> Siiiiiiigh.
>

I had a d'oh moment today at work.

First of all, let me say I am not given to outbursts. My behavior at work is professional.
I am calm. I am quiet. I have even been described as serene.

But not today. Today was the Thursday of hell, the Thursday of the phone that wouldn't stop ringing, the Thursday of the foot high stack of documents that wouldn't go away, the Thursday of too many co-workers on vacation and not enough remaining bodies to cover the gaps.

And, of course, it is the day my one of my least favorite clients calls with yet another problem.
I say "another problem", but it is really the same problem over and over again, caused primarily by the way the client insists on doing business. He cannot be convinced there are easier ways to handle this kind of transaction, even though things always end up in a crisis. Sigh. Eventually we solved the problem with seven phone calls and a wad of cash.

After the last phone call, I exasperatedly blurted out "I HATE THIS ACCOUNT!" fairly loudly to my co-worker who sits across from me.

Unfortunately, I had forgotten that this was also the Thursday that our company's brand new CEO was visiting from out of town. He was, of course, standing about three feet away from me in the aisle directly behind my workstation, along with our regional manager, my department manager, and a Fortune-500 company representative who was a potential client.

koala"did someone say 'bad timing'?"mom