The Vent and Rant Thread

[krisk]

it's 0820. I have finished anything remotely resembling work at 0805

[Verencat]

Since my face presently looks like Mrs Ratched’s in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, crisped and slightly scary, and my interior dialog sounds like George Carlin’s Seven Dirty Words monologue, I feel it’s time for me to participate actively in this thread.

I live in a separatist neighbourhood of Montreal, which is not a problem to me as I am a proud Francophone and I like Québec’s unique culture, even if I don’t necessarily agree with the movement. I also happen to work in the same area, as a baker in a grocery store that belongs to convinced separatists.

Recently, the owner of the store has decided to forbid all the employees to speak any language but French (unless it’s to Anglophone or Hispanophone clients, of course) and that made me extremely mad. Three of my co-workers speak mainly Spanish, two mainly English, and I always spoke to them in their mother tongues to show them respect and to improve my command of those languages. In the last six months, I have been warned numerous times because I only partially gave in to this ridiculous rule, refraining from using any language but French when clients could hear me.

Today, for the second time, I received a written warning for giving instruction in English to a Sri Lankan co-worker that barely speaks French. I only wanted to gain efficiency! Now, two more warnings and I’m fired.
We are lucky enough to live in a bilingual country (let’s say a country in a state of diglossia), and I believe we should embrace this state of things, not make it a constant war. Now if only my boss could understand that...

For those who care, as a baker, I DO make cakes, I DO make lots of pastries, and I DO make doughnuts – and sometimes eat what I prepare...

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by Verencat

Recently, the owner of the store has decided to forbid all the employees to speak any language but French

This would be illegal under German law ... pity it's not the same in Canada. It's a ridiculous rule.

By the way: My future father-in-law (I'm not actually married, just in a relationship for >10yrs) is a baker too - its a hard job

[nekokami]

Yvan, thanks for the answer about mastic vs. silicone.

Originally Posted by Moejoe

Right, that's it!!! Bloody Word has sucked up enough time from me tonight. A ceasefire has to called in the cut-and-paste war between Word 2007 and Feedbooks. I'll resume the battle in the morning when I'm not so frustrated!!

/end rant

Have you tried OpenOffice? It has quirks if its own, but probably handles cut and paste in a more standard way than Word (which always tries to include all kinds of weird tags in copy-paste operations).

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

The results of the MRI came back today. As it turns out, for the past almost three months, my wrist has been .... not sprained .... broken. Multiple fractures that the xray did not pick up.

Oh no! Hopefully you won't have to have anything extra done to your wrist now to deal with that.

Originally Posted by tirsales

I am hungry. REALLY hungry. It's raining like mad and I forgot my jacket, umbrella and lunch at home. What to do?

I always carry granola bars and keep a jar of peanut butter and some crackers in my desk for just this kind of reason. I'd offer to try to email you some, but by now I imagine you're at home or have found something to eat, anyway.

Originally Posted by krisk

it's 0820. I have finished anything remotely resembling work at 0805

Start writing a novel? Develop a computer game (or learn to program, if you don't know how already?) Enroll in an online class?

I came to the conclusion years ago that if my employer can't keep me busy, my responsibility to remedy that in my employer's favor only goes so far. You've tried to help with the backlog. You've offered to go out into the field and help with work orders. You aren't being permitted to do that, and there isn't enough work in your official job description to keep you busy. I get the sense your workplace won't really reward innovation, e.g. developing a new system to track work orders or something else related to your workplace. So you might as well find some other productive thing to do with your time.

When I was a computer operator on the graveyard shift, I used to do all my programming homework during my shift, between mounting tapes and loading paper into the printers. I got a lot done that way, and as long as I got my other work done, there was no cause for complaint. And being productive helped me to be less cranky.

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by nekokami

I always carry granola bars and keep a jar of peanut butter and some crackers in my desk for just this kind of reason. I'd offer to try to email you some, but by now I imagine you're at home or have found something to eat, anyway.

Thanks
I'm thinking about putting some stuff into the freezer at work.. But I always forget it.

[Curly]

Venecat -- that is astounding! So let me get this straight, you can speak English or Spanish to customers, but not to your colleagues? I can understand the need to preserve and protect the French language in Quebec, but that seems to be going a bit far. They will learn French by being completely immersed in the language, but it is not respectful of their cultural/linguistic backgrounds. And certainly not an efficient way to get work done. Is it even legal to do that?

By the way, we can certainly use a good baker around here.

[StDo]

This morning my harddrive refused to work. Nothing but a quiet "clack, clack, miep, clack". That seagate momentus died. With all my work related stuff on it.

