avoiding the office water cooler

When I had my annual work review this year, one of the things I had to do was revisit the previous year's personal goals that I had self-identified.  "Refrain from participating in office gossip" was one of those goals.  I never participate in spreading the gossip but my former coworker friend (who lost her job to the bottle) used to always tell me what she heard.  I knew her stories were mostly second hand and I doubted the source if I couldn't verify it.  Plus, most of the time, I just don't care.  Since that co-worker stopped working for the company early last fall, I have had little contact with the office rumor mill and I like it that way.

Today, a co-worker planned a happy hour outing at Produce Row with a bunch of other people around the office.  Since we can't talk about clients in public (due to confidentiality), the conversation is usually bound to turn to office gossip because that's the only other thing we all have in common.  However, I found out that one of the people that was going out has also not been leaving bar conversations at the bar.  That made me hesitant to go but I want to build team unity and part of that comes from getting to personally know your team.  That way they have more of an investment and are less likely to walk away.  I really like some of these people and I would hate to see them leave, plus I would like to know them better so I went out.  I just watched what I said. Really, I think I work with cool enough people right now that we can talk about interesting things that we have in common without having to resort to office gossip.  It's good to know that I can be social with them...but I'm still going to be on my best behavior.

What else?
Produce Row was pretty nice.  The beer selection was great and they did awesome parings of beer and whiskey.  I got the Buffalo Trale which is Hales Cream Ale with Buffalo Trace Whiskey.  They also have a great patio with a plastic covering so it's functional throughout the whole Portland year.