3 days, 18 hours, 5 minutes, and 58 seconds

...it's no wonder a majority of business owners prefer the slow pain of keeping an unproductive worker on the company payroll, than the sudden, potentially sharper pain of taking them off.
"Think of it like someone who would rather suffer with a dull toothache than go to the dentist and face the drill,"

Yeah, that may be true, but if you make your good employees pick up the slack and let the incompetent employees continue to be incompetent, I guarantee you will lose those good employees.

And if you're like my current boss, you will be mad at the good employee for leaving. Even when she has just spent a year trying to get rid of the bad employees.

Also, giving the silent treatment until you are ready to ask the pardoned prisoner... I mean leaving employee.... to help you out whenever possible only confirms that said employee made the right choice.

Seriously.

I told her that giving me 90% of the previously departed paralegal's work was too much. After telling me she would change (i.e. not be so negative) and would take on some of that work herself, I watched her turn it all over to PL/Biller. Along with my job. Ummmmm. What am I missing here?

One more week.

I got a new job!

I rock!

Enough so, that when I told my current boss I was tendering my two-week notice, she canceled her dinner plans and spent the next hour and forty-five (or is that fourty-five) minutes trying to talk me into staying.

And she was pretty good at it.

But: I knew enough that I refused to make a decision under duress and within an hour of leaving the situation I knew I was not accepting her offer to work things out.

So, in 2 weeks I will be starting my new job. I wish I could say that I will not have as much to post, but, much to my dismay, I encouter stupidity so often even when I am not at work that I believe I will be able to keep this blog running strong. Though I may change the title since I will no longer be an Office Manager.

And aside from that, poor PL/Biller will still be in the office and will have plenty to share, so there will be plenty of links to her blog.

Speaking of: Would anyone like to hire her? I will give her an excellent reference. She works hard and has common sense. She can spell forty, and Pete, and dragon. Contact me if you are interested in hiring her.

I think I have found a new purpose for this blog. PL/Biller--we will get you out of there!

Fan mail

I received an e-mail from a fan (what can I say, I rock!), telling me how great my blog was and how he lived each day just waiting to read what I have to say.... or he had a story of his own to share, I dunno. Either way--

This gentleman was recently given a compost tumbler from an incredibly nice couple. I could write an entire blog on the goodness of this couple, they really are that great, but I'll just stick to his story...

The e-mail read:

"I started a load of compost last Sunday, 3/25/07, since the low temps are to be above 40 deg. for a few weeks. It is heating up to a core temp of 135 deg. which is good for this stage. Filling this tumbler, I came to question a few things, one being how full can I pack it before it will not have proper air circulation. I am guessing the door should be down to help the natural air flow. With this said, I e-mailed the compost tumbler company and asked if a user manual was available."

The response from the company came, via e-mail, wherein they requested his contact information so they could e-mail it to him.

The sad part is, I have heard similar stories.

I am not making this up....

PL/Biller to LS#1: "Make 4 copies.... no, wait, hold off on that for a minute, I have to check something."

LS#1: "Okay."

LS#1 walks to the copier and proceeds to make 4 copies.

PL/Biller to LS#1: "Uhhh, you're gonna want to stop that."

LS#1: "Why?"

Me to PL/Biller: "Didn't you just tell her not to make the copies?"

PL/Biller: "Yes."

LS#1: "You said to make 4 copies. Why do you want me to stop it."

Don't call me Israel yet.

I was going to refrain from calling anyone an idiot this week.

That was stupid. Just plain stupid.

Why was it stupid? Oh, please, let me tell you.

It's 9:50 a.m.. LS#1 and LS#2 both arrived just before 8:00 a.m.

Heard and seen in the last 2 hours at La Office de Stupidity:

LS#1: "What, exactly, is an affidavit?" e.t.a. To clarify--she said "What, exactly, is an affidavit? I am supposed to get an affidavit or sworn statement..."

LS#1: "I just got married a week ago and we've had several fights already. Hahahaha." (great start to your 4th marriage with a guy who still lives in Egypt, LS#1. Good luck with that.)

LS#2 makes copies of an order then hands the attorney the order. Does not put file copy of order in file. Does not give attorney file as she is leaving for court. Attorney calls from court indicating needs file brought over to her. LS#2 complains about attorney.

