Jester and the Bong

When I first joined the Dark Satanic Mill, long ago in the mists of time, the company’s smoking policy was, “don’t smoke in the office. If you want to smoke, do it on the fire escape”. It seemed fair enough to me. There were non-smokers working there who didn’t want their environment polluted and how could I blame them?

For a while, we had a dedicated smoking room but that was consigned to the dustbin of DSM bad ideas and smokers were forced outside, which was obviously a good move. I was a smoker when I first joined up and had been since the tender age of 13, when I lost count of how many cigarettes I had smoked in my lifetime. I gave up on 26 September 2004 and I haven’t smoked a cigarette since then.

After the blanket ban on smoking in public places, the DSM put up a smokers’ shelter, a bit like a small bus shelter with an ashtray in it. It is there that the smokers gather, chat, gossip, bitch and, of course, destroy their lungs and various other organs.

I walk past it on my way from the canteen to the new building, where I now work. It was there that I discovered to my dismay that one of the more pleasant call centre managers, a man I have come to regard as a friend, is a smoker. I’m sorry but I have the zeal of the convert and look down on smokers as lesser beings. It was a bitter disappointment to me and I will have to regale him of tales of people who have died of lung cancer until he gives up, if only to shut me up.

It was also there that a group of younger Asian jesters gathered with a hookah a week or two ago. I wish that I had seen it but unfortunately, I was not in the right place at the right time and didn’t. Apparently they were all gathered round it taking long drags on the mint tobacco that they had brought for the purpose. They even invited a fairly senior member of staff to join them. He demurred.

Unfortunately, somebody got the wrong end of the stick and might even have thought that it contained something less legal than tobacco and so the following e-mail was sent by our MD’s secretary:

All,

It has been noted that there has been smoking outside the designated smoking area. Please be advised that smoking is only allowed inside the smoking shelter and the immediate area in front and not in the bike shed areas.

I would also like to clarify that it is only cigarettes, cigars and small personal pipes that are authorised on the premises and under no circumstances are multiple personal use of bong pipes allowed.

If you have any queries regarding this, please do not hesitate to contact me.

So it’s okay to use crack pipes then.

Jester, Sir Ranulph Fiennes and the Union

It’s still freezing in the Dark Satanic Mill. Well, in our bit it is. Maybe on the floor above it is warmer. After all, they say that hot air rises and in the Complaints Department we produce plenty of it.

The arctic conditions are a particular problem for the skinny Jesters in the team, including Yours Truly (or should I say Yours Sincerely) and Goodwill Jasper, the Gay Ian Paisley. This has become such a problem for Jasper, who doesn’t have a spare inch of flesh on him, that he has contacted the Union and asked them to intervene. The Union has given the Mill two weeks to sort it out or… I’m not sure what.

Jasper is our Union Rep, so I suppose it was the sensible thing to do. It was particularly bad this morning and Jasper spoke to the Union again. This time they have threatened to bring in an external body (presumably to measure the temperature and see how close to Absolute Zero it actually is).

This got Jester’s imagination working overtime. I have a macabre sense of humour at the best of times and I immediately equated cold working conditions and bodies with morgues, so I had to ask Jasper if the refrigeration unit in the local Mortuary had gone and if they were going to move the bodies into our office so they wouldn’t go off.

Several groans later someone told me to shut up and get on with my work. So, another typical day in the Dark Satanic Mill.

Jester and the Discussion Document

I might have mentioned once or twice that, although I maintain a happy demeanour most of the time, I am a part of that unhappy statistic: people who have been diagnosed with depression. I don’t think for a minute that my depression is clinical; in fact I am sure that it has environmental causes, which I might one day write about. My depression is known to my employers and my managers are very good about it. It usually manifests itself in uncontrollable tears but occasionally, I go the other way and blow my top.

Which is how I ended up getting a Discussion Document last week. I usually manage to cope well with stressful situations but if things start piling on me, for instance worrying about Bobbie’s illness (see my previous blog, Jester, Bobbie, her kidneys and the Resource Planner), getting two bad calls in a row and having more work on my list than I can hope to do, I get stressed and, if it’s too bad, I blow my top spectacularly. This is what happened a couple of weeks ago.

