Inspired by true events...

A young lady, recently starting at a new position within a financial institution was seated in a mandatory orientation briefing which included staff members at various levels. It was the afternoon session and the current presenter was doing her best to keep the diverse group informed as well as engaged.

Young Lady, who will from here on out be referred to as YA, was however in a bit of a predicament. You see, over the course of the course of the previous couple of hours, she had downed two cups of herbal tea, completely forgetting that within her internal biological system, tea acts as a form of purgative. So as the first batch of slides went up, so did the indicative sounds of future bowel movements which would be preceeded by, until the alloted time of release, loud and disastrous gaseous emissions from her ample derriere.

Her seat was not such that she could so easily slip out of the class for such an extended period of time without people noticing and worse, figuring out the reason why. The presentation was not one that she could miss, the presenter being from her department and presenting material that she had already been informed she would need to be conversant in, and efficient in delivering. Also, the presence of the emissions was not necessarily evidence that she was ready to "go" but that she was too prepare herself to do so.

So, being the person that she is, she began to silently count to herself, willing her body to respond to her mental commands to extend the time between contractions and reduce the audibility of the emissions. Like a woman trying to mask an induced labour, she concentrated hard. Counting, sipping on water, counting, refusing to allow her butt cheeks to release either air or each other.

For 45 minutes.

It was the longest of her life.

At the end of the presentation, she made a less than graceful escape by which time, her bowels had rebelled completely and the herbal tea declared ownership of her arse.

At the end of the day, as the professionals gathered their things and made their exit, a senior staff member from her team, to whom she had been introduced earlier in the week, walked up to her.

"It is amazing what they expect us to process so early," he said with a wide smile, "but I am sure you will have no issues at all"

Her face looked a bit puzzled.

"I noticed you were concentrating hard on each of the slides. In fact, I thought at one pount, weren't you counting the data along with him?