LS#2: "This 'post' weighs 14 ounces, so I'll have to take it to the 'post'. Do I put postage on it?"

LS#1: "What does (client last name) go under?"
Me: "(Client last name)"

LS#1: "These are two separate documents, do they get stapled together? Do they both get stamped?"

(Deep breath--exhale slowly)

Now, how about my co-workers?

Your Boss Isn't Psycho, but Your Boss Stinks

Your boss is probably not mental. Still, your boss is not competent or professional. You may want to transfer departments or get a new job, before your boss sucks out your soul.

Is Your Boss Psycho?

From the Files of "It Could Only Happen to the Biller"

I bring you Today:

LS#1 is in Egypt supposedly getting married. Again. I was given permission to organize and clean her desk and PL/Biller and I did. I really believe the desk was thanking us for cleaning it. It was just that bad.

Then we both had the urge to go clean and reorganize our desks. Again.

PL/Biller decides she wants her monitor in the corner. We have tried this before and her cords are not long enough, so she decides to try the cords from Miss I Got A New Job's computer. We unhook the cable and I can tell right away it is a standard cable and the reason that monitor fits in the corner has to do with the placing of the "cord holes" in the desk. This one is in the corner while hers is in the middle. We drop the cord in the desk and decide to worry about that later.

A couple minutes later she informs me she has managed to do it. Her monitor is in the corner. Hooray!

Then I get a call:
PL/Biller: "My screen is green. I don't know what I did. Oh no."

Luckily the attorney is in an office conference because when I went back there and saw that her screen really was green, I had no clue what to do. This wasn't the kind of green that you get when you mess with the contrast and brightness on your tv screen. It was like someone had placed a green, semi transparent film over her screen. Her settings were completely screwed and I think the people in the parking lot 3 miles down the street could read anything on her monitor, if they could get past the whole green thing. We tried playing with all of the picture-friendly buttons on the front and all of the display settings, then I decided to go do some internet research on the subject, not really sure that I would find anything because I swear this stuff only happens to the Biller.

She has been banned from touching anything with a power cord in that office more times than I can count.

I decided to save some time (it was about 1:45 and I had done nothing more than clean a desk, fix timeslips and play with a green monitor all day) and grab the aforementioned monitor, since the cords were already unhooked anyway. That didn't work. We gave up trying to unscrew the stupid screws holding the cord in the back of Biller's monitor and realized we would need more of that special sticky tape to put her document clip back on and it was all too much work.

I told her to go to lunch and I would try to figure it out. I got the monitor information and was about to do useless research when she tells me she got it. Nope, it's green again. No, wait, she got it.

Best that we can figure out (or make up) the cord was not plugged in all the way and was pulled out just enough to turn her monitor green. When she released the tension on the cord it was fine, so now she has the monitor "almost" in the corner.

Without fail, at 4:30 this afternoon I was handed an email. And a document to be sent with the email. It needed to be scanned in. The only scanner is hooked up to Miss I Got A New Job's computer. The one we took apart. And had not put back together.

More Made Up Stuff

Attorney: "When are you supposed to use the straight quotes and when are you supposed to use those other, more curved quotes?"

Me: "What?"

Attorney: "A client took out the curved quotes on this document and put in the straight ones. I need to know when to use each one."

(Just to clear this up now--Yes, I do know they are called smart quotes. You correct an attorney who's just had their document changed by a client.)

Me: "Uhhh. Well. I'm not...

Attorney: "I know when you are doing inches or minutes you ...." (random mumbling that I didn't follow.)

I didn't know there was a difference in usage, much less what that difference was. Wasn't it more a matter of aesthetics and preference than a "rule"? And the PL/Biller who was standing there the entire time offered no input. Thanks. But she was clearly unhappy with her document being changed so I made something up.

Me: "I think you use the smart quotes when you are quoting someone as opposed to..."

Attorney: "That sounds right. I think that's right."

After doing research on this, I cannot find a difference. From what I can tell it is a matter of aesthetics and preference. Anyone know differently? Please tell me if there is, 'cause now I'd like to know. My English teachers would be so proud of me.

