NYC in SF

I miss New York sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes. I miss having a car. I wouldn't want to have to pay for a garage or circle a block looking for parking, but I miss getting places relatively quickly. Yesterday I was going to a kosher-style deli, and had to stand around on a street corner in Chinatown for 12 minutes, waiting for the bus to chug its way up the hill. While standing around lamenting my lack of book to pass the time, I noticed the street sign for the alley across the street, smiled, and jaywalked over to take a picture (see attached).

While I don't hang out in Chinatown on a regular basis, I've been there in the past, and never seen any crime. Yet while on the bus on the way in, the bus driver announced three times, "Next stop, Chinatown, watch your wallets!" The Chinese kid (mid 20's?) in a suit sitting next to me laughed and nodded his head each time. All the tourists looked scared and grabbed their purses and kids a little bit tighter. For the entire 14 or so minutes I was in Chinatown, I continued my apparently lucky streak of not seeing any crime.

Fun With Bosses!

We have sub-tenants. I do stuff for them. Sometimes I am asked to do stuff for them that falls outside of the parameters of what is appropriate. That happened Thursday. I spoke with Office Manager about it. He in turn, spoke with Turkey about it. And then this happened Friday! That check is gonna be sooooo big!
 

From: Turkey Lawyerstein
Sent: Friday, August 10, 2012 10:30 AM
To: Green Yogurt
Subject: Sub-tenant

I was going to call him this afternoon.  Before I do,  I want to make sure I am assuming things correctly.  I assume that this is not about money, but the frustration.  And not sure that money makes up for the frustration.   I only ask because the previous person at your desk said she would put up with the frustration if my subtenant paid her for very limited duties such as reception, sorting mail, greeting guests  asking them if they want a beverage.    And my subtenant gladly did so.      Please tell me if you feel the same way as the recent person, as I do not want to deprive you of an opportunity if you want one.

 

		From: Green Yogurt Sent: Friday, August 10, 2012 1:32 PM To: Turkey Lawyerstein Subject: Sub-tenant

There are two separate issues.

1.      What Office Manager discussed with you yesterday, and what I have been forced to pull you in to deal with on a couple of occasions – when clients of Sub-tenant are interrupting me to ask questions about their case, asking me to make voluminous photocopies for them, asking me to write or review a check for them, asking a question about their opposing party, etc. There are already five employees of Lawyerstein & Associates breaking my concentration multiple times a day to ask me questions, give me work, etc. In addition to that the phones are often very busy.  There are also deliveries coming in throughout the day, plus people coming to me to ask other coworkers’ schedules, coworkers informing me when office machinery has broken down, etc. On top of all that, I am trying to get filing done, create closing binders, help train someone with zero legal and little office experience, fix mistakes made by the personal assistant, update various lists we keep, and a myriad of other duties.  I am often rushing to complete assignments for you within a reasonable timeframe, and simply do not have time to stop my work to stand in front of the copy machine un-stapling documents to copy and re-compile them for subtenants’ clients.  Making a quick copy of one check is understandable, but having to spend ten or more minutes at the copier during a busy time of day is very difficult. Having to take time away from my work for you to explain to a Sub-tenant client why it would be unethical or create liability issues for me to review checks or documents, or answer questions is both time-consuming and stressful (due to having to deal with the client’s unhappiness with my inability to do what they want). 

2.      In your email below you write that the person in my position previously would put up with frustration related to limited duties such as reception, sorting mail, greeting guests and asking if they want a beverage because your subtenant paid them to do that.  I HAVE BEEN DOING ALL OF THOSE THINGS FOR OVER A YEAR WITHOUT REIMBURSEMENT FROM THE SUBTENANTS.  When I started working here, it was implied that doing the above tasks was simply part of my job.  Based on what you say below however, that is not the case, so I am requested to be paid retroactively for the year-plus of doing these tasks.  These tasks, in addition to reserving the conference rooms for subtenants, is not at all a problem.  The problem is when the clients of subtenants come to the office and take up my time by asking questions, discussing their surprise at finding out that nobody from Sub-tenant is here for them to talk with, requesting I review or copy documents, etc. It seems that Sub-tenant clients are led to believe there is a full office here, with Sub-tenant attorneys, their files, and staff of whom they can ask questions.  Obviously this is not the case, but I am the person who has to break this news and then deal with their disappointment, confusion and questions, all of which is time-consuming.

Thank you for taking the time to address this issue.  

Now guys,  that paragraph where Turkey is emailing to me? All I changed were the proper nouns. Sentence structure, punctuation, spacing, etc. All his. To be honest, that's one of his best emails. If you took out the extra spaces and the "And"'s that start two sentences it would practically pass as a paragraph written by someone with an Ivy League education. In case you were wondering, Turkey wrote back to me (he was out of the office last week) suggesting that we discuss this "live" on Monday. I can't wait. Oh, and here's a fun tidbit: Sub-tenant never paid the person in my position previously. That's right, Turkey lied. Poor Turkey was a bit delirious yesterday. He was out of town at his country home (in the country), and told me that on Thursday it was 105 degrees. He's been doing a lot of construction on his home, and I joked, "Project number one: Air conditioning!" and Turkey responded, "Oh no. That's too expensive. I have a fan. But I can't figure out how to put it together." On Friday he still hadn't gotten the fan going.  Sometimes these blog posts practically write themselves.