[x]Blackmoor Vituperative

Monday, 2011-08-08

The Mugs of August – ManTech International coffee mug

Filed under: Art,Food,Work — bblackmoor @ 20:32
ManTech International coffee mug

I am going to post a photo of a coffee mug every day in August, and talk a little bit about where we got it and why I like it.

In between working at Circuit City and my current job at OneBookShelf, I did a lot of freelancing and a lot of contracting. Most of these were, by their nature, short term gigs. Come in, take a seat, get the job done, go home and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

One of the few contracting gigs which I left of my own accord was with ManTech. It was a great job: I was a Solaris system administrator for the Defense Commissary Agency (DeCA). The only problem was that it was nearly an hour drive away, and closer to 90 minutes away from our dream property (on which we still, at that time, planned to build a house and ultimately retire). However, system administration can be and nearly always is done remotely. There is no technical or security reason why I couldn’t do the job from the other side of the world, much less from 90 minutes away. And as it happens, the US Government, and DeCA in particular, has a policy not just permitting, but actively encouraging telework.

This directive implements the requirements of Section 359 of Public Law No. 106-346 which requires each Agency to establish a policy under which eligible employees of an agency may participate in telework to the maximum extent possible without diminished employee performance.

(DeCA Telework Directive and Guidance)

So I took the position, secure in the knowledge that I would be able to transition to telework.

You should have seen the face of my supervisor the first time I asked when I might be able to transition over to teleworking a few days a week. You’d think I had asked to use the agency’s servers to torrent porn. Suffice to say, the answer was no way, no how, despite the fact that I never actually physically interacted with the agency’s servers (I wasn’t even on the same floor), and that DeCA policy demanded the availability of telework.

I was barely able to stand the drive to work as it was: there was no way I would be able to tolerate a three-hour round-trip commute. So I found another gig, and left ManTech and DeCA behind. This coffee cup is my only souvenir of that experience.

It’s rather a nice mug, though: large, sturdy, with a rubber base and a comfy handle. I use it often.