With a twist on Mr. Stein’s wonderful/horrific posts about people who should be killed this week, I offer up a story of someone who deserves all kinds of praise and recognition:
Marine Cpl. Matthew Bradford.
A bleak post about Tuesday, that most persistent and terrible of all days:
So, Tuesday, we meet again. Tuesday and I have met often and no good has ever come of it.
I am beyond Tuesday’s power, for I haven’t had steady work since last March, when I finally left minimum wage office jobs for the paradise that is TEFL (Teaching English to Johnny Foreigner). The paradise consists largely of being fired, getting a new job, then finding there’s almost no work so one may as well be unemployed; then, inevitably, borrowing yet more money from friends and relatives, and finally dying in a snow drift in the north of Germany; and then being eaten by wolves and crows. [Read more →]
Just in case you thought job loss was “probably not happening anymore,” a government report was released on Friday, January 8, stating that the economy lost 85,000 jobs in December, keeping the unemployment rate at 10%. This, of course, leads everyone to ask: Who the heck was supposed to be watching all the jobs?
If a tree falls in the woods and there’s no one around to hear it, does it make a sound? Well, that depends on whether it has a Facebook page. Sounds ridiculous, huh? I thought the same thing when I recently applied for a job to be an interactive editor for a news website. [Read more →]
My university has hand sanitizer dispensers all over campus. Until last week there was one attached to the wall between the two elevators in the building that contains my office. Then the sanitizer dispenser disappeared. Don’t worry. Today I discovered that a new dispenser had replaced the old one. And this new dispenser is automatic. I guess someone decided that having everyone touch the sanitizer dispenser with their hands in order to reduce the spread of germs wasn’t the best plan. An automatic dispenser solves that problem. It senses your hand and gives you some germ-killing liquid.
But that can cause other problems. [Read more →]
Discipline is hard and not fun and I’m no good at it. So, since I’m surfing around anyway instead of working, why don’t we find out what sort of free motivational programs are out there for lazy creative types like us?
Let’s start at the beginning; I think that’s a common thing among the disciplinati.
Dear Ruby,
I have a gal working in my office who is a real Bossy Betty. Doesn’t matter who, doesn’t matter what, she’s got an opinion on what should be done and by golly she is going to make sure you take her advice. It’s bad enough on work matters, but I surely don’t need her advice on my personal life! Ignoring her just seems to encourage her and my boss doesn’t seem to mind that she’s running the show. Any advice on dealing with her?
Lynne
Dear Ruby,
A question in the form of a haiku:
Nice to work lady
Now she talks to me all day
Want her to stop please
Regards, Johan [Read more →]
The economy is in the crapper. Sick of hearing about it? So am I. So where are the answers? Every time I turn on the news I cross my fingers that one of these drones is going to give me some good news. An inkling of hope. Something. Anything. “Start a lemonade stand.” Give me an idea. Anything at all. Every night I watch, or actually try not to watch, the news. It’s bleak to say the least. All the reports are about the decline in the stock market, bailouts, stimulus plans and that in vitro obsessed octo-psycho. Enough is enough. The marketplace is changing. We get it. So for everybody out there that’s had it with news stories about overpaid AIG executives and Bernie Madoff’s bazillion dollar Ponzi scheme, stay with me here. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel. [Read more →]
Dear Ruby,
All my life I’ve been a bit of a dreamer. You know, places to go, people to meet, and new careers upon which to embark. While I was married, with a young son, I mostly kept the dreams at bay with occasional small indulgences like becoming a painter for a year. Now in my mid-40’s I am starting to wonder if it is reasonable to still be a dreamer, let alone to actually pursue one. Being divorced I no longer have a family to support, nor any reason to stay where I am or to do what I am doing. I feel the huge wide world constantly beckoning but worry where I will be in 20 years. Is it time to stop dreaming, grow up, and plant some roots?
