Monday, October 26, 2009

Freedom

There comes a point in every abusive relationship, I'd imagine, when the abuse, although not your fault, is present and obvious enough that you are complicit in it. Essentially, the abuse would not take place if you had taken steps to stop it, and you haven't, so you're allowing it to flourish.

I'm an independent computer consultant. My customers are my lifeblood, and so without their good graces, I wouldn't have a business. Until last week, I was contracted for around 5 years by Holy Shirt, a T-Shirt printing company in Syracuse. Although I considered the owner, John Groat, a pain in the butt, I finally recognized that he is simply abusive to people. I explained it away as him having Asperger Syndrome, which may be true, but if so, then that's a condition he needs to deal with, not the rest of us. Over the years, I have seen him go through a steady stream of assistants, all extremely capable people that he mercilessly and publicly berated over minute offenses such as asking him to hold on for a moment while she was finishing a call to a vendor. I've seen him treat grown men and women like children, instructing them on every obvious detail in matters such as: how to pick up the phone, how to take a message, how to leave a message, and once, to me, how to form individual letters, as in, how to form the letter A, the letter B and so on.

Last winter a hard drive went bad in one of the servers. Some of the data, the "Transfer" drive which was used for moving data from machine to machine, looked irretrievable. Much of it was personal pictures John had stored on company servers and forgotten, or never intended, to move to a personal hard drive or DVD. I had told him several times in conversations regarding his extensive backup demands that this data, since it was non-essential, was not regularly backed up. It was simply too large and would take too long given our current backup regime, which would screw up the other essential backups. This was policy since before I contracted there and it was also told to him by the previous IT provider. In addition, the first item in the folder was a message in all caps with four exclamation points stating that "!!TRANSFER IS NOT BACKED UP!!" that had been placed there by the previous IT contractor. All of this was lost on him. So he screamed at me. For probably 8-10 minutes. With other employees present. I was shaking. One employee told me later he was waiting for me to punch John in the mouth. I didn't. I held my ground, restated my point that the data was too large, non-essential and known to be not back up regularly. I crossed my arms and waited for him to get tired of yelling. I thought about the income I was making from this account. I thought of my son. When he finally finished. I told him I'd do what I could to retrieve the data. I did not once say that I was sorry, because I wasn't. When you tell someone something several times and they don't listen to you and then it comes back to bite them, there's no need to tell them you're sorry. Eventually, I was able to retrieve the data. The episode stuck with me, gnawing at me. The money was good and I needed it, as I had recently lost a large account I was subcontracting for when the main contract ran out. His repeated excuse for his behavior, berating people, not allowing someone to explain why they did something, was that "I'm writing the checks, so I can say what I want to say!" This was the last thing he said to me.

Last week I received an email from the company managing his database asking if I could help retrieve a record that had been accidentally deleted about 6 weeks ago. I pulled the nightly DVD backup from the archive and copied the data to a computer where it could be accessed by the database company. An hour later I got a call saying that the record was retrieved, but data entered that day would have to be re-entered, as it had occurred between backups and oh well have a nice day, because it really was no big deal. 20, maybe 30 minutes of work. I tried explaining this to John, but all I was able to get to was that data was lost and it set him off. "We pay you all this money! We spend all this money on backups and you screw it up again!" I try to get a word in but he steamrolls over me. I tell him I'm walking out the door. I stand in front of my car. I breathe. I walk back in.

"John, I wil assist you in transitioning to a new IT service provider." Calm as a Hindu cow.

"Who would you recommend? Who can you refer us to?"

"John, I do not dislike anyone enough to refer you to them." I have never been more honest.

"Let's try to keep this professional."

"John, you have never been professional."

"We pay you a ton of money to keep our data protected!" He's shouting again.

"Let me explain what happen-"

He then says something about my responsibilities as a father and husband but I'm really not listening.

"STOP TALKING!" I have officially lost my cool.

"I'm writing the checks here.." Here it is. The moment I've been prepared for.

"Yes, you are the one writing the checks, and that gives you a lot of leeway, but you still need to act like a NORMAL HUMAN BEING! No one in the world could have retrieved that data! The record was modified then deleted. It happened between the backups, that's that. When you get a new IT provider I will come in to help transition, but until then I don't want to hear from you!"

And I'm gone. I call the bookkeeper and tell her it was a pleasure working with her a not to hesitate to call me with her own personal computer questions. I go to lunch with Nicole. She cannot be happier. Do we need the money? Yes. Do I sell my self-respect? I do not anymore. That night after putting Jonathan to bed I notice a missed call from a blocked number, I know it's John because he always blocks his number. I don't get another call.

The next day I stop in to another one of my clients, an advertising and marketing company called Integrated Marketing. One of the owners is friends with a designer at Holy Shirt. He shakes my hand, telling me how proud he is to have me there. It feels good to be appreciated.

Thursday, July 2, 2009

yogurt, hugs, little people in white hoods

Any one of the strange events that befell me tonight as I checked out at Wegman's in Dewitt would've been been twitter-worthy, but taken together they require me to create a blog to tell the tale.

