Bonus Day is coming and I’m going shopping

January 11th, 2010

The bonus is paltry but I’m going shopping anyway
Boss, to put it very simply, I’m disappointed. To continue on the simple track, the bonus you gave me is nothing short of miserable. I laughed at it. And before you start shouting about the recession, depression, almost going bust and all the other phrases you use when you’re in the corner, let me remind you that I have been working like a dog these past 5 months, ever since we won the Greenstick bid. I know we won it because we cut our profit to almost nothing. I know we cut the profit just to stay in business, but boss, look at me – I’m a walking wrec, I’ll have to get a payday advance just to stay in credit.

Day and night
I’m in the office day and night. I seldom get home before midnight. One of my kids asked his mother who she’s sleeping with when her saw me next to her in bed on Sunday morning. That’s how bad it is. My nerves are shot, I’m sleeping in snatches, I’ve got junk food poisoning and I desperately need a holiday. This is what you call staying in business? This project still has 11 months to run and I suspect that we would be better off without it. Have you ever considered that this project may be stopping us from bidding more successfully on more profitable projects? Perhaps we could be working on two or three small projects now instead of this monster that’s going to send us all to the nuthouse?

Shopping
Anyway, small bonus or not, I need shirts and shoes. First stop is the shirt shop on the corner of Main and Cross. It’s been there for years, ever since I arrived in this small town. I walk over and stop dead in my tracks as I get near. The windows are plastered over in white paper and huge red letters scream – FINAL DAYS! CLOSING DOWN SALE! I find Jerry, the owner inside looking sick. He couldn’t speak; he just stood pointing at the till and crying. “Things are that bad, huh?” I said. He nodded. I bought 2 shirts from his sale rack, shirts I will probably never wear but I had to make the gesture. Poor Jerry, he slaved away single-handed for about 12 years and now he’s closing down. That’s a tough end for a nice clean business.

In the mall
I headed for the bright, shiny G mall, the latest in town. The first indication that all is not well is that I found parking immediately. Up inside the mall things were very quiet. I was looking for shoes. I found the shoe drag, where there are about 10 shoe shops all crowded together in one corner, presumably to make things easier for shoe-hunters. It was difficult to count the customers in all the shops at the same time, but I suspect that I may have been all of them. We are living in hard times.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 11th, 2010 at 10:00 am and is filed under Employment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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