Yes. They probably will. When I tell you what you need to say, you’ll write it down and take it away…. but when you say it to them, they either get offended or upset, or they won’t believe you’re telling the truth. Why is this?

“How come you say exactly the same things as me, but your way is right and my way is wrong?”

Yes, I know. The fact you can’t work it out speaks volumes. Its not so much WHAT you say, its just as much HOW you say it. You’ve got to be sincere, empathetic, understanding, firm and confident, but able to adjust your approach and tone depending on what the other person brings.

And I can’t teach you that. I can make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear (metaphorically, anyway), but I cannot teach you how to read other people, and put yourself across to them in the right way if you don’t already have that ability.

I might be the Bad News Fairy, but I don’t have a magic wand.

Let’s look at today’s highlights, then:

1) Tales of the Dead Dog being buried by candle-light just prior to Christmas.

2) The guy who took us to court – and got a reasonable payoff sends a heartfelt christmas card to our CEO.

3) The man who only did 5 days work and then didn’t come back has decided to try and tap us up for a fortune at Tribunal (there’s no justice).

4) Lucy Cruise-ship (manager) sends long email complaining about how half her staff haven’t bothered to come to work because they’re “sick” on the first day back. Where is she? Why, she’s at home in Kent because “there’s such a long tailback on the QE2 bridge” so she’s decided to be absent too…. Marvelous role-model….

5) The lady who has decided to come back to work today after declaring mental health issues and having 6 weeks off because her sick pay is coming to an end, but she hasn’t been signed fit by her Doctor…..

What a lovely day!! Happy New Year.

Here is Dog, being particularly nosey in our new house!

Anyway, in my usual style, I dealt very positively with the whole episode, including the week in the cancer-ward at Charing Cross hospital, which I will describe as living with the dying. It puts your life into focus, certainly!

Anyway, shit happens to everyone – its all about how you decide to deal with it.

So, following a very busy year, and more recently a little Christmas break from work, I feel the time is right to come back and write.

Facebook is all very well, but I find myself needing something else. Without the bloody annoying people that make up a lot of our lives. Oh they’re nice enough, these people, but they’re mainly stupid.

Yep – still a pedantic snob. Don’t care!

Hope there’s still someone out there who might want to read what I want to say. Let me know.

xx

Hope everyone’s doing ok.

I found out I was pregnant on a Saturday morning in early April, but by the following wednesday I wasn’t any more and miscarried. Didn’t really feel much different to a heavy period if I’m honest. Here I am, just 5 weeks later and I’m pregnant again………

Except this time I actually FEEL pregnant. I can pee for England at the moment, my digestive system is slowing down and making me uncomfortable, I’ve got a wavering appetite (very strange for me – I normally LOVE my food) and I’m exhausted all the time.

Its weird though, knowing, but not being ready to tell people. Me and Badger are quietly excited, but we can’t really get our hopes up, just in case this little bundle of cells decides it doesn’t want to cook properly…

It seems like bloody ages until I can get a confirmation scan.

On the other hand, since I didn’t actually have another period between the miscarriage and my big fat positive test result, we aren’t certain of any dates! By rough calculation, if all goes well, we’re looking at mid Jan 2011.

It seems like forever away.

And my life will change.

Doesn’t feel real yet.

But I have a new subject to occupy my time. Alopecia. See here.

My hair has always been thin, but now I’m losing it in quite a big way. Its quite awful when you’re a girl! I’m now considering whether to go for a wig or hairpiece of some kind. Not an easy decision.

Personal, though – that’s the kind of thing I used to write about here.

So, there are two personal things to tell you.

1) I have been diagnosed with alopecia areata.

2) We’re trying for a baby.

Spaniel xx

Like I did yesterday.

I went in, whilst the place was in chaos. There was no check-in lady to be seen, so I went in, tried my items on, and on my way out, there was the check-in lady.

“Any good?” She asks in that despairing way that only changing room check-in ladies can.

“No thank you” I said, handed her the items and strode away.

“Errr. ” She said. “Where’s your disc?”

“What?”

“Where’s your disc?” she motions to the items in her hand “Fer these?”

