I started writing this blog for two reasons:
1. I get really bored at work.
and
2. I've been frustrated, scared, shocked, confused, and appalled on a daily basis since I started working here at FederalEntity and wanted to shout from a mountaintop.
You probably come to this site because you're looking for a laugh (there's one hidden somewhere on this site, I hope you find it!). But to be honest, that's only 20% of the reason I post here. My main goal is to inform and enrage.
This site has been read by folks at over 25 different FederalEntities (yes, I'm keeping track) - from the big ones (FBI, CIA, DOJ) to the small (some random military groups, NOAA, USDA). The common response is: "It's the same at my FederalEntity!"
The Federal Government is supposed to serve the American public. Federal Employees are civil servants, working for the greater common good. If my posts can broadcast one clear message to the country, I hope its: Things aren't looking that great.
All of my horror stories are true. And they're all being funded with YOUR tax dollars, so it should piss you off just as much as it makes you laugh. And it's only going to get worse unless there are some drastic changes to how FederalEntities conduct business.
So, gentle reader, I ask this of you: Keep reading and keep telling your friends. Post the link on message boards (shout-out to TheNest in Ohio!). Send it to your parents, your ex-boyfriends, and your local newspapers alike.
I love this country, and I think that our FederalEntities still do a lot of good work for millions of Americans. But as a taxpayer, I'll never be content when I find a coworker sleeping under her desk!
Friday, March 28, 2008
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Missing!
One of my tasks while on rotation will be to scan thousands and thousands of documents into PDF files. Glamorous work, I know. Before I can start this task, I need to get some special software from our computer security guy, Marc. Trouble is, Marc is never around.
I don’t mean “never around” like “he’s so busy and running all over the place doing a million different tasks that it’s hard to grab his attention”. I mean “never around” like “the guy never comes to work – ever”.
Marc is in a unique situation – he has no team leader or staff director - his supervisor is the head honcho, our division director. The division director is far too busy to check up on him and Marc takes advantage of this by NEVER coming to work.
How does he possibly get away with this, you might ask? First off, Marc deals with computer security, so nobody can figure out exactly what his job is and if it’s being done or not. Second, he uses the perfect excuse: “I’ve been in the server room doing security installs”. The server room is somewhere in another building and nobody really knows where it is or how to check up on him. Third, he has a Blackberry so he can answer essential emails from wherever it is that he goes all day – although it should be noted that he doesn’t answer 90% of his emails, only the really really important ones from the bosses.
For curiosity’s sake, I decided to keep a “Marc sighting” tally for the first two months of this year. I would find excuses to walk by his cube once or twice a day just to see if he was there. I saw him a grand total of 4 times in January and February combined! No I am not making this up. At that rate, he’ll only be at work 24 days this year! But don’t worry; he’ll still collect every penny of his GS-13 salary ($82,961 of your tax dollars, if you’re keeping score at home)!
Ok, so we’ve gathered that he only comes to work twice a month, but what does he do with all of his free time? After almost 3 years of investigative work, my coworkers and I have determined that he sells jewelry on e-Bay. Really expensive jewelry that he flies to
How did Marc get to this awesome situation? Well, he started off as a computer contractor at FederalEntity. My bosses tell me that as a contractor, Marc was a superstar! He came in early, stayed late, did his work with speed and precision, and was always asking for more tasks to complete and ways to help out! Then, he got offered a permanent position on staff as a Federal employee and everything changed. (Side note: Federal contractors can be fired at a moment’s notice; Federal employees… are practically immortal). As soon as he knew that he couldn’t get fired, he stopped doing work.
When I first started here, my team leader told me that Marc was being watched closely by the head honchos and that he was on thin ice. Nearly 3 years later, and he’s still up to the same shenanigans. It’s so painfully difficult to fire a Fed that I think management has just given up…
It makes me mad though. Not because he makes a ton of money to do nothing (so do all Feds, he's just being honest about it), but because I still need to get this one piece of software from him so I can begin my scanning project! I’ve sent him 4 emails, left him 3 voicemails, and have stopped by his cube twice a day for the last 2 weeks – and have yet to see any indications that the man is still alive. I even left a big note on his keyboard that said “please call me” about a week ago. It has not yet been touched! Lets be honest, I didn’t really want to scan those thousands of documents anyways.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Trapped
Two weeks ago, I was at lunch with 4 of my coworkers/peers at FederalEntity. We’re all bright, hard-working 20-somethings who have been stuck at FederalEntity for the past 2.5 years or so. As we ate, we went around the table taking turns describing how we felt trapped. Each one of us has been looking for a new job for at least the last 8 months, in some cases (me) much longer than that. We’ve all been presented with amazing opportunities within FederalEntity (rotations, new jobs, grad school classes, increased responsibilities, etc.) and we’ve all then had these opportunities ripped away from us at the last minute. In essence, we’ve all been screwed by the system.
