16 September: anxiety and bureaucracy

Wednesday, 16 September 2020

Before bedtime, I had read a four day old letter from a big job that gave me so much anxiety I only got four hours of sleep. There was a form we had to fill out, which wasn’t the problem. The problem was that the letter contained the shocking information that if we hired any employees, which we have no intention of doing, the “prevailing wage” for “landscape maintenance” as set by the state Powers That Be (hereafter PTB) at $13.50 an hour. It was hard for me, and for other gardeners to whom I messaged the information, to figure out if this meant that our work client thought we were only worth $13.50 an hour. If we ever did hire someone, which we won’t, it would have to be someone who knows a choice plant from a weed, and that alone is worth more than $13.50 an hour.

Before bedtime, we got all our social security paperwork together and figured out if we could actually eke out a retirement starting in January on Allan’s 68th birthday. We could, sort of.

I only got four hours of sleep. Oh, I am repeating myself. I am tired.

I made a phone call at the ungodly hour of eight thirty AM and found out the $13.50 only would apply to this imaginary employee, which saved us from immediate outraged retirement, but i am still outraged that our work is considered by the PTB to be of such little value and apparently work test requires no skill or knowledge worth paying for. Then I had to wait another two hours for the appropriate person to be available to talk to about the form.

We still had to go online into the world of the PTB to file the form. I stared bleakly at the computer because I couldn’t even figure out how to LAUnCh the form. And this was supposed to be a work day.

Three phone calls later, I found out that we had to watch two and a half hours of interactive training videos about employees and other particulars relating to big companies and dump trucks and roadway building and delivery trucks. About five minutes of it applied to how to fill out our form, which was not unlocked till we were done with the videos, by which time the person who was going to help us fill out the daunting and baffling form had gone home. But at least the form was unlocked! More bureaucracy would await us the next morning. We cannot even work on our job till the form is filled out and approved by the faraway PTB. Even though it relates just to the hiring of employees, which we do not have, and which, as it turned out, we say on the form that we do not have.

I will give credit that the three different people we talked to on the phone at the PTB agency were kind, helpful, even a bit apologetic, and comfortingly funny.

Finally, in the very late afternoon, we were able to go do a tiny fraction of the work we had planned for today.

We did not have to water, as shown by Allan’s photo of the grey rain gauge.

Long Beach

We deadheaded the welcome sign, although not clipping every cosmos deadhead because there are so many now.

A gaillardia in the lawn nearby evokes memories of when the city used to plow and plant roadside verges of wildflowers.

Downtown, we pulled the Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ from under three street trees. I had seen how dead it looked in the Faux Rod Run video that I shared a couple of days ago.

We weeded horsetail out of Veterans Field garden beds.

Gaura ‘Whirling Butterflies’, ‘Jackman’s Blue’ rue ….is knowing that worth more than $13.50 an hour?

We weeded at city hall. I trimmed a variegated miscanthus back to the wall but forgot to take an after because of my anxiety that someone would come around the corner.

It was a brief enough work session so that I did not want to set up our cones. We’d had to dodge some unmasked people while doing the tree gardens, but it was not as stressful as being stuck into a planter with a hose on.

The hanging baskets from The Basket Case Greenhouse still look great.

They are sheltered from the wind on the entry ramp on the east side of the building.

I have a new hat, from The Sierra Club, not the Green Party.

The sun was setting.

While the air quality was still not ideal, the sky was no longer a featureless grey-orange.

We finished Fifth Street Park in the dusk, enough to not have to return to town tomorrow.

It is looking rather fine at the moment, even in the almost dark, except for this little bed.

The Solidago ‘Fireworks’ looks all off balance there without the sweet peas that didn’t happen. I think later I will move it to the centre of that bed, or maybe one at each end, so at least it balances the one in the other bed, in case whoever takes on the job doesn’t plant sweet peas. (Isn’t thinking about that sort of thing worth more than $13.50 an hour?)

I know now that as business owners we can charge a higher rate than that despite how the state values our work, but I am still feeling insulted, especially when during those training videos I saw that other employees, like carpenters for one example, were valued at $45 an hour.

At least it looks like we won’t be pushed into retirement before we had planned. There are certain jobs I’d like to keep into my 70s. But I have to admit that the idea of retirement looked kind of wonderful last night at one AM. And three AM. And four AM.

in real time, a kitten non-report

About ten days ago, I found out that the kittens would soon have a test, the results of which would take ten days to find out they were or were not cured of ringworm. I’m not sure when the actual test took place. As this post “goes to press” we have brought in our kitten supplies from the garage so they don’t get damp with the change in weather and put them in the bathroom that will be the kitten room when Nickel and Fairy finally come home. It kinda chokes me up to see the hopeful bags of kitten food and special litter for kittens.