Gratis

Perhaps it the incessant din of economic turmoil screaming through the TV, or maybe it’s the fact that I now have my own bills to pay, but I have developed an infatuation with all things free.  Which makes being a consultant the ideal job for me.

Some of my consulting freebies include;

1. Sports Tickets:  I recently received Wizards tickets for the February 27th game against the Chicago Bulls. What the company forgot to tell me was that I would be sitting 20 feet away from President Obama. Cool.  They also forgot to tell me was that I would receive a free physical courtesy of the secret service. Not as cool.

2. Spy Museum Scavenger Hunt: The evite read “We rented out the entire museum so we will have it all to ourselves.”  A genius idea to swindle prospective participants, since the museum was astir with the usual tourists. Our team name, Golf, was assigned to us using the NATO phonetic alphabet. If I had my choice, we would have been the Blue Barracudas. The purpose of the scavenger hunt was to score the most points by first, correctly answering a multitude of intelligence/counterintelligence questions whose answers were contained in the museum, and second, by stealthily placing a sticker on, or “bugging,” an opponent. Cool.  While the results were being tallied, I swiftly moved to the open bar and enjoyed the plated lunch. After some grilled chorizo, house cured salmon, and a few glasses of sauvignon blanc, it was time to announce the results.  We did not win. Not as cool.

3. Young Employees Trivia Night:  Our young employees forum hosted a trivia night at Arlington’s favorite smoky bar, Whitlow’s.  The event was in celebration of St. Patrick and his successful efforts to drive the snakes from Ireland. Cool. (As a side note, St. Patrick has been quickly elevated to my favorite saint.  If I had known about him during my Catholic confirmation, I surely would have selected him as my patron over St. Francis of Assisi)  For round three of trivia, the emcee told us to name the artist and the song title.  Sounds simple.  The catch; instead of playing the original, he sang his own rendition, which sounded similar to car skidding its brakes across the pavement in the middle of a hail storm.  Our team could not identify one artist nor could we identify one song title. Not as cool.

4. Scope it Out 5K: My company paid for my entrance fee, which netted me a free shirt. After the race, they served bagels and bananas.  The person responsible for the buying the food either (a) should return to grade school to learn how to count or (b) was a bit quixotic and thought there might be an overnight throng of day-of-event registrants flocking to support colorectal cancer research.  Noting this prodigality, the volunteers manning the banana and bagel bungalow handed me a clear plastic trash bag and told me to “take some for the road.” Cool. So I heeded their advice.  Bundle of food flung on my back, Chris Cringled with delight, I paraded home.  When what to my roommates’ wondering eyes should appear but bagel chips and eight loafs of banana bread. Eating only two food items all week. Not as cool.

5. Bagel Fridays: A unique social experiment where bagels are placed in the kitchen between 8 and 9 am.  They always told me that networking was the key to success, and nothing more clearly demonstrates this than on bagel Fridays.  The larger your network, the more likely it is that someone will inform you the bagels have arrived, and the more likely it is that you will get the bagel and cream spread of your choice. Cool. The network-less end up with an onion bagel and a garlic herb spread and spend the rest of their Friday trying to expand their network to include someone who has breath mints.  But really, it’s a Catch-22, because who wants to be friends with the person who has bad breath? Not as cool.