Back to the Blech

From an unnamed production office for an undisclosed television show in an address-withheld building in LA where the elevators are shockingly slow...

 
Today was my first day back at work after a week and a day away.  The week and the day were as glorious as you might imagine when I tell you that they were really glorious, and the return was as miserable as you might imagine when I tell you to read any blog post I've ever posted.  I tried to think of a good metaphor for how my vacation was like work... The obnoxiously persistent mosquitoes as my immediate boss, the constant threat of sunburn as her frightening wrath.  When I reached the point, though, of suggesting something about the dead tarantula I saw on the ground outside a Belizean cave being like my hopes and dreams it seemed the metaphor was getting too thin.  Or depressing.  Either way.

So, after wishing unsuccessfully that I forgot how to get to my office and could call in lost and get everyone worried that I had gone totally loopy a la Kelly Bensimon on Real Housewives which I caught up on after too long away, I made it to work this morning and checked my work e-mail for the first time to find that our network celebrated a big anniversary during the week that my coworkers and I were away.  In the spirit of celebration, each day there was some treat for everyone in the building.  You know, the building I wasn't in for once.  Free coffee, free ice cream, free cake; my e-mail cataloged the delight of the day for each day that I was away.  As a small consolation, however, there was a red, plastic, network anniversary commemorative cup waiting for me on my desk this morning.  And another e-mail in the midst of the daily treats one that asked all employees building-wide to please stop watering/dumping out plants in the bathroom sinks.  So at least I know it wasn't all fun while I was away.  (Incidentally- Doesn't everyone just get succulents and then never water them and then say that they're surprised when the plants die?  I can't be alone in this charade.)

Then this afternoon we had a long meeting where we all heard about doing better at stuff.  Where's my job where the assignment that we all have to do better at is longing to be back on a beers-before-noon-style vacation?  That I'm very good at.  Very.

When I Was... How Old?!

From an unnamed production office for an undisclosed television show in an address-withheld building in LA where the elevators are shockingly slow...

Today a new intern started at my office.  She is the niece of someone vaguely connected to our show, a fact that I was not surprised to learn after my boss showed me her resume and it listed "Dancing and Cheerleading" on it.  But I am trying not to prejudge, and also trying to conceal how much I don't want another girl to come into my office.  The thing is that as much as I do wish I had someone nearby to compliment my shoes more often, I like pretending to be overwhelmed in the lonely lady fight against the crass boy energy (when really I think that they're funny).  Also, there is second girl intern starting next week, and my fear is that I will spend the first month that they're both here watching my two male office mates try to have sex with them, the second month that they're here being a fifth wheel in my own office, and the third month diffusing an icy chill of screw-uppery and being the only person who is still speaking to everyone.  I would prefer to avoid all of these things.

So today girl intern #1 showed up, cute as can be, slightly overdressed but totally in the way that someone should be overdressed for their first day at a new office, and she was very friendly and sweet.  I showed her around a little bit and tried to get a sense of her life, but somehow in my questioning I missed what my office mate later revealed to me as some pretty big news: The new intern is seventeen.  As in years old.  As in holy hell that's a young intern and none of us in this office talks in any way appropriately for most civilized grown-up company and certainly not for someone who couldn't even go register for the army if I asked her to.  That is a young, young lady.  If she weren't wearing that cute little black cardigan in the picture I posted, I could be in danger of getting hauled off by Mariska Hargitay for putting that on the internet.

So while it will be a slight stretch to make daily chatter when I have no idea what TV shows she grew up watching or if she knew who Michael Jackson was before he died, at least I know that, by law, I will not have to watch my office mates put the moves on her.  And, in one last mega-bonus, I can tell myself that it is only thanks to her teenagerdom that she is way skinnier than me.

Spring Prank

From an unnamed university in the greater San Francisco Bay Area...

My officemate and I are basically the only ones in the whole building today, so we took advantage of the situation and decided to prank our next door neighbors yet again. This time we decided to dress up their little office couch like a hotel bed, complete with lacy bedsheet, tiny shampoos and soaps, and chocolates (well, M&Ms). Why? The answer is three-fold.

1. We're bored.
2. We like to say that they're in love, so making their office into a romantic suite seemed like a hilarious way to beat that dead horse.
3. We have the key to their office.

Though each gentleman has his own desk, they like to sit together on the couch and work on their laptops. We've already mocked them once by dressing up like them (plaid shirt, boots and ballcap for one; blazer, jeans and sneakers for the other) and working on laptops on our office couch for a full day. Another time, we hid their dart board ind sent them an audio ransom note demanding a plate of homemade cookies in exchange for its safe return. That prank was actually inspired by something K and I did in the dorms. Maybe we'll tell you about it someday...