The Yom Kippur War

About a month ago, I moved from a training position to my real position in the field...unofficially. As a result, I got a new boss. We shall call him Uncle Albert. Uncle Al has been demoted both in title and wage grade twice within the last three years. He does not understand the sales and market aspect of the automotive industry, which earns the company 95% of its profits. I requested Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur off, as well as the October 1-5 so I could go home. He said yes and I had confirmed this several times...over a month ago. He said it would be fine if I take Friday, September 21 and October 1-5 off. I only have five vacation days as a new hire, which I applied to my trip home, and bought plane tickets for Friday, September 28, and Sunday, October 7. Everything was going fine...until today at 5:00pm. Uncle Albert said he wanted to chat with me. He asked me to explain what Yom Kippur was. I told him it was the holiest day of the year for the Jewish people and was our day of atonement. Uncle Al then told me I could only have Yom Kippur off if I used a vacation day. I told him that I was planning on using all my vacation for the first week in October to see my family. He said, "Okay, I will see you tomorrow." Wow.

So what do I do? I have come to the conclusion that all I can really do is go into work and smile and act like everything is okay...that and I went out and bought an exceptional bottle of wine and drank it all.