The ongoing, and quite protracted saga of my predicament at work seems to be heading toward something that looks like a climax. I can only hope now that, metaphorically, the earth moves for me as a result of some truly extended foreplay.
The return to work this past week after the Christmas break got off to a raucous start, the boss and I had a falling out within a few minutes of him arriving at work – the kind where I finally grabbed my coat from the back of my chair and made for the door.
Anyway, cue immediate and extreme back-peddling by the half-wit that impersonates an IT manager and the remainder of my week was seen out with the minimum of contact between us and incredible politeness on his part. For my part, I think remaining monosyllabic is definitely the way to keep the situation deliberately frosty and on edge. It so much more of an advantage when people think you're volatile and need to tread carefully.
The laughable part of it is, the boss probably thinks my reaction is because of the stress of the situation at the moment – to be honest, I'm thriving on the workload – no, its because I could happily draw blood from his face.
I don't think, however, that I have done my position any harm at all... 
It seems the predicament of the 'my job is redundant, but I'm not' situation has been accelerated by this bit of scare-mongering on my part (although I was actually walking out for real...) and the result is, I now have a meeting with both the IT and Personnel managers tomorrow to discuss my future role.
This is quite daunting a prospect because the Personnel manager is actually my boss' boss and a cunning shit to boot; not necessarily smart and intelligent in raw terms, but despite the near unanimous opinion that he's a piece of work, he has survived in his post for quite some years now.
Still, he's never had to deal with the wall of silence and eyeballing that I can present when needed so I do at least have that in my back pocket, that and the fact I'm holding all the Aces at the moment. I am the 'lynch pin' between our company and the out-sourcers who now do the job that my office used to do – and because of the hurried nature of the transfer of duties, the outsourcing folks don't know chuff all about actually running our systems without near constant help and tips - and neither does the boss or anyone else still employed at the company.
It has also filtered back to me (after the gossip about my near quitting disseminated outward) that others in the department fear that without me, the whole of the remaining operation could go to outsourcing. My comment to that was, 'its like a big red button marked do not push' – ooh, the temptation! Still, when all is said and done, whether I like them or not, work colleagues are just that 'work' colleagues and business is business: my final decision if it comes to leaving won't be swayed by any potential outcomes after the event.
...And I have at last, I believe, reached a decision on the idea of a future role that has so far been put out to me verbally and to which I've been deliberately very very careful not to pass any comment either way on. In short, my answer is no.
So, if my job role is no longer needed and I don't wish to accept the job so far muted, where to next? I think tomorrow could be a very interesting conversation – especially as I have been advised to perhaps suggest what I would like to do instead.
Personally, I think that advice was double-edged. Well intentioned on the part of the colleague who spoke with me in some respects but (and here's where my innate paranoia creeps in) not without some degree of self-interest or posturing in the grand scheme of office politics perhaps? Maybe he's concerned about the expansion of the outsourcing if I should pull the rug out from under everything..?
The only quibble I have now, is whether my employer can find some technicality to wriggle out of paying me redundancy if I chose not to accept a reasonable alternative role. And even if they can, do I really give a shit anymore?
I think I should best finish up here and go and type a letter of resignation to take with me to the meeting – if nothing else and the discussions begin to draw all advantage away from me, it couldn't hurt to have the Hiroshima of bargaining postures in my pocket ready for emergencies!
