My boss can’t remember how to do things I showed him yesterday
Performance Reviews
Dec 9th
You may already realize that my boss is quite the character. If you don’t, you can find some stories about it here (and here and here (with MS Paints!) and here).
Now that we’ve taken care of that, and you can see what I’m working with over here, I’m going to tell you a little bit about what Performance Reviews are like in our office. Basically, think Michael Scott…but older.
These days, I pretty much run the office, so I’m the one who does payroll and all that jazz. Which, ya know, means if you work in my office? You should probably not piss me off. Look, it’s not that I don’t LIKE archaeology (but I don’t really like the kind we do), it’s just that it pays better to do what I do now. And it was a full-time gig. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the economy’s not really doing so hot. Full-time = good idea.
Last year, my boss decided that maybe it would be wise for us to have an employee handbook. He decided this because a coworker and I pretty much beat him down until he came up with the idea all by himself. Unfortunately, this meant that I had to write an employee handbook. I had no earthly idea how to go about that, so I gathered a few examples and set about writing it up. This also meant that I had to pick my boss’s brain on every subject from lunch breaks to vacation time to pay increases to attendance. Trust me, my boss’s brain is not really a pretty place to be.
It turns out that my boss does not believe in giving his employees “cost of living” raises. He went on and on about how he didn’t believe in just giving someone an increase in pay for doing the exact same amount of work, and so, if anyone wanted a raise from him, they’d have to come talk to him about it.
Yes, I tried to explain that cost of living raises are designed to keep employees’ salaries in line with inflation and that not giving them essentially means that he’s making it more difficult for the employees to live, while they’re still doing the same amount of work, etc. He didn’t buy it.
I argued and argued, but to no avail. And alas, it says in our employee handbook that no cost of living raises should be expected and that if an employee feels he deserves a raise, he is required to discuss the matter with the boss. Of course, no one but me will actually do that.
Every year, at the end of the year, we’re supposed to have a “Performance Review.” Last year, I think mine went something like this:
Boss walks up to my desk. “Shine, go ahead and give yourself a such-and-such cost of living raise. Oh, and here’s the list for everyone else.”
So…yeah.
After an employee has been here for three months, he is also entitled to a “Performance Review” from the boss. This review should determine the employee’s future status with the company and his rate of pay for the coming year. About six months ago, we hired a new guy. He was only supposed to be here for a month. But, after three months, when he was still here, it was time for a Performance Review with the boss!
This is how that went down:
Boss calls me into his office. “Shine, what do you think of New Employee?”
Me: “Well, I think he works hard. He’s not scared to ask questions. I’ve read some of his stuff and he seems to have a really good grip on the English language.
Boss: “Anything else? Do you think we should keep him around?”
Me: “I think NE is a pretty good asset. He’s a little flaky, but I think he more than makes up for that with his writing. I don’t know how he is in the field, though.”
Boss: “Oh, he does just fine in the field. Let me ask you this, though. Would you date him?”
Me: “………Ummmmm….what?”
Boss: “Would you, you know…date him?”
Me: “……..Ummmm, well, uh, considering that he works here and that he HAS a girlfriend and that he’s nearly five years younger than me…no. I really don’t think I would. Why do you ask?”
Boss: “Oh, I was just curious. He has a girlfriend? What’s she like?”
Me: “Honestly, Boss, I have no idea. None. I’ve never met the girl.”
And now NE has a full-time position with our company. I can’t say I’m sure whether the correct answer was “Yeah, I’d date him” or “Um, Hell no,” nor do I see what in the FUCK that has to do with his employment status at our firm, but there you have it. A Performance Review by Boss.
We'll get back to your regular grumpy holiday blogging tomorrow, today? It's poo time.
Dec 1st
I understand that popular notion of waiting until you get to the office to take your morning dump. The toilet is clean (except that you pooped in it yesterday morning and our cleaning people only come on the weekends), you’re at work so you’re getting paid to relieve yourself of the giant load of crap you’re hauling around in your intestines, and there’s the added bonus of subjecting your coworkers to the smell of death wafting from your rectum.
What’s that you say? You’ve never contemplated the third one? Ah! Then you obviously don’t work in my office.
See, most offices have restrooms for men and restrooms for women and they aren’t located, say, in the middle of the space. At my job? We only have one bathroom downstairs and one bathroom upstairs and both of them are within a (two year old’s) stone’s throw of each and every desk. Which means each and every person. Which mostly means ME. (Obviously.)
Every morning, most of my coworkers choose to wait until they get to work to take their morning poo. I’ve ranted about this before, but I feel the need to do it again, because I just got knocked in the face with POO SMELL.
