The cafeteria in my Hundred-Acre Sandbox has a phenomenal
amount of options. With some restrictions, it’s all-you-can-eat-and-take, and
wise advice given to me early on was to never leave without something. As safe
as it feels here, it’s possible something hits the fan and we wind up hunkered
down for a bit, so it’s a good idea to pack out a couple of Magnum bars here
and there, right?
Most times I leave, I slip a thing of yogurt, a pack of
those Crystal Light water enhancers, chocolate chip cookies, stevia packets or
soft drinks into my pockets or bag. When I return to America, y’all might want
to remind me that this would not be a welcome behavior in convenience stores.
Occasionally, the supply, wherever that comes from, runs
short. People hoard things that are coveted, like soda water. (Yeech!) When I
arrived, there was a selection of soft drinks, but they didn’t have root beer.
Suddenly, root beer appeared and I started doing the five-finger thing two cans
at a time (we do have a drinks-from-the-cooler limit, and I abide by it) at
breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Getting root beer before it ran out became an obsession, but
all of a sudden, I realized that I had an entire shelf of A&W root beer.
This is not in itself a bad thing, of course, but the thing that didn’t happen
was running out of root beer. Apparently the maybe six weeks I was here with no
root beer was unusual, not the presence of it.
It wasn’t until I had an entire shelf full of root beer that
I realized that I was pretty much set, even if the root beer disappeared as
quickly as it appeared. I drink one a week – it’s my reward on the weekend –
and essentially, there’s a tour’s worth of it there. I’ve told people that if
everything really does hit the fan, come to my place with vanilla ice cream.
With all the root beer I need to last through my May 2020
tour, I thought I was set. Well, yesterday I got a call that’s forcing me to
start drinking root beer.
The DC office called and, due to shifting priorities of the
administration, my job’s being eliminated. Yes, it’s not just journalism! As of
this summer, my position and two similar ones are among a bunch more being
eliminated. Normally, the tours are 12 months but I’d extended to 19, so
basically what’s happened is the extension is being taken away.
People seem to think I should be up on a rooftop somewhere,
but this is what happens in this job so I’m rolling with it. Since normally we
know our new posts about a year out, I’m a behind the curve but there’s nothing
I can do about it so there’s no point in worrying about it.
No matter what happens, I have a job; it’s an assignment I
need to find. Right now, the pickins are really, really slim, but something
will come up. I’m going to try to not think about it for a couple weeks anyway.
There are some other work deadlines I should focus on because they come due
earlier anyway.
Besides that, I have some root beer I need to get working
on.
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