The writing on the wall

Yesterday was probably one of our last "normal" days before the office closes its doors permanently. This Monday, 25% of the business will be gone and the inevitable cutbacks will begin.

We decided to have a company luncheon on Friday so I got up early and made a huge green bean casserole. You know the one with the Durkee Onions and cream of mushroom soup. Mmmmm. My schedule got off track and I realized I was going to be running late so I called to give my boss a heads up. I am salaried and a few minutes is no big deal but I feel it is the professional thing to do, so I called.

Typically, when we have luncheons my boss will give me money to apply toward the purchase of meat or something because she never wants to be bothered with doing anything herself. But this time she never mentioned it so I did my shopping Thursday night and all I had to actually prepare was the casserole. So now she wanted me to stop somewhere and buy something for her for the luncheon. I walked right into this by calling the office before I arrived. I knew we would probably need more desserts but that would require more effort here at the last minute so I never mentioned it. I wanted to make it easy on myself so we agreed on a gallon of sweet tea since I had only bought one and I was not sure if anyone else was bringing any. I had to drive past the office to get to the tea but she is better at delegating than actually doing anything herself and I want to keep the peace so I did it.

There are a lot of mixed emotions at the office these days. The company that bought us was the previous employer of several of our current pharmacy technicians. Some left that company on good terms but others did not and they now know this will prevent them from filling any of the limited available positions being offered. You just cannot burn your bridges, no matter what your reasons. It will come back to bite you!!!

One of the techs lied when she left the corporate company, saying she had a family emergency. She then started working with us and never went back. No notice, much less working out her notice. Another tech gave notice but only worked two more days and quit. No one at our company knew about this at the time and these employees have never had any issues in the time they have worked for us. I am certain, like all of us, we never dreamed this new company that was new and so successful would ever close its doors. A couple more of the techs did some serious pot stirring at their old office after they started with us so they will probably prevent them from being rehired as well. I guess people have to learn the hard way to do the right thing.

I have mixed feelings about job hunting right now. I want to work through the end of when they will need me in order to get the severance package but I have no idea how long they will need the billing department. If I start to look for something now they may want me sooner than I want to go. Next week they will have an outsourcing firm there to help us so I plan to take advantage of their expertise as well.

It is no wonder I can't even think about Christmas preparations. So much is in limbo.