Shut it

I had quite the day yesterday. The weather here is so over-the-top-crapola that schools and offices have been closed the past two days. Snow and more snow. Below zero cold. Deadly winds, bringing the wind chill to crazy lows. And then more snow.

So our seven-person office was down to three because of the cold and drifting snow. The university was open but school hasn't started, so some people thought they'd just as well stay home. Unfortunately, three of the ones staying home were cashiers, which left no cashiers. It was me, my boss, and the laziest employee we have....our receptionist.

My boss couldn't cashier because he doesn't step down the ladder. He really isn't a detail guy either so the results would probably be disastrous. The receptionist "A" has worked at the university for several years, but has somehow managed to learn absolutely nothing in an institution of higher learning. She spends her days complaining about students, other departments, co-workers, and our boss. She asks me questions about the most basic concepts again and again. So she couldn't cashier because she is, well, stupid.

That left me. I offered to do it after my boss seemed positively perplexed as to how we were going to manage. "But, that creates control issues when you prepare the deposit," he said. "You'll have to do the deposit," I said (followed by a mental "duhr!")

So I worked from my own work station, a cashier station, and a cashier desk all day. It involved a lot of running. Our receptionist, whose only job is to answer the phone, spent at least fifty percent of her day on personal calls. The boss spent his day doing his usual who knows what. When the receptionist is on a call, our cashiers normally pick up the overflow calls, but when she was on personal calls I refused to do that. I did however forward all calls from my desk to the cashier desk so I was taking those direct calls and the cashier's direct calls. I also picked up overflow if she was on an actual call.

Okay, so we get to the end of the day, and A comes to me to congratulate "us" for holding down the fort. "It wasn't too bad," I said smiling. "I don't know," she replied, "I had 80 calls come in today!" and here is where I should have shut it: "I know, I took about 60 of those."

Well THAT didn't go over well. She told me I did NOT take that many and I said, "You know, calls that come directly to my phone and any other phone in the office get counted in the total on your phone."

Shut it, Mary! Shut! It!

But let's face it. I was annoyed and I do not have the capacity to suppress that when someone is being stupid or saying something so incredibly false. I have always said I do not have a poker face, and clearly I do not have a poker mouth. Potty mouth maybe, but not a poker mouth.

Today when the cashiers were back in she reported to them what I said about the 60 calls. She doesn't know that they really think about the job she does, so I think she thought she had an ally. Oh well, I did feel bad for calling attention to her laziness, but everyone in the office (and the university for that matter) know it's the truth.

Still, I should really shut it sometimes. Oh well.