my temp job

also, good luck getting some money to pay for your missing lunch.

- some person who i'm lead to believe has some kind of authority over me says, "you need to fill out these forms. but first talk to [names of people i haven't been introduced to] about [name of form and/or procedure i have never heard of]."

- i respond with a few questions, such as "what is that form?", "where does that person sit and what do they do and what question should i ask them?"

- they respond, "i dunno. look, if you have some specific questions, send them by email. i'm busy with [procedure i've never heard of]."

- i send them a detailed email with questions, but do not receive a response.

- meanwhile, new employees keep coming by my desk asking such questions as, "when will i be placed in a cubicle?" "where is my new PC?" "aren't you supposed to help me get a badge?" "aren't you supposed to help me get a network ID?"

i don't know my job title. something like "administrator." administrator to whom, and for what purpose, i'm still unclear.

there are no water coolers, no paintings on the walls, scarcely any natural light. the walls are painted dark blue. the only "entertainment" on offer are tvs broadcasting CNN at every corner, and, oh yes, "muffin day" on wednesdays (?!).

the only person whose name is spoken of with any suggestion that they are "in charge" (and who i haven't met) is out of the office.

Today is not a talking day

Seriously.

also: on the first day this guy (he isn't my "boss," i have no fucking idea who my "boss" is and suspect i don't have one) warned me not to leave my bag on my desk, or my phone on my desk. i know this is probably par for the course in big impersonal offices, but combined with the lunch theft it's really depressing. i've never worked in an environment before where i had to wonder if one of my coworkers was planning to *steal* something from me.

is this like your standard white collar office situation? if so, holy christ. and good riddance.

tomorrow i'll try being incredibly passive instead of running around trying to find the answers to questions that should be answered by someone training me, or giving me a list of my duties and the relevant contact people for each. i'll just sit quietly at my desk until someone either offers to train me. when people come up with requests, i'll say something like, "sorry, no one's trained me to do that yet."

i feel really mercenary at this point, since i'm only there for the money and am plotting to leave either at the end of this week or next. i really don't like this. it makes me feel really low and mean and i hate how i get all this negative energy. i feel really remote from the things that make me happy, or at least make me feel alive (even when they are sad things). i can only imagine what several decades of this kind of thing can do to a person.

I'm genuinely not. I love mozarella. The thought of somebody taking it away from you makes me very upset on your behalf.

when I was a sushi chef.

That's fantastic!

I was told when I started my new job not to leave my bag on my desk, either -- that I should put it in a locked drawer instead. Supposedly it was a safeguard against anyone from the "outside" that might somehow get past the security guard at the front desk, gain access to the 5th floor without swiping an ID card in the elevator, and get past a door without punching in a four-digit code. Needless to say, I keep my bag on my desk all the time, and sometimes my phone and iPod, too.

I'm glad - in some ways - that I've always worked at small offices where it's possible for everybody to know everyone else - I like to think that it probably cuts down a lot on the amount of fridgewankery and other petty theft that goes on in larger places.

I have a good job, really. And, we keep the fridge in the stationery cupboard and the key to the cupboard is behind my desk so nobody can steal MY lunch bwahahaha.

i learned this morning that i work in what used to be the "Corporate Systems Information Services" offices of what used to be C*mEd.

"Corporate Systems Information Services"--just say it aloud.

will begging for another assignment help at all? seriously, how about learning how to make sushi?

lauren are you on aim?

it's a bit hard for me to take that attitude. i like to feel useful and competent.

I'm at p***i. After 3 months on this assignment I get a call from my agency: "Matt, did you ever do a drug screening?" Me: "Ummmmm...I'm putting in my 2 weeks today." My agency: "Ok great, but we still need you to come down and take the test."

I predict that there will be stems and seeds floating in my urine sample.

xpost

I suggest you save them from this week and next week lob them at your coworkers.

aren't you in yer mid-20s? what exactly were you doing for 5-6 years to stay alive and out of an office, if you don't mind my asking?

i am wearing a white button-up w/ slacks as i type this. i am clean-shaven and cleanly cut and i have a job interview next week for a job i'm pretty sure i won't get and i think i'm going to a temp agency tomorrow. i need advice. [we already have a thread for that, yes. so what. i don't mean it as in "give me advice please ilx", just as a general thing, like in the smiths song.]

i was working in france, in the film industry, for about a year. i came back and temped for a while, then went abroad again, then returned and spent a while completing numerous grad school applications. then i started looking for work again. now i have about seven months to get by doing random jobs until i go back to school.

i would apply for more "professional" jobs (i.e. jobs in a field i've worked in before, or would like to work in) but (a) i don't want to lie and say that i'm not planning to return to school in septmeber (which i would have to do to get any serious job) and (b) that would take an awful lot of groundwork simply for a seven-month job. i have applied for several teaching-oriented jobs but haven't had much luck. i'm still waiting to hear from a few.

