Hectic

Yesterday was a false alarm. Well, not a false one, the bells were set off on purpose. Will wanted to test our responsiveness to danger given our weakened state. We did fine, and he gave me the shittiest grin when he saw me on the wall with my bow. I almost think he did it just to prove he could get me out of my house if he wanted to, the clever bastard. I gave him a wink before I went home. He's still my friend.

Things are working out rather well, all things considered. We had a bad rush of victims of the new plague yesterday, another ten sick. We're still getting weirdly varied results, though. Some of the ill wake up feeling perfectly fine. This morning one of my own patients sleeping in my living room got up and felt wonderful. He'd only been sick for a few days.

And seven of those ten people aren't bad off enough to stop work. They feel like crap, their breath isn't coming as easily, but much like Jess they can work. Some more than others, but still doing something constructive with their time. More important, they're not using up the efforts of the medical staff.

This does create a special problem, however. As sick people get suddenly better, healthy people get either somewhat ill or totally incapable of caring for themselves, the schedule has to change. Some folks that do heavy labor come down with the new plague and can't manage tending crops or hauling firewood, but maybe they can work on armor or something else that doesn't require tons of effort.

What it boils down to is a hugely chaotic situation in which the different section managers of New Haven get reports each morning from all over the place with new listings for sick, healthy, and people in between. It's becoming a total clusterfuck to manage, because it takes so much effort to work out who can go where, to substitute this person here but then figuring out where the original person needs to be assigned...

Yep, guess who got the job of making all that work?

It's not that bad for me, because I don't have to worry about any other paperwork-type things while I'm doing it. I haven't got a section of New Haven to run, no department to head. All I have to do is take reports from all over the place and do the math. Difficult, but much easier than what my former trainees were facing by doing this and their normal jobs. The fact that my house is a more convenient point of convergence than the new, um, city hall or whatever you want to call it, helps. People running in and out all morning makes it a little hard to keep track of what I'm doing, but I manage.

The folks staying here with Jess and I aren't all that needy just yet. I help them with whatever they need, though mostly that's cooking for them and helping them use the bathroom. I don't have to do much in-depth work with any of them yet since they're still alert and capable of feeding themselves. A couple of them have even offered to help me with the schedule changes, which is endearing and funny. That kind of willingness to help also says a hell of a lot about the character of your average New Haven citizen. I gave them hugs and told them to shut up and get some rest, but I smiled when I said it.

Predictably, some people are upset that I've basically told the leadership to let me do what I want and got my way. Things have worked out well, and there aren't any snags so far. So my response?

Fuck 'em.