Day Four in the Remote office was a mixed bag in every way. I laughed. I cried. I was horrified.
It seems that the usual morning routines are falling by the wayside. Before this week, when I was ready for work, I would settle on the couch with the dogs and the laptop for email and online Scrabble for 15-30 minutes. This morning at 7:45 I went to the dining table workspace instead of the couch, probably because the laptop was on the dining table instead of in the living room. I had barely settled into the chair when I had two dogs trying to climb into my lap and whining which turned to barking. A brief trip to the couch for all of us restored peace in the BungaLowell. The breakfast game has upgraded from a dry granola bar eaten at the office to cereal in a crystal bowl. Does that make me bougie?
Whatever was so funny it made me laugh out loud has already been forgotten (or erased by other events of the day). But something struck me really funny and when I busted out with a loud laugh, the dogs went wild with barking. They probably aren’t used to me laughing here by myself. Or at all.
The horrifying segments started early in the day with a little server mishap. As part of a file naming protocol project, I was renaming a project folder using the new naming convention and thought I deleted it. At the onset of panic, but after my blood had already turned cold, I took a deep breath, did a search on the drive and found it in another folder. There may have been a few seconds of hyperventilation.
Another horrible moment happened in the afternoon when I heard loud talking outside. The neighbor from across the street, owner of a two-family house serving as the Grand Central Station Pawtuckville Outpost and site of recent porch parties with late night loud guests, was standing at the end of my driveway talking with the lady next door. He said, “Yeah, we went, and they were wearing fucking hazmat suits and masks and everything. It’s just the fucking flu, it’s not gonna kill ya.” I hope you are right, dude. And if not, I kind of hope you are one of the first to go. Apparently the various states of emergency and closed businesses are just a fun little scene from a video game and a reason to hold daily open house events in his world.
The crying part of the day was after team members were invited to post videos to stay in touch and a group of bankers posted a video compilation to the song “Imagine” by John Lennon featuring bankers from their various departments and remote locations. It was beautifully done, it was nice to see so many work-family faces, and yes, I got a little bit teary. Maybe a couple times. I’m not the weepy type, so perhaps it’s a result of the new stress level associated with an absence of human contact, not having left my house except to let the dogs into the back yard since Monday night, and being barked/yelled at by Moose all day and kept awake by the party house at night.
The day ended with the final episode of the trifecta of horrors, when, working on the same file naming project that started the day (there are lots of folders and files to rename and reorganize) I created a new folder when I didn’t see it on the server. When the list alphabetized, there were two folders with the same name. I checked – one was full of files, one was empty. Guess which one I accidentally deleted? When a status bar popped up with file names scrolling really fast I knew exactly what had happened.
Normally, at the office, a quick call to H-E-L-P from a desk phone would get things fixed, but it’s different from a cell phone in remote world. Plus, it was Friday afternoon at 4:45, so my panic level was on maximum overdrive. First an email was sent (flagged High Importance!), followed by a phone call/voice mail, then a service ticket opened with the IS group. Truth be told the real first thing I did was swear. A lot. Loudly. Then I did the rest of that stuff. One of our amazing Help Desk team members and I connected and my panic was eased greatly.
Lessons from Remote Day 4
It seems that the usual morning routines are falling by the wayside. Before this week, when I was ready for work, I would settle on the couch with the dogs and the laptop for email and online Scrabble for 15-30 minutes. This morning at 7:45 I went to the dining table workspace instead of the couch, probably because the laptop was on the dining table instead of in the living room. I had barely settled into the chair when I had two dogs trying to climb into my lap and whining which turned to barking. A brief trip to the couch for all of us restored peace in the BungaLowell. The breakfast game has upgraded from a dry granola bar eaten at the office to cereal in a crystal bowl. Does that make me bougie?
Whatever was so funny it made me laugh out loud has already been forgotten (or erased by other events of the day). But something struck me really funny and when I busted out with a loud laugh, the dogs went wild with barking. They probably aren’t used to me laughing here by myself. Or at all.
The horrifying segments started early in the day with a little server mishap. As part of a file naming protocol project, I was renaming a project folder using the new naming convention and thought I deleted it. At the onset of panic, but after my blood had already turned cold, I took a deep breath, did a search on the drive and found it in another folder. There may have been a few seconds of hyperventilation.
Another horrible moment happened in the afternoon when I heard loud talking outside. The neighbor from across the street, owner of a two-family house serving as the Grand Central Station Pawtuckville Outpost and site of recent porch parties with late night loud guests, was standing at the end of my driveway talking with the lady next door. He said, “Yeah, we went, and they were wearing fucking hazmat suits and masks and everything. It’s just the fucking flu, it’s not gonna kill ya.” I hope you are right, dude. And if not, I kind of hope you are one of the first to go. Apparently the various states of emergency and closed businesses are just a fun little scene from a video game and a reason to hold daily open house events in his world.
The crying part of the day was after team members were invited to post videos to stay in touch and a group of bankers posted a video compilation to the song “Imagine” by John Lennon featuring bankers from their various departments and remote locations. It was beautifully done, it was nice to see so many work-family faces, and yes, I got a little bit teary. Maybe a couple times. I’m not the weepy type, so perhaps it’s a result of the new stress level associated with an absence of human contact, not having left my house except to let the dogs into the back yard since Monday night, and being barked/yelled at by Moose all day and kept awake by the party house at night.
The day ended with the final episode of the trifecta of horrors, when, working on the same file naming project that started the day (there are lots of folders and files to rename and reorganize) I created a new folder when I didn’t see it on the server. When the list alphabetized, there were two folders with the same name. I checked – one was full of files, one was empty. Guess which one I accidentally deleted? When a status bar popped up with file names scrolling really fast I knew exactly what had happened.
Normally, at the office, a quick call to H-E-L-P from a desk phone would get things fixed, but it’s different from a cell phone in remote world. Plus, it was Friday afternoon at 4:45, so my panic level was on maximum overdrive. First an email was sent (flagged High Importance!), followed by a phone call/voice mail, then a service ticket opened with the IS group. Truth be told the real first thing I did was swear. A lot. Loudly. Then I did the rest of that stuff. One of our amazing Help Desk team members and I connected and my panic was eased greatly.
Lessons from Remote Day 4
- Working from the home-office means the phone ringer is on to avoid missing calls. Usually it’s on “Do Not Disturb Alarms Only” at the office-office and I rarely remember to change the volume. It’s ok until the door camera starts sending event notifications every six to ten minutes. For the end of a dead-end street, there sure is a lot of traffic since the Grand Central Station Pawtucketville Outpost opened across the street.
- Two computer monitors at the office is a great benefit over a single 15-inch laptop monitor. That extra monitor is handy when doing some cut/paste action between documents or opening a gajillion files at once. When I bought my computer wanted a 17-inch screen but there were none in stock that day and I was too impatient to wait a week. What’s that saying … Good things come to those who wait…?
- There is a reason why skiers are cautioned against taking “just one last run” before ending a day of skiing. I need to remember that the next time I’m trying to squeeze in “just one last thing” at the end of a long day/week. Unless I really want to have a heart attack, of course...
After today/this week, I need a drink. Or a bunch of them.
No comments:
Post a Comment