Thoughts, Rants, and Musings

[Jibralta]

What I noticed though is that my best managers loved their jobs, where the worst managers absolutely detested their positions.

 

The weird thing about Shannon is that she does like her job. She's at the top of her game and her career is on the rise. Her department pulls in at least 50% of the company's business, and attracts business into the other departments. I really don't know why she acts the way that she does. Maybe it's from being in this industry so long. Maybe she's just miserable in life.

 

re you applying for other jobs at the moment? Will be interesting when you hear from that Bill you worked for previously and whether or not their job offer is something that appeals to you.

 

I'm not applying for any jobs yet. However, I've been getting project information organized to update my resume. I actually worked on it this morning and it made me glad that I haven't quit my job yet. I just have a rough outline of my recent projects at the moment and will still need access to my email and to project files in order to fill out all the details.

 

Bill says he may be able to make me an offer in April or May, and that is contingent upon him getting additional work. So, it's not 100% certain, and it puts me in the difficult position of waiting.

 

If I apply for another job and get it, I will miss my window with Bill. And I do want to work for Bill, because I think that working for him will be a good experience. I've worked for him before, and I think he is a good teacher.

 

So, I'm taking my time with my resume. It's the best thing I can do in the interim. I put together a really nice resume in 2018, and because I did such a good job, I have a really good starting point. It's not going to be a pain in the ass to update.

 

If I do a good job with my projects from the last two years, it will pay off similarly when I make my next move.

[Jibralta]

I am sorry you are having such a rough time at work. I seriously don't know how you done this. . or versions of this for as long as you have.

 

Until very recently, I was valued. Yes, I was totally underappreciated, abused, and overworked (just like everyone else), but being valued made a big difference.

 

I can't say for sure why that changed. I haven't done anything wrong, and they still haven't given me a specific example of my under-performance.

 

I honestly think it is their under-performance that has brought me to this wretched state, not mine.

 

They were literally bursting at the seams when I was hired. There wasn't an empty desk in the place. They actually had four guys sitting at a counter doing work.

 

Now, there are six empty desks and nobody is working at the counter. They have not hired anyone new in over nine months. They've just been letting people go.

 

It's clear that they are tightening their belts, and they do so in a bull market which does not say a lot for their business skills.

 

My salary is pretty darned good. I knew that when they hired me (and fortunately I made the most of it by saving).

 

Now that things are getting a little lean, I am probably walking around with a big target on my back.

 

I know this company after almost two years of working here. They have a history of shoving people out when it suits them.

 

If they can't create a legitimate reason to fire someone, they will just make things very uncomfortable for them until the person leaves. That way, they don't have to pay unemployment.

[Jibralta]

I slept through the night. I slept well all weekend, actually. I do have anxiety for the coming week. God knows what frustrations await me. But I am glad to be sleeping well.

 

I worked both Saturday and Sunday, and still made only moderate progress in this project.

 

Yesterday, I was totally zoned out while watching Downton Abbey. I was envisioning a seemingly inevitable argument with Jason, in which he found some way to blame me for his failure to provide the help he promised to me last week.

 

When my boyfriend noticed that I wasn't paying attention, he made fun of me, "There's literally nothing else going on. What can you possibly be distracted by?"

 

I said, "I'm sorry, I'm just trying to figure out how to defend myself without embarrassing everyone in the room." I vaguely thought about how nice it must be to be him, to not even be able to understand the all-consuming worry I was experiencing. I envy that, and I can't wait to have it in my own life.

 

He said, "Why don't you consider not defending yourself?"

 

I was like "Huh?"

 

He continued, "They don't have your best interest in mind. They are not trying to develop you...." He said some other stuff, but these two things really stuck out for me.

 

It never occurred to me to not defend myself. I don't know why I haven't considered that.

 

I generally choose my battles. And I know this is a lost cause. Why am I even worrying about it?

 

What am I doing??

