How Federal Workers Spent Their Unexpected Day Off
It was almost 60 degrees in Washington on Monday, without a hint of snow in the forecast, but some federal workers got the day off, anyway.
One analyst working in the Government Affairs Office told me in an email that he was mentally preparing himself for a days- or even weeks-long period without pay due to the government shutdown. But now that a deal has been reached, he said, “today just feels like one of the lesser holidays, like Columbus Day.” The analyst, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak with the press, said he and his wife spent the afternoon at Costco, stocking up on toilet paper, eggs, and milk. He also split a slice of pizza with his daughter. “All in all, not a bad deal in exchange for congressional inaction,” he told me.
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On my walk toward the State Department’s Foggy Bottom offices, I noticed Mary Ann Rashid walking hurriedly up Virginia Avenue, lugging a large shoulder bag bursting with papers. I took a wild guess: “Federal employee?” I asked; she smiled, and pulled out a packet of furlough papers. “It says that I shouldn’t be here until I’m told to come back,” she told me.
Rashid didn’t seem angry, just slightly exasperated. As a part-time foreign-affairs officer at the State Department, Rashid normally doesn’t work on Mondays, so she had to come all the way in from her home in Oakton, Virginia, to get her packet, which she described as “a bit of a hike” (It’s about 20 miles.) Rashid told me she was at the State Department for the 2013 government shutdown and the one in 1996, and she expects the outcome to be pretty much the same: furloughed for a while, then paid retroactively once the government starts up again. Until that time, she said, “I’m going to work on things I should have been doing anyway,” like cooking, cleaning, and watching as much of the Australian Open as she can.
