalGal in California are putting together a meeting in Denver and don't need any help from someone located in Denver, I can live with that.

Besides, when it all came up, I was still busy with the Hell's Own Software project. Since then, as I've said before, HOS has ground to a (we hope, but don't believe) temporary halt. I have time on my hands. Time I've been spending stre-e-etching out the DarkGlass study work.

So, when Sassy asked if I could clear the decks for Thursday and Friday this week, to help with any little bits and pieces of stuff that might come up at the last minute, I was all for the idea. Can't spend every day playing Insanguinarium, after all.

Somewhere around, I estimate, Tuesday of this week, it all started falling apart. Deliveries weren't being delivered. Copy jobs weren't being copied. Educational notebooks weren't being assembled. (I got a look at the agenda and realized that the schedule was laid out by a lunatic...but that's a different rant.)

It's close to 100 degrees here in the afternoons right now, so I wasn't best pleased to be asked to visit the Downtown Branch of a Major Copy/Shipping Chain (who shall remain anonymous and hereinafter be referred to as Finko because I don't love them) yesterday.

Still, I like Sassy and I'd agreed to help so even though it was a full 24 hours before the legal start of my Amazingly Teamwork Oriented Volunteerism, I popped into my little car, shook my head over the 1/8 tank of gas, and headed Downtown. (I was expecting a Very Important Office Supply Delivery but I asked the Tweenybopper to keep her eyes out for it.)

I hate driving Downtown. Streets, as we all know, are laid out in a grid pattern. Except in Downtown Denver, where some raving psychotic decided that what we need were streets laid out in XXX patterns with all the streets going one-way the other direction, and occasional abrupt and inexplicable intersections between five streets, none of which actually lead in the direction you're going. And the one street that does seem to lead to your destination is always blocked off and under construction.

I won't give you chapter and verse on my attempt to journey the measly two miles between my office and the Downtown Finko office. Suffice to say that it was enlivened by stalled cars, jaywalking geriatrics, offloading trucks, police vehicles, and flat tires (not mine).

In spite of getting lost (don't ask) and driving for 12 blocks in exactly the wrong direction, I eventually overcame the negative cosmic energy and found not only the Finko office but a parking place a mere 1/2 block away.

35 cents later I was on my way inside to pick up the Vitally Important Print Job that Sassy had called about that morning and had been assured would be waiting for me. (Okay, the VIPJob was scheduled to be ready at 10 a.m., but I spent the first five hours of my day working on some other bits and pieces of the Meeting That Is Someone Else's Problem, and then what with getting lost and all, it was 2:38 when I strolled into the Finko office.)

The job wasn't done.

Not only was the job not done, a full 4-1/2 hours after it should have been, but they disclaimed all knowledge of it. No one there had ever heard of my, my company, or our print jobs.

The I.C. is good for a few things. I'm not normally very aggressive, but by that point I was In No Mood To Be Trifled With. I fixed the little blonde with my third-best mean-and-beady gaze and said, "Really?"

She went away and dug two of the three orders out of the bowels of their computer system and they were ready for me in five minutes.

The third job they persisted in refusing to disgorge. Some la-di-dah, I'll just bet story about not having received the files. I dropped off the 13 new print jobs I'd taken down with me (yes, I was suspicious of their bona fides by then, but I was running about of time), promised to e-mail the files for the Mysteriously Missing Print Job and scheduled to pick it all up this morning.

I made my way back to the office. The Very Important Office Supply Delivery hadn't arrived, so I called Sassy who called the company who swore it would be here by 5:00.

To make a long story short, I e-mailed the missing job to the Finko crew, called them this morning, confirmed they'd received it and that it would be ready with the rest of my jobs at 11:00 this morning.

The Very Important Delivery did not arrive yesterday, so I called Sassy again and she called the Very Stupid Delivery People who seemed quite hurt that when they'd brought our delivery by at 7:30 last night, no one was in the office to receive it.

This morning, I drove back Downtown (avoiding most of yesterday's Adventures In Urban Driving), coughed up three bucks for the parking place it took me 15 minutes to find, and hoofed it down to the Finko office for my print jobs.

The Original 13 were done. The ones I'd e-mailed, and called to confirm three hours before were...missing in action. Not done. No one had ever heard of me or my e-mail.

I ratcheted up to my second-best mean-and-beady gaze and said, with awful gentleness, "I did call this morning."

(Where was I? Bossyboots stopped in for a chat and distracted me from my rant.)

Oh. Yes.

Forget it. I'm bored of that saga. The Finko Staff did the copies, offered me no discount for having screwed up everything they'd touched (or forgotten to touch) over the last 24 hours, I made it safely back to the office with 20 minutes to spare before my training call, and the Very Important Office Supply Delivery did arrive a few minutes ago, so I have to go work.

Except...that means opening the Completed Job Boxes that I brought back from Finko's and although I did a cursory check of the copies while I was there and everything looked okay...I'm afraid.

Finko was formed by the merger of two companies. One specialized in making copies of things. The other specialized in delivering on-time, every time.

Since then, as near as I can tell, they've never managed to make any copies for me either right, or on time.

Drat. It just occurred to me that I haven't remember to empty the company mailbox in three days. It will be overflowing. That means a scary trip to the bowels of the building (who puts a conference level in below a parking garage? I suspect this building was once a fall-out shelter.) which means using the elevator. I have Dark Suspicions about those elevators.

Not that I actually mind having to jump up and down to make them move. I feel just like the girls in Thoroughly Modern Millie.