Workin' For a Living (Workin!)

Now that my Hughey Lewis and the News moment has passed...

I'm enjoying my job, although I feel a wee bit isolated, there. I sit in a corner that was formerly storage for Oldsmobile's photography hobby (boxes and boxes of 16"x24" black-and-white photographs from the 1950s up until a few years ago). As a result, I sit in what was formerly an almost entirely abandoned corner, so it doesn't get much foot traffic from the other 4 employees.

Olds: Pacman, you and Radio need to make sure you check on Ms. StrainedConsciousness' progress every so often.

Pacman: Hey, Ms. StrainedConsciousness! You alive?

Me: Yup!

Pacman: Ok!

Yes, that's the actual conversation that occurred today, granted with our real names instead of their Internet monikers. It was funny, yes, but at the same time was pretty indicative of the way my days go. Pacman sits in a corner at work, but it's the corner by the kitchen counter, so he gets foot traffic when the guys refill their coffee cups or when I go fill my lovely Pantone 3395C mug with water to microwave for tea. That is, unless I'm refilling my 1L Sigg Maharashda Gold aluminum bottle for the third time, as opposed to polluting the earth by drinking from wasteful plastic water bottles.

<eco-smug expression just before I dash to the WC because I finished my fourth liter of water for the day>

Because of my location-imposed autonomy, I sometimes feel like I'm not quite one of the regular employees, yet. It's kind of like a flash-back to my days as an intern at Corgan, when my job was to organize stuff in a closet. Sometimes, the only person I saw was the receptionist when I got to work and the receptionist (again) when I left.

It's not nearly that bad working for Oldsmobile, but I hear the guys bantering on the other side of the office as they refill coffee mugs and microwave the leftovers their wives packed for their lunch, and I sigh in a woebegone manner and return my attention to the interior elevations that confront me, drowning my sorrows with environmentally conscious water and fair trade tea.