My unit had a supervisors' meeting today. It was held at the downtown Emergency Services Office in the "war room" where all the representatives of various agencies work together in a coordinated effort in case of emergency: fires, El Nino floods, riots, earthquakes, demonstrations, and so on.

The Emergency Services head honcho gave a PowerPoint presentation that was truly interesting and informative--a first, in my experience. No one slept; there were no sidebar conversations; no one left the room for 'emergency' phone calls as so often happens during the usual scheduled supervisors' meetings.

Then when that part of the agenda was completed, we moved on to the more normal stuff--payroll and incident reports and ontime performance and other less-than-fascinating, but nontheless important, topics.

The usual suspects had their interminable, prolix arguments and discussions. We try to let everyone have her say, but there is a point past which it becomes repitious posturing. Can you say 'boring'?

Three hours later my eyes were scratchy and my nether regions had fallen asleep. It was over -- at last -- and we were on our way back to the office to catch up on all the payroll and client complaints and suchlike.

It was a long, tiring, day, full of sound and fury and signifying...not much.