Anonymous
The job market. A topic that used to inspire oh boy!’s and let me tell you!’s in the American public, now sparking only oh boy’s and let me tell you’s. People all over the country are losing their jobs and homes, and, more harrowingly, people like me are graduating from college. “What are you going to do?” you might be thinking. “How will you find a job, when people who are actually qualified for jobs are having such trouble?” Luckily for me, I am incredibly talented and sure that I will have no trouble finding a great job after graduation. Luckily for you, I am incredibly generous and have assembled some easy-to-follow advice for those of you also entering the job market who are less talented than I am.
Dear Ruby,
I’m unemployed, but looking, and I’m doing okay with unemployment and my savings. I’m a single guy who’s always lived within his means, so I know I’ll survive until I find something. Even though I didn’t do anything wrong and I know there are so many people in the same boat, I don’t know if I should date. It’s like I shouldn’t even ask if I have to be cheap about it. My friends are split down the middle — half say to wait until I’m working (which could be months) and half say go ahead and ask. If I ask someone out for a low-budget date, am I a loser?
Sincerely, Dateless in Depression [Read more →]
Chesterfield County, Virginia, is facing some tough times. While that hardly makes the area unique, it is of particular interest because the school district is facing a massive $52 million shortfall and is looking to cut over 300 positions from the public schools.
The district comprises 38 elementary schools, 14 middle schools, 11 high schools, and a technical center. If the cuts were distributed evenly, it would come out to nearly 5 positions per school. And in government work, seniority and tenure mean a lot, so the newest teachers are the ones who will most likely be on the streets.
A recent letter to the Editor of the Chesterfield Observer suggests it be done differently: [Read more →]
As I mentioned in a previous post, the changing economy has been relatively unkind to my family. In mid-December, I was laid off from a copy-editing job that had made small diversions like buying two or three books once in a while, eating out at a mid-priced restaurant, and seeing an occasional show feasible. Since then, the job market in Cincinnati has been — to be kind — brutal. Luckily, my wife still had a great job that made the necessities possible.
Then, last Tuesday, I got that long-awaited call. I had an interview. Maybe the economy here in Cincinnati wasn’t as bad as I had thought. Maybe the stimulus package and the housing bill had already started working its hermetic magic. Maybe, if the interview went well, my wife and I could once again look forward to the uncertain future.
Dear Ruby,
I know this is a bad time to think about leaving my job, but I hate it and I don’t think I can stand it much longer. I have a micromanaging boss and some bad coworkers, but mostly I’m just tired of what I do. It’s office work and not very creative. I’ve been trying to stick it out, but I find myself surfing around online all day and I’m afraid that I’m going to get caught and fired before I find something better. Should I stay or should I go?
Ken
Dear Ken,
You didn’t tell me whether or not you are supporting a family, but I’m going to try to answer in a way that would address both situations — stay.
Put down the letter opener, I don’t mean forever. What I do mean is, end it like a man. End it honorably, like an agreement, like a marriage, like any obligation. You need a plan and a timetable, so I am providing you, free of charge, Ruby’s patented 3 Weeks to 2 Weeks’ Notice program:
Week 1: Get some real work done.
On Monday morning for two hours, figure out what you need to accomplish in the coming week to get caught up on your work, or at least close to it. Close your office door or tape off your cubicle opening, turn off your phone. You could even send out a “please do not disturb me from 8-10″ email to those likely to disturb you. If your boss gives you crap about it, tell him or her that it’s something you read about in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and you hope it will help you be more organized. It is likely that your screwing off has already been noted and this explanation will give your boss hope that you are getting back on track and that he or she will not have to fire you. It is false hope, but you don’t have to explain that.
I know what you’re thinking — if you could get yourself to work more you wouldn’t be in this position. The problem was that you weren’t incentivized. Here’s your incentive. After every 2 hours of work you complete, you get to spend 20 minutes on your resume and you get to pick one personal item to take home. Maybe it’s 20 minutes reading an online article about interviewing or maybe it’s 20 minutes of writing out a really flattering description of your current position. By the end of a week, you should have a spiffing resume in progress and a desk drawer or two cleaned out.
