Skippedy-do

We spent our whole, entire day today at one of those workplace Town Hall sessions. I know you’re feeling sorry for me already. Thanks. It was pretty painful.

The managers were all trying to act like fun people. The executives talked about “visions of the future” (like so many sugar-plums) and re-evaluating our “core competencies” and briefed us on “strategic positioning”. (I don’t know what any of that means anymore, if I ever did)  There were a few group exercises. And the requisite motivational speaker who told us all how to be more effective leaders and better team-players.

Then because the Head Cheeses are always obligated to have some time for questions and answers, we had a few minutes for questions and answers — just before lunch … to discourage lingering. A handful of employees who didn’t know any better, asked some questions to which they got the party-line answers. Then we had lunch. Then we did more stuff in the afternoon which I barely remember because the room was extra hot and stuffy and smelly after lunch and I was nodding off.

For me, the whole day reinforced how very much I do not ever want to be a boss. If it was painful for me and my fellow employees, I can only imagine how it must be for those in charge trying desperately, in one day, to undo years of lethargy, apathy, antipathy, suspicion, cynicism and hostility.

It was sad.

So anyway, I have to be very careful at this point in my career to avoid any further success. One more rung on the ladder and I’ll be obligated to have staff. I hate staff.

I’ve had staff during assignments. Staff make your life a living hell. You have to make sure they have enough work to do, but not too much or they’ll freak out and have nervous collapses or go crying to the union or something.

 Then you have to make sure they’re doing the work they’re supposed to be doing and not spending their day updating their resumes. And you have to be responsible for all the work they do produce; all the work they fail to produce and all the work they totally mess up.

Staff are always whining about something. They’re always getting into “conflicts” with other staff that you have to resolve. They have personal problems and expect you to do something about them.

And no matter how nice you are or how accommodating and pleasant you try to be, your staff will hate you just because you’re the boss of them.

You really have to walk on eggshells when you have staff. I’m terrible at walking on eggshells. The whole analogy is terrible because walking on eggshells results in a lot of crunching and grinding and pulverizing of eggshells. How is that even supposed to mean something like “being really, really careful”? No matter how careful you are; if you walk on eggshells, you’re going to make a mess.

Just like being a boss. It’s a lose-lose proposition. You can be as careful as all get out about absolutely everything you say and do and think because it can all be taken the wrong way so easily by staff who really want to take things the wrong way. And they always do.

 You have to look like you’re working much harder than any of your staff or they’ll stop working altogether. You have to get in before them in the morning and stay until the last one is gone. And when you finally go home you can’t relax because your mind is full of your aggravating staff.

Okay, maybe it’s not always like that. Maybe some bosses have only great staff just like some people have only great bosses just like some people ride unicorns to work.

I just think the whole “manager-staff” set-up is a bad idea. I don’t think anyone really likes being a boss and for sure, no one really likes being staff. Being staff is still better than being a boss — except for that whole money thing and that whole being bossed around thing. The whole thing, however, sucks.

But, as Red Forman once said, “That’s why they call it work. Work is not about fun; it’s about work! If it wasn’t work, they’d call it ‘Super wonderful crazy fun time,’ or ‘Skippedy-do!”

6 X 6 Euphemisms

I was speaking with a friend the other day – I’ll call him Daniel, even though that’s not the name on his birth certificate.  Anyway, I was talking about something really important and he, as usual, wasn’t listening.  That’s not entirely his fault, though, because he may have a touch of attention deficit disorder. Of course, in his case the ADD is just a euphemism for “has so much going on in his own head that there’s no room to take it information from other sources.”

So there I am blathering away when he suddenly blurts out. “I love euphemisms”. Which is interesting because I just mentioned euphemisms in the preceding paragraph. Don’t you think that’s a weird coincidence?

While Daniel went on to talk about other things he loves or something, I stopped paying attention to him and started thinking that probably a whole of our daily conversation is conducted with euphemisms. The English language is so infused with political correctness and obfuscation that we rarely just say exactly what we mean.

For instance, we eat pork and beef, not pig and cow. (And by “we”, I mean savages;  not me). We don’t have television repeats anymore; we have “encore presentations.” We don’t torture people, we employ “enhanced interrogation techniques. (And, again by “we” I mean savages;  not me).

And speaking of Afghanistan, they keep telling us on the news that our soldiers in Afghanistan are “losing their lives”. Like it’s their fault – that they were somehow carelessness enough to “lose” their lives. I guess saying it that way absolves government of all responsibility for getting them killed.

Nobody gets fired anymore either. They get “laid-off” — which used to mean a temporary thing where the off-laid person had every expectation of getting back to work really soon. Not anymore.

Sometimes firing people is also called “decrecruitment” or “personnel surplus reduction” or “being “made redundant” or being “relieved of duties”.

The one I like least when they tell people they’re “being let go”. Like you’re doing them a favour. Like you’ve been holding them against their will and will now kindly release them into career freedom.

I don’t like that term when you’re talking to someone on the phone either. The person on the other end suddenly says, “Okay, I’d better let you go.”  Did I ask to be let go? Did anything I said make you think I wanted to be let go? I’m in the middle of telling you some very important stuff about the mysterious weeping sores on my buttocks. If you have to go, why don’t you just say, “Okay, I have to go now.” I can handle that. You’re not fooling me into thinking, “Oh, gee. That was nice of her to let me go.”

Euphemism is a Greek work from the root eupheme meaning well-speaking. It’s the opposite of blaspheme which means evil-speaking.

Anyway, euphemisms aren’t all annoying and stupid. They can be, as Daniel implied, lots of fun, too. Here are a few that are a bit unusual:

Death

1. Achieving room temperature
2. Buying a pine condo
3. Taking a dirt nap
4. Liquidating
5. Being living challenged
6. Going into the fertilizing business

 Self-Gratification

1. Doing the Han Solo
2. Relishing your hot dog
3. Liquidating the inventory 
4. Helping put Mr. Kleenex’s kids through college
5. Shooting yourself in the foot
6. Hand to gland combat

Sex

1. Taking the skin boat to tuna town
2. Bumping uglies
3. Feeding the kitty
4.  Doing the four-legged frolic
5.  Doing the horizontal mambo
6.  Knocking boots

 Pooping

1. Taking the Browns to the superbowl
2. Dropping the kids at the pool
3. Bombing the oval office
4. Building a dookie castle
5. Making a Minnesota hand warmer
6. Negotiating the release of the chocolate hostages

Getting Fired

1. Dissing the gruntled
2. Fueling a demand for lottery tickets and liquor
3. The corporate catch-and-release program
4. Giving Bruce Springsteen something to sing about
5. Ass-harvesting on the cubicle farm
6. Separating the wheat from the wheat that doesn’t kiss enough ass 

Wasn’t that fun? Okay, so here are a few more obsolete euphemisms you may not have heard before. Or maybe you have, but I haven’t so I assume no one has. Isn’t that terribly egocentric of me? Actually, I have heard one of them before.  But, if you haven’t any or some of them before, see if you can figure out what they mean without looking them up.

There isn’t a prize.

1. Punchable nun
2. Bury a Quaker
3. Leaping house
4. Woman in sensible shoes
5. Negative patient care outcome
6. Pillow Biter

PS: I was just kidding about Daniel before. He’s actually a very good listener and a scintillating conversationalist.