i can't believe i'm explaining myself to an anonyme on the internet.

i just kind of resent the implication that everyone has or should have passion for their jobs or their careers, or should take a job for any reason other than because it's necessary to get by. and htat those that do are dullars w/ little interests or imagination. i mean tell that to the sexxy busgirl i saw while eating alone at steak n shake the other day, or to the waitress who served me coldly, robotically cuz she was sure this palescuzzy loner-type wasn't gonna be tipping. but i did tip her cuz i'm a nice guy and i recognize.

well i have mixed feelings about the coworkers. it does seem like the kind of job you'd end up in, not because you haven't had advantages in life (as might be the case with someone working at the steak and shake) but because you have had advantages and didn't have the ambition or imagination to make much of them aside from a very baseline white-collar job.

but of course this is a specious overgeneralization and there are probably people there who came from less-privileged backgrounds and for whom landing a "professional" job is a big and hard-won achievement. (which is no less depressing in its own way, i guess).

actually i think the people from that sort of background tend to be slightly less resentful, or at least a little friendlier.

but that too might be conjecture.

I started temping recently and my first temp day was like that only it was 800 bottles of omega-3 fatty acids, some were placebo, that needed labeling. only before they could be labelled the number on the bottle had to be wiped off with acetone. by the last round of 200 the acetone fumes had me queasy as hell.

but the whole "retribution against your coworkers" meme doesn't really appeal to me.

fine, but what does that have to do with pwning a thief? last full-time job I worked had rampant lunch-stealing going on. sometimes they would even just take a bite or two and put it back. this sort of behavior needs a proper response that teaches a lesson imo (i.e. the booby-trapped lunch).

xpost

i really am flabbergasted by the lunch stealing. i think that says all that needs to be said, really, about t he general atmosphere of unfriendliness and impersonality at this office. i can't even fathom anyone stealing my lunch at any other job i've had.

i am not sure if being legendary on an obscure internet message board is a very great or a very terrible thing but i am sure it's one or the other.

apologies if i put you on the defensive, it's just that that comment kinda grated w/ me. and i think you may've opened another can of worms (or perhaps smashed the same one wide open) w/ yr comments on ambition and privelege but i'll try to avoid that for now except by saying that i'd literally rather be living in a cardboard box than an ambitious accountant. i'm sorry for being such a filthy goddamn hippie, i really don't know what happened to me.

also just remember that the whole product of the environment thing needn't be limited to early childhood and adolescence. again i'm not there but common sense is gonna tell me that most of those dudes are victims not willing perpetrators of entropy or whatever.

yeah, that's my guess, as well. sorry if in my confusion i didn't convey that.

No, it's John D. Just another message board dork like the rest of us.

i think we just differ in that i think jobs are evil, and you don't. i also think the evil of a job correlates exponentially to the size of its salary, in many cases. probably most. i know this is a banal viewpoint, so if anyone can talk me out of it, do, but know in advance that you will likely earn only my hatred in trying.

i am sure there are nice jobs, i just haven't found any.

i am sure there are nice jobs, i just haven't found any.

This is basically the crux of it, innit? I mean, I know there are good jobs out there. I've done some work in the past that I've truly enjoyed. I don't know how you can categorically state that "jobs are evil". I mean, what do you mean by evil? Immoral? As long as there has been human life there have been roles/occupations that people have fallen into (selected for themselves or through necessity), and I think it's a natural thing for us to do.

On that point, I think these days we actually have more choice in our occupations, which would (following this line of argument) make employment even less "evil" than it was back in the day when any one person would be forced to either hunt, raise kids, or prepare food, or whatever.

xpost disappointment

i was wondering if, just to make things interesting, i should arbitrarily decide that my somewhat surly coworker (the one who sits in the cubicle next to me) was the one who stole my lunch, and allow resentment to collect accordingly.

"you're the lowest on the totem pole here, buddy!"

"you take orders from everyone!"

"we're all your boss!"

finally when he yapped at me today i accused him of being patronizing and asked him not to use the same tone with me again.

"carry the ball" which is obviously interchangeable with "dropping the ball"
"action items"
"upward trajectory"
"emplanement" (to board a plane...really)
"empowerment"
"continuous improvement"
the e- prefix as in e-mail
and of course some conjugation of "shifting the paradigm"

I had a one man buzzword bingo session with myself that came to an abrupt halt one day when I got an email that included the sentence "all action item procedures must meet our deliverable expectations for our e-business sector in this fiscal quarter". That email alone made me complete my card. Unfortunately the boredom was catching up to me, so in my bingo winning fervor, I did a mock touchdown dance, slipped and fell on my chair leg and resultingly knocked over an adjacent cube wall. That was the end of buzzword bingo.

"So about 6 years ago, I found out my ex-wife killed herself. Now I didn't know about it because I was away on business. So I get home and I see 2 cops standing out in front of my place. They told me the news that she drove her car off a bridge. See, at this point the cops asked me what I was doing the night she disappeared. I gave them my alibi, they called my office, and I was cleared."

