(Non sequitur: Have an audition for a nonprofessional show in a neighboring town. Depending on the director's vision and style, I might actually have a shot at Lady MacBeth. Which is my way of saying I'm going to audition for the play in the hopes that I land the plum female role, rather than committing every weekend in August just to say, "The queen, my lord, is dead.")
Today at work I was binding eight books that had to go to an insurance broker. These books contain all kinds of information relative to the solicitation of insurance. Actually, they were due to the broker last Friday, but the person in charge dragged things out until the last minute. It's his first time putting one of these together, and he's fretted over it to the point where he can barely hand it off. And well, nobody ever meets a deadline at this place. It's insane. My new mantra is "PULL. THE. TRIGGER."
So this morning I took over the copier room, copying and inserting tabs and apologizing to everyone. After an hour I was ready, and began to punch the first book for binding. Book Dude came in. He stood by me. I had a bad feeling.
"So I have these," he said, holding up three documents. Three double-spread, staple-bound documents. "I was wondering whether we could fit these in."
He was wondering whether he could, oh, suddenly pull not one, but three, full brochures of over 90 double-sided pages each out of his ass and have me copy and insert them into eight books.
I have a crappy poker face, but I tried my best to appear neutral. I took one document and paged through. The paper was very thin - bad for copying. It would have to be done slowly, manually. There were a lot of pages. I cursed in my head. I debated going home sick. Faking an ulcer. Perhaps a seizure.
"Can you do it?" he asked.
"I can do whatever you want," I replied, trying to keep my voice neutral, suspecting I was failing. "What you need to decide is how important it is to get these to the broker soon."
Wait. These were annual reports.
"We're publicly traded," I said. "These should be on the website."
My cubicle neighbor overheard us searching online and mentioned that he had them on his machine. God love him.
I commandeered three machines and ran back and forth down the hall between copy machines, stacking and sorting. A coworker helped me fudge three tabs with labels to fit in with the pre-printed tabs for the document center. (We do our own production to save money. The department head is frugal.) At one point, we asked Book Dude if he wanted the inserts in ascending or descending chronological order.
"What do you mean?"
"Do you want it to go 2008, 2009 reports and 2010 notice, or 2010 notice, 2009 and 2008 reports?"
"2008, 2009, 2010."
Walking back to the copier room, the other woman and I reflected that this was perhaps the fastest decision made by anyone in the department's history.
A half-hour later, and I was again attempting to bind the first book, now with three extra sections and tabs.
The binder comb was too small. We had none larger. I called the document center. They didn't have any larger. I stood, head down, racing through strategies. Not for the first time, I wished I'd been a stuntwoman. Less stress.
A co-worker came up with a solution: Put the inserts on a CD and insert the CD in a pocket in the back. God love her. She started burning CDs while I bound the books.
So I threw about two reams of paper into the recycling bin.
Book Dude was very grateful, and I congratulated him on getting his first book done. I am proud that I remained calm and helpful, but he is buying me a bagel tomorrow.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Morning exchange at Au Bon Pain.
Cashier: "OK, you get to play my game. You get to choose: I give you your receipt and you keep it, I give you your receipt and you give it back to me and I throw it out, or I just throw it out."
Me: "You just throw it out."
Cashier: "Great! Thank you for playing my game."
Me: "Thank you for letting me win."
Me: "You just throw it out."
Cashier: "Great! Thank you for playing my game."
Me: "Thank you for letting me win."
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Rage Day has passed...
...hormones settling back to normal, Houston. Much more able to cope, less maudlin and self-pitying. Headache all day, though.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Hormones or Homicide?
I'd sent an email to a coworker and copied my supervisor (as suggested by my co-worker, the woman who's training me). The subject was regarding an ongoing issue with a new client, and wording for a document.
My supervisor emailed me back to say that in the future I should just ask one or the other because it looked like I was "shopping for answers."
It's been crazy busy, I've been swamped, and I looked at this email, and it was the last straw. I mean, really? I've robbed my emails of all personality, stopped asking questions unless they pertained directly to a task at hand (I'd gotten some roundabout feedback that my enthusiasm was great, but I had to remember I'd only been there a short time -- I assume this has to do with my persistence in trying to understand how things work in relation to my job, and since people there can't seem to explain how to tie a shoe without making it convoluted and obtuse, I have to keep asking for clarification. So I've stopped that, accepted that I don't understand half of what goes on around me, and have to resist the urge to. Because apparently my desire to understand is annoying.)
