Desks.

Ruth: mike D, do you have a clean desk or messy desk
i guess clean
Mike D.: you guessed… poorly.
Ruth: haha! guess me!
Mike D:
You’re desk is small. It’s metal… with worn corners from frequent impacts with book carts.

there’s a pencil holder and a place for paperclips
sometimes, when it’s too warm you take your shoes off under the desk
the front is solid… so the desk keeps your secret well

there are papers strewn about, but not haphazardly.
someone placed them there with intent.
the items though, those are a bit more random
the ruler always seems to be in a different spot

there’s a small circular stain on the left from where a cup was placed
but it’s been there since you arrived and is more part of the desk than anything else
thin strips of white out splatter are on the right side
the computer monitor is not at all a flat screen
it’s that computer tan color. there’s dust on top, but you don’t notice it really.

there are three piles of books
you tried to stack them according to size.. with the largest at the bottom.
but recently you had an extra book that needed to be put down and didn’t feel like putting it in the middle
so the pile on the right looks off balance

you have a rolodex but you have no idea who all the people are inside it
there’s no desk lamp. you rely more on the overhead lights from the library
it’s quiet here….
too quiet. sometimes you tap your foot against he metal frame of the desk.
you’re doing that right now.
DONE!

how’d I do?

Ruth: it’s not very accurate, but amusing
me: ha ha ha
did I get anything right?
Ruth: I do have three stacks of books
me: YES!

Leave your name and your job title in the comments. I will make a prediction as to what your desk looks like.

47 thoughts on “Desks.

  • 7/25/2007 at 1:51 pm
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    You know my name already. I don’t really have a job, but let’s say I’m a writer. I do write at my desk, so it’s not much of a stretch. Ok, go.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 1:52 pm
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    Jocelyn Lally: Fire Protection Engineer

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  • 7/25/2007 at 2:09 pm
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    Your desk is a warm wood. Not as intense as a walnut… more like a nicely stained cherry. In darker lighting it would appear red, but your desk lamp… a bright 100 W bulb on a mechanical arm… is too white to reveal the subtle color.

    There are three drawers on the left, two on the right, and one thin one just under the desktop that holds all your pencils and pens. It’s dirty in the drawer, bits of eraser and pencil shavings hide in the corners. There are more than a few pens with unmatched caps.

    Scissors and a hole punch are in the top drawer to the right along with some stamps. The bottom drawer has a few phone books. The drawers to the left are full of old papers and ramblings.

    The desk surface is mostly clean except for a few bills and envelopes piled just to the right of the monitor. You’ve been wanting to go through that mail for awhile now, but you can’t imagine that there’s anything too important in there.

    You have a portable black phone it sits next to a picture frame. The picture is of your kids. The frame is a clean white. Your kids are smiling.

    The desk sits on a veneer floor. It’s a little scratched from where your chair scrapes when it’s pulled in and out. Wires from the keyboard, mouse, speakers, and monitor hang down below the desk in a nest of confusion. It’s dusty back there, but no one has noticed.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 2:25 pm
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    Assistant Director of Admissions (at WPI)

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  • 7/25/2007 at 2:29 pm
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    Your desk is typical of an engineer. It’s that black plastic coated aluminum with a speckled top. It’s cold and hard to notice… as if it was designed specifically to blend in with the environment. Its age is impossible to determine.

    There’s a pad of post-its and a handful of handwritten notes in a rough pile by the phone. The fluorescent lights make everything appear both free of dust and completely dusty at the same time.

    You rest your feet on the CPU under the desk. It’s probably not good for the computer… but nothing bad has happened yet other than the light outline of dusty shoe prints on the black computer case cover.

    The desk lies right on the boundary between clean and dirty. There’s an inbox with half a dozen papers in it. There’s a phone, a Dell mousepad, and a stapler. The stapler is black, boxy, and uncomfortable. There are only three staples inside. But you have refills in your drawer.

    There’s a box of matches in the back of that drawer with a worn out starter strip. The subtle irony of this is fitting.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 2:38 pm
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    Michael E. Fisher, Distinguished University Professor.

