Long long day

I thought about posting to FB, but had a bit of a FB incident today and just didn't feel like it. Also, today has been too long for a FB post - two days long at least. I went to work at six this morning and worked until noon getting done just half of what I needed to accomplish because my XML reports just wouldn't run. And my tech guy kept saying he didn't know what the problem was, they ran for him. I'm enough of an (ex) programmer to feel that when you enter the same parameters, the same way, in the same program, you ought to get the same results. But I didn't. Took SEVEN TRYS to get the first data set instead of an error message, then another half dozen to get the second data set. Then I had to combine them. I'm working with really large Excel files here - in excess of a quarter million lines, and running macros moves from two or three minutes to twenty minutes or more as my program cache gets overfull. Even when I save after every action, and close the app, and reboot the computer. I know when one of my sorts hits 30 minutes that I just HAVE to take the time to stop, drop files, clear everything, rebuild my memory, and defragment or it's going to take even longer than that process takes to do each little data task. So what should have been two hours work was six.

And then I went home to lunch with the marvelous Megan and her sweetie and my grandbabies, but had to go BACK to work over the afternoon (which I had wanted not to do) and work until after six in the evening getting the next two data sets pulled and processed and loaded. During this Jack had a three-year-old screaming meltdown (I admire his vocal ability and think he should train for the opera) which didn't bother me nearly as much as it bothered his mother.

Kent made dinner, but the fish did not turn out well (although we ate them anyway), and then I finished reading April Henry's THE GIRL WHO WAS SUPPOSED TO DIE while eating Butter Pecan ice cream (with Sappho). The best thing about her YA novels, is it's pretty easy to finish one in two moderate sittings (one last night after I went to bed and then this one after dinner). It must be hard to write a story with that much detail and character development and a twisty plot and have it all move along and reach a satisfying conclusion in such a relatively short book. I raised my head from my iPad after the last page and was sure for at least two minutes that tomorrow is Wednesday.

I'd like to find some fast and satisfying conclusions right now. I'd like my nephew not to have dropped me and two other family members on FB because we all commented - genuinely quietly and politely - that a joke he made about Nazis and the Jewish Sabbath really wasn't funny and just reflected badly on him. I'd like to be able to phone or text or email or write to lisajulie and actually get an answer back. Because I want to talk to her so much it hurts. I'd like to know reach some closure on whether or not my church is going to close or keep attempting to function without enough money to pay our payroll, or our rent, or our utilities. I'd like to not have three more small data jobs and one huge double data job yet to do before COB on Wednesday. I'd like to think that my computer tools would work the way they are supposed to when I sign on tomorrow morning. I'd like to have time to spend with my daughter and my grandchildren rather that hiding in the basement staring at the computer.

See, I knew this was too long for FB! And thank goodness, no one reads LJ anymore, so no one will hear me complain. And after all, tomorrow is only Tuesday, not Wednesday, so I have plenty of time to get things done. Plenty of time. Plenty of time.