2002-02-07

Office Wack-job

You know, I can really go weeks at a stretch without thinking about how absurd my work situation is. For the most part, I'm pretty lucky. True, I spend inordinate amounts of time buried under spreadsheets, and I suspect that if the brokers that I speak to on a near-daily basis knew what I actually looked like, what my office looked like, they'd be appalled: "Yes, I'm aware that this is a very hard stock to sell, Mr. Tidy Charcoal Suit, but I'm telling you to sell both lots and....oh, hell, hold on, my wind-up Godzilla is reaching the end of my desk and I have to turn him around..."

It's the break room I can't deal with.

It's actually not really a break room. It's the xerox/fax/mailbox/postage meter room. It just also happens to house the water cooler, the refrigerator, the microwave, and the coffee machine that nobody uses.

Just now I went in to refill my water bottle, and walked smack dab into the Lunch Dance. You know what I mean: four or five co-workers trying not to get in the way of each other as they, at turns, heat up their Lean Cuisines and Cup-o'-Soups, scrawl their names across their newly-purchased 2-liter bottles of Diet Dr. Pepper and fat-free raspberry vinaigrette dressing, and search in vain for plastic forks (spoons we have � plenty � ordered back when everybody was still eating yogurt at lunch). I thought to myself, "My God, I am a drone."

Not only that, but I'm the "wacky" drone, to boot. The receptionist came into my office the other day to show me a catalog item that just reeked of me, apparently � an incense burner fashioned in the likeness of Norma Desmond.

"See?" she cooed. "You put the incense stick in her little cigarette holder!"

"That's...great. Yeah."

"I just saw it and thought, �That's SO Lisa!'"

"Uh-huh."

Another coworker finds it absolutely fascinating that I'm in a band. A typical conversation over the fax machine goes something like this:

"So, Lisa, how's your BAND?"

"It's fine."

"That's just so wild that you're in a band! You play the drums, right?"

"Yeah."

"That's just so wild! Are you playing anywhere soon?"

"Uh-huh. O'Brien's."

"That's just so wild!"

I'm in a good situation though, all things considered. No dress code, really. Get to meet lots of actors and playwrights. It's worth being the office wack-job, most of the time.

lisamcc at 1:08 p.m.

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