Kind Of Like an Easter Egg Hunt

You know in Aliens, when that hard-corps (see what I did there?) Sergeant Apone wakes the marines from their suspended animation, and announces, "Another glorious day in the corps! A day in the Marine Corps is like a day on the farm. Every meal's a banquet! Every paycheck a fortune! Every formation a parade!"

That's how I feel at work. Well. Except that I don't think the days are glorious. And it's not exactly like the farm, except that I DO hear animal noises on occasion. And the meals certainly are not banquets, unless the culinary tide has surged towards cardboard and Styrofoam. My paycheck is not remotely a fortune, unless you're surveying a four-year-old making Kathie Lee Gifford's clothing line. And each member of the parade marches to his own drummer. But except for all that, yeah, that quote is EXACTLY how I feel.

Lately, each day is like an Easter egg hunt. Except that there are no eggs, and no prizes, and no chocolate bunnies. But I DO have to find my doorstop every morning. Alas, I was so spoiled all those years when the custodian left Stoppie right there in my room, in the corner under the thermostat, just a leg stretch away from snagging him under my toe and shooting him out the portal and under the edge of the propped-open door. Now Stoppie may be laying out in the open no-man's-land that is the lengthy hallway. Or on the other side of the inner sanctum, behind the alcove by the cabinets.

But there ARE surprises! Like maybe I hid some Easter eggs last year, and nobody found them, and now they're like new again, and not even stinky, because they were plastic. Inside my cabinet is a roll of black trash bags. I don't remember putting a roll of black trash bags in my cabinet. Those things stay in the bottom of the wastebasket, under the current bag. Then the custodian needs only to pull out the used bag, and tear off a new one right there. Not anymore.

We have a revolving door of cleaning crew now. One of our major players had an accident, broke two bones, and is out of commission. So we borrow from other buildings. Not just one person, but three at last count. Of course each has their own way of doing things.

One day my personal desk wastebasket was missing. I looked EVERYWHERE. Except under the extra student chair that holds the blue cardboard box full of textbook accouterments behind my desk. GOTCHA! No wastebasket can hide from me for long. And TODAY, a person came in with a MOP and started on my floor while I was still sitting at my desk. Gimme a break! Why don't you just paint me in a corner next time? Hope they understand rhetorical speech.

Yeah. I might as well have The Pony bring along his old Easter basket that he used to collect the chicken eggs in. Never know what I'm going to find.

A tisket, a tasket…Mrs. Hillbilly Mom's about to blow a gasket.