Dive on in...

Those who've been with me a while will know that the six months between March and September were bleak in the extreme (apart from the very high moment in August when I connected with a long-lost friend) while I was working at Fuckwittery Inc in a large south coast city.

Ever a glutton for punishment, when that contract finished, I applied for another job at one of Fuckwittery Inc's smaller country branches, with no real hope of anything being good except for the pension provision.  Anyhoo.  I started there on Tuesday.

Two days in and this, the country branch of FI, is proving to be the complete antithesis of FI (City).

In no particular order, I received a welcome card (!), I've been introduced around; today, a person who I met for about two minutes yesterday offered me cake and called me by my name; there are sufficient loos for the number of staff.  There's a kitchen, with plates, cutlery, mugs, tea supplies and a microwave, there's a break-out/lunch area WHICH IS NOT IN THE CORRIDOR - with sofas and chairs and a table.  Staff are treated with respect and trust, as sentient adults. There has been no three-day pointless Induction.  I get mine on 6th January,  and it will last for one day, and include a sandwich lunch.  Fuckwittery Inc (City) managed a two-pack of slightly stale Lincoln biscuits and a plastic cup of stewed tea.

My colleague, Dive, is, amongst other things, an ex-matelot; he's what snowflakes might call ''un-woke'', but we get along swearily. We're about the same age, I'd think.  Same terms of reference. We had the ''Do I offend you? If so tell me'' conversation yesterday, to which I said (having already successfully gauged the cut of his jib) ''Fuck, no!'' He laughed. I also pointed out to him that when he does offend me, he'd know about it - but that he shouldn't hold his breath because I'm too old to be a snowflake about much. He laughed again.   I like him already - he's honest, he's forthright and he expects me to be the same.  Today, he said I was a Rottweiler...I took it at as a compliment.  He's not my boss - he's my equal, and we job-share.  We are trusted to get on with shit, and we are not subjected to micro-management. We have an actual boss, but he's based at the slightly larger country branch further down the coast, and does high-brow things with money and legals, so we are seldom graced with his presence, nor are we likely to be.   That's a shame, because he interviewed me (with Dive) and he seemed like a really good bloke.


The office I share with Dive is roomy, quiet and overlooks a garden area. There are windows - four of them - and they open.  It has two proper desks, and decent tech equipment, a filing cabinet; Dive said I should have that.  He travels light; being of a services mentality, he ''might have to get in and out quick''.  Perhaps he was a naval ninja...  We also have four intact chairs (two wheelie and two for visitors) and, get this...a cupboard, full-length, with HANGERS FOR OUR COATS!!! We have clean walls, a trio of what I'd call ''hotel art'' pictures, plus a photo of Dive's prized open-top Saab.  It's his ''against the bad days'' charm.  If he feels down, he looks at his picture and tells himself that he'll being going home with her later.  Okay, I know that's not PC but, you know, (and this is me talking) I don't care.

We get on, the two of us. 

Everything else will fall into place...

Oh, but on the downside, and typically, the IT doesn't work. 

Friends in high places...friends in turbans...

It's been a while since I put fingertips to keyboard, but I figured, at the start of my tenure with Fucktwittery Inc. that there's only so much negativity that other people want to read.  After a certain point, it all becomes just a wee bit...meh.

So I stopped.  Jeebus, I was making myself even more depressed than I already was.

In a nutshell, since 21st May, things HAVE improved a bit - but only truly in the last two days when I finally got a colleague.  The original holder of Gandalf of Excel's post has been on maternity leave, but she's back - and she appears to be a woman after my own heart.  She is a ''getter-of-shit-done'', and that's good enough for me.  She's also a ''do what you think best - tell me if it goes wrong (which I doubt it will) and I will sort it'' person.  I think we will rub along quite nicely.  Plus, she is The Merlin of Excel, and trumps Gandalf hands down. She's also further up the food chain than Cherub.  It's all good.  Cautious optimism.

Cherub hates me now.  This is because I truly, TRULY got one over on her the week before last, and because I now have (by accident, not design) a friend in a VERY high place within Fuckwittery Inc.

The person who ended up helping me to solve a very sticky computer problem, just by dint of picking up the phone to me while passing through someone else's office and then making a side trip to the office on his way to a far more important meeting elsewhere on our floor, is SO far up the food chain that he's practically God Almighty himself. I had no idea who this person was.  He told me his name was Lucky.  I thought he was a simple tech nerd in IT.  I explained the problem.  He offered to come and help me. 

