Ever notice when someone relates how hard they’ve had it, someone chimes in “oh, that’s nothing . . .” and gives their harder luck case? I started thinking about it watching Jack Nicholson in “As Good as it Gets” on cable yesterday. I see it sometimes on the board. Turns out, I’ve got nothing big to complain about; things are going fairly well. So if I related my latest “heartbreaker” story, it’s actually very minor and whiny in the grand scheme. But I’ll do it anyway, and then I’ll listen to anyone who feels like sharing their petty tough luck cases!
So, part of my job as a flight instructor is the opportunity to participate in what’s called an instructor enrichment program. Basically, take a plane and fly out to another training base to fly in fighter jets or other company planes for a week. This is done in the interest of trying to better relate to our end users.
My sob story is that for the second year in a row, I’ve had to reluctantly turn down the chance to go fly F-16s in the desert for a week. Last year I couldn’t leave work because my supervisor took a new assignment and I had to fill in for him that week. This year, Mrs. C is preggers, and due to give birth the week I’d be gone in February. Suffice it to say, “no kitchen pass.”
All is not lost; The guy who works the program promises to hook me up with another slot later, but still a little frustrating that I’ve had to say no twice in a row.
So, any other insignificant sob stories to get off your chest this new year? (I promise to sympathize.)
Insignificant, but whiney: I just got in from my exciting, glamorous, romantic New Year’s Eve. Met my husband and some friends for dinner; everyone’s in an ‘off’ mood. Then to visit granny in the old folks’ home. Granny is very… trying. Then back to friends’ house for a movie and visiting. Then back to the old folks’ home because granny wanted to be woken up for New Year’s Eve. Sitting in an old folks’ home at 11:45pm at night on a holiday was… depressing. Granny was aggravating, as usual: sending my husband out to get her something to eat. Her appetite is rather erratic, to say the least, and she wants a cheeseburger. Not easy to find a cheeseburger at 11:45pm on New Year’s Eve in that part of town. He finally found something in the sandwich case at a convenience store. He’d been up for 16 hours at that point, and was about at the breaking point with granny’s demands (she has a son and another grandson, but they’re worthless pieces of shit, and my husband, in comparison, is a saint to her).
Anyway. Depressing. Life ain’t much fun for granny these days, either.
For the last three months or so at work I had been teasingly seriously requesting a “review” so that I might receive a raise. I hadn’t had a raise since 2002.
A lot had happened at work. Back story is that I returned from maternity leave (to a major promotion) in 10/04 and promptly quit on the second day back. I was suffering major PPD and getting crappy attitudes from the co-workers so I was thinking that I certainly didn’t need that crap and up and quit.
7 weeks later I’m calling my old boss begging him to let me return. He allows me to come back on a temporary part-time basis. Three days a week, seven to three. PERFECT! Life was fabulous. After nine months, I lost sight of my gratitude and was pestering for a review but all I wanted was a raise. I had been with the company since 2000. So, I end up with my boss telling me I will definitely get a “review” on such and such date. On that date the HR Manager arrives and shuffles me off to the conference room. She not so nicely informed me that since I was “temporary” that I had no claim to a review. Okay, why they had to bring the HR Mgr in to tell me that was a bit confusing, but she told me my boss would have a meeting with me the following Friday to “discuss the work I’ve done over the last year and make a decision about a raise” that she felt I wasn’t entitled to anyway. “You Quit” is what she told me. I mentioned that I was still receiving my 5-year service award. She said that service awards were the only thing that had continuity for re-hired employees.
Fast forward to following Friday. Near the end of the day I go into boss’s office to, in my mind, go over the excellent job I’ve done in the last year (I really did do an excellent job) and maybe see a 50 cent raise. Well, boss starts talking about business and the only thing I catch is “laying off”. I’m flabbergasted. I say, quietly, “you’re laying me off”? I am amazed. I have been golden in this job and have been a huge asset to boss. Problem arose when new Office Mgr came into play. She felt threatened by both my knowledge and my boss’s reliance upon me. I did EVERYTHING for him, dropped what I was doing, did it now for him.
This shitty bitch got me fired, and I know my boss didn’t want to do it. They told me of the layoff around 12/15 and I worked up till the 30th, with my head held high and my ethics strong, but I cried like a baby last Friday saying goodbye to everyone. People who were unaware of my situation were as shocked as I initially was. I’m crying as I type this.
I hope the New Year brings her lots of heartache, I understand her 17 year old daughter has dropped out of school and is living with some guy. I hope that brings her much pain and disappointment.
I haven’t left the house for more than a week. It’s winter here, and all the walking surfaces are icy and slick. I broke my hip last May and am terrified (maybe inordinately so, since when I fell it was summer) of falling again.
Tomorrow morning I’m being sworn in (city council) and the forecast is for freezing rain tonight. It’s at least 30 feet from the house to the garage, and another 50 feet plus steps to get to city hall.
I’ve got a whine that I’ve been whining about since I was 13 years old, and that I’ll whine about till the day I die. Of that I am sure.
