In certain trying circumstances, urgent circumstances, desperate circumstances, profanity furnishes a relief denied even to prayer.
Mark Twain
Some of you may have noticed that I work in a, well, dysfunctional work environment. White Guys with Blue Ties, Inc. is actually a pretty good place to work. My team, however, is a minefield of seething ambition, astounding inadequacy and stunning levels of stupidity.
I am on my soon to be fourth manager, in 2 years. Manager the Last beat a hasty retreat to another team, and we are presently dredging the bottom of the barrel for the next stellar candidate. There is a faint hope on the horizon, however; there is a light at the end of the tunnel, it is an oncoming train, and it piloted by a man named re-org.
I work in a team small enough that you know everyone, but large enough to have two, diverse groups of people. Group One is smart and intelligent and savvy. Unfortunately, the few of these left are busy finding other jobs, and don't have much time for input.
Group two is largely composed of people who are buried beneath the challenge of their jobs, but have been around so long that no one can think of how to unearth them. We'd try, but their signs of life are so few and so small, we aren't sure it isn't a greater mercy to just leave them be.
In the midst of these two groups is me, trying to get through each day. Today, I am sitting, working away, and I hear Person the Profoundly Unaware complaining about purported injustice. Part of our team is in a city 3 hours south of here, and Person the Profoundly Unaware is complaining, nay she is lamenting the pure injustice. These team members attend the potlucks, but they never bring anything.
It's just not fair. . . This is, quite seriously, the end of the world. There can be no hope, and this pressing crisis will take up much of her next few days.
Indeed, a crisis! Let us stop all useful work to consider the crisis, and the fate of the travelling co-workers, because theirs is the exciting life. They drive up the highway to stay in a hotel overnight, spend all day trying to work, but realizing everything they need is in another city, they are the mother's of young children, trying to figure out how to get their kids to activities. They eat crappy hotel food, and sleep in beds not their own. And now, to end your lament, they are supposed to whip up a freaking casserole to bring to a potluck, using only the contents of their suitcases.
These are resourceful women, I can see them. "Wow, I have a hairbrush, a maxi-pad, some eyebrow tweezers, old mascara and 3 peanuts my toddler left in the bottom of my purse. Look out Martha, here I come! "
And I'm sitting here, thinking "Lady, let me tell you about unfair. Let me tell you what injustice is" Let's develop a working committee to define "unfair". Oh, and me, the deadbaby lady: I'm the Subject Matter Expert.
Indeed, a crisis! Let us stop all useful work to consider the crisis, and the fate of the travelling co-workers, because theirs is the exciting life. They drive up the highway to stay in a hotel overnight, spend all day trying to work, but realizing everything they need is in another city, they are the mother's of young children, trying to figure out how to get their kids to activities. They eat crappy hotel food, and sleep in beds not their own. And now, to end your lament, they are supposed to whip up a freaking casserole to bring to a potluck, using only the contents of their suitcases.
These are resourceful women, I can see them. "Wow, I have a hairbrush, a maxi-pad, some eyebrow tweezers, old mascara and 3 peanuts my toddler left in the bottom of my purse. Look out Martha, here I come! "
And I'm sitting here, thinking "Lady, let me tell you about unfair. Let me tell you what injustice is" Let's develop a working committee to define "unfair". Oh, and me, the deadbaby lady: I'm the Subject Matter Expert.
Unfair involves death, sadness, sorrow, tragedy, misery, extreme anguish, disaster, disease. There is no potluck involved.
I get to remember my father's phrase, and develop a new tag for the blog at the same time:
Illegetimi Non Carbonundrum. Don't let those conceived on the wrong side of the bed wear you down to a bruised, bloody pulp of stupidity.
Tell me, do you think it is maybe just possible I'm in the angry phase of grief?
I get to remember my father's phrase, and develop a new tag for the blog at the same time:
Illegetimi Non Carbonundrum. Don't let those conceived on the wrong side of the bed wear you down to a bruised, bloody pulp of stupidity.
Tell me, do you think it is maybe just possible I'm in the angry phase of grief?