And now, a simple email asking for information from my own department members was somehow impolitic in a way I don't grasp, but there is no way in hell I'm asking why. Because I suspect that whatever condescending, verbose answer I get will be the one that sends me screaming across the table with a letter opener in my upraised fist.
So I asked my co-worker if she had any idea what I'd done wrong. After hearing my story, this sweet, 63-year-old Italian-American woman who says "boo" to nobody, screwed up her face and said, "I don't know what the fuck her problem is."
"Ok, just checking. I've had my leash jerked a few times already and I don't want to ask her. But if you don't know, then I don't feel so bad about not understanding."
Then when I followed the advice I'd gotten regarding my initial impolitic question, I got a call from a snarky insurance broker lecturing me on why the information on the form I'd sent in could not be accommodated. She went on and on -- oh yes; she's English, so there was that one extra notch of haughtiness in her voice. I listened to her scold me breathlessly and Britishly, and I finally interrupted with, "Hi. Excuse me -- I'm not an Insurance Person. I've been here all of two months, and I was told by my supervisor that the wording I sent was correct."
So we decided that I'd set up a phone call with my supervisor and the broker. (I won't even go into the nightmare that ensues whenever I try to send my supervisor a simple Outlook invitation, because if I did, I think I'd cry right here.)
After lunch, I decided to tackle the copious files that my supervisor had instructed me to box up and send to offsite storage. I was given a date parameter, and I began pulling files and logging them for storage. There were a lot of files. At one point, I asked the woman who oversees one of our programs whether she wanted me to include her files (they are in the same drawer). This woman is a bit of a princess, and her manner can be infuriatingly condescending and rude.
"Those files were created before I took over the program."
"Yes, I know, but I don't know whether you want them sent offsite, or whether you anticipate needing them for reference."
"I didn't make those files."
(fighting the urge to wrap today's trendy chunky necklace around my hand and twist until her head came off) "I know. But since you now oversee the program, I wanted your input as to whether it was important to you to keep them here or not."
With a tone that suggested I'd asked her whether she wanted to shop at Old Navy, she replied that I could send them to storage.
I was continuing my chore when the junior analyst came over. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?"
"I looked at the carpet, took a breath, and gave her a smile. "I'm sending these files offsite per R---'s instructions."
"ALL of them?!?!?"
"No, only these files through 2008. 2009 and 2010 are staying."
"Well, I went to the cabinet, and it's almost empty!"
(The phobia around any kind of change in this place borders on a sort of collective Autism.)
"Yes, there were a lot of old files. I'm clearing space for those." (pointing)
"Oh. OK."
It all reminds me of the time in first grade when my teacher was out unexpectedly, and the school didn't have time to get a substitute, so my class was divided up and sent to various classrooms. I ended up in the room of one of those sadistic women whose choice of career was baffling given how much they seemed to hate kids.
We were instructed to do our work and, when done, to go to the front of the room to the book table, select a book, and read quietly at our desk. Now, I was reading at a much higher grade level, so I'd pick a book from among the first-grade-level books, read it, return it, and get another. After the third trip to the table, the teacher singled me out and reprimanded me in front of the class for only looking at the pictures.
"No, I'm reading the books," I'd explained.
"No, you're not. You can't be reading them that fast."
"I am. I am reading them," I'd said, standing in front of the class, horribly embarrassed.
"She does read that fast," one of my regular classmates volunteered.
She became enraged, screeched that I was lying. I saw where the power lay, so resignedly, I took a book (they were those paperback books whose shape was cut in the shape of the cover picture and had ten pages or so), and went to my desk. I read it. then I read it again. Then I looked at each picture. Then I read it back to front. Finally, I tentatively put the book back and picked up another.
The teacher had been watching me like a hawk, and she smiled a smug smile. "That's better," she said.
That's kind of how I feel now, except I'm not 6 and don't feel like it's somehow my fault that I'm more capable than I should be.
If I can just keep up the facade for the rest of the year. I just need a year.
My supervisor emailed me back to say that in the future I should just ask one or the other because it looked like I was "shopping for answers."
