25
From now on, historians will divide the days of this office in twain. There will be the time of joyous light, when power flowed freely, hair was dried in the warm breeze, hot brews were boiled as kettles flowed like rain…and the dark times. Those are times in which we live now, where we are denied such a basic right. We claw out a wretched existence in the darkest of places, labouring without dignity or hope.
Yes, the office placing restrictions on the amount of power we use was cruel indeed, especially since the commercial energy monitoring was purported to be used for good. The greatest of tools can be used for good or ill, and they fell into the wrong hands.
And yet, a resistance thrives, hanging on by a thread. Whispers among the cubicles, clandestine lunchtime meetings in the old breakroom, discussions regarding the state of industrial solar and energy storage; any frail, glimmer of hope that will bring light back into our lives, hairdryers back to our desks, the toaster-oven back to the main breakroom. Oh, for the days when cheese toasties would spill forth from its gates in a torrent of dairy loveliness. Alas, it was deemed to be an energy drainer and cruelly banished. But now, hope has arisen. We are close, oh so very close to reviving the great days of light and plenty, and possibly getting charger privileges back because *come on*. Charging your phone? That’s like a human right now, seriously.
Anyway, yeah. Battery storage and industrial LED lighting has made great advancements in the last few years. Perhaps enough to convince the overlords to loosen their tight grip on the energy monitoring controls. At the very least we should be able to turn up the brightness on our computer screens, which would be great because I was talking to my optometrist and she said that people my age can get cataracts in low light, and I was like ‘yes, obviously!’
I just want to charge my phone…
-Byron