Mar 032010
 

Hey! Guess who got another job for which she is over-qualified? Oh, that would be THIS GIRL right here!

I had sincerely expected the employment agency to stamp a big red UNRELIABLE on my file after the Henry-induced debacle at the last place, but my “agent” called me Monday morning with a new assignment for part-time evening work. The location is much more convenient and the shift is 5:30pm-10:30pm, so it’s compatible with Henry’s golden job.

I started last night. The company’s office is located in a nice building with a pretty lobby, manned by a good-natured security guard who got way too close to my face while taking my picture for my ID badge . Then he escorted me into the office where I’ll be working and dropped me off with Ev, a lithe older woman with a salt and pepper bob and nervous energy. The office itself was dirty beige with empty Postal Service bins strewn across the floor. It was about 5 steps down from my evening job two years ago at MSA.

Ev gave me a quick tour of the facilities. In the lunch room, which is a full cafeteria during the day, she was showing me the coffee machine when some squat, unruly bearded man in an ecru work shirt piped up and said in a semi-retarded cadence, “And if you use the last of it, make a new pot!” Aye, aye, Ecru.

I’m not sure yet if he works at the same place as me. Time will tell, and hopefully stories will follow.

Back inside the office, Ev began training me. I’m basically going through client files they have in their system, looking for the ones who are declining modifications to their mortgages. Or something like that. It’s a series of steps, but after watching Ev do it twice and doing it twice myself, she set me loose. Unfortunately for Jim, the older Cosby-sweatered man who also started last night, he did not have a similarly charmed fate and instead spent most of the shift being taken through the process in baby steps. It made me feel sad. It must suck for (some) older people who have probably spent most of their life in some field not requiring computer knowledge, to suddenly be dumped in front of a computer. I kept hearing Ev trying to get him to remember CTL-V and CTL-C before finally giving up and slapping a Post-It note on his monitor to remind him.

The woman whose desk I’m using was just getting ready to leave when I got there, so I had to stand awkwardly to the side while she shut down all of her windows. She seemed nice enough, and her smile was sure pretty when she said to me sternly, “Just don’t leave anything on my desk that has your name and account number on it, got that?”

“Oh. I’ll….try not to do that,” I answered slowly, hoping that I wouldn’t have any of those common urges to tear out pages of my check book and staple them around her cube in the form of my SS#. That didn’t really go over too well at my last job, either.

I made myself comfortable at her desk. It was nice having an actual desk and not a small conference room to be tucked away inside, like at the last job. While waiting for Ev to get the file with my workload ready, I had a chance to take in my co-workers. Three older soccer-mom’ish type ladies and a black woman probably around my age who I already know I want to be friends with because she has cool hair. There were still some day-shift stragglers in the office, but they all seemed relatively easy-going too. It’s not a very big office.

The best part was that there was a distinct scent of fruit snacks wafting around me. It was like being swaddled by Fruit Roll-Ups, and it made me feel at once comforted and hungry. I guess kind of like how you’d feel at a bacon-flavored orgy.

The worst part? They have a strict no cell phone policy. I had to sign off on that shit. I even said no texting in the BATHROOM. At first I was like, “OK, five hours. That’s not so bad.” By the end of hour one, I was chomping on my hair for lack of anything better to do. My knees were knocking against the desk. My fingers were icy and experiencing phantom text-flutterings. By hour two, I covertly pulled my phone out of my purse and quickly dumped in on my lap. I scooted into the desk real far so no one would see it. Granted, my boobs were resting awkwardly on the desk at that point, but it was a faux pas I was willing to endure so long as I could keep up with  my ESPN NHL Scorecenter texts. What? There were a LOT of games on last night.

By hour three, I decided to flirt with danger and send a TWEET.

I didn’t think it would be so hard. But my god, I felt like I had gone five hours without heroin by the time I stumbled out of there at 10:30.

The woman whose desk I’m sharing is an interesting broad. On the cubicle wall directly behind her monitor, it’s a miniature Lourve of angel pictures. Looking to the left, she had  more angels lest anyone forgets that she likes them. By the time I looked to my right, they were practically screaming “I’VE WANTED TO FUCK THE SHIT OUT OF AN ANGEL SINCE I WAS A YOUNG GIRL MAKING MY FIRST HOLY COMMUNION!”

In case I get bored with the angels, she has tons of GOOD WORD from our Lord to read (she even has a study Bible under the desk which I may or may not have accidentally stepped on) and a verifiable fleet of butterflies suctioned to the pane of glass that allows me to peek into the cube on the other side of me.

But my favorite cube accoutrement was the ravishing photo of whom I presume to be her husband. Picture it please: sandy Flobee’d hair, traveling from his crown to his cheeks. He’s not an overweight man, but has some jiggle, as evidenced by the way his pasty white bare thighs sag a bit as his legs are SPLAYED open as he lounges on a couch. SPLAYED OPEN with a DOG BETWEEN THEM. I couldn’t get a good look, but I believe he might be wearing boxer briefs, and if I squinted hard enough I could just barely detect, against the blinding whiteness of his legs,  some ultra-white socks yanked up to his knees.

I am so grateful I get to look at this every night.

Last night, I was telling Henry about it and I said, “I have GOT to try and take a pic—-”

“You’re going to get fired,” he mumbled, shaking his head.