Useless post

I actually had a pretty good post going in my head at the end of last week, but then I realized the stories were way better to me and the biller than to anyone else. But, since they are pretty hilarious to me and the biller I just can't let them go to waste so...

Have you ever seen someone thrown from a chair? I have not, but based on how it feels to be thrown from a chair I would say it is a funny thing to watch.
It's not broken, nobody was nearby playing a joke on me, there is no logical answer for the sudden ejection that occured. The seat itself simply swung forward and downward throwing me forward and downward out of the chair. I believe my first response was to the Biller "Did you see that?"

Next.

PL/Biller was sick last week, sick enough to take a sick day Wednesday and half day Thursday. This is an unheard of event so I did not expect the usual attitude from the boss that other employees get after they call in saying "I think I'm getting a headache, I won't be in today", but I guess I was wrong.

Sometime Friday afternoon the boss calls Biller and says
"What are you doing?"
I informed the Biller that the correct answer would have been "Taking back Poland."

I Make Stuff Up

Attorney: “On the receipt for Certified Mail, where do you put the Attention:? I know on the card it would be addressed exactly as on the letter, but it won’t fit in that place on the receipt.”

Me: “Yeah, on the receipt we just put it in the same box under the name of the company.”

I have no freaking idea if this is true or not, but it makes sense to me. Why don't you try asking the person who has been doing these for the last 6 months, as opposed to the person who hasn't done one in over 6 months. Is it because she is an idiot and didn't know what to do so she left that part off?

Attorney: “If you have a document that says 'attached is a copy of another document', do we stamp that document copy?”

Me: “Uhh, is it already marked as a copy in any other way? Is it marked as an exhibit or is it just attached?”

Attorney: “It’s just attached; I think we do mark it because no, it’s not marked in any other way and if we stamp it they won’t think we accidentally attached the original. It’s not an exhibit.”

Me: “Yeah, we stamp it.”

Seriously? You're the attorney. You're talking about filing a court document and you don't know? At least she had pretty much already answered that one.

This will only come back to bite my little behind if some Post Office Nazi decides to call and explain that the correct format is to attach a rider to the receipt and any idiot old enough to write should know that, or if the clerk’s office calls and tells her she is more of an idiot than the people working over there and how on earth could she possibly not know that she shouldn't have stamped that document.

Or if she gets mad at me. Like now.

About a month ago she calls me and says "Print out the docket sheet on this client." So I did. I put it on her desk with a note that said "Please review, per your request" and left it there.

Yesterday she brought it back to me with another note on it that said "Why did you print this, what did I want it for? I don't see your timeslip for the research so I don't know what to put in my timeslip for the review." Uhhh....

Frustrated because I could get my time machine working to go back and use my mind-reading skills to determine why I was printing the freaking docket sheet, I wrote a to-the-point, what-do-you-expect-of-me note:

"I don't know what you wanted the docket for, you never told me. However, if you cannot remember, I would say, logically and reasonably, that you probably wanted it to see if the subpoena was served on whoever, since that is the last entry and the only piece of information we did not already have."

I get it back.... "Oh, I remember now, it was to see what happened on the 2/12/07 court date, which is not shown on here. See if it has been updated and print out a new one."

Convenient. And then I spent the rest of the day avoiding her because I could not answer a question without eliciting the you-are-so-wrong-and-I-am-going-to-put-you-in-your-place response.

Chain of events

1.)

2.)

a night of hysterics.







3.)


Me: "You suck and can't do your job."

Sucky employee: "You just don't understand what it's like to constantly be interrupted all day long."



4.)
Still.






5.)Must entertain myself or I will throw someone out the window....




The End.

