1. …a man wearing a black cowboy hat, a black leather duster, and grey-ish boots make from (or made to look like) the skin of a cold-blooded animal. Maybe a gator.
2. …a guy wearing gray hooded sweatshirt that said “Smartass University”
3. …a girl with purple streaks in her hair wearing a leopard spotted coat. The leopard spots were a normal color.
There’s never a dull moment as long as you pay attention.
Back to work…
I got a call last night from a charity group. I won’t say which one, but I will say that they used the “gosh, oh golly gee, ah shucks” approach to communication – as though that will ingratiate me to support their cause. You know what, if you’re the token idiot (or if you just sound like one), don’t freakin’ call me, okay? It’s not amusing and I’m not your buddy.
This morning, on they way to work, I saw a guy on a bike on the sidewalk pull out into traffic to swerve around a car – who was also pulling into traffic. Hilarity would have insued if it was actually funny. Instead, there were screaming brakes, loud horns, and I’m sure some general swearing. Idiots.
Wal-mart, self checkout. Okay, if I’m using one of these things, it almost automatically means I’m not an expert at it. I was trying to get a few oddly shaped items scanned and into some clearly defective grocery bags and the woman behind me had already placed all her crap on the converer belt – and was tapping her foot and looking at her watch. Well, maybe she wasn’t actually doing that, but dammit, she might as well have been. It wasn’t like I was standing there reading the labels on a soup can or something, I was trying to get out of the braincell killing flurecoent lights and a little patience on her part would have been nice. I glared at her when she started to scan her items and made her move so I could get my cash back. Wanker.
And yes, I do complain about people in lines being slow, but this is my blog and I say she should have been patient.
Let’s see…I’m really on a roll at this point. What else is pissing me off?
Holiday shopping is usually annoying, but I haven’t really started that much yet. And World Market was cool as usual. The weather has been cold, but I’m adapting. Got a bit of a cold, but it’s not bad. So, I guess that’s it for now.
Back to my regular mood and back to work…
This is going to be something of a random blog entry – a little bit of all over the map.
1. The last time I visited my family, while we were in my parents mini-van coming back from dinner, my sister made a joking comment about how not knowing what I was getting her for Christmas might kill her. I replied and said “Well, I’ll send flowers. I mean, I’ll bring flowers. Yeah, bring flowers”.
I think you had to be there to appreciate the comedic timing, but trust me – it was freaking hilarious.
2. A couple of weeks ago I actually saw someone on a segway. First one I’ve ever seen “live” and in use. He was moving along pretty well with it, but he still looked like a dufus.
3. I’m feeling a little under the weather this morning – pretty much all the stuff that nyqule is supposed to take care of, but I didn’t actually take any. I was late to work this morning and I’ll need to stay a little later to make up for it.
4. My grandmother is in the hospital with pneumnoia. She’s doing better now, but they had fist diagnosed it as the flu and that she should just “tough it out”. We’re generally a little cranky about that one, but not much we can do from here. At least she’s getting good care now.
5. There is no five. I’ve run out of stuff to say that doesn’t talk about mucus and I think that’s a line I don’t need to cross today. So, time to get back to work…
I was off-work last Friday – though I went in for a bit to work on my web page and do a little reasearch. When I got home, I decided to go for a walk. Along the way, I was waiting to cross a busy street and I noticed a girl on the other side – very intently watching the traffic. The cross traffic stopped, left turn arrow kicked in, and I watched for the left turn lane to clear so that I could get an early – but still safe – start across the street. When the lane was clear, I started walking so did the girl – holding up a small red stop sign. She met me halfway across the road, then escorted me the rest of the way to safety of the curb. Apparently, she was a crossing guard and while it was the time for the school-aged children to be getting off of school, I do not look like a school-aged person. I guess she was there for anyone crossing the street, but I’m pretty sure I could have handled it myself.
Later that evening, I went to a bonfire one of my friends was having. The directions I got off the net were ever so slightly wrong, so I ended up parking in Sri Lanka and walking until I found the right place. Had a good time there – mostly just good naturedly bitching about work. 🙂 I left a little after midnight and then had an early morning for breakfast with my ex-roommates mom and grandmother. Yeah, I said I would try and distance myself a bit, but the her pancakes are the bomb!
Also over the weekend, I had a weird dream that I grew hair on the bottom of my feet. Kind of like a reverse hobbit or something. I also dreamed that I was driving a jeep and I had to cross several hundred plank bridges, all in a row, at high speed. It was bizzare.
That’s it for now – time to get back to work…
I dreamed last night that my family had moved back into together and back into the first house we lived in while in Illinois – a big 2 story farmhouse. It was christmas time and mom was busy decorating the house – and unfortunatly woke up the ancient vampiric horde that had moved into the basement. I carved myself a couple of nice wooden stakes, hardened them in the fireplace and went hunting. My sister went the Palidin route and was in charge of the holy water. She prepped a big red bucket of the stuff and we doused the head vampire before I moved in for the staking. Crossing the two stakes held him at bay, then I staked him and used the second stake to pound it in. Worked pretty well and I didn’t have to worry about a hammer. Unfortunatly, instead of turning all the ohter vampires back to normal, killing the head vampire only pissed off the rest of them. We spent the rest of the dream on the hunt through the house and then the rest of the town. I was exausted when I woke up.
