On Dropping A Bomb

So I gave my two weeks notice at work Tuesday. Wow. Talk about "deer in the headlights" looks. Apparently my employer was thinking that this job hunt was going to last until sometime in 2007, and is not prepared. They already know who will be replacing me (the Jedi Apprentice), but it's not yet known who will replace him, so he's still doing his old role and the knowledge transfer has yet to start. I also put a bee in their bonnet about the wisdom of giving me a severance package, even though I am leaving on my timetable and terms. Even though, to casual observers it looks like I am the Alpha and Omega of this whole deal, the employer here has done a considerable amount of pushing to get me out the door. As it's consistent with my plans, I'm not worked up over it, but the conduct of my allegedly benevolent employer is shameful- to the extent that my boss (the source of this crappiness, I suspect) volunteered to me that she felt badly about how I'm being treated WHILE IT CONTINUES. Honest to God, this is the embodiment of "until morale improves, the beatings will continue".

I began making some calls to contacts and spreading the word that I'm leaving town and will be back in touch with new contact information once it's all sorted out, and damn if I didn't get an earful about my soon to be former employer, and how widely despised we are. I'm not naming names, but we are a non-profit that gives away money. How on earth we screw that up to the extent that people are pissed off at us is astonishing.

I'm supposed to be doing a knowledge transfer for my replacement in the meantime, but he's not here, so I'm just hanging loose reading blogs and looking at rental properties in Seattle. Good work I guess. I've worked places where, once you turn in your notice, they escort you out and pay the two weeks off, but no such luck here. In fact, I expect that they are going to need an awful lot of direction and help from me going forward, and unless they come up with a respectable amount of cash, I'll be inconveniently unavailable. It's been suggested to me that they are considering an arrangement wherein they would pay me my previous consulting rate to answer help calls, and that's too bad because I never said I was interested in or amenable to that model. Plus, to make matters more significant, the Jedi Apprentice is leaving on vacation in November to Europe for 10 days or such. Whoops. I guess that means contractors. Oh, but wait a moment- there are offbeat proprietary systems here that no consultant would find familiar or understandable. This shows every potential to become "interesting" (in the sense of the Chinese curse- "may you live in interesting times").

That's all secondary though, and I sit here I'm not worrying about the current employer, or even the new employer so much (I think the new gig is a good fit, and the folks all seem sharp). I'm preoccupied with the sale of the house and how and where I'm going to stay in Seattle while the house in Colorado still needs the mortgage paid. Eventually , my 401K cash out will come through and I'll be financially able to support two rent/mortgage payments (even though I hate the idea), but until then things are very tight. I can just feel the ulcer brewing...