The summer of 1966, we were in Seattle while my dad was working on some business project for several months. I was a HUGE Beatles fan, and they were touring the U.S. A local radio station had a ticket giveaway contest – they’d read a lyric, and the first person calling in to name the song correctly would win a front row ticket. I’ll never forget to my dying day dialing all but the last number, hearing the lyric, dialing as he read it, and knowing instantly that the song was Nowhere Man. And then him saying, “You’re the first caller!”
That’s right, I won the ticket. To be exact, the front-row ticket. To the show that turned out to be the third-to-last Beatles concert EVER in the U.S.
So did I get to go? Ha! My dad, made me go camping in Canada. And he laughed at me. I had to give my ticket to a girlfriend. Who screamed enough for both of us, I’m sure, from her front row seat. Where she was so close to the stage, she touched Paul McCartney. :eek:
My 13-year-old-girl heartbreak has been going strong for 40 years now, and shows no signs of abating. Yes, it didn’t change the world, or even mean a lot to most people. But to have such a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and to have to give it up? It’s well worth whining about!
K, I found them. So, I’m gonna whine about something less bad but more goddamn annoying.
I do not work on commission. But, I have a sales quota. I have to sell $190 worth of flooring every hour that I’m at work. I’m new at this so I haven’t been selling that much. For the last few weeks (5 to be exact), I have been working with one couple. They are building a new house. They were going to have us install carpet in their living room, hallway, both son’s rooms, their daughter’s room, their own room and the loft off their room. I knew this would be a great sale. I worked with them every time they came in the store. Then, the all important day. They finally had all the flooring picked out and were ready to set up for a measure. On this particular day, HR had scheduled me to work out on the floor, instead of in the showroom where I belong. So, I didn’t see them come in and likewise, they didn’t know I was working. Despite knowing how I’ve busted my ass for these people, my coworker “V” set up the measure. She didn’t even get it right. She left off the loft, living room, and the hallway. Just as she was finishing up, I walked into the showroom. Mrs. K saw me and said, “OH! C, if we had known you were here today, we would have had you work with us. We know you work on a quota!” I said it was ok (it really wasn’t, I was fuming inside) and we chatted for a few while “V” left.
Now, “V” almost immediatly went to a new department. Unfortunatley, her new department also has quotas and the flooring sale would still help her. But, she wasn’t in the department when Mrs & Mr K came back to review the measure. Since she wasn’t working in flooring any more and since I felt that the K’s were my customer anyway, I reviewed the quote. I also found all the mistakes “V” made and had to send the quote back for a refigure. This meant the K’s had to come back to the store again. They came back on Thursday of last week. Once again, I am the one who reviewed the quote, fixed the problems, and sold the $6900 install. This was huge. I told my boss the situation and he told me that as far as he knows, the reviewer is the one who gets full credit for the sale, not the person who set up the measure - as the measure only takes about 20 minutes and a review can take hours or days. So, I was happy.
Well, my boss was wrong. I didn’t get one ounce of credit for the sale I busted my ass on for 5 weeks. Also, there’s a glitch in the system so I didn’t even get a sale credit for closing the sale. My boss did because he logged in to help me with something. Even though my ID was in the reviewer spot, he got the credit for the sale because he was logged in. “V” got credit for the sale. I, on the other hand, averaged $29 per hour last week. I’m going to probably get in trouble by the big boss. At least I know my boss will back me up. But, I’m royally pissed. Normally, I don’t get possessive of my customers. But, I don’t normally spend 5 friggen weeks with them. She spent all of 20 minutes with them (and she screwed it up) and she got credit for almost $7000 - and she wasn’t even working in the store or in flooring when the sale happened.
I’m trying to break off a long-distance emotional affair with a married woman. I’ve come to realize that aside from the whole married thing she is also the kind of person who whines about her life and then comes up with these fantastic plans about what she is going to do. But she never actually does anything.
She’s supposed to come visit me in a few weeks as “just friends”, a trip she has already cancelled once before so that she could, “devote all her attention to her marriage.” I have no enthusiasm for her visit because I just know that it will cause me more pain and I think she is using me as an excuse to vacation/not deal with her husband. She has made it very clear that she cannot imagine ANY kind of future for herself, much less one that involves me.
So I need to tell her to go away. But I don’t want to be lonely.
In a moment of inattention the other day, I bumped into the rear of the car in front of me. We’d been stopped at a light, and I glanced away to look at something on the seat. I thought the traffic had started moving. It hadn’t.
Amazingly, there was almost no apparent damage done to either car. But I apparently slammed into the seat belt hard enough to bruise the heck out of my my sternum.
So now I’m waiting to see if I’m going to be sued for some big amount for whiplash or something. I’m really kinda worried about it.
I told cwPartner that our relationship is over. We’d been a couple for about 15 years. We also had conflicts that defied discussion, good times, and couples counseling.
The physical separation is the easy part, since we don’t live together. I feel like I’ve lost a part of myself, though.
I imagine that this is what it would feel like to cut off a limb to free myself from a trap - necessary in order to survive, but I’ll never, ever be complete again.
I do believe that!