Back to work…
So, I was over at my ex-roommate’s mom’s place – putting plastic on her windows. She’d been wanting me to do it and though I usually call first, this time I just stopped by after my post halloween hair-cut.
I had the double-stick tape in place and was trying to get the plastic unfolded when my ex-roommate pulled up to deliver some fish to his mom from the resturant where he works. We talked for a bit and he helped a little with the plastic, but it was….
It was the kind of awkward of two people who were friends, but haven’t seen each other in ten years and realize that they don’t have anything in common anymore.
I could tell the converstation was struggling, so I asked “How are your boys doing?” – which should have been a fountain of topics for most parents.
His reply was “Oh, you know how they are.”
Except that I didn’t – I haven’t seen them in a year and I was asking. I realized then that it was over – if he wasn’t willing to share even the most simple of topics, we couldn’t really communicate.
I was still working on getting the plastic in place when he announced he was leaving. He said his good-byes – leaving me to finish put the plastic over his mom’s windows. I finished up my work fairly quickly – I’ve done this several years in a row – and headed out too.
I think I need to distance myself from his mom and his grandmother a bit more – until he makes an effort to seek me out again, I don’t think I want to run into him. It was just too awkward.
In other news…man, work has really sucked this week. And it was a short week for me at that. I’ve been swamped pretty much all the time and I keep getting these big projects with impossible deadlines. I guess it’s job security, but man – I’ve been hopping. And I found myself clenching my teeth in a meeting. Not good.
But, hey, it’s Friday. And I’ve got no major plans for the weekend. Maybe I’ll clean out my closets and do a little woodcarving.
For now, though, it’s back to work…
On Monday, I took the day off and made my annual campus tour – in costume. One of my favorite days of the year, I usually make my rounds and try and visit as many of my on campus friends. This year, I apparently didn’t plan as well and missed quite a few people. I was also easily distracted and ended up back-tracking a bit.
Here’s a link to more detail and pictures:
http://gozips.uakron.edu/~aws/costume.html
I had a blast – again – and everyone seemed to enjoy it. Got some good reactions from people walking on campus – and a few people that were too “cool” to react. I mean, how could you not react?
I also clanked my way through the library and apparently disturbed a girl that was studying. She took one look at me and turned back to her book with a “sniff” of disdain. I just shook my head as I went on past – wondering if she had ever been a child. It’s freaking Halloween – enjoy it!
My ankles are still pretty sore, but I’m getting better. And really, a little suffering for my art is fine by me – it’s only one day and it’s always fun.
That’s it for now – time to get back to work…
Got a few links for you:
http://video.uakron.edu:81/ramgen/zippy/attachment_disorder.rm
http://video.uakron.edu:81/ramgen/zippy/the_trash_man.rm
http://video.uakron.edu:81/ramgen/zippy/password_patty.rm
staring your’s truely. My film debut – I’ll be on imdb.com before you know it.
I’m ready to go for halloween – and no, I’m not going as a nerd. That would be too easy.
That’s it for now – back to work…
You may want to grab a soda and sit back for this one – it was a really long day yesterday and lots of stuff happened. Here we go…
Got to work early with all the stuff I needed for our CyberSecurity Awareness day. Headed out with the crew to the Student Union to help set things up – and mostly held balloons and watched eveyone’s stuff. Then I grabbed my bag and headed for the restroom – to make my transformation into Zack Geekis – computer nerd. And the hero of the three videos we did for the event. Once fully nerded up, I sat down at the Prize Wheel ™ and talked to people for about 4 hours. I gave away a lot of prizes once we got the sytem down and made a few people’s day.
When my shift was up, I headed back to the restroom to de-nerd. And, incidentally, I should have gotten some kind of hazzard pay for what was going on in the other stalls while I was in there.
Grabbed some lunch, ran into some friends from the HelpDesk, and headed back to work – only to get a call that posters and buttons were needed at another location on campus. Since I had no way to contact those at the Student Union, I put my coat back on and headed back over to pick up the items and make a delivery.
Back to the office again for some more work and a little problem solving, then out the door at my regular time. First stop, comic book shop for some reading material, then over to Burger King. This is where things started to fall apart.
The clerk atBK was friendly enough, but very difficult to understand as she tended to slur her words together. The portions were smaller than I expected for my afternoon snack, which worried me a bit as I usually need some food in my stomach to keep from getting sick when giving blood.
