First day, thankfully over

I’m back at work then…
I hardly slept last night. Nerves, excitement, apprehension, panic, relief and uncertainty were all vying for my attention, and as a result I spent the early hours pacing, chewing my nails or sitting on the bog (and sometimes all three at once).
In the end, it was fine.
Graham, the ginger manager whose name I have been having trouble with, greeted me with enthusiasm and bad breath and said ’Now I have a team I can be proud of.’ Most of the day was spent drinking tea, chatting about ourselves and our ’journeys’ and ambling around the store meeting people and ’learning the layout.’ I’m aware that I am using a lot of speech marks, but that’s because most of what was said today seemed to be lifted from a ’cliché things to say in the workplace’ book.
I’ve noticed a big difference in the induction process when you’re joining management, rather than just the hoi-polloi of everyday employees. When I started at The Other Store, they rattled through everything quickly and got us into shelf-filling as soon as possible. Today, there seemed to be time to spare, and I’m not entirely sure that I learnt anything, apart from Ginger Graham’s life story and plans for the future.
Anyway, first day done-and-dusted, so I feel a bit better now.
Tomorrow I have to watch loads of videos about the history of the company and how I’m expected to fit into it, then I get to ‘shadow’ another manager for the afternoon.
I can barely contain my excitement.

RC 16-5-11