Who's a Disgruntled Employee?

That would be me.

Ok, so I went to our weekly staff meeting today and you know, I sit through those things and I have to consciously make myself not roll my eyes. Have you ever been in a meeting with someone who essentially talks to hear themselves talk? Every “question” is really just a clever way for them to be able to demonstrate their VAST KNOWLEDGE while at the same time giving off a sense of humility, because, after all, it IS a question. Dude, we get it – you’re so smart and so up on critical issues and so articulate and so everything to everyone. This particular guy? He IS really smart and articulate and up on critical issues (I know he reads the paper and watches the news channels, so I’ll give him that at least) but since I have recently come to severely dislike this person, well, my tolerance for him has been replaced by annoyance and then magnified about a billion times.

Why do I dislike him so much, you might ask? Because he’s a jerk. I used to enjoy his company because he was fun and kinda hot -- but that can only take a person so far. I started to resent the fact that he doesn’t work at all (not an exaggeration – he shows up MAYBE six hours a week), and yet, was getting paid more than me, and also? I was doing all of the work on things we were supposed to be doing “together.” And so while I still liked him as a person, as a co-worker, I really didn’t like him at all. But then last week, we got into this huge brouhaha about – wait for it – a computer monitor. It’s a long and ridiculous story, but suffice it to say that I got a new monitor that he felt should rightly belong to him and wouldn’t let go of the issue and was essentially a total asshole and displayed nothing that remotely resembled professionalism about it when he started this ginormous fight with me about it last week when we were alone in the office. So now? I dislike him both as a co-worker AND as a person in general. Hence, my new way of dealing with him is to pretend he’s not in the room. Luckily, that only takes up a small percentage of the work week.

So going back to my original point, that is why today I wanted to stick a pencil in my eye just so I could focus on something other than him talking and the mounting fury I felt when he just wouldn’t stop talking. And talking. And talking. The hour long meeting? Today, it was a two-hour meeting (not unlike the famous "class where time stood still" from days of yore) and I just wanted to scream. I know, that’s not the kind of attitude one should have about one’s job and one’s coworker, but to that I say “whatever.” That’s also not the right attitude, but c’mon, I just sat through that meeting and I’m totally in a mood. Not a good one, in case there was any doubt.