#writersbloqueblog

I sent out 44 individual emails today. One day: 44 emails. That, my friends, is too much.

Like many companies in corporate America, our office has an instant messaging system.  While this is very useful, and a great way to chat between friends, without being obvious that you’re avoiding work, the range of emoticons is questionable. 

There are, of course, the classic faces: happy, sad, angry, yawn, etc.  Then we have the random images: thundercloud, coffee cup, flower, wilted flower, webcam, and others that tend to get used in a random office emoji war. 

Then it gets a little weird, we have a set for just animals: cat, dog, snail, sheep.  Snail I can almost understand, maybe someone’s working slowly.  But sheep? What’s that for?  Who uses that and in what context?

Finally, we come to my favorite set of emoji’s, the ‘never appropriate for office life’ set: kiss lips, martini glass, beer, heart, and broken heart.  I’m assuming that these are the standard emoji’s that come in a multitude of programs.  However, I like to pretend that somewhere out there, in their panoramic view office, is lonely corporate director, sending someone: smiley face, flower, heart, kiss, winky face, cocktail.  Eventually leading to: sad face, wilted flower, broken heart, crying face, thunder cloud.  Hopefully never turning to: angry face, broken heart, web cam, car.  It could happen, people are crazy.  We have a theory that working in a corporate place long enough will turn you crazy.  Is it inevitable?  Do I still have time to get out?  Frantic Face Emoji. 

Regardless, emojis are a great office tool.  Smiley face, so I don’t sound too mean.  Emoji story to my cube friend while I’m waiting on emails.  Sheep emoji, just because.  Emoji that represents someone we want to talk about without them knowing.  I would recommend trying to fit emoji’s into your office life, it makes the cubicle life so much better.

P.S. Can we please get a poop emoji, nothing is ever more relevant.

<3

It looks like today is going to be a day of tech writer go fetch.

I am certain this is not a condition unique to tech writers. It is likely something that happens to all of us mucking through the corporate bog and working at the end of the line. With less time than everyone else on the team you embark on your part of the relay race to product launch partially blinded and with an impossible time limitation. When you are about to cross the finish line, in fact when you say, “Hey all, we've been through two rounds of review and edits, I've implemented all your feedback, so I’m finalizing the document and will have it out by the end of the day,” middle manager X says, “Actually I just completed my review and I have a few questions.”

MMX (Middle Manager X) just wants to make you go fetch and see how far you can run and how much you will take in order to meet the deadline.

***

MMX: Where did this new information come from?

Me: There is no new information in the document, just new formatting.

MMX: I need to see some kind of proof about where this information came from.

Me: That information is in all other documents like this. We started using this information in documents in 2005. It not new.

MMX: Well I need to see those other documents to support this new information.

Me: Ok here are the numbers for those documents. You can pull them right off of the server.

MMX: Reading online is hard. Print them out and bring them to me. (Go Fetch!)

***

MMX: What is this issue about? I didn’t read the emails I’ve been receiving about this issue.

Me: Oh, well, it’s kind of difficult to summarize because there was a lot of discussion.

MMX: Can you please just summarize? (i.e., Can you please send me an email about the emails you sent me…Go Fetch!)

***

Me: OK, so based on your feedback I think we can just remove this text. It was not necessary anyway.

MMX: I like this new text, though.

Me: Ok, so maybe I’m misunderstanding what you’re asking me for.

MMX: Well the new text is confusing so it shouldn’t really be there.

Me: Oh, ok. So I think the solution here would be to take that part out.

MMX: No I like the new text. Set up a meeting with everyone to discuss this.

Me: What are we discussing?

MMX: What to do about the text (Set up the meeting, MMX walks into the meeting and immediately says, “I think this text needs to be removed. It’s confusing.” Everyone agrees with him even though they already approved the previous change. I change the documents and now we’re back in reviews.….Go Fetch!)

In my cubicle I often wear headphones.  Sometimes I listen to music and secretly dance in my chair (yes, I’ve been caught before, thanks a lot Tyga!), or I could be listening to a documentary, maybe a podcast.  Depending on my project, I might have a lot of free space in my head for entertainment; it’s definitely one of the perks of my job and cube location.  However, there are times when I don’t have anything blocking out the noises of our office area, and those times are exciting, annoying, and sometimes terrifying. 

I wish I had explanations for the sounds I hear, but I don’t. 

There’s nail clippers, which didn’t disgust me until a cube friend told me that they saw them being used on someone’s toe nails (gag).

I love the long, loud, drawn out, and often inappropriate and misplaced laugh that bursts over my cubicle wall, often followed by an uncomfortable pause for all involved.