He starts laughing with a 50 year old alcoholic laugh anyone who's gone to a bar will recognize.

"They thought I fucking killed her! I mean, I may have hated the bitch, but that's why I didn't pay her alimony! AHAHAHA"

i'm SO glad i have one week left before my real job starts. fuck temping.

xpost

i had at least two tense interactions between coworkers today.

one concluded along these lines (i'll spare you the buildup):

him: help desk won't help me unless i give them my employer ID.
me: strange. i've called a few times and just gave them my name and they helped me.
him: no.
me: er... no what?
him: no, they won't do that.
me: um, well...
him: it's a policy.
me: it probably is, but whoever i've spoken to let me get help without--
him (cutting me off): no, they can't do that. it's a policy.
me: from the past day? i just spoke to them the other day and just gave them my name.
him: no, the past month, they won't let you do that.
me: but they--
him: no.
me: but I--
him: no, they won't.
me: maybe you got a guy who was really a stickler. maybe you can call back, because I--
him: no, they can't do that.
me (totally flustered): what? what are you arguing about? i'm just telling you what happened to me. i got through without giving my employee ID!
him: hm....

His posture and somnabulant (sp??) attitude reminds me of the obese guy from "The Office." The whole conversation he was leaning listlessly on someone's cubicle wall staring off into space.

God, I'm even boring myself. Well, three more days.

i'm not even going to think about this anymore.

actually, the funny twist is that i called the temp agency to tell them i'd be quitting, and when the person from the temp agency called the company, they couldn't figure out who they needed to tell! in fact, they still haven't figured it out. but that's a long story and, again, i'm not even going to think about this anymore.

Yesterday I did a temp job that in theory I should have loved. However, I've done previous temp work for The Washington Post before, and my feelings--love and hate--for this company are more intense than any sentiment I've ever had toward another person. At the worksite yesterday I was so anxious I kept getting hiccups.

I wouldn't have taken the Post assignment, except that I hadn't had any work for the previous several days. And the terms of this assignment left a lot to be desired. Only one day a week? That won't pay much of my mortgage.

So today I get home from a interview for a regular job. (I wouldn't be terribly excited about this possibility--working for a government contractor at Gonzalez' Department of Justice--but they said that the person they hire will get a security clearance as part of the job, which is catnip to me and many Washington-area employers.) There's a message on my answering machine from my temp agency employer, something vague about the job I did yesterday. And when I got this message it was too late to return the call; the agency is closed for the evening.

I strongly suspect the call is to tell me that the Post does not want me back next week. But I won't know for sure until Monday morning, when the agency is open again. Hell of a thing to have hanging over my weekend! And while the idea of this assignment being canceled appeals somewhat, I'm also assuming that I was a disappointment, which further turns up my anxiety.

My only notion of what to do until Monday to cope with these worries is to go get drunk. Anyone have any less dysfunctional recommendations on how to cope right now?

i was sort of manic about the whole job-quitting thing -- feeling simultanteously the burning need to extract myself from the situation, guilt over quitting a job in a precarious financial position, and guilt over leaving a little bit of work undone and my desk a bit of a mess--until i sat down and wrote a few pages of notes about the job that i hope will help whoever ends up replacing me, and make it less confusing and frustrating for them than it was for me.

in happy news, the day after i quit the job, i got two offers for much more bearable part-time work, which together will add up to more $$$ per week than my temp position. AND, i get most weekdays off. so maybe i can find somewhere to volunteer as well.

So I have this contract job, the terms of which were initially like "at least three months", and they were kind of "maybe it will be longer, we don't know yet, blah blah" when I got it. Almost immediately after getting this job, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. When I told them, they were "oh my god, anything you need, let us know". I'm about halfway through this job (which is really a 'contract' job, 1099-based, no agency involved) and my wife is going to be starting treatment soon, my son is going to be starting preschool, and I need to find out if I am going to have a job in another month or what. Should I just ask them? (obviously you are all going to say yes).

further complicating: I have an interview for a contract-to-hire job tomorrow, I've gone through three rounds of phone screens, I think I can probably get that job if I really want it, but I haven't told them about the cancer or the kid thing (the issue being that I'm going to have to be at his preschool one morning a week because it is a co-op, and also will have to take him there every day, most likely, for the next 20 weeks while my wife is on chemo). At what point do I bring this shit up? I don't want them to rule me out as a candidate because of this stuff, on the other hand, I don't want to get the job and be all, "SURPRISE! MY PERSONAL LIFE IS INSANE!"

They don't need to know anything about your personal life until you have been offered the job. When they offer it, you should then bring up everything that is going on that will impact your schedule. And yeah you should just ask what's up at your current contract.

I'm sorry for all the stress you're being hit with and hope everything goes well with your wife's treatment, with the best possible outcome. Good luck with all of it.