Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Best part of on-site

The best parts of last week’s on-site were the conversations.

Team conversation.  My six-member work team had a happy hour at Westport Social, a local fun and games establishment. It’s known for a menu of wanton excess. No deep-fried pizza or Oreo fondue, but yeah, things like that.

We discussed topics that would be boring were it not for the company: recurring dreams, Halloween costumes, pros and cons of adding Baileys to your espresso martini. And then our newest member bumped it up to the next level and said that he liked us all. It was a lovely escalation from chit-chat up to a real conversation, which I had been missing all week.

Forgotten conversation.  A friend introduced me to the Canadian side of the house and asked if she could tell them how we’d met. I said sure, because we’d met on the campus shuttle bus, where she sat next to me and was excessively friendly. On the bus I wondered, “Why is this random woman on the shuttle bus spending five minutes telling me about this bar she frequents with all her friends?"

And her version of the story was identical, only she ended with, "So Ellen assumed I was a lesbian and I was hitting on her." That suppressed memory exploded the second she said it.  I don't know why I would forget just that detail. Maybe I was embarrassed to be on the other side of that misunderstanding. Usually I'm the overly-friendly one. Maybe I forgot it because I did want her to hit on me, and forgetting is better than regretting? Anyway, now I know the ending to that story. God knows how many other endings I've suppressed.

Y-heavy conversation. 

Again during this on-site, I found myself the lone woman at a table with five men. It was a much larger table than before, but I was in that sweet spot we women of a certain age covet: the lone woman with no younger, more distracting woman to steal the attention. I would be quite happy to make that a recurring event.

Worst part of on-site

Well, now I am done with the work event in which attendance is required.

Technically, I have the medical excuse that I only had to attend the parts where I felt comfortable that I would not catch something. Well, I went to everything and I caught feelings, as they say. By the end I felt so lost and disconnected I was thinking about retirement. 

I think it was because I was looking forward to intimate conversations with with friends, and instead I found polite chit-chat with strangers. So, so many strangers. I think I sabotaged myself: I made some cake and I sent an e-mail with a description of what I was wearing so people could find me and help themselves to cake. What happened instead was that people found me and earnestly asked, “May I have some cake?” I soon found myself replying, “I BELIEVE I SENT YOU AN EMAIL ASKING YOU TO COME HAVE CAKE SO YES YOU CAN HAVE CAKE.” 

I know they were being polite, and it’s not like they were dropping a curtsey first, but instead of connecting through cake I just got chit-chat over and over, half a minute of chit-chat when I didn't have thirty seconds with friends telling them how I feel about them.  

And then on top of that, another pair of shoes suffered structural collapse. 

The person who lobbed the shoe scat at me last time told me it was happening again. 

I had to leave and go to Shoe Carnival and purchase replacement shoes, to which he said, “But now how are we going to follow the breadcrumbs and find where you are?”

Visiting the office

Today we start another one of those required-attendance in-office weeks.

I have been thinking far too much about what to wear. There have been heavy consultations with my boobs regarding packing them into the pre-pandemic underwire bra. 

“Nooooooo,” they say, in chorus. “Noooooo. We don’t like bras. And if we have to, we like thr comfy zip-up bra.” 

I answered, “Well, sure, but Gary weighed in and said matrons need to pay particular attention to ensure that their breasts are ratcheted up or they will risk mockery.”

”Screw that guy,” said Right Breast.

Left Breast said, “He’s always been nice to me, but yeah, screw that guy.”

I’m not sure which way to go: rigid bra or stretchy bra. On the one hand, I don’t want to be mocked, on the other hand, I don't want to wear a bra that’s been benched four years then suddenly suffers structural collapse like the NAOT shoes did that one time. 

Still undecided. May have to pack both options and decide once I get to work. 

In Which I am Reminded I am Old

I think of myself as liberal. In the context of my family, I am moderately liberal, but only because my family consists of one other person, and that person is Gary. If you just thought “You can’t have a family without children,” then take a step to the right of me. 

Yesterday made me realize that I am the fuddy-duddiest of all conservatives, and I am old and out of touch.

I was editing an examination. The first few questions began something like this. 

Question 1: Ivy runs his own manufacturing shop ...

Question 2: John has been your client for years. He wants to move overseas after he retires ...

Question 3: The Andersons feel their twenty-year-old son is too young ...

Question 4: Your client, Amanda, recently had their small business burglarized ...

On Question 1 I thought, “They must have meant Ira or something. I’ll come back to that.”

I sailed past Questions 2 and 3.

I changed Question 4 to “her small business,” because while I have adopted “they” as the plural second-person pronoun we all desire, Amanda is singular, and owns a small business, good for her. 

After a few more questions I confess I thought, “Some questions are ‘he’ or ‘she’ and some are ‘they’ and you can't just switch up pronouns like that in one examination -- “

And then I caught on that yes you can, a person can be “they” if that person prefers it. Society moves on. Points for me! Growth points, adaptability points.

