Shorts, Part 2: Post-Postscript

I showed up for my appointed shift this morning at 9:00 am. The Senior Technician was already there. Her first response: “I was afraid of this.” We both looked at the schedule, and it was my name on from 9:00-4:00. Both she and the Head Pharmacist said that was an error. Senior Tech said, “Well you don’t work Mondays, do you?”

Wha-huh???? I’ve only worked the past three Mondays (two at the 2:00-9:00 shift, one at the 9:00-4:00 shift). And if she was afraid I was going to show up for a shift I was assigned to, why the hell didn’t she or the Pharmacist phone me to verify I knew not to come in? Neither of them were particularly apologetic, both of them blamed the Store Manager for the error, and both of them seemed to think it was completely appropriate for me to leave and come back at 2:00.

When the whole scheduling kerfuffle came to a head the end of last week, a sheet of paper was produced that all the techs had to sign, agreeing to provide notice of days they needed off by inputting the information into the computer (up until then, I’d been providing a written schedule of doctor’s appointments and the like). The Senior Tech took me aside before I left from this morning’s non-shift and told me she was refusing to sign it because she felt all the techs should be working one full weekend a month so they could have the rest of their weekends free. In all honesty, I’m not sure how that’s going to work, since months tend to have four weekends and there are only three techs, but I genuinely don’t care. I just want a schedule I can depend on. I told the Head Pharmacist and Senior Tech that I didn’t care (I kept the comment about just wanting a schedule I can depend on to myself, though). All I wanted to do was get out of there. I’d probably have agreed to work Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, and Easter to get out of there at that point.

I’m in no position to complain; this is the first company that gave me a chance in two years of job hunting, and I’ll do what I have to in order to remain on everybody’s good sides while attempting to do excellent work. But I think it’s finally seeped through my decidedly non-porous skull that I need to “unexpect” any expectations I ever had for earning any respect in this position. It just isn’t in the play book.

The Senior Tech told me on my way out that I should go next door to Starbucks and treat myself to a coffee. Right. Like I can afford an hour’s worth of after-tax pay on latte and cookie.

When I went back to the locker room to collect my lunch bag and sweater, I stopped by the Store Manager’s office to ask him to delete my 9:00 punch-in. A very young Assistant Manager was in charge of the store at the time, and wanted to know why I was leaving (I suspect the managers are all a little twitchy about the pharmacy techs after the new tech walked out in a huff last week). I told him that I’d punched-in in error and needed to erase it. The Assistant Manager immediately realized there’d been a screw up in the schedule again and started to march back to the pharmacy. I told him firmly twice not to do anything about it, making the point that this was just a residual problem that hadn’t been caught during last week’s scheduling shake-up and that I doubted it would happen again.

Assistant Manager then said he was going to talk to Store Manager about it when she came in. Again I told him to leave it be, that nothing would be accomplished by doing that. He neither agreed nor disagreed, and I’ve a nasty feeling that when I go in at 2:00 I’ll be walking into another Pharmacist/Manager confrontation.

Have you ever been so frustrated that you are *this* close to tears. This is going to be a long week.

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