I am in the middle of an unexpected two weeks off from work. Last week I came down with an absolutely nasty sinus infection, and had been offered a position at another place, and wound up resigning by email. I hated to do it that way, but several people I know had been hit by this virus and were out of action for days. I also, in the email, talked fairly neutrally about reasons why I was leaving and gave solid examples of things that had happened to make me want to leave. The upshot was that they told me I did not need to come back to work out my two weeks' notice.

What's sad though, is that when I went back to pick up my things and answer some questions that they had...not one mention was made of my comments about being unhappy, and I didn't have any kind of exit interview. They were all full of smiles and hopes that I'll get better soon and enjoy my new position. Which means, of course, that I've just been labeled a malcontent who was trying to stir up trouble, and not one thing will change. I told them those things because I thought I ought to make them aware of just how upsetting some of their actions have been to the lower-level staff, in the hopes that they start to actually have dialogue with the staff so that the working environment would be less toxic.  I shouldn't have bothered.

What worries me is that I'm going to be made into a handy scapegoat for any problems. For instance, one of the questions they had for me was where some paperwork was. I told them it was in a certain binder. They told me that two people had searched that binder, and it was not there. I called for the binder; right there was the tab for the paperwork, and behind that tab was the damned paperwork! They said something about how they'd expected the paperwork to be arranged in a different fashion, and that's why they didn't notice the tab (ZOMGWTFBBQ?!?).  What's going to happen when I'm no longer there to "fix" things like that? Are they just going to throw up their hands and declare that because they can't immediately find what they need, obviously I messed it up before I left? They've already re-arranged my cube - if they couldn't see a clearly-labeled tab that was right in front of their faces, what have they already carelessly thrown out that they'll later blame on me?

Oh well. Nothing I can do about it now, and even if they do mutter accusations, I'm already into a new job and soon those people will be able to say, "Um, I've worked with her for 6 months and never seen any indication she would do something like that."

What's hilarious is that I suspect part of why they didn't want me back, is that they were afraid I would try to "poison" other employees with my attitude (newsflash: the other employees don't need help from me to be unhappy, they already are unhappy...). So far, multiple ex-co-workers have let me know that they're furious over me being told not to come back, that they think it was really tacky that management didn't even let them get me a goodbye cake and that they're not happy with the way the transition of duties is being handled. So, management has damaged relations with their in-house team, on their own, far more than I ever could. Which is pretty much par for the course, with them.  Sigh.

The hilarious bitches at Disgrasian have provided a "transcript" of Obama's meeting with Bush at the White House. You might want to check it out here. An excerpt:


OBAMA: Mr. President, if I could just get you to focus...

BUSH: Have you wondered where exactly a squid's face is? Those crazy-ass things don't make a lick o' sense to me. Kinda like Koreans.

I'm not big on Obama. I'm not against him, I just can't seem to muster up screaming enthusiasm for him. But I'm sure that there are plenty of people on my flist who would enjoy this commentary from the chicks at Disgrasian, about Fox News' hysterical reporting of Barack and Michelle Obama's "terrorist fist bump".  I always think the best way to deal with idiots is not to scream back at them, but to make them look stupid by mocking them.  And Disgrasian definitely has that down to a science.  They've even got pictures!

Click here for a sampling of other terrorists who have secretly been living in our midst...