Then I backslid and thought, “I suspect that someone else is making a point.” But no, the the Young People at Work said this is normal. Evidently it didn't take them ten minutes to figure out society has moved on. 

I went back and made Ivy run “their own manufacturing shop”. I suppose I might have kept “Ivy runs his own manufacturing shop,” if I were young, but then I realized Ivy is an imaginary person and as such cannot argue with me.

Shoes

I went in to work the day before yesterday. I wanted to wear my wedding ring, so no one would again make the understandable assumption I was divorced. Only, now every ring I own is too large or too small. Also, I wanted to wear my overly-long dress pants, and that meant finding my tall dress shoes, and I have not laid eyes on my dress shoes for four full years.

So I was late. I hustled out of the parking garage, through the revolving doors, and then when I hit the hallway I saw something fly off my shoe. These shoes have large rubbery soles, and evidently part of the sole had calved off like an iceberg. I popped it in my purse and moved on. 

It wasn’t until I was in my department that someone pointed out I was leaving tracks on the carpet as if I’d stepped in something. 

Then I took off my shoes.

Evidently, the heels were disintegrating with every step. I showed what was left of my shoes to a co-worker, Don, who recoiled a tiny bit. He later explained, "She arrived at my desk, barefoot, holding her rotting shoes in her hand like some kind of cat with a dead animal."

I was a little afraid they might progressively collapse like one of those controlled building implosions, so I left to get other shoes. Heel breadcrumbs lead me home like Hansel and Gretel: in the elevator, the revolving doors, the parking garage. 

After I returned in my reliable flat shoes, I remembered the tiny flinch Don gave when I waved my shoes in his face. At the very moment I realized I could find some heel debris and plant it near him, he casually tossed this chunk on my desk.

When your opponent returns fire before you even declare war, you just concede. 

Epilogue: I did some research to see if shoes are like horses and they require constant exercise. Evidently this brand of shoes, NAOT (Nordstrom: TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS, Ebay, Shoes of the Dead: $35), have polyurethane heels that are only meant to last a few years. 

When I got home that night I found another pair of NAOTs that looked fine but crumbled under my fingernail. I pitched them in the trash with the others.

Work Week

Last week my department called all employees into the office for a week-long event. Even the out-of-town employees had to fly to Saint Louis. My medical exemption meant I didn’t have to come in at all, but I could if I felt comfortable.

I felt comfortable for one six-hour day in an auditorium, one half day in an auditorium, and one two-hour dinner in a six-story atrium. 

Day one: I was going upstairs in the parking garage and the automated elevator voice said, “First. Floor.”

I sobbed, “I MISSED YOU SO MUCH, ELEVATOR LADY.” 

The whole day was like that. It was exhausting. I’d turn a corner and see faces from four years ago and every face was more beautiful than I remembered. And of course, I had to say that every time. Everyone’s lifetime compliment allotment has now been maxed out. No more compliments for co-workers, ever. 

I got no sleep that night. I stayed up replaying every cringeworthy conversation, every “I missed you so much, when did you get so beautiful?” Every word went into long-term memory. I comforted myself by thinking, “Everyone loves a fool.”

Day Two: The next day was the dinner, and I evidently had four years of inappropriate male banter in my head that had to be released as well. I got so drunk on male attention that twice I had to leave my table (populated entirely of five guys) and seek out some women. 

I got two hours of sleep that night, again memorizing every addled word and again telling myself, “Everyone loves a fool.”

The Last Day: I swore to myself that I would keep my mouth shut. No social interactions. It went well until I sat down next to a teammate. I had only met her once before, and within moments I was saying -- and pantomiming -- inappropriate remarks.

Again, three hours of sleep, again reassuring myself that fools are loved, not just suffered gladly.

We don’t this again for another six months, thank god.

Used vs Utilized

I don't know if this is specific to TeddyJ, but people never seem to say "used" when they mean "used"; instead they choose to say "utilized".

It happened five times today. It began to cause me physical pain.

And, of course, I can’t correct them, because they choose to use “utilize” because they want a little bump of importance, and much as you might want to, it’s cruel to knock someone who just wants a bump.

For more information about utilize versus use:

Grammarist Use/Utilize

 

Lip Reading

The way my Zoom is set up at work, when I get on a call I can see the faces of the other participants but not hear the audio. 

Often, of late, the faces are animated. Annoyed. There’s clearly a spirited debate, then when they see I’m finally on audio, they shut up. They’ve been arguing. If I could read lips, I’d know what they are arguing about. (I assume they are arguing about processes, because that is what gets the dander up at TeddyJ.)

If not that, the faces are equally animated. Eyes roll. People laugh. Then when they see I’m finally on audio, they shut up. They've been talking about me. Again, if I could read lips, I’d know what they were saying about me.

The technology exists to read lips.

Of course, these folks are earnestly doing good work, but how long until Zoom buys them and there’s a lip-reading checkbox in Preferences? I long for that day.

