The Cube Rat

A friend of mine who works at a company in New York City recently told me of a story about an office discussion that turned into a disaster. She said she found herself being a “cube rat” - a term dubbed in her company for a person who is unable to keep a secret, well, a secret.

Luckily, I am surrounded by great individuals who take personal information in and never release it to others, but it did spark an interest to know whether this has happened to anyone before? I’m sure it has.

Secrets and lies. When it comes to both there can be no better person to talk to then an office friend. Sometimes these discussions circulate around a coffee machine, others around a water cooler, and some from above cubical walls. Most light topics can lead to deeper more in-depth information into a personal life. Usually people feel you can trust the individuals with your information…until it happens. The information you just released comes flying back at you through an email, phone call or the occasional surprise visit from a co-worker. That’s when you know you have just been crapped on by…the cube rat. I recently spoke to a friend of mine at a different organization who was

Ahh…the cube rat. Every office has one (maybe more), and every person finds out who it is the hard way. I have always asked myself, why do people feel the need to spread your information? Maybe because they have nothing better to say about their own life?

Here are some tips to stop this from happening to you:

1: You could become a recluse. Do not speak to anyone. Do your work and go home.

2: If number one sounds boring, then you could test the waters a bit. Talk to everyone and tell them  something different. The topic that returns is the rat.

3: Become a rat to get back at the rat….nah…never mind. That doesn’t sound like an option.

4: Don’t care…keep things to yourself and only provide the most basic information.

Yup…go with number four. Skip all the others.

Mug Shot!

(here are some of the mugs from around the office!)

Show us your mug! Send it in and we'll post it-even if it is an Ugly Mug! CHEERS!




-Jill

March Madness Part 2: MEGA MILLIONS

Well my March Madness pool has all but drained. Note to self for next year: screw allegiance.  Temple U? More like Temple Who? So that Cinderella story didn't work out...with my chances of winning the rather impressive pot worth a few hundred bucks languished, I have decided to go big or go home-I have moved on to what I have dubbed, March Madness Part 2, aka Mega Millions lottery.  The more impressive pot. Way more.

The Mega Millions pool is worth an estimated $500 Million.  Or basically in simpler terms-my paycheck times like a gazillion.  At $1 a ticket and your chance of dying by having a vending machine fall on top of you (no really I heard it on the radio on the way into work this morning) greater than your chance of winning, those are my kind of odds. Math and stats and probability were never my thing.

At my company, like thousands across Mega Million states, office pools are all the rage.  Everyone chips in a few bucks in effort to secure more tickets (aka chances of winning).  However, that dream can be a nightmare if you don't  follow these tips here.  You have been warned.  As I see it, you have 3 options:

1) Either pay $250/hr to a lawyer to draw up provisions for the $1 you put into an office pool for a lottery drawing where your odds of winning are estimated at about one in 176 million.  Again, no Math junkie here but...

2) Go it alone.  Walk your dollar and a dream (shout out to Biggie!) right past your co-workers cubes and out to the gas station...

OR

2) Take that $1 straight down the vending machine and get the $100,000 Bar.  Mega Tenth of a delicious Million right there! JUST BE CAREFUL!

-Jill

Not O-Kcups!

I am a coffee junkie. If I could walk around with an IV pole of java pumping through my veins, I would.

I make a huge pot in the morning but by the time my sprint out the door beckons, I have left the pot half full (caffeine awakens my positive spirit-alas, if you will note I do not leave the pot half empty upon my commute).  Most days, I will take a travel mug in the car as well.  I told you, a junkie.

For the longest time I would peel into Wawa to get my hands on a 24 oz to have at my desk. Again, yes, a junkie.  Wawa is literally across the street from my building.  At the red light, I can turn left into Wawa and secure my 24 ozs and another day being 5 minutes late, or I could head right (and be right and do right and go right) into my building. On time. I often feel like this is exactly how Frost felt whilst penning The Road Not Taken. Although I am still trying to figure out which one he would have thought less traveled.

Anyway, I diverge and digress. My whole point is back in December, my Department decided to chip in and buy a Keurig. If you have to even ask what this is, you are dead to me. I could get to work faster, I could secure additional coffee more cheaply and I could start making less coffee at home and not feeling like I am wasting the world's water supply with my habit.  And surprisingly, the coffee is pretty darn good.  There's always something though isn't there? What's that saying, if something sounds too good to be true...

Turns out those little K-Cup suckers are not recyclable.  Listen, I am no hardcore environmentalist but I pride myself on my carbon footprint.  Unlike my actual footprint, my carbon one is dainty.  It has been estimated that over 7.5 million Keurig brewers have been sold.  Office cubes and offices, dentist and doctors office, hair salons, residential kitchens you name it are littered with these things.  And now, our landfills are apparently littered with the disposable cups as well.

