Days of My (Temporary) Life, week 3

April 14: Monday, week three
When I got in, there was a new person in Joanne’s cubicle. Yes, the axe had fallen on Friday, and they hadn’t even had the decency to tell Joanne that she was being let go. Karol fell back on the thing of, notify the agency, and they’ll call the temp and let them know not to go back.

I know it’s the way it goes sometimes, and that it works in the temp employee’s favor as well. Like, if you get into a situation that really isn’t working out for you, you don’t have to tell the employer that you’re quitting; no, you tell your AGENCY, and they contact the employer to tell them that you’re “declining further work on this assignment” and that they’ll fill your shoes right away.

I still think it’s shitty to look a person in the eyes on Friday and say, “Have a nice weekend,” knowing all along that you’ve basically fired them and didn’t tell them. Once again I will say, I am SO happy that I’m in the file room.

The new temp girl’s name is Beryl. She seems nice. The other A/P clerk, Andrea—who is great but barely got mentioned in the previous post—is a little frustrated. Apparently the brunt of training the temps falls on her shoulders, and Beryl is the third one in about two months. Supervisor Karol keeps running through them, or running them off, I guess.


April 16: Wednesday, week three
Beryl is very upset. Reportedly, on yesterday. Karol became frustrated while trying to teach Beryl something, and hit her on the arm to make her stop moving the mouse. Beryl says that her arm hurts still, a day later, and that she is uncomfortable with Karol. Beryl went down to Human Resources and reported the incident.

Karol admitted that she hit Beryl, but claimed that it was a slap on the arm, rather than the punch that Beryl is reporting. Either way, she now has an adverse record in her employee file.

I am in disbelief that there is more drama happening in this teeny-tiny department. And am glad that I’m only here for this week to do more filing, and then I’m outta here!

April 18: Friday, week three
Once again, at barely past 8:00am, while I was fixing my first cup of Joe, Karol approached me. And again, she asked if I’d like to learn A/P, and stay on for a while. She’d had a meeting the day before, where it had been divulged that the company had recently acquired several new companies, and the A/P department here would be taking on their work when things get settled over the next couple of months. As a consequence, not only do they need temp Beryl, but the Powers That Be have stated that she should hire two MORE temps as well. I still think Karol is kinda nuts, but also think that if the universe threw this at me twice, I should pay attention. I told her I would accept the assignment, and we both got to work making it happen.

Even though I had some grave misgivings, I reminded myself that it’s a temp assignment: if I end up disliking the work, or finding that I absolutely couldn’t work with Karol, then I could always quit and get another assignment. My agent knew about Karol, not only from me, but also from Beryl (who came through the same agency as I).

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not someone who just quits things on a whim. In fact, my temperament is stubborn enough that I’ll often stay at something long past the time I should have stopped; but I’m just too stubborn to “give in”. But in this case, I had to give myself the mental relief of a possible “out” to feel comfortable with taking on the A/P job.

So, bwahaha, the joke’s on me. For three weeks straight I’ve told myself, “It’s just two (three) weeks; no matter how nuts it is around here, you can put up with it for a couple of weeks and a paycheck.” And now I’m going to be working here for a bit. Yep, feeling all kinds of mixed up.