And there he was, at my desk, helping me, when Cherub walked in and heard me, in conversation,  calling him Lucky. It is, after all, his name.  

 ''Oh, Mr Skywalker'', she spluttered. ''What are you doing here?  I'm Cherub.  I'm the Ops Manager on this floor''. 

 ''I'm helping Pinny with a problem'', said Mr Skywalker, ignoring Cherub's introduction.

''But...but...how are you personally involved with such mundanity, Mr Skywalker?'' 

''Because I happened to pick up the phone.  I do that sometimes''. 

 ''Oh, but...'' said Cherub.  

''Pinny'', said Lucky, ''...did exactly the right thing in taking the action she did''.

BACKGROUND INFO:I'd phoned an outside agency about a glitch in a programme that Fuckwittery Inc are paying for as part of my project - Cherub had hauled me over the coals like a five year old for that - mostly because I'd done it without asking her.  Used to thinking for myself, see?  AND she was at yet another meeting, so I had no-one else to ask about how I should go about things.  I had, however, been introduced to a Charming Sikh Gentleman from Textcom, and had spoken to him for about thirty seconds, just after I started at FI. So I used my ''contact'', and phoned him.  He was charming, and gave me some pointers.

And back to my tale...

 ''Furthermore'', said Lucky, ''I know the Charming Sikh Gentleman at Textcom to whom she spoke about this, and I have also spoken to him, and we have now sorted out Pinny's problem for her between us, after she had been struggling with this issue single-handedly for more than 24 hours.  She should not have had to do that''.   

''Okay now, Pinny?''

''Yes, thanks, Lucky''

''Please let me know if you have any further problems, Pinny''.

''I shall, Lucky, and thank you so much for sorting this out for me''.

First name terms, see?  Me and High-up-the-food-chain-almost God-Almighty-Lucky AND the Charming Sikh Gentleman - who turns out to be someone pretty important at Textcom. 

Fuck you, Cherub.

Don't bank on it...

Why is it that Lord Oakwood today had to drive into Hamwic (and right down to the bottom of Hamwic where the sea used to lap against the walls), pay to park, and go to his bank to get a telephone number from a cashier who couldn't have cared less about his problem, then drive all the way back home to Oakwood Hall to make a phone call to the Fraud line of his bank?

Lord Oakwood, being a traditional sort of a cove, doesn't subscribe to any sort of technology.  He has a mobile phone, but it makes phone calls.  It doesn't connect him to the rest of the Universe, surround him with apps for this and that, or allow him to watch porn or YouTube on demand.  It's a phone.  Computer, pads and tablets (unless medicinal) are not on his radar.  He knows about radar, natch, but that's pretty much where technology ends for him.  He still uses paper maps, for goodness sake.

Anyhoo.  Lord Oakwood received his bank statement.  He gave it a cursory glance to make sure that his regular incomings had in come, but was rather puzzled to find a mysterious entry for a debit of £7.99 to Amazon. For a ''download''.  Rather in the way of Rowan Atkinson's judge, who tremulously queries, ''A di-gi-tal WATCH???'', he quizzed Lady Oakwood about what this mysterious item might be.  She was none the wiser, although she DID understand that some scammy bastard appeared to be buying music with Lord Oakwood's debit card  - and that that person wasn't Lord Oakwood. 

Lord Oakwood went straight to the telephonic device in the hallway, found the telephone directory, and phoned the number given for the bank.  Which didn't, of course, put him through to his ACTUAL bank, but instead linked him into a gigantic and convoluted Game of Numbers, requiring passwords he doesn't have (as he doesn't do telephone banking) and number combinations he didn't understand.  After several minutes of fighting with both his hearing aid AND the labyrinthine ''system for your convenience'', he gave up and tried another tack. He got out his debit card and looked on the reverse.  There was a number for Fraud.  He rang said number.  That number linked him straight back into the Game of Numbers, despite it being a different number to the bank number he'd already phoned.  He was stymied.

Stuffing the statement into his pocket, and stalking irritably to the garage, Lord Oakwood got the motor out and set off to Hamwic, secure in the knowledge that there would at least be a real person to talk to at the bank.  There was, indeed, a real person behind the counter at the bank.  However, she could not have been in the least bit interested in his problem.  She scribbled a number on the back of a piece of paper and told him to phone the Fraud line.  The number she gave him was completely different to the number on the back of his card.  A decent bit of customer service would have been to offer to phone the Fraud line for Lord Oakwood there and then, but that didn't happen.  As Lord Oakwood later spat, when recalling the situation over supper, ''It wasn't even as though there was anyone else in the bank.  She (the cashier) wasn't even doing anything when I arrived''.  If he was a man capable of harrumphing, I think he would have let one rip, so exercised was he.

