Monthly Archive for February, 2007

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celebrity assistant soapbox: kimmy walther

Published on February 22, 2007 in Celebrity Assistant Soapbox. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

Anybody happen to watch Anna Nicole’s reality show? Remember her beleaguered, purple-haired assistant, Kimmy? We’ve been wondering what happened to her, and we may have just found out.

www.kimberlywalter.com

Or not. Who knows if the site is real, but on it she claims that she has tapes of her own that will make Howard K. Stern shit his drawers. She also names the real father of Dannielynn. (Oh, snap.)

Gotta love a disgruntled assistant who starts her own blog as revenge.

tip of the week: know when to fold ‘em

Published on February 21, 2007 in Horror Stories and Tip of the Week. 0 Comments

STA reader Anna in Raleigh, NC sent us a story that also inspired this week’s Tip. Her tale has all the elements of a classic horror story: patronizing asshole boss, uncool company, sycophantic secretary, and a narrow escape. Luckily, by invoking one of the all-time great songs, Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler,” Anna wisely figured out when it was time to run, and she didn’t waste any time counting her money at the table.

I was interviewing for a job last week. In hindsight, I probably should’ve run for the door the moment he shook my hand and called me Anastasia. Or maybe when he disclosed that part of the job responsibilities would include teaching safe driving courses to people trying to get out of speeding tickets — something not mentioned in the ad. Either way, by the time he called me lazy for working at a weekly newspaper, I knew this wouldn’t be a good fit. The particular job I was interviewing for was in PR and magazine editing, so I asked my prospective boss — let’s call him Mr. Bing — if he had a background in newspapers. Mr. Bing ticked off a couple papers I’d never heard of and said, “All dailies though. I never had the, uh, leisure of working at a weekly.” Then he asked me how fast I can write. (Please keep in mind that the magazine this company produces comes out every other month.)

Once the interview was over, we exchanged pleasantries and I went on my way figuring that he wouldn’t want me back, but even if he did, that I wasn’t willing to uproot my life for this guy. Several days later as I was heading up the sidewalk to my office, Mr. Bing’s secretary called. He wanted to set up a second interview with me. Excuse me? I told her that I’d have to pass, something I assume she’d never heard before by the shocked way she asked me why not. For the rest of the day I had the lyrics to “The Gambler” cycling through my head, “You got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em. Know when to walk away, know when to run.”

And though it was a completely wasted day, going on a shitty interview does have an up side. At least temporarily, I’ve found that I don’t hate my current job as much as I thought and frankly, I’ve got it pretty good. I guess sometimes all it takes to appreciate what you’ve got is a little glimpse at hell.

time to trade in your job

Published on February 21, 2007 in Horror Stories. 0 Comments

As the only junior in a group on a trading floor, I didn’t have one boss, I had ten.  Each one more was egotistical, arrogant, and backstabbing than the next.  Starting at 6 AM, I would be bombarded with emails and phone calls (mind you, these people literally sat NEXT to me, and there were no barricades) to do some other mindless task, like finding phone numbers on the home directory page.  It didn’t help that our actual desk assistant was completely incompetent, and thus I was given 90% of his work in addition to mine.  Still, nothing I did was ever really good enough.  It wouldn’t have been so bad if people were actually grateful for my work, or took time to teach me something or even just treated me like a human being.  I must have had a thousand mental breakdowns in the bathrooms every day.

Then one day, it was ”Administrative Professionals’ Day.”  My official boss calls me over and says, “I need you to go to Godiva.  Buy Alex [the desk assistant] a $50 box of chocolates.  Save the receipt.”  I was floored.   But I did what she asked with the perennial smile on my face and my “Sure!  Can do!” attitude. –Submitted by Melanie, New York City

omg im lol @ this

Published on February 20, 2007 in Junk Drawer. 0 Comments

If you’re anything like most assistants, you’re probably addicted to email and instant messenger. However, this means that you sometimes feel the urge to have cybersex with your ex while also putting together an Excel spreadsheet. [Trust us: this is a bad idea.]

Yahoo offers this list of tips for safely IMing while at work. The part about getting Trillian is right on point. However, they seem to think that office drones don’t want to get fired, while our evidence points conclusively in the opposite direction.

