Our company is still in the process of moving its far-flung
employees into our shiny new building, and I, being both semi-new and "one of those
computer people" (I figure such an influx is a new thing there), sometimes, with my scruffy, spacy (and multifaceted non-anglo) appearance, will get mistaken for a delivery person, or, worse, an intruder. I've had small incidents the last couple of days; yesterday, when someone's passcard failed to operate in the elevator (instead of the pleasant beep of acknowledgement when he passed his card o'er the electro-
Cyclops thingy, he got the sound of a flu-racked
touch-tone phone), the person entering the
elevator behind him kindly swept his card and took our requests for floors, pressing the buttons for us as we packed ourselves in. I started to tell the bad-passcard guy to go to the second floor and have the card checked, or maybe take it out of his wallet before swiping, when another employee interrupted and began a long explanation of pretty much the same thing. To me. Rather than give him an "I WORK HERE, BUD" lecture, I just listened, smiled, and waited 'til I could get to my floor.
Today, after taking a cigarette break outside, I stumbled back into the building, high on nicotine and fumbling for my passcard, as usual. One of the front-desk people, apparently someone new, barked out a "where (the hell) are you going (, scumbag)?" at me; I had to kindly explain that I was headed for the __th floor, and that I worked there.
Maybe we should wear company uniforms.