Ping!
Where did we last leave this?
I sigh. There are some people that make full-time work a chore. This woman is one of them.
I stare at the e-mail. I have been copied on three separate correspondences circulating around this particular subject, all of them started by her, all of them saying the same things – and all of them addressed to different people.
This person is the reason I have taken up competitive sighing.
I take a deep breath and exhale slowly.
Hi, Florence, I write. If I understand you correctly, you are looking for resolution on this matter. I have attached the three conversations I am aware of. Please let me know where you’d like to go next as I can do nothing until I hear from you.
Ping!
Are you sure? she writes. I don’t remember you needing my input in the past.
I close my eyes. We’ve been doing it this way for almost five years. I fight the urge to sigh again and settle for a slight moan that makes Female Intern turn around grinning.
“Florence?” she whispers.
I grin at her. “Was it the groaning?”
Dear Florence, I write. We’ve been doing it this way for a good amount of time now and I don’t understand why you…
And it is there that I stop, because anything I write after that will include phrases like “willful inattention”, “please refer to the last dozen e-mails we’ve had on this same subject”, and “suspected lead-paint-chip ingestion”.
I take a deep breath, highlight and delete everything but the salutation and continue anew.
I believe we’ve been doing it this way for a while, haven’t we? Perhaps I’ve been unclear in the past. Please keep me copied regarding the decision made and I’ll implement the changes.
Hugs and Kisses, Pearl.
Thinking better of it, I replace “hugs and kisses” with “best regards”.
We'll save that for the follow-up e-mail.
27 comments:
Ah...she's one of those people who try to force others to make their decisions for them. That way when things go wrong they have someone else to blame. Either that or she has no clue how to do her job and needs others to do it for her. Your choice.
Every office has one.
Delightful vignette, with which I identify in a general way. Since I've mainly worked alone, I have a similar, internal, correspondence with myself. Usually opt for "best regards" too --sending "hugs and kisses" to myself would be silly, and disturb others.
Tell Florence the Brady Bunch called and they need her back. Then fill her position with someone who actually has a working frontal lobe.
Maybe she just doesn't communicate well with the written word or maybe her mind is stuck in a perpetual loop. Either way a slap to the back of the head should get her going again.
I usually close with "Thanks A Lot"
They can take it as they wish.
I just appreciated my retirement a little bit more!
Thanks for the reminder of why I love being retired!
Competitive sighing - yes!! The alternatives are competitive swearing and competitive job hunting. Neither of which are all that attractive ...
I don't get it. If she needs direction, give it to her. If not, ignore her. Now you know why I don't work in a cube.
A Monday morning at work with Pearl. Monday.
Hari OM
Oh yeah, that's the stuff to send ya menoloopal.
You showed waaaaaayyy more restraint than I was feeling in the reading of it - commendable indeed.
.......could you lay charges on her for aggravating the CTS??? "Excess typing of circular argumentations, m'lud".
Dear Florence,
I understand you're not running for election this fall. (How you get a job where I work.) Can I offer you any assistance in closing your office?
Best regards,
and so on.
Sorry it only works that way in government. If you're real, real lucky.
i am impressed by your restraint, sugarpie! ;) xoxoxox
I like to sign my work e-mails with "Gentle caresses," It throws them off and makes it so that they don't want to e-mail me anymore.
I feel your pain. Sometimes I look around the office and think to myself "Seriously? THIS was the best of the bunch you interviewed for that position?"
I'm beginning to think that this is devious plot on HR's part to weed out those of us that can't withstand idiocy.
This sounds just like the email exchanges I have at work, minus your impeccable self control.
You've got the bureaucratic tone down pat in your email corresponding.
Have you considered politics?
Your sighing would have been followed (too soon) by groaning and sobbing. Your restraint is admirable.
Ugh. Every office comes with one of these people as standard equipment. Unfortunately, we are unable to send them back to the shop for repair, cuz they'll never have the right parts. So we just tolerate these big gas guzzlers the best we can until they're paid off and traded in, crashed and sold for crap—Yes, crap—Or covertly driven off a cliff. Meanwhile, send her through the car wash—give her the works—snap that towel across her ass while she's dripping wet, and hang some air freshener around her neck. All while contemplating which cliff is closest.
Florence sounds like the type of person you could hit with a book and she still wouldn't get it......
Hah! My next email would say, we've been over this too many times, over and over, and I don't know how to make things any clearer. Perhaps you should go back to training?
Well, that won't win you any roses, but it might get her off your back for a while.
It's bait, don't take it. Or if you do send an email to self an CC her: Florence *&^%
We do work in the same place! I knew it! Where are you hiding?!
I know Florence, that dimwitted cow. Can't make a decision to save her life and copies everyone in her incompetence!
Just one more bit of proof that most earthlings are stupid!
There's one in every workplace, isn't there.
If some genius would syndicate you, you'd be posted on as many office refrigerators as Dilbert is.
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