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  • 7/25/2007 at 2:58 pm
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    I wish. :) We keep the phone books and stamps in my husband’s desk in the kitchen. My desk is in the living room. No room for a lamp because of the computer and accessories. I do have old papers and ramblings in a drawer, but not on the left. The drawers are all messy. You prediction sounds much nicer.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 3:38 pm
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    Ryan Schenk: Rails superstar

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  • 7/25/2007 at 3:47 pm
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    Your desk is heavy. It’s solid wood. The drawers have warped over the years so they don’t open very well. The iron drawer handles are black and imposing.

    It is a formidable desk. You take comfort in knowing that you could hide under it safely in the rare case of an earthquake. The desktop is two inches thick and covered over in a deep dark reflective red gloss. The desk fits well in its environment. The heavily carpeted floor and dull orange lamp play off each other to give the impression of authority.

    The computer, however, is very far out of place. This is a desk from the 20’s and does not easily accommodate technology.

    There’s an analog clock on your desk, though you tend to rely more on the computer’s clock on the taskbar. A mug holds a pencil, a sharpie, and a black pen. You lost your blue pen a few weeks back.

    You have a series of files on your desk that are more or less organized. Someone recently put a new file on top and you haven’t yet decided where to put it.

    The whole ensemble hints at a conflict between then and now.

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  • 7/25/2007 at 4:58 pm
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    Irene: Research scientist (biology)

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  • 7/25/2007 at 5:00 pm
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    Theresa: (seemingly permanent) graduate student in psychology

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  • 7/25/2007 at 5:20 pm
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    Financial Software Consultant

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  • 7/25/2007 at 5:32 pm
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    Caitlin McMonagle : Quality Engineer Extraordinaire

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  • 7/25/2007 at 5:51 pm
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    I don’t believe that this is actually you at all. Request denied! DUN DUN DUN!

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  • 7/25/2007 at 5:57 pm
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    I know, it’s just the best name ever. I wanted to see what you would come up with.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 6:08 pm
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    This desk is a friendly one. It’s a ‘L’ shaped desk with a light colored top and a flat screen monitor right in that corner. There’s a keyboard tray and a snazzy shelf unit on your right. The shelf holds a handful of reference books and a pile of non-descript parts that you’ve collected over the passing months. The desk is tall, but your chair is taller. You can’t easily maneuver the chair so that both arms will slide under the desktop. This irks you… but not enough so that you’ll hunt down another chair.

    You have a few trinkets here and there that individualize your desk. Things from home. A picture frame with UUIG’s picture, a small plastic toy dinosaur (your colleagues refer to it as the Brontosaurus… you correct them: it’s an ‘Apatosaurus’), and a tiny cannon that shoots jelly beans if you pull and release a plunger.

    There are technical drawings sprawled out across the desk. Beneath them lies a calendar on which are dozens of scribbles. There must be something 3-D under there too because the paper bulges in the center. Perhaps a pen… or a calculator.

    There’s no lamp here. You rely entirely on the buzzing of the fluorescent bulbs above you. When the office is quiet the buzzing of the bulbs is as loud as the fan in your computer.

    Your desk doesn’t sag or sway. It’s confident and overflowing with use. The metal cylindrical legs are elegant and simple. It serves its purpose well.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 6:20 pm
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    Actually, I was more intimidated by the sheer number of Desks I had to analyze. I don’t think I understood the breadth of this project before I started. I figured by calling you out on the name I could avoid a lengthy comment. sigh. I guess not.

    Michael E. Fisher?

    Your desk is wide. Uncomfortably wide. The room in which it sits has a slightly bowed ceiling so the perspective doesn’t seem right. At first glance, the desk appears to be ikea. But instead of particle board with a faux pine surface, yours is actually pine through and through.

    The desk has two levels, one 3 inches above the other and set back so it only covers a portion of the total surface. There are piles and piles of papers on the desk. Folders, papers, and pamphlets are stacked 5 inches high. The different piles are impossible to distinguish from one another. It’s more like one pile than multiple.

