I had a moment of pithiness and wit at the office this morning, before the staff meeting. There's an office-wide contest for wall decorations in one of the conference rooms, whichever department has the best wall wins... something. Whatever.

Initially, Perfect J was adamant that she did not want to have anything to do with the wall decoration, she didn't want all of the responsibility to fall on her, she can't draw anyway, blahbitty blahbitty blah... but then as soon as Supervisor N started working on it by herself, Perfect J couldn't stay away.

So when Somehow Normal K arrived this morning, she asked, "What's going on with the decorating wall? Is J doing it?"

And I answered, "I don't know. But you could replace 'know' with 'care' and it would still work."

[silence]

Then Curmudgeonly J started with the loud donkeyish laugh until I started to fear for his health. Glad I could toss a joke grenade his way.

And staff meeting was actually not quite as painful as normal today, because there was an almost open-and-honest discussion of just how horrible staff meetings have been lately, how much free-floating hostility is evident, how badly I want to drink before coming in on Thursdays... not that I actually think there will be long-term changes, but it was good to feel heard and understood, and I was certainly not the only (or even the initial) person on my side.

Plus it's always cool when Supervisor N directly and politely dresses down Perfect J and Curmudgeonly J about how, if they HAVE to argue like an old married couple, they have to do it in private and they have to learn how not to take it out on the rest of the team.