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Monday, March 28, 2011

Out With the Old, Out with the New

My commentary on how long it's been since I've posted isn't really worth reading, so I'll skip it.

The company I work for moved to a brand spanky new building. Actually, the company my company rents space from built a new behemoth, and my company has a floor within the new behemoth. We've all been excitedly awaiting this new building for a couple of years now. On our worst days, we would say "I'm quitting! But not until I get to see the new building. Then, I'm QUITTING." We were all enticed by the pretty color schemes, the promise of windows next to our desks - windows with sunlight! - and a new dawn for our department - our whole company!

When we all first walked into the new building, we were in awe. It's bright, beautiful, spacious, modern. Then you get to our floor. Today was day 19 in the new building. We've all spent nearly 3 weeks trying hard not to be negative, trying hard to remember how excited we were to move into The Future of Cancer Care. But we're still waiting on that new dawn. So, I figured this called for lists. I'm going to just get all that negativity out of my system here, and maybe there'll be a little hat tip to some of the good things before I wrap this up.

You Get What You Pay For

1. The "tile" on our floor is about the quality of fruit roll-ups painted gray. 19 days in, and it's gouged up like Seal's face (no offense, Seal- I loved Kiss from a Rose).

2. No one can seem to master the art of consistent air pressure from one room to the next. Your hair blows dramatically as you pass through doorways, and just when it starts making you feel glamorous, the door slams hard behind you and makes you wet your pants.

3. Our state-of-the-art break room can hold up to 10 people on a floor that employs around 75 - and no, you may not eat at your desk. You might sully the pretty gouged floors. This is the Future of Cancer Care! You cram yourself into the break room until the fire codes weep from neglect.

4. Our state-of-the-art break room has an ice machine - a big one! Cool! Heh. It broke twice during the first 7 days we were there, flooding the break room. It also has two microwaves! They also broke. We have new fancy patterned styrofoam cups in there, though. Not those bland white ones that actually insulate your fingers from heat - nope! These burn the shit out of your hand while you drink your coffee and tread water with your 74 coworkers in the break room.

5. It seems we hired Acme ADA inspectors to consult on the building's design. Not a single doorway in the place is actually built for a person in a wheelchair to easily get through. Wait, that's not true - a few of the doorways are. Which ones? The stair well doorways. Yes.

6. One of the elevators takes you to the 5th floor, regardless of which button you pushed.

7. What's left? Let's see - a third of the exam tables were broken on day 1, and could only be positioned in the 90 degree ramrod straight up position. Soap dispensers didn't work, doors were designed to open against the exam table so you almost hit the patient every time to walk in, and there was no toilet paper.

8. Also, it turns out that working for years without seeing sunlight leaves you at a disadvantage. Now we're all walking around discombobulated and squinting because it's so BRIGHT. Does it have to be so BRIGHT?

9. This amazingly spacious clinic is not ideal for ill people with difficulty walking any sort of distance. But, I guess we could just put them in a wheelchair...

You Also Get a Little of What the Landlord Paid For

1. The rest of the building is amazing. I think I said that already, but it bears repeating.

2. The new cafeteria sells really healthy food and biodegradable containers to put it in. It costs about what you would expect, though, and your insurance doesn't cover it.

3. That window by my desk is very pretty.

4. Ready made small talk with patients every day: So, what do you think of the new digs? Isn't it spacious? You can catch your breath a minute before you answer. I'll wait.

5. The faucet in the break room actually has hot water that comes out hot. Big improvement from the old building. And we have a filtered water machine that dispenses cold AND hot water. Pretty nifty, I think.

All in all, it's cool. Lots of work went into it. Not all of it was well thought out work, but there was lots of it. I've seen the new building now.

And I've submitted a couple of resumes to other places this week. Because you can't paint the ship and expect it to stop leaking.

2 comments:

Janet said...

I'm glad you are able to recognize some good things about the new place. All new things require some time to break them in. We got a new computer system at work last year. I worked on the pilot starting in Aug and then we all went live in Oct. There are still a LOT of things wrong and sometimes I miss the old one. It's so much less efficient than the old one that it has caused us all to have to work some weekends just to try to catch up. Sucks.

Melody said...

Biff! I just checked this out. Glad you're back to the blog...don't stress if it's another while til you post again. It's been two months for me. I've just gotta say, YOU...CRACK...ME...UP! I seriously wanna read a book by you some day. A David Sedarian style book. Cuz you CAN do it! Love you!