Rob wants to know what five things in your office you must have in order to function.
Take a look at your desk or workspace. If you’re anything like me then it’s a carefully crafted piece of chaos theory in action.Everything on there is useful or has purpose but of all the clutter (apologies if you’re one of these uber tidy people for whom a desk is a sacred, set square perfect place) which 5 things can’t you live without?
Hmmm...
My laptop is definitely number one. Without it I can do nothing constructive and instead must fill my time with useless fillers such as coffee breaks, trips to the bathroom and meetings.
Number two is a combo of the red pen of doom and the highlighter of death. These weapons are used to disembowel substandard documentation that is given to me as sacrifice. I return the carcasses to the petitioners for disposal and occasionally grant them my blessing.
My phone is annoyingly required and comes in at number three. Not for regular phone calls - I never make those and receive a stunningly low amount of them (thanks to IM and email) - but for the increasingly frequent online meetings that I dial into.
My fourth required item is my Blue Power Ranger action figure. It was given to me by Bear and it guards my cube 24x7.
My fifth is pretty much the same as Rob's. I have a business card pinned to the wall next to my monitor because I am apparently incapable of remembering where I work or what my phone number is.
I too can never remember where I work and frequently answer the phone saying my former employers names.
Ya, it's pretty embarassing sometimes especially when it's my current boss calling.
Let's see...
1. My desktop/laptop combination. I multitask all of the time, and it's impossible for me to have one booted without the other, especially if I'm doing laundry or cooking dinner at the same time.
2. My red/blue/green/black ballpoint. This is actually four pens in one, and I'm addicted to office supplies, so this is a good substitute for the forty+ pens I'd normally have laying around.
3. Digital Camera. Just in case the cat does something cute, or it starts snowing, or I want to take some candids for the blog...
4. The blog. I get distracted easily, think up things I want to keep or write down, so I blog them really quick and get back to what I'm doing. I know that's not technically ON my desk, but it keeps me sane.
5. Baby lotion. Yes, I still use Johnson's baby lotion. I handle SO MUCH paper that my hands get really dry to the point that I crack the cuticles and such (at which time, I have to haul out the spray-on superglue antiseptic, because bandaids and typing don't mix).
That was HARD. No more hard questions *poinks*
And here I was thinking lotion by the computer was just a guy thing. ;-)