    Rising above the paper is your monitor. It’s a flatscreen monitor and the standard windows “pipes” screen saver has been going for at least two days.

    Thankfully, you also have a keyboard tray. otherwise the computer peripherals would be buried under a pile of papers as well.

    On the far end of the desk, there’s a mug half full of day old coffee. It’s cold and sits on the only cleared 3 inches of space on the desk. The mug is solid white. It has no design or advertisement written on it. Just simple white.

    The desk sits on a tile floor with black scuff marks all around. Your winter jacket is thrown over the corner of the desk, and it resides there throughout the year.

    Above the desk, hanging on the wall, is a large print of a Yosemite.

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  • 7/25/2007 at 6:40 pm
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    For a change of pace, you could do my home desk instead.

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  • 7/25/2007 at 7:22 pm
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    This desk is a friendly one. It’s a ‘L’ shaped desk with a light colored top and a flat screen monitor right in that corner.

    This is all correct. I have a laptop, too, so I use dual monitors.

    There’s a keyboard tray and a snazzy shelf unit on your right. The shelf holds a handful of reference books and a pile of non-descript parts that you’ve collected over the passing months.

    Negative on the keyboard tray. In fact, I made sure that I had a desk without a keyboard tray because if I had one, I would bang my knees on it all day long. I have a bookshelf on the right, that is correct. But it just has a stack of checksheets and a pyramid of Red Bull cans and some empty Mountain Dew bottles. There’s a small bottle of vitamins up there, too.

    The desk is tall, but your chair is taller. You can’t easily maneuver the chair so that both arms will slide under the desktop. This irks you… but not enough so that you’ll hunt down another chair.

    The desk isn’t tall, but all of the chairs tend to be too tall, you’re right. I have mine as low as I can get it, and it’s reclined pretty far so I can seat comfortably with my long legs. I did track down a new chair a few weeks ago, though.

    You have a few trinkets here and there that individualize your desk. Things from home. A picture frame with UUIG’s picture, a small plastic toy dinosaur (your colleagues refer to it as the Brontosaurus… you correct them: it’s an ‘Apatosaurus’), and a tiny cannon that shoots jelly beans if you pull and release a plunger.”

    I have one of the more individualized desks in the office. Things from home (Kansas) include some wall calendars and Jayhawk figurines and pins. I don’t have any real photos of UUIG actually.. but I do have some small wax sculptures that she made on my desk (the trinkets you mention). None of them are dinosaurs, but one of them is a fish. Instead of a jelly bean shooter, the “fun” thing on my desk is one of those magnetic ball and stick sets you can build stuff with.

    The most noticeable thing at my desk are all of the orienteering maps I have hanging up. Currently, I have 10 up. I also have a 10″ tall cardboard Jayhawk that sits on top of the cubicle wall to let everyone know where I’m from.

    There are technical drawings sprawled out across the desk. Beneath them lies a calendar on which are dozens of scribbles. There must be something 3-D under there too because the paper bulges in the center. Perhaps a pen… or a calculator.

    Ever since we went LEAN, we only have one work package at a time, so that limits the amount of drawings on my desk. I do have pens and pencils and erasers that find their way under papers, though.

    There’s no lamp here. You rely entirely on the buzzing of the fluorescent bulbs above you. When the office is quiet the buzzing of the bulbs is as loud as the fan in your computer.

    I have a lamp, but it’s always off. It’s integrated under the bookshelf. I never hear the fluorescent lights because I’m right next to the office printer. It makes a lot of noise, even when it’s not printing.

    Your desk doesn’t sag or sway. It’s confident and overflowing with use. The metal cylindrical legs are elegant and simple. It serves its purpose well..

    It certainly doesn’t sag or away. It’s not overflowing with use… just yet. Metal legs, but not cylindrical. They are slabs on the side.

    Oh, and everything about the desk/cubicle is beige. Everything.

