I'm not the only one who hates Maria...

Tee hee.

Well, Michelle doesn't HATE her, but she doesn't like her. Both of us were pretty peeved off with something she said to me today.

The three of us were just kind of standing around waiting for something to get finished in the lab, and Maria said something like, "See, you [as in me] don't need a chemistry degree!!"

Michelle and I just exchanged glances because Maria has been treating me like I'm not as good as she is because I don't have a chemistry degree. So Michelle looks at her and says, "Well, I consider Karyl to be a chemist because of all the work she does around here! She does everything I do around here!" (And Michelle has a master's in chemistry.)

To which Maria replied: "An honorary chemist..."

I told Kurt about this conversation and he swore to stab her with a spoon. I guess because it inflicts more pain.

I married an odd man. :o)

In other work-related news, I could sue my bosses for sexual harassment. But you know, it was just way too damn funny to do that!

See, I wore this shirt today to work that I bought at Sears. It's got this huge Chinese design on the front, and around the circle of the design, it reads: "Confucius says, it's the year of the hottie!"

Well, the part where it says "it's the year of the hottie" gets hidden below my more-than-ample bosom. So George looks at me this morning and says, quite innocently, "What if we can't read what's below?"

I just kind of looked at him and bust out laughing. Then Tesfa made it worse by saying, "If we can't read what's underneath, can we just stare at it all day?"

I was practically rolling on the floor by this time. Those poor men... Everyone at my company is certifiably nuts, I kid you not.

Oh, and Tesfa asked Michelle about Maria's performance, and Michelle was honest with him and told him that she's not performing to expectations. Then the conversation got onto the subject of my performance, and Michelle told Tesfa everything I had been up to lately.

You wouldn't be able to necessarily quantify everything that I have done since I've been at that company, but I have worked my ass off getting my responsibilities coordinated and organized, and having to take over a good deal of Michelle's duties since John's been gone meant that I had to totally revamp what are actually my responsibilities.

Michelle was honest with him -- she didn't have to fluff anything at all. But she told the truth when she told him that I do everything she does. I QC everything that she used to, I do QC by myself even though it's not technically my concern, I do ALL the QA (QC = quality control and QA = quality assurance, and yes, there IS a difference), I set up systems left and right, and I took it upon myself to reorganize the DoD lab book so that the entries are now clearer and more readable. Not to mention keeping that damn wet lab clean (which is like cleaning up after three year olds -- messes EVERYWHERE), and doing everything that I was told WAS my responsibility when I started. But I'm enjoying every second of it. I really am.

So I guess in a way I was upset by Maria's hiring because I felt that Michelle and I had everything under control. Our productivity has really suffered because we're showing Maria how to do everything several times over, and she's gone off on personal business so often that we can't count on her being there. We can only give her projects around the edges, which means she just picks up the slack that I was doing when things got a little slower. Michelle and I had a system down, and she helped me as much as I helped her, and things were going quite smoothly. Now we have to babysit this supposed chemist, and it's driving us both nuts.

The good part is Tesfa is of the opinion that Michelle and I will get fat raises and/or bonuses come the first of the year. The bad part is said raise/bonus will probably be as much as a normal company's standard Christmas bonus! :o)

Ah well. I refuse to look a gift horse in the mouth.