Keurig's website read the following: "Reducing the environmental impact of our packaging materials and brewing systems is a top priority for Keurig. It is a challenge to create a portion pack that is recyclable and delivers an extraordinary cup of coffee; however, Keurig is actively working to meet this challenge head on".

Keurig got me into this brew-ha-ha and they will get me out.

-Jill

Lunch Time

It usually hits your nostrils around 12pm; those lingering smells that seems to circle my cube and land straight into my nose. It’s the lunch hour, and all at once lunches migrate together and form a smell that can either be delicious or down right hideous.

The cafeteria is no better. We only have two microwaves, and one is usually broken. By 12pm you will be the 5^th or 6^th person waiting in line just to heat up your lunch. Being that far behind will easily squash 15 minutes to your lunch hour. If you are pressed for time, oh well! Better pack a peanut butter and jelly sandwich! Because by the time you reach the front, your frozen lunch has melted away allowing you to knock off a few minutes on the microwave heat up instructions. When you finally reach the microwave everyone stares at you. Feeling rushed, you struggle to heat up your lunch and look for something to do to kill the time.

The best is leftover fish. Who doesn’t love the smell of fish microwaving, filling the air with that glorious scent of the sea?! I think that mixed with macaroni and cheese are two of the worst smells during lunch. Oh wait…add broccoli to that list as well. I’m sure we have all heated up something stinky, and I apologize for this. I am now aware and will not make people suffer anymore. I now realize that some food is meant to be kept at home.

Thank goodness spring is officially here. The beautiful weather offers the opportunity to sit outside away from those smells, or a chance to adventure out for lunch.

We are one, we are the same

Under these fluorescent lights (where every zit we’ve had since birth simultaneously becomes visible), and within these gray, radio-factory-in-Russia walls we sit in prefabricated conformity. So similar are the cubes that I have, on my way back from the bathroom, actually sat down and started working at someone else’s desk. Couldn’t tell the difference (but I was in a decongestant haze).

So our individuality is limited to how we dress (except for the overall awesomeness of Lisa's fabric-lined cube walls). That is our statement of workplace nonconformity – an emphatic, solemn declaration that states: “I am me!”

But sometimes in our effort to be different we become the same.

With all the colors and styles of clothing available, statistically the chances of wearing the same thing to work as your cube mate on the same day are slim. But just like winning the lottery, or being Lee Harvey Oswald (who worked in a radio factory in Russia, btw), sometimes we’re in the right place at the right time – or the wrong time (depending on your point of view).

Some recent collisions of fashion:

A spirit of fellowship, eh comrades?

What Are Tan Towels?

In the past two hours I have heard the term “tan towels” used at least 10 times. I had no idea what they were, but I found out quickly that they work. My sister, who is leaving for a European vacation tomorrow, decided to purchase tan towels to make her skin look “sun kissed” instead of “winter kissed.” She used the towels last night and this morning her skin has a natural glow. Seeing her beautiful skin sparked a conversation between my female cube neighbors. Now everyone wants to tan towel, and now everyone is going to Ulta at lunch to purchase them.

It makes sense considering that we sit in our cubes for a good majority of the day with no vitamin D. Our skin needs something…and maybe a tan towel is the healthy answer.

If you are a little skeptical of the tan towel, do a Google search and read some of the reviews. The reviews say the product works. There was only one con and that was the fear of the uneven tan line. It can definitely be avoided with exfoliating before spreading the tanning solution over your skin. You can also wear gloves. 

Since spring is around the corner, help yourself and your skin to some tan towels.

~ Lisa

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

Take a hike, Christmas (I'll give you the number #2 Seed!), I am talking about MARCH MADNESS people-the revelry that combines sports, a little gambling and slacking off at work.  Joy to the World!  Cue this scene for my Christmas analogy:

Experts say March Madness sucks up about 90 minutes of workers' attention for every day of the games, and lunch breaks tend to extend beyond the usual time limits.  Like Christmas in March!

I would feel really bad about this statistic (no I wouldn't), except that the "Commish" of our office pool is actually part of our Management team.  It's as if by not participating in the pool, you might botch your hopes for the next promotion.  Consider it taking one for the team!

Go TEMPLE!

-Jill

Gleaming the Cube

by Mike

Most people who have actual offices can sit at the desk, face the door and mentally qualify visitors as friend or annoyance as they arrive (or intrude) – and act accordingly. We cubed are not so fortunate.  Doorless, and with our backs turned, we are at the mercy and whim of the co-worker pop-in.

