...What is it about people taking the same seats at staff meetings? I remember on one team that I was on, there was always someone who wouldn't sit at the table, but preferred to stay in the corner - this was at a daily meeting. We'd sometimes move the chair, or block the seat somehow, but she would find a way to stay in one corner of the room.

She was always a quiet individual, and I wonder if it's because she didn't like being focused on, or didn't want to stir up a hornets nest and preferred to watch the goings-on instead of participating.

When I moved to a new team, I took a seat at the table and someone mentioned that I took so-and-so's seat. Yeah, so? what's the big deal? No big deal. OK. But when the aforementioned individual came in they asked where they were going to sit.

I asked if there was assigned seating because I hadn't gotten my chair assignment yet. That ended that conversation. I try and take a different seat in every single weekly staff meeting now just to throw people off. Other folks have started employing the same rationale - just take a different seat. It doesn't throw our boss off, and it's not like we've got assigned seats.

Heck the boss is the only one who sits in the same place week after week because he's the one running the meeting, it's his office, and he runs the wireless keyboard and mouse on all the spreadsheets during the meeting. But we do have another individual who likes to sit in the corner - right at the boss' right side, and we wonder about the psychological implications of that.

Of course, this is creepy guy I'm talking about, so maybe he just likes being cornered.

Remember the person I mentioned earlier? The one who always sits in the corner? Well, she and that team joined our staff meetings temporarily last year because of the departure of the ex-boss, and she still sat in the corner during those. It's absurd.

When we moved offices, we got conference rooms that were massive - and there were no chairs in the corners. She still manages, when it's a big meeting, to insert herself into a corner of the room. I'd ask her about it, but I think that might be construed as rude.

It's just... odd.

So then I got to thinking about where I sit in rooms in general. A square room has four sides and I attempt to never be in the corner of them. I also attempt to be generally in the middle, in a spot where people can't necessarily be behind me. I like being in the middle, having a view of what's going on everywhere in the room, and I don't like to feel like I've turned my back on someone.

Or maybe I'm reading too much into where people stand and sit in rooms. *sigh* It's just one of those days, y'know? I suppose that there's no real point to this ramble, other than to wonder why people sit where they sit during meetings...

...and why they want to be 'cornered'.

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Yes, I know this entry could have been so much better, but I didn't have the energy for it today.