A Girl...

Simon Says - "Acqua alle funi!"

So, I am at work today. Gosh, sometimes it barely seems worth it, huh? The neverending grind to make a buck.

But it's OK this week, and here is why.

Like an abused puppy that finally gets a gentle pat on the head, I have earned the praise of my boss.

My boss is a better friend than boss, and we really should decide, once and for all, whether we are friends or co-workers, and we should just keep it that way. She has been "there for me" (a phrase I detest, but there's really no other phrase that says the same thing that people will understand in the way that it is intended) through some nasty, hard times. When I was going through the two worst, most difficult times in my life, she offered support and understanding above and beyond what I received from most of my so-called friends, from the ones who I thought really would support me.

Unfortunately, she is also the world's most demanding boss. Christ, you have no idea.

My ex-coworker, who quit in a bluster one day when he decided that he couldn't take it any more, is the one who coined the word "nanomanager." The boss is such a control freak that "micromanager" just didn't do the trick.

It's nearly impossible to live up to the expectations that she sets. I tell you, no matter how well I do something, there is always ALWAYS some little detail that she can use to tear the whole thing apart.

I might create the world's greatest report for the client, and she will manage to look at my cover letter, and tell me that it is so poorly worded that it is an insult to the client.

Here's the thing - if it does the job, then it should be just fine, right? That is how I see it. But with the lady in charge, it doesn't matter if it's done right, so long as it's done her way.

But here's the problem with doing it her way, in parable format:

Imagine, if you will, the raising of the Obelisk in St. Peter's Square in the Vatican. The obelisk was transported across the Mediterranean Sea from Alexandria, Egypt. Placed at Mt Vesuvius, it was admired by a sixteenth century pope, who decided to have it moved to the square in front of the new bascilica. The planning and engineering took a year, and the physical trip through Rome took hundreds of men and horses nearly four months to accompish.

After all of this, the 110 foot tall 300 ton obelisk was to be raised from horizontal to vertical in the middle of the square - again, hundreds of horses and men using the world's most advanced (at the time) system of ropes, compound pulleys, and winches. The men and horses would pull the ropes nearly a quarter of a mile, down the Vatican avenue, past the castle, and along the river.

The pope had waited four years from the time he decided to move the obelisk until this moment. Because of the solemnity of the occasion, he demamnded complete silence from everyone, under penalty of death, while the obelisk was placed upright.

The huge crowd was hushed. Horses and men began to pull. On and on they went, the pulleys and winches groaning and squealing, the giant obelisk moving upward, inch by inch. Despite all the planning and engineering that went into the project, one key componant had not been considered. The friction of the ropes and wooden pulleys was generating a lot of heat.

When the obelisk was about half way to vertical, an English sailor in the crowd noticed that smoke was rising from the pulleys. If the pulleys or rope were to catch fire, the obelisk would come crashing down, and be entirely destroyed.

So the sailor yelled out, "acqua alle funi!" (wet the ropes!). Slaves rushed in with water, and wet the ropes, saving the obelisk from crashing back to the ground.

So here's the question for you, reader:

Did the pope say to the sailor, "I demanded silence! For going aginst my will, you shall be hanged in the morning!" or did he say, "good job - you judged wisely, and went against my bidding when it was the right thing to do."

Well, I leave that for you to find out. But I'll tell you what - with my boss, no matter what I do, it's the wrong choice.

I have heard both of the following (I shit you not) in the past week:

"When I tell you to do it a certain way, I do it for a reason. Just do it like I tell you and it'll be fine."

AND:

"I know I told you to send the email (that she wrote because the one I wrote was not good enough), but I thought that you would be smart enough to make changes to it."

So, if I let the obelisk fall, I should have said something. If I suggest we wet the ropes, then I was too dumb to realize that she demanded silence for a reason, and why couldn't I just do it like she told me to?

SO...

Back to the start, and the point of this whole long miserable rant...

I did a damn good job on a big big project that was due yesterday. I worked late all last week, I worked Saturday, and then again Sunday night.

I was sure that I would give this thing to my boss, and it would be wrong all wrong how could you give me this it's not what I asked for what could have been going through your mind.

Turns out, she said it was fantastic.

So today I don't feel like it's such a grind. Today work feels fun. And I dressed up two days in a row.

TOPIC CHANGE:

Leah was right - biking was so much fun! We were the coolest people at the lake. Coolest by far. You could hear the jealousy violently exploding in the heads of all we passed.

More pictures to come, I promise. I just have to get them off the camera and onto my computer, so that I can email them to Leah so that she can create a slide show which she will then ftp to her site. Simple.