6 November 2008

Oops! (or is it actually sigh?)

It’s now more than two weeks at the new job, and things couldn’t be any different or any better.

There is such a strong team culture and doing things as a team is the norm here. And I actually heard words like well done and perfect applied to work done all the time. And of course the fact that work is only 8km away from home and I can drive in each day and get free parking. Any wonder that I can’t stop grinning?

It is a whole new world of GA (general aviation), RPLs (recreational pilot licences) and what not. And it is such fun (yes, fun).

But there’s a fly in every ointment. My own personal dhristhi pariharam. The hardest thing is not the jargon, but getting used to and recognising a whole set of ‘new’ people. I am beginning to suspect that this is something I am rather hopeless at. And this is because....read on.

I went down to the main kitchen to get a cappuccino this morning. Saw a whole crowd of blokes hanging around there. Said hi to them and waited for the machine to make my cappuchino. One of the chaps looked strangely familiar. I sneaked another quick look at him and decided I must have seen him:
a. on the train to Wlg in my previous job
b. he had been a retail assistant in one of the shops I frequented
c. he had been on TV, that’s why he looked familiar.

For some reason, I was convinced that it was option c that was the right one.

It would have been alright if I had stopped with just thinking that. But me, I have to talk, don't I? So I said to him, have we met before? He gave me a very strange look and said yes, we have, we had all our IT training together last week. Then it hit me, he was J, another newbie like me in my workplace and we’d gone through two 2-hour systems training sessions together just a few days ago. And I thought I’d seen him on TV!!! OMG! How could I. How did the TV even come into the picture? I’ve officially lost it.

I apologised profusely and said all the right things about how my memory was a like a sieve and he was nice enough to come up with some of his own faux pas. But this is worrying. I can’t be so scatter-brained. Just not good enough.

And ...this isn't the first time such a thing has happened to me.

4 comments:

Shammi said...

Age, da :) Just age!

Pollux aka Paps said...

Shyam: Hah, speak for yourself - I ain't old;-)

Anonymous said...

Ha ha, thank God I'm in the same job for the last 5 years or so - that saves me from meeting many new faces all at once..
But in general, I am good remembering faces, but very bad with names.. there have been a couple of times, where I forgot the person's name.. and wthout knowing their name managed a good half hour conversation! :)
Vidya

Pollux aka Paps said...

Vid: IT would take a lot to keep me in the same job in NZ. The longest I've been in teh same role is 26 months;-) It has to be a really spl place for me to hang in there for a long long time.