Back he came to Oakwood Hall, still with his problem unresolved, but with a number to call.  He called, explained, and it was all sorted out - as was the second debit from his account, for the same sum, which actually went out of his account as the Fraud Officer was looking at it.  That, as the Fraud Officer said,  ''proved'' that Lord Oakwood's account had been compromised.  Lord Oakwood could not have been downloading from Amazon at the exact same time that he was reporting a fraud.

Lord Oakwood is a healthy, sprightly chap (as those of you who know him IRL can attest).  There are no flies on him, he has a full set of marbles, and he's fully able to stand up for himself.  He just doesn't ''do'' technology.  It saddens him beyond all reason that he can no longer make a simple phone call and speak to a person when he needs to.  It annoys him that businesses and service providers assume that everyone is linked in to the digital highway, and that there's no way through for him without jumping through hoop after hoop after hoop, which he can't do.  He feels disenfranchised.  More than that, he's really pissed off that some toe-rag has nicked money from his account.

Lord Oakwood has gone out to see his friend this evening.  Lady Oakwood is rather hoping that when he returns, he'll have got his mojo back.  His bank card is another matter entirely...

Rock the frock...

'tis a good day indeed when Cherub is out of the office as she was today.  I caught a glimpse of her teetering down the corridor, but she was far enough away that I didn't have to acknowledge her in any way. 

'twas an even better day when I got a handle on a way through the mire of the job, simply by calling in a few favours from people who I have been working closely with, and who, in their turn, have had the full Cherub experience.  I may just have turned a corner.  Whether or not it's the corner that Cherub wants me to turn, I know and care not.  At least I'll have something to counter with when she next goes off on one...

Happy days too, with the news that Mr A has been fashioning a prop for a costume party later in the year.  Having seen the photos of said prop (Mark 1), I have to say my im was truly pressed.  He IS a clever chap.

I'm spending the rest of this evening clearing out my wardrobe.  When I arrived at Oakwood Hall 9 weeks (9 chuffin' WEEKS!!!) ago, I brought with me a carefully considered capsule wardrobe of ''office'' clothes, all fitting the brief of ''Office casual, but no jeans, no t-shirts, no strappy or low-cut tops, no flipflops''.  Damn.  I hated every item, as nicely cut and ''classic'' as they all were.  The ''sensible'' trousers went home in week 2.  The dull, monochrome ''office-coloured'' tops ditto.  Everyone else looks so DRAB. They don't even wear ear-rings.  Sod it all.  I'm busting out the colourful frocks, the pretty shoes, the embroidery.  Spring and Summer are hoving into view and, besides, the office is a furnace most of the time.  I plan on invoking Menopause Rules if anyone says anything about my choices, although I fail to see how a nicely cut, expensive dress is less acceptable than a pair of black or grey trousers and a sensible top and acrylic cardi combo.  I brought my favourite dresses up from the Anderson Shelter a couple of weeks ago, and have been wearing them.  There have been ''looks'', I can tell you. I managed to score three lovely new dresses today, from the local (normally quite low-rent) charity shop in the local shopping centre: One from East, and two from Monsoon - total outlay, £15.00.  Added to the rainbow cornucopia already in the wardrobe, I'm good to go.  There are enough in there now to wear one every day for a fortnight without repetition.  The other items have been purged to storage in my suitcase behind the door, pending removal.  Tomorrow,  see me flounce, and colour me Gorgeous...

Showboating...

In my book of ''How to be a half-decent manager'', asking people who've been in post for 6 weeks to do something unnecessary and complicated, using a system that they've had hands on for about 10 minutes BECAUSE USING IT IS NOT PART OF THEIR JOB, and literally two minutes before they are scheduled to leave for the day, is not acceptable.  It's especially not acceptable when what you're asking that person to do will stress them out completely BECAUSE THEY DON'T KNOW WHAT THEY'RE DOING, will cover YOUR arse in glory, and get you and your entire team out of a very sticky situation that's pretty much of your own making. Furthermore, it's not acceptable, when that person explains the ''lack of skills'' situation to you, to crowd into their personal space with your laptop and your deputy and throw back at them, ''Well, you DID say you could be flexible and adapt to the needs of the service, and that's what I'm expecting you to do now''.  You tossing your hair back and sticking your nose in the air whilst saying it doesn't exactly endear you to me, either, you fucking showboater.