 

Anyway, I wrote those two things down on a post-it:

 

They don't have my best interest in mind.

They aren't trying to develop me.

 

That's it. That's the simple truth. I'm going to bring the post-it to work and look at it through out the day. I'm not sure exactly how, but I think it might help.

[Jibralta]

I guess my fear is, that if I don't fight back against unfair blame and criticism, it will somehow become true and brand me.

 

I think that what I need to accept and really own is my belief that these criticisms and blame are unfair, and (most importantly) are inaccurate.

 

That belief needs to settle itself into my core, and I need to draw strength from it.

[Jibralta]

I think I really have trouble understanding that there are people out there who actually want other people to fall short of their potential.

[Jibralta]

Slept awesome last night.

 

Shannon has been perfectly pleasant at work. Well, I I don't know if the right word is "pleasant." The word "bland" may be more appropriate, actually. She almost seems indifferent to the issues that arise with my project.

 

It reminds me a little of the way my mother used to behave, but I'm not sure if that's what's happening here. I don't think Shannon is wired like my mother.

 

When I was growing up, my mom would fly into rages about whatever. Then immediately following the rages, she would give us the silent treatment. The silent treatment would go on for days. She would either ignore us, or give us short monotone answers when communication was unavoidable.

 

Shannon's bland behavior reminds me of that, but I don't know if that's what it really is.

 

Whatever it is, it works just fine for me!

 

Of course, I have the ominous feeling that the other shoe is going to drop sometime soon. But that's not affecting my sleep, so I'm gonna go with it.

[Jibralta]

Joe, the structural engineer, handed in his notice yesterday. He told me about his own job hunt on the day that he came in and saw me packing up my stuff the other week.

 

I'm glad for him. I just wish I'd started my own job hunt earlier, so that I could be at the same point that he's at now.

 

I'm making slow progress with my resume. Yesterday morning, I unpacked some of the boxes from work and started organizing the project information.

 

I cleared off a spot at our table so that I can go through all of it and remind myself of what I've done.

 

I don't have the best set up here for this type of work, but I'll make do.

[Jibralta]

I go to physical therapy on Monday nights. I've become friendly with the therapist, Tessa. She's about my age and is a very light-hearted, humorous sort of person. We laugh a lot.

 

My work-debacle was fresh on my mind last Monday, so she got an earful. Yesterday, she asked how things were going and I said they weren't better, but that I felt better.

 

She said something about emotions subsiding, and I thought, "I wasn't emotional!"

 

But then I realized yes, I definitely was emotional. I was ready to walk out the door at one point last week! And I couldn't concentrate to save my life.

 

I started to rein it in late last week, after I spoke to the MEP project manager, Louis. He was telling me about his progress on my job, and I said, "That's fine if you're not going to have anything by Friday. I don't care. I don't even know why I'm working. I can't concentrate knowing that I'm surrounded by assh*les. F*ck this job. F*ck these people."

 

I know Louis understood what I was going through because he warned me about Shannon when I first joined the department. When I told him what happened with her and Mark, he said, "It happens to everyone." BUT despite the fact that he understood and sympathized with my plight, I could tell that he was not tolerant of my despondence and lack of focus. I realized that I needed to get a handle on things because I wasn't being fair to the other people on the project team.

 

A similar thing happened with Paul. He asked how I was doing (post-sh*tstorm), and I said "Sh*tty. I've never worked in a place like this. I don't know what to think or do." He said, "It's the way of the world. You just haven't been around much." I quipped back, "I'm 43. I've been around plenty." But his message was clear. I just have to suck it up.

 

I've never intended to be one of those people who stops doing good work out of spite. I'm still working through the weekend, still going in early. But my dejection has taken some toll on my output and I'd like that to stop.

[Jibralta]

Late yesterday afternoon, I sat with Eddie, the QC guy. I needed input on some soffits and possible asbestos remediation.

