What IS it with our office and laughably bad temp workers? Our newest temp is doing my old reception job -- which, let me tell you, left me with A LOT of down time. Not much to learn with that job, even on your first day.

Unless, you're LAUREL.

I give Laurel a few things to do -- say two labels to type, three letters to mail out, and a file to label. Not much. And even on my worst day (or any seemingly normal person's worst day) that amount of work wouldn't take more than ten minutes. Fifteen, tops. Not only did it take Laurel more than an hour and a half to finish this, I found out (after she'd gone home, of course) that she left the letters AND the file to label on the desk to do tomorrow. Which means that in approximately 90 minutes, Laurel's only work-related accomplishment was to type two labels.

TYPE. TWO. LABELS.

I honestly don't know what she does with her time. I wish I had a hidden camera, because I'm intensely curious. She's not like Floyd or even like Floyd's Replacement, she's an entity all her own. She's SPECIAL. I honestly think she might've ridden the short bus to school (in which case I sorta feel bad for being so annoyed with her).

Case in point: Yesterday, I asked her to look something up for me on the computer. Twenty minutes later, I came back up to her desk to check on something entirely unrelated, and she took that opportunity to ask me a question (so far, so good you say? Just wait). I have one of those mouse pads with the built-in wrist rest, and this wrist rest is much higher and gushier than the flat pad part on which the mouse sits and rolls.

Laurel's Question: She said the mouse we broken because it wouldn't go down, it would only go up. I took a look and, you guessed it, she had the mouse butted up against the edge of the wrist rest. I explained the problem, thinking she would get a bit of a chuckle out of something so simple and silly (and moronic, really), but honestly people SHE STILL DIDN'T get it. I had to physically pick up the mouse and put it back down at the top of the mouse pad to demonstrate how a mouse works.

At this point I thought maybe she was just one of those ladies who isn't familiar with a computer -- a die hard typewriter kinda gal, which would explain her confusion over the way a mouse works.

Then Today: She asked me if she could write out labels and addresses because she didn't understand our typewriter.

Didn't UNDERSTAND our typewriter.

I ask you this: WHAT is there to "understand" about a typewriter? You put the paper in, you type, you take the paper out. The end.

I'm beginning to think there are no good temps in the Bay Area. Either that, or our office has been cursed by the Notoriously Stupid Temp Fairy.