Being the first Friday of the month, today should have been Company Lunch day. We were scheduled to have pizza, and I had my eating pants on. Breastfeeding has turned me into a bottomless pit. They say that you're eating for two when you're pregnant, which is true, but the extra person is like the size of a shrimp. I am still eating for two, but I'm supporting twenty pounds of baby meat now. I am always hungry.
But then Company Lunch was postponed until next week because half of my coworkers were out somewhere or other. However, the office park was sponsoring some kind of tenant appreciation day. They had one of these last year, where they had a few food trucks come in and set up in a parking lot. Last year it had been hot, and I stood in a long line with my coworkers and wished that I had brought my sunglasses. I'd gotten pizza last year, because although there was a BBQ truck, my body and its shrimp passenger were rejecting BBQ at the time.
This year, the setup would be the same - food trucks in a parking lot. They even had the BBQ truck back.
Here's the thing: there's kind of a hurricane going on. Not that it's here. Right now it's off in the Caribbean, whipping palm trees around. It may come whip pine trees around, but they're predicting that it will likely go to the north of us. However, it's been raining for about a week. We've had all the kinds of rain - little bitty stinging rain, big ole fat rain, and rain that seems to come right up from the ground.
One guy went to get himself some BBQ and came back drenched. Now, I love pulled pork BBQ, and the only thing better than pulled pork BBQ is free pulled pork BBQ. But I did not have an umbrella. I used to be the kind of sensible person who kept an umbrella in the car, but it seems like the car umbrella always became sorta mangled and busted after time in the car. I did not have a raincoat or even a hoodie. Do I love free pulled pork BBQ enough to stand in the wind and rain for it?
Somebody said something about ponchos. Inspiration: trash bags.
I went digging in the cabinet under the sink in the break room. Way in the back was a box of 55-gallon industrial strength trash bags. I pulled one out and held it up to my shoulders. Yes, this would do nicely. I cut a hole in the top for my head, and an amused coworker helped cut holes for my arms. The bag was huge; I was protected down to my shins. I grabbed a smaller bag for my hair, and I was ready to go. A couple of people snapped pictures.
So, at this point, I felt very silly. Just in case you know someone who does things like this and you think, Huh, I guess they don't realize that they are ridiculous - this is not the case! But I was committed. I wanted my free pulled pork BBQ, and all I had to do was stand in a hurricane and be ridiculous in front of strangers. It's funny, I had no problem appearing this way in front of my coworkers, who I would actually see in the future. It was the strangers, who I would likely never see again, or if I did, who wouldn't recognize me not wearing garbagewear. And that's dumb, so I was going to do this.
Another coworker looked at me, sighed, and went to get another trash bag. I gleefully helped him with the arm holes. It is always better to be ridiculous with a friend, which is pretty much the basis of my marriage.
We ordered BBQ, then stood in the cold and the rain to wait. The lines were quite short this year. It was not raining too hard, maybe little bitty stinging rain. I remarked that I wished it would rain a little harder to justify my 55-gallon industrial strength wardrobe. The wind picked up and some big ole fat rain came down. That's better. People mostly avoided looking at us, perhaps whispering things like, "trash bag people, 3 'o'clock" to their neighbors. There were some people there who must work at some fancy place, because they were out there in business suits. I guess they don't have Trash Bag Fridays at their office.
We got our free pulled pork BBQ (and ice cream!) and headed back to the office. I hung up my trash bag poncho to dry. I might need it again sometime.
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