Oddity Captain’s Memo

Fiction Fragment Friday

This week is not prose. I was told I had to share the memo Captain Moss sends to the crew. Since I have had an extremely busy and mentally draining week this worked very well. So dispite my intention of not doing so here is the memo he sends to the crew. I do like fiction in other formats and this certainly fits that. I also hope to use the format options to make the most of this entry.

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To the Crew of the Oddity,

I want to start by thanking you all for the hard work you have put in over the past few months since I took this billet.  In a very short time, we have made unprecedented progress in improving life onboard ship.  I know change has the potential to cause anxiety, but you have all embraced my vision.   We could not have achieved the successes we have without your support. 

I want to call out some of these successes by division, but to do that I first want to acknowledge the new organizational structure that has supported these successes.  I am grateful to my senior staff for stepping into their new responsibilities as well as their part in designing the new structure.  As a united crew we have embraced the Oddity identity outwardly with a new paint job and ship suits.  Internally you embraced it long before I arrived.    

Engineering:

• 115 backlogged maintenance and repair items have been completed
• We now have a comprehensive plan for system updates
• That lingering smell is no longer present in the gym
• Finally, we can now perform a system jump and bake cookies at the same time without losing power. 

Logistics and Ship Operations:

• The new crew services department has been created allowing for consistency among laundry, break, and galley duties. 
• Considerable improvement in the quality of meals being served.
• Implementation of a knowledge and skill sharing program for the crew starting with cooking classes, but soon to expand into additional disciplines and interests.

Systems Division:

• An internal ship intranet has been established with weekly updates and blogs from all divisions.
• A form is now in place to request automations or data analytics.

These are only the beginning though.  Coming soon is the Odd Plates Cooking Competition to determine who the new Head Chef will be.  Additional details will be published on the Crew Services site over the next few days.  Everyone is encouraged to participate whether they are competitor, judge, or enthusiastic audience member. 

Supporting this competition will be screenings of the cooking process on a brand new screen being installed in the galley tomorrow.  This screen will allow for future movie nights, improve karaoke, and enable future morale improving efforts still being organized.

A new software suite that I anticipate assisting with profit improvement will have a production version rolling out in the next week.  This software I have begrudgingly allowed to be named Mosstermind is proving valuable in finding potentially valuable cargo and allowing us to claim it before our competitors. 

My final announcement is an additional staffing change that I anticipate may cause some concern.  Home office has determined that our ship should have a first officer and assigned a newly promoted employee into that role.  Effective as of tomorrow at 0900 hours, Victor Lumsdon will rejoin the crew as First Officer.  Our current organizational structure will remain in place, and I want to reassure you all that the progress we have made will remain.  There may be a few complications along the way, but we will find a way to integrate this new role into our ship culture. 

Instead of thanking you all once again for your efforts I instead want to stress that Oddity belongs to all of us.  Work towards improving it is work towards improving our own lives.  We are building something we can all be proud of and it is more than just a ship.  Oddity is our home, our livelihood, and our statement to the universe that we are not to be ignored. 

Continue to support each other.  Continue to move forward.  We are in this together and heaven help anyone who gets in our way.