Despite being a morning person, I'm still irritated by Jeremy's cockcrow chirpiness. 'Let's make today a great day' he says every day; and it usually was until his arrival.
Like a human-shaped locust swarm, Jeremy's appearance in the office blights everything. The switchboard jams; computers freeze up unexpectedly and the Internet fails; coffee suddenly goes cold, muffins disintegrate into inedible crumbs; and I haven't checked but I'm pretty certain our sales fall as well.
He is our equivalent of Coleridge's ancient mariner. God knows what occupational albatross he killed to bring down such misfortune on the company. Someone from the mailroom? A corporate consultant? The guy who fills the vending machine in the cafeteria?
'Let's make every day a great day.' Jeremy might as well be invoking an ancient curse for all the good this cliche does. It's actually a howl of neurotic paranoia in positive thinking clothes. Obviously Jeremy thinks it will magically come true if he repeats the mantra often enough. But then he immediately breaks the printer.
Unfortunately our office is open plan, otherwise we could confine Jeremy to his cubicle. For his own protection, of course, before an exasperated colleague walls him up in the conference room or buries him alive beneath the reception desk.
Recently, of course, we've found ourselves working from home because of Coronavirus. We can't blame Jeremy for a public health crisis, but it can't be coincidence that our virtual meeting software frequently cuts out when he is talking.