At night, it goes without saying, you’re Facebooking, LinkedInning, and hitting the job boards. Hard. But, only at home, where you have time to write carefully compelling cover letters and catch the errors before you hit “Submit.”
Week 2: Hanging curtains in the escape tunnel [Read more →]
What kind of work environment could possibly lead to this situation?
A Buffalo man told police two men, including his manager, forced him from his home Friday evening and drove him to the restaurant where he works and told him to clean grease off a Dumpster.
The man… said the pair forced their way into his bedroom by kicking open the door.
He also told police when he was done the manager gave him his paycheck and instructed him not to go to the police or “he would end up dead somewhere.”
I’ve heard people joke about this sort of thing as a solution to truancy in the public schools, but it just doesn’t work in restaurants. The reality is that this is a terrible way to motivate people. Even in tough economic times, when forcing your employees back to work may seem charitable — after all, who couldn’t use the overtime? — it’s just not effective. And Friday evening was awfully darn cold in Buffalo. While I am sure there is a bit more to this news story, whatever’s missing can’t possibly justify this managerial response. He was probably going way against company procedure.
Still, as wrong as the manager’s actions may seem, I’d like to thank him and his accomplice for what they’ve done. It’s stories like these that help the rest of America to keep a positive view of our own jobs. Even on the worst day, I will always be able to say that my boss just isn’t the breaking-and-entering-and-stealing-my-phone-and-dragging-me-to-work-and-threatening-my-life-and-then-paying-me type of guy. He really, really isn’t. That’s probably worth a “thank you.”
The best typo I have ever seen in my line of work was “[a] coyote’s plaintiff whaling.” But the book I’m cleaning up now — without naming any names or titles or major publishers — has some pretty good ones.
[After tipping a cauldron of boiling tar over the enemy,] “he turned away from the sight of the massive pile of writing flaming demons…”
[The Dwarf King] “patted the legendary harmer at his side.”
“With the death of the Queen’s closets advisor since the time of her father…”
On the scale of one to plaintiff whaling, I’d give these 7, 8, and 9, respectively.
Dear Ruby,
I have a job people often envy. I am a writer in advertising. My friends think I’m cool. However, my boss re-writes everything I turn in. Today, after weeks of research on a new client, I turned in a great bunch of headlines for a magazine ad. She re-wrote them, but obviously had not done the research. Do I give her notes on why her version sucks? The guy next to me says to face the fact that I’m an art whore. I never was a very good whore, so I’m not super comfy with that. What to do?
Thanks,
Peach
Peach, honey,
I think maybe someone doesn’t want to be a very good whore.
Bosses, teachers, editors, pimps — they’re always telling you to do stuff you don’t want to do and then sometimes they’re not even very nice about it. And sometimes they’re dumbasses. If your boss is really a dumbass who’s rewriting your great stuff and turning in her own crappy stuff (and hopefully not passing it off as yours), the market/management/clients will eventually correct her.
My advice: keep lovely laser copies of all your own great stuff, build yourself a bitchin’ portfolio and get ready to move up when she gets canned or maybe start dreaming about your own piece of street corner. But, remember this, even if you’re really good, even if you have the greatest stage name ever — even if the john is Richard Gere — Peach, you are a filthy whore, like everyone else. We all sell stuff to buy other stuff and we all have to deal with the difficult people on top from time to time.
Be a better whore. Work on your technique. Take it with a smile. Keep good records. And let old Ruby know how it works out.
Does Ruby know what’s best for you? Just ask.
We all have our horror stories about lousy customer service. My most recent was when my husband and I were standing in line at an office supply store. The clerk was yapping into her cell phone while scanning our purchases. Without so much as a word or a glance in our direction, she managed to bag our items, take our money, and hand us our receipt. Her name tag identified her as the assistant manager. [Read more →]
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