Here’s the thing, boys. It’s disgusting. I don’t care who you are, your shit does, in fact, STINK. We also have several different kinds of poopers in the office.
The “I Have a Lot of Gas and I’m Going to Force You to Listen to It, But Then We’re All Going to Have to Pretend That Didn’t Happen” Pooper: I hate to tell you this, but having to listen to you relieve your bowels every morning is really not inspiring any more respect for your cause here at work. If you feel like it’s going to be a gassy one? Please poop at home.
The “I Just Rocked a Big Deuce and I’m Going to Leave the Door Wide Open and Never Bother to Use the Air Freshener so Thoughtfully Provided for Me” Pooper: If I never have to smell your crap again, it will be far too soon. Please subject your wife to this, she took vows. I didn’t. That doorway is in direct path to my desk. For the love of all that is orange, please close the door at least a little and feel free to use that fancy little bottle of Febreez (which, actually, now just smells like poop to me anyway…but at least it’s slightly prettier poop than whatever roadkill you’ve been consuming).
The “Close the Door All the Way and Trap the Smell in the Bathroom” Pooper: While I’m generally okay with you trying to be considerate about the smell, all you’re doing is making it worse when I realize that I have to pee. Which is inevitably about five minutes after you’ve expelled the large quantity of meat you ate for dinner last night right into the work toilet we all share.
The “I Work Upstairs, but I Don’t Want to Smell my Own Poop While I’m Working” Pooper: Seriously, POOP IN YOUR OWN BATHROOM. I’m already dealing with a lot of poop down here, I don’t need you adding to it. If you get the urge, just as you come downstairs? I feel sure that you can hold onto that log until you get back upstairs to your own space. I usually manage to hold mine ALL DAY. Hell, I barely even pee at the office any more if I can help it.
So, this is to you, dear Office Poopers. Please, please, please…KEEP YOUR POOP IN YOUR OWN TOILET. If you’re so regular that you can plan your poop for every morning right as you get to work? Please schedule that poop with your intestines just a little bit earlier. You know, when you’re at home. I’ll talk to the boss about counting that time as work, so you can get paid. It’s not like you’re doing anything useful in the bathroom for that half hour anyway.
**In case you didn’t notice (seriously, what’s wrong with you?), I changed the layout on my blog. What do you think?**
Sexual Harassment, Geriatric Style
Jun 8th
Let’s all think back for a moment. To the stories I’ve told you about my dear boss. Like this one. And this one. We can’t forget that one.
I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned the sexual harassment issue, but, well, there is one.
This morning I guess my neck was itching. Which it has every right to do. So I scratched it. Which I have every right to do. And I guess there was a big red mark on my neck from the scratching.
Boss thought it was completely appropriate to stroke the red mark on my neck when I leaned over to put something on his desk.
It wasn’t.
I jumped about ten feet in the air, as I always do. This doesn’t deter him at all, by the way. The other day, he reached out to grab my arm and I twisted it out of his hand. Didn’t even slow him down.
Actually, Climber and The Mole came up with possibly the best suggestion I’ve ever heard. Just make a weird noise. Every time he touches me. Something bizarre and obnoxious.
It might actually work. Of course, I would feel a little ridiculous. But it’s better than being fondled all day.
Also, it sparked an MS Paint, by request from Grief (a previously unmentioned person in my life, who now will get his OWN BLOG POST. Should he ever do anything interesting enough to warrant one). Drawn by Cam at the office:
I think I’m starting to fall in love with Cam’s MS Paint renditions of me. I’m pretty adorable.
Since he was MS Painting, I wanted to MS Paint. My inspiration came from elsewhere.
I'm the new Lisa Frank. Germans are tricky, though.
May 26th
It all started with a fairly simple statement:
“Can you come help me? I need to scan something and I can’t remember how you told me to do it.”
You see last week, my boss asked me how to scan a picture for one of his reports. Not that this was the first time.
Him: Do I just push the scan button on the copier?
Me: You’d think so. But no. Remember? You push the Template Button, then Scan to File, then choose whether you want it to be a TIFF or a PDF.
Him: Which do I want it to be?
Me: What are you going to do with it?
Him: Put it in a document.
Me: Put it in what document?
Him: A report I’m working on.
Me: Then you’ll probably want it to be like a picture. So we have to scan it as a TIFF and then we can make it into a more usable format.
So we go through all the steps and he said, “Now where did it go? Is it on my computer?”
Which, for all I know, is him asking if it’s actually physically sitting on top of his keyboard.
Me: It’s on the server. In a folder called Scanned Documents. Do you remember how to get to the server? (Half the time he thinks that the server and the Internet are the same thing, you understand.)
Him: Yeah. But is it on my computer?
