Days like this make me appreciate high capacity magazines on semi-automatic rifles.

Last night I had a little talk with Filipin-Pho.

This is nothing new. Even though I've shown many times that I can tell what he's been doing (or not doing, more specifically), he still slacks off when he thinks nobody can see him and I've got to reprimand him for it every time.

Last night though, I had to talk to him about missing an alarm that came two minutes before his shift was done. He didn't answer the alarm, and as a result didn't respond to it.

And why?

Because he was already gone. Here's why:

Standard policy is to show up fifteen minutes before your shift starts. The idea being that the person you're relieving can brief you on what's been happening, and to advise you of any ongoing situations you may need to know about. It also gives you time to get your uniform on, go to the bathroom, and all that other good stuff so that you're actually ready to do your job when the cuckoo comes out of the clock.

Note that you don't get paid for that fifteen minutes. That irritates a lot of people. But if you flip it around, then you're not really ready to do your job if you show up right at the last second, are you? If you're not in uniform and you act as security, you're in violation of your license. If you can't assume your duties because the guy you're relieving hasn't explained the situation yet, then there's a gap. There are lots of little reasons.

Filipin-Pho figures that he has to spend eight hours "working", and that's it. And since he takes transit and often ends up at the site half an hour before he's scheduled to work... yeah. He figures he can abandon ship half an hour before he's supposed to.

Nobody relieves him in the morning. He's got to stay right until the bitter end, and then let himself out. We have a contract and the site is paying us to be there until then. I told him as much.

He went very cold and sullen, and would only say "That's bullshit." He stopped answering me too, and just kept staring at nothing with a set jaw. Oh, and once he said that he'll finish out the month and he's gone. Then back to the silent treatment.

It kind of made me want to stick a Milk Bone down his throat and a hungry dog up his ass, but I refrained. Where was I going to get a Milk Bone?

I feel his pain. When I was doing the graveyard I used to end up there half an hour before shift too, and since there was usually very little to be briefed on, Barney would make good his escape. Now that I do afternoons, I still get there half an hour (usually) or so before shift, but one Filipin-Pho is on site and briefed I leave. It's pretty standard practice.

If he came later, I'd stay until then with nary a complaint. But if he shows up, he's on duty and that's that.

On the walk home, I called up Operations and asked if I needed to fill out an incident report when I have a pissy guard. The guy asked me to elaborate, which I did, and he said that I didn't, but I should write up a note to Cookie Monster just so that if something further happens and this is the catalyst, we can point back to it.

Then he asked for the guy's name, which I gave.

Ops: "Oh, that guy."

Rimmy: "You recognise the name? Something I should know about?"

Ops: "I can't quite remember, let me pull up his file... ah yes. He abandoned post when he was working at Vancouver General Hospital."

Rimmy: "You're kidding me!"

Ops: "Nope. Left the triage centre without warning, and in the middle of a phone call from us asking about it shut off his phone."

Rimmy: "Damn!"

Ops: "You know what? Fuck this guy, write up an incident report and I'll have mobile pick it up from you tomorrow."

Rimmy: "Works for me."

Ops: "Night dude."

Now... why exactly do they send me these duds? Especially with a documented history like this?

He better not have ducked the fog during that shift. I'll have his balls on a plate if he did.