Tag Archives: fear

It’s not a ditto machine…

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Those members of the workforce in a certain age bracket will remember the vaguely chemical smell of the still warm purple inked pages that use to define the phrase “homework assignment.” I can say with relative certainty that the $35,000 copier you are currently trying to crank start is not a “ditto machine” no matter what you say.

And since we’re in the general area of on the topic of printing, you don’t really have to stand there and manually insert the “funny” legal sized paper, while asking someone else to hit the print button on your computer. There’s a whole tray of it already there in the machine for you. If you really want to be fancy, you could even click the little checkbox on the print settings popup and print “duplex” copies rather than standing there and trying to print front and back manually.

Look, this is the sort of thing that might be fun to watch the first time, but after that, it’s hard to watch the same fail happening over, and over, and over… and over. You’re going to have to take my word on this, but learning how to use the big scary copier, is going to be good for you in the long run. Face your fear and do it anyway!

Editorial Note: This part of a continuing series of previously de-published blogs appearing on http://www.jeffreytharp.com for the first time. This post has been time stamped to correspond to its original publication date.

It keeps me up at night…

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I’m not generally given to bouts of fear, but sometimes, lying in bed, late at night, I think some moments of trepidation are unavoidable – a product of a brain churning through a 100 different scenarios each more unpleasant than the last. Perhaps that’s the curse of the educated class; that we know the things we know and are thereby unable to live lives of oblivious happiness.

There are hundreds of possible “bad things” that one can reasonably fear. There are the perennial favorites: war, famine, plague, pestilence, dogs and cats living together. Then there are the more personal fears. Is tonight the night the “big one” is going to hit the New Madrid Fault? Is Uncle Sam going to open his doors on March 5th? And what could I have done to be better prepared? While those are quite real possibilities, that’s not the one that wakes me up at night.

The one that gets me every time is the fleeting notion that this 30-day hiring freeze could easily be extended through the end of the fiscal year – or beyond. Even more vexing is the thought that I’d then be sidelined here in Memphis indefinitely. It’s not an unreasonable thought. Should Congress pass a Continuing Resolution at or less than the funding level during FY10, I fear it’s altogether possible that the human resource managers at echelons above reality could decide that hiring and transfers are not currently in the best interest of the government due to the costs involved and in an effort to attrit the workforce into its desired size and composition. That would mean another six months marking time awash in a rising tide of disinterest and discontent.

To have gotten so close only to be turned away now would be a hammer fall. Even my self-confidence has its limits.