MetaChat - My Little Office

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25 March 2009

My Little Office A friend of mine works in the Ontario civil service. Some months back the Ministry in which she works was undergoing an accommodations shuffle and “furniture refresh”, one of the results of which was that all the managers on one floor were reassigned to new offices. Then a manager had the bright idea to come in to her workplace one weekend and paint her office. →[More:]She painted three walls pink and a fourth “accent” wall mauve. Apparently she intended that the colours should harmonize with her lovely Monet water lilies print. However, the overall effect screamed “My Little Pony”, and wasn’t enhanced by the roller streaks and paint drips and the other flaws common to a poor paint job. More importantly, the manager did not prime before painting, which meant that the wallboard had to be replaced at a cost of $7500.

The manager was a protégé of the Assistant Deputy Minister, so the ADM took it rather mildly, but it still caused quite the hullaballoo. News travelled fast, and many people made the time to pop by the office to have a look at it. Everyone in the ministry thought it quite hysterical, except for the poor director assigned to resolving the problem. My friend thought it likely that the manager would be asked to bear some of the cost.

post by: Orange Swan at: 10:07 | 30 comments

Maybe she just needed a pretty parlor all her own.

posted by Hugh Janus 25 March | 10:40

Wow... is this common in other areas? I can't fathom being allowed to repaint my office. (well, if I had one). I've never seen such a thing, either. Generally it's "bring in any lamps or plants or whatever, but you can't do anything to change the physical basics of the room."

posted by kellydamnit 25 March | 10:46

A guy I was seeing has a couch and Rock Band in his office. I am so freaking envious.

posted by TrishaLynn 25 March | 10:50

She wasn't allowed to repaint her office. She just went ahead and did it.

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 10:50

The only people I've heard of who can have their offices decorated are in top-of-the-heap positions, such as the editor-in-chief of a magazine.

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 10:54

The only people I've heard of who can have their offices decorated are in top-of-the-heap positions, such as the editor-in-chief of a magazine.

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 10:54

Wow, that is ballsy of her! I've tried to create a privacy wall of plants around me, but that's about it.
One former coworker got a grass skirt and tacked it all around her desk so it would look like more of a vacation zone. That was pretty funny.

posted by rmless2 25 March | 10:56

I don't think this woman's judgment is to be commended in general. Some months before the "My Little Office" incident she was convinced she was having a heart attack, so an ambulance was called. She was carried out of the office on a stretcher and then whisked off to the hospital. Where she was diagnosed as having a panic attack.

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 11:03

Man, I didn't even have a choice of art for my walls. But at least I have four real walls and a door. I think cubicle farms should spawn the next worker revolution. Guy has been temporarily given an office, because his work right now is too important for him to try to do it in a cubicle. Am I the only one who see something weird there?

posted by crush-onastick 25 March | 11:03

That is craziness. (Then again, I work in a cube. But we only have 4 people here, so it's not horrible.)

posted by sperose 25 March | 11:11

Where she was diagnosed as having a panic attack.

Well, to be entirely honest, if you've never had a panic attack before, that can be an understandable and very common mistake. True, full on panic attacks are horrible.

posted by kellydamnit 25 March | 11:13

I'd kill someone for office walls right now. Even one wall. One wall that only goes up half way. Someone in our company thinks that offices and cubicles stifle creativity so I have a desk and a chair and a little file cabinet in the middle of a room with lots of other desks and chairs. No walls, no cubes, nothing. It's all very Ikea-ish and stylish but christ, somedays I just want to stand up and yell, "everyone please shut the fuck up right now." I'm guessing that wouldn't be a good career move though.

posted by octothorpe 25 March | 11:16

You could try doing the Les Nesman thing, octothorpe: putting tape on the floor and insisting that everyone mime knocking politely on your "door" before you will acknowledge their approach to your desk.

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 11:19

Our office is getting repainted soon, and we each get to choose a color for one wall in addition to the other three being painted a vaguely gray neutral. I can't even remember what I picked. Something blueish/greenish/grayish.

octothorpe, i'd go NUTS in that environment.

posted by Stewriffic 25 March | 11:25

The worst part is that they won't put teams together in the same area, each team has members sprinkled throughout different areas on the floor. They say that this breeds "cross-team pollination" but mostly it means that the loud conversations in my area are about subjects that I don't care about. It's not all open, there are some walls between open areas and there are conference rooms and little phone booths if you need temporary privacy but I still feel like I'm in some fifties movie about office life. I really have a hard time concentrating since I tend to look up every time someone walks past my line of site, which is about every 30 seconds.

posted by octothorpe 25 March | 11:33

octothorpe that sounds like a nightmarish setup for anyone trying to concentrate on anything.

