Stupid Idiots

Like the scene in the movie, "The Sixth Sense," where Haley Joel Osmont tells Bruce Willis, "I see dead people everywhere," I feel like I am stuck in an endless loop with idiots.
I see stupid people everywhere.
Or maybe they're just brainstems with legs.

The aforementioned Mensa, for example, who inexplicably believed the rules for Daylight Saving Time would be suspended the day after we turned clocks forward...

The moron in the Toyota Corolla this morning that slid over to the left, lane by lane, until he was comfortably installed in the inside, fast lane...going 50mph.
Meanwhile irate drivers swerved around him at 80mph.
Stupid idiot.

I realize that's ridiculously redundant.
But so are the boneheaded stunts some people pull.

Like one woman in our office, who turned off the air system because it was too cold in her office, and the rest of us roasted for two days' worth of meetings in the adjacent conference room, until the building engineer discovered what she'd done.
Bring a freakin' sweater.
Leave the @#$% thermostat alone.
Stupid idiot.

Mensa's On the Loose

How many problems could be avoided if only instructions were followed the first time?
I try to give a lot of notice and a lot of detail to my people, so that there’s as little chance for error as possible.
Basically, if my people look good, I look good.
If my people screw up…

Daylight Saving Time impacts different businesses in different ways. The “additional hour” of light presents some unique opportunities for us: An additional hour to do business…and an additional hour to manage.

My boss’ solution was to ignore the change.
However, just “turning it off” is not an option.
Our Controller really dropped the ball, however, thinking that Sunday’s time change miraculously would not be in effect the following day. She failed to update critical systems to reflect that reality.

Brilliant!

So I get a phone call at home on Monday evening, wanting to know what to do to fix the problem. I was happy to give my recommendation for a manual fix, 90-minutes before the fact. But when the Controller started sassing back about how much trouble it was going to be, I snapped.

“It wouldn’t be a problem if you’d followed the directions I issued last week, and we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” I said. “You called for help, which I am happy to give, so let’s focus on that part for now,” I continued.

The CFO backed me, saying yes, the instructions I gave were pretty clear. She had had a week’s notice to get it right.

This is the same Mensa that ignored/repudiated/blew-off my instructions for a weekend project that has been a fiasco for the past three weeks. She even got another employee in on the gambit, and together they figured out a way to create a situation that was hopelessly FUBAR.

They disregarded specific instructions for structuring the project in such a way that if one machine failed, a second one would continue to run. She cut corners and copied an operational template from one machine to another--without adjusting the configurations for that specific machine.
No wonder it didn't work.

I had it fixed in about 20-minutes.

The real irony in today's fiasco is that this beyotch last week sent to my staff an e-mail--almost in an end-run around me--reminding them of the time change, and asking whether they had their act together.

Busybody...fallow mind.

TURKEY!

You really know a person is a worthless turkey when they can manage to disrupt your office even after they've left the company.

I received a call this morning from a former executive who had been "separated" under such onerous circumstances they had to drag in a lawyer to mediate the divorce.
Four months ago.
This piker had schlepped some of his personal furniture into the office suite when he started here, and wanted it back.
Now.

Seriously, the guy calls at a quarter to eight in the morning to announce his movers will be here at ten to pick up his stuff. Thanks for the notice, you creep.

Three Hermann Miller (oooh!) office chairs and a white board in a conference room.
Not a dry erase board on an easel, mind you.
No, this sucker is anchored into the studs and sheet rock.
When it comes out, it's going to leave a large hole.
He wants it now.
Has to have it today.

I told him he would have to give us a little time to arrange to have the thing removed; there were back-to-back meetings scheduled for that conference room all day long.

When he asked to speak to someone else about this (remember, it's an hour and 15-minutes before the office opens), I suggested he speak to one of the partners, a former Air Force Colonel, who likes this guy even less than me.

Within the hour, moving men were rapping on our door, wanting his stuff. I gave them the chairs and an IOU. We'll probably just offer the jerk some more money so he can go buy another white board somewhere else.
Like he needs it.
Meanwhile, two people showed up for work this morning with no chairs in their work spaces.

What a great legacy to leave behind at a place you've worked. A crappy taste in everyone's mouth, and a few gaping spaces to remind us we're glad he's out of here.