My boss’s girlfriend just came up to me and gave me a heads up that my boss would throw a strop about some bags of clothes being left in reception to be picked up tomorrow, with the classic gem of “you can see how it looks untidy, can’t you?”
No, I can’t. I walk in and I see an office block that’s a hub of activity and facilitates it’s tenants. A place for meetings where staff are happy to help with requests, or an office where you don’t have to fight with the landlords (because that’s ultimately what we are) to get small concessions. A place that cares more about improving the community (which as a social enterprise is our purpose) than minor appearances. I’d probably think it was untidy if it was in the way for days on end, but the bags are gonna be back against the wall, behind the reception desk, for less than 12 hours.
What is it with people valuing things being out of sight? There’s a pragmatic element to general neatness, making it easier to clean, getting hazards out of the way, and looking nicer, but I don’t understand people throwing a fit because things are temporary less neat.
Anyway I moved the bags all of 5 metres into a meeting room next to reception. See if he whines about them making a mess of a room that isn’t being used until the middle of next week.
it’s an external signifier for an internal moral preoccupation with neatness as lived symbol of protestant goodness
There’s something I would refer to as “neatness to a fault” where someone is so focused on appearing neat that it’s detrimental to the livability (or in your case, workability) of a space. A great example of this is wanting empty counters in your kitchen so you put every single thing in the cabinets, but now every time you need to find something in a cabinet, you have to take 2/3 of the shit out and put it all back when you’re done - you can’t just reach in and grab the single thing you need and it’s a huge waste of time, especially for someone like me with ADHD. The amount of work required to keep the counters free of clutter is not worth the reward, you are much better off just leaving some things out, getting rid of things you don’t need, and/or building more cabinets.
There’s a happy medium somewhere, but good luck convincing management. They will of course find someone else to blame if the pickup is missed because the clothes are not out by reception when the courier arrives, hopefully it isn’t you.
My parents unplug their toaster and put it away in a cabinet when they’re not using it
I need to do this, the visual clutter does my head in.
It also means there might be months outside toast, but I’ve probably forgotten to buy bread anyway.
