Monthly Archives: November 2015

One Day Only…

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The niceties of Veteran’s Day aside, it’s placement this year smack in the middle of the week is just bloody inconvenient. Just as I found myself getting settled in for the evening I remembered that this isn’t the weekend and there are still two more days to slog through between us and Saturday. That’s hardly the end of the world, but it still doesn’t do much to improve my opinion of these “floating” holidays that are tied to a date instead of attached in lockstep to a weekend.

Now, please don’t take that as any criticism of the holiday itself. Anyone who knows me will tell you that my absolute favorite kind of time is time off and that I’ll take it wherever I can find it. If I had a little more leave in the bank this year, I would have proactively resolved the issue on my own. Alas, the home buying and repair have eaten up way more vacation time than I would have spent in any normal year.

Today was an anomaly, an irregularity, a one day only special. I’ll take it. Gladly. But don’t for a minute think that’ll keep me from bitching about it.

Things not do do…

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So let’s say you’re the boss. You’re going to be out of the office for a few days and you have to pick between your underlings to tag someone to be the “responsible adult” in your absence. There are any number of ways you can go about making the selection – by seniority, but lack of seniority, by drawing lots, or even by throwing a dart at a list of names. All are sort of a pot luck approach to section that all but guarantees someone who doesn’t want to be in charge ends up, albeit temporarily, making the decisions.

If I can offer up a pro tip to those of you who ever find yourself needing to designate your own temporary replacement, the guy not to pick is the one who has been eyeball deep on a single project for the last three weeks and who has no earthly idea what anyone else is doing, what their project status is, or really anything beyond how many emails have piled into their inbox since the last time they were at their desk. When you do that, all you’re really going to accomplish is to leave everyone even more confused than when they started the day.

Sometimes the vagaries of staffing and coverage mean you can’t avoid the unprepared leading the unwilling towards the unforeseen, but it’s not going to be what you might call a best practice. If history has taught me nothing it’s that I’ll gladly make decisions regardless of how ill-informed I happen to be on the subject. As always, in the absence of clear guidance, I will create my own… and that course of action has nothing if not a truly mixed bag of results.

Regularly scheduled broadcast…

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With the heavy lifting of last week over, I’m fairly certain that we’re now returning to your regularly scheduled broadcasts around here. Mercifully, the coming week will largely be about administrative minutia and doctoring up the aftermath to make sure everyone comes out looking good. Being a master bureaucrat of long experience, thats the kind of work I can churn out all day long without calling on too much brain power. It’s for the best really, because I’m still not sure how deep reserve of that I have, even after the long weekend of making no decision more challenging than when to eat and what to watch.

Our great bureaucracy is in the midst of that magical time of year when just about everyone’s thoughts are turning to the two month “holiday season,” those eight or nine weeks of the year between Veteran’s Day and New Years that are punctuated by 4 federal holidays and everyone trying to burn off the last of their use-or-lose vacation time. It’s not quite a “slow” season, as the beast always needs fed, but the pace does ease – if only because at any time it’s likely one or more of the people you need to talk to to get anything accomplished will be elsewhere.

In no way should that be interpreted as a complaint. In fact I’m counting on the schedule taking a few stutter steps if I’m ever going to catch up on email and all the other stuff I’ve been largely ignoring over the last few weeks. When I was last at my desk, the unread message count stood somewhere around 300+. If Thursday and Friday kept up the pace, I could have a personal best 500 messages waiting for me to read, file, delete, or continue to ignore indefinitely.

While in an of itself that all seems pretty bad, I can tell you this is the least angst-filled Sunday night I’ve passed in quite some time. I’m counting it as a win.

What Annoys Jeff this Week (Conferences and Events Edition)

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1. No means no. Yes there are empty seats. No you can’t fill them. If I’m going to risk my career that $50 bribe you offered isn’t going to get it done. Asshat.

2. Closing time. If you’re sitting in a venue and the lights go out, that’s a good sign it’s time to leave. You can go to the local tavern, grab a bit to eat, or finger bang each other out in the parking lot for all I care. But you can’t stay here.

3. Q&A. All your questions are answered on the agenda. Read the agenda. Don’t be the douchebag who asks the 100th time where the bathrooms are or what time someone is presenting. Asked and answers. Actually, we answered before you asked.

4. You look tired. There’s a reason for that. That reson involves the alarm clock ringing at 0330 the last 4 mornings so I can get here at least an hour before you do and being here an hour or two after you’re (supposed to) leave. Want to help me look less tired, go sit in your seat quietly and try not to say anything stupid.

Early starts…

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I’ve got a couple of ridiculously early start times coming this week. Not by choice, but of necessity. I know I’m supposed to look on the bright side and think this year’s Big Group of People Who are Going to Want All Sorts of Stupid Shit Done at The Last Minute is going to be the best one yet – but in all seriousness, my inner introvert is already exhausted before anyone even sets foot through the door tomorrow.

The very best thing I can say about this event is that by Thursday night it will be over… and remind myself that no matter how bad it gets, at least I’m not the guy who lost the blimp. He’s going to be having a far worse week then I am. 

I’m going to try to keep the posts coming, because jackassery in the face of a thousand “guests” is nearly inevitable. If I miss a day, I hope you’ll all understand that nothing coming out of my mouth in the moment is in any way fit for print.