PETER ERIK DU RIETZ

WICKED NOTES
 
Who hasn’t occasionally been irritated with colleagues and bosses? After all, our place of work usually forces us to cooperate with people to whom we, under normal circumstances, would never even say hello. Rather like in the military service, come to think of it. Add to that the fact that one often has to work in groups or ”teams” and participate in various teambuilding projects, and the feeling of annoyance is immediately off to a whole new level. Especially if it takes place during weekends, thus stealing valuable time from things one would much rather be doing than shooting with bow and arrow together with Betsy Lardass from Accounting or paddling a stupid canoe with the remarkably tedious ornithology freak Ken Dingbat from Sales.
 
My short story, Wicked notes, came about when I went through the stuff I’ve written and jotted down regarding moronic things I’ve encountered in my professional life — which, for the most part, has actually been quite pleasant and trouble-free, and not at all as bad as what people have suffered elsewhere. Take, for example, the company that gave their employees cell phones but, fearing theft, chained each employee's phone to the desk in their respective cubicle. Or the company that felt their employees spent too much time in the bathroom and subsequently distributed restroom tickets to their ”human resources.” With ten tickets per person each week, management counted on the employees visiting the restrooms no more than twice a day, cleverly assuming that no-one wished to run out of tickets by, say, Thursday morning. To add insult to injury, on the same day the restroom ticket scheme was implemented, the company brought in a lecturer who spoke at length about ”The importance of self-worth at the workplace.” Which, once again, proves that management is a bunch of banana-munching morons who live on another planet and don’t even have the sense or common decency to stay there. (Obviously, I'm not suggesting that all managers are idiots. Just the ones I’ve met, worked for, heard of or seen on television).
 
Each memory that came back to me upon reading those old notes and letters made me increasingly irritated, until I finally felt it my civic duty to write this short story. I think most of us can relate to much of it. Someone like the main character, Gunnar Svensson, can be found at most companies, I think, and it wasn’t until I finished writing Wicked notes that a rather unpleasant thought occurred to me: what if Gunnar Svensson is, in fact, me!
 
I hope it’s not as bad as all that. In fact, my sole ambition with Wicked notes is to entertain you and hopefully bring a smile to your face. And finally, please keep in mind that in this particular case, fiction can never be as unreal as reality. Unfortunately.