My Tenure (Clock Signal: The Aftermath)
It is my 10-year anniversary today, They remind me.
I am being Rewarded for my Tenure.
I am discreetly removed from the production floor.
I am taken
for the mandatory photo, for my certificate.
We pose in front of The Corporate Video of The Gleefully Dancing Suits. We don't wear suits in my department, only in Admin.
One person on our team started wearing a suit every day, during The Great and Unrelenting Heat Wave,
but he didn't last very long. They whisked him away for an Another Important Project after 3 consecutive weeks of Suit.
You are what you dress for, They kindly Advise
I wear hiking clothes, mostly; The higher-end kind.
Durable and Multi-purpose; A Wise investment.
For my Tenure, I can chose a Special Present from a Glossy Catalogue wrapped in Shiny Blue Ribbon.
A women's-specific fishing rod; the Ladyfish A Cordless Screwdriver, a Meat Probe !
A Pearl wrap bangle bracelet for Ladies
A Men's Muscular Watch.
I finally decide on a Weekend stay at Oak island resort; The water-resistant binoculars are a close second.
But what I really want is my own office
My own Garbage Can; a door that can close
A sturdy door knob, and all my questions answered
A bigger pot for my plant
System updates better than the Original.
Knowledge that isn't hoarded
Communication between departments
I want to know all the reasons for the things; the Inflexible Rules, the Countless Contradictions, and the Great Silence
For Things to Make Sense
For a Wage high enough to buy Office Appropriate footwear.
My Joseph Seibles have laces.
I enter my chosen promo code
I make a note in The Suggestion Box.
Google Translate (Please) My Boss's Instructions
Uuiuuuuuu Asteee Ngo Caht ruretrns {Proces sggggh
We both stare down at the message.
What do you think it means? I ask.
Mitchel shrugs. "I dunno," comes his nonchalant response.
Not my circus, not my monkeys, he is fond of saying.
Not His Stress; this one's mine. I peer down at the sentence with one eye closed.
It doesn't help.
I put it into Google Translate. "Bangla Detected", it tells me.
I sigh and twirl around in my chair, to stimulate the brain cells. Too soon for another coffee. I water my plant from my seat, with water from my Nalgene Bottle. No Electrolytes this time. It's bad for plants, actually. I Googled it.
Mitchel the Problem Solver, the Logical Thinker, finally takes pity on me.
He deduces.
Well, it starts with the letter A, and this word, also starting with A would fit the sentence, and the resulting sentence formed by that A word and this R word, could be a potential answer to your inquiry.
I stare down at the gibberish, and it starts to make sense, finally.
Yes, yes that seems about right. I am gonna go with the word, with that sentence.
Relieved, I start typing out my reply. I direct the customer to Asset Recovery, where his Assets can be Recovered.
We can't recover them in This Department. Asset Recovery is just down the hall past the Water-Cooler.
I could get up, walk over and talk to Jenn, get the response for the customer from her. Save an extra email. But then the customer will start asking me about Asset Recovery things and
We Wouldn't Know Anything About That Here.
One time I told a customer how to get the Show Chassis Serial number, as per Instructions I googled from our website, and he sent me the picture of the **** Soldered to the Motherboard. I didn't know what it even was, but I walked over to our TAC team and showed them the picture.
So, no consultations with other departments. Anyway it would be too distracting. The last time I went for a consultation with Jenn, I stayed there for almost 15 minutes. We chatted about our upcoming bike-packing trip and she didn't meet her metrics that day.
I open my next email.
Uh-oh.
This one's from Bob, A Very Angry Customer. I can tell. It is bolded, all in caps. Three exclamation points at the end. Bob is lavishly dramatic. I wince at the caps, at the extravagantly bolded font.
I don't want to refer him to Logistics. They would need to speak to him, then. And any replies from them, would require clarification, from us. Guidance.
"Communication is Key," I recite to myself, aloud.
"Efficiency is Essential," Mitchel responds, absently.
Automatically.
Our customers are mostly the Angry type, due to the nature of our work, but at least it's only emails. We don't take phone calls here. They would need to speak with another department if they want to talk, to exclaim.
But the other Departments don't seem to know anything about what we do.
I used to be in the Logistics chat, and we would Share Information but I got removed for being too disruptive.
For asking too many questions, I received A Verbal Warning.
"You Don't Need To Know That To Do Your Job".
And
"It isn't Our Position Here to Explain That."
I do like to see The Bigger Picture, though.
So back to Bob, who is Extremely Frustrated
Fed Up
Blowing A Gasket
At The End of His Rope.
Plan A and Plan B Ruled Out as Potential Options To Provide Resolution, I switch to Plan C.
A Consultation with Andrew, Our Fearless Leader.
The Overlord.
I sigh again.
"Is Andrew On The Move, or is he At His Desk?" I ask Mitchel.
"He's walking across the parking lot," Mitchel reports.
It must be Lunch-time.
We have a great view of the parking lot from our cubicles next to the 4th Floor Windows.
Sometimes we can even see a ship, in the distant harbour.
We watch our boss saunter across the lot, pecking at his phone while eating some oddly shaped Orange Object .
Bad News.
When he is On the move, his responses never make any sense.
He really needs to turn off his predictive texting.
To stop Multi-tasking.
What is that he is eating? I ask Mitchel. It isn't round enough to be an orange...it looks more like...
"Is he eating a whole Orange Pepper?"
Mitchel peers down. "I think so."
"But...why?"
His focus shifted, Mitchel shrugs; complacent once again. "I dunno."
Read this poem's predecessor from our 2018 Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry Contest, "Clock Signal: The Medulla of the Device".
