the chair

While I'm a little bit nervous to blog about work after a friend and fellow blogger recently discovered her bosses found her blog, some stories have to be told.
To set the scene: I work in an office that has expanded in personnel, but lacks the space for all of us. I currently spend my day in a portion of the office nicknamed "the bunker" where I work intimately (due to proximity) with 3 co-workers and 1 slightly neurotic boss. (Really, I'm hoping she does not discover this blog..)
Yesterday my boss realized her assistant doesn't have an "office" chair. You know, a chair that most offices have with a tall back to provide support, armrests, adjustable heights, and wheels. The truth is she does have an "office" chair, but I am using it. I'm the one with out an "office" chair. In fact, I'm without a desk or proper workspace. For almost 3 months, I had no chair, no desk, no computer, and no phone. Finally my laptop computer was ordered and delivered, and not long after I had my phone extension installed on a co-worker's phone. Trust me, this was progress. It was progress I made after 3 months of asking about a work space, trusting my computer had been ordered, and wondering where we would put my phone. All of this was by my own initiative and inquiry.
Now after being there for over 4 months, I've established some sort of workspace with my laptop, borrowed phone, and half desk. For a while as I worked in my area, I sat on a barrel chair with a wooden back. After a few weeks, my back started aching. That's when JW offered to let me use her chair. She assured me she didn't mind. I'm not sure I believed her, but I accepted the chair. This was several weeks ago.
Then yesterday my boss notices that JW doesn't have her chair. With everything going on, I'm not quite sure why she chose this fight. She demanded to know where JW's chair went. JW explained that I have her chair. Now it's not as if my boss can ask where my chair is. I don't have a chair. I've never had a chair. I STILL DON'T HAVE A DESK. I'm sitting at the half table covered with my boxes of files that I have no where to put. Sorry, that was a tangent.
There was at one time an extra "office" chair in the bunker. Then one day much like any other day someone came into the bunker seeking an extra chair to roll into the big boss' office for a meeting. It was never seen again. In fact, we didn't really give much thought to it again. Until yesterday.
For some reason my boss decided to freak out that JW doesn't have her chair. She told JW to send an email to the ENTIRE staff to find out who has her chair. Well, technically to find out who has the extra chair since I have her chair. This morning her tirade about the chair continued. She went to the office manager to demand that she find out where the chair is. Trust me, the office manager was not very happy about this request. She is swamped with work and doesn't have time to be tracking down some chair.
In the meantime, she offered JW the account coordinator's chair. Then she called our upstairs office and asked our web designer to return the chair- even though he doesn't have a chair either. As he was rolling the chair into the bunker, the account coordinator came into the office. I started laughing when I heard the account coordinator ask, "Where is my chair?"
Really, the amount of time spent on this whole chair issue was pretty ridiculous. With the long list of high priority issues we all have to deal with, I'm not sure how the chair ended up at the top.