Pugnacious Priest's Warcraft Blog

We have been slowly transitioning to a ‘office cubical flare free’ environment. We no longer have set desks and so float around the floor  at a different desk each day.  ( mostly ). We lock our stuff in lockers at the end of the day and wipe our desks down courteously with alcohol wipes for the next person.
I’ve suggested that just for fun they give the keyboard a little upside down tap every now and then,  just if they’re curious and want to count the eyelashes. They think I’m weird.

I pull out of my locker every day my  Warlords WOW mouse mat. The one piece of ‘flare’ that I can roll out, or fold out.  I keep my Cata one at home.
It’s been a conversation starter, an icebreaker and a homing missile, detecting the curious and the real gamer who recognize what the graphic means and have no other way of asking a random person in the office ‘are you a gamer?’  How do you  tell in a corporate environment without a flash of flare, or a turn of a conversation, like one  awkward drinks and mingle that turned into an interesting discussion about gaming and  micro transactions. I think I have sussed out all the gamers in our greater team now,  the oldshool gamers,  the current and active,  the wistful, ‘ when I used to have time..’

I’ve had some great conversations with people I wouldn’t normally know how to break the ice with outside of discussing work related stuff, and got to know some strangers a little quicker, the games  they play, have played or even what quest they are stuck on, and that makes me feel a little more connected,  a little more included, and in all my years of work,  the people you work with really  make the difference.  I’ve been in older teams where I have had little in common with their interests,  and struggled at work related events to find common ground outside of work,  and now at least I know a few I can snatch an interestng conversation with.