I've been going about this all wrong.

All along I've been here at the office saying that I'm hanging around to the end to get my severance. Now I realize that is the absolute wrong approach.

Yesterday the President of the Bank that I work for came by to speak to us. It was interesting. They didn't have much information but there were a couple interesting tidbits. Legal close is 2-15, some people will be released then. Operational close aka integration is tentative for September. That's even further out than I thought. One thing he said was that they will need most of operations to stay until integration.

The most illuminating information, though, was from other attendees. Seems there are definitely people who have been given retention bonuses not to bolt. Now if they need us until September, they can very well pay us a premium not to walk away. That's my new philosophy - show me the money.

I'm getting my resume together and out there. I'm going to interview if only for the practice. If I find something I like I'll bolt. If I find anything at all I may try and parlay it into some additional cash.

So now it's obvious I'm not getting the summer off. If I can get paid to stay until severance that would be excellent. If I can double dip with severance and find a new job then, that would be great. If neither of those happen I'll just move on and let them deal with the bs.