Back when we were all in the office I was able to use my heightened hearing, at times, to listen in on whatever conversations came out of the Team Leader’s cubicle. Now that I’m alone I can't use that bat-hearing superpower (and at some point in the last fifteen years that's faded into boring old tinnitus). 

Or, I could learn to lip-read. How long does it take to learn that? That might be a good holiday project.

Treasure at Work

I am bereft. My work team is losing our most recent addition, a woman who is just a treasure. Let's call her Treasure. 

Below is an example of why I am going to miss Treasure. 

============

I was displaying my water bottle to my team.

I wanted them to notice it is stamped with my least favorite phrase. 

I held it up to the camera. "Look at this thing!"

Treasure said, "Clearly, that is a uterus."

=======

Treasure is being wrested from our team, but I hold out hope she will be shuffled back in someday.

 

Work Advice

TeddyJ employees are complaining about being asked to return to work (albeit be-jeaned, and only for three days a week).

In response, Powers That Be seem to be indignant about the employee indignancy, and they hijacked the monthly diversity meeting to talk about gratitude. 

They tried to be subtle. We were advised to stop saying "I have to" and replace that phrase with "I get to."

We were also advised to keep a daily journal. That one made me smile. 

TWIL: How I Have Failed at Work for a Decade

This "transparency" thing is taking over at work and people are being really frank.

A long-time co-worker shared with me that when she started she had been warned to never ask me questions.

I confess, I would often hear new workers asking other people questions when I was right there. Me. Me, the expert. Or Me, their mentor. "Why aren't they coming to me? I know the answer. I love one-on-one training. I love teaching. Am I intimidating or something?"

I was surprised to hear from my co-worker that the word went out among new employees that if anyone asked me a quiet question in an email about, say, "How do I make a pivot-table in Excel," I would march to that person's desk and say loudly, "DON'T WORRY I WILL BE GLAD TO SHOW YOU HOW TO MAKE A PIVOT-TABLE IN EXCEL," and everyone would know of their ignorance.

While I am delighted this co-worker told me this "funny" story,  I am also dismayed to learn I have had this reputation for years. Really dismayed.

Also, I cannot WAIT until the next time this particular co-worker asks me anything. "OH YOU DON'T KNOW WHERE THAT TEMPLATE IS LET ME GET EVERYONE ON  A TEAMS CALL AND WE CAN ALL HELP YOU."

Zoom Rules

I notice that Zoom work conversations are more intense than in-person conversations. (Or at least, what I remember of in-person conversations.)

Rude people are ruder, for one thing. I suppose they sense no one is going to bop them in the nose. (Or possibly, "we" sense no one is going to bop "us" in the nose.) No immediate consequence, because there's no immediate feedback, becuase no one is making eye contact, because on a grid of six people you can't tell who is looking at you. One person is looking up and to the right, another down and to the left, and only psychopaths look directly at the camera.  When a friend is on screen I've been tempted to say something completely outrageous and slap a post-it to mark where they looked when they looked at my square. 

I've also "pinned" a friend, where you make the friend's face take over your entire screen, but I can't do that for long. I feel like I'm violating them, get creeped out, un-pin them.

I wonder if we'll all stop making eye contact in real life, and all be recklessly rude when this is all over. 

TWIL: Three Bears

I was stewing about two co-workers who share nothing but a job title. One is too slow, one is too fast; one is flight, one is fight; and the only thing have in common is that neither appreciates the other. 

"His porridge is too cold, her porridge is too hot," I grumbled to myself, then wondered what I was thinking about, because I had almost forgotten about Goldilocks and the Three Bears. 

That led me to Wikipedia, where I learned a number of things I didn't know.

• Goldilocks is a 19th century story. I thought all fairy tales went back to Middle Ages.
• In the original, Goldilocks was, per Wikipedia, "an obscene old woman." Hello, I'm right here. I found the original, and I would protest she is not obscene, just profane. 
• My need to have a third bullet here goes back to a literary "rule of three."

Since the day I learned about Goldilocks, the two coworkers appear to be joining forces and assigning each other work appropriate to their personalities, so I don't have to request they promote some other wee baby bear so the porridge is just right. 

Now Available at Work

I have some rules for work.

One rule, Don't be Friends Above Your Pay Grade, has recently been amended to Don't Flirt Above Your Pay Grade, because I can't go about cutting off any more friends.

Another rule is Don't Alk-Tay About the Og-Blay at Ork-Way. (Which, translated from the PigLatin Don't Talk About the Blog at Work.)

When I started at TeddyJ years ago, they were very strict about the internet. Systems were in place to block YouTube, most coding discussion boards (except for StackOverflow), and all the blogs, including this one. 

A few years ago YouTube opened up. (I immediately inaugurated my laptop by watching a cat video.) Then the discussion boards. 

And most recently, I got to this very blog via my TeddyJ connection.

I don't know how long it will be out there. It seems very unwise.