Well, when I said I COULD be flexible, I meant for you, Cherub, you with your Big Important Manager's Hat and Salary to Match, to work shit like this ''need'' out and ask me to help you with it BEFORE you fuck off to yet another meeting - especially to a meeting where you know someone is going to kick YOUR arse for failing to meet YOUR targets and because you're ill-prepared.  Your failure.  Not mine. 

However (and breathe, Wilma.  You've got this), with a bit of assistance from another colleague who had been listening incredulously to the conversation, I came through.  The ''crisis'' turned out to be something that could easily have been dealt with tomorrow, but I dealt with it today, and will finish off dealing with it tomorrow.  Unfortunately, I dealt with it so well that I fear I may have landed myself yet another ''task'' for Cherub to add to my list of STUFF THAT'S NOT MENTIONED IN ANY WAY ON MY JOB DESCRIPTION.  We shall see.

I wouldn't have minded quite so much if I'd been sitting on my laurels all day - but I'd already, and off my own bat, spent a good deal of time preparing a document to take to the ''huddle'' tomorrow, to show off what I've achieved with the project (and no supervision) thus far - and how several of the teams have been achieving excellent stats as the result of the work we've been doing together.   I'd even sent it to Cherub to vet before sending it out to the team leaders - not that I have to, but I thought it would be both polite and politic.   Cherub basically then took my document to her meeting with the Big Cheeses - but didn't have the knowledge to explain any of the back-end stuff, nor any of the rationales covering how and why the project has been set up in the way it has.  Hence...Arse-kicking.  She should have taken me.  WAAAAAAAAY above my paygrade, though. I did ask.

Having to deal with all that last-minute shit, though, has given me a bank of 45 minutes, which I intend to take back by leaving at precisely 2:15 on Friday afternoon.  It has also made me some new chums - including, bizarrely, Butterball.  At the ''height'' of ''negotiations'' between me and Cherub, Butterball disappeared.  It was all getting a bit heated in the CTA team area, it's true.  However, when Cherub had gone back to her meeting and I was doing my ''thing'', Butterball reappeared with tea and biscuits for me from her own personal stash, because she ''thought I'd need them''.   This was A Good Thing. As was passing my final Medical Terminology Exam with perfect marks...I get a certificate and everything. 

The Ministry of Truth, made flesh...

When I first came to work at Fuckwittery Inc., and when I was standing up for myself against a barrage of unfair shenanigans being imposed upon me by people who should have known better, I was severely castigated for calling the office in which I work, ''a fucking call centre''.  The castigation wasn't for the epithet, but for having had the temerity of likening (and I quote) ''an office full of hard-working people who certainly don't EVER consider that they work in a call centre, and who would feel aggrieved that you consider the office to be one'' to a call centre.  I was also told that I didn't know what I was talking about.  The person who made those comments (the Fuckwittery Inc. ''Ops'' Manager - let's call her...Cherub) then went on to tell me that our office was as far from a call centre as it is possible to be - and she should know, BECAUSE SHE'D MANAGED ONE.  I countered with, well, this IS a call centre.  I know, because I worked in one for all of two days - and then I walked out, never to return.  The conditions were terrible.  You had to physically find a manager and ask permission to leave the floor to get a drink of water from the cooler, and even to have a wee, ffs.   Added to that, we had to enter a code for each change of task, a code for being at your desk taking calls, a code for being at your desk but not taking a call, a code for being at your desk and writing a note, a code for...well, you get the drift.  The micro-management at Fuckwittery Inc. struck me as being the same, not quite as high on the Draconian Scale of Servitude, it's true, but pretty damned close.  Cherub, smiling sweetly beneath her light-oak perma-tan, assured me that these things would never happen at Fuckwittery Inc. and, besides, as I wasn't going to be doing those tasks, I shouldn't worry about it.

Anyway, all things being considered, we did agree to disagree on the subject, and things moved on.  Contracts were amended, my job was sorted out.  You've read about it here - at least, I hope you have.