“I didn’t get one” I said.

This is interesting, I think to myself. What kind of powers does a changing room check-in lady have? What’s she going to do about this situation, then? Will I be arrested?

She’s looking at me with a face that seems to say “Could she have stolen something? Does she look dodgy?” She eyes me up and down. I am wearing my work suit, I have a hand-bag and little else about me. Her face brightens.

“Okay then!” she says, and turns away to her racks.

Amazing.

The front line of store security.

Another year has gone by and here I am delivering yet more bad news to a group of people who should have seen it coming, but are still shocked and crushed nonetheless.  All but one of them has been here before. Last year and in some cases, the year before, too. It can’t be good.

No-one likes the news that they may not have a job in 6 weeks time. But as I sit with Manager Frank as he delivers the rationale for why half the staff have to go, I can’t help but be amazed at how they take it. Frank has never been in a position to deliver this kind of news, and I can feel him waiver and shake from within. But he pulls it off. None of the audience will ever know how much time I sat with him and made sure he was saying the right things in the right way, explaining what to do when, and how this long and horrible process has to work. They see him, their leader, strong and decisive. I know better.  

How do they take it? Lets go round the room.

Cyril, a big, miserable-looking lump of a man is good at his job, despite the appearances. He takes the information in and grunts occasionally as though someone is badly telling a funny story he’s heard before, even though its not funny, and yes, he has heard it before. He asked pertinent questions about how he’ll be affected by the pending redundancies, but theres a sense of sadness about him, despite his gruffness.

Next to him is Carl. A skinny man who looks permanently like he’s been caught doing something he shouldn’t be.  Not an idiot, but he’s certainly not very good at his job, and before the redundancy threat came along, he may have been looking dismissal in the eye in any event. He seemed fairly pragmatic about the news, and even put forward some useful suggestions.

Brenda, a hard-working, conscientious and dilligent member of staff who we’d be sorry to lose looked close to tears and barely spoke. Secretly I know that as long as she applies for her own job, she’s safe. I cannot tell her that. No-one can. I feel her pain, but there is nothing I can do. Absolutely nothing.

Violet, who reminds me of Thelma from the Scooby Doo cartoons, makes a fuss and moans and complains and was utterly selfish. She has no awareness of how the others feel, unlike me. She drew attention to herself, tried to make others feel sorry for her and succeeded in doing exactly the opposite. She too is not meeting her targets, and is performing at a much lower level than Cyril and Brenda, and they know it. Violet made no friends today.

Christine stoically took in the information, and worried about her poor sickness record. Her achievement level is similar to Violet’s, but she didn’t upset the applecart, and quietly wrote her own notes to ask sensible questions later. Christine is generally easily led by others – but not today.

Bob is off sick, unwell and poorly performing. If redundancies hadn’t come knocking, Bob would be facing dismissal earlier even than Carl. He was grateful for the information we gave him, and even thanked me. Unbelievable.  

Muriel squeaked and sqawked and generally tried to be teacher’s pet by making out she knew all along that things were bad and that something like this was bound to happen. Muriel is a high achiever, but she talks too much, is very emotional and manages to upset everyone very easily. She stamps her feet and cries when she doesn’t get her own way. So today, she just did her thing. Out of all the others, Muriel is the only one who hasn’t been through redundancies before. She is fairly new to the team, and had no appreciation that these others are all survivors.

As a team, this is a most dysfunctional team. Their line manager, Kate, is inexperienced and finds it hard managing this group of people who are, at best, like a sack of cats.

None of the team mentioned Kate. Partly because they hate her anyway, and partly because, with the exception perhaps of Brenda and Cyril, everyone else is way too selfish to consider anyone other than themselves. 

No-one thanked me as we left. No-one except Frank, that is.

I’ve never stopped to think about it like this before, but I am the messenger. I say what needs to be said in a sensible, reliable way. I am the voice of the corporation, a face for the faceless entity that is an organisation. The person to shout at, to complain to, to hate. On another level, the complainers know that I am there for them. Administering the will of the company, yes – but they know it isn’t my will. It isn’t me they hate. They just need a messenger to shoot. Its nothing personal.

And that’s me.