A coffee mess

Being alone makes you do stupid things. Such as engulf yourself in work or working out (still has work in it!) because you want to ensure that when you get home you drop dead with tiredness. However, this new found working schedule needs stuff to propel it. Enter my new speed. It's called coffee.

When I reach the office I go and fetch my water of the day and make myself a large cup of coffee, which I keep on my desk in case students drop in. While all the other coffees I drink while they are nice and hot, this cup gets drunk throughout the day and gets fairly cold and yucky. For you see, whenever students come in to see me, I take a sip of that coffee. And that sip helps me get through most of the student questions (that are sometimes, let's face it, more than stupid).

Needless to say, people that have seen my previous office space will know that this one is also, yet another mess. Because, that's the way the world turns. Or the cookie crumbles. Or whatever.

Now. The coffee cup is always sitting right in front of my keyboard such that I can ALWAYS take a sip before turning to face my students. And while I am coding or working I tend to wear headphones and be really really focused on the task. (see where this is going?) And my office walls are fully transparent (we're all like goldfish in a bowl, really) and tend to slide easily. And most staff by now will just come in my office because knocking is useless if I have my headphones on.

And here we go. So far, three of them have managed to freak the hell out of me. Because I am very focused and listening to loud music, the moment they come in and I finally notice them, I tend to freak out, throw the headphones, or the keyboard, or whatever it is that I am doing. And this hits the coffee cup, that spills all over my clothes, my two monitors, my carpet. It has gotten so bad that the office secretary has given me a tea towel for these emergencies, and some of the colleagues approach my office making really loud noises to ensure I don't freak out.