HR Burka

At some point in the last 20 years, HR departments codified their sexual harassment rules and banned "unsolicited compliments" from the opposite sex. Thus, if I I look nice, the women on my teams can all agree that I look nice, and the men stay silent, as if they cannot see past the impenetrable HR burka.

If I see my friend has shaved his beard and looks 20 years younger, I have to keep quiet, but of course I don't.

I mean, I've been the target of the "nice blouse" compliments. I know compliments can be creepy. But most of the time they're nice. I think there should be an exception of some kind for old friends. Or perhaps a facial hair codicil. 

(I didn't get in any kind of trouble for my compliment, and my friend took it graciously. But still, it felt odd that I was lobbing compliment bombs across the male/female border.)

Work Icebreaker

Meetings at TeddyJ often start with icebreakers. I was born with my built-in icebreaker: my extra thumb. 

I was in a meeting the other day, and the instructor presented us with the oddest icebreaker.

"What's something you did before you were eighteen that you're proud of?"

Completely blank. I truly did not do a thing I was proud of in my youth. I struggled to think of anything, but the thoughts that surfaced were all "kept my head down" and "did what my mom said." It came around to me too soon.

"Nothing," I said. "Survived? I can't think of a thing I did." And she replied that a lot of kids don't survive, so now I'm Aborted Suicide Attempt Girl.

I realize now I had two good options:

1. Lie. I could have published a book of poetry or given a stranger CPR.
2. Say "I was born with an extra thumb" because that still works. I did it before 18 and I'm proud of it.

 

Face Shaming

Earlier this week I was in a small six-person meeting. I looked exactly like this.

Someone on the call was making chit-chat and remarked, "We can tell what Ellen did yesterday: she got some sun."

"No ... Why do you think I got sun?" I was genuinely perplexed. 

"Because of your face. You got a sunburn."

I explained that no, I had no sunburn, that was just my face. And then I blamed the cholesterol medicine, not because I believed it, but because I hoped it might embarrass him, and it did, and I was glad. 

And then I balanced things out by poking my face to prove my skin became white. This amused them. So I was gracious and didn't let them know that for God's sake don't comment on an older woman's face. 

Kindness

Our work project meeting took a break for lunch, and while I did turn off my video, I did not mute. For the past three years this would have been fine, because lunch is when you do the laundry, and make dinner. Who stays at their desk listening to the phone at lunch?  

Who? People at work in the work building having the same meeting from inside a big Zoom-enabled meeting room.

I spent my lunch hour having not one, but two, loud arguments with Gary. And then I came back to my desk in the guest room and saw a teams message that said "Everyone can hear you."

Oh no.

I immediately got on and demanded to know what they'd heard. They claimed they coukdn't really hear anything. I said, "But you heard The Tone, right?' 

They admitted they heard a tone, yes. It only occurred to me after that they could have been listening to Gary bellow as well as my snippy responses. 

I later found out that my team leader was also sitting in the meeting room as everyone enjoyed the entertainment and said, "Out of kindness, can we just mute Ellen's audio?" which was kind.

I survived it, I learned from it, and I don't have to see those people for a few more days.

Forgetful

I was asked to give a status on my current work projects.

These are my thoughts, in order:

Well I had a meeting yesterday. What was it? It was for that project with that woman with the tall hair. The Doomed Project. What's the actual name of the project? What's the status of that project?

I was able to answer after I recalled the name of the woman with the tall hair, Diane, and my status was: "I had a meeting with Diane to discuss her project."

But then the manager said, "So that's XJT. How's it going on the AGW project?"

Crap, I completely forgot I'm on the AGW project. To to be fair, we've only had one kickoff meeting and it was yesterday afternoon. 

I replied the status was much the same as it had been yesterday afternoon and he moved on.

I was still shook that I had blanked out complexity on my two projects when someone reported on another project.

Damnit. I'm on that project too. What is wrong with me?  Why have I forgotten all my projects? 

This amnesia seems to be specifically work-related. I'm still aware of the outstanding list of projects in the hopper for the house. Back in the work office I had a physical list I updated every day. Maybe I need to institute that for the home office.

Team Name

We are all reorganized now at work. I have two bosses now, one for my skill development (both work skills and god help me, social skills) and then another for my task assignments. All the people under these two bosses are then broken up into "high functioning teams" that are then assigned to projects.  There was a lot of team binding thrust on us the first time we tried this: not so much this time around. 

However, as a team we are expected to get a team name. I suggested "The Flying Wallendas," another high functioning team.

While we were discussing on Microsoft Teams the Wallenda family, and if they were good role models, and how many deaths per performance would knock you out of the role model category, and how St. Louis has its own branch of Wallendas at Circus Flora -- while we were doing that our development boss was looking up gifs of the Flying Wallendas and came up with a clip of Karl Wallenda walking a tightrope. 

He did not watch the entire thing before posting it.

And then he did.

