Homeless

[dreamshark]

Yesterday I packed up my office at work and brought home 10 years worth of old calendars, office supplies and random junk. No, still not retired. I keep waiting to get laid off as promised, but keep getting extended. However, my entire division has now been turned out of our building in Shakopee (on VERY short notice) because some genius at corporate HQ decided that the tax writeoff for letting the building stand empty was worth more than anything we could possibly contribute by continuing to work there.

So we spent the last 6 weeks frantically redesigning our huge labs to take up 60% less space, unracking everything and stacking it on pallets to be shipped to California, and throwing out thousands of dollars worth of equipment that didn't make the cut (very painful for frugal Minnesotans). The last truck left the building on Friday the 13th (what could go wrong?). They issued us all laptops and docking stations and sent us off to work from home. I plugged in the laptop and ascertained that I could access the VPN, but I still haven't figured out how to set up my office so I can switch easily between computers. So instead, I spent the day trying to integrate the influx of office supplies and an entire desk drawer pharmacy into the ambient clutter. My office is cleaner, but desk in the sewing room is completely covered with boxes of pens, pencils, markers, and highlighters. I'm not sure if that is progress or not.

It was sad to say goodbye to the co-workers I will rarely see again, but confusing. We kept falling into those old goodbye patterns - "It's been great working with you - maybe we'll run into each other again" and then remembering that we supposedly are still working together.  It's been a weird week.

Comments

[mle292.livejournal.com]

That sounds very unnecessarily stressful. Let's hope that the promised layoff is soon, and you'll all be able to join up for coffee and talk about work in your retirement, while collecting unemployment on their dime.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

Not with a bang, but a whimper?

Going through all this with a lay-off still pending sounds like an annoying amount of hassle. I hope working from home makes some things easier at least.

[pameladean]

You would think most corporations were just too stupid to live, but they keep on rolling along and crushing things at random.

P.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I entirely agree.

K.

[vgqn.livejournal.com]

The father of a friend of mine told her when she was about to start her first job, "You will be amazed how many things won't make any sense at all, and yet the business survives."

Until, of course, they don't. Sometimes the stupidities do catch up.

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

And sometimes it's an inverse relationship. Our stock is on the rise.

[pameladean]

Sometimes they do, but they so seldom seem to bite the people responsible for them.

P.

[quility.livejournal.com]

How frustrating.
I hope things improve soon.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Just phone it in for as long as it lasts.

K.

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

I've kind of been doing that (except for the last few weeks of frantic lab-moving). But now I get to phone it in literally. I know, not the worst problem in the world. It's just hard to plan.