This doodle is more like a fan shout out than a personal thing.
Everyone who watches TV knows the Office is ending after 9 season’s of being on the air. And well I think I may have mentioned it before on this site I’m a fan of the crazy antics of Dunder-Mifflin all the characters are so zany yet grounded that we can relate and feel like we know them.
Personally, I work with a girl like Kelly,
I won’t name names.
a guy like Ryan,
I get this face every time I walk into our annex.
an Andy/Dwight,
He may be the most professional of us all… still not naming names.
and even a Pete.
Just because he’s new doesn’t mean he’s any less important.
I have always related to early season’s Pam and well now that Pam is grown up and has it together, I can relate more to Erin. I have always loved to draw, and I’m a little bit on the kooky side, and I am awful at Scrabble. And I love to assist in pranking our Andy/Dwight as much as humanly possible, and he CANNOT take a joke.
I have sounded like this on many an occasion,… this is probably why I’m not let around a lot of clients…
So in this Office nostalgic post… I share with the lovely internet, a Pam Beesly drawing that I made very ironically, while at work:
Thanks for the giggles Pam!
Also I wonder who could guess which coworkers are which :)
I don’t fit into my office. This is not a new secret. Like, I don’t fit in so bad that it’s nearly comical. It’s almost like I’m a mystical being stuck in a land of protocol and unyeilding emails. Actually that is almost exactly what it’s like, it’s hard to be a Lauren in a 9-5 kind of world.
And the best part of all of it… is that my boss hasn’t the slightest idea. And the worst part is… I think he’s such a nice boss, that I kind of never want him to know how hard it is to work with some of the other people in our tiny office space.
I’ve been tinking about it a lot lately. Have you ever thought that maybe Tinkerbell was really just tired of being treated poorly by the lost boys? And maybe she was tired of always being put in cages and treated like a weird sparkly decoration? I do. She was totally over it because she know she can do more than that.
Now several times last year I thought of quitting my job, without any back up plan. And not for reasons people usually do… No one ever has a great boss, and bad coworkers. No one has ever said that! And no one ever says when they are in a bad work environment that they love the work they create. Which… I do. I like the clients I deal with. I love the idea of something I draw being built and occupied by people who are learning, and working and changing the world with their existences and thoughts and dreams. Right now at this moment, that is what architecture means to me.
Things I don’t like about work is being harassed by coworkers, being asked to quit to make certain people feel better about themselves (several times, actually) and feeling totally unappreciated for all the actual effort I put into creating a product that we are proud to put our names on.
I have actually tried to think through these issues a lot in the last few days. How can you get past these kinds of work problems?
The first one… well I’ve tried a few things. Including ignoring, trying to talk it through, and finally giving up. And then I stumbled upon these little words from every cool chick’s homegirl, Tina Fey:
“So, my unsolicited advice to women in the workplace is this. When faced with sexism, or ageism, or lookism, or even really aggressive Buddhism, ask yourself the following question: “Is this person in between me and what I want to do?” If the answer is no, ignore it and move on. Your energy is better used doing your work and outpacing people that way. Then, when you’re in charge, don’t hire the people who were jerky to you.” -Tina Fey, Bossypants
I have taken these words to heart, and my days have felt so much lighter and brighter than they used to. I can do my work really well, and I will be in charge of a firm someday. And maybe I’m also better about this type of situation due to the fact I may (or may not) have concealed and color coordinated weapons on me pretty much at all times.
Basically this is me getting ready for work. Except I’m more partial to flats. Image Courtesy of: Photobucket & the Weinstein Company
And secondly, I’m not going to disappear to ease other people consciences. You are an adult, I am an adult, we make our own decisions. And I’m sticking around to get stuff done, and you can’t be rid of me so easily. Also you have no right to banish a good fairy, unless your name is on the business, which it is not.
No one ever to told Glinda to get the Heck out of Oz. She was just doing her thing and being sparkly. And that is how I want to be. Especially with that hat! Image Courtesy of: Photobucket & Warner Bros.
