Never Look a Gift Horse in the Mouth

Four times a year Oxford has an employee appreciation month. We get to wear jeans all month, and during the first week we all get a present on our desks. Sometimes the gifts are nice, but more often than not, they make me shake my head & wonder, "What WERE they thinking?" March starts an appreciation month, so we all recieved a token of Oxford's gratitude today - it fell into the WWTT catergory, but I'll cover that in a second.

Some of the nicer gifts Oxford has given:

- A fleece blanket with the Oxford logo on it
- A really nice gym bag with the Oxford logo on it
- An insulated lunch bag with the Oxford logo on it
- A disposable camera & a photo album - bet you can't guess what was emblazoned on both of them!

Some of the more random gifts:

- A talking pedometer (yes it was emblazoned with the Oxford logo) I ask you.... what good does a pedometer do those of us who are penalized if we get up from our desks too often during our eight hour shift??
- Microwave popcorn with the Oxford logo on it - now to be fair, this one did come with a $5 Blockbuster card, but it still made me laugh
- A "Stress relief" kit - stress ball, hand-held massager & a little card that you put your thumb on to see how stressed out you are

The best one was a couple weeks ago. We came in & on our desks we had a little present. It was a Power Bar, a bottle of water & another little hand-held massager. Oxford had just changed our benefits to where we no longer get any reimbursement if we go to a gym, but instead we can go on-line to a special website just for Oxford/United employees & read about how to live a healthier lifestyle. So, as an incentive to live healthy, we got this "desk-drop" as they call it. I walked into work & one of my friends greeted me with, "Don't eat the Power Bar before you read your email." A company wide email had gone out from CAPTAIN WELLNESS saying to please dispose of the Power Bars that had been left on our desks, and if we had eaten them, to please call the nurse's hotline. Gone was gift number one! Then I drank the water... Gone was gift number two. The next day I accidently knocked my hand-held massager off my desk. It broke. Gone was gift number three. (Yes, I do know what was wrong with the Power Bars... it seems some of them had *whisper* worms in them) So, there I was - First gift poisoned, second gift went right through me, third gift broken.

Which brings me to today. We came in to find something that looked like a highlighter (with the Oxford logo on it) on each of our desks. Only, it wasn't a highlighter. You took the cap off, and sprayed it, and it was hand-sanitizer! How clever is that??