2004-01-15

So, it looks like there is such a thing as karma after all: I�ve been laid off. I�ve been downsized. I�ve been �made redundant,� as they say in my soon-to-be home country.

This sucks.

Apparently the Minister�s Office is being �restructured,� and they just don�t need another communications officer. They're going to replace my position with a general admin position. My new � and now former � boss insists that it�s nothing personal, and that he�s been more than happy with the work I�ve done for him so far; in fact, I should evidently have done a much crappier job, since he claims I�m �overqualified� for the position that will replace mine. Thwarted by my own excessive intelligence! Ah, if I only had a nickel for every time that had happened, I wouldn�t need to work at all.

This doesn�t mean I�m out of a job, thankfully. It just means that I�ll have to go back to my old job. Not the much-complained-of position in briefing and correspondence, either, since technically I was only acting in that position (for a year and a half) and it has now been filled: I�ll have to go back to my old position as an admin assistant. So, I�ve been sacked to make way for an admin assistant, forcing me to become�an admin assistant. Is that ironic? I think it�s ironic. I know for a fact it�s ten flavours of shitty.

Of course, my old director probably won�t actually make me do an admin job � I am overqualified for that, at this point, and there must be a better use for my fabulous talents somewhere in the unit � but I will, unfortunately, have to go back to my old rate of pay, at least temporarily. Now is the time for much wailing and gnashing of teeth!

I reacted pretty stoically when I got the news, I think. I smiled, said �Thanks� like a sucker, and went back to my desk. Then I did what any woman would do: I fucked off and had my hair done, spending an hour in the salon, not neglecting to forget to take my cell phone with me � what are they going to do, fire me? Heh. At the salon, I got to see a guy with a full-on trailer park mullet getting a perm, so that cheered me up. (It was a pretty chichi salon, too. Brilliant.)

Then I came back to the office, and after some remedial net-surfing, I formulated a plan of action:

1. Surf internet some more.

2. Sulk. Perhaps whine a little.

3. Update resume. Apply like the wind for any and every position I can find.

4. After one month, if am still schlepping along in grunt job, purchase one-way ticket to England: departure date, April 1.

That�s right � if I don�t have a better job in a month, I�m bumping up the trip plans. This prospect cheers me immensely. Life sucks now, but in a month I�ll either have a decent job, or six weeks to go before leaving this frozen turd-bucket of a city for good.

So fuck you, life!