interesting karma kickback yesterday at work

[magical thyme]

The morning shift tech is usually pleasant to work with, but can be unexpectedly nasty in very passive aggressive ways. So yesterday was slow. She mentioned the ED had been steady but at least the CBCs had all been negatives, so there hadn't been any diffs (manual differentials on the CBCs).

During a coffee break, she started chatting about a book that she's reading about an ancestor of hers. Several of her family came over on the Mayflower. So I talked a little about my family history, mentioning that half my grandparents came from Greece. Which led her to say, "Well I hate to tell you this, but Greeks are lazy people" and the next thing you know, she's ranting about the financial crisis there and how that's due to Greeks being lazy.

Seriously?

Anyway, I blew it off. After she left, an ED came in with a positive CBC. So I'm standing by the printer waiting for the report, and nothing came out. A little investigation and I discovered that during the night, somebody had accidentally switched off the printer. When I turned it back on, a positive diff on an ED printed out from 8:20 in the morning.

This was a serious, serious mistake on her part. The nature of the positive was such that it required a full diff, not just a scan, to confirm there was no instrument error. If there had been an instrument error, somebody could have been incorrectly treated or incorrectly released from the ED.

The thing is, we are supposed to check the instrument monitor, which shows POSITIVE in bright red, and we are supposed to check the results on the pc monitor, which showed 38% Monocytes, which is extremely high. Instead, she was just resulting everything without looking and depended on the printer, which only prints out positives, to flag her. Um, can you spell l.a.z.y.?

So when we find major mistakes, we leave "love letters" for the person who effed up. Yesterday I wrote my first for a fellow tech.

[Ilsa]

1. I wish she was properly educated

on the Greece situation, too. She needs to understand that it isn't the little guys doing the taking.

[magical thyme]

2. I started to try, but it became clear it was pointless

She was really just looking for a fight. I expect it really was a personal shot at me. Can you imagine if she'd started ranting about how Africans are lazy to, say, a black co-worker?

[Ilsa]

3. You're right, of course. Better to take

the high road on this. And next time, let's see if she mouths off in front of someone else. I would imagine that she's creating a hostile work environment for more people besides you.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

4. I have been told "Mexican is a vulgar language, Spanish is classy."

Also, "ALL illegal immigrants are too lazy to learn English."



Also, "All the poor people in the city (read:black) are gonna invade the country the day Obama is inaugurated the 2nd time and steal all the wealth out in the country."

They don't have cars or gas money, but somehow they're gonna loot little towns instead of all the wealth in Houston or Dallas?

Also: "I lived in Spain for two years. They are too socialistic and lazy because they take siestas in the afternoon."

Didn't happen. These nuts believe anything their paranoid friends tell 'em.

[get the red out]

5. I wonder

I wonder if people who believe the most bizarre, probably corporate created, explanations for world problems are just new to the planet soul-wise? That Greek people are lazy and that caused a world financial melt down is beyond illogical, how can someone who is otherwise intelligent fall for crap like that?

[magical thyme]

6. I don't know...

On the one hand, the lab is filled with people that are otherwise very intelligent, but their politics are unbelievably naive and foolish.

On the other hand, I think she was projecting her own laziness (eg the piss-poor job she did that morning) onto me, the half-Greek?

And spiritually, I'd say she is very un-evolved. She has serious health issues brewing as well, indicating a very out of balance being. That's why I can blow off her nasty side and just ignore it. I feel sorry for her.