So now I'm merchandise...

Initially (as far back as I'm going to bore you with), the plan for this week was that I pack the things that needed to be transported to NYC by Wednesday, and that my mother would drive up to Ithaca on Tuesday in order to do the transporting on Wednesday. The wishful version was that I'd have all the other things in storage by then and have the apartment clean and all errands accomplished, so I could be transported then as well. Needless to say (if you know me), this was not likely. Plan B was that I would stay to finish all of the above and travel to NYC by bus on Thursday evening, so that Friday I could register with the temp agency that will be paying me for my work this semester. (For logistical reasons, my "internship" is really a contracted temp job). All this was for the purpose of starting work this coming Monday.

A little background: Mr. C, who will be one of my supervisors and is the person who offered me the position, told me originally that all the details regarding my payment would be taken care of by the temp agency, so I should contact them about it and then inform him of the date I wished to begin work. Since the agency told me I could register as soon as a day before I started, I planned the Friday-Monday schedule as mentioned above. Last week, I emailed him again to remind him of this arrangement, but later the same day I received an email from the woman in HR saying she'd need a week to do the paperwork on me and find me a workstation after I registered with the agency, so I should plan to start on Tuesday the 18th instead (the 17th being a legal holiday). I said wa-ait a minute...if I had known she needed that time I would have come to the city a while back just to register and then come back to pack and move. How come they didn't tell me this before? Well, turns out it was simply a lack of communication (there's a shocker!) between my supervisor and HR, but the matter isn't really flexible because approval to hire me must be gotten from higher up.

Fine. So in order to avoid missing an entire week of work (and pay), I spontaneously came back with my mother (who was a real trooper, helping me load the car and then driving for at least half the trip on snowy, slushy roads on Wednesday morning), leaving my apartment looking like a tornado hit it, so that I could register on Wednesday afternoon, so that they could start the ball rolling and be prepared to welcome me to the office next Wednesday. Now I have to return to Ithaca for a few days before then to finish the job I left undone. It's a hassle, but the best compromise I could work out.

Here's the kicker, though: The forms they need to send in for me are not exactly for approval to hire me, because I won't be a real employee. They're more like a purchase order. In a way that makes sense, because they will be purchasing my services from the temp agency...but to me and my mom, standing amid the boxes and all the random things in my apartment, nothing could have been funnier. Mom wondered aloud if they were going to box me?!