Pack Day Wednesday
Pack Day Wednesday really sneaks up on you. You’ve settled into the groove of Life With Two Carry-Ons. You’ve stopped wearing flip-flops around your hotel room because you consider that it’s now your own home and the koodies from the previous guest have evaporated. You may have even stopped putting a towel down in the shower and just suck it up and go in barefoot. You’ve adjusted to the climate and time zone change and start to think that life in Boise, Idaho wouldn’t be terrible—if you weren’t Jewish and like to shop for clothes at stores other than Wal-Mart. You may have even unpacked into the hotel drawers—highly doubtful. You think that if you are going to use the expression “I’m living out of suitcase” that you may as well live up to it. Yup, just as you settle in, time to pack up again for the return trip home.
From morning to night, Pack Day Wednesday is always the busiest day of the work week. You know that your status report is due right before Travel Day Thursday, so you have to make some progress on the to-do list that you set for yourself earlier that week. And, let’s face it—you’d anything to make an earlier flight home on Travel Day Thursday, so you’re willing to shut off the IM and limit the amount of time spent on celebrity gossip websites in order to get some work done. Yes, Wednesday is the day that you actually do work. Much unlike Travel Day Monday, Travel Day Thursday and Work From Home Friday—you are actually working really hard for an entire day. Team Members are also working hard. The team room is quiet—client impersonations are kept to a minimum and there's limited talk of points, status or weekend plans. You decide as a group to skip Team Lunch and maybe, if done early enough, to organize a Team Dinner instead. Your eyes start to get blurry and your wrist sort of hurts. You look through your laptop bag for your mouse, but remember that it’s on your kitchen table at home. Bummer. You have made 13 different Power Point slides all with pie charts, line graphs and Harvey Balls. You curse Harvey and his balls. You have spent so much time in Excel that you start to think that it may be in the top three greatest inventions, but can’t determine which one of the other three it would knock out—the iPod, DVR or Gmail. By the end of the work day, you realize that you’ve managed to complete the impossible—you’ve finished four days of work in one.
You’ve worked hard and just want to go back to the hotel, go to the gym, chill-out, maybe meet up with Road Friend or Boyfriend, watch the Bachelor and pack, but someone has decided it would be fun to organize a Team Dinner. After all, there wasn’t a Team Lunch and although we sat together in the same room the entire day and carpooled to and from work together, we may not have bonded appropriately this week, so we all should spend time together at dinner. Team Dinners are usually on Wednesday because everyone needs to blow off steam from the long work day and know that they don’t really have to be super sharp on Travel Day Thursday. You agree to go to Team Dinner—you could use the alcohol and are sort of sick of making small talk with Room Service Man.
By the end of the day—most likely around 11pm—you finally make it back to your hotel room. You take off the hotel bed comforter because Oprah with a black light still haunts you, turn over the pillows to the “clean” side and put on your PJammahs. All you want to do is go to sleep. But, nope, it’s time for your number one hobby—packing! You wonder if you can postpone until the morning, but then realize between Team Carpool, Hotel Check-Out and playing the Airplane Seat Game at aa.com, that your morning is way too busy and you’re better off packing now.
Packing on Pack Day Wednesday is definitely different than packing on Impending Doom Sunday. Yes, you still pray that the carry-on will close, but everything else has a different methodology and feel to it. You sort of just quickly fold everything back in order and pack the hanging items back into your carry-on. There’s no thought or planning or checking of the weather. It’s completely mindless, which is a good thing, because you seem to have lost yours after the 4th toast at Team Dinner. On Pack Day Wednesday you have a little spring in your step—you’re on your way home! On your way back to the shows that have taped for you the past week, home to your own bed, home to clothing options—you know that you have more than the two shoes and one pair of jeans that are in your carry-on. Home to Poland Spring water. Home to your friends and family and Sunny at Victoria Nail. Home to magazines waiting in your mailbox. Home to fat-free balsamic, a real spicy tuna roll and Tasti D Lite. Home to your collection of take-out menus. Home to public transportation. Home to sirens. You fall asleep in the hotel bed with these lovely thoughts of Travel Day Thursday fresh on your mind.
From morning to night, Pack Day Wednesday is always the busiest day of the work week. You know that your status report is due right before Travel Day Thursday, so you have to make some progress on the to-do list that you set for yourself earlier that week. And, let’s face it—you’d anything to make an earlier flight home on Travel Day Thursday, so you’re willing to shut off the IM and limit the amount of time spent on celebrity gossip websites in order to get some work done. Yes, Wednesday is the day that you actually do work. Much unlike Travel Day Monday, Travel Day Thursday and Work From Home Friday—you are actually working really hard for an entire day. Team Members are also working hard. The team room is quiet—client impersonations are kept to a minimum and there's limited talk of points, status or weekend plans. You decide as a group to skip Team Lunch and maybe, if done early enough, to organize a Team Dinner instead. Your eyes start to get blurry and your wrist sort of hurts. You look through your laptop bag for your mouse, but remember that it’s on your kitchen table at home. Bummer. You have made 13 different Power Point slides all with pie charts, line graphs and Harvey Balls. You curse Harvey and his balls. You have spent so much time in Excel that you start to think that it may be in the top three greatest inventions, but can’t determine which one of the other three it would knock out—the iPod, DVR or Gmail. By the end of the work day, you realize that you’ve managed to complete the impossible—you’ve finished four days of work in one.
You’ve worked hard and just want to go back to the hotel, go to the gym, chill-out, maybe meet up with Road Friend or Boyfriend, watch the Bachelor and pack, but someone has decided it would be fun to organize a Team Dinner. After all, there wasn’t a Team Lunch and although we sat together in the same room the entire day and carpooled to and from work together, we may not have bonded appropriately this week, so we all should spend time together at dinner. Team Dinners are usually on Wednesday because everyone needs to blow off steam from the long work day and know that they don’t really have to be super sharp on Travel Day Thursday. You agree to go to Team Dinner—you could use the alcohol and are sort of sick of making small talk with Room Service Man.
By the end of the day—most likely around 11pm—you finally make it back to your hotel room. You take off the hotel bed comforter because Oprah with a black light still haunts you, turn over the pillows to the “clean” side and put on your PJammahs. All you want to do is go to sleep. But, nope, it’s time for your number one hobby—packing! You wonder if you can postpone until the morning, but then realize between Team Carpool, Hotel Check-Out and playing the Airplane Seat Game at aa.com, that your morning is way too busy and you’re better off packing now.
Packing on Pack Day Wednesday is definitely different than packing on Impending Doom Sunday. Yes, you still pray that the carry-on will close, but everything else has a different methodology and feel to it. You sort of just quickly fold everything back in order and pack the hanging items back into your carry-on. There’s no thought or planning or checking of the weather. It’s completely mindless, which is a good thing, because you seem to have lost yours after the 4th toast at Team Dinner. On Pack Day Wednesday you have a little spring in your step—you’re on your way home! On your way back to the shows that have taped for you the past week, home to your own bed, home to clothing options—you know that you have more than the two shoes and one pair of jeans that are in your carry-on. Home to Poland Spring water. Home to your friends and family and Sunny at Victoria Nail. Home to magazines waiting in your mailbox. Home to fat-free balsamic, a real spicy tuna roll and Tasti D Lite. Home to your collection of take-out menus. Home to public transportation. Home to sirens. You fall asleep in the hotel bed with these lovely thoughts of Travel Day Thursday fresh on your mind.
posted by Jammahs at 11:25 AM
2 Comments:
Can't wait for travel day!
Keep up the good work. thnx!
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