And well the other one…. Hmm, there isn’t much I can do about this. All bosses everywhere do this in some shape of form… I mean if you keep pulling off impossible deadlines for them, they think that you can do so much more. Sometimes to fulfill my boss’s requests I find myself alone in the office in the dark of the night clicking and clacking away at the computer just to meet the deadline. And then after it’s all printed, he will say, no lets go back to the other thing we were at a few days ago. And then I will smile and know I tried. This actually happens a lot, and it used to make me really mad. But now I think he requests crazy things because he believes I can make magic. So now instead of getting upset when my work is shelved… when I complete the impossible tasks he asks of me, I just feel a little bit magical.
And well all of the analogies in this post came from my truly desperate grasps at happiness. Online Quizzes. Yes, when I feel a little blue I take internet quizzes that tell me things like I should paint my walls blue… or eat a margherita pizza. So this time when I was feeling a little down I took an internet quiz about Fairy tales and even the internet agreed:
You Are the Fairy! You are charming, cheerful, and a little bit magical. You make other people’s lives better. You are a bit eccentric at times, but you truly care about people in your own way. You are hyper and restless. It drives you crazy to sit still, and you are usually the first to leave any event. You are unpredictable and flighty. No one can guess what you’ll be up to next … or where you’ll be! Image Courtesy of: Blogthings
And then I applied that knowledge to my actual existence, and found that it’s not really too far off. Eccentric, cheerful, probably coated in glitter. Maybe being a fairy isn’t so bad, as long as someone thinks you’re magical.
♥Lauren
p.s. Sorry Amber who reads this blog, but you know how it is ;)
You know this time of the year is a magical time. The leaves turn, the nights get longer, people are a little nicer (to your face)… and the Lauren is always stuck in the office missing these previously mentioned things.
I have been so busy these last few weeks that I actually have dreaded taking the days off I had previously planned. This Friday I plan on not going to work and I plan to celebrate my birthday, so I need to figure out how to make a whole new day somewhere in between that can be filled with work. I think if anyone can do it… it could be me. I would like to call it Blergsday. I am in need of a Blergsday miracle.
I have work up to my eyeballs, no one wants to Wang Chung with me, and some people at my work are even gossiping about me (for real). This basically means, I’m too awesome for them to handle. And their lives are really really boring. Trying to deal with all of this while simultaneously trying to figure out if I found the lid to my pot.. is really stressful!
Any who I also have to admit that I actually had to do something even more terrifying to make sure I don’t neglect my blog, my birthday, my doodle time, the holiday I created about my friend Isabel, and my other responsibilities. I made a calendar with a drawing matrix and scheduled events. I this I just made making doodles a professional commitment… how is this happening to me? How is it you can get so busy you have to schedule in fun? Is this real life?
♥Lauren
Also shout out to my brother and sister-in-law. I haven’t heard from either of you for what feels like forever. I hope your vacation was awesome. And I ♥ you all.
So today I was being very good in the office, working on all the right things, saving and cross referencing all that I have to do… basically being an angel, okay. And then a certain coworker that I may have made into a meme comes on in, and is not so chipper. Being that I rode into work today on a unicorn of cheerfulness and good tidings. I thought I could do a little Lauren-y humor with him. And then I found out that much like a children’s story about a cantankerous coccinellidae I need to make an allegorical story about being grumpy… that brings me to today’s doodle. BTW this is not specific in anyway or is about any one of my coworkers:
or maybe it is.
The moral of the story is don’t be grumpy with the girl who knows Photoshop.
So everyone else out there in the big old internet, I hope you are having a lovely day. And if not… just make sure you don’t peeve a girl who can make a doodle of you in 30 seconds flat.
♫Lauren
P to the S: He’s not so grumpy now that he’s full of the lunch. But still the doodle is done… if you know what I mean.
Viciously Sweet 