# One rota, two altered cells, one arrow between them

> A printed rota grid with one name crossed out, another written above it in a second pen, and a hand-drawn arrow linking that cell to the matching swap two columns away.

August 21, 2026 · https://justog.club/stories/the-shift-you-swapped

One printed rota, seven columns, three rows. Most cells hold a name in handwriting too small to
read. In one cell, a name is crossed out and another written above it in a different pen. An arrow
runs from that cell to a second one, two columns over, circled the same way.

Two cells changed, not one. A swap always needs both.

## What is printed on this design?

A rota grid exactly as it was printed, with one hand-made correction added afterward.

The grid itself — seven columns, three rows, a name per cell — is the original document, unaltered.
What changes it is a second pen: one name struck through and replaced above it, an arrow drawn to
another cell two columns along, and a circle around each of the two altered cells. Every other name
on the grid stays as printed and stays illegible.

## Why does the arrow matter more than either crossed-out name?

Because the arrow is the only mark on the grid that records the exchange rather than just the
result.

Read the two altered cells on their own and you'd see two ordinary corrections — a name swapped out
here, a name swapped out there. The arrow is what says these two changes are one transaction: a
week moved from one cell to the other, not two unrelated edits. Without it, the grid would just look
like two mistakes that happened to be fixed the same day.

## Why is a swap always two changes, not one?

Because a shift has to go somewhere. Taking a name out of one cell only balances if a name goes into
another.

The grid makes that arithmetic visible in a way a conversation never does — a spoken agreement to
switch two weeks leaves no trace once it's settled, but a rota holds both edits permanently, in the
same pen, dated by nothing except that they were clearly made together. The circle around each
altered cell is doing the same job twice: marking that this cell, specifically, isn't the original.

## What does the second pen tell you that the first one can't?

That the correction happened after the grid was printed and handed out, not before.

A printed rota is fixed the moment it's distributed — the names in it are a plan already agreed.
The second pen is a later layer, added once something changed the plan. Keeping the two visually
distinct, rather than reprinting a clean version, is what makes the object worth drawing: it shows
the plan and the correction to the plan on the same page, instead of hiding one behind the other.

## Do I need permission to print a rota like this?

No, if the names are illegible and nothing on the grid identifies a real workplace, a company or a
person.

A plain grid of columns and rows with handwriting too small to read isn't anyone's document — it's
the shape any rota takes. Keep every name genuinely unreadable except whatever the household wants
legible, and there's no name, no logo and no schedule here that belongs to anyone else.

## Is this design making a point about how workplaces handle swaps?

No. This is one grid, two altered cells and one arrow — not an argument about how any employer runs
its rota.

Some households swap a week with a colleague; others move a shift a different way entirely. The
print doesn't take a position on any of that, because it isn't the point. What it shows is the
mechanism common to all of them: a change on one side of a week has to be matched by a change on the
other, and the arrow is what makes that pairing visible.

## Does this sit near a household's other small records?

Yes — a rota is one of several places a household keeps a change it made on purpose.

The same instinct runs through [two phones set to the identical
alarm](/stories/the-two-phones-with-the-same-alarm), where redundancy is the whole design,
through [a calendar with more than one plan struck through around a single
entry](/stories/the-plans-you-changed), and through [a folded note that covers an absence
between two neighbours](/stories/the-neighbour-who-has-the-key). None of these were designed to
be read by anyone but the household. All of them end up legible anyway, once you know what the marks
mean.

## Does it print well?

Yes — the contrast between the printed grid and the hand-drawn correction is what carries it, and
that contrast survives reduction easily.

Print the grid lines and illegible names in one flat, even ink, and the arrow, strikethrough and
circles in a second colour, slightly heavier, so the correction reads as clearly added rather than
part of the original. Pale grey or another light, neutral ground keeps both layers legible against
each other.

## How do I get one made?

Describe the swap at [JustOG](/) — where the arrow starts, where it lands, and how far apart the
two cells sit.
Pick a direction, drag the crop frame, see it composited on the real garment, and it's made to
order and shipped.

Designs other people have published are in the [shop](/shop).

Two circled cells, one arrow, and a week that moved without anyone announcing it had.