8 January 2002

Hey! Guess what! It's Kris' birthday today! Everyone wave and wish Kris a Happy Birthday!

Yesterday didn't improve significantly. When I got home from work, the cat was hopping on three legs again. Ashby managed to get online just long enough to tell me that his internet connection is messed up and he keeps getting bumped about every fifteen minutes, with reconnect times of an hour or more - so we shouldn't really count on him making it to the Hall.

The grocery store had moved the rice, leaving Matt and I wandering around dumbly, insisting, "They can not not have rice!" And as we were loading the groceries into the car, the Dr. Pepper box ripped, spilling a half-dozen or so cans into the parking lot.

Quite simply, it was a Monday.

I'm hoping today will be better.

More payroll follies: Since Mike didn't take any leave during the last pay period, and since he really is single with no dependents, neither of the most prevalent payroll bugs hit him. (That is - leave taken during the last pay period was taken twice; and many people with deductions were listed as not having any.)

So they found another way to mess with Mike's head. When his stub came in the mail this past weekend, it enclosed a direct deposit notification for more than forty thousand dollars.

Now, Mike's a good programmer, and it wouldn't surprise me if he made somewhat more than I do.

But not, I suspect, that much more. The Company is cheap, after all. But he walked over to his bank and requested a balance - they really did deposit over forty thousand dollars in his account.

He eventually figured out what he thinks the error was: Instead of multiplying his "hours worked" by "rate of pay" to get his salary, he thinks they multiplied "hours worked this pay period" by "hours worked this year" by "rate of pay."

We're not sure how they're going to go about fixing this. Can they call back the taxes that were paid? Or the social security payment that came out of the check? What about they money they deposited in his 401(k) account? (And what about the interest it earns while he has it?)

I expect, however they fix it, they're going to screw him over. But it was good for a fair amount of levity yesterday. ("Hey Mike? Can I borrow ten thousand bucks?" "Sure, no problem!")

--Liz