Tools of the Trade

I guess I should mention that the drill Mike was letting me "break" in for him was a $450 drill. That might put things in prospective just a bit.

As long as we're talking about tools, let's talk about an enumerator's most valuable tool. That would be a pencil. We get very possessive of our pencils. Several other partners said the same thing. In fact I was meeting with my CL (crew leader) and borrowed her pencil. The second I was done with it, she grabbed it back. It is pretty funny. But what would we do if we didn't have a pencil?

Friday I did my first solo census job. I have knocked on plenty of doors by myself, but there was always somebody within shouting distance. I drove out all by myself. It was a little unnerving at first but then I enjoyed the quiet time with myself. I have to admit that a couple of times I showed up at a door without a pencil. "How could that happen?", you ask. Well it is like this, my clipboard was loaded up with a blank questionnaire, a continuation form, my notice of visit which I leave in the door if no one answers, and the confidentiality statement. I usually clip my pencil to the clip board but got a little fancy and set it beside it thinking I could remember it. WRONG. I survived both times. The first time the lady answered and asked me to call her back. I wrote that with the pen in my pocket on my notice of visit (NV) since I wouldn't be using it. The next time no one answered so I was able to get my pencil out of my car and fill the NV out. I'm supposed to carry my bag to the door with me but it is heavy and bulky. I'm afraid it will bite me one of these times.

Today I worked for 7 hrs and did nothing. I didn't even knock on one door. We have a meeting every Mon AM. I did do a little there, but not much. I turned in some completed forms from the week-end. Then it was hailing and we thought it would be better to wait until late afternoon to knock on the doors that we had.

We met again at 3:00 to get new binders with more work since our old ones are almost completed. Well the binders didn't show up until after 4. Then we did the paperwork that we have to do with them. We went to 2 houses and it was raining and ugly and we are supposed to keep our forms dry. We decided to call it a day. The good news is that we filled in a form at one of the homes. The people live in Reno and come to this house once a month or so. It was such a good thing that we caught them. It maybe wasn't worth 7 hrs of work but maybe 5 hrs.

And I got to spend some time at home. I washed my dishes and cleaned off a couple of counters and did a little ironing. Things have been out of control here for the 2 wks that I have been working.