Doing Time

Today I spent 11 hours in a tiny room with two other women, three laptops, four cell phones and wall after wall of "artfully" cluttered "decor"--being choked by aromatherapy diffusers and smothered by relentless piano music.

It was around hour nine that we really started to lose it. The mean started coming out and we couldn't be pleased by anyone or anything except our own, caustically witty banter (filled with plenty of bile and disdain for our captors).

Under the best of circumstances, an accreditation visit is painful. Today it was damn near suicidal (or should it be homicidal?).

"I'm just a resource," is the mantra of our fearless leader. A natural resource--and no one's looking out for our conservation. We, like fossil fuels, will one day run out (screaming).

Today was the latest incident of abuse in a long line of "domestic" situations between campus and corporate. Corporate, unexpectedly, being the victim--and we just keep coming back for more.

There was a sign lying on a filing cabinet that stated: "If your name is on this list you have an unresolved problem." We decided to use that statement to frame the idiocy of those around us. The list of "unresolved problems" we could identify is far too long to even start on here.

The degree of masochism reached an intolerable level as the tedious tinkling of those piano keys once again cresendoed to its peak. It felt like it was attacking me--I even startled my colleagues by actually yelling out in a futile attempt to halt the onslaught.

Finally, nearly five hours after the Campus President left without a word to us, the visiting team also left without a word to us. The team that we were waiting on in the ungodly massage office prison. The team that was our whole reason for being there in the first place. The team whose status report of the day's findings would tell us whether we would need to return to the chamber of torment for another go tomorrow.

All I know, is if I have to hear one more note of "relaxing" piano numbers, someone's going to pay. And it ain't gonna be cheap.