So I get a call from a user who wants me to fix their email system because apparently it’s broken.

Caller: Is my email down?
Me: Why don’t you tell me the problem you have and we will go from there. (Yeah, I know, a bit sarcastic.)
Caller: A client has sent me an email and gets an error message. Can you check my account.
Me: What’s the message?
Caller: The server couldn’t get it and there was a time thingy.
Me: Okay, I will need the exact message.
Caller: So I should tell the client he is just screwed?
Me: No. Can you ask him to try and email the error message to me or write down the exact message?
Caller: I will see if he has time.
(I verified we were receiving mail and that I hadn’t received any error messages from the system while we continued our conversation.)

Okay, a little bit of a pain. After all, I am good at my job, but not magic. Just like most people, I need information to form a theory and to solve a problem and this call didn’t give any. As icing on the cake, the caller sent an email to the client which read:

Talked w/my IT guy and he needs you to hold his hand through it….sorry…

Huh? I wanted information, not the client to solve the problem. So what we have here is a failure to communicate. If a client calls to buy a product and says “ I would like to buy a thingy to do stuff” (in these exact words) would you not ask questions to find out exactly what they wanted to do then tried to help them find a resolution? INFORMATION IS KEY!!!! Anyway, I guess I have to take some of the blame. If the caller didn’t understand that I need info and couldn’t just “check my account” then I needed to inform them better. Like Sun Tzu says, “If the words of command are not clear and distinct, if orders are not thoroughly understood, then the general is to blame.” So if I didn’t make the caller understand what I needed to help them, then it’s my fault.

Then again, he goes on to say “But if his orders are clear, and the soldiers nevertheless disobey, then it is the fault of their officers.” I have written several articles for an internal newsletter about the procedures for reporting trouble all of which make the point that to help them, I need information and at this point, a vacation.

Let’s look at a hypothetical situation.
A manager tells one of their employees that the employee does not smile enough around other people when in the manager’s presence and this is disrespectful to the manager. (Note that it is when they are together around other people specifically, also note that the person doesn’t frown or make faces. They just have a casual look about them. Hypothetically you understand.) To further that point, the manager then states the employee needs to respect the manager’s “superiority” and it is not their fault they were promoted into this position rather than the employee. To finish this hypothetical discussion with a flourish, the manager also said that if the employee couldn’t do that, then they could move on.

Okay is it just me, or is this (no wait, I meant “would this be” not “is this” since this is purely hypothetical) a violation of a bunch of basic management/leadership principles? Not to mention border-line illegal.

So here is your question for the day, if you had to work for someone like this, would you come to work and “grin and bear it” as you pray daily for a lighting strike or would you smile brightly as you quit?

To dream that you are screaming, symbolizes anger and fear. It is an expression of your powerful emotions which you have kept pent up inside. I do have anger over having to go thru so much to find this info that most people have. I also fear finding, what will I find? Will it help me, hurt me?
To dream of your knees, symbolizes a level of support your may be receiving. It also indicates that you are feeling very emotional. Feelings of inadequacy and issues of power/control also come into play. You may have more than you can handle. I am feeling emotional , and lord knows, adoptees constantly have issues with power/control.
To dream that you are bleeding or losing blood, signifies that you are suffering from exhaustion or that you are feeling emotionally drained. Okay, I am feeling drained and a bit tired, but I’m getting my second wind now.
To see a bright light in your dream indicates that you need to move toward a higher level of awareness and feeling. Bright light dreams are sometimes common for those who are near death. Okay, other than the last part, I do want to move toward a higher level of awareness. Like being aware of where my blood comes from. On the death part, maybe it’s the death of the lost child in me?
So how weird is that? Dreams are such fragmentary things, so are they like listening to a medium? By giving vague comments they make them seem true as your mind grasps for meaning?
I want to know. I need to know. I deserve to know. I will know.

I dream, therefore I become. Cheryl Renée Grossman

I don’t usually remember my dreams. I mean, I must dream, and I awake with fragments but I can’t remember dreams the way many people seem to be able, with the exception of two. I didn’t put much stock in it but I checked out this site (http://www.dreammoods.com/ some of the keywords are in bold) and it was a bit of a shocker.
The first one I have had off and on for the last 10+ years that I can remember. I am in a room, which is sort of like a large greenhouse, walls of small rectangular windows and a curved glass ceiling. The windows are old and slightly opaque giving some light from the sun outside but not direct sunlight. The room has a large pool, which is rectangular as well, but with smaller rectangular sections running perpendicular that have steps into the dark water. The water isn’t really dirty, just dark. There is a large seemingly dead tree on one side with broken branches poking out like skeleton fingers and with the roots going into the ground and out into the water. It’s also hollow. Once, when I went swimming, I climbed up inside the tree. I get the vague sense that I probably shouldn’t be there or that feeling that keeps making you look over your shoulder, almost like the house is deserted, except the ghosts. I can see into the house it’s attached to but can only make out a large room that is open two floors and a circular stained glass window above a huge double door.

The second is me in a large empty room. I begin to scream, falling to my knees. It’s the sound of someone’s soul coming apart. Blood begins to drip from my eyes, nose and mouth until finally a pure white light bursts from them instead. It never ends, or at least I never see what happens to me, the dream just ends.