Where am I?

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face of the earth
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Me

Not Cool

Today I strolled to the lunchroom to put my lunch in the fridge. To my dismay, the refrigerator door was open and all the food was gone. So I asked a co-worker when we were getting a new one, and the reply was "we aren't, not unless we pay for it."

Wut?

And never mind that I was the last to know about it.

Let me point out that across the building, where the executives, customer service, sales and purchasing departments are located, the area is the carpeted, aesthetically lit, and houses new cubicles and chairs, all the employees have access to a gourmet kitchen complete with a refrigerator. Or so I hear. I haven't actually seen it because the employees in my department do not have access to that side of the building and its magnificent kitchen.

You see, the now-broken refrigerator located in my work area was an old rejected lab refrigerator that someone cleaned out and put in the lunch room so our division could have one, because the company was too cheap to supply our area with a refrigerator when they built the building last year.

Wouldn't I have liked to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation.

Project Designer: May I suggest the top of the line Whirlpool model for your refrigerators? Your employees will appreciate their lunches being nice and cool, not to mention salmonella-free. I'll put you down for two, one in each lunch area.

TG Owner: No, no, we will just need one. A second refrigerator for that area is such a huge expense. Don't want to go over budget now!

So, if the Quality and Regulatory department wants a refrigerator (to store lunches that must be eaten in 30 minutes), we must all pitch in and buy one ourselves.

There are 25 people in my department, 7 of which are managers. And none of them can convince the company to purchase a refrigerator for us. A new refrigerator costs $400-450, and less for a scratch-and-dented floor model. That means I work for a company that won't spend $20 per employee to make a mandated 30-minute lunch hour more convenient. Call having a refrigerator a perk, a benefit, non-requirement to do my job, whatever.

I'll be calling it "not cool."

Three Phrase Book Review I

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski


Hamlet with dogs.
Intriguing coming of age.
Unresolved silence.

Hello from Morocco

In grad school for my MFA, my first realized project was to design the lighting for Dominick Argento's opera Postcard from Morocco.

It's a strange little opera that is set in a train station in Morocco circa 1915, and captures the stories of the travelers passing through the train station telling their stories by what they have inside their luggage, though never revealing the luggage's actual contents. Postcard delivers a simple metaphor for the dreams and fears, motivations and "baggage," one carries throughout life.

In one scene, the travelers descend upon the man with the paintbox; they move from cajoling to downright bullying, pressuring the man to open his luggage.

It contains nothing.

Then the travelers leave the station and there's a weird dream sequence where the painter sings and plays out something about sailing on a ship. The end.

My point here is not to go into Postcard's wacky plot elements, exotic surrealistic setting, or even the oddity of the soprano aria "I keep my lover in a box." No, I'm focusing more on the significance of when it appeared in my life and how it's one of the designs that was the most difficult. It was a big deal to design because of how young I was, and it presented difficulties both in the interpretation of the opera and the realization of the design. During that time I identified with the painter who had all his emptiness revealed, but once he revealed his fears and was left alone, he could realize his dreams uninhibited.

Whenever I feel as if I can't express myself, or I'm withholding expression of my dreams and desires, I feel as if my art or my life may have no substance. The best way to describe it is "feeling a little 'Postcard.'"

Today I'm feeling a little "Postcard."

Breakthroughs

This past month I've made great breakthroughs in my understanding of how an OTC pharmaceutical company works. It really is no different than any other business, where money and sales are the all-powerful rulers. Except when the FDA requires you to spend some money to list all your products per their new electronic rules, and then the all-powerful rulers seem to have butts so tight that they consider using our suppository products.

But back to the breakthroughs. I'm not going to try to tell you that I like this job, because I know that everyone reading this already knows I'd be fibbing. But a while back, when I was spending my days at work just trying to "get through the day without crying," I started woefully collecting information on how to get this company in compliance with the FDA. Considering I have absolutely no experience or background in this field and that the FDA rolled out a new process in June 2009, the task seemed overwhelming (hyper corrected by CJ as an UN-daunting task).

But last week I got to that point where it all seemed to be coming together. Pouring through the scant paper records, folders containing photocopies of product cartons rather than actual artwork files, and the incomplete (and overwrought with errors) document control system (*shiver*), I was able to complete the first set of FDA data for the 900 products this company makes.

And it felt really good. Still not good enough to say that I like working at TG, but still, it felt good. It almost made me think it is okay that my boss plays solitaire at work.

I guess I know things now.

Every Step Counts

As part of work's "voluntary" mandatory Wellness program, the company gave everyone pedometers to wear for two weeks. The goal is to get 10,000 steps a day, and every employee's steps are tracked daily.

All I've heard for 2 weeks is "every step counts!"

Due to having a desk job and the fact that I haven't been exercising, I have logged the lowest about of steps on my team, and probably the company. For the first time in my life, I am doing something half-assed, which has caused me much shame and embarrassment. But I kept wearing the pedometer because I said I would, and "every step counts!"

Yesterday, my "Wellness Team Leader" came by to tell me that she is relieving me of my walking duties; that they will no longer track my steps because the meager amount I'm contributing isn't adding much to the team score. She will be taking my pedometer and giving it to someone else whose pedometer broke. Seeing the look of disbelief on my face, her explanation was that the company won't pay to buy new pedometers to replace broken ones, and she thinks it is only fair to give mine to someone who "is taking the challenge seriously."

No joke.

How many steps do you think it will take for me to walk out the door?

Duped Again

Last week my employer had everyone attend a mandatory meeting about our new Health and Wellness program at work. They're kicking off a "voluntary" wellness program, where the company is providing free health and blood screenings, smoking cessation programs and 10,000 steps-a-day contests. Sounds good, right?

Well, employee beware.

These "voluntary" programs are actually mandatory if I want TG to continue to contribute partial payments to my health insurance.

That's right.

If I participate, get my blood drawn for cholesterol, liver, and thyroid screenings, and participate in the "counseling" sessions, I get to keep paying the same health insurance premiums offered through my employer every month, at the cost of $225 a month. I struggled with this $225 a month when I first took the job, but resolved it by reassuring myself that being employed was more important.

If I don't fully participate in this "voluntary" health and wellness program, my employer will not pay for any portion of my insurance, and I will have to pay $400-500 a month in COBRA rates.

And then I realized: having a job could actually put me into a greater financial hole than being unemployed. Staying on unemployment and paying the 65% discounted COBRA rate under The American Recovery And Reinvestment Act would have been cheaper. I feel like I've been duped.

Let's just say that's not a good way to keep the blood pressure down.