Category: Work

There are a number of possibilities

I am either a) no longer crazy b) seeing an incompetent psychologist or c) broke. My folks gave me money to go see a counsellor, and providentially I ran out of cake about the time the psychologist pronounced me in markedly better shape than when I showed up in February.  I’d like to thank LTGW for getting me the referral, Peggy and the krewe at church for being the soul of lovingkindness, Jeff, folks and kinder for being supportive, sometimes rather more pointedly than I’d like, but whatever.   I’ve got Tony’s number and I will definitely go see him if I start going off the skids again.  In the meantime, nothing can touch me, for yea, though I walk through the valley of piles of paperwork, I shall fear no angry customers, for the Buzz is with me, and He Fucking Shreds.

Last day….

It was sad to be in that building for the last day.  I moved into that building many years before I started this blog, and now a new and exciting chapter starts (and I’m much closer to Brian C, Tom U, and numbers of other former coworkers who are now at a company ‘across the hall’ so to speak).

We packed up the desks about noon and then went to Joey’s Coquitlam for lunch; then I drove Dustin back to the office, picked up some cleanser and a vase that had been left there, wandered back to my old desk to say goodbye, picked up the yogurt that I’d left in the fridge, and felt a surge of unhappiness.  Then I got home, struggled with the fucking lawnmower for quite a while, said fuck it and did the weed-whacking instead, and then went back, gave it a mighty heave and got the lawnmower running.  Then I finished the lawn.  Since the back lawn grass was wet as a baby’s diaper the exercise provided was kind of extreme; mowing the front yard left me exposed to the sun to the point I thought I’d pass out.

Sweating like a pig, I brushed myself down and then went and got my new stickers for the car (having thoughtfully changed my coverage to include the kids), fetched beer as per Jeff’s request, taste tested a new vodka cooler (cranberry lime) and upon making the discovery that unlike every other cooler I’ve ever had, it wasn’t disgustingly sweet, I purchased some.

Then I planted some seedlings and discovered an ant colony in our compost pile.

I was supposed to go to Tom and Peggy’s to practice, but after the exertions of the day I couldn’t move.  I eventually recovered to the point of cooking toasted ham’n’eggers and collapsed for good around nine without even looking at my computer.

Sundry and various

Call centers in Indian jails, this should work out well.

One Life to Live and All My Children will be cancelled. And replaced by a celebrity cooking show.  Hey women and shift workers!  Stay home and get fat, it’s not like you do any good to our advertisers otherwise.

Why would narrowed neck circulation have anything to do with MS?  But apparently it does.

Get your hands off that peen, or, what eXACTly are you testing for?  BC cancels controversial test of young offenders which involves handling young men’s junk.

If you’re a cop and get involved with drugs… you can collect two paychecks!  Mind you you’re not reporting the second one, but o well.  Woot!

Teachers in BC get a say over class size and composition. This is very good news for BC kids and parents, not to mention the teachers.  If you’ve ever taught a kindergarten class which is 1/3 ESL and has two special needs kids and is 30 students (not making this up, I have a friend who was in this spot) you’ll know what I mean.  Just getting them to line up for the can is a challenge!

I don’t get it. Can somebody explain to me why this is funny?

I’m impressed!  Ba-dum kish!

Katie’s only been here two nights and already I am fidgetty.  9 pm last night she leaves, says she’ll be back late, doesn’t show, doesn’t text.  Is she in a ditch? Did she crash at Kashka’s? Is she where she probably is?  And why’n fuck do I care? (Apart from how, every time she doesn’t come home, I have to rehearse what I’ll say to the cops if they come to my door?)

I blearily and wearily looked out my back door this morning, and thought, “Spring and Vancouver… no longer BFFs?”  There’s like half an inch of hoarfrost on things.  I knew at the end of March we’d get more snow because I could smell it.  Sounds stupid, but it’s true.  Now I can’t smell the end of it.  Snow tires will remain on car until further notice.

