Friday, May 2, 2014: Drunk, naked and driving the mobile stretcher around the MCG

For the working-man, there are few moments more treasured than finally handing in that letter. 'Thank you for the opportunities', it might read, 'but I have taken an opportunity to pursue other interests'. To add a closing broadside, perhaps a suggestion of parts of your body they can kiss, is tempting but unnecessary - it's implied, inherent to the utter smugness of the resignation letter.

It's that smugness that sets the tone for the golden two weeks or so between handing in that letter and finally leaving.  The notice period, when perhaps your former professionalism and diligence escapes you a little. It starts with being a few minutes late in the morning or taking a bit of extra lunch break; hell, what are they going to do about it? Fire you? So maybe you spend an afternoon just walking around the office, giving all those other suckers a chance to see just how carefree you are. A kind of victory lap around the office; a reminder that you have win, you've escaped.

These behaviours are all good and well, but sometimes it gets a little silly. More than one employee has been known to take this presumed immunity outside the envelope from time to time. One too many lunchtime beers perhaps; or telling Linda in HR that perhaps she could find a boyfriend if she smiled more (hell, everyone's thinking it). Or telling the boss to go off and say, copulate with himself. This kind of stuff you don't have impunity for. That line is important.

So we're particularly keen to see how Andrew Demetriou handles these last few weeks. With the handover pretty much taken care of by means of hiring his own deputy for the top job, the silliness has already begun. "People have got the right, if you really want to make a protest about it, to take their own food to the football" he told 3AW this morning. This kind of behaviour, picking a fight with his much-loved 'commercial partners' would never have flown back in the heady days of angry Demetriou...

It's the start of the golden days for Andrew, and we can only hope it ends in him drunk, naked and driving the mobile stretcher around the MCG while crying and screaming that we never gave variable pricing a chance...

In the news...
Ross Lyon is really, really, really really confident about Michael Barlow playing in Sunday's western derby. "We're really, really, really, really confident" he said in his pre-match presser.

Essendon's Jake Melksham insists that teammate Jake Carlisle is not troubled by his poor performances so far in 2014. "He's still the likeable Jake who laughs and mucks around" he said, sounding somewhat like a teacher comforting a Mother who's worried about her sons test scores by telling her how popular he is.

 And finally for this week, Magpie Brodie Grundy is attempting a brazen new strategy of not giving away free kicks in almost every ruck contest he enters. "It's something I'm trying to fix because obviously it's detrimental for the team" he professed.