Our happy family

…is showing cracks.

Tonight was an interesting night! Got called into relieving today (that, is a story in itself).

One of the ortho guys is on leave, so they’ve hired a resident to relieve him. This reliever, however, doesn’t wish to work his late shift today, so admin have organized the other reliever to cover that shift. Now, she’s been sick this week: I sent her home on Monday morning. To my surprise, she’s around the next day, her cough sounding much worse and she’s seen her local doctor who’s given her a couple of days off. Just to tell me she can’t work this Saturday because of the funeral. “What time is it?” I ask. She’s vague about it. Never mind, it’s probably true; it has been in the news all week. That just leaves me, and I’m not adverse to surgical reliving.

To complicated matters, one of my other colleagues has been stuck without a day off for the last month. She wants a day off too (obviously), and despite me offering to cover her on Thursday and Friday elects to call up admin to get the other girl to do her Sunday long shift.

“Why don’t you take Thursday and Friday off? Both relievers will be around, so one of us can cover you while the other helps the post take team.”

“Don’t think I really need two days off. What about Sunday?”
“Sure, I can do your Sunday, but I won’t be around to help Monday.”
“No, you’re already doing Saturday. Besides, that would be too easy.”
“Too easy? You know if you talk to admin…, she’s just going to call me.”
“Well, then I’ll tell her you’ve swapped shifts. I want her to do it, because she’s slacking off all the time.” Rant/Rant/Rant
(WTH!) “I think I’d better call admin too.”

Anyway, it worked out well (for me), because Sunday was supposedly crazy as hell. Nothing too dramatic happened on Saturday, except at around 5 I was asked to relieve the on call resident who covers palliative care/psychiatry patients. “Just from 5:30-8:30, you’ll never get called,” he said. Why not? It’s something different, and it’s not like I’m doing much anyway. Of course, soon after he left, I started getting calls. At the end of the night I checked the rosters down at switchboard. Turns out that was his whole shift, and he wasn’t even the guy who was supposed to be on! Here I was under the impression he’d been there the whole day. Oh well, at least I’m entitled to claim a remote call allowance for the period. From memory, that’s 3 for every callback, paid at 1.5 for the first hour and 2x for the rest.

Lessons to be learnt here…
1) Women can be so bitchy.
2) Don’t be so obliging or people will walk over you.
3) Know your overtime rights!