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Could be someone I know, someone I don't know, fictional characters, dead people. I don't care, I'm an equal opportunity complainer when it comes to complete dickwads.

Wherever there's a Complete Tool, I'll follow closely behind with my anonymous bitching. 'Cuz that'll show 'em.

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Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Who Flipped On The Crazy? Part 2



The continuing saga...

I get in to work yesterday, fully anticipating a craptacular time.  I was not disappointed.  It was moments after arriving that I discover two things: 1) EmployeeVonMunchausen is piiiiiiiiiiiiiiissed about something.  I don't really have time to coddle her, so I chose to ignore the shit out of her and 2) the intern was not coming in until later that day.  Oh, awesome.  Me and Lil Miss Sunshine alone.  For hours.  Spectacular.

This, of course, does not stop MisManager from calling a meeting with me.  She's been dying to give me a report about the things that happened while I was gone.  The more she talked the more I began to mentally sort her list of complaints into different categories:

I. The Stuff She Actually Witnessed

She can give firsthand testimony to:
  • The fact that one of the crew ("Carlos") was spinning around on his chair while talking to his coworkers during some down time.
  • MisManager brought the whole crew potted flowers.  "Carlos" colored one of the 2 flowers that bloomed on my Lead's potted daisy with a black Sharpie.  She told him that was rude and she couldn't believe he would do that (he's a 20 year old kid who lives to antagonize my Lead....why was she so surprised?).  Then she got mad at him for trying to exchange the defaced plant with his own.  She accused him of being ungrateful.  Make up your damn mind lady.
All of this amounts to "who gives a shit."

II. The Stuff She Heard From Other People

Not too many details in this category.  Apparently when my people complain to her, she doesn't think too much of doing that pesky "asking questions" thing.  This is why I didn't want to get too worked up over the list she gave me until I'd had a chance to talk to my people.

She said that others complained to her about:
  • "Carlos" and Jailbait (hereafter referred to collectively as The Boys) were playing the whole time.  They, according to second hand story, partied all week and snapped at anyone who tried to get them to do anything.
  • The Boys didn't help perform any of the tasks to open the office.
  • The Boys didn't help perform any of the tasks to close the office.
All of this is stupid petty bullshit that I obliterated with about 2 minutes of investigation.  Uh, we have record logs of the times that we interacted with our clients.  We also have a checklist that employees initial for closing.  It's not hard to work that shit out.  Oh, and the strenuous opening tasks: get the mail bag ready and make sure we take the customer pick-up tray out of lock up.  Even if they didn't help participate, who gives a fuck?

The conclusion: they helped a proportionate amount of clients and Jailbait himself initialed more than half the crap on the nightly checklist.

This is why details are important.  Next time she needs to do what I do when I get this pettiness in front of me: explain to them exactly what they need to "put in that person's file".  Yeah....I'm taking you seriously and we're in it together.  Gimme the goods, Tiger (that's what she said)....  What ends up happening, most of the time, is a lot of immediate back pedaling.  That's what I thought.  Shaddup! 

III. The Only Actual Problem That Occurred While I Was Out

MisManager and Lead were off to a development class, which left EmployeeVonMunchausen alone with The Boys for half a day.  I know she was dreading it, but she's been dying for opportunities to show how ready she is for a promotion.  There you go EVM.  You can do it!

But she didn't.  At all.  Her big plan to make nice and ensure a pleasant day, was to bake The Boys a pan of brownies.  YES!!  Then she follows it up with a speech that went like this:

I made you guys some brownies because I want us to have a good day.  I want to make it clear, though, that if you screw around I will tell MisManager.

Facepalm.

Oh, EmployeeVonMunchausen, no.  You had them at brownies!!!  Really, with them you just had to say, "Brownies!" (if you had to say anything) and they would have been your best friends.

This was my big concern because, according to MisManager The Boys were avoiding EVM for the rest of the week and their cooperation and communication totally broke down.  Oh man, I do not like coming back to personnel squabbles.

What did I do today?

I got everyone's stories.  Funny enough, no one else thought that The Boys were a problem.  Hmmmmm...  Oh, except for EmployeeVonMunchausen.  Surprise!  She actually started crying when I talked to her because last week was HELL for her.  Yeah, well, that's what happen when you say stupid shit to your coworkers and they don't want to talk to you.  Funny how that works.

Things are back to normal now.  I declared a "breather" day and we all just concentrated on having fun.  Together.  Even you EVM, even you.

Get ready for Part 3, however, because EmployeeVonMunchausen has a very interesting idea of how to contribute to group fun...

Sigh.  Thanks for the blog fodder, EVM.

2 comments:

Candice said...

Kind of makes you want to quit your job, huh? ;)

Is being homeless REALLY that big of a deal?

Awesomeness said...

You have no idea. Homelessness would may be manageable if I didn't live in Phoenix. Only the REALLY crazy homeless people hang out here in the summer. ;)

I'm fortunate to not normally have these kinds of issues, but I guess EVM thought she knew better...

Things are getting back to normal now, but it's not what I wanted to come back to.