And then "NOOOOO! Don't look at that! Not the message I wanted to send AT ALL." Because of course it was one of the times things did not go well for the Wallendas. Karl fell off the tightrope, bounced off a taxi, hit the pavement. 

Of course that sealed the deal, we had a team name just so our boss would relive his embarrassment every time he had to refer to us.

Just yesterday it occured to me Cheech and Chong would be another high performing team. Don't know if that will knock the Flying Wallendas out of the competition.

 

In Which We Were Fired

I was fired once, actually fired. I don't mean semi-fired, like when I disappeared from the schedule at the IHOP, or when my teaching contract was not renewed after I refused to change a kid's failing grade. I mean actually actively fired, pack up, turn in your badge. 

I was a cashier at the university cafeteria, and I was called into the office by my boss, Mr. W____, who asked me to explain how my deposit was 400 dollars short. I couldn't explain. I counted out 800 dollars, wrote 800 dollars on the envelope, slid it into the safe through the slot. And now he was saying there were only 400 dollars in the envelope? 

How could that be? A mystery. 

My boss did not find it mysterious. He fired me, and there were tears, tears all the way home, tears on the phone to my then-boyfriend Gary, who said, sympathetically, "You are clearly upset! So I won't see you tonight. I'll talk to you tomorrow." 

A week later I was in my former workplace, eating lunch, and a fellow cashier told me that since I was last there another person had been called into Mr. W____'s office, again with a short deposit envelope, only this time Mr. W____'s boss noticed a pattern. After Mr. W____ refused to take a lie detector test, he himself was fired. 

Cocaine? Gambling? We wondered, but that would stay a mystery.  I had already nabbed a better job in the library days after I was canned, so I was actually better off. (In addition, Gary learned that when your girlfriend has been fired that is not a reason to break your date.)

I never had trouble getting a job after that, though I never tried for another job where I handled money. I never tried to clear my name, because I felt anyone who knew the situation knew the resolution. The nice thing is, nothing that awful has happened since. 

Personal Work Idiocy

I was put on a team at work, we were given new software, and tasked with making a little practice project. We put about four hours of work into it.

Toward the end, I was just playing with the software. I added our new project to my list of preferred projects in my new workspace, and then I changed my mind, and deleted it from the list. Let me be clear. I deleted it from the list.

It even said, "Are you sure you want to delete this? You will not see it again."

A more accurate warning would have been, "You will not see it again, you, nor any of your kin: it will be gone from not only this list of preferred projects but all the world and all its bytes will be scattered to the ether." 

Because it was not only gone from the list, it was 100% gone.

And because I am compelled to confess all my sins, I told everyone on my team immediately, then I told everyone on the larger team, then I publicly applauded myself for having only done it once in sixty years, then immediately remembered the time I deleted an entire project directory and then I had to tell everyone about that too. 

Why am aI compelled in this way? Good thing I've never done anything criminal. Or good thing I don't remember it if I did.

Seducible Moments

Someone at work introduced a new term, "seducible moment," the moment when you might gets users to commit to what you want. 

Everyone giggled, but by the end of the day even modest young ladies were using the term.

It enraged me.

What I want to do now is to use the term in our next big meeting, but slowly, in an impossibly dry, pointed  tone, with a raised eyebrow, the left one, because it goes higher, so people will know Grandma does not approve of this horseshit.

After years of suppressing my sexuality, prohibitions on my attire, finger shaking and eyebrow raising, now I have managers tossing out sexual terms. First we were told our projects weren't "sexy" enough, now our moments need to be "seducible." 

And this was a male manager introducing the term. Isn't he being suppressed? Isn't he being told never compliment a woman's blouse, never make a double-entendre? Have the tables not turned? No. No, of course not.

Alternatively, reckless cursing has been introduced by the female Big Boss. I wonder if any older men who work for her resent that they had to change their cursing behavior in front of the opposite sex for years and now the ladies are doing it.

I mean, really. (Clucks disapprovingly.)

Not Missing Much

Work officially re-opened last week. I retired my bra-free denim shirt to conform to the revived dress code. 

You wouldn't think they would care what I wear on a Zoom call, but they say they do.

And then I steeled myself for the phone calls. "Ellen, where are you, it's a party and everyone's here and we're having a pot-luck breakfast." But the big reunion day came, and the single report from the office was that no one else was there.

Since then, some leaders have attended planning meetings in person, and my guess is that next month there's going to be a push to get everyone back into the expensive, recently re-designed buildings.

I think of Mom saying "If you're too sick for school then you're too sick to play." Well, if I'm too vulnerable for a concert then I'm too vulnerable for work.

I'm just rehearsing for a fight no one will have with me. It seems as if we'll all just stay propped up in our beds in pajama bottoms and fancy shirts. 

Co-worker Owns Me

I was in a meeting when someone mentioned that April showers bring May flowers, and of course I responded with,"Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote!"

And then I stopped, because that's all I know of Canterbury Tales, just the "April showers" part written in Middle English. 

