Wacky Day

Oct. 26th, 2006 10:50 am
gnomi: (Default)
[personal profile] gnomi
So, this morning I get up and leave for work as usual. I get my bus (on time, even, which has been odd for the 66 recently), get to Harvard Square and go down into the T, where I observe an Inbound train pulling out of the station. No problem -- it's not even 7:15, so I have plenty of time to wait for the next train and still be able to get to the office by 7:30. But... the T is slow to come. No train until about 7:20, so I don't get to Kendall Square until 7:30. Not a big deal, but annoying. But because I'm running just that much late, I decide that I don't have the extra luxury time to make my coffee the way I usually do (I have a Coffee Caddy that my mom bought me a couple of years back; I can make just one cup of the coffee that I prefer. But it takes longer than just grabbing a cup from the coffee urn at work, so it's something I skip when I'm running late). So I stopped at the Au Bon Pain right near the T to get a cup of coffee.

Coffee in hand, I head down Main St. to my office building. When I arrive, I see that the lobby is much more populous than is normal for 7:40 AM (and, in fact, more populous than is normal for any time of the day. I go up to the desk and go to swipe my access card, and the security guard says, "The building's closed; the power is out." One of the building management people (whom I recognize because she and I took a building-sponsored self-defense class together three years ago) says, "You're from [name of previous owner of my company], right? I haven't seen anyone from there yet." "When do you think the power will be back on?" I ask. "It's been out since about 8 last night, and NStar's saying it won't be back until at least noon," she replies. Hrmph, says I, and I decide to call [personal profile] mabfan to tell him what's going on.

"My building has no power, so I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I'm going to call [my boss] and see what she says."

"You could always come here," [personal profile] mabfan says.

"I'll give you a call back when I know what's going on," I tell him, and hang up.

A coworker (but not from my group) comes in, and I tell her about the power outage. She figures she should call another coworker (who is a manager-type) and find out what he's thinking. I see yet another coworker enter, give him the info, and all three of us start making calls. I call my boss' cell phone and get her voicemail. I don't leave a message, figuring I'll call her home number (since she frequently works from home on Thursday), but before I get a chance to dial, she calls me back.

"Hey, Nomi," she says.

"Hi," I say. "The building has no power, and they say it'll be at least noon before it's back."

"Yeah, I heard from [editor at work who gets in around 6:30 AM most days]."

"She's gone home, I figure?"

"Yeah." My boss pauses. "They're still saying noon at the earliest?"

"Yup. I'm not sure what I should do."

"Go home. Take the day."

"Uh, but... I have no work at home. And [male coworker] says the exchange server is down."

"So, take the day. Have a day off. If the e-mail comes back, check your e-mail, but otherwise just take the day."

We talk a bit more, during which time I express my discomfort with this whole "having a day off" thing and she sympathizes. She and I then determine that we should probably call others from our group to let them know about the power outage and all, and then we hang up.

I call [profile] seborn and get her voicemail. I leave a message and then call [personal profile] mabfan back.

"[Boss] is sending me home," I say.

"OK," [personal profile] mabfan says. "Stop by here and meet my coworkers on your way home." I ask [personal profile] mabfan to e-mail [profile] twitch124, since I don't seem to have a phone number for her in my handheld.

As we're talking, [profile] seborn calls me back, and I tell her that, no, she's not dreaming and, yes, we have the day off, nominally. She says she'll pass the word along to [profile] twitch124, and we hang up.

I head toward the T, calling my parents on the way to tell them why I won't be calling at the time they expected me to call. "I'm being sent home from work," I tell Abba.

"Why?" he asks, with a tinge of "What did you do?" in his voice.

I explain about the power, the exchange server, the conversation with my boss, and tell him I'm off to visit [personal profile] mabfan and then go home. Ima picks up the other line, and I retell the story. "Take the day for you," she tells me. "Do something you don't usually do on a workday."

So, I go to [personal profile] mabfan's office, meet his coworkers, see [personal profile] saxikath there, and then I get back on the T and head home. Where I am now. So far, the "something [you] don't usually do on a workday" seems to be "sit at my diningroom table and surf the Internet." Not overly exciting, I know, but a nice change nonetheless. :-)

Date: 2006-10-27 03:07 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lisafeld.livejournal.com
Sounds like you had a great day! Are you taking off today, too, or is the power back on?

Date: 2006-10-27 03:51 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] gnomi.livejournal.com
Power came back around 3:30 PM yesterday, or so my e-mail told me this morning when I got in, and so I'm back in the office.

I had a nice relaxing day yesterday, planned Shabbat meals, went on a brief grocery trip, had lunch with a friend, and got a good chunk of Shabbat cooking done. In all, a very nice island of unexpected calm right before my crazy pre-Shabbat work-and-prep day.

Date: 2006-10-30 02:31 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lisafeld.livejournal.com
Sounds lovely!

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