I don't think I can negotiate anything. At the end of spring semester, they just send me an email that says, "You can pick up your contract for next year in the office," and the contract has my new salary printed on it.

I applied for our local public library a few years ago, just to see if maybe I could get in, and I got a lovely letter back telling me I wasn't qualified. I was working in library retrospective conversion at the time and well knew my way around library automation. The letter essentially said, "We're salivating over your experience, but we have to hire someone with specific education. We're so sorry!" It still have the letter, it's great ego boo.

In imaginary land where there would be any chance for me to get a raise, I would happily trade it for more time off.

We are paid very well though and we have good benefits. Just crap crap of a boss.

lisah, yes. It is the speakeasy bar that made me blink. Especially with all these liquor license kerfuffles. And I remember them pulling pranks before.

As far as I know, just the name of the bar is not real. We're involved in the liquor license stuff (I can tell you more about it next time I see you) so, if it's a prank, they are pulling a long and involved and kind of cruel con!

I negotiated my salary and vacation time at my current job. I think I asked for about $5000 over what I was making at the job I was at (because I was happy with the salary and knew it was fair for the someone with my experience) and asked for 4 weeks vacation because that's what I was getting and I didn't want to lose it. My company was very small when I joined, though, and they were flexible and cool with giving me what I asked for. I started with 4 weeks vacation plus a week sick time which was awesome but then lost a week when we went to general PTO, vs a vaca/sick split. I'm back to 5 weeks now, since I've been here 5 years as of last June. And I hardly ever take my PTO as sick time. I work at home if I'm not feeling well enough to come in. I'm lucky I haven't had something that's really laid me out recently, though.

So the .01% REALLY?! REALLY?

I think I might throw something at Benn next time I'm in there or GW.

I've been at the same job for so many years, I'd have no clue how to negotiate. I'd be completely dependant on the advice from y'all, which isn't a bad place to be.

Mini-rant. I pay big bucks for MLB.tv so I can watch my A's all the way over here in Colorado. I use CJ's PS3. And there is a "known glitch" that is keeping me from watching my team. There have been a ton of different "fixes" posted in the forum. Currently I'm on "reinstall, powercycle, reinstall, log in, exit, reenter, put your right foot in, take your right foot out, press X O X square triangle triangle". Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. I. Want. My. A's. NOW.

I told CJ I was so frustrated that I needed a shot. The sweet boy brought me a shot of Jameson. I iz buzzed now. And I now have the A's on my tv. Jameson is magic.

Jameson is magic.

Yay!

I negotiated rather better leave and salary at my current position, because I knew I was the only possibility for the contract firm to fill the slot. Which is nice, except I've burned through most of my leave dealing with my parents (I'm lucky I haven't been sick much this year).

The down side is that if I have to go back to the private sector, I'm afraid the expectations will be fairly high, or that I'll have to take a pay cut.

Maria, I cannot believe your employers, or Dana's. But then I'm astonished that the NY Legislature voted down a bill to require five paid sick days for every full-time employee. Apparently expecting to keep your job after coming down with the flu is too much to be expected in this economy.

I was essentially told a few weeks ago that I was lucky I got time off when Rob died, since I hadn't been there a year yet and wasn't entitled to vacation. There is no bereavement leave.

I'm thinking they're the ones who are lucky you got the time off, as the phrase "given the circumstances, no one would convict her" sounds in my head.