The title would be:  Cat Showdown at the Secretarial Corral

The secretarial pool where I work share common office space . . . five women crammed into a room no bigger than your average kitchen.  As anyone who has attended middle-grade PE knows, this is a set-up for disaster.

Apparently, last week, there was a brutal reprimand.  These women used to laugh and decorate their office and basically enjoy themselves as they worked their day away.  Now they've got a nose-to-the-grindstone thing going on.  I mean the chilling silence of the dead (as opposed to the iconic moaning of the undead).

To be fair, there was constant laughter echoing in the hall.  Jokes were rampant.  One of them ate a cricket on a dare.  One of them regularly wore dollar-store alien antennae.  They had so many holiday decorations under their desks, foot room was optional.  But I wouldn't say any of the above-mentioned deviations from normal business practice interfered with their ability to get the job done.

Or were they deviations?  Just the other day the IT guy came into my department, set up his cell phone next to the paper cutter, and pretended to chop his hand off for the amusement of his three-year-old.  And I thought the people who wrote for The Office made that stuff up . . . .

I've been a boss and I've been an employee and I've worked self-employed from home and I've been a stay-at-home mommy.  Each hat comes with its perks and its drawbacks and a constant: it's human nature to take things personally.

So now the secretaries work with lips sealed ... unless their supervisor happens to be out.