Seeing Red

“i don’t want to be run over by a bus”.
“yeah i’m sure getting hit by a bus wouldn’t be good”.
“well, it’s definitely not one of my aspirations”.

in a perfect work place, people do their jobs. another department had someone leave and so hired a replacement right away because things were so hard for them (boo hoo. they have to work from 8 to 5 like the rest of us. boo hoo). however, this department is still pulling the “i don’t know how to do this you do it” or "we don't have the time" thing. not really sure why they would do that since they hired an "overqualified" person. as a result a number of things have been passed to my anemic department without my supervisor knowing.

one day that department's head asked me to do something his department handled. when i hesitated, he shrugged and said to me, “but we don’t know how. can you find out? otherwise you guys might miss your deadline”. while he left on time to go home i waited for a 100 page report to print out.

the next day my supervisor wanted to know why i was behind on so many things. i told her calmly what happened but could feel my cheeks grow hot. it made her upset. in the future i was to direct any department requests to her. i go back to my cubicle and the guy from the other day wanted me to review the 100 page report so i directed him to my supervisor. he hesitated but went and was lectured on how he should not delegate work to other departments without notifying the heads first.

later he came over to me and said my supervisor was overreacting and we should all work together. so i shrugged and said to him, "she just wants to meet the deadline." not seeing my dig, he accepted my response and walked away.

it was weird most of the day with both department heads ignoring each other. both mumbling about how the other was just being lazy. things weren't looking good. but then everyone cheered up when the higher ups announced everybody would be given a bottle of red wine. the department heads acted like nothing had happened.

so in conclusion the best way to put out a fire is to pour free booze on it.