Et Tu, Claudette?
Day of much anger. Not a good thing. I know that.
Friday so many people had exit interviews that the joke was you should avoid going near the manager’s office so he doesn’t accidentally terminate you. Three people I’ve worked with 10 years – between them they had over 100 years at GBD. Gone like that.
They had 30 days to “find something” but they didn’t. One guy said he might become a cable guy, computer tech support jobs were $8 an hour now, the market is glutted, he’d rather flip burgers for that kind of pay. One guy away from work said he was a disciple of Milton Friedman, things change, but somewhere down the road like the Industrial Revolution there would be 15 jobs created for every 10 destroyed and you can be a Luddite or adapt. Like move to India and do the same job for $8k a year piecemeal?
Attitudes seemed upbeat, even in the worst of circumstances you have to believe things will get better. One by one, smiling faces went to the executioner, collected their last paycheck (automatic deposit is automatically cancelled for the terminated), turned in their badge, and walked out the door. Thank God it wasn’t raining.
Not much got accomplished among the well-wishing survivors. Lots of handshakes, a few hugs, and then goodbye. I told some of them I’d have to have an open bottle of tequila on my desk to do exit interviews.
Home. Bar. Determined to wash it all away. Peasant meal, white beans and ham hocks. Sleep. Up at 2:30. Loud party next door. “Best late night ever!” somebody screamed. Random screams, loud music, forget sleeping. It stopped about 4:30 but my day of anger had begun. About 5am I tried to sleep on the sofa. I was awakened by this rattling sound.
Claudette had climbed on the table and was playing with objects in a wooden tray, making noises to keep me awake. That was it. I got up.
Went to WalMart, determined not to do anything stupid in my state of anger. Went out of my way to be nice to everyone who helped me. That made me feel better, not because I was being nice but because they were nice in return. Bought some jeans, some shoes. About 8am, I called Liz on the cell phone and asked if she wanted to go to BJs. Strangely, she was awake, not having slept either and we were there when they opened at 9am. We went to Fowler’s afterwards and I bought an imported Brit can of Heinz Spotted Dick just because it was funny. On to A Southern Season, horribly crowded because of their 27th annual inventory reduction sale. Got a couple of egg rings and cutter for soft-boiled eggs for Liz while she went to The Potted Plant looking for patio stuff. On to the Carolina Brewery for a few Copperline Ales just before noon and then back home to sleep. I got through the day without doing anything stupid out of anger. Small victory.
6:58:10 PM 
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