THE PAST 2: First Day at Work

Hope you'll enjoy today's post, when it comes to trilogies the second part is often the best (the original Star Wars, Lethal Weapon, Back to the Future spring to mind, admittedly LotR and Indiana Jones 2 were not the best, but good enough alright!).

Nervous Schoolboy
Do you remember your first day at school? I do, well at least the part until I got pummeled unconscious by the schoolyard bully (my shrink insists that never happened...).

Going round that first corner with my shiny new blue/red backpack completely oblivious, well, going to work the first day was not so different, all that changed was 20 years spend doing things the Catholic Church would not approve off...

Approaching Microsoft...
You may imagine I was more than a little curious as to how "Microsoft" (not the most unknown company in the world!) would actually look from the inside. All my previous work experience had been in dusty stock halls, in aluminium filled factories, or behind the desk of an old "Rocky-style" gym.

So as I took the LUAS (our urban rail, I'll talk about it later: www.luas.ie), got off 15 minutes later, and walked towards the two imposing white towers (the twin towers were a bit ominous, but I got over it...), I was more than a little excited...

I didn't know anyone, since I had been hired on the phone, and I was wearing my fanciest grey suit since the agency that recruited me told me it was "business attire".

This soon made me look fairly stupid as I arrived completely overdressed and it was a fair Spring day so the heat didn't help any (there wasn't tattoos and piercings everywhere, but let's just say the dresscode was definitely "casual").

The taxi driver who took me from the airport on the first day had told me to approach Miriam in the reception and so I did, and sure enough minutes later I was picked up by my "supervisor-to-be" Line and we rode up the elevator to the 7th floor (left).

Moving up in the world...

From here I could admire our large (but frustratingly inconsistent and slightly overpriced!) canteen, and look up at the beautiful glass roof of my new "work home": The Microsoft Atrium Building.

On the 7th floor I took my place with the Nordic team as a Transaction Specialist, and they all proved to be a great bunch of guys and gals, lads and lassies: Jannick, Kamilla, Louise, Timo, Tess, Dorthe, Lars, Mads, Steen, Michael, Hanna, Mike, and Per.

I put the one's that are still my colleagues in bold just to show you how vibrant a place it is (Dublin and work!), and it truly seems like ages ago that I went into that team feeling like a complete newbiee (think J.D. from Scrubs! I would later meet our version of Dr. Perry Cox in our manager Helge Tønnesen!).

My first desk! (While I've had four jobs in the company, I must have had double that amount of desks by now!)

One "half" of the Nordic teams area after work hours...



The first week I spend newbieeing around in the team like a headless padawan trying to understand the ins and outs of the business as much as you can as a part-time spectator, and then I went into training for 3 weeks before returning as a fully fledged...not swan...but agent! Ready to take on partners any time of the day...

And???

As for the rest? Well as they say, its history, but it is also a story for another day...

So as Lorne said in the final episode of "Angel": Goodnight folks...

-Renny