Potluck of Champions

"We haven't had a monthly birthday lunch since October," remarked my supervisor in our staff meeting today, perhaps reminded by the fact that today was her birthday.

We all felt awful. Well, you know - more or less.

"You have to understand the culture I come from," she went on. "I have never tasted meat. I never smelled it. If we can just have a potluck with no meat, we can start having group lunches again. Perhaps breakfast would be easier."

Mmmm, bacon!

It's not fair. I've never been insensitve towards vegetarians. I would never dream of trying to sneak meat into one (stop snickering - I heard that!). My ex-mother-in-law used to, when her older son was a vegetarian; she made a point of cooking things like rice and soups with beef broth, and denying, right to your face, that they contained any meat products whatsoever. But she's batshit insane, so I don't know if I should really hold her up as an example of the kind of behavior I virtuously refrain from emulating.

It's just that I've never known a vegetarian whose dietary requirements forbade anyone else in the same room to eat what they might personally prefer. Granted that much too often, a vegetarian doesn't have enough options at a potluck, restaurant, or buffet - a small garden salad does not a meal make, especially if it consists largely of iceberg lettuce, which makes a handy packing material but is not technically food. So at a potluck where a vegetarian will be present, the attendees should all keep that fact in mind, and be sure to bring at least something that everyone can eat. But to insist that no one else gets to have any meat at all?

You could apply the argument that it's inconsiderate to smoke around nonsmokers, who might find the smell of cigarette smoke unpleasant, not to say unhealthful. And as a meat-eater, I wouldn't want to force the side-effects of my own taste on an innocent bysteander.

Then again, if that's the case, I really don't see why I can't have microwave popcorn permanently banned from my office.

Perhaps I'd be more sensitive to my supervisor's taste if not for the fact that it's part of an ongoing pattern with her: she's terrified of snakes, so we didn't get to have a snake guy do an educational presentation at a safety meeting which she would not have attended anyway. She's disorganized, so everyone else has to jump through multiple hoops to present information to her in as idiot-proof a format as possible, at not inconsiderable inconvenience. She's micromanagerial to the point of insanity, so all her staff must sign in and out on an electronic dot-board, track every phone call, email, and visit in a special database, and submit weekly and monthly status reports.

Whatever the reason, I'm starting to have thoughts of branding my resignation letter into a slab of raw meat with a live snake wrapped around it, and this worries me.

Well, it wouldn't make for a very happy birthday for the snake, would it?

Oh, Go Eat a Cow

Happy Birthday, October babies! We had a potluck lunch at work in your honor today. Maybe you weren't there, but I was thinking of you. Well, a couple of you, anyway. I don't know about the rest of you people.

I do not like this new tradition (there's an oxymoron for you) pushed by the panicmonger boss, because what it of course ends up being is a monthly staff meeting, with food that we have to buy and/or cook, scheduled during our lunch hour. We're supposed to have them even on months where there are no birthdays, which is supposed to be more fun, but kind of diminishes the meaning a bit, don't you think?

The panicmonger is a vegetarian, which of course is fine. What is slightly less fine is that she has stated, and appears to be absolutely serious about this, that everyone must bring only vegetarian dishes to these potlucks. Which we have to attend. And sit through her damn demoralizing staff meeting. On our own time. "You can eat meat for lunch 30 days a month," she wrote in an email. "You can be vegetarian for one lunch!"

Almost everybody brought meat today.

The panicmonger was displeased, and she's not above a little sulk. She had forgotten the event and brought her own lunch anyway, so she ate that. One woman had made a casserole with meat, but also thoughtfully prepared a meatless version; and what with that, another couple of vegetarian entrees, salads, and sides, there were plenty of completely meat-free options available anyway. But the panicmonger wouldn't touch anything, and kvetched quite a bit about all the meat there, and how from now on nobody better bring any more. She was joking, but clearly a bit pissed. "When I interview Robbie's replacement," she said, "the first question I'm going to ask is, 'Do you eat meat?'"

"And ask how old they are, and if they're married or have any kids!" I chimed in.

What are you going to do? I had a couple of other thoughts on teamwork in today's meeting, neither one of which seemed to please her very much:

"We put the 'fusion' in 'confusion'!"

and

"You can't spell 'team' without 'meat'!"

I can has new job now?