Selling cars is not my cup of tea

Following my unfettered success as a receptionist at the helicopter base, job offers flooded in from all over the Thames Valley. Everyone wanted to employ that pregnant Australian lady who loved franking the mail. Ok, that's a lie. No one wanted to employ me but I did love franking the mail.

My next temporary assignment was to a luxury car dealership for five days. The agency and I were both under the impression I was being hired to man the reception desk, which was not strictly true. A young English girl welcomed me to the fold and suggested I take the seat beside her at reception.

In front of her was a computer, a telephone, some pens, paper, some post-it notes, all of the typical office trimmings. In front of me was a wide expanse of empty desk. No phone, no computer, not even a pen. I awaited my instructions. A few minutes passed before the girl explained that the service manager – who ran the service workshop across the street - was on holidays for a week. For a moment I wasn't sure how that would affect me but I thought that's nice he's getting a break from work.

She went on to explain that in his absence her work load would increase substantially – such that she would be responsible for booking in all the car services and managing the timings for each job. I was a little unsure where that left me until she explained in light of her increased workload she'd thought it would be good to have some extra assistance at reception. I agreed until she explained exactly how the arrangement would work.

Her phone would ring, whereby I would quickly pick it up and answer "Good morning, [insert luxury car dealership name] Oxford, Georgie speaking". The caller would then articulate his or her needs, at which point, regardless of their needs, I would have to say "One moment please, I'll just transfer you to our,…um…, receptionist". At that point I would 'transfer' (meaning I would pass her the actual phone) and she would process their call. Without a computer or phone of my own I was unable to do anything else. Except feel comically superfluous and wonder if I was part of a sketch entitled "A Guide: The UK's failing economy."

My only other job was to record the time of each call and nature of their query. This would be quite fine assuming the phone rang off the hook. But it didn't. By 10.15am the phone had rung once. Around this time my friend noticed that my presence might in fact be unnecessary. She asked "Is this a little bit boring for you?" "Oh not at all. I find I'm at my peak when I have absolutely nothing to do." Actually I just smiled and said I was happy to do something to help. I hoped this might prompt her to find me something - ANYTHING - to do, but alas. So I sat there willing the time, and myself, to disappear.

On the plus side I was surrounded by wonderful people which really helped the time fly by. Except that I wasn't. I was surrounded by smarmy car salespeople. The manager came in with a group of associates, took one look at my pregnant belly and asked exactly what I'd done to get myself in that state. I was taken aback and retorted that if he couldn't grasp the basics of human reproduction was he really in a position to be selling £65,000 cars to members of the public? Well I wish I'd said that. Or worse. But again I just smiled meekly and willed the day to be over.

But it wasn't. Not yet. More challenges lay ahead. One of the salesmen came over and asked me really slowly "Love, do you reckon you're up to making me and my co-worker a cup of tea", as if he was laying down the greatest challenge I might ever face. I was tempted to ask him to show me how to make the first cup and then I could probably manage to make the second.

Of course I jumped up, ran to the kitchen and made two cups of tea really really slowly. I then looked at my watch and thought actually getting through this day will be the greatest challenge I ever face. And worse, unlike most challenging scenarios there would be no satisfaction at the end of it. Just dread. Another F.O.U.R whole days lay ahead. 

In that week I really started the question the wisdom of some of my life choices.  In particular, leaving a job where making a cup of tea was completely incidental rather than the complete sum of my day.