ORANGE CRUSH
THE DAY AFTER: Worker productivity falls victim to championship night
Let’s just say it hasn’t been a banner week for worker productivity in Houston.
With Astros games stretching toward midnight almost every day this week, exhausting fans with nail-biting pitchers’ duels and topsy-turvy slugfests, employees and bosses came to work groggy, sluggish and blearyeyed, their minds on postgame analysis, the next day’s pitching matchups and, finally, the victory parade.
Come Thursday, Richard Lizcano, a Houston handyman, had left it all on the field, unable to sleep from excitement after the team’s historic World Series win on Wednesday night. “I work for myself,” Lizcano said, “so I called myself and let myself know I wasn’t coming in.”
Lizcano was among the thousands of Houston workers still recovering
from champagne- and beersoaked celebrations of the Astros’ first triumph at the World Series.
On the day after, workers across the city ignored their alarm clocks. Astros banter dominated meetings. And companies deployed their personnel to buy hats, T-shirts and bobble-heads for the office.
In other words, not a lot of work got done.
Wes Dickason, who works for a local litigation support services firm, didn’t get home until 3:30 a.m., after the champagne showers and blaring horns on Main Street. His clients didn’t show up to a scheduled breakfast on Thursday morning.
“Nobody’s at work yet,” Dickason said. “I had to get some eye drops just so I didn’t look so hung over.”
Drivers miss work
Frank Polanco, owner of Lonestar Delivery, said five of his truck drivers missed work on Thursday. Stephen Green, who manages imports and exports of oil field equipment, said his business will slow for a few days — he took more congratulatory calls than sales calls.
“We’re pretty much done for the week,” Green said.
No one is expecting anything to change Friday, when the Astros will be celebrated in a parade through downtown, ending at City Hall. The Houston Inde- pendent School District canceled classes for that day, and many of the city’s businesses — particularly those along the parade route — will shut down for at least a few hours.
The Houston law firm AZA will close at noon so its lawyers and support staff can go to the parade. On Thursday, the firm, hosted a fajitas and barbecue lunch to celebrate the championship, with the normally buttoned-down crowd ditching business suits for Astros gear.
“There is a so much euphoria in Houston,” said partner John Zavitsanos, “that even Ebenezer Scrooge would be wearing an Astros cap right now.”
Jay Kohn works as a service adviser at a Mercedes-Benz dealership. He’ll also be getting time off to head downtown Friday afternoon.
“The bosses all get it. They’re supportive,” he said. “They’re letting us go to the parade, if we just promise to come back sober.”
Sure, said local economist Patrick Jankowski, Houston’s productivity is down this week. But the World Series victory could spur a flurry of sales — not only of hats, shirts and other merchandise, but also of pricey engagement rings and weddings, after Carlos Correa’s dramatic proposal to his girlfriend Daniella Rodriguez following the team’s 5-1 win Wednesday night. And, soon enough, he speculated, it might bring film crews to make a movie starring Tom Hanks as Astros manager A. J. Hinch.
“I don’t think any employee or manager begrudges their employees of coming in a little late or spending extra time in the coffee bar,” he said. “This is an event that people will be talking about for years.”
Vows malfunction
State District Judge Mike Engelhart said he had no doubt that he and the six employees who work in his courtroom suite were not operating at peak efficiency in recent days. Englehart, who stayed up until 1 a.m. tweeting and Facebooking after the Astros’ big win, admitted that he missed a line in a wedding ceremony, and had to start over.
“It was a sentence or two before the kiss,” he said, “so they had to kiss again.”
While people were celebrating into the wee hours Thursday morning, Scott Lewis was working for Pop-a-Lock, negotiating crowds of chanting revelers as he helped stranded motorists who locked keys in their cars or got flats. A few hours later, he was standing in a long line at Academy Sports + Outdoors.
“Forget work,” he said. “I can’t do it. I’ve got Astros fever.”
John Stewart, human-resources payroll director at Houston Methodist, had a presentation to give at work on Thursday. But not long before he was scheduled to talk to new managers about compliance issues, he, too, was standing in line for Astros merchandise.
“I’m sure the Astros will come up in that presentation,” Stewart said. “You can rest assured.”