Our office flooded yesterday.
We've had problems before. Part of the bulding has 3 floors with a sloping roof, but there's a middle section which is only 1 floor with a flat roof. The plus is that the middle of the building can get natural light from the skylights. The minus is that the gutter gets stuffed full of leaves and water rises (over 2 feet on the worst occassion) and then floods through to the lowest level.
Since our wonderful and insane cleaner was stopped from going out to sweep leaves from the roof the building management company have been meant to do it. Apparently they didn't.
So yesterday we get a sudden very heavy rain storm. I share my office with 1 colleague. She has the window (and I have the shelves - she chose first) and she started to panic. I told her there was nothing to panic about.
Then the water reached the top of the gutter, and we called downstairs to talk to the deputy managers.
They rushed up and decided the gutters needed checking for leaves. But the deputy wouldn't go out because his shoes would get wet (!) and the next most senior person was arguing he should go out as he was male and more senior and, er, she didn't want to get wet either.
As I wear big boots, and everyone always thinks I'm weird because I like rain, I went out. It seemed better than listening to them arguing. I got rubber gloves and a bin bag. The deputies stood indoors with an umbrella.
Unfortunately I don't know the gutters. I couldn't see any blockages because they were so blocked you couldn't even see where the drains were.
Luckily as I walked down the room I got to the other end of our building's roof and Luke, our immigration specialist, looked out of his window and saw me. He came out and knew where the drains were and cleared them really quickly.
So we all came back from the roof, dripping slightly but feeling pleased with ourselves, when more people from downstairs came rushing up. The whole thing must have taken 5 minutes but there was water pouring through downstairs.
It came through the electricals in the customer toilet, and in the back office. Someone had to jump into action and move the photocopier because that was getting soaked. The back office (and the manager's office off it) stink off damp. The corridor at the back was soaked through. Only a very small amount of paperwork was affected, and the ceiling hasn't fallen in this time.
The management company have been out today looking very unhappy.
On the plus side I am becoming more disreputable. On top of taking cigarette breaks when I don't smoke we are now eating lunch everyday (well - the 3 days this week) in the pub over the road, despite not drinking. Very nice cheap sandwiches, 2 minutes from work, very quite at lunch time with huge tables to sit at and gossip. We're all sitting over there drinking coca cola and enjoying girly chat (5 of us on Monday, 3 of the same plus 1 other on Tuesday, and 2 of us with 1 other on Wednesday - but so far it has been all the women of the office only).
What other nice things am I missing out on because of a general lack of vice ?
Victoria J
We've had problems before. Part of the bulding has 3 floors with a sloping roof, but there's a middle section which is only 1 floor with a flat roof. The plus is that the middle of the building can get natural light from the skylights. The minus is that the gutter gets stuffed full of leaves and water rises (over 2 feet on the worst occassion) and then floods through to the lowest level.
Since our wonderful and insane cleaner was stopped from going out to sweep leaves from the roof the building management company have been meant to do it. Apparently they didn't.
So yesterday we get a sudden very heavy rain storm. I share my office with 1 colleague. She has the window (and I have the shelves - she chose first) and she started to panic. I told her there was nothing to panic about.
Then the water reached the top of the gutter, and we called downstairs to talk to the deputy managers.
They rushed up and decided the gutters needed checking for leaves. But the deputy wouldn't go out because his shoes would get wet (!) and the next most senior person was arguing he should go out as he was male and more senior and, er, she didn't want to get wet either.
As I wear big boots, and everyone always thinks I'm weird because I like rain, I went out. It seemed better than listening to them arguing. I got rubber gloves and a bin bag. The deputies stood indoors with an umbrella.
Unfortunately I don't know the gutters. I couldn't see any blockages because they were so blocked you couldn't even see where the drains were.
Luckily as I walked down the room I got to the other end of our building's roof and Luke, our immigration specialist, looked out of his window and saw me. He came out and knew where the drains were and cleared them really quickly.
So we all came back from the roof, dripping slightly but feeling pleased with ourselves, when more people from downstairs came rushing up. The whole thing must have taken 5 minutes but there was water pouring through downstairs.
It came through the electricals in the customer toilet, and in the back office. Someone had to jump into action and move the photocopier because that was getting soaked. The back office (and the manager's office off it) stink off damp. The corridor at the back was soaked through. Only a very small amount of paperwork was affected, and the ceiling hasn't fallen in this time.
The management company have been out today looking very unhappy.
On the plus side I am becoming more disreputable. On top of taking cigarette breaks when I don't smoke we are now eating lunch everyday (well - the 3 days this week) in the pub over the road, despite not drinking. Very nice cheap sandwiches, 2 minutes from work, very quite at lunch time with huge tables to sit at and gossip. We're all sitting over there drinking coca cola and enjoying girly chat (5 of us on Monday, 3 of the same plus 1 other on Tuesday, and 2 of us with 1 other on Wednesday - but so far it has been all the women of the office only).
What other nice things am I missing out on because of a general lack of vice ?
Victoria J
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