"I'm on my way to management training. Anger management, but management nonetheless. Yep...management material." -- Andy Bernard, The Office

Have I ran off my last reader yet? No? Okay, here's another boring post about my bland job.

I'm really hoping I can get tomorrow, Friday, off, because my head's about to explode.

"Hello, thank you for calling Fizsimmons Wireless. How can I help you today?"

"How can you help me? I've got a $200 bill!"

(After taking a few minutes to review the bill and make fixes.) "You were charged for your secondary line as though it was a primary line, so I've credited you $90.01. I do apologize for the error. Because you changed your plan in the middle of the bill cycle you have some prorations, too, but those are correct. So after tax your credit is $98.27; just deduct that from your payment. Anything else I can help you with?"

"Yeah, can you help me with this bill I've got?"

Am I wrong if I envision smashing this man's face with a hammer? I JUST WENT OVER YOUR BILL, FUCKTARD! OPEN YOUR GODDAMN EARS! He was even more grating considering I'd spent 40 minutes with some other old bat just before him and went over every charge on her bill in detail five times, and she still said, "But I've got this high bill..." I hung up on her dumb ass. Yeah, "unprofessional," whatever. You would have to sit and stew in back-to-back-to-back to back hicks, senile old farts and Third World morons, then go get 60% reviews on 100% perfect calls before you could grasp the angst that can grip you.

This evening some bitch called up and said everything in this sarcastic, sing-song, I'm-better-than-you voice. It was making me nearly suicidal and after awhile I started talking back to her in the same voice and she started straightening up, but when she reverted back to it I said, "Ooo-kayyy! Let's sing a song together in sing-song voices! 'Here we aarrree, on earth togetherrrr...' Okay, your turn." Yeah...oh, no, that'll get ya fired! I DON'T GIVE A FUCK! I'M SICK OF HEARING THIS SHIT!

The rumor floats in the air that our call center may be on it's way out, anyhow. Since a recent merger, most of the operation is moving to Texas, so maybe Fitzsimmons-ATL will go the same route. A couple of payroll people in our tiny payroll department have already either quit or departed for Texas. One of the call cues we've been taking is going away (the one I despise the most, so thank God), and today they gave us a crash course on this other temporary one that looks like they're trying to find something for us to do to keep us breathing. Add to this that everyone's reporting getting dinged on these oddball, obscure rules, like we just can't win. Our team is supposedly sixth-from-shittiest in our call center, which is the absolute shittiest in the chain. How is this happening? It's a usual corporate tactic, I think, to raise productivity goals to unattainable levels and then say, "This factory/call center/branch isn't making the grade. We may as well shut `em down." Then they use their shitty reviews to withold everyone's severance pay or unemployment benefits.

But that's merely rumor. There have been a lot of new hires. But I've about reached my limit. I compare it to sitting in a toxic stream full of mercury. Your liver might absorb the mercury just fine for awhile, but at some point you're going to get sick and flip out. Flip.