The main theme of lunch that day was clear: we all want out, but…
It’s like there’s some weird unknown force that’s keeping us stuck here. Judging by my older co-workers who have been here for 20-30+ years, this place is like being caught in quicksand. Every “lifetime” Fed says the same thing – they came in thinking they’d try Government work for a few years, and next thing they knew 30 years had flown by and they were still here!
The Government is tricky like that. You come in when you’re young and you don’t get paid that much. But the work/life balance is great and every year you get an automatic 8-12k raise. After 5 years you realize that you’re grossly overpaid but have no relevant skills that would help you to make the same salary in the private sector. Then it’s decision time: you’re in your late 20’s getting paid lots to do very little – do you give it up to go to the private sector (doing more work for less $), or do you keep coasting on the Federal wave for the next 25 years and then retire?
I keep telling myself there’s NO WAY I’ll stick around here forever, but (cliché) that’s literally what they all say…
Who from the lunchtime group will escape and who will get trapped? At this point, it's unclear. Now its crunch time for all of us - in a year, it’ll be too late. We’ll be stuck like mice on a glue trap.
(stuck at FederalEntity - even gnawing off your limbs won’t help)
My 3-year anniversary is in June. I know one thing for certain: if I make it through year 4, I’m toast.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Stop! Thief!
Yesterday, my lunch was stolen from the office fridge. This isn't the first time that my lunch has been swiped, and it probably won't be the last. Our office has been plagued (for the last 10 years, so I'm told) by a mysterious refrigerator thief.
After 2.5 years of gathering info on the fridge thief, here's his Modus Operandi.
-The fridge thief does not appear to follow any regular patterns. Sometimes he steals items that have been left in the fridge for a long time. One time, he snagged my coworker Jessie's frozen lasagna only an hour or two after she had put it in the freezer.
-He seems to have strange taste - my boss has had several cups of "Diet-Jello" stolen. The only thing sicker than eating diet Jello is stealing someone else's diet jello and eating it.
-He's totally gross - Another coworker reported that the fridge thief picked all of the pieces of chicken out of her grilled chicken salad leftovers.
-He cooks/eats/disposes of his stolen goods in a different kitchen. I've actually searched the kitchens on other floors and gone cube to cube looking in everyone's trash cans trying to find my missing yogurt cups. To no avail.
The suspects:
- The Cleaning Crew - My boss loves to blame them because there are about 50 of them who wander the halls all day and they don't make much money. This is a possibility, although to my knowledge, nobody has ever seen a cleaning person ruffling through the fridge. They have no excuse to be going through the fridge in the first place, so one incident would be enough evidence to catch them. Plus, this food stealing has been going on for over 10 years, and I doubt any member of the cleaning staff has been here for that long.
- The autistic Photo Copy Boy - People often accuse him because he doesn't "know better". I doubt that it's him, because Photo Copy Boy eats McDonalds for breakfast AND lunch almost every day. No, I am not exaggerating.
- Chuck - Rumor has spread that this guy is the fridge thief. He's just a regular Federal employee who works on my floor. He's been around for a long time, and probably makes $90k a year. He's really nice, but realllllly weird. And he's been caught in two "suspicious" food incidents. One time, a woman caught him eating her yogurt. When confronted, he said that he brings the same kind of yogurt to work, and he thought that it was his (sounds plausible). Another time, he was caught trying to hide an entire tray of donuts in the cabinet beneath the kitchen sink. The donuts were put out for public consumption in the kitchen, and he was trying to hoard them all! Under the sink! Behind an empty coffee maker box! That's just weird.
Chuck has just as many supporters as accusers though. The most common reaction to the allegation is: "Chuck is the nicest guy ever, he could never be the fridge thief!" Yes, I'll admit, he is one of the nicer people I've met. But stealing food (especially Diet Jello!) isn't an act of malice as much as it's an act of weirdness. And boy is Chuck weird.
Yesterday, when my frozen burritos disappeared I swung by Chuck's cube to peek in his trash can for "evidence". I found nothing. So for now, the mystery of the fridge thief lives on!
After 2.5 years of gathering info on the fridge thief, here's his Modus Operandi.
