Red and Yellow, Black and White...

According to my employer, the EEOC recently decided their definitions for military status and ethnicity were insufficient, and all Equal Opportunity Employers (which I'm guessing is government-subsidised in some way, though I haven't done the research to find out) needed to re-register ("re-identify") their personnel according to the new definitions.

It would seem to me that the way to best manage not factoring race or ethnicity into the hiring/promotion/compensation equation would be to not address it whatsoever. Imagine my surprise, then, when I got an email from our Human Resources department this morning stating, "Our records show you have completed the military section of the self identification process but have not completed your ethnic designation. I've attached instructions for reference purposes." The instructions she referred to were a memo we all received in our Inbox two weeks ago stating the following:

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Action Required

Reminder all associates are required to re-identify both ethnicity and military status during the period, August 1-24, 2007.

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Only problem with that, of course, is that there was no option in their drop-down list for, "I decline to answer this question because it's none of your freakin' business."

The email actually caused my breath to lodge in my throat. I read and re-read the corporate email, making sure I understood what I could potentially be getting myself into before I shot off at the mouth (or, in this instance, fingers), then ever-so-politely responded, "Stuff it." Okay, it was actually something more like, "Is this meaning to say that RBFC is requiring me to identify my ethnicity as a condition of my employement here?"

Moments later, my phone rang. I spent the following ten minutes listening to a corporate PR rep try to smooth my ruffled feathers. No, of course the information would never be used to determine eligibility for promotion or pay (all of these are, of course, merit-based). No, they didn't want to use the word, "require", and didn't I want to be a good little employee and just fill out the form? The HR person assured me the information would never be linked to my social security number, my employee ID number, my name, or any other identifying information.

Why, then, did I get an email, specifically addressed to me, informing me of what I had and had not registered for? If the registration isn't in any way linked to my employment information, how would they even know I hadn't registered my ethnicity? I call bull-shit.

The problem, of course, is that the deadline is tomorrow. There's no way I can even scratch the surface on the information I'd need to thumb through in order to clarify whether they can, in fact, enforce the policy that all employees must identify themselves by race.

I guess tomorrow I'll phone up the local EEOC branch and spin a couple questions past some unsuspecting office clerk. Poor thing.

Wish 'em luck, won't you? I'm going on the warpath...

The Girl from Ipanema

I was sitting in my cubicle, in my standard-issue wanna-be-ergonomic office chair, listening to the forth round of "The Girl from Ipanema". I was very glad, at that point, I was wearing a headset instead of holding the receiver. No doubt the company big-wigs issue them with the understanding that even the most die-hard Sinatra fan can only take so much. The cost of handsets being thrown through the window could get a little pricey.

I'd been on hold for 27 minutes, last check, and was on my forth transfer. All four phone reps claimed I was in the wrong department, and thus began the "Tall, tan, young and lovely..." assault . I wonder, sometimes, if there's life on the other end of the line.

Finally, success! A human being answers the phone:

"Great-Big-Financial company, Jane Doe speaking. How may I assist you today?"

'You could drop the cheesy phone voice,' I think to myself.

"Hey there. This is Mouth from Another-Great-Big-Financial company, calling in regards to the requested transaction for our mutual client, Mr. Bigbucks."

"And is Mr. Bigbucks available for me to speak with?"

Damn. A strike-out. "No, he isn't, I'm afraid."

"Oh, I'm sorry, Mouth," chirps Jane, dripping with vicious sarcasm. "I can't discuss the transaction with you unless Mr. Bigbucks is there to give his permission."

Jane and I both know her company has already spoken with me three times regarding this particular transaction. We're also both aware that she's going to do everything in her power to hold on to that particular quarter-mil for as long as possible, and that it's my job to get her to release it and send it to me.

I imagine Jane and I as two knights, squared off against one another in a jousting ring. We straddle our chairs, keyboards tucked snuggly under our arms, and stare intently into one another's monitor-reflecting eyes. Suddenly, the flag drops, and we lean forward at a charge. The keyboards collide in the center of the ring, Ps and Qs flying hither and yon. Jane is dazed, but not down. Swinging my mouse overhead like a mace, I deliver the death blow...I smile, batting my eyes. "Well, Jane, if you would be so kind as to review your notes, you'll see that John Smith and I conference-called Mr. Bigbucks just last week on such-and-such date at so-and-so time, and that he indeed has given his permission for you to discuss the transaction with me." I'm a meticulous note-taker. It's what makes me good at my job.