Today, during the weekly ''huddle'', where the section heads meet to abase themselves before Cherub and explain, in minute detail, why their teams haven't met whatever ridiculous requirement has been set for them in the preceding week, the bombshell was dropped.  It was like that scene in ''Deep Impact'' when the comet lands in the sea, miles off-shore and sucks all the water away from the beach before hurtling it back inland in waves several miles high. The intakes of breath were so deep, I almost ran for a crash trolley.  Coming soon, and hanging over my poor benighted colleagues like a veritable Sword of Damocles, will be the very same conditions as the call centre that they're ''not''. It's all being done, of course, so that Cherub and the Ops Team can see where ''teams are struggling with workload'' and can ''assist'' with providing ''additional resources''. It's not a call centre, though.  It's also being done so that individuals and teams can be set  ''realistic'' performance targets, and so that under-performing individuals can be boot-camped or (probably) booted out. But it's not a call centre in any way.  Each member of staff will be personally responsible for making sure that codes are input when beginning the working day, when comfort and lunch breaks are taken and when they are away from their workstations FOR ANY REASON;  there will be task codes for every task (not sure what happens to people whose jobs are multi-functional, as they'll spend more time putting codes in than they will doing the actual jobs). Still not a call centre.  There will be one of those gigantic screens in the corner of the office (sorry, call centre) showing running stats for each section, which will ''engender healthy competition''. SO not a call centre.  Not even CLOSE.  I shit you not.  Those words were used.  Cherub then said, with the air of a really nasty gang boss, ''of course, it's imperative that we know where every AGENT is and what they're engaged in doing AT ALL TIMES, so that we can justify any business decision to request additional finance and other resources''.   If referring to staff as agents ain't corporate speak for ''call-centre drones'', then I'm the Queen-elect of Southern Pago-Pago.   These people already work like dogs, under vile and intimidating conditions, and my heart is breaking for them - even the ones I don't like very much.

Seriously.  It was awful.  Tuppence, my new pal from one of the sections, actually hissed. I've never seen a dozen people's shoulders droop so suddenly and so far, en mass.   I kept my head down.  I wasn't even supposed to be in the meeting but,  even though I don't work for her, my current desk is within Cherub's purlieu and I was mid-task when the team leaders arrived.  Luckily, this latest fuckwittery doesn't affect me one jot.  I'm not wired into the Matrix like the rest of the staff, and I  don't deal with real people either by phone or face-to-face.  There has been an air of real dejection hanging smog-like over the desks all day and much muttering in corners. 

Oh, and on Monday, I have to give up my desk and move back to Butterball's section so that Cherub can move into ''my'' desk - but that's a tale for another day.  There's only so much  hate I can direct towards one person in one day - or subject my readers to...

One bright note: who in their right mind names a child Loki? That's a lot of name to live up to, going through life. It cropped up today. Can't tell you where, or in what context, just believe that it did, and smile like I did - after all, it's fun, and tomorrow is Friday.  Let's hope there's gin.

Scents and sensibilities...

Do not, my friends, allow perfume to spill in your handbag.  This is particularly irksome if you don't realise it's happened until it's too late.  I'd been walking round all weekend thinking I could smell my perfume rather more than usual - and assuming it was just because I'd been squirting it with a slightly heavier hand.  Nope.  It was because the lid had come off.  Checked the bag.  Didn't seem to be any damage, or sogginess.  Evaporation.  Yes, that'd be why there was no trace of damp.  I sometimes remember bits of science, despite my best efforts to forget. 

Now I know that perfume, out of the bottle and into a bag, is capable of bleaching every single bit of ink from a railcard, thus rendering it invalid.  It's also capable of doing the same on two unused return tickets I had in the same wallet (about £25-worth of wasted ticket) and on all the receipts that I was saving for the tax man.  As the railcard saves me 1/3 on every trip I take to home and back, it had to be replaced.  Only problem was, no replacement is possible without the receipt.  Even if I'd had the receipt, I'd have had to pay £10 for ''administration fees''.  Gritted my teeth and paid £30 for a new one, fuming.   Handbag smells lovely, though...

Still, that notwithstanding, the gods were on my side today when Boots pretty much paid me to take away a load of Clarins; their current offer is ''buy a couple of things (which I planned to do anyway), we'll give you three freebies and a pretty bag, plus £10-worth of loyalty points''.  Decent enough deal.  Even more of a decent deal when by cunning chicanery, I was able to deploy not only a double points voucher for the purchase price, PLUS a ''200 extra points when you spend £20'' voucher; added to the £10-worth of points they were already giving me in the deal, AND an extra free item because the consultant obviously couldn't count, they were almost giving me the whole package for about £5.  I gave the extra freebie to Lady Oakwood.  She was delighted.  The 50ml moisturiser she received is worth about £35 on its own.  I also have one as part of the deal.  Happy days.

And, in another delightful ''mitigating the perfume and railcard debacle'' event, I found out today that one of the ophthalmologists is called Mr Lash...