Rare Flare

For the first time since I started working for him, I actually had an argument with Gavin today. He can be a bit over-enthusiastic and over-bearing at times, and he lets himself get obsessed with some insignificant factors and keeps going on about them, but generally speaking you can deal with him by ignoring him or just doing what he asks for, with minimal effort. But today he beat me over the head repeatedly with something and I just couldn't let it go and walk away.
He suddenly decided, five days before the date, that we should have a massive on-site street party at each of our three locations for the upcoming Jubilee Bank Holiday. He had visions of hundreds of people waving flags and eating vol-au-vents, simply because the photos would be good publicity. Even though we are at nearly 100% capacity for nearly 100% of this year, he is still trying to find ways to make us look attractive to other holidaymakers. I told him there were already plans in place for fun little Queen-based events in the coming 7 days, but he dismissed all that as 'not enough, Rory, not enough.' I asked him why he was dropping this on me today and he said, 'You did such a good job of putting the Hallowe'en thing together, you're the ideal man to pull this off,' which is a change of opinion, because he was dead against me doing anything in October and didn't even acknowledge it as a success after it happened. We had about ten minutes of back-and-forth 'discussion' in which I kept insisting there was no need to add to our program as it is already, and he kept buttering me up to try and talk me round. I gave him a list of reasons why it was unfair on the staff to suddenly ask them to do more, and why a hastily-put-together, half-arsed attempt at something was likely to end up unsuccessful and leave us looking unprofessional, but it got me nowhere. He was like a 5-year-old putting his fingers in his ears and saying 'la-la-la' because he didn't want to hear what he was being told.

In the end he shouted, "Well, whatever you say, THIS IS HAPPENING!"

To which I replied, "Well, it won't be happening with help from me," and I stormed off.
So, we'll see what happens next.

RC 28-5-22