You know the economy sucks when...



For the first time since I stepped into the workforce lo those 22 years ago, last week I survived a round of major layoffs.  In a week, 6 of my friends will be out of work. 

For those keeping score I have been laid off twice, fired twice and and quit twice.  Actually, if you count my hiatus after my foot fell off I was fired two-and-a-half times...but I don't count that.   What kills me about the layoffs is that they are occurring in a business that you wouldn't imagine them happening. 

Unfortunately, in the interests of preserving my job I cannot divulge by name who I work for or indeed, the business I work in, lest some drone without a life be trolling the Internet looking to earn a few brownie points with the boss.  Luckily, this is a visual medium and I can post a helpful visual aid to help you figure it out. 



Combined with:

Got it?  Okay then...

With this in mind, (and no, I'm not going to give you any more hints about my employer), I stand inside looking out at those toting boxes filled with personal effects from their offices.  For some of the layoffs, it makes little sense.  Take for instance, my immediate supervisor.  She has without question been the very best boss I have ever had in the past 22 years. 

She is the most knowledgeable person with regard to the mechanics of the job I have ever known, yet they laid her off.  Needless to say I am not very happy about the situation because she was a safety net for my numerous shortcomings in the job.  Now it's gone and I am real close to a cliff.

Moreover, the fact that these are layoffs in an industry that really shouldn't have them is itself very disturbing.  In a depressed economy...and yes, I invoked the idea that we are in a depression...the one thing that remains constant and grows is crime.  More people get desperate, commit crime and go to prison in such an economy during periods of economic strife than at any other time.  Yet where I work, they are letting people go for economic reasons.  It makes no sense.

Yet I survived it. 

Surprisingly, I have an odd sense of relief. 

I am a tad ashamed of that. 

Life gets weirder and weirder.