Home Blogs Bathroom Break, Boss? Week of 31 March 2002
Week of 31 March 2002
Not Work Related
You know. This has nothing to do with work but it has to do with anonymity. On top of a work blog....I think there should be a ROOMMATE blog... oh oh oh how I would love to bitch about them right now.
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It Ain't Over 'Til the Fat Man Gets Canned
It's been a fun ride, but now my Corpulent, Lazy-Ass Co-worker is just about a day or so from being canned. How odd to know this when he doesn't. It's actually kind of a sad feeling. He's talking about bringing in a boombox next week and asking me if I mind. I feel like I'm in a movie where someone's dying, and I'm trying to hold back tears while telling them how when they get better we'll go to the circus.
Except of course in this case I couldn't be happier. I know that sounds harsh, but I'm sorry, this guy is an uber-loser. It's not just his incredibly slovenly ways (did I mention that he rubs his snot into his shirt?), chronic belch-a-rama and near-total absence of personal hygiene, but also his amazingly repellent personality and nonexistent work ethic. It's hard to feel very sorry for a guy when the supervisor comes over twice in one hour to tell him to stop web surfing and get back to work, and each time he goes right back to it as soon as her back is turned. Some jobs, you can get away with this, but this isn't one of them. If you slack off here, it's readily apparent. So you've really got to have a career death wish to laze around like this when you know you're being watched. Sheesh.
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Once upon a time I worked for AOL. I held the coveted position of working in the techmail department, which meant I didn't have to talk to the stupid people on the phone. I only had to try and make sense of their email, which was usually a complaint about busy signals or a request for instructions on how to eliminate traces of online porn viewing or cyber-infidelity.
Creating time to slack was simple because it was easy to manipulate the system. As long as we answered 33 emails per hour we wouldn't get in trouble, so we'd slam through a bunch of canned answers for 15 minutes and goof off for the other 45.
When you have a group of 15-20 idle computer geeks logged into AOL, which they despise, you have a great deal of power at your fingertips.You have an army. A mighty geek army with one mission: payback. Day after day of putting up with stupid AOL members, even if that meant sending out canned answers for 25% of the day and sulking the rest of the time, demanded retribution.
First everyone in the department would create screen names that were alike. After seeing Pulp Fiction we all decided to be gimps. There was NakedGimp, HappyGimp, UltraGimp, GimpyLeg, and so on. Once we had about 15 gimps online and ready to go, one of us would call out a chat room name. Friends of Bill W. Boston M4M. MarriedButLooking. Whatever room was called would soon be drowning in a horde of gimps swarming into the chatroom like locusts.
At first the people in the chat rooms would be amused, asking how 15 people with similiar screen names all wound up in the same place. Next they became annoyed after realizing that all 23 slots in the room were full, so no one else could get in to talk about whatever the actual topic was. Once that realization settled in we would break out the big guns.
On cue, all the gimps in the room would start saying random Zippy the Pinhead quotes. There would be a handful of people trying to talk about sex in public restrooms and three times that many saying "I'm EMOTIONAL now because I have MERCHANDISING CLOUT!!" or "The FALAFEL SANDWICH lands on my HEAD and I become a VEGETARIAN..." or "All I can think of is a platter of organic PRUNE CRISPS being trampled by an army of swarthy, Italian LOUNGE SINGERS..."
We'd stay as long as it took to disrupt whatever conversation was being held prior to our arrival. After the non-gimps had left in disgust the gimps would vanish as quickly as they'd arrived, off to another chat room. BiMoms4BiMoms. Looking4JOBuds. Itz420tyMe. The Gimp Army's work was never done.
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My manager asked me yesterday if I would work with her today 10-4, since I cancelled a trip, I said sure. She had the DirectTV set to the music channel and played country all day. :( My ears are bleeding.
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Porn deletion is great and everything . . .
But it isn't exactly what I want to do with my life.
I'm an actress sadly enough. My world is about my "look" and my age. Luckily some of it has something to do with my acting. Some of it.
I'm at one of those lovely cruxes in my life where I'm just out of school, eager to work as an actor, trying to get by and figure things out. Silently wonder about my nose shape, about how much older I can get before I make it . . . is it too soon or too late to think about going back to school. You know, for like law or something.
Silently wonder if this uphill battle as an Asian-American actress really worth it.
And then you have a nice day. A day where you get to do a monologue just right. When some Industry person sees you and looks like she's writing good things about you on your headshot . . . A day when you see yourself on tv.
