The Meeting: According to Je-Ve'

In reading Pratt's version of the day we met, I actually learned a few things that I did not know before. Maybe he will learn a few things from my side of the story.

I actually felt somewhat intimidated by my first day at work. The Close To My Heart corporate office is a huge building, and I had never actually worked customer service over the phone or by email before. Now that I know how picky they can be about how much experience the people they hire have, I'm surprised they hired me in the first place. Maybe they were desperate, because there really were a lot of emails to be worked on.

I was fairly early to work that day, and we were instructed to sit in that first room in the chairs around the beautiful fountain in the lobby area. There were between four and six of us (I can't remember exactly, but I know I'm the only one from that group who still works there), and none of us really spoke to each other until Sonja came in and took us into the conference room for our first day of training.

Anna was her name, by the way, Pratt. Brooke thought she was stuck up? I suppose someone could get that impression without knowing her very well. She was actually very friendly to everyone, but she seemed to have something to say about everything.

Anna was the other writer that was being trained with me. The remaining trainees were going to be call agents. The information we needed to know was basically the same, so they trained us together.

After going over a few basic rules, Sonja decided to take us on a short tour of the building. The first place was the break room, and then to the Consultant Services room, where we were introduced to several of the call agents and the two writers, who seemed to be in a corner all their own.

Miriam was nice and friendly, but Pratt was definitely strange. I faintly recall the "email ninja" comment, which I think I all but completely ignored at the time. It was certainly random, and not something I felt should be replied to.

One of the call agents was in that same area, and he had a picture of one of the Star Wars ships as the desktop on his computer. Star wars; that was something I could relate to and comment on. So I did, and that was pretty much the extent of our first meeting.

Once I finished training, they kind of put me on the opposite side of the corner as the other writers, so the best way to communicate was by email. I had to send my first several emails through Pratt, because I did not have the permissions to send them myself at the time. I would often ask questions, and he would answer them, as well as add comments of his own. He was definitely a teaser, but I caught on quickly and teased him right back.

Those of you who know us well will know that to this day we still tease each other a lot, though it is probably quite a bit nicer now than it was then.

The pictures Pratt mentioned are on my mom's laptop. I hope to have them up later tonight.