Empathy's for suckers.

So, my boss finally came back to work after having their first baby last week. To hear it from him, he was the one in labor, I'll probably be telling people he's too busy to talk next week because he's breast feeding.
Just when I was giving up hope that he would make his way to the office today - because the office is five blocks from his house, a trying commute, he strolled in, baby in tow. Apparently, his (trophy)wife, (in her twenties), is doing something right - as far as training men goes - because he brought the baby with him, so that she could sleep late and get a shower. I'm not sure who did more work, him or the baby.
The baby had a much more welcome reception, I can tell you that much.

Enough of them for a while.

FYI, on a personal note, I don't have kids, don't plan to, so I don't see the big hub-bub about two people procreating. I especially don't see the necessity for the man to be off work for a whole week - soon to be more... but that's me.
I also am notoriously known as not being the most empathetic person alive, unlike the bleeding heart suckers I am surrounded by who love to throw money and sympathy all over the place. And, I have a pet peeve about being manipulated by guilt, can't stand it, in fact it incurs the opposite reaction in me than other people. Guilt trips are totally obvious to me and extremely repugnant, I have no time for them. I have a mother who is anti-guilt as well, which explains why my father and brother have never helped around the house, since we know that guilt is the only true way to get men to do things for you.

Lets go back to work for a minute... this reminded me of a situation a few months ago...

My boss and his wife own a couple of rental properties, which, I have been granted the pleasure of managing for them, along with the parent company - the one I was hired to run. A few months ago, one of the properties became unexpectedly vacated, meaning that the tenant called up two days before the rent was due and said he'd be moving out, breaking his one year lease after only about four months. No problem - at least he called - right.
We immediately started advertising the apartment for rent and got a lot of lookers. However, there were a few unforeseen problems. The previous tenant had a dog. A really stinky dog. Because even after I had the carpets, vinyl and tile steam cleaned and deodorized, it still stunk like wet dog - which I have to say, people did notice. We also had the apartment re-painted, which the painter had to go back FOUR times to re-do. Each of the first three times he had just tried to 'patch' the paint, and only did the parts that were damaged, then when the paint dried it revealed that the color didn't match, finally on the fourth visit, he just painted the entire thing. Ok, problem under control, just a little stinky.
So, these people called me from a motel one day, saying that they wanted to see the apartment and asked the basic questions, how much is the rent, security, etc. I make an appointment with them and go over so meet them and show the place. At which time they began to explain to me that they are living in a motel and wanted to move in like the next day or something so they didn't have to pay another week at the motel. About now is when I started to get a hinky feeling about this couple, because they are not living in the motel because they're from out of town or anything. And believe me, I can understand going thru hard times and I'd never fault anybody because of it. I'm all about equal opportunity, etc. etc. Until the couple started to ask me whether or not we'd be pulling a credit report or not, and they told me the rest without me even asking, the 'wife' didn't have any credit whatsoever, uh huh, and the 'husband' had 'bad' credit due to breaking his foot and being out of work a few years prior. I probably would have gone along with any other excuse besides bodily injury. Having broken several toes (from horses stepping on my feet) and one hand (punching a school bus, that's another story) and tearing every ligament in one of my shoulders, and working thru (often before seeking medical treatment if treated at all) these injuries, I determined that it was almost impossible to absolutely destroy one's credit solely from a broken foot. So I asked the so-and-so's to come by the office and fill out a credit application, which I had no intention of using, it was for the sole purpose of letting the boss and his dad have a look at them, so that they could help in the decision of whether to rent to them or not. This is a family business after all. Also, having rented our own properties, I know from experience that it is always harder to get people OUT than it is to get them IN. The family took a look and they too veto-ed the couples' rental application hands down, so now it is unanimous - not just me - remember that. The woman calls the next day and I tell her straight out that it's not going to work out and (in my mind) we have parted company.
Until the following Monday... when I am ambushed by a very aggressive (pushy) elderly (old) lady in my office asking my boss a bunch of questions about the apartment. Apparently, and I'm telling you this in retro-spect of course, this elderly woman is one of my boss' neighbors and Mrs. so-and-so cleans her house for her. She approached my boss while he was out in his yard over the weekend, saying that so-and-so wanted to rent his apartment and that she would vouch for them, but could he lower the rent and have the driveway repaired, which he agreed to all, not knowing that so-and-so was the couple that he himself had veto-ed the week before. We agree to her terms - maybe since she was pounding on my desk and I called the so-and-so's and let them know that we had reconsidered due to this woman's offer to guarantee that they pay their rent - I'm not sure how she planned to facilitate this. I said that I would call back when the apartment was ready (at this point we were only on the 2nd painting) and when I had the rental agreement written up. This was around noon. At two o'clock, my boss', his dad and I were all meeting in his office when the phone rang and he answered on speaker phone (possibly the deadliest invention of the 21st century), it's the old lady, and she wants to know why I haven't had the people in to sign the lease agreement yet. It gets better, and she just wanted to let my boss know that 'his secretary' - that's me (it makes my skin curl when people call me that, I have two business degrees and multiple other certifications - possibly more education and experience than anyone in the building) 'I just wanted to let you know, your secretary (that's me), was very rude to me today and to Mrs. so-and-so (I guess yes ma'am-ing someone is considered rude here) and that if she worked for me I would fire that girl right away.' She went on for another minute or two, and I'm sure if you can imagine my face, you can imagine the look on my face. Needless to say, I'm still living with the nightmares(sarcasm). You might be surprised to hear that it wasn't the first time I had someone say that about me, of course before they said it to me, this old lady thought she was going around my back. I think that my boss and his dad were more embarrassed for me than I myself was embarrassed, but I fought off the urge to yell obscenities at the telephone in front of them.
We didn't rent to them in the end, fortunately, leaving the so-and-so's high and dry - I never thought I'd say it but amen for nepotism.
Just another day in the life!