The move at work is getting closer.  Sure would like to know when we’re getting training on the new phone system and how it interacts with the call center software, but I’ve been assured there will be training.

Our CEO is leaving, and our new CEO is younger and French.  Rumour has it he’s moving to Vancouver.  I’ve met him the once, and apart from observing that he has a George Hamilton grade tan and a sense of humour, I have no comment.

The cats have been extremely rangy.  Margot in particular has been up in Eddie’s grill.  Eddie came for a nice long hug last night.

I played Buzz for about half an hour last night.  He’s going to be my bed time snack.  He’s so quiet when unplugged, but he sounds great.  I was thinking of dragging the amp into my bedroom, and just said screw it and brought Buzz in.

I can hear Margot laboriously licking herself on the basement stairs.

 

 

Let the good times roll

Blackberry emailed me today to thank me for buying their phone. I responded in a fashion that can only be described as vitriolic.  I also cc’d Robof9 and whined about how I should have taken his advice and gotten an iPhone.

I don’t know why I’m choked, I got the biggest bonus in my personal history for the last year of work.  Makes me feel motivated, let me tell you!

Too bad

I WISH I could talk about work in detail.  There was a communiqué from Finance yesterday that managed to combine Kafka, Jacques Tati and General Nivelle in its spirit, tone and usefulness.  The originator will be receiving one of Allegra’s Famous Emailsâ„¢. Since that about covers it without being too specific or blaming individuals, I’ll let that one go out into the world unchallenged.

Last night Jeff and I had purple potatoes, steamed carrots and onions, and the leftover pork chops.  The purple taters were so om nom nom.  I will do them mashed sometime for fun.

After supper we watched Capitalism, A Love Story which had the usual annoying Michael Moore tics (I prefer people with some dignity so I always hate it when he lets people cry on camera, but that’s me being a frikkin WASP there darlin’) but was otherwise very well done, and if I disliked the crony politicians of the Reagan, Clinton and Bush eras I loathe them now.  The scale of the plunder that has occurred and the short sightedness of it all disgust me to my core.  However, a collapse at this point is inevitable, and Canada and many other places will get dragged into the maelstrom, so everybody learn to grow food.

After the movie, I dragged myself out to the Puddleâ„¢, where Paul, Keith and Katie were also swimming and soaking.  It was very nice to hang around with them.  I didn’t actually swim, I just gave my back some relief from the horrors of being attached to me for a while.  Then I came home and slept until 6:03 in the morning, which is like a frikkin’ miracle.

Also, I finished a song in Songwriter (Walk Away)… the one that goes I have tried to walk away, but my thoughts will not wear shoes, I would pity my poor mind, if I had a mind to lose (which I wrote last summer but seems very apt these days).

I don’t know if any of the foregoing constitutes staying busy or not.  When I see what other people accomplish I feel pretty slow.  Anyway, to horse!  I need to get into work and flatten some paper.

 

Cow-irkers

There was a little colour printout of a teddy bear with a heart, which was the only evidence that somebody thought of me on Valentine’s.  Yesterday was very interesting and challenging.  I learned some interesting things and have had a chance to think about them. Everybody wants to make sure customer service is excellent, and that’s my base line belief.  Some of us are better at gauging what customers want than others, and you can all take from that what you like.

Anyway, there’s some Washingtonians and Californians in the office today and so I making more biscotti.  Once they take food from your hand you own them.

But sometimes they just like you for who you are.

A selection of Valentines

I’m at an appointment this morning so I won’t be going to work to hand out Valentines, but I will share this with you. I thought of doing it yesterday afternoon but it was cooking and laundry after I got home and I couldn’t get excited about printing them out.

Guess I’m just lazy.  Snurk.

Homily went well.  Double snurk.  I took half the biscotti in and that worked out well… Peggy took the leftovers.

