It happened. Today, after three months (a record length of time for one assignment) I took 'ownership' of my role. The ability to do so lay dormant inside me for a long time. So many things were waiting to be done. Clearing out of random documents that had been sitting in random draws since 2004, leading me to the conclusion that the office has only ever seen temps doing reception since then, or there was a permanent receptionist, but she also sat on her arse reading The God of Small Things followed or preceeded by the front and back pages of the Herald. So much random shit lying around doing nothing, having long been useless or irrelevant to the immediacy of the reception desk. I chucked out piles and piles of this shit, leaving me with 3 redundant trays with which to do exactly what I pleased. My 3/4 colleague made a few light hearted comments about Public Servants; we pondered the uncanny similarity of the office to an archeological dig. He said he was at that office years ago, and the same files were sitting on the same shelf in the same cupboard untouched in the same state as they were even back then. I refilled the business cards, I refilled the brochure holders, and for an A4 sized one, printing out a lovely insert that said Please Take One in elegant typeface. A triumph.

My slightly manic but overall positive energy quickly spread throughout the 3-person office and everyone was talking and smiling and chatting and laughing and feeling confident and efficient.

But there's nothing left to do now. I've done it all, in one afternoon. Time to get back to my book.  ¶ 17:26