Hurricane Preparation

Well I wouldn't have thought I'd ever say I experienced an earthquake and a hurricane within a week of each other (especially in Virginia Beach, I mean really?) but by the end of this weekend I'll be able to.

Hurricane Irene is still headed our way and residents, just like when it randomly snows here, have lost their minds.  I ran a few errands to get ready (grabbed some cash, filled up my tank, and got some non-perishable food) nothing serious, but while I was out it clearly registered that Irene has made people crazy... or at the very least completely inconsiderate of others.  I don't care to elaborate because then I'd have to relive the most annoying parts to my day, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Back at the office, we were getting email after email with PDFs on hurricane preparedness and notes of things to do before the weekend and the office closes completely.  We were asked that if we sit near a window to put the blinds down and try to turn our screens or equipment toward the wall.  Easy enough.

Meet Leanne... well more like Leanne's desk (yes, someone sits there).  "Leanne" just started with the company a few weeks ago (her true identity is being protected) and took the hurricane emails from HR very seriously.  A few things you should know is that Leanne does NOT sit beside a window and obviously did more than turn her electronic equipment against the walls of her cube.  

Every picture or document pinned up in her cube has been taken down, the frames put in drawers, monitor turned around, her file cabinet was moved, and the top of her desk has been entirely cleared off.  As for me, I forgot to move my monitor and turn off my surge protector.  Whoops.

Photo Update as of 8:39am on 8/29:

Looks like Leanne's desk is basically back to normal.  However, my co-workers and I think she might be holding some things back  for fear of what this week could bring.  Its either that or she thought now was the time to avoid putting back up some of the newbie materials they post in your cube to help you get started and remember things.  

Featured Colleague: Meredith Mobley

 

Welcome to the first-ever Featured Colleague Friday post, exclusive to Walk a Day in my Flip Flops.  By exclusive I mean I'm not quite fancy enough to start a multi-blog series like the 30 before 30 or What I Wore Wednesday (give me some time), but if you have fun colleagues that you want to talk about on your blog, please do!

My sister recently suggested I give myself weekly topics to focus on so that I don't stop blogging and I think it was a great idea.  So, for the next few Fridays I'm going to attempt to post about my some of my favorite colleagues.    I know this combined with Office Shenanigans makes for a lot of office talk, so I'll try to keep it interesting and fingers crossed... you actually enjoy it!

Without further ado I'd like to introduce you to Miss Meredith Mobley.  Meredith is a diva by day and a diva by night.  When she isn't working at Dominion Enterprises as the Marketing Communications Coordinator, aka Queen of Communications, shes volunteering with PRSA, freelancing, and (not "or", because she does it all) spending time with her family and friends.  

Writing and Public Relations are Meredith's great loves, only second to God.  You can always find her in pearls, heels, and on the other side of a camera lens.  In case you can't tell, she is extremely photogenic and not camera shy (the above shot was taken in our office).  One of my favorite memories of Meredith was when I was walked by her cube and saw her checking out a photo of herself (practically full screen) out of the corner of my eye.  The best part was the smile on her face, in the picture and at that moment while looking at it, you should have seen it!  I laughed immediately and did a double take to be certain of what I thought I saw; I wasn't mistaken.  If you know Meredith you know that's not hard to believe, perhaps you've seen similar behavior by her yourself!

A few of my favorite things about Meredith are:

1. Her confidence.

2. Her frantic feet tapping when she thinks something is laugh out loud funny but doesn't want to cause a distraction at work.

3. That she passes me hand written notes in the office via post-its.

4. How she'll make sure to do a catwalk strut of a new outfit if you haven't noticed it.

5. When she uses her handheld mirror to spy on me in my cube or when she threatens to spray me with canned air dusters (wait, I actually don't like that).

6. Her initiation of and or quick retaliations to sassy office banter.

7. That she keeps a can of beefaroni or clam chowder in her desk at all times.

8. The heart she has for her friends and family.

My original intention was to make this post pretty funny, but I wasn't as successful as I'd hoped to be.  If you know Meredith you're probably laughing more than if you don't, but as I started writing it I realized I was doing it more for Mere's entertainment than anyone else's.  

Office Shenanigans... I'm bringing this back!

Well, initially when I posted about Office Shenanigans the thought was to keep the posts coming... but as you can see I haven't revisited the topic since August 17th.  I'm so lame.

However, now that some time has passed and I'm feeling motivated to blog more than I have been, this is a perfect time to bring the "series" back, or should I say start the series since there was only one story before now?  Shall we get started?  

Let's talk about AOL Instant Messenger, which I'm sure you've heard of.  Where I work it is strongly encouraged to set up an account for inter-office and more often inter-department communication.  We say its for ease in file sharing but really it allows for instantaneous conversation without having to get out of your seat or carry on a face to face conversation with your co-workers.  Genius. And we wonder why people are growing more and more dependent on email and less comfortable with phone calls.  BUT, this isn't even what I want to talk about, this was just to "explain" why we have it.  What I really want to talk about it what the above conversation.

First of all you should know that the Meredith (aka memobley) shares a cubicle wall with me.  Next you should know that these sort of messages aren't at all unusual to get.  I'm not sure why I initially assumed it was a misspelling- clearly she'd be using a greeting from the dark ages.

P is for promotion

I probably don't need to say too much more than the title, but I'll share anyway.  Right before the end of the day I was brought in by my manager and offered a promotion!

I did and didn't see this coming.  We had talked awhile back about my current position compared to the level I thought I was performing at but a lot of time passed between then and now.  I was excited to hear the news and finally feel like I had made progress.

