Two thoughts.
Poker
Over the past few weeks, my co-workers came up with a great idea to waste an evening — playing Texas Hold-Em poker. I thought it have to be one of the best idea, considering that our team is approximately 25 travelers strong, and the alternative are not much to sneeze at (workout, hitting restaurants and bars, talk about work, blah, blah, blah).
I had to take a week off the very week they decided to start the poker game, so I came in pretty fresh last week against my peers. After three hours of play, I somehow found myself in first place, squeezing ahead of James who were making a serious effort to have a commanding lead, but couldn’t do so due to lack of chips (we all ended up reselling our chips for hacks who keep having to buy in). This week, with a more plentiful supply of chips, James ended up with a lead that was only threatened once by me, only to overcome with a wicked river card. I ended up second.
The great thing about the whole poker game is that I can pretty much tune off from the conversation, while focusing on the cards or other things associated with it (TV, beer, nuts). Why do I tune out? It takes a lot of energy to concentrate with other folks, trying to understand what they are saying by interpreting the limited sounds that my hearing aids can force by my broken ears, and the movement of their lips. A poker game play to my advantage in two aspects: The table is ’round’ — I am able to see everyone from any spot, with not much of a difficulty; and the conversation is usually linear. Rare are there multiple conversations, everyone opts to either regal a tale or two, discuss about the subject at hand, or just talk about the absurdity of relying on the river card, despite the clear frequency of success doing so for some players.
So I have the ability to tune out, miss a few tales, and yet tune in, and learn a lot more about my co-workers than in any other environments, such as restaurants (multiple conversations), bars (too noisy/dark), and workout rooms (too much sweat = no hearing aids).
I do hope this poker night tradition continues until the end of the project.
Openness
I have never been told as often as I have this week that whatever I may have done should not be done either in a certain way, or not even be suggested at all. Either the paranoia level at this company is at its all high level, or my sense of tact is receding in a very severe way.
As I noted above, I enjoy poker so much that I took some time off lunch to look for some additional chips to stock up the local supply with. I found some halfway passable chips (the 8 gram clay-coated type) for $15 a batch at the Discovery Store (heavily discounted from the $50 retail price). While showing it off to my peers, I was told to put it away, and never to mention that we even play such a game in the office.
Same thing goes with the NCAA basketball pool. Interest in this is at its usual high, and I volunteered to arrange everything, but every step of the way, I was told to keep it on the super-low-ground. “Don’t mention that it is a part of this company!” “Don’t e-mail to the corporate accounts!” “Don’t even show the playing chart in the office!”
Even joking about certain things that may not be taboo is done with a strong encouragement to keep it quiet so that nobody else would overhear the conversation.
Why is there such an extremely high level of fear in the workplace in ensuring that work and fun are not intermixed in any manner, despite evidence demonstrating a higher level of productivity when there is indeed playtime to be had?
I see myself as a more unrestrained person at times, but I can be quite sensitive to any direct sense of offense on anything that may have been done. If I somehow sense (even wrongly) that I may have offended someone out there, I would be quite apologetic, and would cease to do anything offensive anymore around that person. It is just my nature to lighten the moment, but not to harm anyone emotionally.
I do miss the time I had with a few wonderful co-workers in Montreal. We ended up buying bags of rubber bands, and flinging it in creative ways toward each other from time to time. I don’t remember when it stopped, but once it did cease, that assignment pretty much felt like work, and I started plotting to leave that assignment. That story is probably legend among my peers, but not as much as that butter incident that Fran loves to repeat to anyone he meets, that silly bastard.
Is consulting such a serious business these days that it’s an impossibility to even have fun? I do not want to face having to go back to Portland every week till September if I can not have fun, even though it may not be ‘quite proper’ among some circles.
