sent from: London, UK. destination: London, UK

Returning to work after my day off sick I found my chair vanished. I looked everywhere – somehow we were one short. I wasn’t about to steal someone else’s so I used a temporary one while I tried to figure out who to call. There’s no clear person responsible – if my computer setup is broken I contact systems, so maybe my chair is the same thing. Everyone around me is new – we’ve all been there for 6 months or less. I contact systems, they point me to the building facilities manager, a woman with an officious, holier-than-thou attitude who spends her time either berating people or calling them darling and sweetheart, when she isn’t chain smoking outside, that is. I call her number – “CALL BARRED” it says. Wow, I never knew I had pissed her off. I emailed her to ask for a new chair, and waited. In the meantime I was sat in my too-low chair looking up at my monitors. My normally smaller-than-me neighbour teased me at our reversal of fortunes. Hours pass, no chair appears, and then, after lunch, one magically appears. I hug it, blissful, joyful. I name it and promise I will never leave it alone again. Then I got an email… [continued below]