    Reply
  • 7/25/2007 at 9:37 pm
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    The world has never seen a desk like yours. Walking into your cubical is like taking a Magical Pokemon Journey. The desktop, crafted from paper mache and painted bright bright yellow, is molded in the crude shape of Pikachu. With wooden lightning bolt legs, the desk is a triumph of both art and utility.

    Your computer monitor is being held up by a lifesize Mewtwo. The mouse sits on a Charizard mousepad. They keyboard has an overlay of Machop.

    The lighting comes mostly from two Beedrills whose Thorax’s glow a mellow gold.

    The desk is warm to the touch and smells vaguely of anime. The chair, a giant shell of Blastoise, is cushioned heavily and has great back support. You have a small container full of binder clips and other office necessities in the corner. A spotlight shines on them from the corner of your office… and from what appears to be the careless placement of office supplies rises a giant shadow of Geodude on the wall.

    Four cups sit on your desk. One ceramic. One paper. One plastic. One Glass. When you pick them up to get your daily beverage you say “Ceramic cup? I choose you.”

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  • 7/25/2007 at 10:24 pm
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    Your desk is black – some sort of Formica. The surface is smooth and clean. Overall, it’s pretty orderly. There’s an ‘office organizer’ in the back. It’s black plastic and doesn’t reflect much light. It has one or two mechanical pencils as well as a white block eraser.

    Sometimes, if you’re bored or waiting for a test to complete, you take the eraser and write your name on the black desktop. It seems to work well, but you always smudge it away immediately afterwards.

    The desk is just about up against a wall… a cord for a powerstrip comes up from the back. A large square wooden leg drops from each corner of the desk. The leg is a solid 3 inches thick. One of the legs in the back has a crack in it, though it remains structurally sound.

    Your computer is about 6 years old. The tan monitor sits heavy on the desktop. the CPU resides below. The mousepad is blue and worn. The keyboard has a few old stains and the enter key is dirty. There’s a pile of paperwork in the corner, but it’s neatly piled. You have no phone on your desk, but it doesn’t bother you much. There’s one on the other side of the room that you can get to within two rings.

    There’s a calendar high on the wall with a picture of a waterfall. It’s still showing the month of June.

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  • 7/26/2007 at 7:34 am
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    Kurt from Work : Quality Control Analyst – Microbiology

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  • 7/26/2007 at 9:04 am
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    DANGIT, MIKE D!! HOW DID YOU KNOW?!?!?!

    (Well, besides that you’ve been to my office before)

    (Except, thanks to the dude on the side of the road in Boston, I have an Aeron chair now)

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  • 7/26/2007 at 11:29 am
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    Andrew Oleson, Advanced Scientist (Pigmentation Chemistry)
    lol

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  • 7/26/2007 at 11:44 am
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    Advanced Scientist is SUCH a cool title

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  • 7/26/2007 at 11:55 am
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    This desk is strong and fast. There is a tide of paper and reference texts that regularly appear, disappear, and reappear… a constant cycle of academia. Two cups sit on your desk, a water nalgene and a plastic travel mug. The nalgene is half full of water, the travel mug is half full of warm coffee.

    The desk is aluminum with a dark gray coating. It has rounded corners and a fluidity to it that reminds those passing by of the railroads. There’s a wall clock hanging to the left of the desk, it ticks loudly but you’ve grown to ignore it.

    There isn’t a slow day at this desk. But on those days when you can be patient instead of rushed you like to lean your weight on the left-hand arm rest and look across the desk. It’s a proud desk and you appreciate its support. When things get tough the desk supports you and helps you get through the mayhem. You and this desk have a friendship built on necessity and hard work.

    The desk’s left end is against a wall. It pushes off the wall like a peninsula or getty. It’s stable. It’s permanent. It’s your desk and there’s a small bag of nestle chocolate chips in the drawer held closed with a twist-tie.

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  • 7/26/2007 at 12:12 pm
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    Your home desk is a marvel of modern efficiency and minimalism. The desk itself is a Parson’s desk, which is a larger version of the seminal Parsons Table, named after the Parsons School of Design. The minimalism leaves some with a cold impression, but its utility is rich and ever-present.

