I never realised I could annoy others in the workplace this damn much until now.

A few days ago, I borrowed a stapler from this lady sitting next to the pigeonholes and where the post is done. Letter and cheque in hand, I walked a couple of steps towards her, grabbed the stapler in the other hand and mumbled "sorry can I borrow this". By the time I finished my brief sentence, the stapler was already back on her desk. She turned around, looked at me with a creepy grin, took the stapler and put it on the other side of her desk against the wall.

Earlier that day, I strolled to the main office with a green file in hand. Inside is my resignation letter and a couple of other things. As I went up the lift, my heart was pounding and I was thinking shit he's not even going to be there. There he was, zooming out of his office to speak to his secretary (? accounts person? paralegal?) and I said good morning. After he was done with his orders, he said "hi I want to introduce you to our manager". I smiled to both and said "we have met". As he said "can you go speak to him", I stopped him and said I need to speak to you first. He paused and asked "before you have chat with him?" So I followed him into his office and said here's my resignation. He was shocked and he muttered "you have found a new job. That's it?" I can see the numerous streams of thoughts racing his head: why so sudden, why the half-ass reason and what about my old boss who is his consultant.

His reaction made me decide to skip the Christmas party. Much rather not sit across the dinner table seeing him twitch at me, or desperately wanting to find out more about what's going which I would either lie to his face or evade.

He has made work life in the last month and a half more difficult than I have ever experienced. The shouting, the orders, the virtual electronic tagging in the form of an excel time sheet, the overreaction to printing getting sent to the wrong office inadvertently and the multiple speeches in his attempt to put me in my place.

This professional world is small, and as much as I would stay far far away from his firm from now, I am bound to run into people that I met there at some point. I am not thrilled that I am leaving on such nasty terms, and how much I feel like a fly that he wants to slap away, but hopefully the only people that are cross with me are him and the woman with the stapler.

Oh and the other day when I told my old boss I had a scream-off with the lady in the our new office who apparently has been given the reins to whip the juniors including me, she said "good, don't put up with it".

Once I got the ball rolling with my "up yours" resignation, avalanche came and my old boss gave the same "up yours" termination. Rumours (from her and a middleman) have it that Mr Control Freak was going to give us the boot. Had I not beat my manager/boss to it, I would have had a stern warning form the manger coming.

So now I have just over a week of loss of income, but such is the price of a sweet vindication, and I get to spend some time to take care of cases and people to ensure the next transition will not turn into the same kind of flop. Of course the market is tough and 5000+ lawyer wannabes are churned out from the mind-numbing LPCs every year. But from our meeting/interview (in front of my old boss) and his comments, it was obvious that what he wants is a cheap caseworker who can do everything and who he does not have to invest in training, especially in an area of law that he has no interest in and clients he does not want to see in his office (cos they don't wear suits/ethnic/illegal/(insert his thought bubble)).

What I take away from this is the running of a commercial firm with a tiny office, big Central London ego, West End identity crisis and the "lawyers are here for your money not to help you" reality.

P.S. 117 firms face imminent closure as a result of the insurance fiasco. Trust my luck to find myself in this just over a year after graduation.