Me: Yes and no. You can get to it from your computer, though.
So he went into his office and I didn’t hear anything more about it. For about ten minutes.
Him: Can you tell me where that document is again?
Me: Which document?
Him: The one I scanned. I can’t find it.
Me: It’s on the server in a folder called Scanned Documents. It will be in a folder with today’s date.
Him: Okay.
And I didn’t hear anything more about it. For about a half hour.
Him: Um. I can’t seem to find that document. Could you come in here and help me?
Me: The scanned thing?
Him: Yes.
Me: You still haven’t found it?
I went in there and walked him through the steps to find it.
Me: Do you remember how to get to the server?
Him: Yes.
Me: Okay, let’s see it.
He clicked the right things and up pops the server.
Me: Now. See that folder (RIGHT FUCKING THERE IN FRONT OF YOU) called Scanned Documents? It’s in there.
Him: Oh. I didn’t click that one before because I didn’t think it was the right one.
Me: …
Him: So it’s in there?
Me: It’s in. The Folder. Called Scanned Documents. On. THE SERVER. Yes.
Him: Oh.
I didn’t even punch him.
This morning, he came up to me again. “I need to scan something and you know I can’t remember how. Could you help me?”
And we went through the whole thing again.
This led to my coworker, Cam, sending me this picture. Which I thought he found on the Internet, but actually he drew especially for me, using MS Paint. That was good news, as the picture is of a girl with red hair, wearing a black dress and pink heels. And that’s exactly what I’m wearing today.
Here it is:
Basically, this was like putting little twigs or newspapers on a fire (I’m really good at keeping the fire going. I’m not so good at starting it). We had a staff lunch for the departure (Shut up, I’m going to cry about it) of my bestest of friends and the only reason I can do this job and stay sane, Toanny. No, that’s not really her name. It’s her annoying “I’m not a celebrity but I still smushed up my name with my husband’s name” name. If I didn’t love her so much, I’d pretend not to know her for this.
After lunch, where the statements “I want to eat unicorn meat stewed in the blood of the innocent” and “Lisa Frank meets Twilight. That needs to happen.” were uttered, it was an MS Paint extravaganza.
First, Toanny came up with this:
Then I took it upon myself to best Lisa Frank at life (though apparently someone has already done Lisa Frank meets Twilight…but only about that creepy sparkly vampire thing. No unicorns were involved.):
I call that success. Suck it Lisa Frank. (But seriously, do you spell it “weiner” or “wiener”? Because my spell-check keeps correcting me when I spell “weiner.” Even though I think that’s right. Damn it Germans! Why can’t you follow the “i before e” rules?)
And then Cam paid homage to our last supper with Toanny. It is awesome. I’m the red-head with the <3:
Yes, it has been a productive day at the office. Thanks for asking.
Also, a snippet from a gchat conversation between me and Cam:
Cam: Word.
Getting rid of all those apostles was a pain.
me: That’s what Jesus said.
And then Cam spluttered all of his coffee onto his keyboard.
I have no idea what you're talking about.
Apr 9th
I feel like I say this about 15 times each day at work. Most people in my office start their conversations with me as though we’ve already been talking for 10 minutes…but we haven’t.
“So, that’s great. We’re all good with that. They’ve said they’ll accept what we’ve sent them.”
Huh?
From the other room, “I tried to put that photo in here, but it’s not there.”
What?
“So those boxes weighed 19.5 pounds. Are those all the numbers you need?”
Did I ask you for numbers? Do I look like the recorder of all weights and measures?
Why do they all think that I can read their minds? I can’t. I’m good, but I’m not that good. And I don’t care. That’s probably the biggest problem.
But today, when I arrived at work, I got a doozy from my boss.
Him: So are you all oiled up?
Me: I have no idea what you’re talking about. Am I what?
Him: Are you all oiled up?
Thoughts running through my head include: Am I competing in some kind of body builder competition I don’t know about? Should I be on my way to the beach (YES!)? Do I seem constipated?
Look, I can’t control my brain, okay? I have no idea why it went to constipation.
Me: Seriously, I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Him: Was I not talking to you?
Me: I really don’t know what you’re talking about. Talking to me when? You’re talking to me now…
Him: No. You called. A little while ago.
Me: I didn’t call. I certainly didn’t call you about oiling myself up.
Him: I wonder who I was talking to. I thought it was you.
Me: Uh, yeah. That wasn’t me. And I still have no idea what you’re talking about.
It seems that one of our other employees (there are only three of us girls) called in to say that her oil light came on and she was going to stop and have it checked out before she came in. And he thought it was me.
Of course, he also thought that “So are you all oiled up?” was an appropriate question for his much younger female employee.