Check the story out here.

workplace distraction: office toys

Published on February 20, 2007 in Junk Drawer. 1 Comment

We’re always looking for cheeky ways to deal with cubelife. Luckily we discovered office distraction stable, Office Playground. They’ve got a myriad of typical office gadget goofiness, including Mr. Potatohead, basketball hoops, a squirt gun that looks like a fire extinguisher (that one might not be a good idea), but there are a couple other gems we thought you might appreciate.

Croquet-in-a-box might be a nice choice for the more civilized servant, and they have plenty of stretchy things for stress-cases to pull and squeeze. They have 14 different Zen Gardens, including this one that makes us think of a certain Cabana Boy.

Oh, and they have voodoo dolls, in case you want to try out that spell we gave you. Not that we’re condoning the black arts or anything.

happy president’s day

Published on February 19, 2007 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

Are you at work right now? Wow, that sucks. Tell your boss it’s very unpatriotic for you to have to work on this fine national holiday. If that doesn’t work, tell him that by making you work today, what he’s really doing is not supporting the troops in Iraq. If he throws the whole “that’s on Veteran’s day” thing back at you, remind him that you didn’t get that day off either and that, frankly, you’re not sure how he can run such an un-American business. And maybe stomp off in a huff. And maybe threaten to write a letter to Homeland Security. Or maybe not.

We’ll be back tomorrow with goodies galore.

office game: toss the boss

Published on February 16, 2007 in Junk Drawer. 0 Comments

Over at Save the Assistants HQ, we’re big fans of anything that lets us slack off during the day, whether that means fun websites, toys, or drinking games. Today’s find was sent in by STA reader Bill- The Boss Toss.

It’s better than a Bobblehead, more fun than Stretch Armstrong, and a very good way to relieve your tension. Keep one on your desk for emergencies.

week in review

Published on February 16, 2007 in Week in Review. 0 Comments

The week of love went fairly well for us, especially now that we’re capping it off with a three-day weekend.

- We got an insider’s look at trade shows and learned all about how Flaxtrolls feel about Chinese people.

- A clever assistant learns to work the Post-It in his favor.

- Cupid hit us right in our happy, glowing hearts with some awesome news.

- And what week would be complete without some sort of celebrity train wreck? This time, Brit-Brit’s assistant speaks out.

We hope all assistants are able to honor the founding fathers this weekend with a work-free Monday.

britney spears’ ex-assistant speaks out

Published on February 15, 2007 in Celebrity Assistant Soapbox. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Confession time: I am one of the twenty-seven people who actually watched Britney and K.Fed’s reality show. It was horrific and I couldn’t make it past the first episode, but I did get enough time to feel sorry for Britney’s assistant, Felicia, aka Fee. The story on Fee is that she was a friend of Britney’s mom who ended up being little Brit-Brit’s mother figure. She endured a lot of nonsense, like Britney coming up with inane rhymes such as “Felicia Ann Culotta/she likes to fuck a lotta!”

Um. Right. So, that said, Fee has called out her former employer for the latter’s outrageous activity. This is the woman who had to spend months of her life on tour with Britney and K.Fed before they got married, OK? I’m amazed she’s even this coherent. Check out the open letter from Fee to Britney here.

london calling

Published on February 15, 2007 in Horror Stories. 0 Comments

I serve as an assistant for 2 people (twice the fun?). During the recent snow in London one of them was stuck at Heathrow and called me to find him a flight out. I explained that the flights were delayed or canceled all across the board, but told him I’d see what I can do. After working the phones and the internet for almost and hour, I finally found a flight out on another airline, but they fly out of Stansted, and Stansted only, and they only had one flight left for the day. I went ahead and booked the ticked, then called my boss back to let him know. Of course I was then yelled at for not getting a flight out of Heathrow, even though I had figured out how to take the train to Stansted. Right before hanging up though I suggested that he try talking to the airline employees at the airport (novel thought, right?). Of course that didn’t go over well, but I hung up, and since it was time for my lunch break I left and let his calls go to voicemail. While I’m at lunch boss #2 calls and says boss #1 is on the phone and needs the details of the flight out of Stansted. Boss #2 sounds confused, but I tell him all the info and the reservation # are on a post-it on my desk. I’ll always win! -Submitted by Noah, New York City