Slip Sliding Away

Week One, February 2008


Snow Haiku:

Over the wide calm
moments before dawn - flurries
fly south on the wind.

Monday - An hour before daylight I already know I will not make it to Geekatopia before noon - if then. Even should I manage to get off my snowy hill without sliding into a badly placed power pole, without four-wheel drive things are bound to be interesting on the route. Around here everything shuts down at the first rumor of snow. Snow plows? Sanding? What is that? Why bother with the oily, greasy heavy equipment approach? The way we Geekatopians handle snow is to stay home - which is the primary reason we invented telecommuting. Of course there are some hardy/zany souls who set off over the ice flow to the Cube Farm no matter what the risks to life and limb. But then there are still people who bungee jump.

Tuesday - As quickly as it came, the snow is a slushy memory on the median this morning. Grim-faced commuters clench their steering wheels and glare into a stream of red tail lights as they creep back to work. In their hearts they are little kids reluctantly abandoning snow forts to return to frigid classrooms.

Friday - The week winds down with avalanches in the passes and torrential rain here at sea level. Microsoft is sniffing around Yahoo, Google giggles, gold glitters as the stock market tangos up and down the squeaky floor. It is winter in Geekatopia, it is Super Bowl week - anything can happen.

THIS WEEK’S OFFICE PLANT CARE LOWDOWN:

Five things your plant will hate you for:

1. Using it as a trash can - apple cores, banana peels, rubber bands, chewing gum, razor blades, dried out ball-point pens and used tissues do not make good compost. Garbage is not aesthetically pleasing and it promotes insect infestations, fungus and diseases. Also, if you have a plant service your plant care technician has better things to do than dispose of your rubbish! Improve your shot at the round file.

2. Using it for beverage disposal - Coffee and tea are good for your plant, right? Wrong! That is an urban myth. Forget it (coffee and tea make the soil too acid. Not to mention that the funky dried-up tea bags lend a less-than-professional look). Worse, if you use creamer and/or sugar you will start a stinky science experiment coworkers will not thank you for. Same goes for soft drinks (with additional stickiness factor). And the “last drop of my water bottle”? That practice encourages root rot and fungus gnats. Get thee to a sink.

3. Giving your plant outdoor “vacations” - As well meaning as you may be you are not doing it any favors by exposing it to sunburn, bugs, temperature shock, icy rain, or avian “deposits”. Same goes for using it to prop the door open for the UPS guy. Just don’t. If plants liked roaming around they would have wheels not roots. It takes about six months for them to adjust to any new environment so find them a nice safe place to live out their lives and leave them in peace.

4. The feast and famine treatment - Recognize this scenario? You ignore your plant until it shrivels up like a strip of jerky - then, overcome with guilt, you drown the poor thing. You neglect to feed your plant for months on end - then, thinking to atone for the starvation rations, you pour a double batch of plant food onto your victim, which it cannot assimilate any better than you can digest a piano. Plants require consistent and considerate care - with the emphasis on consistent.
(Note: water is no more “food” for your plant than it is for you. Plants living in pots need fertilizer on a regular basis. Buy some and use it according to the instructions on the package.)

5. “Economizing” - Yes, we are all concerned with conserving energy, but when you place a thousand-dollar palm tree in a windowless conference room and keep the lights off between conferences you are being “penny wise and pound foolish”. Look at it this way: fluorescent lights cost pennies to run as opposed to having to buy another thousand-dollar tree every few months. Consider also that a healthy, happy tree is cleaning the air of nasty chemicals and bad conference room vibes.