A co-worker answered, "The droghte of March hath perced to the roote" and then proceeded to rattle of the rest of the entire canto without stopping for breath.

I laughed so hard I wheezed. I have never been so delightfully one-upped. 

I mean I assume he was quoting the rest of it, he could be saying some Swedish Chef gibberish and passing it off as Middle English. 

Zoom Dress Code

The TeddyJ powers that be are making optimistic plans to have us all back in the office in April. I think it's April. I didn't pay close attention because I will not be going back in the office, thank you, no. I'll change over to home-based; the pay is the same.

For those going in they are making one remarkable adjustment, the office dress code is dropping to business casual. (This after I got myself down to five suits that fit. Those five suits no longer fit, but by April they could.)

You ask why I care about the dress code if I am not going in to the office. Well: there is now a Zoom dress code for people working off-site. Two rules:

• no T-shirts
• no denim shirts

So, goodbye to 20% of my wardrobe right there. My denim shirt (the one I bought to allow for bra-free days) is now struck from the roll, bra or not.

I put it on immediately after I read the email. Perhaps I can wear it out at the seams by April. And I fully intend to protest by wearing nothing but underwear downstairs. 

Snow Queen

Years ago our department re-framed the Christmas Party into a "Festivus" party. Now that we have merged with the HR department, we attend a "Winter Celebration'' party.

I was excited about the Winter Celebration, because the invitation encouraged us to wear winter-themed costumes.

I planned on donning my tiara, my rhinestones, a white boa, and a blond wig. Then I intended to  powder my face as white as I could with flour or cornstarch or something. So, I was all set up to attend the party in costume as the Snow Queen from Narnia. I confess that all I remember about the Snow Queen is that she is evil and offers children Turkish Delight, but if one has a tiara, what is one to do? One must be a queen.

That was my plan, then I checked the invite and it just says "wear your best winter attire" which is NOT the same as "come tarted up like the Snow Queen." Additionally, I  saw a Zoom image of all the attendees from last year and every person is wearing a holiday sweater as their holiday costume, with the exception of one party-pooper: me. I didn't even change my Zoom background. 

So, I guess I'm conforming this year. I don't think I even have a holiday sweater. Maybe I can be the Snow Queen just to amuse myself. 

(Thankfully I found a classic Santa hat when I was digging in the costume box for the blond wig, so I am going with that.)

Zoom Protest: A New Form of Business Communication

There's a new thing going on at some Zoom meetings at work. Let's say the leader of a Zoom call drops some bad news. The team in the call behaves with utter professionalism, no one breaks stride, but one by one their zoom backgrounds turn to:

A Kermit-sipping-tea meme with an annotation referencing the bad news.

A Before-and after meme with an annotation referencing the bad news.

The This-is-Fine meme with an annotation referencing the bad news.

A photo of a dumpster fire. That one was mine. I didn't annotate it with the bad news, because by then it was clear what we were protesting, and because Grandma here didn't know where the meme generators are.

I am so delighted by this new form of quiet protest that allows the work to continue without the typical interruption for ten minutes of complaining that I am ...

Icebreaker

In the past, icebreakers at work were easy. "Say your name, your department, and one interesting thing about you --" and boom, born with an extra thumb, on to the next person. 

Ice breakers are harder now, because we have zoom meetings every day, and the extra thumb has very little impact after the first time, so we have fifteen minute debate topics.

Cake or pie? (Pie won by a slim margin.)

Thanksgiving: Buy or bake? (Fifty-fifty.)

Nina or Pirate? (There was no debate, we were all Ninjas.)

Given that the daily meetings are only 30 minutes long, I thought it was odd they devoted half the given time to Would You Rather Fly a Dragon or Be A Dragon (fly), and I was initially impatient.

After six months, it dawned on me that it was actually beneficial to begin the day arguing. If I start the day telling Joe he's a fool for preferring cake, it's much easier to say "I think you are also wrong about the placement of the copyright on that PDF" at the end of the day. 

Are they doing this on purpose? I don't know. I suspect they are. Perhaps we could debate that when we are all back from Thanksgiving break.

Swirly

Twice in the last week I've heard a new term at work. 

"Swirly."

It means the swirl of chaos. "Everything was fine until the boss came in and then the meeting got all swirly." Additionally, "I don't know if it was the finger-pointing or the swirl, but that situation fell apart." 

Is this just a TeddyJ term? Where does it come from?

Halloween Costume

I vaguely remember a work email that says we can dress in costume during a zoom party the Thursday before Halloween.

The only thing that comes to mind this year is to put on my paper hazmat suit, and the swim goggles, and the air filter mask Gary used one time when killing bugs and go as Me Leaving the House.

Kind of a downer though. 

I could fall back on my fallback, which is Madonna. This is a recent photo.

I have a wig I could braid, a kimono, and then add a chunky necklace around my head. And on a zoom call I could have the original photo as my background.

