Patterns and Motives

I just realized it yesterday, walking out to the car: she can smell the divorce on him.

It explains why she's been chatting him up in recent weeks, to my irritation (the less she works, the less tolerance I have for her Betty Boop sing-songing).

My college roommate could do this, too -- I was aware of the dynamic, but never managed to put a name to it. The guys she was interested in had something in common, but I couldn't put my finger on it, and the only time our interests overlapped, I beat her out (yeay for me). Her first all-in relationship was with a guy who was engaged, but she was right: he was perfectly willing to destroy that engagement by cozying up to her. I figured it was all due to broken-family dynamics at the time, and it probably is.

Once the "smell the divorce" idea popped into my head, it rippled out over my mental picture of the office, and I saw its framework clicking into place over patterns I'd been noticing -- who she approaches, whom she does not; who she chats up, flirting, and whom she only talks business with.

This is a strange new way to evaluate the strength of others' romantic partnerships -- by whether Her Girliness seems to think she has a shot at them or not.

I bet she has no conscious idea she's following this pattern, and no malicious intent. My roommate didn't seem to be able to help it, either.

Heh heh

Supervisor operates under the working theory that if he's said it once, he's said it enough: Well, I told you...

Possibly, he trusts the rumor mill to carry official information along with hearsay.

Or, he just hasn't realized that the reason we know everything the President (for instance) says is because there are, um, cameras and reporters there to relay the info.

Is is so surprising then, that he finds himself in a near-constant state of annoyance that his subordinates aren't doing what he told [one of] them they should?

...

So the other day, he tells me a certain paperwork package should go across his desk for review -- he specifically said I didn't have to worry about this, that the sup should bring him the paperwork for review.

Yesterday, I created two of these packages, and both came back from the sup in the normal way; they didn't go over to LeaderMan. What are the chances, I'm thinking, that he remembered to tell them about this new process? But he specifically said I didn't need to worry about it. But he'll get miffed with me if he finds out these didn't go to him.

Classic situation, I know.

So this morning, one of the sups is sitting in LeaderMan's office chatting, and it hit me exactly what I should do: I took the paperwork into the office, and as I handed it to the sup, I smiled and said, "The other day, LeaderMan told me that he'd like to look over this paperwork before it goes out." The sup shrugged and immediately handed the paperwork over the desk to LeaderMan, who joined in, "Yeah, I want to look at those before they go out...from now on..." kind of trailing off at the end, as if he might be realizing that something was going on here, but he couldn't put his finger on exactly what.

Since, of the three people in the room, I'm the only one who knew why this interaction was subversive, I'm the only one who left the room chuckling internally.

Shift in perspective

I enjoy exchanging greetings with one of the custodians in our building. His voice is very unique -- imagine your stereotypical Jamaican, mon, give him a tenor range and imagine that he's smoked for twenty years to give his voice that broken, gravely quality.

Now have him sing-song, "Hello, byootiful gul..."

See how it brings a smile to your face?

The other day, my fun little thing got a little bit spoiled by Her Girliness -- she went around a corner in front of me, and I heard his unmistakable voice say, "Hello, byootiful queen..."

Yeah, damnit. It was my personal little fun thing, and she has to go and one-up me. And I can't imagine she appreciates it as much as I do, either. I don't get that many compliments, so I value them.

Anyway, just now, I saw a different woman turn a corner, and heard him say joyfully, "My byootiful queen!" and she responded pleasantly to him.

So, for what it's worth, my nick-name is now the unique one, so I feel better about it again. Who knows, maybe he uses "queen" for women with long hair....or older women....

...ooh, that would be good. Let's tell ourselves he probably only calls older women "queen"....

(cuz Her Girliness is a few years younger than me.)

Morale is up.

:-)

Thanks for the Feedback

My favorite way to get feedback about my job is only to hear from the boss when he doesn't like something I've done.

While logic suggests that this means he liked the previous hundred documents I prepared since the last time he rejected one...

...still, makes you feel good.

Morale is high.

[/sarcasm]

Beauty Not Beheld

New theory: she's a character in her own real-life movie -- it's a badly scripted movie, and she's one of those characters who's vacant in one scene, but possess key information in another, depending on the needs of the plot. (The plot, in such movies, is never heading anywhere truly satisfying, unless you're satisfied by big explosions.)

Scene 1 (interior, office cubicle)

(we join a conversation already in progress)

GALFRIDAY: Oh, so, um, I have to do a Final Doc for this job --

GEEKGAL: -- No, that's already done, that's what you're holding in your hands....

GALFRIDAY (stares at document she's holding, as if it's someone else's parking ticket).

(Fade to Black.)

Scene 2 (interior, office cubicle)

GEEKGAL sits typing at computer (or, alternatively, reading political news on the internets).

* * * * *

....okay, this pseudo script format isn't doing justice to my annoyance, because your full embrace of my irritation requires too much specific knowledge on your part to appreciate just how frustrating the conversation was, that I overheard, that I was going to somehow capture in script form here.

Here, let me teach you something specific about my job, and now that you understand, get a load of this what I heard her saying yesterday! Can you believe that?!

Suffice to say that she went from damsel-in-confusion to authority-on-what-should-be-done in the space of a couple of minutes, and both of these states were Highly Inappropriate -- the damsel should know how to do her job by now, and the authority shouldn't be telling her superior what to do.

But then, lately, I've been noticing that she doesn't actually treat people all that well, a lot of the time. I previously characterized her as being Nice without Doing Anything, but often, I'm beginning to see, she isn't even that Nice.

Shrug.