    The desk is black, to contrast and compliment the only things sitting on it: your iMac, and your iPhone dock. When not in your possession the iPhone sits quietly in its dock charging. The light from the phone shines an eerie but comforting glow on its surroundings.

    The only other item on the desk is your pink pen, which rests in a pink marble base. The color of the pen is a stark contrast to the rest of the desk and hints at your underlying passion and sensuality. The dogs explore the table at times, climbing up onto its smooth surface, but this is infrequent and generally frowned upon.

    The crisp corners of the desk cut the room. But not so much as to make it uncomfortable, just enough to make it interesting.

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  • 7/26/2007 at 12:41 pm
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    And, you and Ryan shame this website on its birthday with your lies.

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  • 7/27/2007 at 5:12 am
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    “a tiny cannon that shoots jelly beans if you pull and release a plunger.”

    I WANT ONE.

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  • 7/30/2007 at 5:10 pm
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    Darn! I’m late to the conversation. I’ll comment anyway.

    Becky: US Navy Hospital Corpsman

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  • 7/30/2007 at 7:48 pm
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    Your desk is full. It’s design is simple, a flat top with each edge gently curving downward like a quilt on a bed. It’s a very light yellow pine with a bright gloss. Beneath the desktop is a four inch trim. It reaches downward and gives the desk a sense of completion. When you sit at your desk, you find there is ample room to cross your legs.

    There’s a single drawer on the right with a small wooden knob handle. Inside are the standard assortment of office accessories: pencils, pens, tape… it is only your three hole punch and your stapler that reside on the desktop.

    When it’s too hot in the office the desk has a sense of coolness to it. But that feeling doesn’t seem to surface in the cold. The desk moderates the room but adds structure. Each of the four cylindrical legs climbs up and is topped by a sphere of equal radius. The spheres do not seem out of place, instead they give a great sense of stability.

    To those passing by, the top seems messy. But the five piles of paper are placed in such a way that priority is forced. When you sit at the keyboard the most critical of tasks lies under your right wrist, brushing up against you with each mouse stroke as a subtle reminder that, yes, these tasks still need completion.

    There’s a lamp here. It’s tall and mechanical. It matches the desk well in its functionality. The monitor is flat and set back. When you’re deep in your work you lean forward closer and closer to the iridescent screen.

    The desk used to be up against the wall, but you’ve moved it so that it faces the opening to your space. Despite it’s skeletal frame, it provides enough protection and professionalism that you feel relaxed and empowered when you sit in its space.

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  • 7/30/2007 at 8:13 pm
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    Your desk was spawned from the unholy union of oak and steel. The 3 inch desktop is reinforced with large metal beams that pierce through its side and show no remorse in warping the gentle grain structure of the wood. The grain now appears tortured and twisted, bulging at its uncomfortable metal brace.

    The legs were once gracefully bowing oak branches, but are now straight beams imprisoned by steel. When the temperature drops the metal and wood groan in discomfort.

    The top is stark. Your computer sits next to a microscope and a beaker. Any that saw your desk in another environment would assume that the user was a perverse cruel scientist willing to bend morality to achieve his distorted dreams.

    There is uneasiness about this desk.

    The light from above flickers. There’s a hum of electricity in the room and the tile floor feels cold. Sometimes when you sit behind your desk you feel a rush of power. The desk may be appear wicked, but it can spawn great ingenuity. Many ideas have come from this room. Some might walk the line of decency, but all drive humanity closer to mechanical and biological dominance.

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  • 7/30/2007 at 9:17 pm
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    Your desk is thin, professional, and orderly. The desktop is a study of bright and anodized aluminum. It’s sleek and structured. The top is black. It had a luster at one point but has dulled in the last 10-25 years. Simple. Bauhaus.

    There is no hidden functionality to this desk. It serves its purpose. no more.

    There’s a single pile of paperwork on the left. A small rock sits on top as a paperweight. The smooth simplicity of the rock is fitting.

