Close Your Legs And Your Mouth

I am in a break room talking to an old female colleague who is the office manager. We work in a building with multiple departments, and the management department upstairs is notoriously all old men who don’t have a great reputation when it comes to respecting women — although this is changing!

Office Manager: “I’m thinking about taking a new job. An opportunity for [management department upstairs] has opened up, and if I do, it’ll be the first time they’ve had a woman manager. Plus, it will be good for me to try something new after so many years doing this.”

To encourage her, I try to say both, “Spread your wings and fly,” and, “Stretch your legs,” but I get them mangled together.

Me: “Spread your legs and fly!”

In front of a few other colleagues — all of them on the level of my manager or higher.

No recovery from that one.