Brought the Office with Me

Day THIRTEEN

My day was going well until 4:55pm when a colleague decided to confront me, very upset at something that I had done. The act that I did made her feel very threatened while I thought I was just doing my job. By 6pm yoga with Danielle, I couldn't shake off what happened an hour before. I felt unsettled and as a result, my mind replayed the conversation, asked questions, got defensive, and a whole range of emotions. I had trouble balancing on one leg and kept falling out of standing forehead to knee and standing bow. Although my mind settled a bit more by cobra, the aftertaste of the bad experience lingered. By spinal twist, I was exhausted both physically and mentally. I was so tired that I didn't even have the energy to be upset with myself for letting this get in the way of my practice. After class, this unsettled feeling had dulled greatly although it did not completely disappear.

After talking about my day with The Husband over a sushi dinner (I felt I needed to treat myself), I wasn't bothered by it anymore. I'm not going to own someone else's insecurity and anxiety. I will have a very matter-of-fact discussion with my colleague tomorrow to clarify my side of the story and I will try to be compassionate about where she's coming from. That's it. I'm not giving this any more time because I've already let it bother me more than necessary!

The President's ONE RGI

In his 6 months of employment at The Foundation, The President lamented that he has yet to come up with one RGI [really good idea] until now (Of course, we all know that's not true). He has decided that The Foundation will be CLOSED next week. And even if we chose to come into the office, we can't. At least for 3 of the 5 days...the building is under total lock down. No after-hour security guard to let us in. Ha! He said for those of us who have our computers and crackberries, er...blackberries, attached to our central artery, we can still certainly work from home but we have been given permission to take the week off so that we can spend time with our families for the holidays.

How's that for a nice Xmas present?! And he has said that next year and all subsequent years, he will work out some time for the office to be closed depending on which days the holidays fall.

I think The President's idea is not just a really good one, it's a BRILLIANT one. Wow -- the office closed all next week and I'm going on vacation for the first two weeks of January. Three weeks off. God, thanks for looking out for me!

And Office Santa came around this afternoon, handing everyone their white envelope. In it were our annual letters from The President, informing us of our yearly salary increases. I opened up my letter, paused at the new amount and thought, "Huh...OK, I wasn't expecting that." I got a little more than the standard 3.5% annual increase. I worked a bit harder this year, asked for more responsibilities and was given them, and carried them out well. Thanks to the PBT [Powers that Be] for the extra little boost -- I feel recognized for the extra work that I did. I was allowed to invite MoJo and we celebrated at our annual holiday party of Swedish glögg, smoked salmon, beef tenderloin encrusted with herbs, and all other sorts of goodies. Yum.

Today was a really nice day full of surprises and signs of appreciation by the PBT at work. I'm very thankful -- for a job with a great employer.

Transit Strike Day #3

Day 3 of the strike: another walk across the Queensboro. It's amazing how we are all creatures of habit. I saw the same blonde guy in a black leather jacket rollerblading past me as I left my apartment and started my walk the exact same time I did yesterday. Made the same time I did yesterday to the office too. Amazing!

I adjusted my clothing appropriately for today's walk. Instead of wearing my lovely 2/4 length, camel colored coat, I wore my windbreaker on top of a t-shirt. What a difference -- I no longer felt encumbered!

These pictures are taken at the foot of the Queensboro Bridge, on the Manhattan side. The Red Cross Disaster Relief van provided hot chocolate for all commuters during the strike and I believe they were at other bridges in the city as well. Too bad I can't take in chocolate and sweets! Dang.

These last two days in the office, I've been battling with my self-discipline in not eating an awesome chocolate cupacke from the Buttercup Bakeshop made available by a colleague who was given a half dozen yesterday. There were 3 remaining in a box he left behind in the office refrigerator at 9am this morning, untagged (When you don't put your initials on food in the office fridge it means that anyone can lay claim to the food. And trust me, the people in my office are not shy about eating and taking...ha!). And I must admit, my resolve broke down by 10 am and I ran to the refrigerator and found that all the cupcakes were gone! The person who took the last cupcaked didn't even have the courtesy to toss the box from the fridge (no home training, seriously)! So I walked away and just helped myself to some water. Bah! Now, I've been jonesing for one of their red devil cupcakes. Ugh. I can't take it!!! Sooooo good!!

