Disaster

We had a lovely anthrax scare at work recently.  The Executive Secretary opened up a manila folder with her letter opener and white powder came out.  The folder was sketchy- our company name but no address and yet it still got delivered here.  One of my jobs has to do with emergency preparedness so the Secretary came to me to ask what to do.  My first thought was “Why are you bringing the anthrax over to me???”  I got her to go back to her desk and call security downstairs while I tried to strike a balance between standing as far away from her desk as possible vs. standing close enough to help her as she talked to the authorities.

As soon as security came up to our office suite, everyone, including my boss and her boss, were not allowed to use our computers or phones.  We had to write down our name, address, birthdates, and exactly what happened for the officers while sitting in an open area of our office.  The officers kept asking us if we were feeling odd in any way (one officer came into our office suite, the other way stayed behind the glass doors).  The Secretary became flushed, but I think that was partially because the building shut off the HVAC system (so that potential spores would not move to other floors in the building)  and she was a little scared.  After 20 minutes or so we were fairly certain that it wasn’t anthrax because none of us had any symptoms, but we still needed to find out was exactly was sent in the envelope.

Enter the hazardous division of the Chicago Fire Department.  Yes, the CFD has two of these divisions in the city.  They came in wearing full gear, face masks and gloves while carrying a bunch of plastic boxes with fancy machines in them.  They asked a few questions and then headed over to the offending envelope.  After some testing it was determined that the white powder was a protein and that there was a semi-threatening note in the envelope (the Secretary didn’t get as far as looking in the envelope after seeing the white powder). 

Meanwhile, the six of us caught in the suite were laughing and joking.  We wondered if anyone had alcohol in their desks as we might as well be drinking if we were all stuck there.  I started to call the Secretary “Patient Zero” and have continued to call her that through today.  J  I’m pretty sure the officers and the firemen were not happy with us, but what else are we going to do?

In the end, the suspicious powder was- get this- SHAVINGS FROM SOMEONE’S FOOT.  EWWWW.  I told the Secretary that as soon as she got home, she better take the longest and hottest shower of her life.  NASTY.  Who does that???  Two and half hours later, we were finally allowed to leave.  Phew!

I think that I need to send an email around to the rest of my company telling them if they get a suspicious piece of mail to NOT bring it to me!!

--------------------------------------------

Speaking of emergency preparedness, partly because of that job, I was asked yesterday to head out to New York to help with Sandy disaster efforts.  I’m leaving right after Christmas and will be gone for two weeks.  I’m happy to be going because it will be a great experience and I will be able to help people in need after such a major disaster.  However, this means missing New Years Eve with CP (we didn’t have big plans….just heading over to a friend’s house) and not really seeing him for a month.  You see, the day after I get back from New York CP goes on a worldwide tour of airports and countries.  He flies from Chicago to Tokyo, then Tokyo to Bangkok and stays in Bangkok a week.  Then from Bangkok he flies to Istanbul, then onto San Paulo (Brazil) for another week.  He will mostly likely miss some of my crazy hormonal mood swings from IVF drugs, but he also won’t be around to help me administer them.  :-(

Needless to say, I have heard I will be working 12 hour days so I may not be reading/commenting too much while I’m in NY- but I’ll be thinking of all of you!!