Occasionally I can hear someone else’s music streaming through their headphones, reminding me to check mine the next time I hit play.

On certain Fridays, a group of people play jeopardy, off of those one-a-day calendars.  Sometimes it’s rowdy, but on Fridays no one really cares.  When I can hear I like to play along in my head.  I rarely know the answers.  I’ll never be the next Ken Jennings.

There’s loud, angry guy, unafraid to yell at whomever or whatever has offended him.  He shocks me with his bold tone, unaware or uncaring of who’s around him. 

Whenever someone brings a kid in, there’s a flock of ladies who turn into complete giddy, inappropriate child snatchers.  They make such a fuss it’s beyond irritating.  I feel bad for the kids who are not yet old enough to be left at home, but too old to be offered dusty candy from a lady whose voice is raised three octaves, smiling at them with her head cocked to the side.  

But my least favorite noise in the office is something that happens every. single. day.  Sometime around 1:30, out of the depths of a neighbor cube, comes forth the loudest, wettest, most unapologetic belch.  Every. Single. Day.  For the people around, it produces gags, wrinkled noses, disgusted sighs, but from the belcher, nothing.  No excuses, no apologies, no muffling or shuffling to try and cover it up.  Nothing but the belch that comes from deep within their gut, torturing us all.  EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.

I wasn’t feeling well last Friday, and I had checked out a laptop from our IS department. Even though I could have made it into work, I knew that the conditions were perfect to try out my dream scenario of working from home; more specifically working from my California King-sized bed. I wanted to recap the pros and cons of my working from home experience, so as to educate anyone who is looking to expand their bedroom into a home office.

Pros: Sleeping In Without the prospect of 1) waking up in order to scrub, brush, conceal, and squeeze myself into pre-sedentary lifestyle clothing in order to make myself somewhat presentable to the working professional scene (and public in general) and 2) taking the long commute looming before me, I knew I could sleep in and not get ready whatsoever in order to make my usual start time for work. These extra two hours would be blissful and welcomed, since as I already mentioned earlier, I wasn’t feeling that great.

Cons: Neighborhood noises My sleeping in fantasies were quickly squashed when I was roused by the alligator tears/wailings of my young neighbor girl. Apparently, she doesn’t like to wake up early either.

Pros:  Working in pajamas This was an all-time fantasy, which was everything I thought it would be.

Cons: Paranoid Truman-Syndrome I’m pretty sure that our IS department has hacked all the laptop webcams and they were all watching me in my pajamas.

Pros: Being at my house all day I was able to accept delivery on an online purchase I had ordered. And by “accept” I mean, cower away from any windows until the mailman leaves so I can quickly pop outside and grab the package before anyone sees me in my pajamas and/or steals said package.

Cons: Heat-stroke I don’t have A/C in my house, and it was 99 degrees out. Our office is usually blasting the A/C at 65 degrees, which is always why one should store a cube sweater at work.

Pros: My own personal bathroom access Please refer to Thursday’s blog post about the horrors of the office bathroom etiquette to understand why this is an ideal situation.

Cons: I took about 82 bathroom breaks

Pros: Uniterrupted Productivity I usually am very easily distracted, and I had a very tedious task ahead of me this day. I knew I had to get this project done by the end of the week, and if I were in the office I would be too tempted to take walks with my office buddies, take a long Friday lunch, and generally indulge in regular Friday slacking antics.

Cons: Since I was so productive, I forgot to eat during the day. By 5:00 I was a mess, and had to drag myself out of the house in order to scavenge for food to sustain myself.

In summary, I realize that there are always reasons that coming to the office is good; for my sanity and for my personal hygiene. I’m glad I was able to try “working from home” out, but as long as I have great office buddies in which to share our horrific and awkward cube-life adventures, it’s not so bad to drag myself in during the week. 

I have a love/hate relationship with casual Friday.  On the one hand, all I want in my office life is to wear flip flops and t-shirts. However, like most things, it comes with a price.  For every pair of jeans I pull on I have to see someone in inappropriate casual day attire.  Below is a list of felonious outfits worn on casual Fridays:

Thin, tight, white tank top (so tight I could see the outline of her belly ring), with a black bra underneath.

Orange top, with the entire back cut out.

Just a straight up spaghetti strap camisole.

Extremely baggy jeans.

Saggy jeans.

Thin leggings/yoga pants with a short shirt.

Stomach showing (this is also an offensive act on a non-casual day).

90’s style whale tail. 

Shorty shorts.

A ridiculous amount of cleavage.

Club attire. 

 Sweatpants Jumpsuit (Velour is out people, I better not see JUICY or anything else written on your butt!).

Wallet chains.