Perplexed

I am still working. Ha! You knew that since you haven't yet heard me screaming, "I QUIT!" from the rafters.  This is an interesting month for me at work. Unless some different decree comes down from on high, the ancient, slow, and long obsolete system in which I have worked since 2006 will be shut down at the end of the month. I have done the same tasks month in and month out for years and next month, I won't be doing those tasks anymore.

About 18 months ago, my employer hired a consultant to help me with my monthly tasks in order to free up my time to implement the new system. In a totally logical move, they followed up on this outlay by never assigning me any tasks in implementing the new system.

Do you know how in certain workplaces there are incompetent workers who are basically maintained but are never given any new responsibilities because experience has taught their supervisors that they muck up everything new they are given? I am absolutely positive that situation does not apply to me because I have never been given any new responsibilities to muck up. I have the equivalent of a bachelor's degree in computer science and I was not consulted At. All. in any of the new system development. My coworker has built it all.

In the new system, I now have exactly one job. Everything about this task was designed, built, tested, and executed by my coworker. Once it met his specifications, the task was turned over to me. It consists of me, once a week, pressing a 'go' button and waiting to see if the job completes about twenty minutes later. That's it.

Because I am generally disillusioned with whole idea of a career anyway, I have been somewhat content with watching all this play out at a distance. I don't go ask questions or offer help or ask for new projects. If they are going to treat me like a data entry clerk, I have decided to act like one. But twenty minutes of 'work' once a week is pretty extreme, even at this place

Right now, I am perplexed. Is anyone paying attention? What in the world will I spend next month doing? My coworker, who has built all these nifty programs, is taking off most of June as a result of the new PTO policy so I can't imagine I will spend a lot of time training with him. I have no idea what I will be doing. I might spend the whole month surfing the Internet. It's just the latest chapter in this strange, dysfunctional institution. It's almost comical except I still have to show up every day and live it.