Neville Nerd...

So, I rang Neville Nerd – the head high poo-pah doo-dah manager type person who lurks in the big smoke of Sydney. Now, Neville is always too busy and important to speak to me over the phone or via email so when he answers he cuts me short due to his magnificence before I can say anything. This time I cut him off before he could indicate his god-like status to me.  I told Neville there was a problem in the making and explained what. He said ‘I see no problem.’ I said, okay, no worries then. He was quiet for a moment before asking what the problem was. I told him ending with ‘a bullet can be dodged or it can be slammed into someone’s arse.’  That wouldn’t be my arse because I’m just a lowly Office Manager. It would be his – which I would enjoy seeing.

So, Neville said ‘send an email to everyone.’ Now, Neville is particularly anal and needs to see all emails that go out ‘to everyone.’ I said I would write it and send it on to him to do his anal checking. He said ‘I’m too busy to read it.’ Okay, I said in that way that indicates I could write anything in that email while running with scissors. He decided then to dictate an email over the phone. ‘Send that off.’ I did.  Two minutes later he rang and said ‘Why did you send that? It could be misconstrued.’ I pointed out they were his words.   He was quiet and then said ‘do you think people will read it the wrong way?’ I said, I couldn’t say. I nearly said Fucking hell nitwit, it’s nearly knock off time. People could read it upside down while swallowing a knife and patting a croc and I wouldn’t care right now.

He then dicktated…er dictated another one and he said ‘what do you think of that?'I said I would send it. ‘But what to you think?' My response, if you’re happy with it then that’s all that’s required. There was a lot of silence then because I freaked him out, as I wanted to, due to non-committal I’m-just-a-dumb-woman stuff. I may be a nobody in the company but I’m an expert at playing with people’s minds especially in upper management.  Did it get sent? Yep. He ended the call with ‘I’m very busy please don’t ring again.’ Fair enough. I understand that. I had to stop writing at my desk to deal with a boring work problem. We all have crosses to bear.