The beginning

So, for the time being there won't be many pictures up, since I just moved to Missouri and can't find my camera cord (I'm sure I'll find it when I unpack all my stuff) but watch for pics of my new friends and places. This is one from my graduation pics that Coleman took for me (thanks girl!) so it's a few months old, but I figured I needed a picture of myself up here.

Something I've been meaning to write my family about, but haven't got around to it: my desk at work. It's huge. It's a big circular thing, bigger than a half circle, with the computer in the center. On one end of the desk is a filing cabinet and a locker to put coats and things in (and that's loads of fun, I keep forgetting to take them home until I get two umbrellas and three coats in it, and then I look very silly carrying them down the hall to my car.) I have a couple of overhanging shelves and desk organizers, as well as a hole punch (the two hole kind), a stapler, a phone, a pen holder, and a paper clip holder. My printer is under the desk on top of a little stand where I can put three different stacks of paper. There is also a garbage and a shred bin under my desk.

Now, when I started this job, I couldn't imagine using all the space on the desk. I thought it was way too much space, and that I would always feel like a space hog. Never mind that everyone else was using their space, I just couldn't see it. Boy, was I wrong.

Right now my desk is cleaned off since I'm out of town, but a couple of days before I left for training, I was looking at my desk wondering where the space went. The desk organizer used for paper has different forms on every shelf. On a typical day I have 5 or 6 different piles of files arranged on my desk. Let's go through these, shall we? I have two separate piles for approvals (because I work with two different forms); a pile that needs more extensive background checking; a pile who had hits in the background check that I haven't resolved yet; a pile of hits that I have resolved and haven't gotten to my supervisor yet to approve; a pile that needs some preparatory work before I can run the background check (basically something I have to type up and print out); a pile I don't have the training to work on yet and need to pass of to someone else; and a pile that I have questions about. Oh, and a pile of finished forms that I haven't sent out yet. OK, so that's 9 piles, but some of those are transitory, or only have one or two files. I've gotten to where I make a note on a sticky note and put that on the top file so I know what the pile is for, especially before I go home for the weekend. I also have one of my overhead hanging thingies (I don't know what else to call it, it's not a shelf) that I use for files that I need more information on, especially when I requested another file from somewhere else in the building.

On top of all this is the little things that come with the files. One of the items in my pen organizer is a stapler remover, and I use it ALL THE TIME. So right around my computer I get all these little staples, or sometimes pieces of staples, which I periodically gather up and throw away. I also get tons of elastic bands that come wrapped around files that are related, and I have a nice big pile of them that spills over onto my work sometimes. I really need to bring a basket or something for those when I get back.

The big shelf that I have isn't too full yet, but that's where my books from training are going to go, along with any other materials that I decide I need to have readily available. I am a computer user, so it's likely that I'll rely on my computer more, and not have too many of those. But my desk is full (at least when I'm in Missouri). And I am no longer skeptical of the need for a big desk.

I have more to write, including some adventures in training, but my lunch break is almost over so I need to get back downstairs. So I'll just say до свидания и люблю вас! (goodbye and I love you all)