Okay, so I haven’t written in a while. I feel a little bad about it, but things have been crazy busy over here… you forgive me, right? I thought you would.
Anyway, we’re finally moving out of the house of the unholy, and moving into our own one-bedroom flat in north London. Score for us. This new place is pretty nice, but we could be moving into a rat-infested munghole, and it would be better than our current accommodations. It’s just a bonus that our new place is really nice. We will be living in a converted Victorian house, which has three separate apartments. Ours is on the top floor, and gets plenty of light during the day. I’ve seen closets bigger than our new kitchen, but it has a washing machine and a skylight, so I’m not complaining. Plus, it’s less to clean. Our bathroom is also kind of small, but again, that’s fine with me, since it’s less to clean. Our living room is fairly spacious, and has a nice big window overlooking Alexandra Palace. We also have a table and chairs, which will be a welcome change from eating dinner on the couch like slobs. And, our new landlord has left us a really big television as an incentive to move in early. Nice. The bedroom is also pretty big, and almost twice the size of our current shoebox. And there’s a landline, so we’ll finally have our own phone. I’m so excited.
On to other things… I’ve been feeling a little bummed out lately, and I think I’ve finally figured out why: I don’t feel settled in here yet. I know, I’ve only been here for a short time, but I feel as though I’m constantly working toward something and can’t really relax. I’m hoping things will be better when we’re in our own space. Because then, I’ll be able to leave the dishes in the sink worryfree for as long as I want to, without having to read about it in a note later. I’m also looking forward to using the phone whenever the hell I damn well feel like it, and not having to ask permission first. I’ll bet you thought we were lying, or at least exaggerating, before when we mentioned the fatlady, also known as psycho bitch. But we will be free of her in less than five days! Woo. hoo.
Work is okay… I’m working on that feature I was telling you about last time I wrote. It’s really running me down though, because all these damn fashion people think they’re too good to talk to me. I’ll show them. Well, I probably won’t, but it helps to complain…. Ha ha.
So, I’ve noticed something about working here in jolly old England. There seems to be a pretense of professionalism in the newsroom. Allow me to explain. My first day at work, I attended an HR presentation about the company, where I was told about advertising figures, growth within the company, benefits – it felt like they were selling themselves to me. I was given a handbook of rules, and told I had to complete a computer course on health and safety in the office. The handbook has rules on personal phone calls and the use of the internet, in that they are only to be used during your lunch. Then I noticed the section that said your use of the internet, email and phone was monitored regularly, and that you didn’t really have any privacy during work hours. This was different from what I was used to. Not that you’re allowed to goof off at work back home, but the rules don’t seem as strict. But I thought, okay, this is how things are done here. I was introduced to a lot of people during my first week, and don’t remember the names of most of the people I met. Everyone dresses smartly (the word around these parts for business attire), and looks as though they’re hard at work. But, when I was making my rounds through the office, I noticed that things weren’t as they seemed. Joanie was playing solitaire, Billy was on hotmail, Sam was listening to MP3s, and Anna was on the phone with her boyfriend. Hmm.
I returned to my desk, careful not to spend too much time on the net or checking my email, for fear that I was being monitored, even though I didn’t have any work to do. I also took to dressing smart for work, which I never really minded doing in the first place. But then, I noticed that most of the women in my office, unless they work in advertising, wear trainers (running shoes) with their dress pants, if they wear dress pants at all. Most of them wear jeans, even though Fridays are the supposed casual dress day. Hmm.
During my first week, this woman named Glenda sent out an all staff email entitled “My kid’s better than your kid.” If you’ve never seen this, I’ll send it to you; it’s hilarious. But that’s besides the point. This email was a joke, with swear words, and definitely inappropriate under the terms of the employee handbook. I was expecting to get another all staff email about sending out inappropriate emails, like I’ve seen happen in other places I’ve worked, but nothing came. Turns out that everyone sends everyone else “funny emails” all the time. I’ve received countless music and movie quizzes, weird animations, MP3s, pictures and movie clips. I began to wonder if our emails were being monitored at all. Hmm.
Anyway, after several weeks of this environment, which seems more slack every day, I decided to join in. You know what they say: when in Rome… Anyway, I was editing a piece and decided to play some music, quietly. About 10 minutes later, my line manager asks me if the sound was coming from my computer. I said yes, and he said that it was fine. Five minutes after that, this guy, who I’ll call Head Boy, asks me about the music. I offer to turn it down, and he promptly tells me to turn it off because it’s unprofessional. I was like, WTF? We work in the same office, and not half an hour ago, one of my coworkers was playing MP3s of the A-Team theme song very loudly, but no one said anything to her. Anyway, I turned it off, because I really didn’t care about listening to it. What bothers me is this pretense that everyone in the office is professional, and that our environment is a model of professionalism. If that were true, Head Boy would not have been able to take a five-hour liquid lunch on Thursday, our press day.
This pretense problem isn’t unique to my office either. When I was working at the Daily Mail on Sundays, I had a very rude encounter with this woman, whose name I don’t know, so I’ll just call her Stick Up Her Ass. I was sitting at my desk, editing a story on Quark. To the far left of me, I had placed the book I had been reading on the tube ride in. The book was closed, out of my peripheral view, and out my reach. SUHA strolls by, stops dead in her tracks, swivels around and tells me to put the book away, because some people would find it “impolite.” I thought she was joking until I saw her face. I don’t know why, but the women in this country have the snarl face down pat. If you’ve ever been to England, you’ll know what I’m talking about. I put the book away, thinking, “Okaaay.”
Anyway, you tell me, are these people demented, or am I just spoiled?
Talk to you soon,
S.
