Bosses, complete b*stards or just b*stards?

You are entitled to holiday, and I advise going to personnel if your boss carries on being a fucker about it.

Chris V, Pete, wanna me by new boss?

Although I doubt we'd get very much work done coz we'd be on ILX all day, or would we actually converse? So many questions......

I think I may have overdosed on cough medicine..

If a boss has to say something which the subordinate doesn't want to hear, it takes a lot of maturity to accept that it's nothing personal. I'm sure it's a real pisser for some, who are good people but get landed with arsey staff.

Well done, though, smee.

(This probably works because I only have five people working for me. I can see it might get a bit messy and disorganised if I were head of some multi-national conglomerate)

Just say you're setting up a charter school founded on the values of the naturalist way of life. If you keep emphasizing the word "values" and don't explain what "naturalist" means, you're in the clear.

He likes to ask me lots of questions in a way that sets up this teacher/student type relationship.

For example:
Boss: "Sarah, Do you know what is wrong with your voicemail message?"
Me: "(pause) No..."
Boss: "Do you even know what you say on there?"
Me: "Well, (blah di blah di blah)..."
Boss: "Let's listen to it together, shall we?"
(calls into my voicemail and puts it on speaker phone. I still don't hear anything wrong with it)
Boss: "NOW, do you see what I'm talking about?"
Me: (Blank stare)
Boss: "Do you see what's missing here? There's your message.. and it's very nice and professional.. and then the voice that says, 'Speak after the tone.'"
Me: "Yes...?"
Boss:"SO, YOU need to say something like, "Please leave a message after the beep and I will get back to you," because otherwise how are people supposed to know to leave a message???

WTF???

And today he asked me if I knew how to find the square footage of a house.
Yes, of course.
So then he proceeds to draw a diagram of a house that is very rectangular but - tricky tricky - is basically two rectangles put together instead of just one.
Do I know how to find the area?
Of course! I went to middle school!
But even though I say, "Yes, yes. So you multiply length times width and add the two areas...," he goes on to talk to me very slowly and uses an example and repeats himself several times.

Then, later he made another comment about how I should feel REALLY lucky that I get to wear jeans today on office casual day. He said, "You know, Sarah. I know you want to be like the other people in the office and wear jeans. But what if I said you had to go by all their policies? What if I made you work from 8 to 5:30 for now on??? Is that what you want?"
Yeah, that's really funny.
So, I say, "You know, I've said this before, but I REALLY don't mind. If you REALLY don't want me to wear jeans on casual day, I won't."
But he'd prefer to carry on about it.

GRRRAJRKLARJKLJRKLRJRRR!

Or, perhaps: "Bite me Satan"

Or I could do the devilhorns thing that Elaine did on Seinfeld.

Back when I worked at the RE office, it was generally the bitchiest realtors who took on the assistants. (The nicest ones generally couldn't afford to, alas.) Bleh.

All this boss stuff hits home for me though because I'm one and it can be absolutely excruciating to have to make decisions that nobody is happy with. I recently went through the time-off thing and it's still eating my soul...we have an absolutely no vacation in May policy and my employee asked off for the last week of the month for a wedding. I feel like an awful person no matter what I do in this situation.

(note: I do not actually think this is a good idea at all, tho I do have a friend who has gotten away with something similar.)

Today is his birthday. He is still in a horrible mood though. The first thing he said when he called in this morning was, "What did ... Lender say about the package?" I told him and he yelled, "You call back that Fckhead and you tell him that....!!!"

I left a message for the company supervisor to announce his birthday at their meeting. Sure enough, he had everyone sing him happy birthday. In return, my boss called me up and said that it will definitely effect my next bonus, that he HATES getting up in front of people and that I should know better than to have done that.

I also got him a card for everyone to sign and a cake. He better not scold me for those too! What a jerk!

Sarah, that sucks. Though your boss may not be Alpha Asshole, being handed a Bill O'Reilly book and being told "maybe this will help you think" is always pretty fucking discouraging. :(

okay, fine, but 3 days is a fucking lie, I was here at 8 on monday and tuesday and no-one else was here, and no-one fucking noticed. So I figured that, along with the fact that I didn't take a lunch yesterday, made up for it. Guess not! I will never come in a second early again since it goes unnoticed. and if I'm running late I'll just not come in at all.

Also, she made me take down a notice giving helpline numbers for students who've experienced racism, because it was 'inappropriate' for our noticeboard. Yeah, because it's not like our centre is the most visited part of the university for international students, or anything.

MF wants diana [another office admin assistant] to move to the empty admin cubicle that is closer to him. When the irm partner, DH, heard MF wanted her to move, he put up a stink because he likes her sitting closer to him. not to mention MF is never in the office so it shouldn't matter where she sits to begin with. anyway, these two grown men are going back and forth putting her in the middle of it. MF then decided to call some high level admin person in chicago to see if they could make the move happen, and the high partner was about to be called the last i heard. they made the our office manager fax over our floor plan to chicago with X marks as to where she is sitting now and where they want to move her. these people are nuts. we are talking about a difference of maybe 10 steps (i know this because the office mangaer actually walked and counted the steps it takes to get to and fro from both cubicles). an outstanding use of the office manager's time.

grrr. then don't promise things that you can't deliver. certainly not if you're going to spring changes on people two hours before you need them. and spec the damn thing well in the first place, if it's not sure in your mind how it works then how am i going to know? and T being in late is exactly what to do with me? nothing. grrrr.

Now, I know that you don't actually ride public transportation yourself, and so this may be an unfamiliar concept, but let's think about it logically: I'm late because the earlier train DID NOT COME. I do not possess psychic abilities that will allow me to ascertain this in advance.

Also, thank you for making me work on Martin Luther King Day because we are so "busy" when in fact you're just going to make me sit around filing all day because you don't want to be in the office alone. Because all the other fucking businesses here are taking the day off. Partly because last year you gave a speech to the entire office about how important it was to observe it.

I can't wait to not fucking work here.

I used to commute on NJ Transit from Bergen County. I took an express train to Hoboken, then the PATH, and got in around 9.10 every day. My boss lived in Bklyn. But she wanted ME to get on a train 45 mins earlier (which was NOT an express) in order to be at my desk before 9am, so she could feel confident that her authors would get someone on the phone even if she didn't feel like coming in until 9.20.

So basically I'm saying I feel your pain.

Also: now that I've given the ABSURD 2 months notice she wanted, she has now decided that she wants to try to find a way to kick me off of health insurance, since you pay installments for three months in advance. EVEN THOUGH they will reimburse her for the last month as soon as I leave. AND she wants ME to help her figure out how to cancel it. This bugs me especially because she is very independently wealthy. Also because she gave me a big speech when I was hired about how important it is to give your employees health insurance.

Also, are you still looking for something to do tomorrow night? If I'm not too busy w/ Bk 2, I might have an idea. Will email.