Naming Rights

My office sits in a little alcove in Building A near 8 or 9 other offices. At IVCC, they don't arrange faculty members by discipline. In an effort to avoid cliquishness, they mix it up. So I'm next to a biology teacher, down from the philosophy instructor, around the corner from the French teacher, etc. It's an eclectic bunch and we all get along just fine. (Except for the biology teacher who, as I have previously blogged, insists on conducting all of her phone conversations on speaker.) 

Anyway, we all share this little mini-fridge and microwave in the back hallway near the printer. Since I arrived here three  years ago, the fridge has been filthy. Spilled pop and drops of spaghetti sauce speckled the bottom. The same three bottles of half-drank (drunk?) water sat in the shelves on the door. Ancient ice encrusted the tiny freezer.

Generally, I didn't care. I'm not a clean freak and as long as I felt okay about placing my Tupperware inside and didn't feel like something was going to crawl up and try to  break into it, I was fine. Three weeks ago, however, the glacier that had been growing in the freezer began to expand. Our tiny fridge was entering its own ice age and it got to the point where it was difficult to close the door. 

So, man of action that I am, I decided I'd take care of it. I left a note telling everyone to take whatever they wanted to save by Friday. Then I had it hauled to a floor sink in a janitor's closet where it sat and defrosted overnight. Saturday morning, Parker and I returned to the school while Suzy and the older two were at a church thing in Joliet. Armed with 409 and a lot of paper towels, I cleaned that sweltering pit of filth to the best of my ability. Once it was all clean and shiny, I returned it to its spot, happy we could not only close the door but close it on a fridge that didn't look like a hoarder's house. 

A few colleagues stopped by and said thanks. They marveled at its cleanliness, commented on how long it had been since it was in this kind of shape. And that was that. It got done and everyone was happy. 

Then someone decided to give me naming rights. Here at the school, some area rich guy gave us a million dollars to outfit the new community technology center with some fancy stuff. Due to his generosity, the building will now be named after his dad. Someone in my group of offices thought my fridge cleaning was worthy of similar naming rights. Behold:

Thanks to some peer with a label maker, I am temporarily immortal.