 

As we were talking, Ivan came in and looked at the project. He said to me, "I see you're treating this as a tenant fit-out, as I suggested." I said, "Yes," but felt puzzled, as it was not a simple tenant fit out.

 

Ivan gave us some insight on the asbestos issue and left the room. Eddie breathed a sign of relief because Ivan will attack a project if he sees fit, and Eddie usually gets the brunt of it.

 

Basically, whenever Ivan lurks around, you queue the Jaws music. You never know when he's gonna strike.

 

But he didn't strike this time. And when I got back to my desk, he was talking to Jason, telling him to follow up on the asbestos issue with the client. I know this because Ivan caught me before I left again and told me so.

 

I am not sure why Ivan is so involved here. I'd like to think that he takes my side on things, but you never know.

[Jibralta]

Up again. Jury's out as to whether tonight's sleep is ruined.

 

The other shoe did drop yesterday, sort of. It was more like a slipper, padding softly: just Shannon asking if I was going to be ready to send the review set to the client on Friday.

 

I'm not, of course. After my preoccupation last week, and Jason's total lack of follow through in 'supporting' me, I'll need at least another week.

 

But there's no use telling her that because she doesn't listen.

 

Her response won’t be “How can I help?” It will be a demand disguised as a question: “Why not!” Then I will try to answer her but she won’t listen. Maddening. It's like torture.

 

So, I said, "I hope so."

 

She whined, “The client is giving me a really hard time.”

 

I felt like saying, "Aw, poor baby. Ask me if I give a sh*t. I'd love to see the client smack you to Kingdom Come and back. Seriously, wrong tactic to take here. You expect me to save your ass but you won't lift a finger to help me? That's amazing. What's more amazing is that I think you're full of sh*t. I'm sure the client isn't even asking after the drawings. They aren't due until Friday and unless you told them, client doesn't know they're going to be late. How stupid do you think I am?"

 

When I first started working for her, I noticed that Shannon whined. I thought, "That's odd, but not annoying at all."

 

Famous last words.

 

Kind of like me telling Bill, "No rush; it's not an emergency" when he asked if I could wait a month or two for him to make me a job offer. The next day, the sh*t really hit the fan for me.

 

Shannon's whining now sounds to me like fingernails scraping a chalk board.

 

My birthday is coming up and I haven't even thought about it. I've been too preoccupied with work. My whole evening was ruined by that one stupid question from her. That's how wound up I am.

 

I'm seriously considering taking Thursday and Friday off and eff all. It's not really my style, but I feel like I'm just banging my head against the wall with these people.

[Jibralta]

This past year, my boyfriend got himself some recording software to play around with.

 

One of his projects has been to re-record Orion by Metallica, playing all of the parts himself.

 

I was like, "That's not something I would choose to do for fun, but ok."

 

He spent the last few months scouring the internet, figuring out the various parts of the song: guitars, bass, drums, organ.

 

He played and recorded both guitar tracks and the bass track. He programmed the drums electronically, and found an organ sample and a gong sample to use.

 

Throughout these months, I've often heard samples of his progress. I think it's amazing the way that he can figure everything out.

 

I know this song well, but I became aware of so many more elements of it as I listened to his progress.

 

He finally finished the song last week and it sounds great. Almost identical to the original version. Really. He is so amazingly talented. I'm so proud of him.

 

After listening to the whole thing, I sort of understood why he felt that doing something like this would be a fun project.

 

This is not his recording below; it's just the song:

 

[video=youtube;c8qrwON1-zE]

[Jibralta]

Here's a song for my work day.

 

Back to the front

You will do

What I say

When I say

 

[Jibralta]

I've developed a bad case of the bullsh*ts and am taking the day off of work today and tomorrow. The plan is to work on my resume and get it out there.

 

I hear there is another assignment for me in the pipeline, so I guess I won't be getting fired. I don't know when I'll have time to do it, as I'm still less than halfway done with the current project.

 

Whatevs.

[reinventmyself]

I've developed a bad case of the bullsh*ts and am taking the day off of work today and tomorrow. The plan is to work on my resume and get it out there.

