Cube 216D - Day 1

Yesterday (day 0):

Made the move over from the head office yesterday.  Had my former phone booth of an office packed up and ready to go by the middle of the morning.  Had a chicken wrap for lunch.  Cut my finger and bled on my desk.  Walked to the first aid room for the first time in my eight years with the company.  Am pretty sure that it's the only room in the entire building I've never been in.

Packed last boxes into my truck at 3 PM and called my brother.  Said I wanted to go to the driving range for an hour.  Everybody at this office would think I was moving, everybody at the other office would think I was still here.  It was almost too perfect...

Today:

6:30 AM - Arrive at new office early to unpack boxes.  I am one in a long line of about a dozen cubes along the north wall of our two-storey office building.  Since I'm on the north wall, I can see the sun reflecting off the building across from me, but that's as close as I will come to seeing it from my cube.

There was a note on each desk as I walked through the building to my station.  The front was stippled with faux confetti and read: CONGRATULATIONS!!  The inside read: Welcome to your new workstation!!  I tossed it into the recycle bin with the understanding that the card was more excited than I was.

7:00 AM - I have unpacked most of the boxes and I managed to throw out even more paperwork than I did in the initial purge when I packed them.  I'm not too sure how much was because I deemed the paper unnecessary and how much was because I didn't really care.  Probably some beautiful confluence of the two.

7:30 AM - All boxes are unpacked and I am in the final stages of sorting.  More office paraphernalia will arrive later this week so that we may outfit our workstations in the corporate-approved accessories.  I can't wait to see my 'personal shelves' and 'folder sorters'.

Other cube-dwellers arriving now too.

8:00 AM - 90% organised in my new workstation and I have made my first attempt at turning on my laptop computer.  It powers up wonderfully but lacks any sort of connectivity to the world outside my two and a half walls.  I do nothing but utter something like, "Well, crap."  There is no emotion in my voice.

8:10 AM - I eat my banana.

8:15 AM - I call the IT Helpdesk, which is located in Ontario, over 3,000 kilometres from where I work.  Since they cannot connect to my machine remotely because the lack of any sort of connection is the problem I'm calling about, they can do nothing at all for me except to tell me to reboot a couple times and unplug and re-plug a couple of cords.  Nothing works, but John is very personable over the phone.  He puts in a service call for the guy who now works down the hall from me to go to the basement and patch in my connection.  I don't know when he'll do that.

8:30 AM - I complain about the lack of connectivity to a co-worker, who says that the IT guy down the hall will have to go to the basement and patch in my connection.  I briefly experience dejà vu.  I wonder aloud why they didn't just plug them all in at the same time.  He looks at me and shakes his head, like after eight years here I should know better.

8:35 AM - I decide to go and get coffee.  I don't know where it is, so I wander the halls, carrying my mug that says "You are safe.  Do not panic," while I whistle random tunes I probably heard on Treehouse TV.  I find a coffee-maker, but the reservoir is out of water and I refuse to fill it up cup-by-cup with my empty mug.  I go in search of a water pitcher.

8:40 AM - I find a water pitcher in the big kitchen on the first floor.  There are two, side by side, so I feel no guilt taking one back up to the second floor.  I wouldn't have felt guilt anyway.  I top up the reservoir and select a single serving of Chocolate Almond coffee.  With one packet of raw sugar, it's quite yummy.

9:00 AM - Still no IT help.

9:10 AM - I wander down to the first floor to see if I can find the IT guy.  I am quite proud of myself when I think to make note that the number of my LAN port is D2-87 so I can tell the IT guy.s  I have no idea what he looks like, but I assume he'll sport the minimum of corporate attire, wear his hair intentionally umkempt and have some degree of a sullen expression on his face.  I cannot find him.

9:15 AM - return to my desk and open Notepad so I can record the morning of my first day at the new corporate office.

9:35 AM - Still no IT help, I have typed all that is written above and am contemplating a second cup of coffee.  I wonder when I can post this tripe to my blog.

9:40 AM - Random IT guy pops his head around the corner of my cube and says, "Trouble?"  I've never seen him before, but I was right about the hair and the attire.  Wrong about the sullen look.  I would call it more cocky.  I give myself a mental gold star for getting two out of three and reboot my computer for what I hope is the last time today.

9:45 AM - Look out world.  I'm back online.

Comments

[Moksha Gren]

Congratulations on your assimilation into the cube world. You've been talking about this move for some time, but it will be odd now not to picture you huddled out in your trailer.

And a laptop! Huzzah! Finally you can compose your posts from the comfort and safety of your toilet. Technology at its finest.

[Simon]

I've actually only ever had a laptop since working here, but am still tied to the umbillical coming out of the wall. I should be wireless at my next upgrade, but I don't know when that'll be. You can still picture me huddled if you like. Just bathed in more natural light.

[Moksha Gren]

So..all you've needed for total freedom was a simple wireless card?That's just cruel. I've got a wireless router and card with no laptop to put it in. You've got a laptop with no wireless. Together we would be unstoppable...and yet alone we are weak and worthless.

Would it help if I tried to round up an extra wireless card?

[Mark]

Let's ship that man a wireless card, for gosh sakes. I have one I'm not using right now, but the router will have to come from elsewhere. Preferably, St. Elsewhere.

Hey, I'm super jealous of your mug that reads, "You are safe. Do not panic," because I know exactly where you got it, yet I don't have one. Grrrrr!!!

Ah, the cube move. Did it just a couple weeks ago. Threw it all into a huge box, then almost threw out my back lifting it two feet off the ground onto a cart. Ended up with my hand lotion all over my corporate logo mug and Darth Tater's cape. Just not right.

[Simon]

Mark, there's something very wrong about getting hand lotion all over Darth Tater's cape. Like, Bill Clinton-esque sort of wrong.

[Émilie B]

Hey Simon, good luck on your new office era. :)

[marian]

I'm not sure if I should congratulate or commiserate here, but I'm assuming this all means more money, so congratulations. I love your mug! That's absolutely perfect. And hey, be glad you actually have an IT guy. Many's the time I've wished for a sullen IT guy.

[Moksha Gren]

I was having the same thought at the climax of Mark's story. I felt vaguely dirty just having read it.

So I read it again.

[Simon]

Marian, the change doesn't come hand-in-hand with more money, but the presence of more sunlight during my day is a nice little boost.

Moksha, Mark made me feel dirty too. Especially with his "threw it all into a huge box" comment. I mean, really!