By Mel Carriere
Photo of Scooby, feeling a little loopy in the August heat, also by Mel Carriere
It was 97 frickin' degrees in San Diego yesterday. I had the long weekend so I'm not complaining, but what the hell are we paying San Diego prices for if we are going to get Florida weather? While my coworkers were out there dripping away their precious life's fluids onto the soil and sidewalks, instead of driving out some bottles of cold water I'm sure our supervisors we're sitting around complaining about how lazy letter carriers are and wondering why the hell they didn't bring their jackets because the air conditioning makes the office so damn cold. Which raises the question, while you are out there baking your brain in the hot August sun and wondering why you ever signed up for this crap, what is your supervisor really doing back there in the PO besides grumbling about how slow you are?
I'll be the first to tell you that being a supervisor is a stressful and demanding job. Sometimes Postal supervisors work 15 hour days, get compensated for 8, and when they complain are then told by upper management that they should work more efficiently so they can get the job done on time. Typically upper management is populated by backstabbing incompetents who were bad supervisors who delegated everything to 204bs. Therefore, they really might not be aware of the workload associated with running a Post Office. Just don't think I'm accusing all supervisors of being lazy here - Typically about 30-40% of supervisors work themselves into an exhausted frazzle in order to pick up the slack for the other 60-70 percent who take extended lunch breaks and then lock themselves in their offices to play on the computer before going home early.
A new report about a hack attack on Ashley Madison, a website that apparently promotes and facilitates marital infidelity, bears my hypothesis out. Among the 36 million Ashley Madison accounts hacked, 52 were using a USPS.GOV address to log on. I already know what your keen, discerning, critical mind is thinking right now; that 52 accounts out of 36 million is not very much at all, not even a drop in the proverbial bucket. So our organization has a few under-worked philanderers with too much time on their hands and not enough sex on the home front, big deal? No, what this really means is that we have 52 under-worked philanderers who were STUPID enough to use their postal email address to set up an account on the site. I'm sure those 52 were not even the tip of the iceberg, but the handful of microscopic water crystals at the tip of the tip of the iceberg consisting of probably thousands of other supervisors who were smart enough to use a private email address to log in. Even so, these uncounted thousands were still out there cruising for tail on a government computer with their feet up on a government-issue desk, while every once in a while adjusting the thermostat because it's just too damn cold in the Post Office in August, after which they go out to the workroom floor to yell at a 204b, then return to the computer and minimize the Ashley Madison screen so they can check up on where you are currently wasting time.
A spokesman for the Postal Service Inspector General said that "more information is needed before determining if any violations occurred." I think that means the OIG has to make sure none of its own people's names are on that damning email list before they start pointing fingers elsewhere.
Perhaps the only solution is to start using GPS monitors on those fat-ass supervisors and station managers, admittedly not all of them, who take two hour lunches, tell the 204b to hold all phone calls, and then disappear into the office until 3:30, at which time they warn that trembling 204b doing both his and the manager's work on the computer that he better come up with an acceptable excuse to explain his or her absence in case the Area Manager calls. Hmm...Maybe ankle bracelets would be better, ones that set off a deafening alarm wail if the manager punches out before eight hours are up. On second thought, I don't think anybody manufactures an ankle bracelet that will wrap around some of those fat ankles I've seen waddling out of the Manager's office. Any suggestions?
The Postal Tsunami gains its coastal destroying power with copious amounts of Starbuck's coffee, which is not cheap. Unless they completely annoy or offend you, please take a look at what my blog sponsors on this page have to say.
No comments:
Post a Comment