Cancelled Long Weekend

Time: 11:50pm
Mood: Pissed (but in love! It's V-day after all!)
Song of the moment: Fergie - Clumsy

A couple of months ago, the Canadian gov't decided to add another statituory holiday to their list - Family Day. This was to promote time spent with family.

When my coworkers and I turned on our computers and checked our emails this morning, we were greeted with this note from our executives:

"It has recently come to our attention that the majority of *company name* customers will be working on Family Day (February 18, 2008). Knowing that we need to fulfill our customer requirements and meet customer demand, we have made a decision to remain open on Family Day (February 18th) and substitute this public holiday for another day.

All employees are asked to report to work as usual on Monday Feb. 18th, and instead observe Monday March 24th as a paid holiday when *company name* will be closed. We realize that this is a late decision on the company’s part, and therefore this is not “mandatory”. All employees have the following options:

1) Observe the holiday substitution on March 24th as outlined above, OR
2) Take Feb. 18th as a paid holiday; however March 24th will be an unpaid day off as *company name* will be closed on this day"

Now this pisses me off for several reasons. First of all - isn't it a little late to tell us to come into work on Monday, after everyone has made long weekend plans? Secondly, they're making us choose between coming in on Monday, or to dock a day's pay if we do take it off. And lastly, they're missing the whole point of this holiday. It's called Family Day because we're supposed to spend it with family (even though most of us wouldn't, that's still not the point). Ok fine we are still getting a day off later in the year, but my other family members don't get the same day off as me - how am I going to spend time with them?!

This shows me exactly what my company thinks about where family should fit into life. I hope I never absorb that mentality - please shoot me if I do.