It's been crazy busy, I've been swamped, and I looked at this email, and it was the last straw. I mean, really? I've robbed my emails of all personality, stopped asking questions unless they pertained directly to a task at hand (I'd gotten some roundabout feedback that my enthusiasm was great, but I had to remember I'd only been there a short time -- I assume this has to do with my persistence in trying to understand how things work in relation to my job, and since people there can't seem to explain how to tie a shoe without making it convoluted and obtuse, I have to keep asking for clarification. So I've stopped that, accepted that I don't understand half of what goes on around me, and have to resist the urge to. Because apparently my desire to understand is annoying.)
And now, a simple email asking for information from my own department members was somehow impolitic in a way I don't grasp, but there is no way in hell I'm asking why. Because I suspect that whatever condescending, verbose answer I get will be the one that sends me screaming across the table with a letter opener in my upraised fist.
So I asked my co-worker if she had any idea what I'd done wrong. After hearing my story, this sweet, 63-year-old Italian-American woman who says "boo" to nobody, screwed up her face and said, "I don't know what the fuck her problem is."
"Ok, just checking. I've had my leash jerked a few times already and I don't want to ask her. But if you don't know, then I don't feel so bad about not understanding."
Then when I followed the advice I'd gotten regarding my initial impolitic question, I got a call from a snarky insurance broker lecturing me on why the information on the form I'd sent in could not be accommodated. She went on and on -- oh yes; she's English, so there was that one extra notch of haughtiness in her voice. I listened to her scold me breathlessly and Britishly, and I finally interrupted with, "Hi. Excuse me -- I'm not an Insurance Person. I've been here all of two months, and I was told by my supervisor that the wording I sent was correct."
So we decided that I'd set up a phone call with my supervisor and the broker. (I won't even go into the nightmare that ensues whenever I try to send my supervisor a simple Outlook invitation, because if I did, I think I'd cry right here.)
After lunch, I decided to tackle the copious files that my supervisor had instructed me to box up and send to offsite storage. I was given a date parameter, and I began pulling files and logging them for storage. There were a lot of files. At one point, I asked the woman who oversees one of our programs whether she wanted me to include her files (they are in the same drawer). This woman is a bit of a princess, and her manner can be infuriatingly condescending and rude.
"Those files were created before I took over the program."
"Yes, I know, but I don't know whether you want them sent offsite, or whether you anticipate needing them for reference."
"I didn't make those files."
(fighting the urge to wrap today's trendy chunky necklace around my hand and twist until her head came off) "I know. But since you now oversee the program, I wanted your input as to whether it was important to you to keep them here or not."
With a tone that suggested I'd asked her whether she wanted to shop at Old Navy, she replied that I could send them to storage.
I was continuing my chore when the junior analyst came over. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?"
"I looked at the carpet, took a breath, and gave her a smile. "I'm sending these files offsite per R---'s instructions."
"ALL of them?!?!?"
"No, only these files through 2008. 2009 and 2010 are staying."
"Well, I went to the cabinet, and it's almost empty!"
(The phobia around any kind of change in this place borders on a sort of collective Autism.)
"Yes, there were a lot of old files. I'm clearing space for those." (pointing)
"Oh. OK."
It all reminds me of the time in first grade when my teacher was out unexpectedly, and the school didn't have time to get a substitute, so my class was divided up and sent to various classrooms. I ended up in the room of one of those sadistic women whose choice of career was baffling given how much they seemed to hate kids.
We were instructed to do our work and, when done, to go to the front of the room to the book table, select a book, and read quietly at our desk. Now, I was reading at a much higher grade level, so I'd pick a book from among the first-grade-level books, read it, return it, and get another. After the third trip to the table, the teacher singled me out and reprimanded me in front of the class for only looking at the pictures.
"No, I'm reading the books," I'd explained.
"No, you're not. You can't be reading them that fast."
"I am. I am reading them," I'd said, standing in front of the class, horribly embarrassed.
"She does read that fast," one of my regular classmates volunteered.
She became enraged, screeched that I was lying. I saw where the power lay, so resignedly, I took a book (they were those paperback books whose shape was cut in the shape of the cover picture and had ten pages or so), and went to my desk. I read it. then I read it again. Then I looked at each picture. Then I read it back to front. Finally, I tentatively put the book back and picked up another.
The teacher had been watching me like a hawk, and she smiled a smug smile. "That's better," she said.