Name that drawing

Okay. So the boss may have been out of the office today. Of course, the normal things that happens when a boss is out for a day, happened. What, the picture doesn't explain it all? We were cleaning. Alright, I agree that it does look a bit like a car with wings. Let me start off by saying that this drawing is not mine. In fact, the top of the picture was actually labeled as (insert billers name here)'s desk. I cannot list the name here, as this is an anonymous blog, but I assure you it is not mine. You see, I am not the only person in the office who constantly feels the need to rearrange my desk. However, after taking everything off of her desk, silly biller was feeling a bit overwhelmed and uncertain about how to rearrange everything. Thus the picture. I suggested drawing a diagram. At least something to giver her an idea of what to try when she goes back to the desk that she was avoiding (due to the mess--and I didn't blame her, it was pretty messy with everything off her desk and on the floor) That is actually a desk. With a hutch (the part that looks like windows on the side of a car--yeah, I know. I tried telling her it looked more like a car than a desk). And that thing that looks like a wing, it's not really a wing--that is a file holder that needs to stay where it is. I think the wheels came in a little before the wing (see, told you I tried to tell her it looked like a car). Though I am not sure about the part coming off the side. I think that is supposed to be the bottom part (the bottom of the L ) of the desk, even though it looks more like a part of the wall. My favorites are the phone and monitor. The monitor more so because she drew her background on her monitor. Can you guess what it is? Unless you know her personally, you will never guess (and even then, probably not), trust me on this. It's a unicorn. No, seriously. It's supposed to be a unicorn. (In her second drawing she did a little better--if she were trying to draw a donkey.)
So, I suppose this was the type of day I needed. Especially after Friday. Ahhh, Friday.... Good times...
Friday evening, after work...
I come home from work and my husband tells me that one of the ladies he works with asked him "Does your wife ever get mad? Because she seems like the type that is very hard to anger, but when she gets angry she'll really make you pay for it" (or something like that--actually I think her phrasing involved the words "knife" "stabbing" and "repeatedly"---jokingly, of course) Not really funny, yet, right? Keep reading...
Earlier that morning (approximately 8:00 a.m.)...
The attorney hands LS#1 a document to be done before her court appearance at 9:30. This document should take approximately 30 minutes, if it's complicated. 9:30 rolls around and the attorney has not even seen the first draft of the document so she tells me I will have to proofread it whenever LS#1 finally finishes it and have her bring it over to court. About this time I stand up and walk to the middle area between my desk and LS#1's desk and glance over just in time to see (of course) Windows Messenger. One of the problems with LS#1 is that if she is not using Windows Messenger to chat with her friends, she is chatting on MySpace(tm). I was furious. So furious, in fact, that I was shaking. She was just complaining that she had too much work to do. After the attorney leaves, I mention this fact out loud (that I am so mad I am actually shaking). Now LS#1 wants to know why. Was it because of her? Did she do something? To which I could only manage "You don't want me to answer that right now, just finish the document so we can get it to her." LS#1 stands up, and since she is the touchy feely type that is always finding some reason to hug or touch anyone in the office, I thought she was walking over to me to find out what's up and give me a hug. Without looking in her direction I told her "Just finish the document, we will talk about it later." She makes an annoyed noise and asks "Can't I get a cup of coffee?" I'm thinking "No. No time." But I can't tell her that, stupid laws, so instead I walk to her computer, save the document, grab the worksheet of the document and proceed to walk back to my desk to do it myself. Somewhere in here I finally tell her that I saw her chatting, which she denies at first until I remind her that I saw it, which prompts an attitude from her while she continuously asks me to let her finish it. I am so mad at this point I can only tell her no. I finish said document, print it on bond, and with an eery calmness that I am still amazed over, tell her to run it over to the attorney.

I think that about sums it up. But to explain some more, part of the reason I was so upset was because the day before PL/Biller and I listened to LS#1 complain about how busy she was and how she couldn't do all the work she had to do, and why were we making her run over to the courthouse (she actually asked the biller if she was crippled--now it is the Legal Secretary's job to run to the courthouse, Paralegals are not allowed unless they are going for research purposes--fairly new rule, within the last year or so), and I had to point out to her that what she had in front of her was a normal workload and that she has been extraordinarily slow up til now, but she should really get used to this. It really is a normal workload. Not busy. Just normal.
Yeah. Funny, funny times. (sigh)

The Reason Blonde Jokes Were Started, and also why you should not do drugs

Cognitive skills. Deductive reasoning.
I know people have different levels of these mental abilities, but seriously??

