I was recently contacted by a lady I once worked with during the summer semesters this year. I know I’m not a good coder, so she must have been pretty hard up for one to work on Joomla.

We didn’t part on the best of terms, so I was a bit surprised when I saw an e-mail from her in an ‘old friend’ tone, literally talking to me like we’ve been friends forever. I never use the term, but this time I have to say I was sorely pissed.

I know I was wrong in the way I handled several things with her, but she also went back on her word, and money matters are a touchy subject with me — especially when we agreed on $15 an hour and she told me it was $12 when pay time came round. I got a rather poor review on Scriptlance which doesn’t bother me much — what still rankles is that we worked outside Scriptlance and she then posted a rating for projects that had nothing to do with it.

Well, in retrospect, I’ve learned to move on. The ratings have never affected me — for some reason I’ve won nearly every project I’ve bid on since then. As usual I deliver very speedily, usually within half my bid time — for example everyone else bids 4-7 days on a WordPress theme. I bid a day, promise delivery in 12 hours, and deliver in 6.

I must admit I made much of my placement exams — I didn’t have to read for them eventually –, and left her hanging in the middle of three projects.

I was told this was the essence of American backbiting — negative comments behind me and all sweet words when communicating. For [fill this in]’s sake, if you’ve got something negative to say about me, at least tell me to my face — I actually love hearing those because I get to think and improve — but when you say A to me and go behind my back and say B, I usually write you off as an insincere person.

When we had our confrontation yesterday, it was basically a meeting of two people who’ve wronged each other, but refuse to apologize — that much I must admit. I’d really have loved to work with her again, setting my time and all that, but call me a male chauvinist, saying ‘No’ was a pleasure.

I’ve heard hell hath no fury like a lady scorned — I’m yet to see that.