Thank goodness I had a Timemachine Backup. However the last six hours I have been buying a new harddrive, then a torx screwdriver (yes, four damn screws were holding that actually dead hd) and reinstalling the system (that took me two hours of waiting... ... and reading ).

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by StDo

This morning my harddrive refused to work. Nothing but a quiet "clack, clack, miep, clack". That seagate momentus died. With all my work related stuff on it.

Its actually "clack, clack, clack, miep" - Beethoven, 5th symphony.

[ravenne]

Originally Posted by tirsales

Its actually "clack, clack, clack, miep" - Beethoven, 5th symphony.

Also called „per aspera ad harddrive novum“...

[Verencat]

Originally Posted by tirsales

This would be illegal under German law ... pity it's not the same in Canada. It's a ridiculous rule.

By the way: My future father-in-law (I'm not actually married, just in a relationship for >10yrs) is a baker too - its a hard job

Originally Posted by Curly

Venecat -- that is astounding! So let me get this straight, you can speak English or Spanish to customers, but not to your colleagues? I can understand the need to preserve and protect the French language in Quebec, but that seems to be going a bit far. They will learn French by being completely immersed in the language, but it is not respectful of their cultural/linguistic backgrounds. And certainly not an efficient way to get work done. Is it even legal to do that?

By the way, we can certainly use a good baker around here.

Frankly, I don't know if it's legal or not. I never heard of anything like that anywhere else in Québec. I don't plan investigating any further because I don't plan staying there more than a few years, long enough to get my degree... and I just hate conflicts.

I did talk to my boss this afternoon to expose to him my opinion (I couldn't when he confronted me, I just froze and coudn't think of anything else to say then multilingual swear words). He understood my point (I think) and allowed me to speak English at least with my Sri Lankan colleague, as long as if it's not in front of clients. And he tore up the warning!

Curly, sent me a plane ticket and I'll be there tomorrow! Nothing is more enjoyable to me than to see someone have a feast out of what I cook!

Tirsales: good for you! Long lasting relationships are quite hard to find these days, you can be proud!

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by Verencat

Tirsales: good for you! Long lasting relationships are quite hard to find these days, you can be proud!

Not proud, just very, very happy

[nekokami]

Originally Posted by Verencat

I did talk to my boss this afternoon to expose to him my opinion (I couldn't when he confronted me, I just froze and coudn't think of anything else to say then multilingual swear words). He understood my point (I think) and allowed me to speak English at least with my Sri Lankan colleague, as long as if it's not in front of clients. And he tore up the warning!

Oh good! Glad the boss was able to see reason, at least to some extent.

I suppose the point of the rule is at least partly that the customers are presumed by the owners to want to hear only French while shopping (except that, as you pointed out, some of them don't speak French). But I don't think it makes sense to forbid speaking whatever language is most mutually intelligible between staff. I'm guessing they're not legally allowed to hire only workers who are fluent in French....

[Verencat]

Originally Posted by nekokami

Oh good! Glad the boss was able to see reason, at least to some extent.

I suppose the point of the rule is at least partly that the customers are presumed by the owners to want to hear only French while shopping (except that, as you pointed out, some of them don't speak French). But I don't think it makes sense to forbid speaking whatever language is most mutually intelligible between staff. I'm guessing they're not legally allowed to hire only workers who are fluent in French....

Well I did my research and I found out that it all started with a campaign of the Québec office of the French Language to promote service of clients in French. Companies are obligated by law to be able to serve clients in French, but cannot discriminate on the basis of language when hiring new staff. They just have to make sure there is at least one French speaking employee on the grounds at all times, so, I would say my boss just pushed the envelope too far.

[yvanleterrible]

Originally Posted by Verencat

Well I did my research and I found out that it all started with a campaign of the Québec office of the French Language to promote service of clients in French. Companies are obligated by law to be able to serve clients in French, but cannot discriminate on the basis of language when hiring new staff. They just have to make sure there is at least one French speaking employee on the grounds at all times, so, I would say my boss just pushed the envelope too far.

Your boss had absolutely no right to act this way, it was illegal. If he had tried to fire you that way, you could have had his head on a legalese platter.

The law stipulates that French speaking customers must have the right to be served in their language. It does not say that English speaking customers can't. What language employees speak to one an other is none of his business unless he does not understand and it causes problems in the organization of duties. But that is an other matter unrelated to the language law.

He's a jerk and I wish you get your degree soon so you get out of those crummy places.
Bonne nuit ma fille!

[montsnmags]

Originally Posted by yvanleterrible

...
Bonne nuit ma fille!

http://video.google.com.au/videoplay...08240615174661

Cheers,
Marc