Food in my belly, I headed out again to the public library where the blood drive was being held. I got there at about 5:10 pm and went in the front door where the signs were. Unfortuantly, that was the end of the signs. Once inside the library there was no indication that a blood drive was going on. I searched the first floor, then headed to the basement – which was distressingly under construction. Back up to the first floor, then outside to see if they were having a blood mobile instead. No luck. Back inside and to the information desk – where people cut in front of me and generally ignored my existance. Then over to the check out desk where I waited in line for a couple of minutes before I finally was able to ask someone – and they had to look it up. I was told it was downstairs and that I should just follow the yellow footprints on the floor.
Yes, that was my sole navigational aid.
Guided by the footprints, I made my way back downstairs and went past the “under construction – do not enter” signs to the meeting room – and the blood mobile.
It was now 5:25 and I sat down to wait. They had a line of people 7 deep waiting to give histories, one person taking the histories, and one person actually taking the donations. Not a good sign. Fortunatly, I had plenty of paper with me and proceeded to fold.
And then I noticed that it was taking longer to go through the history than it was to actually give the blood. Never seen that before and clearly the person in that area was the bottleneck. So, we waited. A few people left to get magazines and come back. One guy simply lefft.
At 6:30, I was finally called to do my history thing. And it took forever, even though they got some more people working. They also had trouble with my new vs. old card as the system wasn’t reading my double red donations.
Finally, over to the donation area. Being an old hat at this, I didn’t expect any trouble. I’m apparently a fool.
The needle hurt going in and kept hurting. I kept my mouth shut since the only resolution is to move the needle – and that usually just makes it worse. I did my squeezing and focused on the task at hand – going through at my usual pace. Finished up when I expected and the tech went to fill the little tubes. And that was a problem. The little clamp/spout/needle they use to put the blood in the tubes wasn’t working – even after she fiddled around with it for a few minutes. She called in the other guy that was working there to help out when he was done with his people. He fiddled around with it too and couldn’t get them to go.
So, he gave up and she started to do the wrap up procedures. She seemed disappointed – and then told me that it since they couldn’t get the tubes filled, they couldn’t use the blood.
Well, there was no freaking way I was going to let that happen. Not after all that. So, I suggested that they use the other arm and get the tubes done. She seemed plesantly surprised that I volunteered for that and then had me switch sides so the other guy could do the tubes – we was apparently better at than she was. Well, no duh.
I think we freaked the people in the room out a little since it looked like I was set to give yet another pint. The guy started to work on getting the tubes filled and the needle he used hurt far worse than the regular one. Finally done – two arms, two bandages. I got out of there with a small can of pineapple juice and a sigh of relief. I’m still going to give blood next time around, but I can’t say this was a good experience.
But, there’s more. A friend of mine and I went out to grab a late dinner and on the way back to my place he looked in the rearview mirror and swore. The car behind us was dangerously close. While we watched, it slammed on the brakes, then accelerated. Then it weaved from one curb to the other and finally slammed into a parked car on the side of the street. We were half a block away when we saw this, and quickly pulled over and when to check on the driver.
The woman that got out of the car, dusty from the airbags and dazed from the impact, was also totally wasted. When we asked if she was okay, she said “no, I’m really drunk”. The car was totaled and the noise alerted the damaged car’s owner – who came out while someone else called the police. My friend shut off her car – since she’d gotten out and left it running – then tried to get her out of the street. She wandered around despite our best efforts – and kept asking for us to give her back her keys so she could call her boyfriend. We gave them back to her, since it was clear she wasn’t going anywhere. Even with her keys in hand, she kept insisting that we give them back so she could make a call.
The police arrived a few minutes later and my friend gave me his keys to drive his car out of the way and back to my place – only a couple of blocks down the road. He stayed to give a report to the police and I played video games until he got back.
So, over the course of one day I:
1. was a movie star and game show host
2. gave blood from both arms
3. witnessed a car accident
Heck, I’m tired again just writing about it. Better get back to work so I can rest up.
later…
So, I went for a walk last night to get some contact solution at the drug store – and then I decided to stop at McDonald’s for dinner. Which is nearly always a mistake, but I figured that I could get a quick bite to eat and escape with minimal damage. While I was ordering, I accidentally caught my laundry wound on the edge of my pocket and started bleeding again. I was still waiting for my food when I realized the blood was running down my finger. I grabbed some napkins and managed not to bleed on the floor. The fries weren’t ready, but they said they would bring them over to me.
So, I sat down with my book and started eating. The sandwichs were, to my surprise, prepared correctly. To my further surprise, they actually tasted good. Amazing.
And then the timer on the fryer went off. The strident beeping could be heard throughout the resturant. And it was unending. Not like a microwave that will eventually shut itself up – these just keep beeping and beeping. It was bad enough that I couldn’t read. And you know it’s got to be bad if I can’t read.
My sister has complained about this in the past – she has very sensitive hearing. My hearing isn’t as good as hers, but I’m more easily annoyed now that I’m a little older.
I ate more quickly than I would I have liked and pretty much gave up on the book. Could have been a good experience, but the assault on my ears was too much. I’m really glad I don’t work there.
Back to work…
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