Desk Slave
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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in
desk_slave's LiveJournal:
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| Thursday, December 8th, 2005 | | 3:50 pm |
Your wife's dead? Merry Christmas!
My boss just buzzed me and asked me to send flowers to a long-time client whose wife passed away last night. (I'm not sure why our receptionist can't do that, but that's beside the point.) My boss has known this man and his wife for a dozen years (I've never met them) and this is what she told me to send him: a poinsettia, with a card that reads "From your friends at Name of Our Company."
Okay....let's think about this for perhaps a millisecond longer than she did: It's the Christmas season and yes, pointsettias are in abundance. It is also the season in which people routinely send poinsettias to valued clients. So when this flaming red harbinger of all things Santa arrives at our bereaved client's door tomorrow, with a card reading "From your friends at Name of Our Company", how in the hell is this poor man going to know that the plant is a sympathy gift, and not a routine holiday greeting?
But to interfere in this matter would mean I'd have to converse with my boss in more than monotonal monosyllables, so I couldn't bring myself to suggest something a little less...um....cheery. I placed the order exactly as she suggested. This probably makes me every bit as bad a person as my boss, but if she can't be bothered to spend more than three seconds thinking about this poor man and his dead wife, people whom she knows and claims to have some feeling for, why should I rescue her? I can only hope that he'll never even see the plant...I'm sure some relative will answer the door and assume it's...well....a routine holiday greeting. | | Tuesday, December 6th, 2005 | | 3:28 pm |
Unitard Sighting!
Just got an e-mail from a friend who spotted Mr. Penis, in all his pot-bellied glory, at a local food co-op! She reports he was "casually strolling" around in his signature ultra-revealing-shortie-unitard, oblivious to the double-takes, hastily-averted eyes, and flaming cheeks of his fellow shoppers. My friend had the questionable good fortune to witness him brazenly purchasing a cup of coffee (for the warmth, I guess), and the spectacle was so enthralling that she smashed into an aisle display and dropped her shopping basket on the floor!
(But don't feel badly for her--she wasn't injured and the crash provided a welcome distraction. For everyone.)
My friend believes Mr. Penis's wildly inappropriate outfit to be some sort of wrestling get-up. I'll defer to her judgment, since it sounds as though she got a better look at him than I did on the day he popped into our office to pay his rent. If you'll recall, I kept my eyes on the floor during most of our mercifully brief exchange. But for the record, I find the idea of a wrestling outfit even more frightening than simple underwear, mostly because Mr. Penis appears to be middle-aged.
Whether it's wrestling attire, jammies, or a dance leotard, we'll probably never know. I think the real question is why does he walk around dressed that way? There was an odd-ball sort of logic to his costume when I saw him in August, but it's been in the 40s all week! Is he really oblivious to accepted social norms for venturing out in public? Is he a rebel? Does he think he has a hot bod? More literally, could his body temperature be ten degrees higher than the rest of us?
Mr. Penis, what gives???? | | Monday, December 5th, 2005 | | 4:44 pm |
Mistaken Identity?
I think my boss has finally gone all the way into the Twilight Zone. She's in her office with her drug-addict handyman and yelling at him about a different handyman, whom she used to like but has decided should be killed because he's "too expensive."
The bizarre part is that she's screaming at Drug-Addict Handyman as if HE were Too-Expensive Handyman! She's even calling him by Too-Expensive Handyman's real name! So, either my boss thinks Drug-Addict Handyman is actually Too-Expensive Handyman or Drug-Addict Handyman thinks he's Too-Expensive Handyman. Because he's not correcting her as she heaps abuse intended for someone else on him.
Either way, it's very noisy. | | Wednesday, November 30th, 2005 | | 10:55 am |
Yo ho ho
Well, here it is....another agonizingly slow day at the office. I never did work up the nerve to fake the stomach flu, so here's how I spent most of yesterday:
Downloaded a very complex and ultimately unsatisfying free online game called "Puzzle Pirates." In this game, you are a under-privileged pirate sailing the 46 seas and trying to earn enough gold coins to clothe your avatar in something nicer than rags. You learn to "bilge," "swordfight," "carpenter," and "pillage" by playing a series of Tetris-like puzzles. The more you play, the more coins you earn. The only thing I was any good at was "bilging." It took me about two hours to earn 143 "pieces of eight", which seemed like a sizable sum, so I went to the little pirate tailor shop to get my avatar a decent dress. Turns out, my "booty" wouldn't even buy a chemise, much less a dress (which started at about 24,000 gold coins) so I uninstalled the game in a fit of disgust. Arrrrrrrrrr!!
