New Job question:

[DavidMS]

I have a new job at a small IT sales and service company. Unfortunately Ru$h and Hannity are on the radio daily. Anyone have coping techniques (other than checking in on DU after work)?

[gmoney]

1. Boss, I can't hear people on the phone with the radio playing...

...would it be possible to turn it off, or move my desk?

[Tangledog]

2. It's been a long time....

A guy used to have Howard Stern on when I showed up in the morning. I turned it off. He turned it back on. I turned it off. He more or less won, because he'd been there longer and had a kind of dominating personality (he was our best salesman), but he left after a couple of months.

Did you know that this was part of the gig when you took the job?

Listening to Rush (or listening to Al Franken, for that matter), has nothing to do with working. Does your boss/supervisor know that? Or is your boss/supervisor the Freep in question?

Does said boss, or your coworkers, already know that you are a non-moran? If not, make the case that you can't concentrate with the television in the background (not that you can't concentrate with mental mucus in the background).

If you have already got into a shouting match with the Freeps, you may already be branded as a lib'rull, and you've forfeited your right to complain about the microwave not working.

I sympathize. I once worked in a place where I had to bring a Walkman because I couldn't stand listening to the CHR station that had the same car commercial every 20 minutes and that a worker with more seniority insisted on listening to. They weren't paying me enough for me to buy batteries every 2 days, and didn't think that the radio fascist was a problem (or they were scared of her). I decided that any job that include Billy Joel by definition blew shit out of its ear, so I quit and signed up with a temp agency. I'm not saying that's a good alternative for you, but you might be in for a rough ride, and I do sympathize.

[DavidMS]

3. Unfortunately, its the President (very small company)

Other than that, he is a cool guy.

And yes, he knows that I listen to NPR.

I figure I will probably get an Ipod and some headphones and listen to music. Unfortunately because bandwith is expensive I can't even listen to Air America during business hours. If I could get it on the AM dial in NVA, I would listen to it.

And this job is an excelent entry to the IT field. So I will try to work around it.

Thanks for the help.