I usually sit there brooding about what’s going on for a few minutes and let it all get on top of me. Then I decide I don’t want to work at the Dark Satanic Mill anymore. Then I start packing up my things, turn off my computer, log out of the phone. Then the swearing begins. I’ve done my best to keep foul language out of this blog and I think I’ve succeeded but in real life I swear like a trooper. In fact, I think my language would make a trooper blush, even when I’m in a good mood.

So this series of events unfolded a couple of weeks ago. My manager wasn’t in that day. She would have jumped on it (not me, just the tantrum) very quickly and diffused the situation. The managers who were in are both new to the company and I think they were gobsmacked. My colleagues were either laughing at me (I believe I’m comical when I lose it) or trying to calm me down. Eventually, one of the managers came over and took me into a private room and asked me what was up. By that time, I had vented my head of steam and explained what was going on. She came up with a practical solution, which was to get me on standard complaints for a day to give me some slack. I was then to be off for 5 days (including a weekend, I had already booked the leave) and I would be able to return to work after that ready to resume my normal role.

When my manager and I were both back at work, I got the discussion document. I always thought these were a preliminary in disciplinary proceedings but this didn’t feel like it. It felt much more like a welfare call. She wanted to know what had led to my outburst and how they could have prevented it. I actually felt very repentant and made sure she knew I thought I’d acted badly. I was my judge and jury and she was my psychiatrist.

I think my main regret about the tantrum, though, was Mr Grumpy didn’t witness it. He’s always wanted to see me lose it. The sad thing is, though, I have to be very careful not to lose it again, so I’m hoping he will never see me throw my toys out of the pram.

The Emo, The Area Network Manager and New Brooms

I was never under the illusion that the Dark Satanic Mill has a monopoly on treating its staff in … let’s be kind here and call it … a silly way. In fact, I would go further and say that in a competition between the Dark Satanic Mill and our local Clownstabulary in the let’s-treat-our-employees-in-a-ridiculous-fashion stakes, the local Clownstabulary wins hands down every time. I was, however, under the illusion that maybe other employers (particularly in the private sector) have more idea how to treat their workforces.

 Not so. I was wrong. I collected my daughter, The Emo (she is a Timelord in her spare time – her catchphrase is “saving the Earth with a cup of tea”), from work on Sunday. I’m an indulgent mother and she has me twisted round her little finger, so I run a free taxi service for her. She was  distraught. She works for a national greeting card retailer, a sort of Dark Satanic Paper Mill, but I will call them Eastwoods Cards.

Her particular branch of Eastwoods Cards had had a visit from the Area Network Manager. I am not sure exactly what an Area Network Manager does but I suspect she is senior to the store manager. The Emo told me that the Area Network Manager has decided that the workers in the shops in our home town are too happy and she is going to redistribute the employees round the various shops.

The Emo has a major problem with this. She is perfectly capable at saving the Earth (or some other planet) on a weekly basis over a 13 week run but she is a very shy girl and has great difficulty building up friendships and has taken nearly three years at the shop for her to feel confident about the people she works with. She is now really worried that she is going to have to go through the same slow, laborious  process of making friends again. She also thinks that the idea is plain stupid because it is well known in psychological circles that happy people work better (something the Dark Satanic Mill and the Clownstabulary would do well to recognise).

I explained to her that there is little she can do. None of the workforce belongs to a union so they have nobody to represent them and they will be powerless to stop this going ahead. She will be moved to another shop and will have to start making friends again. The same thing happened to her Dad – he was part of a good team, who were split up around the Division because they did not make enough arrests (my husband likes to do proper police work – going into town on Friday and Saturday and arresting drunks to reach his targets does not give him job satisfaction) or something similar.

I did explain, however, that this Area Network Manager reminds me of our very own, sadly departed, Fat Controller. She, like him, must see herself as a new broom with lots of clever ideas, which she will put into action. She will make a thorough nuisance of herself for a time and make those who report to her hate her and then she will leave, possibly under a cloud, having caused major damage to the workforce’s morale.

It almost made me feel nostalgic.

