Unff

That's the sound of a sucker punch to the gutinoids. But not necessarily a bad one.

I'm stewing over a few things, holed up in my Fortress of Solitude, when I get a call from a whole room full of people I used to work with.

It's my old bosses, PDiddy and the Chuckster, running a proposal. Apparently, there have been five in the last month since I left. The irony of that is...well, I don't even know if irony is the right word. That's just life in Proposal Land. They always almost drop, almost drop, almost drop, then BLAMMO--without fail they all drop at the same, worst possible time.

I had just this morning been thinking, rather fondly, about my old boss PDiddy, and told the guys as much on the phone. I had actually been on the verge of writing him an email this morning, but chickened out for some reason or another.

I realize that under his tutelage, I have either been trained to be the most amazing secretary ever, or a completely deranged, compulsive obsessive, detail fixating nutjob. These might not be mutually exclusive concepts.

But there is a secret in all of this. All I really wanted to say in my email was this:

I miss you.

Because I do.

One of the things I didn't anticipate was the vast difference in feel between an office I'd worked at for almost 6 years and a brand new one. Sure, the people I've met have been friendly. And I probably have more in common with a larger percentage of them than I might with the crew I left behind. But still. . .

I guess I just didn't bank on the obvious fact that we end up spending a sizable chunk of our waking lives with our coworkers. I can honestly state that I saw more of my coworkers, even socially, than I did of anybody in my family. And in the last two years, more than any one in my social circle/friends.

And the kind of work they were in the middle of today--it's grueling, hellish, thankless work. But for some of us it engendered a foxhole camaraderie. After we worked a few weekends, or months of weekends together, we became a kind of loose knit team. We got stuff done, when it *had* to be done. And we didn't bitch. Well, not too much. Everybody had their quirks, and you pretty much knew when to give somebody a pass or some free space.

And never, EVER, print anything out on legal sized paper for PDiddy. Unless, like me, you just find some kind of perverse pleasure in seeing him get riled up. Yeah, I'm sick like that. Just ask Bef. She's lived with it for years.

(BTW---how is your SpaderWaiter, Beffrany? Dost thou stalk him at new locations? Is he working at TGIFs now? I know that you know, you sick little thing you. And Billy Zane is still teh gay).

I think I lost the thread here. But in case it didn't come through, that was a cool phone call to get.

It made me smile. In fact, I'm still smiling.