Gulp.

LauraT25

Forgive me, this is long.

Monday evening my lab got an e-mail that we need to be very careful with our spending, because money is tight.  This is not unusual for some labs, but our lab is honestly kind of careless, so it made me a little concerned.  Our funding is up in the air right now, and it worries me that my boss is worried.  I'm not far enough along to graduate if our lab loses money, and I've known people who have been seriously screwed.

Yesterday, my boss called a tech into his office...and fired him.  Then he called a post-doc into his office, and I assume did the same (she didn't say anything to anyone, but she ran off for an hour, came back for two seconds to grab her coat and left).  It was majorly awkward because the tech is a loudmouth and, even though my boss told him he can just stay home for the next two weeks and still get paid, he stuck around talking about his resume, finding a job, how he's going to pay bills, etc.  If he does that for the next two weeks I will bash my head into a wall.  Both of these people deserved to be fired, but my boss is non-confrontational and will keep the worst dead weight around.

Now, I'm really really worried that the situation is serious.  Also, I'm a little nervous that he's going to be mad at me for being so behind on my exams (which is mostly his fault, but the most recent three months have been because of wedding, holidays, and Jeff's surgery) and for taking off so much time - he told me to take as much time as I needed, but in this light I'm thinking it looks pretty bad.  We're supposed to be meeting sometime this week, hopefully today - when he asked I figured it was just normal stuff, but in light of the last two 'meetings' he's had...eep.

stonkey

Sending you good vibes and hoping for the best! Ugh ... sending good thoughts so hard!!!!

sunshine_day_dreams

Yikes!  How far does it set you back from graduation if the lab loses funding?  That sucks, dude.  I'm sorry.  Hopefully trimming some of the fat, so to speak, will be enough and everyone else will be able to stay.  Crossing my fingers and sending good vibes to you.  Hopefully he just wants to chat about normal work stuff later.  Try not to stress it.

Ferdy2584

praying that you don't have to go through what they did in your  meeting. Maybe he will just cut your hours???? Sending KV your way muffin.

LauraT25

Thanks everyone   I will let you know how the meeting goes, but I already feel better because my lab manager assured me that the boss has no issues with me.  Whew.

sunshine_day_dreams

That's a big relief!  Maybe just assure your boss in your meeting that you know you've been missing a bit more work than you'd like lately, etc. but you're on it and going to work harder, blah, blah, blah.  Just to CYA, ya know?

LauraT25

sunshine_day_dreams:

That's a big relief!  Maybe just assure your boss in your meeting that you know you've been missing a bit more work than you'd like lately, etc. but you're on it and going to work harder, blah, blah, blah.  Just to CYA, ya know?

I definitely will - and it's true!