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half of Microsoft. I maniacally checked meeting room reservations and the jobs website, trying to glean
something
about my future. Our top people landed at Windows Phone and Bing. When I tried to get answers from my PM about me, all I received in response was eerie silence.
    Then, yesterday afternoon, I got pinged by an HR rep who wanted to see me in the meeting room down the hall the next day. (I had seen that appointment. I had no idea it was for me!)
    Before I got out the teapot and threw myself a pity party, I dropped everything and found the nearest Victims Against Victimhood meeting, which helped enormously. (I know you’re a huge skeptic when it comes to VAV, but they are my rock.)
    I drove myself to work this morning because I didn’t want the added indignity of having to load a bunch of boxes onto the Connector. I showed up in the meeting room, where the HR woman calmly informed me that our entire team, except for those who already left for Bing and Windows Phone, were being RIFed.
    “However,” she said, “you rank so well that we’d like to assign you to a special project located in Studio C.”
    Audrey, I just about fell over. Studio C is on the new Studio West campus, and their work is the most high profile at Microsoft. Good news: I’m getting
promoted!
Bad news: the new product I’m working on is in high gear, and I’ll be expected to work weekends. It’s a hush-hush project. I don’t even know its name yet. Bad news: I may not be able to make the Prospective Parent Brunch. Good news: I’ll definitely be able to pay for the food.
    Talk soon, and go Huskies!
    *
    From: Ollie-O
    To: Prospective Parent Brunch Committee
    REAL-TIMEFLASH!
    We’re up to 60 RSVPs! I’m just throwing out some fertilizer , but: Pearl Jam . I hear they’ve got kids entering kindergarten. If we get one of them— it doesn’t have to be the singer— I can grow it.
    *
    From: Audrey Griffin
    To: Soo-Lin Lee-Segal
    Great news about the promotion! I’ll gladly take you up on your offer to pay for the food. I still have enough green tomatoes in the greenhouse to fry up for appetizers, plus dill, parsley, and cilantro for aioli. I’ve stored two bushels of apples and want to make my rosemary tarte tatin for dessert. For the main course, how about we get that traveling pizza oven to cater? They can set up in the backyard, which frees up my kitchen.
    Ollie-O was right about buzz being “viral.” Today at Whole Foods, a woman I didn’t even recognize recognized
me
and said she was looking forward to my brunch. Judging from the contents of her shopping cart—imported cheese, organic raspberries, fruit wash spray—she is the exact quality of parent we need at Galer Street. I saw her in the parking lot. She was driving a Lexus. Not a Mercedes, but close enough!
    Did you hear? Shipping a sick child off to boarding school! Why am I not surprised?
    *
    That day, I had a hall pass because our music teacher, Mr. Kangana, asked me to accompany the first graders for the song they were performing for World Celebration Day, and he needed me for rehearsal. I was at my locker getting my flute, and who did I run into, but Audrey Griffin. She was hanging some prayer rugs the third graders had woven for the art auction.
    “I hear you’re going to boarding school,” she said. “Whose idea was that?”
    “Mine,” I said.
    “I could never send Kyle to boarding school,” Audrey said.
    “I guess you love Kyle more than my mom loves me,” I said, and played my flute as I skipped down the hall.
    *
    From: Manjula Kapoor
    To: Bernadette Fox
    Dear Ms. Fox,
    I have researched medicines for motion sickness. The strongest remedy available by prescription in the U.S. is called ABHR transdermal cream. It is a composite of Ativan, Benadryl, Haldol, and Reglan, formulated into a cream for topical application. It was devised by NASA to administer to the cosmonauts to combat motion sickness in outer space. It has since been embraced by the hospice