” I saw an advert for the position of Office Angel after the first lock down and thought that would be ideal for me. Only 2 mornings a week, get me out of the house and meeting new people, nice little job, keep me out of mischief and give something back to the community. I’d been fine during the lockdown but as soon as my other half went back to work I was lost on my own. There’s only so much cleaning and sunbathing a girl can do!
Being an office angel is a bit like working in a circus.
Lion Taming – First job in the morning is to feed the local street cats. The most I’ve seen in one go is 13 but usually there are 6 or 7. There is plenty of hissing and spitting goes on as they all want feeding first. One of them, a long haired tabby, is very vocal. You would think they hadn’t been fed for a month the way they carry on and they will try to convince you all morning you still haven’t fed them! This one likes to eat straight out of the cup as you pour the biscuits into the bowl. Once the biscuits hit the bowl they’re not so interested any more, but will eat them eventually. Strange!
Acrobat/Contortionist – We loan out cat traps, cages and baskets to people to help them catch cats in order to take them to the vet for treatment. Saying we are short of storage space in the office is an understatement. Our stock of traps, cages and baskets are kept in one of the toilets and are stacked from floor to ceiling if we have none out on loan. You can always bet though, that when someone comes in to borrow one of these, the one they want is the one tucked away right at the bottom or stacked high above my head. I’m not the most agile person I know so this can be quite a challenge and often ends up with me in clambering, not very elegantly, over numerous contraptions.
Usherette – One of the main qualifications you just absolutely must have to be an office angel is the ability to make a good cuppa and carry it up 2 flights of steps, together with any cake or biscuits one of the volunteers might have brought in with them, without spilling any. I’m good at this, but then I have had lots of practice over the years.
Clown – Volunteering for a charity that deals with animal welfare can be harrowing at times and some of the things we’ve all seen or heard about are enough to make your blood boil and your stomach churn. All these instances are dealt with absolute professionalism but sometimes we just need to let off steam in order to maintain our sanity. I thought I looked very fetching in the bright red wig we’d had donated as I pretended to be on a catwalk strutting up and down the shop area, but I’m not so sure the customer who came into Gladrags was of the same opinion.
Juggler – There are never 2 days the same here in the office. You just never know what is going to end up on your desk that needs “sorting” NOW and I love it (well most of the time anyway). An average day (is there such a thing?) in no specific order, can be balancing the expenditure, answering emails, making a fuss of four legged visitors, answering the phone, making coffee, updating our Social Media presence (those little cartoons you wake up to every morning?? Yes that’s down to me, sorry), buying in pet food, organising rubbish bins for the centre, booking in cats for neutering, loaning out traps and cages, feeding the office cats, paying bills, taking in donations, shopping in Gladrags and dealing with anything else that lands on the desk.
I love my role within Team KAR and really do feel like I am making a difference.
If you’ve got a spare few hours on a regular basis you should try it. There’s so many different areas of the charity you can volunteer in there’s bound to be one that’s right up your street! “
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