Llama, Llama

Read this blog and the comments. I read it and laughed. I think you will too! Thanks Inspector Gadget. As usual, you sum up the crazy world in which we live perfectly.

Jester and Bored Retired Ladies

One thing I’ve forgotten to mention in this blog is the welcome return of a retired jester on Monday. I very briefly mentioned her retirement in April but I glossed over it because I had got drunk at her leaving do and kissed (tongues and all) one of the Gay Gordons and I didn’t want to mention it then.

Well, she’s bored and has come back to the Dark Satanic Mill. She is now part-time and does admin in the Complaints Department but it is wonderful to have her back. I didn’t even think of a name for her back in April and I am tired of racking my brains for jester names so she can retain her old nickname from work and will henceforth be known as Goodwill Thora.

Welcome back Thora: we all missed you terribly.

Jester and the Move continued

It’s been an interesting 3 days at the Dark Satanic Mill. On Wednesday I went to work as normal but instead of going to my usual part of the building, I went to the New Building. Now, the New Building has plenty for me to moan about but the main thing really is I hate change. Actually, it’s not so bad after all. They’ve sat me next to Goodwill Josie, who’s great fun and the office is clean and tidy.

It is, however, very cold because, for some reason, nobody can adjust the air conditioning. In fact, I don’t think the word “cold” does it justice; maybe a better word to describe the conditions at the New Dark Satanic Mill would be Arctic. We’ve all been suffering from frostbite and hypothermia. Goodwill Jessica was reduced to sitting on her hands yesterday in an attempt to warm them up enough to type. I have decided that I am going to come into work on Monday in full arctic explorer garb: fleece hat, gloves, scarf, fleece jacket and wind and waterproof jacket. I might even wear my hiking boots with crampons attached. I did ask on Thursday if I could wear my rag coat and hat (I’m a Border Morris Dancer in my spare time) but my manager told me that that is not smart business attire and lent me her jacket, which is.

She also lent Goodwill Josie another manager’s cardigan, which made Josie feel like a granny and she spent the rest of the day saying “Ooh, that’s bonny!” in a granny-like voice.

So, apart from conditions that Sir Ranulph Fiennes would recognise (I keep expecting to see Jeremy Clarkson and James May drive through the office in a large Toyota, swigging Gin and Tonics), what else is there to say about the new office?

Well, the new printer is broken. Some heavy handed Jester slammed the paper drawer in too heavy-handedly and broke bits off it. It now complains loudly every time we print anything, which is about every 5 seconds. It also has to be treated very gently if we want it to print is at all. Jasper has the missing pieces on his desk. It was he who realised the problem and very tenderly gathered up the broken bits to show to IT.

The drinks machine (and I’m convinced it is brand new) does not work. There was a technician working on it most of Thursday and most of yesterday but to no avail. That means we have to go up to the second or third floor to get a drink. I went up to the third floor yesterday (I had not been told the machine on the second floor was working) and my Customer Service Manager (i.e. my manager’s manager) caught me coming down stairs with my cup of hot, brown water. She nearly had a fit on health and safety grounds and asked me to use the lift. I can’t do that because I’m claustrophobic and I think the stairs are the lesser of the two evils, even though they are so open plan that I’m terrified of falling through the non-existent risers. So I trod very carefully indeed.

Talking of claustrophobia, the toilet cubicles are a nightmare. They are tiny and I can’t use one of them because it is about 2′ x 2′ and there is no room for me to cower in a corner, screaming “Let me out, let me out!” The others are a tiny bit bigger. Yesterday, I noticed that one of the soap dispensers had fallen off the wall. I wish I’d had my camera with me; it was one of the funniest things I’ve seen for some time.

Finally, I had intended to run a book on who would spill coffee on the carpet first. Too late, Josie did it yesterday. I’m proud of her!

Jester, Pennywise and Delusional People

During the general chaos of the move the Dark Satanic Mill yesterday, there was an unwelcome visitor to our department and Jester received a call from an old friend.