That's kind of how I feel now, except I'm not 6 and don't feel like it's somehow my fault that I'm more capable than I should be.
If I can just keep up the facade for the rest of the year. I just need a year.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
The more I think about it...
...the more I want a T-shirt with "Woo Woo" inside a circle with a slant line through it. Or better yet, a necklace that says "woo woo," that I can wear undercover every day to remind myself that my Inner Woo Woo still lives.
Playing the game
I meet with my immediate supervisor, a woman I like, every Friday. She has lots of good things to say, and I think she's happy with me, but this week she gave me a word of caution.
"You have a great, outgoing personality, and we love it. But you need to remember that this is a *very* conservative company, so when you send emails, make sure to keep them factual and very professional."
"Ok...can you give me an example?"
"You responded to an email I sent, and I think you said something like, 'Woo woo...'"
"Oh, right; OK; no problem."
"I'd just hate for an email containing something like that to be forwarded and the head of the department see it."
"Uh-huh. Sure. No, no problem, point taken." (I'd responded to a message she sent regarding a resolution to a problem that had been nagging us. It was completely internal.)
Of course, the unspoken part of this was, "The department head is inflexible and humorless and will come down on you like a ton of bricks, so I'm trying to spare you by giving you a heads up." I appreciated it, actually. No more expressions of happiness over new endorsements. Basically, no having to care.
It's an odd situation to be in a job where you don't have to be a Type A about your work, where they WANT you to back off and let other people give you things and take the responsibility. I have to keep reminding myself that I'm not making a ton of money (my mortgage and condo fee for my very small 1930's condo takes almost 50% of my take-home pay), and that this job is less senior, and less is required of me.
There was a side comment about how she knows I want to change everything relating to the Claims Guy. I said actually, that would be hard since he can't really tell me how things get done, so I'm having to figure out how to do what I need to do in a way he wants, so I'm just doing my best in a way that makes sense to me (as an aside, Claims Guy is very nice but is positively dreadful at giving information, and as a result I've wasted a lot of time chasing my tail). Oh yes, I did make one earth-stopping change: I removed the Post-it Notes that he routinely STAPLES to file folders to identify them, and made actual file-folder labels. I told him to just give me folders and I'd be happy to make labels. Whoa! Look at me going rogue with Word and the Avery labels!
So instead of being proactive, I'm going to sit back, wait to be given things to do, and not care when I have down time. I can do that. I can relax just fine.
"You have a great, outgoing personality, and we love it. But you need to remember that this is a *very* conservative company, so when you send emails, make sure to keep them factual and very professional."
"Ok...can you give me an example?"
"You responded to an email I sent, and I think you said something like, 'Woo woo...'"
"Oh, right; OK; no problem."
"I'd just hate for an email containing something like that to be forwarded and the head of the department see it."
"Uh-huh. Sure. No, no problem, point taken." (I'd responded to a message she sent regarding a resolution to a problem that had been nagging us. It was completely internal.)
Of course, the unspoken part of this was, "The department head is inflexible and humorless and will come down on you like a ton of bricks, so I'm trying to spare you by giving you a heads up." I appreciated it, actually. No more expressions of happiness over new endorsements. Basically, no having to care.
It's an odd situation to be in a job where you don't have to be a Type A about your work, where they WANT you to back off and let other people give you things and take the responsibility. I have to keep reminding myself that I'm not making a ton of money (my mortgage and condo fee for my very small 1930's condo takes almost 50% of my take-home pay), and that this job is less senior, and less is required of me.
There was a side comment about how she knows I want to change everything relating to the Claims Guy. I said actually, that would be hard since he can't really tell me how things get done, so I'm having to figure out how to do what I need to do in a way he wants, so I'm just doing my best in a way that makes sense to me (as an aside, Claims Guy is very nice but is positively dreadful at giving information, and as a result I've wasted a lot of time chasing my tail). Oh yes, I did make one earth-stopping change: I removed the Post-it Notes that he routinely STAPLES to file folders to identify them, and made actual file-folder labels. I told him to just give me folders and I'd be happy to make labels. Whoa! Look at me going rogue with Word and the Avery labels!
So instead of being proactive, I'm going to sit back, wait to be given things to do, and not care when I have down time. I can do that. I can relax just fine.
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