So today, thanks to snow, the unit is empty. At 9, when I got in, only one issue editor was here -- and no one else. Out of, now, 10 other people. A little while later, the most useless girl in the world wandered in, plunked down, and... checked e-mail. Surfed the web. Made popcorn. Chatted electronically with her friends.

Did I mention we had 50 documents in the queue? Yeah, so here I am doing all the work while this chick who's getting paid at least ten grand more than me is socializing. Okay, it's par for the course for her, but on a day like today, where it's me (and a trainee or two) and her, that sucks.

So I fire off an e-mail to my boss, protesting this in as diplomatic yet straightforward terms as I can. My boss responds with, in not as many words, the following:

1. Have I directly told the girl to do her job, yet?
2. Her method of dealing with this particular problem would be to forward my e-mail to her.

I think I'm getting annoyed at the wrong person for abrogating her job. You're expecting me, a fellow employee with no power, authority, or even seniority, to tell someone else to do the job she's being paid to do? You won't take any action against her, at all? Your method of resolving this is to forward an e-mail I wrote as a complaint to her as if this is somehow solving the problem? (I KNOW the last one was a Dilbert cartoon...)

Aah, it's my own fault. I know my boss is useless; I haven't actually ever seen HER do work, come to think of it, and the unit actually runs better when she's not here. I shouldn't have expected any more than what I go.