everybody's talking and no one says a word

Phew. Well, watching Friday Night Lights last night cured me of my big bowl of wrong. So I seem to be over my discontent and I am just enjoying going solo at the moment. I am at work today, but at least I can shut my office door, and am not forced in a room with 65 other people, listening to vision statements and building a sustainable culture. The worst part about company retreats is that it isn't enough to spend all day with each other- no, there is an insidious insistence that you must also go get sauced with your coworkers after the work part of the day is over. It is a bit unrelenting, to say the least.

Still, some of the corporate absurdity is too good not to point out. For example, each morning at the retreat, we would arrive to ridiculous music blasting on the loudspeakers. Unfortunately, the playlist appeared to only contain a handful of songs, and so we had to listen to them over and over again. Of course, there had to be a theme involved. I'll let you guess the idea from a few of the songs that were part of the nauseating loop:

• Stand by Me by Ben E. King (I pointed out that this song gave me nightmarish memories of junior high school dances, but no one seemed to relate- is this only an EBF thing?).
  
• We'll Be Together by Sting (thanks for ruining a perfectly acceptable song).
  
• We Go Together from the Grease soundtrack. Seriously.

I know- you are feeling a little ill just reading the list. Now picture listening to it every few hours.

Because I cannot resist being a wisea$$ at such events, I came up with some alternate suggestions that went over less than swimmingly:

• Don't Stand So Close to Me by The Police
  
• Get Off of My Cloud by The Rolling Stones
  
• We're Not Gonna Take It by Twisted Sister

Well, I thought they were funny. Besides, I didn't suggest the one song I really would have had blasting if I had my druthers: Take this Job and Shove It by Johnny Paycheck.