My boss' handwriting is really bad. Really. But after a while you get used to it, or at least get to a point where you can figure out the word you cannot read. Reading the sentence all the way through to figure out what word would fit there, or just knowing simple terms. The latter part is admittedly more difficult if you are new to a law office, but after a year one would think that the simpler terms would be known by now. So when LS#1 comes to me for translation, which is pretty regularly, I try to get her to figure out what it should be. This particular sentence read something like "...I need to prepare a Settlement Report...." The word in question here was report, and not having time to lead LS#1 to the answer I simply told her. She replied "Oh, well I thought it was the title of the document so I checked the file, but couldn't find anything." This got my attention.

I pointed out "First off--it is the title of a document and secondly, the sentence says 'I need to prepare'. As in it is not prepared yet. As in it won't be in the file"

A Note

For all of you attorneys out there, please notify the other attorney when you move a court date. And if you notify the other attorney before you go in to move the court date, they can attempt to be there so that when your office does not notify said other attorney that there is going to be a new date you do not have to blame them.

I think I will be sick tomorrow, as in preparation for this day it only seems that it will be a bad day... although, the jury trial case was settled so that did help some... maybe it won't be so bad. (Never laugh at a hopeful person)

Common Sense, or the lack thereof

Yesterday, LS#2 took some documents over to the Circuit Clerk's Office. Three sets to be exact, and while there were problems with all of them when she returned, that is not what actually inspired this post.

We have several this-is-how-it-is-no-exceptions rules in this office. The one that you need to know here is "the attorney checks everything before it is taken to the Circuit Clerk's Office" (actually, before we take documents anywhere--but that is where LS#2 was going on this particular outing.) Let me just point out that she did follow the rules, if you are one of those technical types. She did bring the docs in to the attorney, but the attorney was on the phone. She flipped through them then handed them back to LS#2 who proceeded to run her little errand (incorrectly as it was).
That evening after everyone else had left for the day the attorney said to me "perhaps we should make it clear that the staff is not to give me the documents while I am on the phone." To which I thought "duh" (meaning that we don't give her documents while she is on the phone--not that I thought we needed to tell people. Seriously? You have to tell people that?) Anyway--fast forward to today:

As LS#2 is preparing all three sets of documents again for her return trip, LS#1 and PL/Biller are in the general vicinity so I decide now is a great time to start informing of the new "don't try to show attorney documents when on the phone" rule. So I state the same, as PL/Biller is walking into the attorney's office to grab the calendar. She quickly walks out of attorney's office and inquires what I just said (slightly concerned because apparently all she heard was "no" and "when attorney is on the phone" and she thought I said not to go in her office at all when she was on the phone.) I figure that, since LS#2 is still standing nearby, it couldn't hurt for her to hear it again since I am certain her name only contains a few letters because if it were any longer she would probably forget it, so I reiterate what I had just said, and without missing a beat PL/Biller replies "Isn't that just common sense."
Now, as is usual, LS#2 automatically gets defensive and spews forth excuses like a kid that didn't do his homework and PL/Biller realizes that this was an actual problem and the person standing next to her was the offending party. She simply turns and walks down the hall, turning halfway to mouth her apologies. Of course, I cannot look up; after all she did voice my thoughts exactly and I am already trying to hold it together and if I look up I will have to try even harder to not laugh.

And as I walk into her office for the "that was inappropriate" talk, she is already profously apologizing and we both are now wondering the same thing:

When LS#2 finally decides to do it, which one of us is going down first?

To be, or not to be, Evil

Yes. I am back to mean me.. This, ironically, does coincide with the employee who thinks I am evil going off of her antidepressants again. Shocker.

Wait, good me again. This morning she apologized.... MAKE UP YOUR MIND!

And we lost an employee. Unfortunately it was one of the ones we wanted to keep. I am doing my job, her job, and the babysitting job I keep thinking will end eventually (is that laughter I hear?)

As I try to figure how on earth I am possibly to manage this task, my mind went a little haywire yesterday and I was temporarily blinded by a full strength migraine.
Hooray for work!

