My half-new job
I've been away lately, mostly having a quiet little battle with depression. One of the brighter notes in my life (and make no mistake, external bits of brightness do make a difference) is the fact that I've started my half-new job.
This is to say that I'm still in the same building and my salary still comes out of the same budget as before, and technically I'm supposed to go back to hell my previous assignment in 15 months (*snort* yeah right), but I have a new boss and a new project and a new desk on a new and much-higher floor.
I have a window! I look westward, out at the classic Sixties Modern Standard Plaza across Fifth Avenue, with its famous weather ball. The weather ball--which was converted at some point since my childhood from an actual ball to more of a weather bunch of lights on a big block of metal thing--is what my sister, who works at a television station up the street, looks at to out-predict their superstar meteorologist nine times out of ten.
It works like this: Red means temperature rising. Green means temperature staying the same. White means temperature dropping. Flashing means precipitation. Steady means dry. I once planned to write a short story about winter in Portland called "Flashing Green Again". In this picture, it is flashing green. Again. And it will be for the next six months.
Also? My dear friend roseambr sent me the pretty, pretty flowers on my first day. I have the best friends in the world.
On the 14th floor, where I now work, not only are there windows, but there's an actual porch-balcony thing which, faute d'air conditioning today, they'd opened the doors to. I could step outside! And look what I saw when I looked down:
Another rarely-seen view of the world's second-largest hammered copper statue. Umbrella-passerby on the sidewalk to the right for handy scale and confirmation of the Flashing Green Again state of the weather ball.
And, just for autumnal atmosphere and because who knows when they'll ever unlock those patio doors again, here's a rooftop garden on the much, much nicer building kitty-corner from mine.
Portland's kind of pretty this time of year.
This is to say that I'm still in the same building and my salary still comes out of the same budget as before, and technically I'm supposed to go back to hell my previous assignment in 15 months (*snort* yeah right), but I have a new boss and a new project and a new desk on a new and much-higher floor.
I have a window! I look westward, out at the classic Sixties Modern Standard Plaza across Fifth Avenue, with its famous weather ball. The weather ball--which was converted at some point since my childhood from an actual ball to more of a weather bunch of lights on a big block of metal thing--is what my sister, who works at a television station up the street, looks at to out-predict their superstar meteorologist nine times out of ten.
It works like this: Red means temperature rising. Green means temperature staying the same. White means temperature dropping. Flashing means precipitation. Steady means dry. I once planned to write a short story about winter in Portland called "Flashing Green Again". In this picture, it is flashing green. Again. And it will be for the next six months.
Also? My dear friend roseambr sent me the pretty, pretty flowers on my first day. I have the best friends in the world.
On the 14th floor, where I now work, not only are there windows, but there's an actual porch-balcony thing which, faute d'air conditioning today, they'd opened the doors to. I could step outside! And look what I saw when I looked down:
Another rarely-seen view of the world's second-largest hammered copper statue. Umbrella-passerby on the sidewalk to the right for handy scale and confirmation of the Flashing Green Again state of the weather ball.
And, just for autumnal atmosphere and because who knows when they'll ever unlock those patio doors again, here's a rooftop garden on the much, much nicer building kitty-corner from mine.
Portland's kind of pretty this time of year.