Here are the ways I have been “popped-in upon”: 

1.     The soft knock.  This barely audible, light tap on the cube edge is favored by the diffident and extremely polite. These people typically understand that you are busy. They stand not assumedly, but in serendipitous anticipation at the imaginary cube door until invited in, almost as if to say: “I can’t believe I’m standing here, but since I have your attention…”

2.     Those who start talking before they are in sight (and barely in earshot). These people know timing. They can yell “Hey, Mike!” from a distance and conclude with their demands as they arrive in your cube. I find that the best way to handle this crassness is, when you sense the person coming, pick up the phone and act like you are on an important call. Most will do an about face and leave (rather than suffer your distracted, slightly-annoyed, “I’m-on-the-phone” wave); others, however, will wait, forcing you to feign an entire phone conversation.  Which leads me to…

3.     Just stand there. Yes, there are co-workers who have come a long way to see you – some from as far away as the floor above.  They endured an exhausting elevator ride to be here and they will not be deterred. But they won’t speak up either. It is customary in this approach to enter your cube as quietly as a church mouse after a Saturday night bender and simply stand and stare at the back of your head. This is favored by the non-assertive, for they rely on that sixth-sense, that innate ability we all have to know when we are being watched, and not on making their presence known themselves. 

I am uncertain as to which of these is preferable because each one is met by me with the same expression of confused, abstracted, disappointment… WAIT!!!!  I just returned from visiting a co-worker’s cube. She was wearing ear buds and jamming silently, I am guessing, to……. nothing.  Brilliant - she avoided my pop-in, despite my trying ALL THREE of the above! Absolutely brilliant!

Pay Day Playlist #1

TGIF!  Welcome to our new installation, Pay Day Playlist.  Every two weeks we will provide a kick butt soundtrack to finish off your work week strong and get you ready to head into the weekend with a kick in your step.  All tracks courtesy of our uber talented co-worker, JULES! (can I get a Hey Ho! ps-I added a few tracks girl, couldn't resist).   Have a Pay Day Playlist you think will be music to our readers' ears, hit us up?

LBJ (cubed)

When I was graduating college in 1995 and looking for a job (and working in a produce department), I knew that somewhere in the world there was some cubic footage with my name in it. Must have been strung out on legumes.

At 8.5’ wide by 8.5’ deep by 5’ tall – my fourth, post-graduation cube is slightly larger than the average prison cell, but without plumbing (or sodomy).  I have been here for 10 years – the longest I have ever in my life been in one consistent space. I was 29 when I entered, now I’m almost 39. Getting older – starting to fart dust.

Besides work, a lot has happened among these drab, gray, slightly sulky walls.  I have been married and divorced, fallen out of my chair and had a thumbtack stuck in my hand.  I have Googled, and been very interested in, topics such as “Bulgarian cabinet making” and “Are vests in style?” and I have lost some hair, but abandoned pleated, cuffed pants – which is a trade-off I was glad to make. I have loved and lost, watched and discussed “LOST,” and was even half blind for a while (the magazines I designed then are a little crooked). While in this cube I received the Sacrament of Confirmation, stopped attending Mass, got over my fear of roller coasters, and learned to make cochinita pibil. Friendships have dwindled and kindled, I have eaten off the floor, discovered I was not a germaphobe after all, done headstands, trusted, been headstrong, foolish, persistent, buzzed, hurt, and happy.

So there is serious mileage in these 361.25 cubic feet. I don’t know what it all means, except that now I am sitting in my cube, smacking my lips on legumes, and supposed to be working. Next Google search: “inane blog posts.”

Always Wipe!

 "If you eat at your desk and you don't wash your hands, you might as well be eating at the toilet," says Bill Flynn, Everclean Services.  A University of Arizona study found a typical workspace has 400 times more germs than a toilet.

As I ponder this disgustingly disturbing statistic, I am eating at my desk. Where I always eat.  Just greattttt.  I mean, really, you try to alleviate one bad habit or try to improve upon behavior (read: I try to save money by not eating out at lunch), and bam, all your efforts go right to the sh*tter.  So rather than eat my lunch in the ladies room which would be weird (but not really any weirder than some of the antics I have seen go down there come to think of it), I just stocked up on a bunch of these:

So before you unwrap the wrap, a word to the wise.  Grab a wipe! As in that kind to the left, not the kind in the bathroom.

-Jill

Pencils, Pens, Markers…Oh My!

By: Lisa

 

I wanted to share a really neat website that provides unique office materials. Usually work will pay for your materials, but they are always basic and from the same company. So I wanted to branch out a bit and while doing a quick search one night I came across a website called See Jane Work. Yes, it does lean more toward the “ladies” crowd but it provides different materials that fit your cube, or office décor. After an hour of looking through the website, I fell in love with each design! I finally decided to treat myself to a cute little pen holder. It is part of the Vinea design and I felt it would accent my new fabric perfectly. It’s another way to make your cube part of your work life.

www.seejanework.com

...And Say Goodbye to Mine (Junk Drawer)

By: Jill

Lisa is one of those girls. Blessed with insane beauty, sharp wit and clearly as evidenced by her post below, an unparalled metabolism (the girl is THIN, Poptarts and all!).