Most mornings I awaken

to the sound of Jeff tapping on his keyboard.  Sometimes it’s a cat and that staccato defooding sound in some very long-to-be-discovered corner.  Sometimes it’s the smell of a skunk penetrating through the window; sometimes it’s my natural clock, which spits me back out into consciousness anywhere between 2 and 7 am.  Sometimes it’s a leg cramp, and that’s what I got this morning.  I woke to pain pain pain and had a hell of a time getting my foot flat to the ground to get the muscle stretched out and the muscle – the same one I blew out running for the bus the year after I hurt my back – is still grumbling and hot.  Ah, but pain is what tells you that you’re alive.

Daughter Katie came over last night.  I picked her up after work (Dax tried to scare me by materializing next to my car window, but Katie had the kindness to warn me, so I let him know that he WOULD have given me a heart attack if I hadn’t been warned.  He also told me the size of his paycheck, which was respectable for his age and educational level) and then fed her and Jeff home baked schnitzel and veg, and we talked and watched CSI and the Mentalist, which amusingly enough had identical plots, and then we walked up to 7-11 where I got her bus tickets and milk and eggs for myself, waited with her for her bus and then walked home.  Canada Way is so noisy for pedestrians it’s practically deafening; two streets in Jeff and I enjoy a very peaceful little enclave, no barking dogs or noisy neighbours, and yet we’re smack in the center of Edmonds, 10th, Kingsway and Canada Way, all busy arterial streets.  We do get train noise at night as it echoes in the Fraser Valley and comes up the hill; we get the eerie booming noises at night that are actually special effects explosions down in that movie set off of Marine down in the flats; and we get airplane noise a fair bit, although rarely at very low levels, and hardly ever helicopter noise, which scares the crap out of me.

Soon there will be a visit by the rest of Paul’s family to abide for a while in the bosom of the alternative justice system of BC.  I have decided that with all my quirks and drama I’m best off staying away.  My mother is hosting them and that will be the right end of the family to shelter and help them while this goes on; who can say what will happen but I earnestly hope for some closure and a feeling that it’s what John would have wanted rather than a trial and jail for the woman whose inattentive driving killed him.

I am very seriously thinking of either giving Ziva to a family member or selling her.  I have taken so much pleasure in owning her that it may seem a little odd, but if I’m going to be that close to the new location of the office and I can still borrow Jeff’s car occasionally to shop, I should be in good shape to have enjoyed her and then released her back into the wild.  Neither of the kids have evinced much interest because they don’t really have the cash flow.

Ocelots at the Seattle zoo.

I am waiting for Jeff to awaken so I can cook him breakfast.  Finn pancakes and coffee; I’m going to have mine with applewood smoked cheddar.

I have shippiles of work to do today; I have Valentines to create.  I am planning on sneaking into work on Sunday after church and putting them in people’s mail trays.  Every year it’s the same thing.  People are travelling, or they never check their mail trays, and the next thing you know you’re getting thanked for the Valentine on March 1st.

I brought home the flowers Jeff and the folks gave me and they are still gorgeous and sweetly scented.  I know cut flowers are frowned on by some people in my connection, but I will never frown.  Their colour and scent brightened my work area and made many other people happy but me for the balance of the week, and now they’ll be pretty in my kitchen until they’re done.

I send a hug into the ether for Lady Miss B and warm wishes to her hub and miniB, and a big old mushy group hug for Tom and Peggy, my folks and brother (nearly typed bother, and that was NOT my intent), Scott for digging up the name of the psychologist for me, my coworkers Mike Y and Hassan and Kev and Patricia, and I blow kisses at Veronica.  Sneetchy scowling at some other folks for workpain, but I won’t name them. More hugs for Rev. Katie who visited me in sickness and hell that’s what ministers are s’posed to do, and Sue, Carol, Kathleen and Gary for a really good board meeting.  I wish the contractors working on the new building the time, money and safety to do a good job.

I wish a lot of things.  It’s strange to think that this time last week I wished for nothing but cessation of wishing.

