Jun 28, 2011

Another Reason to Love My Job: The Intern.

Since June 1st, the Communications team at work (my group!) has an intern. Sean is a sophomore at George Washington University and is interning at Blackbaud for the Summer. Since his arrival, I am no longer the newbie, and have taken him under my wing. Scratch that – we have become best friends. Yes, he is 8 years younger than me (omg, I am oooooooooold), but I have adopted him as my little brother at work.

We immediately bonded over a mutual love for food. Two weeks ago, Sean tweeted me:

“tomorrow…we feast.”

The next morning I was eating his mom’s homemade chocolate chip biscotti with my morning coffee. Win, win!

To be fair, I brought him some green beans from my CSA box. Pretty much daily, we leave stuff to eat on the cubicle partition like this:

See the carrots? This is the view from Sean’s side.

We’ve also started a collection of Blackbaud squishy animals. This is my side of the wall.IMAG0045

The other day for lunch, neither of us knew what we wanted and nothing at the cafeteria appealed to us. I told him I was a very random eater and we should just go attack Publix. And attack we did. This is what we came back with:

Sliced apples, fake crab meat, soy crisp chips, baby carrots, a pint of tomatoes, Greek yogurt, lima beans, and a pack of gum.IMAG0010

For the record, we ate all the crab, the whole can of lima beans, most of the apples, some of the chips and half of the carrots. Sean finished the entire pint of tomatoes by himself. After all of that, the gum was very necessary. By the way, those soy crisps are goooooood. Get some.

Our newest way to work is, well, not at our desk. One day we were both complaining about our bums hurting in our chairs and I reminded him that each floor has couches. I have no idea why they are there, but I have seen other people working on them, so I suggested we give it a try.

With our headphones in, our coffee, and a pack of gum to share, we got so much work done. It’s funny how a change of scenery can improve your performance! I can work just fine at my desk but I like to mix it up! We sat there for a few hours, and one lady asked us, “Aww, do y’all not have your own desks?” I thought that was pretty funny. IMAG0070

I’m lucky to work in an environment where I can move around! I know better than to work from the cafeteria – I’d be quite large if I did that every day. The cool thing about working near the atrium is the sound from the water fountain. It’s so soothing. And see the view? You can creep on lots of offices across the building. Just kidding.IMAG0065

I am so lucky to work with such wonderful coworkers. My cube mate, Elizabeth brings me pickles and we ate pickle popsicles together! My friend Matt in the IT Department draws me pictures and gives me candy! And Amanda, who was/is a blog reader and I met for the first time because we ended up picking up our glasses together! The newest member in our area promised to bring me leftover birthday cake tomorrow…let’s hope that happens!

Are you close with any of your coworkers?

Do you prefer to keep your social life separate from work? Shooooot, I’ll be friends with anyone!

What are your favorite and least favorite things about your job? Favorite – the people and environment. Least favorite – the coffee gets me WIRED.