Remember me mentioning my wife some months back where I said she has been suffering from a long term illness? She has been at home recuperating (on the mend, btw) and was expecting to go back to work at the end of this month. She got a call from her workplace asking her to come in for her yearly employee evaluation. When she arrived, she was ushered into the bosses' office and told her position had been eliminated and she was being let go. They then told her she was going to be given a severance package, handed her a box to put her things in, and sent out the door.
As background, she was the office manager when the company started nine years ago and has seen the place quintuple in size and business in the years to present day. She went without vacations or pay raises for the first four years with the understanding that when the company grew she'd get her reward then (and in fairness, they have compensated her well since then).
To make a long story shorter, it appears that the severance package is more hush money to keep her from making waves to the labor board than a gift for nine years of good solid work (not that she'd even ever consider doing something like that).
The upshot is, she isn't really upset or annoyed since her illness has made her reevaluate her priorities in life-- and work isn't very high up there now that the kids are gone out of the house and my income is more than enough for everything we have and do. I just think it was... interesting... how it all came about today.
Totem