And I lol'd at the grass skirt on the desk thing.

posted by chewatadistance 25 March | 11:39

See now, THIS is why we cannot have nice things!

posted by mightshould 25 March | 11:41

octothorpe, I'd lose my mind in about half a day in an environment like that.

posted by BoringPostcards 25 March | 11:51

I have an idea... LET'S ALL COME IN THIS WEEKEND AND PAINT METACHAT!!!

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 11:51

Thank the gods I work for weird museums. I got to repaint my office orange with white spongepainting. My pink Christmas tree, coconut monster head and collection of troll dolls work well in this environment. Not only that, I got to have a friend do the actual work and be paid because the art students who were supposed to do it - granted, this was after part of the walls got torn out due to plumbing issues, so it wasn't just random redecoration but necessary - lamed out. When I worked at the Walters in Baltimore the photographer and designers had decorated their offices by gluing every single image of the Mona Lisa they could find anywhere on every single surface. It was awesome.

posted by mygothlaundry 25 March | 11:59

Had to replace the drywall? Absolute bullshit, what contractors are milking the government here???

No matter how shitty the paint job, a couple heavy coats of Killz or similar heavy-duty primer and a couple coats of paint and it's done.

posted by Meatbomb 25 March | 12:30

It's all very Ikea-ish and stylish but christ, somedays I just want to stand up and yell, "everyone please shut the fuck up right now." I'm guessing that wouldn't be a good career move though.

Cubes don't fix that. They buffer distant noise a bit, but there's always some mope with nothing better to do yakking for an hour in the cube next door. Or there's Chronic Cough/Sinus Trouble Guy, or Ms. Whisper-Sings Along With Her Headphones, or Mr. Must Read Aloud Under His Breath, or of course Ms. Party Cube, What Has The Cube Where Everyone Likes To Hang Out.

It's nicer not having to watch it, though, I guess.

posted by middleclasstool 25 March | 12:39

Had to replace the drywall? Absolute bullshit, what contractors are milking the government here???

I said as much to my friend, and she insisted that it couldn't be covered with primer because the latex wouldn't adhere to the wallboard and would flake off anyway.

posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 13:19

We have far more space than people right now. Everybody could have their own office but we are all in the cubes, even the CEO.

It's for the ease of communications, apparently.

posted by trinity8-director 25 March | 13:56

It's for the ease of communications, apparently.

CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?

posted by lysdexic 25 March | 15:24

Yeah, sometimes too easy. Most everybody wears headphones.

posted by trinity8-director 25 March | 17:00

I used to be at a desk with my back to the flow of traffic so that everyone who wanted to talk to me had to tap me on the shoulder to get my attention because when the headphones go on, the entire world disappears. Also made it hard to goof off on Metachat.

Now, I face the flow of traffic, so I see anyone coming towards my desk or my boss' desk and can go *POW!* generic home page when I need to.

posted by TrishaLynn 25 March | 17:07

My first 'proper' ad agency job (as in, actually paying - but I had been in three ad agencies prior) I had it all, briefs (that I stole and copied from senior peoples desk so that I could ambush the meetings with better ideas and win the gigs), money (a pathetic salary that allowed me to rent a dump in a ghetto with no shower), and a desk. In he hallway. At the top of the stairs of the fourth floor.

So one day I decided I was a little sick of being the receptionist of the fourth floor and stayed late in the evening to redo my area. I superglued chairs to the wall, open books to the ceiling, had a shark and a few other fish randomly hanging at different heights and a potted plant half upside down on a slanted wall. The first few people who came up that morning found me sitting in the wall chair (desperatly trying not to fall off it) with a huge book asking them: are you in the book? If you're not in the booook you can't come in (in my best Hudsucker proxy voice). It was funny for about half an hour.

posted by dabitch 25 March | 17:57

I don't think this woman's judgment is to be commended in general. Some months before the "My Little Office" incident she was convinced she was having a heart attack, ...she was diagnosed as having a panic attack.

I don't think having panic attacks necessarily implies anything about a person's judgment. Mrs. Doohickie has had panic attacks and has perhaps the best judgment of anyone I know.

posted by Doohickie 25 March | 22:01

Had to replace the drywall? Absolute bullshit, what contractors are milking the government here???
My thoughts, too.

I've been thinking about painting my office, too. Not sure if I'm allowed, but I figure it's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission.

*brags about having an office with not only walls, but two windows. A CORNER OFFICE, no less*

*fails to mention that, because of the weird building shape, office is triangular*

posted by dg 27 March | 06:35

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