Office Life and an etymological query

[fauxklore]

One of the less enviable tasks our operations director has is participating in the group that is planning our relocation. At some point (theoretically late next year), we're supposed to move from our relatively cushy quarters in a leased building to a purpose-built government facility. There are numerous issues with this, ranging from the likely commuting nightmare (they are planning 900 parking spaces for 6000 workers and the only public transit is a shuttle bus which will run every half hour at best) to their refusal to allow office suites to have refrigerators to the alloted office space per person being less what the Geneva convention requires for prisoners of war.

But the absolutely most mind-boggling item she mentioned has to do with the lack of conference rooms in the facility being built and the way this was explained by the facilities planners. The exact quote was "this is an office building. It's not to be used for meetings."

On a separate, only slightly related subject (i.e. I had scribbled it on the same page of my planner), does anybody happen to know the origin of the term "Daddy Rabbit"? Or, come to think of it, does anybody outside of my office use the term?

Comments

[shmuel.livejournal.com]

Well, to clarify, my impulse toward a Creole or African-American folktale etymology would be for where it originated; the 1912 citation establishes that it's been in white vernacular usage for at least the past century. (I've also found several references to it being used in U.S. government agencies, including -- but not limited to -- the Pentagon.)