Pen- jackers

The PMO looked at me like I was a viking who was going to raid her stationery drawer.

"What do you do with them? Take them from the office and sell them in the black market?"

"Actually that's not a bad idea", I thought. But I didn't know any potential black markets for blue cheap plastic pens.

"No, I..."

"I am going to keep count this time", she didn't let me finish.

Drat! What did she think I was doing with them anyway? I didn't have children who I could give these away to doodle at home. And I wasn't building a Scrooge McDuck- style dungeon to store a stash of use-n-throw scribble- makers. Maybe the problem was I took only one pen at a time, when others picked a handful. Decency doesn't pay anyone these days.

"She's creating a scene for nothing", I thought, "Three times in a week is not much, is it?"

Actually, come to think of it, even if I wrote 72 hours straight without stopping, I wouldn't exhaust 3 pens. Damn! Where did it all go?? Pondering over the case of missing pens, I came back to my desk. As soon as I unlocked my system, a mail from the PMO popped up-

Dear All,

This is to bring to your attention the reckless use of office resources. As you are aware we have a limited budget for office supplies which unfortunately some of you have been misusing.

Please note that going forward all stationery dispensed will be monitored. Hope that you will be judicious in using the office supplies and be mindful of the environment.

Note: Please report any imprudent usage of resources.

Thank you,

Grace

PMO

"Oh, come on! This pen costs less than Rs. 2 a piece!" 

I was livid. Now I gotta be more careful? This was outrageous. But I couldn't bother about this now, I had another meeting to attend. Since the multiple escalations in System Testing, we had been having a meeting everyday. Everyday, a stream of delta updates. Everyday, multiple excel sheets and macros. Everyday, pie charts, bar graphs, scatter charts, bubble charts, cluster charts, combo charts, fish bone analysis...

It was a constant fight to stay awake. Especially since this meeting was scheduled right after lunch. I, personally would not expect any employee to be productive between 2 to 3 pm. That too, in an office where the cafeteria served "Salim's Biryani". Yum.

Tushar tapped me on the shoulder, "Pen..." he whispered.

I handed him my newest treasure and went back to taking a wide- eyed nap.

"Wake up you idiot!", my semi- conscious brain screamed, rejecting the visions of unicorns and rainbows.

"Oh, what did I just do...", I was suddenly aware of my surroundings.

So, this was where my pen was going. I kept getting them from the PMO and people kept "borrowing" them. And at these times, I am usually too somnolent to realize that the pen I just got was someone else's mistress now. Well, no more!

I poked Tushar, "Pen..." I whispered.

He gave me a since- when- do- you- take- notes look but sensing that this time I wanted my mistress, err- pen back, gave it to me.

I pretended to understand the defect rejection ratio and other big words in the meeting because I wrote "Defect rejection ratio" in BIG WORDS in the notepad. By the time the meeting was over, I had created an impenetrable fort around "Defect rejection ratio".

Ha! I had saved Julia from Pen- jackers today. Yes, I named her! Moving back to my cubicle, I thought I should give Grace an anonymous tip on all the people who took my pen and never returned it to me. After all, she did ask to report imprudent usage. I passed Anand's desk and borrowed his blue post-its.

1 post-it to write down the names.

With the rest of them I could finish Marge's hair and my Simpson's family at home will be complete.