start from 8:40am, i spent all of the morning just go through the case notes, consolidating the contact info, and making phone calls to owners and property managers. i finally stopped at 10:30am, i still hadn't used the bathroom yet, nor take a shower, or had breakfast. after finishing with the bathroom, i decided i'd have a cup of noodle soup because it was the quickest food option. when i grabbed the box, it realized i bought packaged ramen instead, not the cup kind. i ended up having simple ramen. the packaged variety doesn't taste like the cup variety, and even though both said beef, it tastes more like a savory salty flavor than anything natural.
i managed to leave the house by 11am, heading first to the forest street apartments. i went to the maintenance manager's office but i could hear he was on the phone, so i waited outside his office until he was done. he must've had a security camera somewhere, because after a few minutes he opened the door like he knew somebody was outside. he hung up his call so he could help me enumerate 10 addresses. i invited me into his office, with his white boards with unit listings, which ones were vacant, which ones people were moving in, which ones people moving out. he lives his life following these units, so wonder he knows everything about them. i actually managed to stump him today, he had to look up some info on his phone. i was curious where he was from so i asked, discovered he's originally from haiti.
i then spent the next hour filling out the case reports, one after another. i discovered i only had 8 cases, and 2 of the cases had disappeared from my list even though i already collected the info to close them. i ended up sending my supervisor the notes so she could forward them to whoever had those cases today so they can close them. so not only was i closing my own cases, i was also closing the cases of other enumerators!
so out of 24 cases today, i managed to close 18 of them, a 75% closing rate. i'm not even sure how i did it. but if we're speaking honestly, about 13 of them were freebies: 10 because i had dealt with the buildings previously so i had a maintenance/property/rental manager to call, and 3 that were harvard housing units that were closed after checking with my supervisor. that still meant 5 addresses closed the hard way.
i spent my break at michael's, chatting. i told him it'd be another week or so before i can get my prescription, because when i called my eye doctor, they said because it's been more than a year since my last visit, i was due for an eye exam before they would issue a new prescription.
my last 2 cases of the day took my close to my parents' cafe, so i went home to pick up a few things. the road crew had finished paving the street, neighbors were outside admiring their handiwork. i told beth that it looked like a mullet, business on the sides, party in the middle. apparently it made quite commotion, shaking all the houses on the street, even worse than yesterday when they were stripping the road. i went out again, this time via bike. after finishing the 2 addresses (neither of which i closed), i went to the cafe. my parents' were there, along with my sister and her godmother. i then made my way to belmont, where i could get a free dinner, but more importantly, to pick up the lawn aerator that arrived yesterday at home depot.
my father and i went to home depot after i arrived at the house (with the car, even though they left after me, they still managed to get home before). coming back, there was a hazy sun setting in the sky, courtesy of the west coast wildfires.
my father tried out the aerator immediately, it serves it purposes, glad we only spend $20 on it and not the nearly $40 the nearest cheapest coring aerator on amazon.
after dinner i biked home, getting another opportunity to use my powerful headlight. it keeps on slipping from the extension bar, i have to find a better way to mount it. maybe it's as simple as tightening the rubber strap. i didn't have my helmet and felt a little risky without it.
my supervisor sent us another nightly summary text. only 16 enumerators are left working cambridge, but we managed to close 125 cases today. that means the average close rate per enumerator was 8 cases. i managed to close 18 cases, not counting the 2 others i closed but ending up going to another enumerator. i was personally responsible for 16% of all the closed cases today!