Gentle Readers, I have been put on notice by the benevolent overlords at my fabulous temp job that even so much as glancing at such risque websites as CNN or The New York Times is an express violation of their internet usage policy. So, I am afraid that over the next few weeks, until my replacement is able to take over for me and my joyful, spiritually rewarding time there will be but a fond, fond memory, my exposure to any form of intellectual stimulation that might inspire a blogpost of any quality at all will be severely limited. I apologize in advance for any inadvertent dry spells or utter mundanity.
Yours truly,
Andy
arise, shine, for your light has come
About Me
- Andy
- City of Roses, Cascadia, United States
- Meditations on life and scripture, based on the daily lectionary of the Book of Common Prayer of the Episcopal Church.
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8 comments:
What???? That's ridiculous! Who doesn't let people read NEWS SITES at work? What *are* you allowed to look at? Why even give you internet access?
Wow. It's a good thing you'll be leaving soon.
Yeah that's way up on the "what the fuck" scale... I guess they want mindless drones, apparently.
Perhaps to entertain yourself you could make up a fun office-oriented game. You could concoct a list of office buzzwords that people overuse. Put a check mark by a word each time you hear someone say it. At the end of the day, go home and do a shot for each one (unless you can manage to do that at work without getting noticed -- ooooo, another game! -- which would totally impress me, which really is a good reason to do lots of things). And then blog the results. After the shots, of course :D
What does it say about me that my mind immediately jumps to alcohol as a solution for all of life's problems? Shit, I'm Homer Simpson.
LawFairy - you are only truly a Homer Simpson if you are also easily distracted by donuts. :)
Andy, I like this game. I also used to enjoy "put dead batteries in the neighboring cubical's clock so the chick will stop keeping track of when I eat lunch" That was a fun game. Of course, when you say "benevolent overlords" I'm picturing the big ugly guys from "Hitchicker's Guide"... Do you get slapped in the face by flyswatters if you think?
Andy, seriously. Call your temp agency. Tell them the people you're working for are fascist pigs and you want out. Fucking Romans. I swear.
Well, the thought has crossed my mind, a few thousand times. It's a lovely, comforting fantasy. But the sitch is, the new person is starting at the end of the month, so I only have a few more (intolerable, yes) weeks there. If this were open-ended, I think I'd have a better shot at leaving and saying it's not the right fit. But to get out of a position when the end is imminent and all you can say is, "They won't let me read the New York Times," I think that would reflect very poorly on me. If I were being harassed or abused in some substantial way, okay. But the reality of the situation is, the employer gets to make and enforce the rules. From the agency's perspective, I don't think I can successfully claim that they won't allow me to ignore their stated internet usage policy, you know? And I've been placed there by the temp division of one of the recruiters I work for, so it's rather important that I leave with the best reference I can finagle. If they haven't already been alerted to the fact that they're unhappy with me, I see no reason to risk drawing their attention to anything that might reflect poorly on me.
Perhaps this all reflects what I warned you--you might be massively overqualified to be "office help" out here. Wasn't thinking of such dire consequences, at the time : P.
If I were you, and having been in a similar situation to your current one in my past, I feel I may speak with at least a little authority here, I would take this as a sign that I was not doing what I was supposed to be doing. Unfortunately, I can offer you no further guidance. You must look within yourself for that. As always, I wish you the best.
y'know what's funny (in the laugh so you don't cry sense), is when I worked there (disclosure: I was formerly employed by a different, FAR less draconian, section of the firm Andy currently works for) the organization was in the throes of having to admit that really everyone needed email. Not just the bigwigs and "decisionmakers"--and maybe their admin assts, who actually did the scheduling--but everyone who ever sat down at a desk. This would be the late 90s.
Internet access, they very much viewed as an only-questionably-necessary evil, what with their (legitimate*) security concerns. You used to have to have a special password to access anything beyond the intranet; looks like they've got a new approach to the same result now.
* They do handle a lot of personal info, and were late coming to the computer party, so were uncomfortable, and made some infrastructure choices (Windows 98) that left them more open to virii, etc., than they should have been.
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