OFFICE MOVES...and a short break into childhood dynamics of the classroom with pretty girls and dirty boys and new seating charts

There is a new guy in the office today. I am not sure what his role is -he's not an architect - I think he is to do business development, marketing, or something like that.

I had to move to a new desk to make room for him. I sit closest to the principal that he'll be working with, so I moved two spaces down to the empty desk. It is not a big deal to move and it is kind of nice to go through all your stuff and do a little house cleaning. Right now, my desk is spic and span - give me a couple of days and it'll be trashed with drawings.

I think this location will difinitely be permanent. I get the feeling that this office doesn't move around a lot. At my old office, we would move 2-3 times a year. When new project started up, they would put the team members together to be more effient. That office was a real organic set up. The furniture was on wheels and our desks looked like flat kidney beans. We would move to a general area and cluster our desk together. Power poles were located in generic locations to make a quick set-up and plug-in to the network.

As a kid in school, it was always exciting when the teacher dicides to rearrange the seating. A lot of my teachers did the cluster of four desk together. I would always hope that I'd get put next to one of my friends or the pretty girls and not next to one of the dirty kids who used bad language, didn't take baths, were a year older, and wore heavy metal t-shirts. I guess the teacher in her knowledge knew better than putting me next to my best friend, but I would usually get lucky with a pretty girl and not so lucky with one of the dirty boys. I learned that as intimidating as the KISS t-shirts were, and as cocky as their language was, that I could get along with them. But I think for me getting along, meant for me to play down to their level which usually got me in trouble. I guess that all depends on the pretty girl. Who was I trying to impress more: the guy with Gene Simmons face and tounge on his shirt who could beat me up because he flunked out a couple of times or the pretty girl with her pretty friends.

Anyway, my new neighbor is a guy from Egypt. His wife is pregnant and he reads news online in Arabic about the persecution of Copts. From what little I know, a Copt is an Egyptian who is of the Christian Religion (not a TV show on FOX.) They are persecuted in a racist sort of way. They are identified by their names and by their national ID cards which state your religion. This all seems very fascinating for me, so I am excited about my new cubemate. He goes to Christian church here in town with other Egyptians who have left due to the persecution. He says that most Egyptians in America are Christians and they come here to worship in freedom.