It’s story time with Aunt Mandy!

Gather ‘round the campfire, kids, and I’ll tell you a tale from my remote office days.

Fact number one about me: I don’t do boring well.

Fact number two about me: If I see an opportunity to express my creativity, I’ll take it.

And boy did I take it.

Working remote, I attended A LOT of meetings. Virtual MS Teams meetings. Meetings where we were encouraged to keep our cameras on, to foster communication and connection in a world separated by screens. Like most of the separated world, I chose to rely on virtual backgrounds to hide my cluttery lifestyle. That’s where the fun began (please refer to facts 1 and 2 above). Sure, I could have gone with the standard blur your background option or any of the other handful of pre-chosen or company branded backgrounds, but where’s the fun in that? I needed pizzaz! I needed originality! I needed to feel connected to my fellow meeting attendees through eliciting reactions ranging from humor to nostalgia! How did I accomplish these great goals? By scouring the internet for unique background images.

Seasonal background images were the low hanging fruit on the creativity tree.

For Halloween, I busted out the Munster’s set, because it was a staple in our house growing up. Not the original, but the Nick at Nite reruns. Sheesh, I’m not THAT old!

I had a few Christmas go-to backgrounds, depending on the tone of the meeting I was attending. If it was on the serious side, I would go with a subtle McAllister’s House from Home Alone.

Otherwise, I went with a more unspoken commentary regarding our current work conditions route with these beauties:

You get the idea.

There were pop culture backgrounds:

(I guess I Rick Rolled myself with this one because NO ONE ELSE GOT IT!)

There were happy backgrounds like this one:

The genuine smiles when people saw this one STILL warms my heart.

I even had obscure pop culture backgrounds from Portland’s hallowed history:

I was on The Ramblin’ Rod Show once. I’m still bitter I didn’t win the smile award, but that’s a story for another time. Suffice it to say, I gave it my 110% which in hindsight probably ended up looking more like a mad grimace instead of a cute grin…

And you can’t forget about the I’d rather be here instead backgrounds!

If I had a book for everyone that asked if that was my personal library…I’m serious! SEND ME THE BOOKS! I NEED ALLLLLL THE BOOKS!

Okay, so where I’d rather be is equal parts boring and unrealistic. I’m a hobbit at heart! Give me a cozy hobbit hole, a beautiful reading nook and a cup of coffee, and I’ll be set for life!

Sigh, so cozy I’d never want to leave.

But the best background I ever had was the time I was going for a look at me and my cool record collection vibe. The image I found had walls of records, a cozy chair to sit in, and was full of color. I received so many comments on how fun the background was. I also noticed that Tom Waits kept coming up in conversation. Whatever, I just chalked it up to one of those things where you keep noticing something, then you notice it more because it’s on your mind like a self-fulfilling coincidence. One day someone asked me if I liked Tom Waits, and I answered that sure, he was okay. Totally non-committal. I mean, I knew a few of his songs but I hadn’t done a deep dive into his catalogue like I had for Tom Petty or Van Morrison. The reaction to my nonchalant response was odd enough that it stuck with me, and I brought it up later at our coworker’s weekly coffee hour. Why was everyone so obsessed with Tom Waits?! And that’s when I found out that ALL THE RECORDS FACING FORWARD WERE TOM WAITS ALBUMS. You, see, I could only see the tiny square of my background in the corner, but when I was on other people’s screens it was MUCH LARGER. For WEEKS people were thinking I was this ultra-hip music nerd with a thing for old Tom, too cool with my “he’s aight” response, when in actuality I just thought it was a cool image and had ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA THEY WERE ALL TOM WAITS.

I guess Tom Waits for no Man(dy)…

I did buy an actual Tom Waits record after I found out, because frankly, I HAD EARNED IT. It’s on the top, second to the left.