I am exhausted. Purely and utterly exhausted. 

Work has been a nightmare. Currently enduring an eight day workday streak, and my night off on Thursday can't come fast enough. And if Rona and her hold over people wanting to buy more groceries isn't bad enough, our store has been plagued with a monumental challenge. If y'all read the newest entry for Dear, Grocery Shoppers, the new process of how our store's stock crew is to perform their job is truly kicking our spirits down. It's been a while since I've felt this drained. For the first time in almost a year, I had to resort to an Epsom salt bath. My knee is wrapped in a brace from the constant kneeling and unkneeling. This week is just some icing, as next week is going to be pure Hell.

Our store's dairy lead needed emergency rotator-cuff surgery, and he's going to be out for up to six months. Another dairy worker is on vacation next week, and another dairy worker is going to be off for a weekend. In unadulterated managerial decision making, it is up to the overnight stock crew to make up for lost manpower. Boy...oh boy. We are not prepared for this. 

Here's our game plan:  every member of the stock crew, including our supervisors, are going to be working a six-day workweek. The fella who will be taking the dairy lead's role for the next several months will be working all seven days of the upcoming week. We're all going to be working 48+ hours next week, and a few of us have been tapped to work the seventh day. By a few of us, I mean the best workers. This means...I have no freakin' clue when my next day off will be after Saturday night. I'm at a loss here. According to our HR manager, none of the people who applied to work for our store as new employees are 'available' to work overnights. 

No new workers, a brand new way (completely unproductive, by the way) of doing our jobs, an upcoming overhaul of our ordering and inventory management system, and a worn-out stock crew. Next week will be no fun. I've already warned Noah about my soon-to-be cranky mood for the entire time, and despite his positive mental attitude, I just don't think the poor guy is ready. I'm already irritable about the lack of performance from the crew over the last several days, and it will not get better. 

That isn't to say that I got this. I got this. I've endured worse. I did a thirteen-day workweek just last month. Several years ago, I mustered through an eighteen-hour shift. This is just another hurdle. 

If there is one thing I have to say to Rona and her devious tactics that have plagued our world, it is this:  you can't break me. I've been working hard for a long, long time, sweetheart. This...this new little stunt you're pulling on our stock crew. It's cute, I'll tell ya that. 

Unfortunately, this will probably cause some pushback on my writing time. I have a couple of chapters pre-written, and that'll help out, but my pacing will be thrown off. I'll do my best to keep up, but I'll be needing to rest when I can for these upcoming weeks. The important thing to remember about this scenario is that this is a marathon. Back in March, I endured my first sprint, dealing with monster-sized orders, stocking my aisle until the crack of dawn, and straight up performing. But sprints aren't my thing. I live for a marathon. 

I've always had the pipe-dream of setting the world record for the longest worked shift in retail history, and I know I can do it. It seems like a wild and silly dream to have, but I've sprinkled the concept in DGS. I love to work. There's nothing I'd rather do than bust my back, put in a hard day, and be able to say that I'm contributing to something worthwhile. My position isn't looked at in a highsighted light very often. It is my role, and my stock crew's role, to put the groceries on the shelf so you and your family can have a meal. I put some serious pride into that thought. Do I wish for a better job? Hell yeah, but I'm happy where I'm at now. I like being one of the ten reasons why there is food available for purchase in the store I work at. I am one of the ten people that allows our store to hit $1.3 million in sales a week. 

And this marathon has me salivating. 

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In other news! In case my In the Shadows fans missed it, Rising in the Shadows now has its first chapter! You may have missed it since I post-dated the publishing and it got buried in the Stories page. Oopsie daisies! My bad! That'll be the last time I do that, I promise! I got two more chapters in the waiting as I tackle the next when I get off work tomorrow morning. I need to find time to edit Noah's next entry into Dear, Grocery Shoppers, and I just posted Chapter 7 of Cernunnos. I'm remembering my words of "Aaron, don't bite off more than you can chew." I'm almost at the point of eating my words, but I'm just waiting for someone to tell me to quit poking it with my fork. No, sir! I shall poke and prod my food as long as I can! 

And wow! Love in the Shadows is getting closer and closer to 60k views! I'm stunned, in all honesty! I just wrote that out of sheer boredom, and look what I did! Sixty thousand views. That is just bananas! I'm glad I finished it, though. I'm not one to finish hobbies, and seeing it done is so satisfying! 

It's bedtime for me. I just wanted to get that little life update off my chest. Through the next week or so, I'll do my best to keep up with my writing, but it took me almost twice as long to pump out the newest Cernunnos chapter. I usually crank that out in several hours, but this one took about six hours across three days. I don't feel myself burning out...but I am going to need some pep pills or something. 

Anywhoosin...night!