Writing on the Wall

I'm just stopping in to say hi. I found out Monday night that I have to completely re-write a 4,000 word manuscript that St. Fozzie's is submitting for a federal grant opportunity. It's for $100,000 and this is the preliminary grant application I wrote last fall. After finding out it was accepted for full submission, I handed it off because I knew I didn't have the time to concentrate on it. St. Fozzie's hired a professional grant writer to create the new manuscript and our Director of Development called me in a shaky voice on Monday afternoon, asking me to read it.

I'm sorry I did. It's just too massive to fix. If I had it my way, I would re-write the entire document, creating a better baseline argument and flow of logic. I tried doing this, quickly got overwhelmed, and had to draw out the project on my office wall:

Yeah...complicated, eh?

I should mention, I only had the time to scribble on my walls because the Leadership Essentials meeting (at St. Rowlf's) I had scheduled for Tuesday was not on Tuesday. There was a miscommunication among corporate folks and it's actually Thursday. I didn't find out about this until I DROVE to St. Rowlf's. Well, Thursday, I'm leading a 3-hour Six Sigma class, attending an Operations meeting, and co-leading two other teams. So I ended up having a few "free" hours yesterday to work on this grant and I'll catch the Leadership Essentials class in May.

I had to stop "granting" because I was asked to be a mock Joint Commission surveyor and we had our intro meeting to that exercise for two hours in the afternoon. It is pretty cool, but I have to learn all the rules and regs for inpatient Rehab, our Inpatient Orthopedic unit, and PT/OT.

Returning to my office, the doodlings suddenly looked like graffiti on a train overpass and visions of pajamas danced in my head. I had to leave or I was going to quit my job in despair. Or worse, throw a stale, flat Diet Mt Dew at the wall so the graffiti ran in illegible fingers toward the floor!

So here I am, up at 4 a.m., slaving away on the manuscript. I have an "Ethics of Healthcare Reform" conference in downtown Chicago at 9 a.m.; at least I get a break from the office today and will stretch my brain in other directions.