-The fridge thief does not appear to follow any regular patterns. Sometimes he steals items that have been left in the fridge for a long time. One time, he snagged my coworker Jessie's frozen lasagna only an hour or two after she had put it in the freezer.
-He seems to have strange taste - my boss has had several cups of "Diet-Jello" stolen. The only thing sicker than eating diet Jello is stealing someone else's diet jello and eating it.
-He's totally gross - Another coworker reported that the fridge thief picked all of the pieces of chicken out of her grilled chicken salad leftovers.
-He cooks/eats/disposes of his stolen goods in a different kitchen. I've actually searched the kitchens on other floors and gone cube to cube looking in everyone's trash cans trying to find my missing yogurt cups. To no avail.
The suspects:
- The Cleaning Crew - My boss loves to blame them because there are about 50 of them who wander the halls all day and they don't make much money. This is a possibility, although to my knowledge, nobody has ever seen a cleaning person ruffling through the fridge. They have no excuse to be going through the fridge in the first place, so one incident would be enough evidence to catch them. Plus, this food stealing has been going on for over 10 years, and I doubt any member of the cleaning staff has been here for that long.
- The autistic Photo Copy Boy - People often accuse him because he doesn't "know better". I doubt that it's him, because Photo Copy Boy eats McDonalds for breakfast AND lunch almost every day. No, I am not exaggerating.
- Chuck - Rumor has spread that this guy is the fridge thief. He's just a regular Federal employee who works on my floor. He's been around for a long time, and probably makes $90k a year. He's really nice, but realllllly weird. And he's been caught in two "suspicious" food incidents. One time, a woman caught him eating her yogurt. When confronted, he said that he brings the same kind of yogurt to work, and he thought that it was his (sounds plausible). Another time, he was caught trying to hide an entire tray of donuts in the cabinet beneath the kitchen sink. The donuts were put out for public consumption in the kitchen, and he was trying to hoard them all! Under the sink! Behind an empty coffee maker box! That's just weird.
Chuck has just as many supporters as accusers though. The most common reaction to the allegation is: "Chuck is the nicest guy ever, he could never be the fridge thief!" Yes, I'll admit, he is one of the nicer people I've met. But stealing food (especially Diet Jello!) isn't an act of malice as much as it's an act of weirdness. And boy is Chuck weird.
Yesterday, when my frozen burritos disappeared I swung by Chuck's cube to peek in his trash can for "evidence". I found nothing. So for now, the mystery of the fridge thief lives on!
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Field Trip
Today I'm going on a field trip!
To celebrate Black History Month, our entire office (50+ people) is heading over to the African American Art Museum. Yes, techincally Black History month was last month, but better late than never, right?
As I had mentioned before, these "celebratory events" are of great importance to the staff directors. There's such heavy pressure to create a "diverse" workforce that when there's an event like the "Pan-Asian Heritage Luncheon", you'd better show up or have a very good excuse why you can't. Our associate staff director has been known to patrol the hallways to catch those who try to skip such events. I've been caught twice in these round-ups - it's really awkward...
So today at 11am we will all meet in the hallway and metro over to the Smithsonian African Art Museum for a 3 hour excursion. The museum is free, but since we're all still being paid while we visit the museum, my estimation is that the trip will cost about $6,000 in salary expenses (50 employees x $40/hr average x 3 hrs). Thank you for your tax dollars, by the way. I do appreciate them very much.
I'm actually really excited for this trip! I get to go to a museum, I get to go outside, I don't have to sit in my cubicle staring at the wall all day. And I think they sell alcohol in the Smithsonian cafeterias...
To celebrate Black History Month, our entire office (50+ people) is heading over to the African American Art Museum. Yes, techincally Black History month was last month, but better late than never, right?
As I had mentioned before, these "celebratory events" are of great importance to the staff directors. There's such heavy pressure to create a "diverse" workforce that when there's an event like the "Pan-Asian Heritage Luncheon", you'd better show up or have a very good excuse why you can't. Our associate staff director has been known to patrol the hallways to catch those who try to skip such events. I've been caught twice in these round-ups - it's really awkward...
So today at 11am we will all meet in the hallway and metro over to the Smithsonian African Art Museum for a 3 hour excursion. The museum is free, but since we're all still being paid while we visit the museum, my estimation is that the trip will cost about $6,000 in salary expenses (50 employees x $40/hr average x 3 hrs). Thank you for your tax dollars, by the way. I do appreciate them very much.
I'm actually really excited for this trip! I get to go to a museum, I get to go outside, I don't have to sit in my cubicle staring at the wall all day. And I think they sell alcohol in the Smithsonian cafeterias...
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