Sorry you're leaving

The brown envelope schlepped its way around the newsroom and finally landed with a jangle on my desk.
Inside were coppers, a few minor silvers and the odd pound coin, all poured out of poorer people's pockets for the editors' leaving present.
"Make sure you give generously," was the plea from the sycophantic underlings, still eager to impress a drunken Scottish tightwad with a penchant for the sensational.
"At least two pounds."
At least two pounds? Let me see.
It wasn't too long ago that I spent almost three months waiting to speak to the Old Hacker. Three months and not a single word. Not one utterance for an editorial employee who sits slap bang in the centre of the newsroom. Not even a "Sorry, can't talk now" or a "I'm going to be honest, this is the situation..."
No, wasn't offered the pleasance of that.
Instead, I had to threaten to hand my notice in to get any kind of response.
And even then, I was told my meagre wages, out of scale with everyone else's, were absolutely fine as they were.
So that £2 I was asked to give, let's see, works out at about 20 minutes work. So, in order to contribute to his collection, I'd have to give up my precious earnings from 20 minutes. That 20 minutes would've been spent sweating, swearing and thinking of ways to get out of work tomorrow, while balancing a handful of community-based leads, forward planning lists, and phone calls from angry readers with no intellect.
So, £2 is it?
That's what I should give back to the man I hold single-handedly responsible for ruining my career.
I resisted the temptation to write "Eat my fucking shit" in his ridiculous leaving card.
Others hadn't resisted the temptation - with two personal highlights from the garish ball-point blanket of comments: one, curled like an affectionate tongue in the starfish: "Thanks boss."
The other, "Thanks for everything" - from someone in a similarly shit job with similarly shit wages to me.
Thanks for what, eh? The man we're talking about almost let two serial killers get away with murder in eagerness for headlines and sales.
So needless to say, I didn't put my £2 in the envelope.
Just a short note saying: "Hello, I've never really met you, but I work in your department for 10 hours a day for fuck all money. Sorry you're leaving. Thanks for nothing. I would've given you some money but you've done fuck all for me, mate. I've busted my ass for two years and haven't had so much as a thank you. So consider my pay rise your fucking leaving gift. I know you're going to get a glorious company pension, complete with free golf for life, so £1,000 might not seem that much to you. But believe me, it is a lot of money. The difference between a motivated, enthusiastic member of staff and a jaded, demoralised hatefiend. So take that money as part of your retirement deal, dude. You've clearly been skimping on everyone's rises so you get a better financial reward. And that's why I haven't given you £2, you fuck."