Nurse Follies: Mandatory Meetings

I had to go to a meeting this week at work. I don't like going to work for anything less than four hours. This includes staff meetings, circle jerks, and parties.

But this meeting was mandatory, the Bosshole said. I complained. I don't usually attend staff meetings, opting to read the minutes later. I asked the Bosshole if I could just read the minutes of this meeting. He said no, my attendance was required because participation was expected. Besides, he reasoned, it's going to be fun!

Ugh! This coming from a guy who thinks the Billy Idol Christmas cd was a symphonic masterpiece.

So, I drove in. I even went in early to catch a staff meeting before this other mandatory meeting. I'm sure the Bosshole almost passed out from shock.

From the staff meeting, a small group of us goes to another part of the hospital where this other meeting is held. When we get there, we find it's a brainstorming meeting. Fun? Not even close.

One of the better parts about working nights is how creative we can be when we are bored. Since most the attendees were night shift people, we started to entertain ourselves with inside jokes and innuendo.

At one point, we are all asked to write down ideas on post-it notes on how we can improve things at the hospital. Some of the ideas were serious, then there were some that were not...like installing a margarita machine on the floor.

We were asked to put our post-its on the wall after we were finished. Then, everyone was given three red sticky dots to go put by our favorite ideas.

I lagged behind, waiting for the majority of the crowd to disperse before going up. Tweener was standing in front of me, and I jokingly complained the line was moving too slow. Without missing a beat, Tweener turned around and announced, "This is what interests me!" and puts her two remaining red dots on my sweater.

In the two most obvious places.

There are many things my coworkers can say they've seen me do. None of which was embarrassment. This would be their lucky day.

Toph sees this exchange and gets excited. He gives Tweener a congratulatory cobra strike. Still red, I pluck the obscenely placed stickers from my sweater, and stick them next to a couple random post-its. The night shifters are laughing. The day shifters have no idea what just happened. Bosshole apparently missed it entirely.

The meeting comes to a close. Smo smacks Tweener on the butt. Toph also likes this exchange. I swear, the night shift is a sexual harassment lawsuit just begging to happen.

I complained to Bosshole that the meeting wasn't as fun as he promised. "Yes it was, you guys were laughing!" he defends. I shake my head. Our fun had nothing to do with the meeting.

We were just making the best out of a bad situation.