Life is good.  I’m going to go work on Dandelions Dreaming now, it’s the best thing I can think of for Peggy’s birthday.  Later today I’m going to talk to Jeff about capturing video from games so I can do something really kickass for Left4Dead/Rising in a Zombieland Redemption, which is the new and deliberately awkward title for my zombie choon, and it may get even longer, at which point I’ll shorten it again.  Such is the creative process; you put your best shit in, you take you best shit out, you put your best shit in, and you shake it all about.

W00t

Off to the Big 6 for brekky.  I’m leaving straight for work after that.

Didn’t mention I had my planning for this year meeting with my boss yesterday.  I told him about my challenges and he is supportive.  We slogged through some stuff that was quite hard, brainstormed a bit and then he made it clear to me why I respect him so much.  He knows what’s important, full stop.

I have long since finished the homily for Sunday but now I’m working on the framing words to take people into and out of the homily without freaking them out too badly.  I think I will manage nicely; we’ll see on the day.

Happy sigh for meals with friends

Man when the hell did I get old enough to have a friend for 45 years?  C’est bizarre, ça.

Anyway, Bonnie has a few grey hairs and perhaps her smile lines are a little more chiselled than I remember, but she is STILL BONNIE, the petite and energetic and outdoorsy and powerfully intelligent friend of my childhood who looks at least 15 years younger than her lying ass birth certificate, and she is a happy person to be around.

We watched pictures of John on the laptop and Bonnie brought a photo album which had pictures of her mom and John and various rellies in happier times.  I took some pics but I won’t post them without permission.

The Royal City Thai restaurant is assenkicken.  They must get by on the lunch trade, the joint was deserted the entire time we were there but the food was nothing short of spectacular.  It was $130 with tax and tip for five hungry adults, there was about one meal’s worth of leftovers, and there was alcohol too… gosh the soup was stellar.  Service stellar too.  Attentive without being pestery.  A find, I must say.

Keith and Kate both came AND I AM SO HAPPY about a) Paul suggesting it and b) how happy Bonnie was to see them and vice versa.  Katie got to see the only surviving picture of John on a skateboard.  I said to her afterwards that alone was worth the price of admission.  Who’da thunk it? Gave Katie and Keith rides home.  Jeff’s subpar and didn’t attend but there’s a whole host of gut wrenching bacteria writhing around the GVRD these days; I hope they don’t sink their little pseudopods into him too far.

Ziva is burning lots of oil.  I should check levels before setting out tomorrow, and I’m probably looking at engine work.  Jeebus, I ain’t paid for the last lot yet.  I have to stay alive, I have two dependents, one metal, one furry.

I couldn’t find the god forsaken USB microphone, so I bought another one.  If the original turns up I’ll give it to Paul.  I tried to buy a slide whistle but they didn’t have one. Twelve on order and no slide whistles, what’s this world coming to. I MUST HAVE A SLIDE WHISTLE. It’s impossible to be a living cartoon character without one.

I can hear Miss Margot’s stertorous breathing. I cleaned her eye gunk this morning and she accepted it with good grace (filled 10 saline soaked qtips with her eye gunk).  The second I tried to clean out her ears, World War Kitty was declared and I beat a hasty, but integumentarily intact retreat.

Anyway I have an appt. with Mr. Methocarbamol followed by a long sleep on the complaisant Millie the Mattress.  Tomorrow morning I’m going to fire up the computer, get the order of service done, and pray to the shade of Ada Babbage that the server reboot contemplated yesterday at work will make a proper workday possible.  Also, I have a one on one with my boss (who is really, really awesome, and I’d say that anyway, thanks) tomorrow.  I haven’t exactly told him anything, but I will, tactfully.  Hopefully before the half dozen or so coworkers who read my blog rat me out.  And no, ratting me out is neither polite nor accurate; I’m just shouldering my responsibilities again, and grace and temperance are threatening to bitch slap me if I don’t stand up straight under the load.