Well, then there is me, Jill.  I like to refer to my build as extra medium!  And my will power as extra none!  So while Lisa is snacking on Poptarts, I have begun a program called The 4 Hour Body based on the book of the same name below:

Basically, you spend six days a week eating meals consisting of protein, vegetables and legumes.  No white carbs. No fruit.  BUT you do get one cheat day where the mantra "anything goes" applies.  YOU BETTER HIDE THOSE POPTARTS GIRL! My cheat day is coming.

Welcome to My Junk Drawer

By: Lisa


I’ve come to realize that no matter how hard I try, I will always have junk food in my cube drawer. It’s inevitable and I’ve come to accept this.

What is your hidden junk food? Do you feel ashamed to have it hidden in your cube?

I was…but not any more!

I never have one set item because it changes all the time depending on my mood. A few months ago you could've bet money and won that I would have at least 3 full bags of Snickers Fun Size candy in my bottom drawer. Snickers was the front runner for a while, but today standing with a bright shiny light beaming over it was my new obsession. It called out my name from aisle 7 in Target. It was the limited edition Pop Tart. Looking passed the artificial flavoring I focused on the fact that they got fun-fetti cake in a little pop tart. I held this box for a while and contemplated buying it. Hmmm...it did have 8 vitamins and minerals...plus it’s limited edition.

Ok…sold! Mr. Confetti Cake Pop Tart…welcome to my junk drawer.

Cover Those Gray Walls

By: Lisa


This is one of a few entries that will include the inside of my cube. I realized that we spend the majority of our life staring at blank gray walls, or whatever color your cube might be they are boring and depressing. We are human beings and we are capable of expressing our interests in any way we feel, so why not spice up your cube and make it into whatever you want?

When I moved into this cube back in December my goal was to cover the walls immediately. My previous cube had these tiny walls where you could see the heads of each person around you, so I couldn’t do much but cover the walls with photos. The tall cube walls are nice because they offer some privacy, although it’s still not the luxury of an office where you can shut your door and go away for a while. Here, the wall is always open. So I decided to think of a way to make this my own place. I almost tried apartment wallpaper, but the sticky back layer would not stick to the fuzzy cube wall. My next thought was to spend a little more and get fabric. I didn’t want to go too bold for fear of giving myself a headache, so I found a light green fabric with large cream colored flowers. It’s busy, but it doesn’t scream migraine. As all our readers will find I am a huge old movie fan, so when it came to deciding what I would frame in my cube it certainly included Cary Grant, Grace Kelly, William Powell and Rita Hayworth. I bought three white frames from IKEA for $15 each and put classic movie posters inside.

Marshalls is also an excellent store to find unique frames so I bought a couple different colors and put some family photos inside.

Soon I will be covering the rest of the walls with probably a light cream color to get rid of this gray. Like I said before, it’s a slow process, but it is fun and makes coming to work so much better. Stay tuned to more updates and changes from inside Lisa’s cube.

The Mouse Pad : To Have or Have Not?

By: Lisa

I never understand how anyone can work without a mouse pad.

At one time everyone needed one because the mouse contained that teeny tiny ball that always collected dust particles, and you would have to sit there and clean it out with a very sharp object. I could be dating myself, but how frustrating was it when the dust would crust along four little rollers so if you were trying to move smoothly along the computer screen, it would keep skipping and pausing! Ugh…that was a nightmare.

Not anymore!

Now, computer “mice” illuminate one very powerful laser-light which only means one thing…no more cleaning! We can now move gently over a soft surface without the hassle of "dust crust" catching or skipping your arrow throughout the screen! So, the question arises: do we need a mouse pad?

After asking several co-workers, the final decision was 50/50. The new laser mouse is designed to move just as smoothly along the table top as it would over a soft mouse pad. Most workers use whatever the company provides them. Usually that consists of a boring circular pad with the company logo. I say expand out and express yourself! Buy a mouse pad that reflects who you are and what you like. Think about this...you have to glance down and see it at least a million times a day, so why not put something there that makes you happy.

What's (as in Food) in Your Cube?

By: Jill

A study from ComPsych, a provider of employee assistance programs, found a significant correlation between balanced nutrition and at-work energy and productivity. 

For the most part

For the mostest part ha!

Plants & Productivity

By: Jill

Research shows that having plants within your peripheral view while working on a computer can reduce stress levels and increase productivity by 12%...hmmm, guess flowers do not fit into this study? Because ever since I put beautiful tulips in my vase on my desk this morning, I haven't stopped looking at them. Wilted productivity you might say...And yes, I did buy myself flowers for Valentine's Day.  You must love yourself first :)