My working week, my Sunday best

First day at the new job. I didn't actually do any work--HR had three of us new employees in a conference room, and we learned about how to use the time sheet software, and how all the departments interact. They gave us huge manila legal binders full of documents to fill out so they could add us to the health insurance as fast as possible. It was quite efficient, actually.

Documents. Beneficiaries. I didn't anticipate the whole having to pick someone's name to put down thing. The first time in years that I couldn't just put Glenn's info there and be done with it. He is no longer my "in case of emergency" person.

The other two girls in the orientation are going to be in the HR department. They immediately bonded over the fact that they have boyfriends. As if that sums them up completely as people. I zoned out while they had the whole "What's your boyfriend's name? What does he do? How long have you been together?" conversation. It reminded me of the time in college when I (briefly) dated a rugby player and he introduced me to his teammates as his girlfriend, not as Moxie, and I was like, "Hello? I'm a person here, not just a space filler you can call your girlfriend." Neither of them were wearing rings and I got the distinct impression that both of them wanted rings very badly. Their conversation was a sort of sociological study in oneupsmanship, a kind of "We're moving along in our relationship and that makes it okay that we're not engaged" dialogue. One of them asked me if I had a boyfriend and I said "Nope," and they were like, "Oh. That's okay!"

Grrrr.

They gave us lunch and at the end of the day, they took us around the office and introduced us to people. Everyone seems nice. There are a lot of cute, young consultant types--always a plus. I'm so happy to have landed at a good company, to have a place to go every day and feel like a productive human being again!