By the time I left the office at 3:45, the strike was declared over and transit workers were returning to work. By late this evening, I heard the usual rumble of the N or W train by my apartment. It's a welcome sound.

Transit Strike Day #2

So I decided to go the office today. Otherwise, for every day I not come into work will be counted as a vacation day. And you know how precious my vacation days are to me! I thought it would also be a neat adventure. I'm a native of Queens but never walked across the Queensboro (not as pretty as walking across the Brooklyn Bridge so one is not missing much, trust me) and I always toyed with the idea of walking to work or at least biking (when I finally own a bike) so I took the strike as an opportunity to experience something new, walk with my fellow borough folks to work, and take pictures in the meantime. At least I would have some sort of intersting answer when people will ask me years later what I did in the 2005 subway strike. I also wanted to see what Manhattan looked like too. And the only way I was going to find out was to walk there.

To the right is a (dark) shot as I began the trek onto the Queensboro. The next pic is of the East River and Roosevelt Island, a residential area which sits right in the middle of the River. Manhattan is behind the buildings in the forefront.

Anyway, the walk door-to-door is a mere 3.3 miles. That's nothing! My thrice weekly power walks in Central Park (which I've not done in weeks!) were 4 miles on uneven terrain so walking across the Queensboro Bridge should be a piece of cake. And I'm happy to admit that it was! Subway or no subway, I left at my usual time at 8:45am and the entire walk took 45 minutes. My bosses were just pleased that I could make it and didn't care if I was late.

Thank goodness for those fitness walks! It was great to zip past pedestrians and even those on bikes who had difficulty peddaling uphill on the bridge. It was also really interesting to see cars filled to capacity since a car was not allowed into the city with 4 passengers or less. I had several offers for a ride since drivers were desperate to get into the city and picked up pedestrians for free. See this NY Times article about how strangers are thrown together in cars. Although it would've been interesting to get into a car with total strangers and feel completely safe, my commute was so short that I would find myself jumping out of the car once I got past the pleasantries. Anyway, I wanted to get back into the swing of power walking and doing 6.6 miles a day would prepare my body for all the food I would be eating for Christmas and New Year! I felt in tip-top shape although this morning I wore my nice camel coat. Tomorrow, I think I'll wear my windbreaker since I arrived in the office sweating like a pig!!

Changed out of my sweaty t-shirt and windpants into a something a little more acceptable for the office although it was still on the casual side. Half of my colleagues who made it all wore sneakers, including myself. With a shortened day, I worked what I could and left before it got dark at 3:45. Although I knew I would be perfectly fine, I still did not want to walk through the industrial parts of Long Island City in the dark. The area is just a bunch of big, somewhat desolate and dimly lit sidewalks with warehouses.



Above is a shot of the line for the Q60 bus, a line owned by a private bus company, that runs between Queens and Manhattan. The line ran the lenghth of entire city block and wrapped around two more corners. Madness! I thought of taking the bus back home but when I saw this line, I realized that it would be faster for me to walk than wait. To the left, a detail of the Queensboro reflecting the light from sunset. Below, the UN building with the sun setting behind it.

Since I needed to leave early, I couldn't find the time to leave the office and walk to Madison and Fifth Avenues. These two avenues were designated for emergency vehicles and not open to other vehicles. It was virtually empty and many people took advantage of walking down a usually busy street. Unfortunately, I was not one of them. No worries. I walked down an empty Fifth Avenue once, immediately after the Saint Patrick's Day parade before the avenue opened up to traffic.

I'm not miffed about the strike at all. The entirely new adventure into the city was well worth it. And isn't this what life's about? New opportunities and experiences?