Moved on to a new game called "Sudoku"--the numbers-based puzzle that's taking Europe by storm! If you've never played Sudoku, you can try it online for free here: http://www.websudoku.com. I played these puzzles, with varying degrees of success, until my vision went blurry.
Read lots of "Pop Candy," Whitney Matheson's blog for USAToday.com (http://blogs.usatoday.com/popcandy). I highly recommend it. It's how I found out that Spike from Buffy is getting his own TV movie! (Can't wait!)
Today promises to be much the same, with the exception of Puzzle Pirates, that is. Sudoku, anyone? | | Tuesday, November 29th, 2005 | | 10:27 am |
Desperation
Holy crap, I have NOTHING to do! It's not that I'm procrastinating...I am literally out of projects to complete. It's all done. We've entered the slow season here at the office, and there's nothing new on the foreseeable horizon. I'm free of responsibilities other than maintaining an upright position at my desk.
This sucks!
My feelings surprise me, because how many times have I stressed over never being able to attain the elusive state of being "caught up?" Oh, it's not that I haven't slacked off a great deal here at the office, but it was a wholesome sort of slacking that fully recognized there were things to be done that could be--should be--put off for another more auspicious day. It turns out that slacking off is only fun, perhaps even only possible, when there are other things I should be doing.
So instead of feeling happy to be sitting here typing a blog or shopping online--reasonably guilt-free--I feel sort of...frightened. It's only 10 a.m., and I have no idea how I'm going to fill the hours between now and 5:00 o'clock. One of my co-workers, equally becalmed, suggested we fake serious stomach illness and go home for a few days. I'd try it if it didn't mean communicating in person with my boss. I wonder if I could send her an e-mail saying that I just threw up into my trash can and am heading home for the day? I could slip out the door while she was on the phone.
Hmmm...this is a plan not without merit. I'll let you know if I decide to do it. | | Tuesday, November 8th, 2005 | | 11:38 am |
Is this bad karma?
Like a bad memory or a shameful secret, Alice keeps coming back to haunt me!
Idiotically, I assumed we'd see less of her after she moved away at the end of the summer. But instead, she's still knocking on our door every weekend! It's as if nothing's changed at all!
The first time Alice visited our house, she caught me completely off guard. In the week or two since she'd gone, we'd gotten into the habit of opening our door when someone rang the bell, rather than peering fearfully out the window first. When I saw her standing on our porch, my first coherent thought was that she'd somehow learned to drive a car! The idea was so horrifying that I completely forgot myself and rudely blurted out "How did you get here?"
It turns out that one of our neighbors brought Alice back so that she could spend a few hours walking up and down the street seeing her old friends. Charming!
Actually, it was nice of our neighbor to do that for her. Once.
But now Alice is back all the time, courtesy of at least three different neighbors. Apparently, they've got a rotating schedule for driving Alice in to drive us all crazy. It's worse then when she lived here. Before, we had her trained to call us before she dropped in. Now, she just.....drops in. And always at the worst possible time---when I'm frantically cleaning the house before we have dinner guests. During the last few minutes of daylight while we're organizing our garage. Just as we've sat down to eat lunch. (Of course, there's no good time for a visit from Alice.)
We're not the only ones who are suffering. Apparently, the young couple who bought Alice's house have been surprised on several occasions to find her peering into their windows to check on the renovations. I know the neighbors ferrying her back and forth mean well, but I can't help but feel this is unfair to Alice: how will she adjust to her new surroundings and make new "friends" if she's always hanging around her old neighborhood?
More importantly, how will I ever live an Alice-free life if she keeps catching rides back to my house? Is there nothing to be done? Must I actually move away myself? Aiyeeeee!!!!! I can't take it anymore!!! | | Monday, October 31st, 2005 | | 4:36 pm |
The Blog is Back
Okay, so, the novel idea? Not so good.