And by the way Miss I Got A New Job--She has me billing. BILLING! On top of the ones you started that she has started giving back, she's given me several small estates to bill this week. And a new case from ML/BM. Oh, and I still can't give up ticklers or calendar because nobody else can handle it (and by nobody else, I mean the two LS's as the other PL is billing and can't be pulled from that.) And I thought you would find this funny:
I get a call at 9:00 a.m. Saturday morning--"I started my computer but the Ctrl Alt Del won't work; it's completely frozen. I shut down my computer, then shut down the server but I don't have the password to get back in. Give me a call." So I explained to her that for some unknown reason, when it is cold the left Ctrl Alt does not work--she tried the right and it did. Still baffled on that, but the slight panic in her voice was temporarily amusing.

Also--Miss I Got A New Job--the other PL and I want to know how things work out for you so feel free to post here!

I Certified Copy

The biller calls legal secretary #2 and asks her to fix a timeslip which currently reads “Trip by legal secretary to (clerk’s office) to file obtain 2 certified copies of (document) and I certified copy of (another document)”

Several things are wrong with this to begin with, but it gets even better than those errors. First off-- to file obtain??? I am not sure how to file obtain something but she was PICKING UP these documents. The biller also mentioned that the I in the I certified copy portion should be 1 (as in the number, not the pronoun). After these issues were all supposedly fixed the biller went back into the timeslip to double check.

Timeslip then reads “Trip by legal secretary to (clerk’s office) to pick up 1 certified copies of (document) and 1 certified copy of (another document)”

She fixed the “pick up”; changed 2 to 1 in the first certified but left copies plural; and changed the I to a 1.

Biller calls LS#2 back and says “How many certified copies of (first document) did you pick up?”

LS#2 says "I don't know, let me check. 2. Yes, 2."

"Then why did you just change it to 1?" says the biller.

"Because you told me to!" exclaims LS#2 (and yes, at this point I am standing in the hallway laughing.)

"No, I told you to change the I to a 1 if that is what you picked up. I never told you to change the other document. You need to make sure the numbers match what you picked up." the biller replies. (Okay--so I am not good at this kind of story-telling, you still get the point.)

LS#2: "Okay, I'll fix it."

They hang up and a couple minutes later the biller pokes her head down the hall and waves frantically for me to come down there (this happens alot in a normal day.) Did you guess what she wanted? That's right--LS#2 did not change the timeslip. I told her she needed to find out why she did not change it. So she calls her again. "Did you change that timeslip, I am trying to finish the bill."

LS#2: "Yes, it's fine now."

Biller (with the head-about-to-spin-around-360-degrees-look): "I'm looking at the timeslip and it still says 1."

After a couple of minutes of arguing about whether or not the timeslip was fixed, the biller finally gets up, goes to LS#2's desk and asks to see her computer. And here's the clincher; the absolute only proof you will ever need to drive home the fact that you should never-NEVER-do drugs....
LS#2 shows the biller a paper copy of the timeslip she printed out yesterday. YESTERDAY. She printed out the timeslip for the attorney to double check, and she was looking at that. Not the computer to see what the timeslip looked like now. YESTERDAYS PAPER COPY. OMG. Help me!

Out! Out You Demons of Stupidity!

Thank you, Dilbert, for you stupidity protective desktop background, but I am afraid even you cannot help me now.


So I give a project to an employee. It’s a fairly large project and I have immediate work to be done so I only give the first part and mention several times that when this part is done to let me know and we will go over the letters for the second part.


At the end of the day I come across another job for said employee to work on, as projects are desperately needed at the moment because the boss is out of the office on vacation… did I forget to mention that?... So I label it with a large bright yellow post-it that says “Do after ……… letters” which was the next part of the project that she was supposed to let me know when she was ready for it.


So about 3/4 of the way through the next day, when she had not gotten the letters (part two) of the project from me I decided to give the other letter that she was supposed to do afterward to another employee who is low on work. When I went to get it, I saw it was sitting on the employees letter stand, and as she informed me she was almost done with it I stared dumbfounded at the large bright yellow post-it still stuck to the middle of said document. I could not even look at her as I asked “What about the other project”. I kid you not--she actually said “Well, you didn’t give me the letters.” So I explained to her again that I told her to come get the letters when she was ready for them. I then explained that the large bright yellow note stuck to the letter telling her to do AFTER the other project should have been enough to let her know she needed to do that letter AFTER the other project.


Yay! Work!
Anybody looking for a housekeeper? I could do that.