First some backstory:

Mike Tyson's Punch-Out was an unabashedly racist game that for some reason was never the subject of any controversy until the title character started getting all rapey. The franchise has never lost the impressive ability it has to exaggerate ethnic stereotypes. Glass Joe the French cafe-dwelling weakling who would've waved the white flag the moment Von Kaiser crossed the Rheine. King Hippo the so-monstrously-overweight-he's-barely-human Pacific Islander. Soda Popinski, whose name was changed from Vodka Drunkenski for the NES version. Great Tiger....wow. And so on. I received the new Wii version of Punch-Out for as a Father's Day gift. A new character, Aran Ryan (new to me, apparently he was in Super Punch-out for SNES, never played it) is a brogue-having, hyper-kenetic Irish boxer with an annoyingly shouted catch-phrase "YA DON' LOOK IRISH!". Jonathan (four years old) has heard this exactly once. First time I boxed Aran Ryan a few days ago. I believed it to be harmless, and possibly forgotten. I was mistaken.

Nicole (@beaslee on twitter, follow her if you don't already) was busy after work tonight and after running an errand with Jonathan, he and I went to Wegmans to grab some dinner and a few breakfasty items. I knew for sure we were out of milk and apple juice. After leisurely gathering our purchases we headed for check-out lane #21, where the story really begins.

Lane #21 had all the makings of a quick and average check-out. An apparent mother and grown daughter in front of us buying mostly produce. I was even able to fit all of our purchases on the conveyor immediately. This will be quick. Then the waiting began. Jonathan was getting restless and climbing on the bookshelves opposite the conveyor. There seemed to be some sort of confusion over how many Greek yogurts they were buying (I know they were Greek because Nicole sometimes buys the same brand). Back and forth, looking in the bags, counting the yogurts on the conveyor. Jonathan's climbing on the cart and trying to find ways to pinch his limbs in the metal grating. Another two women come over and starting talking to the women in front of us. "Oh, I've missed you!""Oh how are you?" They start hugging. and not quick hugging but serious, long, full-body hugging usually reserved for funerals and graduations. I'm contemplating my options. Take everything and go to another lane? Grab the milk, leave everything else on the conveyor and go to the express lane? Aran Ryan chooses now to rear his proud Irish head.

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

It rings out like a pregnant fart. Probably no one hears it but me. "Jonathan, stop." I try not to make a big deal out of it because he can really sensitive to disapproval sometimes and adding a crying child to this situation isn't going to make it any better.

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"
"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

By now the other women have left and we're back to the original two. Finally over the great yogurt controversy, check-out is proceeding. Or so I think. For no reason at all the cashier, who is older, in her 50's or 60's, just stops ringing the groceries and is talking to the women. Full conversation, hand gestures and all. Seriously?

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

"Jonathan. Stop saying that. What he's saying is 'Ya don't LOOK Irish' not 'I don't LIKE Irish.' Okay?"

"Okay Dad."

The conversation in front of us appears to be over and all the items are rung. Finally. Now we can...wait they have coupons? Jesus Harold Christ. Coupons aren't ringing right, gotta call the supervisor.

We've now been in line for 20 minutes. People have walked in, shopped, checked out and are home. Jonathan manages to get his arm stuck in the cart.

The manager comes and solves the coupon dilemma. Now we can...wait why the hell is the cashier hugging these women? Both of them? What the hell is going on? I JUST WANT TO LEAVE!

I give up and put my stuff back in my cart and move to another lane, giving the cashier in lane #21 the stink-eye the whole time.

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

Pal, I don't really care anymore. We've moved to aisle #19. Looks like a winner, but I've about had it at this point. This cashier is roughly the same age as the last one and is getting chatty with Jonathan "Are you going to go see the fireworks?"

"WHERE ARE THERE FIREWORKS?" Comes from behind me from a customer standing way to close to me.

"I think there are some good ones at the fairgrounds."

I do not give two shits about fire-

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

-works right now. I just want to take my racist child and go home.

"WHERE ARE THE FAIRGROUNDS?!" Why are you shouting crazy woman? She's practically forcing me away from the lane now.

"I'M NOT FROM AROUND HERE." Where are you from that boxing me out like you're Dennis freaking Rodman going for a rebound is acceptable behavior in the check-out line?

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

"Jonathan. Please buddy, stop saying that."

"Do you have any coupons" The cashier says smiling.

"What?"

"I DON'T LIKE IRISH!"

"Do you have any coup-"

"NO."

"Umm, excuse me." He's talking to the cashier. He's a polite racist child. I'm swiping my shoppers club and credit cards at lightspeed. "There's a boxing game..."

I grab the receipt out of the cashiers hand, stuff it in a bag, grab my kid under my arm and make a break for it.

It's raining. We get to the car and I load stuff into the trunk and buckle him in. I tell Jonathan that saying he doesn't like Irish is a mean thing to say and he shouldn't say it. He says he's sorry.

"Can we play Super Mario Galaxy instead?"