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Occupational Suicide, Chapter #2,481

Today, I was asked to write a first draft of an email with an update on what my department has been up to recently. The final email will soon be sent to the entire company. It was my job to get the ball rolling.

And I rolled that ball. I rolled it to the tune of two-and-a-half pages, including section headers. And footnotes. Eight of ’em. Footnotes.

“Tomorrow Never Datas”

Actually, that might be the problem. Or at least, a really strong indicator of the problem. Which is me. Obviously.

I won’t bore you with the actual text of this update. But I will share those section headers — and the footnotes. These are actually real. I just sent the email. Noodly appendage to god.

Sections of the Update Email to Communicate to the Company What We Do:

Data Hard

Data Hard with a Vengeance

Live and Let Data

To Live and Data in L.A.

Tomorrow Never Datas

(Did I mention our department works with data? That’s kind of important. We do data. I think most people in the company are aware of this.

If not, they will be soon.)

And the footnotes:

(1) There aren’t actually any Easter eggs. But don’t tell the people who don’t bother to read footnotes.

(2) In fairness, we’ve written scripts that do most of the work. We barely stake any personal pains over this any more.

(3) Or pizzas slipped under the door. We’re not so picky.

(4) Hah!

(5) We are so sorry. Yes, we know. So sorry.

(6) Happily, the “five-second rule” works much better with a hard drive full of data than a bite-sized candy. Though both taste worse after you step on them.

(7) Well, not all our activities. We never(8) post anything to the mailing list about our writing gigs or orienteering events, for instance.

(8) Mostly. Mostly never.

So my question is this: Should I be worried that my boss will fire me the second she’s done reading the email?

Or should I be more worried that she’ll send it out, everyone will read it, and the entire organization will fire me, possibly involving actual fire?

This whole “business savvy” thing. I do not think it means what I think it means.