They said that this was going to be easy.

Yet another Saturday night @ the office.

Normally I get paid to sit on my butt all night, counting the holes in the celing tiles... again. But tonight, I actually have to work.

As my little blurb in the header of my blog states, I'm a phone monkey. Which means that I answer the phone, in as pleasant a manner possible, and try to help them get their problem resolved. Despite the fact that I have extensive IT experience, and was hired for an IT position, I'm not allowed to help them with simple problems. (I'm not even able to ping a router. We're blocked internally). Just take the report, and thank them for calling.

Tonight, it's gets worse. There have been a huge jump in the number of calls, and everyone wants their service fixed "yesterday". Now I do understand that these clients pay the company I work for upwards of $300 Million/year. But when they report a trouble in the most remote part of a bloody mountain range at the end of the day on the Saturday, of the Easter long freakin weekend... 10...9...8... OK, all better now. These clients may have to wait a bit longer than usual, under the circumstances.

Most rational people understand this bit of simple logic. But then, there are our clients, from governments, to big business, they all believe that, imagine that, the rules don't apply to them. Tonight there are specifically 5 of them and collectively are calling in to me about every 6-10 minutes, almost enough time for me to actually get anything done for them. And, like me these are just people being paid just to be a pain in my ass, when there is nothing better for them to do on a saturday night. They don't have anything to do but bug me, I have to make things happen in every step, in every group along the way.

If there was one word that I could abolish from the lexicon of the english language; It would have to be "escalation", and it's root "escalate". Infact lets just get rid of the whole notion, all it means in my context is: I'm telling Mommy!!! And she's going to tell your Mommy, and you'll be in BIG trouble.

Trust me I would be a happier man indeed.

Oh well. At least I don't have to have certain "management" strutting around, (some with mug in hand, some without), trying to look busy, without actually doing anything.