I'm On A Need To Know Basis

A very unusual thing happened at work today, I arrived early. How early you ask? Really early, before 7 am. Now maybe you think that's not all that early, but for me its early. Generally, if I make it by 7:30 am, its still early, eightish is more the norm. To make matter worse, I always have trouble sleeping on Sunday night. The anticipation of a new work week is always disturbing to me. I fell asleep about 11 pm last night and woke up at 3 am, tossing and turning until 5 am, when I finally got out of bed. I was tired before the day even started. Being tired when you arrive at work in the morning does not bode well for the rest of the day. I checked my voice mail on the way into work and returned a call to someone who needed an answer right away. I thought how lucky I was to only have one new voice mail after the long weekend. By the time I reached my desk, I had another new voice mail. This was the best kind of voice mail a guy can get. It was from the boss saying he was in a city far away and would be gone until tomorrow afternoon. How great is that? I'm a salaried employee, so I'm hired to do a job, not to punch the clock, a concept the boss routinely tries to abuse. When I come and go seems irrelevant to me, so long as the job gets done. The boss, on the other hand, is all about the clockwork. He figures that every hour beyond eight that I work each day, is a freebie for him. This is a problem with the whole salaried worker idea. Employers are quick to ask you to go above and beyond and less willing to recognize when less than forty hours in a week is appropriate. My goal is to keep it as close to eight a day as possible, while still getting my work done. Anyway, I had to go in early today because my co-workers are both off for the next two days and I had to cover for one of them at a meeting. Of course, I know nothing of the meeting and there was not a hint that it was in the offing. This past Wednesday, while I was fighting my way through the avalanche of idiotic emails from the boss, someone called to ask who from our office would be attending this meeting today. Since I was the Lone Stranger at work today, it fell to me. So this morning, when I should have been heading to WalMart to get coffee, I found myself on the interstate, rocketing toward a community 35 miles or so south of my fair city to attend a meeting in the place of the alpha male member of this duo. When I arrived at the meeting, the lead guy of the folks I was meeting asked me for some paperwork that alpha guy was supposed to have for him. I had to plead ignorance. The guy was not happy and insisted upon recounting the entire conversation in which he told alpha guy about the urgency of having the paperwork to him today. I was appropriately sympathetic, but I don't think he was assuaged. I did solemnly swear to talk to alpha guy the moment he appears in the office. You gotta give them something, even if its the non-committal, committal. I got back to the office around noon and had a bunch of phone calls to return, and administrative things to do. Around 2 pm I was overcome with fatigue, but being a trooper, I pushed on until 3. Then, seizing on the whole salaried employee thing, I came home and took a catnap. A guy's got to do, what a guy's got to do. Merle. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgemental and cranky Tag: Daily Life Personal Finance Humor