Just a Question

I've decided that this blog is going to be a weekly one. This is due mostly to the fact that when I get off work, I'm just too tired to do anything accept watch a little boob-tube and eat some Ramon noodles. Perhaps this will change once I get out of training and start doing my job in earnest, but I'm not going to hold my breath just-in-case.

I've been trying to keep up with the blogs of my friends, but they, too, have to wait until the weekend, and I usually don't comment on them. My poor friends. They must think I don't love them anymore, and that I don't find what they write interesting, but I do. I truly do. I just don't have a lot to say right now that doesn't have something to do with work. This leads me to the question I want to ask with this blog:

Do you (have you, would you, etc.) allow work, school, social obligations, family, etc. to consume you to the point that it engulfs you, forcing you to foresake what you consider the pleasures of life?

(Obviously, my answer to this question is yes. You can use the two posts I've made since I started working as evidence. Throw on top of that the fact that I only leave the house to go to work, and it becomes clear that I'm working myself up to lonely recluse status. Ay, me. Looks like I'll be dying alone. I won't be found for weeks, and my body will be gnawed by the dozen or so cats I'll have collected by then.)

There's Just Too Many Verbs

So, I've started my new job with Express Scripts. I think it's going to be a good job, and I like the people who work there. But there's one thing that bothers me. Friday, in my training class, we were asked to write a definition of a Patient Care Advocate in our little four person groups. Then, we all came together as a class and wrote a definition. What we came up with, or rather, what the rest of the class came up with, while stating what we all thought would make a good PCA, was horribly wrong in the grammatical sense.

I say that the rest of the class came up with it because I bit my tongue, for the most part, refrained from becoming the grammar Nazi I usually am, and allowed them to express themselves. It was very painful for me to hear, and see. The biggest thought in my head was, "Too many verbs." In fact, I think I pointed this out to them out loud, but no one took any heed. I'm not sure they even understood what I was trying to say. I don't think they realized that trying to fit utilizing, supporting, educating, assisting, providing, (and several more verbs in the same vein) was a bad thing in a one or two sentence statement.

In the end, they only used about half of the verbs they had originally suggested, but it was still too many. I wonder if I should have spoken up? But then again, how important is it to write grammatically in a class in which we are only learning to speak knowledgeably and empathetically to patients, not to write in this manner. After all, when speaking, all of these people seem to have a fine grasp of English grammar.