Choking on her final breath, pencil skirt and suit jacket smudged and torn from taking her spill into the dirt of the jousting ring, Jane resorts to her final tool in the financial world arsenal - the hold button. "It will take me just a moment to review the account, Mouth. Would you mind if I place you on hold?"

'YES!' my subconscious screams. "No, Jane, that would be fine. Take your time." My voice drips with honey-coated barbs as we start The Waiting Game. It's something like The Price is Right, except there's no smiling Bob Barker, no television cameras, and nobody goes home with a new bedroom suite.

Something inside me dies as Sinatra croons yet again, "... when she passes, each one she passes says, 'Ahhhh'."

30 minutes - 30 lies

It was 6 degrees when I walked in to work this morning. Six degrees.

As in six degrees above zero.

Fahrenheit.

Yeah. Cold.

Typically, the sun would be up and the birds would be out chirping. Icicles would sparkle like glass ornaments on leaf-bare trees. I'd pass the other city people I see every day, walking the opposite way into work. I'd walk under the wind chime, three stories up, hanging outside some one's window. I walk under that wind chime every day. It's just the perfect pitch - that happy, light, melodic tinkle that brings a smile to your lips and adds a spring to your step.

This morning, the chimes were frozen together. The birds were nowhere to be heard or seen. The city people all had their faces covered, trying to protect their eyes and ears from the blistering wind.

This morning, I felt like I was making a death march into Hell frozen over.

It isn't that I don't like my job - the job is fine. I make enough money to pay my bills, I work in an office at a desk and I don't have to clean somebody else's bathroom or say, "Do you want fries with that?" to put food in my mouth. It's somewhat dead-end, and I certainly don't intend to spend the next decade of my life holding down that desk, but it's doing a fine job of getting things settled before I dive back into school.

The problem, of course, as with any low-end cubicle job, is the people. People hired in off the streets (yeah, just like me) without a college education (yeah, just like me) who can't form a proper sentence without saying "ain't" or forcing a double-negative (not-so-much like me). People who don't bathe every morning. People who are missing their teeth. People who's idea of "business casual" is stretching the 1970's polo they wore in high school over their protruding beer belly. "People" people.

I've been asking my boss for months now about getting some extra training. I have an idea what I'd like to do and where I'd like to go, and although I don't intend to stay with the company forever, I intend to stick with it for a few more years - certainly long enough for them to utilize whatever new-found skills I may acquire in the near to immediate future.

"After tax season" she keeps telling me. She's been telling me this since November. Finally, one of the big-wigs in an office across town decides our whole division needs a bout of training. Finally, my pleas of, "I've got to learn something new or I'm going to go insane," were heard (or at least executed, albeit without registration). Finally!

So the boss comes up with the training schedule. Everybody is supposed to be set up for two separate days of training, one month apart, so as not to leave the entire department without bodies to do the work. The training I'm scheduled for, unfortunately, are things I already know how to do. I mention this to her, and remind her of the things I've been asking to learn for going on three months now.

"Yeah, that's not really what we had in mind. After tax season. Guess that means I can cancel your training days, huh?"

And I can't post out until March 28th.

I thought we abolished slavery like, a century or so ago. What do I know?

20 Questions

I recently applied for a promotion in Cubby-Gopher Land, which may seem a bit ambitious to some, given that I've only been there since April. No sense wasting time about it - I'm more than qualified for the supervisory position I put in for, and there's really no good reason I couldn't feasibly be bumped up.

No good reason, of course, except that I interviewed with Corporate Barbie herself. Daphne sat across the table from me, fresh out of anorexia rehab (quite literally), fidgeting with her pen and nervously asking generic, straight-off-the-page questions.

"How do you deal with conflict?"
"What do you say to an employee who you believe is calling in sick, but who you feel is lying."
"How will you handle a situation that could arise if your co-workers believe they should have been promoted instead of you."

I nearly fell asleep in my chair, it was so dry.

She just sat there, batting her Maybeline lashes and twittering prettily, as if it'd have some effect on me. She tried to read the page seamlessly, which I'm sure she was coached in during some corporate training program. Unfortunately, it made her look more like a stammering idiot. She did, however, get the cutest little wrinkle between her brows - practiced, I'm sure. It was all I could do not to reach over to pat her on the head, and coo, "There, there, sweetheart. Don't you worry your pretty little head about it. Mouth's gonna make it all better." Ugh.

I'm supposed to find out by the end of November whether I got the position. Wish me luck?