We’ll start with the unwelcome visitor. Pennywise came in looking all tanned and healthy to hand in his sicknote. He is signed off until August 31st. This was like a red rag to a bull for most of the jesters and caused one of us, Madness, to become almost apoplectic, so she turned round and said words to the effect of “Aren’t you supposed to be off sick? You don’t look very ill to me.” Jester wouldn’t even look at him. It is so galling when somebody who is supposedly off with depression comes into work looking tanned, healthy and most of all happy, when his or her colleagues are there working their arses off. Infuriating!!!

Later on, Gary saw Pennywise in Asda with his two sons and his wife, laughing and joking. Fortunately, Madness was not apprised of this, so she will not be sentenced to life imprisonment for murder in the near future. Good job, really: I like Madness. I can’t say that about Pennywise.

Then, later, I had a call from my lovely delusional lady, who thinks she’s a criminal psychologist and crack a hardened paedophile in minutes, where it would take the police years. She is a lovely lady, although I am convinced she is a complete fruit loop (is that PC?) I wrote about her in a previous blog. When I realised who was calling, my face lit up. I know that because the office suddenly became brighter and I know there was genuine warmth in my voice when I asked the usually fatal words “How can I help you?”

She told me. She asked me to write a letter confirming that at no time has she ever handcuffed any of our engineers to her bath. Maybe I’m getting a bit ahead of myself here. This customer, let’s call her Julie, is diminutive. I have this on good authority, from Julie herself and from our very own Quality Assessor, who visited her house to inspect damage caused by our engineers. He told me (and this is in his exact words) “She’s a registered midget!” I have included the exclamation mark because it was there in his voice. So she’s small and birdlike.

She has a care worker and while her claim/complaint was going on, this care worker would be around the house, doing whatever she was there to do. One of the problems Julie had with our engineers (a common problem, unfortunately) was they rarely finished the jobs they were there to do, so once, she told me yesterday, she joked to her care worker that she should handcuff the engineer to the toilet until he had finished the job.

That seems a good idea to me and maybe when we issue policy documentation to our customers, we should enclose some handcuffs as a gesture of goodwill, although I’m sure any of our contractors who are reading this blog will blanch as they read this paragraph.

But I digress. Julie has not been very happy with her care worker and has criticised her and now, it appears that her care worker has had her revenge by accusing Julie of being a hostage taker and handcuffing the engineer to the bath. You should see me laugh while I type this (and the mistakes I am having to continually correct because I am shaking so much!) Julie has received a risk assessment of 4, which means that social services will not go into her house and she says she is suing the care worker and wants me to write to her to confirm that she has never handcuffed any of our engineers to the bath (or toilet for that matter) or taken them hostage.

I have agreed willingly. There is not much I wouldn’t do for such a delightful lady. I am not sure if what she has told me is firmly based in reality. As I said before, I am certain she is delusional, but the letter won’t hurt anybody, so I’ll write it.

Finally, she did send me the tapes. Four of them. Unfortunately, I have not listened to them. I have a CD player in my car. I hesitate to say this but I lied to her yesterday. I told her I had listened and they now had pride of place in my cassette collection. It was a white lie and I will listen to them oneday. It is simply a matter of time.

Jester and the Move

It was chaotic at the Dark Satanic Mill yesterday. At least it was in the complaints department. Our company moved into its current building in July 2004 and since then, it has recruited and recruited and recruited so the building is now bursting at the seams (incidentally, that is the name of a Strawbs album that I particularly like). The DSM has therefore bought (or should I say acquired? That’s good business speak after all) a new building to house some of the departments. Complaints is one of them. So we had to pack all our belongings away in crates so they could be moved to the new building yesterday at 3pm and we had to move to temporary desks in our call centre so our computers could be moved too.

Of course I moaned about it. Our department has a bit of a reputation of being miserable buggers and I didn’t want to give anybody the wrong idea. My colleagues Gary, Jeannie and Josie kept their spirits up by basically being very silly – having water drinking competitions and the like – until a manager came over and pointed out the error of their ways.

We move into the new building today and should have new everything, except CPUs (or boxes as we like to call them). I will unpack all my possessions, including my model of Michael Essien, Sigmund Freud, pictures of Dave Grohl, Frank Lampard and Jose Mourinho and last school photo of my youngest, Bobbie. Then I have to start ringing customers again. Never mind.