Paperwork

I have too much experience filling out paperwork. If there is paperwork to be filled out, here Jeff, you are the detail person, and you do it best! Is this a compliment, a hand-off, or am I really that anal retentive person that insist that the detail is done and done right? Where am I going from here?

Everyone fills out paperwork and my situation is no different. I have filled out paperwork in triplicate for the government and the U. S. Coast Guard. Prior to that, I filled out huge amounts of paperwork when I went to the University of Alabama too many years ago. They do it all on computer now, and the registration is done mostly from home and the time on campus may even be nil when it comes to the actual registration. Back in 1955, it was two days of standing in lines to sign up for certain classes and trying to avoid Saturday class if at all possible. Now they don't even have classes on Saturday. My degree should have an asterisk by it as "let it be known that Jeff Nutter achieved this by attending Saturday classes and night classes when everyone else was partying and having a good time". Don't you think that should be on my degree?

I volunteered and joined the U. S. Coast Guard shortly after finishing college as Uncle Sam had given me a deferment for a year or two to finish. Now I was 1A and try to get a job when you are 1A. You signed your name on an application and then the form had a blank space for "draft status". Unlined was "if 1A-1D, stop here!" So I needed to get my military obligation behind me and the USCG Reserve was the way to go, or seemed more to my liking. Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork. No computers back in 1961, and the Coast Guard is part of the Treasury department and you have to pass the tightest security exam. They sent officers to talk to my neighbors, my minister, my employer, my brother, and just about anyone that might have some dirt on me. Well, I passed! Again more paperwork.

I have now been exposed to the paperwork in getting my mom into a lock dementia facility that she needs now at almost 91. I started yesterday after breakfast about 10:00am and guess what time I put the folder and briefcase away? 4:00 pm, or almost 6 hours with only three or four 15 minute breaks to relieve my writers cramps and deal with mother nature. I am still not through, as now I have a shopping list of things required on a check list that must be present for her to check in sometime next week.

So it is off to Home Depot and Walmart for the things she needed. I will stop here as like yesterday, telling you about this has made me tired. I need a break....Thanks Evan or Amie if you two have read this far!!!LOL/Jeff