The other day I was just casually watching this special on Halle Berry. It was the day after the Oscars and this was just some stock documentary about her on a Woman's cable channel from the days of her Dorothy Dandridge project. I was still inspired and secretly happy about her win while I watched it, kind of eager to absorb the tales of her past, her struggle, eager to glean some insight onto my own struggle, skectically wondering why she looked so different from her high school photo . . . when I saw myself. I literally saw myself.
A promo for that channel had suddenly came up and there I was, for one brief second, typing on a laptop on the television screen. Odd. I barely realized it was me. And then all of a sudden it came back to me, those hours under those lights and makeup. This one wild day that came from a simple mailing of pictures. There wasn't much money from it but I got this first professional experience, a dressing room, a crew, a shoot. This was the footage from that strange day on a far-flung side of Manhattan not too long ago.
Like a premonition, or a poltergeist, my black hair, the yellow face disappeared before I could even really see it, and on the program went. After I shouted the good news to her, the little girl I was babysitting, but who preferred to be on the computer in the next room, would run in during every commercial break afterward hoping to see me, excited to see me. And I continued to watch the special as well, hoping to catch myself again too, but the end of the show came and went and didn't. And that little girl has since forgotten to check that station for me. And in an odd strange way I'm glad I didn't see it again.
Let's hope that this other thing I got paid for (not a whole lot but hey) is just the beginning of something better . . .
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Sometimes There's Justice
So as I'm sitting at my desk just now my supervisor comes up behind me, places her hands on my shoulders, leans really close to my ear, and whispers softly...
We're interviewing next week to replace [Corpulent Lazy-Ass Co-worker]. He should be gone by Friday or Monday...
I love the smell of napalm in the morning.
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A Working Class Hero Is A Great Thing To Be: Part II
Springtime in my second year of college was spent raising beer money for my fraternity pledge class. One of our means of raising funds was directing parking at nearby Irvine Meadows Amphitheater. Work consisted of standing around the parking lot in our blue jackets waving our flashlights back and forth and back and forth. Now that I think about it, I don't recall directing parking lot traffic being an very productive job. But it paid an hourly rate of $6.50 and we could see the shows after the lot was full, so it was not a complete bust.
I saw some epic crap that spring: Tears For Fears and Whitesnake immediately come to mind. But the mother of all crap shows during my tenure at Irvine Meadows had to be none other than Grammy contraversy Milli Vanilli. The crowd that night was a circus. Hundreds of teens ran rampant wearing glow necklaces and t-shirts screened with Fab and Rob striking supermodel poses. Overweight parents with fanny packs stretched around their waists plodded around trying to keep up with their crazy screaming children.
The opening act was Young MC of Bust A Move fame. Being the consumate frat boy that I was, of course I owned Young MC's cd. So when he started rapping and sounded dead-on like his disc, I started poking my buddy Simon and shouting into his ear "Hey man, I think he's lip-synching!". Afer a few rhymes I concluded that he was in fact "pulling a Solid Gold" and lip-synching. The only live rhyme he did was Fastest Rhyme where he rapped accapella. I started feeling cheated even though I was technically getting paid to see the show.
Then Milli Vanilli took the stage. Kids were going bonkers. To get in the spirit of the crowd Simon and I jumped up and down, threw down the Smurf dance and did a few chest bumps. Fab and Rob were on fire. They bantered with each other and worked the audience with masterful perfection.
"Look at all the beautiful ladies We loooove all the beautiful ladies, don't we Rob?"
"Yah Fab, we loooove all the beautiful ladies."
Smoov. So smoov. But when they started singing I found myself getting suspicious again. I poked Simon again and yelled into his ear "Hey man, I think these guys are lip-synching too! How the fuck can they sprint around and chest bump and sing at the same time without sounding the least bit out of breath? They can't! RIPOFF! RIPOFF!!!".
Months later Fab and Rob were holding a press conference and giving back their Grammys for being nothing more than musical facades. A sad dose of reality. They were puppets: strategically packaged and marketed but in fact only an illusion of productivity. Kind of like my job as a parking attendant.
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The Area Manager came into today. He looked at me, doing my job, and said "Hi, NamethatisnotRebeccabutismyrealname. How are you today?" I said "Oh, you remembered my name!" all silly and teasingly-like. He said "Of course I do!", smiled at me, and walked off, leaving me to explain to his back and shiny bald head that he called me Rebecca last time he was in.
And he didn't even notice.
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The store manager at my Blockbuster is starting to get on my nerves. Supposedly she has trained people before, but seems oblivious to the fact that I am the new girl and don't know half the stuff. I guess she has a whole store to think about and she's doing her best. It's hard being the new girl. I haven't been the new girl in a long time, almost ten years.
Tonight it seemed like I got all the weird stuff. I managed to fill my credit slip sheet. I had at least two people come in saying they had rented the wrong thing. "The wrong movie was behind the box" When I check people out, I open the box to check that the box and tape/disk are the same thing and I say the title to the customer. People don't listen, I swear.