 

I hear there is another assignment for me in the pipeline, so I guess I won't be getting fired. I don't know when I'll have time to do it, as I'm still less than halfway done with the current project.

 

Whatevs.

 

trying to get you to quit, maybe?

[Jibralta]

trying to get you to quit, maybe?

 

I have certainly seen them do it before!

 

But in this case, it's actually good for me. I know I said that getting fired would be the best possible outcome, but I really don't like the idea of it.

 

Yes, it would give me a small income while I search for my next gig, but there is also a stigma attached to being fired. I wouldn't feel good about it.

 

The new assignment means that I get to stick it out until I find my next job... at least a little longer.

 

I planned to work on my resume today and tomorrow. I did a little work on it today, but have gotten a bit distracted.

 

Bill emailed me this morning, "Hey keep hanging in there. We are getting really close. Just landed two new clients which could mean a good stream of work in addition to a bunch of other projects coming on line. How are things? Maybe we can meet up sometime and I can fill you in on what we are up to."

 

How convenient that I took the day off today and tomorrow (albeit unofficially)! I arranged to meet with him tomorrow. I won't have a resume, but if I act fast I can at least have a rough project list.

[Jibralta]

I met with Bill a little while ago. He appears to be in the exact same situation as he was two years ago: still waiting for that big project to hit and give him a financial windfall.

 

I checked out his website a couple days ago, and it seemed like his company had really grown since I worked there. But that's the deceptiveness of marketing.

 

The company is exactly the same way as it was when I was there two years ago, except he has two more part-time employees. And a great-looking website.

 

I don't think that gig I had with him two years ago would have panned out to full time. I made the right choice to pursue the job offer from my current company.

 

But I still really like Bill, and am interested in working for him.

 

Yes, there's a bit of smoke and mirrors at work with his business. But it's not that horrible, self-destructive, insidious kind of BS that Frank pulls off on a daily basis.

 

I listened to Bill talk about what he's been up to for the last few years, his plans for the future, and what he's learned from past experience.

 

I didn't hear any of the unbearable pomposity that I hear when Frank opens his mouth. It was so refreshing.

 

I would work for Bill, if he made me an offer. It will probably mean a pay cut and it would probably be a risk, but I think the experience might be worth it.

 

It's just going to be a matter of timing, because it will be at least a month before he makes a decision on whether to hire me or not.

 

A lot depends on the workflow that comes from his new clients. Also, my resume will soon be in the pipeline and I may soon (hopefully) be fielding other job offers.

[Jibralta]

On Thursday night, Arnold and I went out to dinner with my coworker (Eddie) and his wife (Mary). Eddie is the QC guy at work. He's in his early 70s.

 

Eddie gave me some interesting information about the firm that we both work for.

 

Apparently, they practiced architecture without a license for many years and were fined repeatedly for it. I was simultaneously surprised and unsurprised to hear that. Surprised because it is so brazenly stupid and dishonest. Unsurprised because of my experience with the leadership, and my observations of the company over the last two years.

 

Eddie also told me that Frank really screwed one of the guys who works for him (Gary), and that as a result, Gary called out sick from work for most of last week (I can really relate to that!).

 

It seems that the screwing of Gary was not limited to Frank, though. Mark also screwed him. And if you ask me, Mark screwed Gary worse than Frank did.

 

You see, our employment contracts indicate that we will receive a 4% commission on work that we bring in. Gary negotiated a contract for $30K more than Mark had planned for, and Mark refused to reward Gary with a commission or a bonus.

 

Gary had actually explicitly said to Mark, "Don't propose your fee to the client yet; I can get more." And Mark held off on delivering the proposal and let Gary negotiate for him, then refused to compensate him for the increased amount.

 

Now it's true that our contract is conveniently vague about commissions. But any smart, honest businessman would go out of his way to make good on something like that, especially when it's at literally no cost to himself. If Mark paid the measly $1200 to Gary, he'd still have almost $29K more than he would have without Gary's efforts.

