table dance

Melvin TV* is a pretty tiny operation - just a hole in the wall, really. The newsroom consists of about 5 full time reporters and their desks, 4 freelancers, a spare desk, and a table. There's a reason I'm describing the layout of the room to you, and it has nothing to do with feng shui. At least I don't think it does.

The table has become the focus of an ongoing territorial debate (that periodically erupts into a kerfuffle). Freelancers have nowhere to put their stuff. The table seems like a good place for it, being so handy and rectagular and all. But it turns out it's also the perfect place for the assignment editor to put her obsessive-compulsive disorder. Sharing is out of the question, because the aforementioned baggage takes up the whole table. The table, she maintains, must be kept empty. All 12 square feet of it. It might be needed for surgery. Tapes, scripts, pencils and the other detritus of the vagabond newswaif must be swept away. Sometimes the assignment editor takes these items and throws them into the garbage to make her elusive point.

I'm afraid this sort of dysfunctional mommy tactic could foreshadow soapy mouthwashing or withholding of pencil priveleges.

*guess what - it's not really called melvin tv.