It's one of those situations where you know you're at a different level than when you came out of college (which is when I started as a Marketing Coordinator), but that growth and your transitions aren't clearly defined in your resume.  Of course, I could tell a potential employer how much I had developed myself professionally but having it laid out on your resume sometimes says more.

While I feel it was well deserved, I also feel incredibly blessed.  I have friends that in the past year have lost their jobs or feel like they are still in the position I just came out of and that makes me grateful for this new opportunity.

Overall, my job isn't changing much.  I took on a lot more responsibility awhile ago and now it's officially becoming part of my job description, plus I'm responsible for an intern... eek!  But seriously, how fun is that?  I mean after this season's first episode of The Office, I have been having way too much fun thinking about the possibilities.  Just kidding, we won't send them on Starbucks runs or break into their car.  Although, if I was an intern I wouldn't mind.

interesting day at the office

Most of you know that I plan my company's industry/internal events for a living along with other various marketing tasks, of course... but if you didn't, now you do.  Anyway, each time a large national event draws near I get insanely busy at work.  I can certainly fill up a 40 hour week year round but when an event is close I stay late, eat through lunch, dream about things I need to do, and randomly write post-its to myself while at home.  It's intense.

Today though hit a whole new level I didn't think I ever would.  I had a panic attack at work.  It came out of nowhere.  One minute I'm walking to my desk and the next minute I'm looking at some mock ups that weren't the final files I was expecting.  All of sudden my chest got tight and it felt like I was getting less air.  Now, I've had panic attacks before and this was mild (in terms of my outward reaction) but it was still an anxiety attack nonetheless.  I stayed calm, controlled my breathing and tried to compose myself so I could work.  Of course, my close friend Gillian knew something was up, but I assured her I knew how to handle it.

I'm still baffled.  I didn't even think I was overly stressed.  I guess the body has a way of taking over when you're not doing a good job respecting your limits.

Office Shenanigans: The Kudos Board

I want to start out by emphasizing that when reading these posts it helps if you watch The Office.  If you don't, no worries, but certain references will make more sense if you do.  Actually, if you don't watch The Office I'm worried, it's pretty much one of my favorite shows and you're missing out.

Now let's get started... I've caught a lot of grief for yesterday's post being just a preview and not having a story.

Awhile back my office decided to start our own mini-version of the dundies with a kudos boards.  I don't remember when this board originated and it's even less clear the time of its demise, but it was short lived to say the least.  Basically, we had a white board up in the office with everyone's name and space to "anonymously" write kudos about one another.  Then we would share these in department meetings and they would also get emailed to the kudos committee.  The kudos committee was made up of some ladies from another department, who once a month would walk around the office shaking pom poms & other random noisemakers as they passed out goody bags to that month's kudos recipients.  This is not a joke.

While their committee was awesome, the best part of this whole office episode is the types of kudos submitted amongst our team.  They started out genuine and professional, but as people lost interest in giving praise and slackers started feeling left out of the spotlight, the weirdest efforts started being acknowledged.  For example, someone was given a kudos for cleaning and organizing a spare cube.  While this was a nice thing to do- one, it did it not seem kudo-worthy and two, it begged the question of people's workload.  I suppose we've all had days where we take a break from one thing to do something more mindless, but who wants that highlighted?  What make this particular kudo extra awesome is that is was given in the same month we drew randomly from the submissions for a half day off.  Yep, you guessed it, that person's accomplishment was drawn and they got to a paid half day off... for cleaning a cube... out of boredom.

Needless to say, the kudos committee didn't come into our department too much after that.  Honestly, they must have decided that our team's "accomplishments" didn't merit a full bag of candy and a huge applause from their committee.  I'd have to agree, but don't tell anyone.

Oh, and before I forget... Happy Birthday Dani!!!  Sort of random, I know, but it's my sister's birthday and it should be definitely be mentioned on my blog!

Office Shenanigans

I've probably mentioned before (at least to Scott) that sometimes when I watch The Office it makes me think of where I work. For the record, we do NOT have our own version of Micheal, but we do take department Christmas photos, debate over the temperature, and chit chat at the water cooler.

This upcoming Friday marks my three year anniversary at my job and to celebrate that occasion I'm going to share some of my favorite stories from my office.

If you don't work in a cubicle I invite you to read these stories later this week and take a peek into our world. If you do work in one, I still want to invite you to sit back, read, and laugh at the things our offices have in common.

This is my cube at work. Awesome, I know.

My Point Exactly

I knew it! If you haven't read my pre-Valentine's Day blog you need to in order for today's to make sense.

Today at work the flowers started...

I was secretly hoping with Valentine's Day falling on a Sunday that I wouldn't be subject to the overwhelming amount of flowers and love going around the office, but I wasn't that lucky. And of course, someone in my own department of 12 had to be sent some. The recipient (who shall remain nameless ) isn't in a relationship, her admirer is a guy shes been on a few dates with! How does that work??? And the best part is she left early for the day to catch a flight and there the roses sit, unadmired til Tuesday. I secretly plotted how I could take them home for the weekend and have them back before she noticed next week, but I couldn't. Truth is, I would never actually have the "balls" to do such a thing and it wouldn't be possible with all the onlookers in the department...but I thought about it. Pathetic.

The worst part is that I am torn because I stand by my previous post and the fact that I don't want money wasted on flowers for a Hallmark holiday, but I find myself jealous- how awful, especially because I adore this particular co-worker.

I want to add that she received flowers for this same occasion last year too, different guy, same point (actually the second year running makes it that much more envious).

her arrangement looks just like this...