 

I think it's particularly dastardly of Mark to deny the commission, and it makes me feel a lot better about disliking him so much.

 

Frank's part in the whole thing was typical Frank: he just threw Gary under the bus when Mark questioned the number of hours Gary was spending on a project.

 

It happened during the ridiculous 'coordination' meeting that the 'leadership' has every week, where all of the project managers lie to Mark's face about the work that's supposedly going to go out, and then run to the billing lady after the meeting to tell her not to bill what Mark tells her to bill.

 

Mark could have praised Gary during the meeting, for his effort in successfully negotiating a higher fee. But instead he criticized the number of hours that Gary spent on a project. Frank, ever the sycophant, piped in with, "I keep telling him he's spending too much time with it, but he just won't move faster."

 

Paul, the finance guy, was in the meeting and witnessed the exchange. He's friends with Gary and he hates Frank, so he told Gary what Frank said.

 

I guess Gary confronted Frank about it. Frank confronted Eddie, assuming Eddie was the one who ratted him out to Gary. Then Gary didn't come back to work.

[Jibralta]

It's my first interrupted sleep in a while.

 

Shannon caught me as I was heading out the door today and asked after the status of my project. I just wanted to say, "Give up the act. You're the f*cking boss. You can ask any one of the people around you who you assigned to help."

 

But instead, I took a page from her book and said, "I don't know. I have to ask around" and motioned to our coworkers who were literally sitting closer to her than I was. I continued, "I wish you had asked me this an hour earlier because I would have been able to ask people. But I'm heading out the door now." And then I left.

 

I am pretty sure the look on my face said, "I despise you." I was done f*cking around and the mask came off for a moment. Shannon is a coward at heart and she backpedals a little whenever she finds herself up against a real opponent. It feels good to see her shrink whenever it happens, but it's not how I want things to be. It's pointless and reckless.

 

The exchange left me feeling exhilarated and angry. It's the anger that I'm working through now. It's deeper and more clear than it was a few weeks ago.

 

My dislike for Shannon is poisonous to me. I don't want to dislike her. I don't want to think about her at all. I want her out of my life. I feel trapped and want nothing more than to escape.

 

What I hate most of all is that my anger at these people and this situation is making me angry in general. Arnold came to bed earlier, and instead of snuggling up to him in my sleep, I resisted. It was my anger resisting, not my grogginess. That made me even angrier, and I got up.

 

I finally got a resume together and on Sunday night launched it into the Covid-19 Job Desert. Not the most auspicious time to job hunt, and I still have more resume-related work to do. But at least the ball is somewhat rolling.

[Jibralta]

My sleep last night was really awful, and this morning I drove to work with a ton of anxiety. It was intense for a couple hours, and then it somehow faded and things got better. I'm not sure exactly how or why. Nothing particularly positive happened.

 

They hired a new person in my department, and I think that may have triggered my anxiety to begin with. When I saw her come in yesterday, I thought for sure she was my replacement--and she may yet be. But I've talked myself off of the ledge for now.

 

With the Covid-19 scare afoot, the office is trying to figure out how to enable everyone to work from home. They have a great IT guy, and they have some provision for it currently, but the management is so terrible that working from home is sort of a joke. Whenever I find out someone is working from home, I know I'm probably not going to get anything out of them that day.

 

But now the office has implemented a strange policy where , if you're working from home, you have to call your manager three times a day and log all of your time, yada yada yada. It seems like these rules are making people take working from home more seriously, at least for now. My last company didn't need to take measures like this to make people productive, but it is what it is.

 

Today, they gave some of us, including me, desktop computers so that we could work from home. Perhaps this is one reason why my anxiety decreased: they probably wouldn't hand me a computer if they were going to fire me.

[Seraphim]

I hope you can work from home. ❤️ I hear you my anxiety is massive as well. Hugs.