It feels, though, as if I should do something with the opera mask or the fez I bought in November 2019, too late for Halloween that year, the last Halloween in Normal time.

I can't decide. There are two opportunities: the work party on Thursday the 28th, and then of course there's still the Friday before the 31st. Creepy mask sans fez might be good to just slip on for the work party, and then Full Madonna for the next day.  

Hard to say. Nice to be able to acknowledge the holiday, anyway.

Work Love

Last Monday I dryly said something snide and a co-worker I had only met a week earlier said, "Oh, Ellen, I love you." A few days later I heard the same declaration from my boss.

This made me uncomfortable, because in one week my female coworkers said "I love you" two hundred percent more often than my family ever said it when I was growing up. 

Sure, I ate it up quietly last week, but it seems to me an "I love you" comes pretty cheap these days. When did this start? Did it start with Leo Buscaglia and Princess Diana? Is it because they promoted hugs, but now we can't touch each other as freely, so we toss out "I love you" as casually as "Gesundheit?"

Mind you, I am all for not touching; I'd take a casual I love you over a hug any day. You can't ignore a hug. You can't skate past it with a question about deadlines. 

I suppose it's all a reflection of the more open, transparent culture we're trying to adopt at TeddyJ, and that's fine. I'll just need some time to reciprocate.

Ring Light

I don't remember the first of my coworkers to purchase a ring light or halo light for the Zoom calls. Pretty sure it was post-pandemic. 

All I know is that it breaks the first beauty rule, which is to deceive. Because I can see your fake lighting. Because you wear glasses. 

Or, sometimes, even without the glasses. Look at this pupil.

That's the pupil of Ed Robertson from Barenaked Ladies.

 

He's clearly working, and he's paid to look like a rock star. I am not.

However, my duties have recently changed, and now I work a lot on Zoom. A ring light might soften my scowl lines, but it can't conceal the wattle which now accounts for a third of the real estate on my face.

And you know what else? I see that you all have your laptops stacked up on books to give you a flattering Streisand camera angle but I only do that when the zoom call includes the Bigwigs. I am keeping my laptop on my belly as I lounge in bed. This is what you get:

I once cared about the wattle, but now I see it as a second and third smile. And to be perfectly honest, I will brush my hair and change out of that t-shirt before work. And of course I'll add a Zoom background so I don't look as comfortable. But that's all you're getting, work people. At some point Ring lights can only do so much.

Sweats

I spent last week buying new clothing. First of all, Gary complained that it had been a year and a half of me wearing pajamas to do gardening and to get the mail.  (As a man at work asked me to clarify: “He’s just now annoyed by this, or it took him a year and a half to say anything,” which suggests that Gary is hesitant to complain, and at that I laughed uproariously.)

In my defense, I don’t sleep in tank tops and sweat pants like the Kids Today, instead I’m in large tailored cotton pajamas with piping, buttons, and patterns. If I was to switch to comfy clothing that can transition from day to night to middle of the night to the next morning then all the way to bed again, which is my intent, I would need some tanks and sweats.

My first purchase was a flamingo pink lightweight “sweat” suit, too thin to make anyone sweat unless t-shirts are too hot for you.

It was nice in that it did indeed transition from night to day, and as long as I kept my laptop screen angled to display just neck-up on Zoom calls it looked like a nice rosy pink shirt.

It had only been half a day before I was in a Zoom call with just two other ladies and I found others carefully positioned our laptops and cameras so pajamas were disguised. 

I shared that I was also disguising my lack of bra, and angled my laptop for the full frontal.

Much hilarity. I’m always happy to go for the cheap shock-based laugh, but this time I blushed as pink as the shirt, because I haven’t seen the girls from that angle, so jumbled they looked like a Picasso painting.

So that prompted a few more purchases: Day-to-Night-Transitional sweats that have a little more substance, and what I hope is a similarly transitional sports bra. I suppose Amazon needs extra time to find a 40 DDD sports bra that zips up the front. 

Steve at Work

Sometimes you meet just delightful people when you are working.

Take Steve.

Only photo of Steve I have, appropriately

He changed departments about six years ago, and we’d catch up in the cafeteria, but it wasn’t the same as working every day with Steve, because Steve was hilarious on a daily basis, and I was lucky enough to sit next to him in all the seating charts. 

I didn’t know him at all until the first time I emailed him. His immediate reply was “Stop emailing me.”

Just for a moment, he tricked me. I was concerned that I had stepped over some line during the month I had worked by him, but no, that was just deadpan Steve. 

People at work were gobsmacked last week to hear Steve at Work had died, and then surprised again to hear it wasn’t from Covid, but instead from an aggressive bone cancer that took four months to progress from “a toothache” to death.

So here, I give you the Steve at Work Blog Compendium dating back to 2009. He read the blog and at times commented under an alias.

The boldfaced posts below actually star Steve, and below that are the ones in which Steve is a supporting player. I want to use them all as a reference when I get old and don’t remember my friend at the next desk.

