No Camels Were Harmed During This Entry

While working for the heinous ass-clown, Mr. Panty-Waist, it was inevitable that there would come a day when I would make a monumental decision in my life, between either finding a new job or coming to work with a chainsaw and bloody, murderous intent. While the latter appealed to me so much more, the former was necessary to preserve my sanity and possibly my freedom, though I doubt you could find a jury anywhere in the country who’d convict me for obliterating that waste of good skin and his Skankariffic, Blonde, Ass-kissing Sidekick.

The day in question - the straw that broke the camel's back - occurred on an otherwise quiet Thursday, shortly after our company had undergone the installation of a new phone system. The phone system not only was totally different from the previous version, but our phone numbers also changed, including the area code, a fact bound to confuse and baffle clients for months, most of whom would scratch their heads, frown and think “Did they move to Maryland?”

The day the installation was complete, Mr. Panty-Waist asked me to send an email to all of the people at our main client that we conversed with daily, informing them of our number change. I dutifully compiled a list of every person at every level of power, at this client who should receive the email, typed out a very polite, grammatically correct and brief email informing them that our numbers had changed, our address had not and attached was a spreadsheet with a contact list of all of the team members in our office and their new phone numbers. I told Mr. Panty-Waist the people who would be receiving this information to make sure I wasn’t missing anyone. He approved it.

Once I’d proof read everything I sent it to all the recipients. I cc’d Mr. Panty-Waist and his Skankariffic Blonde Ass-kissing Sidekick (SBAS).

Bear in mind, this was a trivial email with our number changes not the Declaration of Independence.

A few minutes later, Mr. Panty-Waist and SBAS were huddled in his office with the door closed, gossiping in annoyed tones. They called me in. Mr. Panty-Waist then proceeded to whine for twenty minutes that my email was “unprofessional”. He was vexed because he said not only would all the higher executives at the client be appalled to be receiving the same email as the lower ranked employees, BUT also, the subject line of the email? I'd typed it all in capital letters! *GASP* This is totally unacceptable. Capital letters? People will swoon and faint. Markets will crumble and crash. Birds will fall out of the sky like stones. The client will laugh sarcastically at our incompetence. They’ll call us and cancel our contract because we are amateurs who capitalize the subject lines in e-mails. They will have to rethink our whole relationship. I will have to sit in the stocks for a day having people throw tomatoes at my head for my hideous crime.

The SBAS giggled and twittered throughout the whole dressing down. I shouldn't really hold it against her, it's hard to do much else with only two brain cells.

I clenched my fists and tried not to yell, “What the fuck is wrong with you people? Are you really this anal and ridiculous? Have you any concept at all of magnitude? Of comparative importance?” I didn’t though. I just sat and sulked for the rest of the afternoon. Naturally, no one from the client called with their panties in a wad to complain about the audacious email and I got about nine responses from people thanking me. Those people must have been ill or mentally challenged because they hadn't even noticed the criminal, one-line capitalization, or maybe they were just too polite to mention it.

Next day, Friday, Mr. Panty-Waist was out of the office. He called – get this – three times just to go over the whole “unprofessional email” thing again on the phone. I sat in silence the whole time while he talked not saying anything. The third time he called I put him on mute and cussed like a sailor then hung up on him.

New phone systems have a habit of being unreliable, no?