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This two-month detail is taking ten years off of my life!!!
Working days now, 6:30am to 3pm. Since these are normal business hours, and the boss is there, I am now his flunkie.
That's right, every day begins with: "What are you working on today?"
Which we all know REALLY means "I need you to do something for me."
Anyhow, I like the boss. On the downside, he's a tempest in a teapot, spawning stress everywhere in his wake. But then again, he's under enormous pressure. Which he shares.
But he's a good guy and I genuinely like him. I was scared to death of him the first couple weeks, and I'm still intimidated (surprisingly enough I get intimidated by bosses). But now I know that he thinks I can do the work, which is good because I didn't want him to think I couldn't. The downside is that now he asks me to do everything! But at least we have a rapport now, which is important.
So... he has me do all kinds of flunkie activities. Like helping him do reference checks for people he wants to hire permanently. So here I am, my little self, calling up all this brass, asking personal questions about other brass. Everyone involved is several grades my superior -- so I just swallow the nervousness and pretend I'm fellow brass and chat it up. What an experience!
Oh yeah, and there was that time some White House staff were scheduled to visit and he told me I would have to say a few appropriate words to them if he had stepped out of the office when they dropped by.
(He hadn't, and I didn't, but that was a bit of an adrenaline rush)
And -- have to choose my words carefully here -- we're working on a huge project. Huge. Nationwide. International incident-type project. And we're having trouble with it. So he leaves for the weekend and wants me to explain our status to the Big Brass over a conference call.
Oy. So I figure out what I'm going to say, dial into the conference call, and sit for 45 minutes listening. Except everyone was speaking so far away from their phones I could only hear every other word. I'm sitting with my head on the desk, ear glued to the crappy phone speaker. And I'm deathly afraid of missing my cue to give my report. Finally, it's my turn. I introduce myself, explaining I'm standing in for my boss. And I start my little report, trying to explain why we've done diddley squat on our big project. And I reach across the desk to flip a piece of paper... and I jar the phone. The receiver hangs up and I'm dropped from the call. In the middle of my report.
I scream. And then frantically push the buttons on the phone to get back into the conference call. I got on, apologized, and Ms. Brass was really cool about it. So I continue, and give the report of the day. And she thanks me and remembers my name. So now Brass knows my name. Oy.
There's a lot of other little stuff... but those are the highlights.
With all the stress, I've developed two coping mechansims: either I work out for 90 minutes, or I drink. It's either one or the other it seems.
When I say 'drink' I mean wine. I enjoy wine for the sensory experience, matching with foods, etc. I never (until now) drink more than a glass, or maybe 1 1/2 glasses, always with food. Last Saturday, my friend had a wine tasting party. We had a great time, and I drank quite a bit! However, Sunday morning I realized that I had acquired my first ever hangover. Not a *real* knock-down drag-out hangover, just a little one that made me tired, dehydrated and cranky. But my very first nonetheless.
Anyhow, so Wednesday night I meet up with one of the supervisors from home who was out here in a conference. (he is, incidentally, a Victor Garber lookalike). We had a very nice dinner at Ruth Chris' Steakhouse, and he ordered a bottle of Blackstone merlot. We finished the bottle and both wound up sort of stumbling down to the metro station.
Of course, my drinking buddy called my friend at work and asked her if I got back to my hotel okay... and told her about the merlot. And the boss was there, and heard about me and the merlot... and the first thing I hear when I get to work the next morning (after "are you doing anything today") is -- "Stay away from the merlot while I'm gone." (in a teasing manner of course).
Oh boy. Well I'm certainly collecting new experiences!
Working days now, 6:30am to 3pm. Since these are normal business hours, and the boss is there, I am now his flunkie.
That's right, every day begins with: "What are you working on today?"
Which we all know REALLY means "I need you to do something for me."
Anyhow, I like the boss. On the downside, he's a tempest in a teapot, spawning stress everywhere in his wake. But then again, he's under enormous pressure. Which he shares.
But he's a good guy and I genuinely like him. I was scared to death of him the first couple weeks, and I'm still intimidated (surprisingly enough I get intimidated by bosses). But now I know that he thinks I can do the work, which is good because I didn't want him to think I couldn't. The downside is that now he asks me to do everything! But at least we have a rapport now, which is important.
So... he has me do all kinds of flunkie activities. Like helping him do reference checks for people he wants to hire permanently. So here I am, my little self, calling up all this brass, asking personal questions about other brass. Everyone involved is several grades my superior -- so I just swallow the nervousness and pretend I'm fellow brass and chat it up. What an experience!
Oh yeah, and there was that time some White House staff were scheduled to visit and he told me I would have to say a few appropriate words to them if he had stepped out of the office when they dropped by.
(He hadn't, and I didn't, but that was a bit of an adrenaline rush)
And -- have to choose my words carefully here -- we're working on a huge project. Huge. Nationwide. International incident-type project. And we're having trouble with it. So he leaves for the weekend and wants me to explain our status to the Big Brass
Oy. So I figure out what I'm going to say, dial into the conference call, and sit for 45 minutes listening. Except everyone was speaking so far away from their phones I could only hear every other word. I'm sitting with my head on the desk, ear glued to the crappy phone speaker. And I'm deathly afraid of missing my cue to give my report. Finally, it's my turn. I introduce myself, explaining I'm standing in for my boss. And I start my little report, trying to explain why we've done diddley squat on our big project. And I reach across the desk to flip a piece of paper... and I jar the phone. The receiver hangs up and I'm dropped from the call. In the middle of my report.
I scream. And then frantically push the buttons on the phone to get back into the conference call. I got on, apologized, and Ms. Brass was really cool about it. So I continue, and give the report of the day. And she thanks me and remembers my name. So now Brass knows my name. Oy.
There's a lot of other little stuff... but those are the highlights.
With all the stress, I've developed two coping mechansims: either I work out for 90 minutes, or I drink. It's either one or the other it seems.
When I say 'drink' I mean wine. I enjoy wine for the sensory experience, matching with foods, etc. I never (until now) drink more than a glass, or maybe 1 1/2 glasses, always with food. Last Saturday, my friend had a wine tasting party. We had a great time, and I drank quite a bit! However, Sunday morning I realized that I had acquired my first ever hangover. Not a *real* knock-down drag-out hangover, just a little one that made me tired, dehydrated and cranky. But my very first nonetheless.
Anyhow, so Wednesday night I meet up with one of the supervisors from home who was out here in a conference. (he is, incidentally, a Victor Garber lookalike). We had a very nice dinner at Ruth Chris' Steakhouse, and he ordered a bottle of Blackstone merlot. We finished the bottle and both wound up sort of stumbling down to the metro station.
Of course, my drinking buddy called my friend at work and asked her if I got back to my hotel okay... and told her about the merlot. And the boss was there, and heard about me and the merlot... and the first thing I hear when I get to work the next morning (after "are you doing anything today") is -- "Stay away from the merlot while I'm gone." (in a teasing manner of course).
Oh boy. Well I'm certainly collecting new experiences!