[Jibralta]

Thanks, Seraphim :)

[Jibralta]

My boyfriend usually does all of the food shopping around here. Of the two of us, he's the better shopper and he's got the whole thing it down to a science.

 

He's been making forays into the food stores all week. He scored a nice block of toilet paper on Monday. On Tuesday, he sent me a photo of the empty toilet paper aisle.

 

Today, he went to the store at 7AM and said there were 50 to 75 people lined up out into the parking lot, waiting for the store to open.

 

I told him that if we have everything we needed, he should come home. But, he stayed and shopped.

 

He came back about a half an hour later and said, "It's a f*cking zoo out there."

 

I saw exhilaration on him. It reminded me of how he likes to go out during the chaos of Black Friday. I realized that this environment might actually attract that kind of shopper --the Black Friday Shoppers-- into the stores.

 

I said, "I think you like it."

 

He said, "I do. I forgot how much I like it."

[Jibralta]

We did two trial work-from-home days last week. Thursday and Friday.

 

On Thursday, my remote desktop froze up, so I went in to work. On Friday, the remote desktop worked, but I ended up going in for the last 2/3 of the day because it's just better to work from the office.

 

On both days, it was a skeleton crew. It was really nice.

[Jibralta]

Jason admitted to me yesterday that he told Mark and Shannon that I wasn't cut out for retail architecture.

 

It was just me and him in the department yesterday, and we got to talking.

 

He's been a real pain in the ass for the last month, and I'm sure it's had everything to do with Shannon's complaint about me to Mark a couple of weeks ago.

 

Mark may be a moron, but he's the boss-moron. When he decrees something, people listen.

 

Except me. I just scowl at him now. Loser.

 

Anyway, I'm not surprised about Jason's disclosure. He's proven himself to be very two-faced. I think back to the end of November, when he professed to be my ally:

 

One night, last week or the week before, after one of Shannon's 'episodes,' Jason actually followed me out the door at the end of the day to tell me not to worry, that he had my back. That the expectations were unreasonable, etc.

 

Not long after that, he promised to help me with my work in return for me helping him with his. Then he failed to make good on his promise every single time after that.

 

I think back to early/mid February, to the blatant lie that I caught him in:

 

I get fed up with Jason a lot, too. Last week, he totally threw me under the bus for something I was not even involved with. I found out only because Shannon sent me a terse email which forwarded a response from Jason that read, "Jibralta was working on it, but I haven't heard from her in a while."

 

To be honest, when I read that statement from him, I knew I had fallen out of favor somehow.

 

Why? I don't know. Whatever the reason, it was determined behind my back and I was not given any opportunity to address it.

 

I'm sure that was a deliberate arrangement on their part, to make it impossible for me to fight back.

 

I had only vague suspicion of my 'fall.' The only evidence of it was that it had become justifiable to use me as a scapegoat.

 

There's no fighting a suspicion. I'd just look crazy.

 

I've seen this happen to people here before. I spent months in this department fixing mistakes. I saw who actually made the mistakes and I saw who got blamed. The two were never the same. It's just the culture here.

 

Even so, I tried to remain hopeful... but reading back through these pages I can see I obviously felt something was wrong because I was having trouble sleeping.

[Jibralta]

My boyfriend and I watched a Mr. Rogers documentary a couple months ago. It showed a scene from Mr. Roger's Neighborhood where Mr. Rogers invited Officer Clemmon's to soak his feet in a kiddie pool with him. This took place on the heels of the Civil Rights movement in the US, when people felt uncomfortable about race and were reluctant to intermingle.

 

At the very end of the scene, Fred Rogers looks directly into the camera with the most aggressive look I've ever seen him give. He's always struck me as a pacifist, but this glance stuck in my head because it looks like a challenge. And that's what I figured it was, a challenge to the haters. I loved it.

 

I just googled the clip, and judging from the comments, I'm not the only one who noticed it.

 

I'm glad.