I’ve often imagined what a world without clerical officers constantly competing for your attention would be like. And I have to say, it’s pretty damn boring, and far from the nice quiet Utopia I had imagined.
I made the extra effort today to get into work about twenty minutes before the picket lines were set up. I wasn’t alone. It was scarcely bright outside and the place was full of sheepish looking EOs and HEOs. A tumbleweed overtook me as I walked with coffee in hand down the corridor to my own section, where I was joined later by some EO colleagues and the HEO. It was business as usual for us, and I put away the vodka bottle I had been saving for later.
Later I joined a cluster of managers having a look out the top floor window at the picket line outside. Cars were passing tooting their horns in what seemed to be support. Some colleagues were in it walking around in circles and holding placards. One looked up and spotted me grinning out the window and waved back with a middle finger extended.
Some EOs were driven mental by their striking subordinates phoning their own work extensions from the picket line for a joke. They sat through the cacophony rather than taking the COs' phones off the hook. Silly EOs.
In my own immediate area it was quiet as fuck. Nothing, and I mean nothing, happened. I was beginning to have clerical officer withdrawal symptoms. I missed the proffered leave forms, the queries from the public, the random shite spewed by the office bore, the humming colleagues (humming tunes, that is, not humming as in "somewhat lacking in personal hygiene" - because I wouldn't miss those).
As I was leaving the COs were chanting loudly and I didn't want them to add "scab" (I'm not! I didn't touch their work!) to their repertoire. I managed to slip out unnoticed.
I can't believe I missed them all, today though. Because tomorrow I will be contemplating killing them all over again.
I made the extra effort today to get into work about twenty minutes before the picket lines were set up. I wasn’t alone. It was scarcely bright outside and the place was full of sheepish looking EOs and HEOs. A tumbleweed overtook me as I walked with coffee in hand down the corridor to my own section, where I was joined later by some EO colleagues and the HEO. It was business as usual for us, and I put away the vodka bottle I had been saving for later.
Later I joined a cluster of managers having a look out the top floor window at the picket line outside. Cars were passing tooting their horns in what seemed to be support. Some colleagues were in it walking around in circles and holding placards. One looked up and spotted me grinning out the window and waved back with a middle finger extended.
Some EOs were driven mental by their striking subordinates phoning their own work extensions from the picket line for a joke. They sat through the cacophony rather than taking the COs' phones off the hook. Silly EOs.
In my own immediate area it was quiet as fuck. Nothing, and I mean nothing, happened. I was beginning to have clerical officer withdrawal symptoms. I missed the proffered leave forms, the queries from the public, the random shite spewed by the office bore, the humming colleagues (humming tunes, that is, not humming as in "somewhat lacking in personal hygiene" - because I wouldn't miss those).
As I was leaving the COs were chanting loudly and I didn't want them to add "scab" (I'm not! I didn't touch their work!) to their repertoire. I managed to slip out unnoticed.
I can't believe I missed them all, today though. Because tomorrow I will be contemplating killing them all over again.
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