Steve plays a prank

Steve surprises everyone

Steve eats at a food truck  

More Steve:

Steve rescues Late Mom’s book

Steve recommends a restaurant

Steve shaves his head too hastily

Steve eats odd things for breakfast

Steve steps up and eats his odd breakfast publicly 

Steve laughs at my idiocy

Steve tries to correct my idiocy

Steve makes a job aid

Steve stays quiet about the baby

Steve recommends The Woody

Steve gives breaking D.B. Cooper news

Steve organizes a dining event

Steve mocks two idiotic things I did in one conversation 

Steve gives breaking Hitler news

Steve is a target of soup cans

Steve and I bet

Steve baits the government 

 

 

 

 

More Work Shenanigans

So, the new thing at work is to be vulnerable. Bosses, executives, co-workers, we must all be vulnerable so that we can trust each other.

It feels very awkward to be in front of people and talk about my purpose in life and my greatest fears and what shaped who I am today. 

Jerry gets a lot of heat, or course, for ditching us, in fact he gets all the heat, and I’ve said that he was verbal and loving and then said we weren’t worth the $100 each in child support, so that’s why I don’t respond well to compliments and can’t talk to bosses about bonuses and raises without tearing up.

I had to make that song and dance again this last week, and there was an extra bonus question. Beyond “What affected you most as a child?” We were asked “What affected you most as an adult?” I said, “Well, getting MS - because it turned me into my father, everything I hate, someone who is overly emotional and talks without thinking.”

That surprised me. Still not as much as having an entire four hour work meeting devoted to childhood trauma, because that’s how the Kids Roll Today.

My Friday Night

I start a new project Monday, and I wanted to finish up my old project before I get absorbed in the new one. I worked on it all day Friday, and then all evening Friday, and then from midnight to 5:30 a.m., when I got two hours of sleep.

At about two a.m. I remembered the conversation I’d had earlier with the stakeholders. “Oh it’ll be a snap. Four hours at the most.” Hubris. Hu. bris. 

At three a.m., I remembered I was the only one in a hurry for this to be done, so I shut everything down and tried to go to sleep. 

At three-thirty a.m. I realized I was still working in my head, and it wouldn’t stop until I finished the last “little bit.”

Again, remember, no one wants this done but me. I am both slave driver and slave. When the birds began chirping I was still at the last little bit, thinking if I got it done then I could enjoy my weekend.  And guess what, I finished, but I didn’t test it as thoroughly as I should have. So, it’s not done.

Okay This Makes Two New Buzzwords

I was in a department meeting when a visiting speaker said, “I mean, that’s what’s you expect. It’s table steaks.”

Then she went on, but I was still hung up in this new phrase. Table steaks? Like ... table wine? Kind of a lower-grade steak you get a restaurant, not a fine steak/wine, but a table steak/wine?

And OF COURSE I had to go into the department group chat and say, “Did she just say table steaks? What does that mean?”

Of course, it’s some poker reference. Table stakes. I suppose it’s the expected ante or something? I don’t know. All I know is that add this to the Oregon Trail references and 1) I don’t know what anyone is saying at work anymore and 2) I have heard it used twice now in two days.

I’m going to quietly post this photo in the chat every time I hear it from now on.

Oregon Trail

Okay, there’s a new buzzword at work. Or buzz phrase. Or buzz cultural reference. 

It’s the Oregon Trail computer game. 


It was designed in the seventies, but it didn’t become a popular technique for teaching the  perils of the Oregon Trail until the Apple 2e version came out, just a few years after I graduated high school.

Instead, my history teacher taught us about the Oregon Trail with a five-day long slide presentation of photos he’d taken of the trail.  I can tell you the one thing that I remember: whenever he flipped to a slide of a lonely grave, and there were many, he would say, “This person probably died of cholera. And how do we get cholera, kids?”

”BY DIGGING YOUR WELL TOO CLOSE TO SOMEONE ELSE’S OUTHOUSE,” we would shout. 

Clearly there was cholera, and, as you see above, for the younger folks, dysentery  — but does anyone remember anything else about the Oregon trail?

The game certainly made an impression on the young(er) people at work: it is THE metaphor for a journey. And they can’t talk about it without making funny dysentery references.

“Cholera,” I whisper to myself.

Been a Year, Was Bound to Happen Sometime

Last night it was 3:30 am and I hadn’t been able to sleep yet, so I just decided to get my work  laptop and start working. I worked until oh, 11:30, when I needed to have an urgent video conference with my coworker Benjamin.

Frankly I am astonished this hasn’t happened before today. Here I am looking all professional.

NO zoom background masking the fact I am propped up in bed.

NO attention paid to hair or eyebrows.

NO attempt even to put on a heavy denim shirt to stay braless but modest.

”Benjamin,” I said, “You are a gentleman. I have just realized I am in my pajamas and you have said nothing.” 

He was gracious and demurred in some way and we moved on. I just stayed in my pajamas: the damage was done.