    Your desklight extends around the computer monitor which rests on the right. It’s a single bulb on an arm, with a black half sphere directing the light to the desk where it casts a thin shadow on a lone paperclip. The paperclip was left there absentmindedly. Perhaps it fell off a stack of papers or a folder. When you notice it, you will brush it off the desktop with your hand and drop it into the magnetized paperclip holder that sits just under the monitor.

    There are two exposed shelves to the right, under the desk – where one might expect to find drawers. You have a pencil holder and a box of tissues on the top and a few piled books on the bottom. The tissues are the cheap store brand, which helps ensure that your co-workers will pass your tissues up for your neighbor’s which are multi-ply with aloe and excess.

    The desk sits on a hardened carpet. The stiff weave doesn’t seem to respond to someone walking across… but if the desk were moved a thin indent would be evident.

    Sitting at the desk, you remain focused. There’s no need for busy distraction here. Your work and your desk seem well paired.

    A paper cup of coffee sits on the edge of the desk by your left hand. The coffee is still warm.

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  • 7/30/2007 at 9:52 pm
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    It is rumored that Brian May of Queen once quipped: “I recycle my guitars after a single use. Recycled guitars make great desks.”

    And so it is with your desk. The legs were clearly formed from the finest of acoustic necks. The tabletop is a particle board, made from shards of rock and roll.

    When people walk by they get various songs stuck in their head. Sometimes it’s Tom Morello’s sick Audioslave solos. Other times it’s the finger tapping fury of Angus Young. Still other times it’s some song that probably hasn’t even been written… just three or four notes with heavy distortion and tremolo from a whammy bar. It’s catchy and people find themselves whistling it for days.

    While you don’t know whose instruments are shredded inside your desk, you know that the desk does glow purple in the dark. So it’s pretty likely there’s at least one Prince guitar in there.

    You purchased the desk from a gypsy who wandered the streets carrying the desk on her back. You pitied her and her story, which seemed so ludicrous at the time that you held back laughter for fear the gypsy would cry.

    But you were drawn to the desk.
    It beckoned to you like a glass of lemonade on a hot day.

    You purchased it for $5.70. You gave her a 5 spot and three quarters. You tossed the nickel that she gave you in change into a street musicians case. When the coin hit the bottom of his can, he whipped out an arpeggio so solid and loud that the steel structure of the neighboring skyscrapers resonated and a rolling bass could be heard all the way into the Worcester palladium where a ska band stopped their set thinking there was an earthquake.

    As each day passes you find another hint of rock buried within the unstained, uncovered, particle board desktop. Just yesterday you found what appeared to be a guitar pick. It was pink and smelled of marijuana. And last week you found what appeared to be Mike McCready’s facade in the drawer on the left.

    When people see your desk they laugh at its unfinished brazen appearance… but unknowingly, they laugh in 5/4 time.

    Reply
  • 7/31/2007 at 10:15 am
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    Desk left
    Desk right
    Desk below

    As you can see, you are right only on two things.

    To those passing by, the top seems messy. But the five piles of paper are placed in such a way that priority is forced.
    Except it is not so much piles of papers, as a swarm of papers to which only I know the rhyme and reason.

    The monitor is flat and set back. When you’re deep in your work you lean forward closer and closer to the iridescent screen.
    That’s completely true, and my aching back by the end of the day is the evidence.

    Nothing else is true…I live in a cube, I have a fluorescent light over me, the desk is attached to the walls of my cube and can not be moved, it is made of that plastic covered MDF and has no legs or drawers, my cube is in the hottest part of the office and does nothing to give a “sense of coolness” to anything, I have a ton of boxes below my desk that I often rest my feet on, and I use my mouse left-handed (even though I’m a righty).

    However, the stapler and the three-hole punch are currently hanging out together next to the phone.

    I’d like to think I will someday have a desk like you described though. Thanks.

    Reply
  • 7/31/2007 at 10:25 am
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    Wow! That’s totally right! You have a gift, Mike!

    Reply

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