Opportunity Only Knocks Once, And Usually When You'e On The Can or The Saturday Evening Post

As mentioned on Wednesday, Scott was in training on Thursday and Friday, which left just me and Simon to work the desk, as no one had opted to come in for the OT.
A recent managerial mandate has led to a change in the way we work the desk, requiring the person working one particular station to sit in a different area (the area where Brian sits).
Because it just made sense, initially we just moved all three of us into that area and forwarded the phones. However, we discovered that one of our lines couldn’t be forwarded, and so when people called it, they went to voicemail, as no one was sitting there to answer it.
This meant we had to divide our forces, with one in the other room, and the other two sitting in our normal area.
We defied this rule on Thursday, though, as Simon was working the stations that he’s least familiar with, and so would have a lot of questions for me, and I was working the station I’m least familiar with, which meant I’d have a lot of questions for him, so being in the same location made sense.
On Friday we rotated, putting us each back in familiar territory and allowing us to abide by the separation rule.
Of course, that meant that I was out on the desk alone, which meant no one was there to answer the phone when I went to the bathroom or went to get water (so that I could go to the bathroom some more), and, since I work in an environment full of children – retarded children – the water cooler in our internal break room was broken, so I had to venture outside of the NOC to get water.
Now, my shift runs from 6 AM to 6:30 PM.
I usually arrive there between 5:50 and 5:55 AM. We seldom stay all the way until 6:30, as our relief arrives at 6 PM, so we leave as soon as we’ve given the hand-off. Generally that means leaving somewhere between 6:05 and 6:20 PM, depending on if our relief is on time.
So if we figure on a 5:50 AM arrival and a 6:20 departure, that is a full twelve and a half hours spent there.
Generally I take about a half hour lunch break (at a maximum), which means twelve hours at – or at least near – the desk.
Add up bathroom breaks and trips to the water cooler or vending machine, and, to really stretch it, that’s a total of an hour away from the desk.
So that means that I spend about eleven and a half hours sitting at the desk.
One would assume that the majority of phone calls could manage to come in during those eleven and a half hours that I’m at the desk, and not during the hour I’m away from it.
(Actually, there’s coverage when I’m gone to lunch, so that means that there are twelve hours during which calls could come in when someone is there to answer them.)
Such was not the case on Friday.
It was as if there was someone spying on me and waiting for me to step away, then putting a call through.
It went like this:
6:00 – 7:30 – At the desk. No calls.
7:30 – 7:33 – Bathroom break.
7:33 – 9:10 – At the desk. No calls.
9:10 – 9:15 – Bathroom break. Phone call.
9:15 – 11:35 - At the desk. No calls.
1135 – 11:36 – Get water. Phone call.
11:36 – 11:55 – At the desk. No calls.
11:55 – Just heading out the door, stopped by phone call.
There was a call for me while I was at lunch, but Simon was covering the desk and answered it.
There were no further calls from that point on until…
3:30 – Return from vending machine. Take big bite of Snickers bar. Phone call immediately after I complete the bite. Mouth far too full of chocolate, peanuts, and caramel to answer. Too big of a bite to swallow, not enough time to chew. Silently curse Universe. Grab napkin. Spit candy out into it. Answer phone.
Now, I should mention that for the past few months we’ve had an intern (sort of; he’s not technically an intern, but I don’t know what else to call him) on our desk.
I haven’t mentioned him before because, frankly, the less said about him the better.
Suffice to say that he is like a particularly well-used crayon that comes in a box that does not include a crayon sharpener.
Still, despite his lack of any useful skills, you would think that he could at least answer the phone.
You would think that, and then you would let him, and then you would regret thinking that.
Still, on some of the occasions during which I was away and the phone rang, he actually answered it. He did manage to not bungle it too terribly, though he did need some instruction as to how to pick up the line that was on hold (and he did bungle that by putting it on speakerphone , though he didn’t actually appear to notice, as he held the handset up to his ear).
Still, the point is that it’s remarkable that, even with the odds on your side, you can still lose. I mean, eleven and a half freakin’ hours in which I can be reached and the calls have to come in the hour’s worth of time that I’m away?
It’s not unusual, though, and I have actually come to call it the Stacy Syndrome.
Basically, the amount of time Scott spends at the desk is roughly equivalent to the amount I do, and yet, a good percentage of the time, Stacy manages to call to talk to him when he’s away.
(Simon has an uncanny ability to walk away from the desk just before a call comes in for him, but that’s actually working in his favor, as they’re usually work-related calls that he’d just as soon avoid, and which Scott and I then have to take over for him. This is not as bad as one guy who used to work with us, though, who would page people, then walk away from the desk without having mentioned to us that he’d paged someone to call.)
In any case, the weekend was mostly uneventful (though Scott ended up on a conference call today for about five hours), and there isn’t much to say about it, so I suppose that I will bring this unusual Saturday evening post to an end.
(Couldn’t resist the pun.)