Administrative Assistants--they are your BRAIN

So, previously, on Burnstopia...the Wife was bitching about how nobody did anything for her for Administrative Professionals Day--the day of joy and relief from the monotony of her daily existence (mostly because she forgets all about it until someone does something for her!).

Today, the Wife came in to work. Yesterday she had been across campus to a media library to pick up a film for a professional type to show in class. Now, this professional type is not new to this blog. Stories have been told of her before. I shall leave it to the reader to search the archives and guess which ones.

This particular professional type is...well, we'll be nice today and say she's a bit batty. I've performed a number of demeaning tasks for her including cleaning her new office, moving her old office and being poked in the HEAD by her while I searched for maps on google that she could use in a powerpoint presentation.

As mentioned above, today the Wife came to work, and the professional type came, wringing her hands, to the Wife's desk. She had LOST the video. From 1:00pm yesterday to 9:00am this morning (she had to show it at 10:00am) she had LOST it. She wanted me to find it. ME. I did not lose the video. But it became my job to find it. So the Wife dutifully trots down to her office and at a quick glance ascertains that it is not THERE. The Wife looks at the professional type and says calmly, "Where did you go after you left my desk?" The professional type, fingers to her forehead (as if she could PRY the information out of her fogged mind) says, "Well...I went...to [another professional type]'s office...and the filing cabinet...the [specific place on campus]...and then home...oh! what if I left it in my CAR?" So, I trot all the way back down the big long hallway to the professional type's office and then to the filing cabinet where...

TA DA! The video is sitting right there. So I pick it up and trot back down the big long hallway back to her office and set it down on her desk while she laughs it off and I? I return to my desk.

SERENITY NOW!!!

I think the whole point of celebrating Administrative Professionals Day is the acknowledgment, once a year, that Admins are the BRAINS behind the entire operation. We keep up calenders, schedule meetings, play inter-office politics, keep up with various work related deadlines, we schedule conference calls, create budgets, plan parties, we order catering, set up and take down for events, (and in my case) help put together grants, edit journal submissions and quite often, listen to what's going on in personal lives. We're the ones who know all the gossip, who can't work with whom, what each of the professional types is currently working on and what they'd rather be working on...who has familial obligations and who is having problems. We're the ones who know how the copy machine works, and the fax machine, we replace the toner cartridges and we know where the damn paper is kept in order to restock printers and copiers. Our jobs are often mindless and very often bereft of respect or gratitude.

See? I knew if you could just see if from my perspective you'd agree that a pound of Godiva chocolates once a year isn't too much to ask.

And as much as I mock them, I really do work with some lovely people who, for the most part, are enjoyable. At the very least they're entertaining, and on those occasions when they recall that I am, in fact, very well educated and fairly intelligent, they can be quiet interesting.

Still. ONCE A YEAR!!!