My first night working I heard about another girl named Heidi who worked there. The guys seemed to not like her. They said even with me being new and not knowing a lot, I was still preferable over Heidi as far as who to work with. So, tonight I finally got to work with Heidi. She is 19, talks fast and talks a lot. I talk fast at times and when I am nervous or excited I talk too much, but she puts me to shame.
The manager, Chip, was actually from another location filling in. Heidi flirted like crazy with the poor boy. He seemed to brush it off pretty well. She reminds me of myself at her age. That just occured to me. Except I didn't wear glittery eyeshadow.
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New Hire
So last time I mentioned anything about any of my coworkers was the brown-noser who would take massive notes whenever my boss would be teaching us shit. Well, it's been awhile -- but he quit a few weeks ago. Today I walked into work and discovered that my boss has hired a new lab assistant to replace the previous buttmuncher....
His name is Darryl.
I used to believe that everyone at my school, no matter how geeky or studious they are, they don't look all too bad. However, this new guy disproved my theory. This guy's gotta be King Nerd (in looks) of the school, complete with big and round spectacles, big messed up greasy hair, icky free t-shirt, super stained khakis and your classic worn-since-grade-school white high tops.
Call me shallow, but I don't know if I can work with the guy. Someone please bring him back to 1987. Thanks.
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Revenge is a Dish Best Served With Total Quality Assurance
There are 8 million stories in the naked city, and each one of them ends with a dial tone....
The time: last autumn, a Friday. The place: Tech Support Hell. I get a phone call from a client. Let's just call him "Ernie Bishop." Ernie calls up all hot under the collar because he exchanged a unit and didn't receive it the next day. (We have a policy that any exchanges processed by noon will ship the same day overnight.) I look at the faxed service agreement and sure enough, he got it in just under the wire.
I apologize and tell him that the unit should be shipping out today. It's not enough for him. He gets all snotty and goes on and on about how HE MUST HAVE THIS [PRODUCT] TODAY, et cetera. You know, because he's a VERY IMPORTANT CUSTOMER. (He's not. Our key accounts include Microsoft, AMEX, Sony, and several well-known government agencies. This ain't one of them.) The idiot owns exactly ONE of our very cheapest product. (By the way, I'm not saying we treat our smaller customers like shit...just that there are certain companies we're directed to take any amount of abuse from, and this isn't one of them, not by a long shot.)
So. I continue to apologize and tell the guy that not only will we pay all his shipping costs, but we'll spring for Saturday overnight delivery. His response is to whine about having to come in Saturday to receive the item. Apparently his beef is that we won't fly the fucking unit in on the Concorde and hand it directly into his arms.
Then he demands an EXACT delivery time for the package. Since it's Airborne, all I can tell the guy is that it should be there by about 9:30 a.m. More whining ensues. At this point my brain is about to explode from all the smartass remarks I'm holding back. Finally all I can say is, "I'm sorry sir, but the precise delivery time depends on Airborne; I can give you their customer service number if you need more specific information." More whining.
So, on Monday I come into the office and I see this e-mail from my boy Ernie. It's steaming with bile and invective, questioning my competence, and -- I like this line -- "Rest assured your superiors will be hearing from me." Ha ha ha. Rest assured. My apologies, Mr. Vanderbilt. The e-mail is dated about 9:20 a.m. I check the Airborne shipment record. It was delivered at 9:34.
At that moment I make a decision: this guy is going to pay. Not for hassling me or for his impotent threats, but simply because this is the kind of puling little pissant loser who makes the lives of workers in all service industries a living hell. This is the guy who insists on seeing the manager because his Big Mac had fewer than the requisite number of pickle slices. This is the guy who holds up the line at the airport for half an hour because he didn't get his window seat, even though he didn't check in until five minutes before boarding. In short, this guy is a whiny, self-important douchebag, and I am going to punish him for it. I am going to give him back just a little of the misery he's been dishing out. In striking a blow against him, I strike a blow for everyone who's had to suffer this fool's static.
I'm resolved to spend the next year, 2002, exacting my revenge upon this hapless dickwad. I shall not rest until my thirst for justice is sated.
So...I've got a plan of attack, but I welcome any ideas you might have for how I can (anonymously) annoy this guy. Any suggestions? The requirements are that it must: a) be anonymous/untraceable; b) (mostly) legal; c) (mostly) harmless, in that I don't want the guy to lose his job or be physically harmed, just annoyed and/or embarrassed. I'm thinking more along the lines of Chinese water torture than the thumbscrews. Any creative sadists out there?