It turns out that I was interested in writing a novel mostly to distract myself from the arm-length list of household projects that must be completed before we sell our house next spring. That, plus it's a lot of WORK to write a book. Especially the kind I wanted to write, which would, of course, change the world and usher in a new era of peace and happiness for all mankind. Did I mention that this novel would also make me incredibly rich?
So, I'm shelving the book for now (ha ha). But I'm not necessarily putting it away forever.....
In the meantime, I will distract myself from my increasing fear that I am one of those people who starts things but never finishes them by reading the entire Chronicles of Narnia in anticipation of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, due in theaters December 9 (mark your calendars).
This was one of my most favorite books as a child, although I never really enjoyed the other books in the series. In fact, I HATED them. They just didn't hold the same magic for me as that first book, and I was so bitterly disappointed that I've avoided them ever since. But I'm older now, and more tolerant. So I'm giving them a second chance.
Since each novel can be read in about 45 minutes, I guess I shouldn't consider reading all of them to be a noteworthy commitment of time and energy, but still. I WILL FINISH THEM.
I will.
I will triumph. | | Friday, September 30th, 2005 | | 3:27 pm |
We'll all sleep easier now!
My boss has solved the problem of rampant identity theft! It's so simple, I don't know why someone hasn't thought of it before. All that's needed, she says, to stop bandits from stealing private information and using it to obtain credit cards and pilfer bank accounts, is a PIN number. These unique PINs would be assigned to every man, woman, and child in America and used to indisputably identify them.
If you're thinking the same thing I was thinking--that these PINs sound remarkably like social security numbers--you'd be wrong! The difference, says my boss, is that no one else would know the PIN number except the person to whom it is assigned. It wouldn't be written down....anywhere. No one else would ever have access to it. It would be totally secret.
Hmmm...a PIN number no one else knows. Not the credit card companies, banks, mortgage companies, not even the government agency that assigned it to you. No one who could verify that it was indeed a PIN or that you were indeed the true holder of the PIN. Holy crap, it's GENIUS!
I'm so embarassed---when she stepped into my office and started blabbering, I assumed it was going to be another worthless, ill-conceived monologue about some topic absolutely irrelevant to my work or the work of the company. Possibly delivered through a mouthful of the white-bread and mayo sandwich she eats for lunch. Boy, is my face red.
I have to go now...we've all been called in to a staff meeting to make up our new PINs! | | Thursday, September 22nd, 2005 | | 2:41 pm |
Okay, I'm back. Just for today though!
A friend and I were discussing the miseries of the Sunday Blues via e-mail earlier this morning. You know the Sunday Blues, right? That dark weekend depression that overtakes you as Monday morning draws near? My dose isn't usually caused by the idea of returning to work, since I frequently sit at my desk and do absolutely nothing all day. No, the blues usually settle on me shortly after waking on Sunday to face the long list of chores l couldn't get to on Friday or Saturday.
Just thinking about the blues puts me into avoidance mode, and I thought, instead, about how long it's been since I've done absolutely nothing all weekend long. My husband and I used to make an effort, once in awhile, to devote an entire day (or sometimes the whole weekend) to ignoring our responsibilities in favor of doing nothing but fun stuff. We'd go clothes shopping, go to the movies, eat a 5,000-calorie lunch in a favorite restaurant, sleep late, read for hours, take naps, whatever. We'd call it "The Weekend of Indulgence." I just realized it's been way too long since we've done that.
"Weekends of Indulgence" are much more fun when shared, but I discovered that I can make due by myself if my husband is out of town for a few days. (It is impossible to enjoy a lazy weekend if your poor husand is in the next room slaving over a stack of student papers.)
Here is my solo "Weekend of Indulgence":
Friday: lie on couch in front of TV all day watching movies and eating junk food. Leave house only to walk dogs. Fall asleep in front of TV at 2 a.m. with remote still in hand.
Saturday: lie on couch reading books all day, then switch to movies in evening. Consume more junk food. Fall asleep in front of TV at 2 a.m. with remote still in hand.
Sunday: Get some exercise to relieve terrible headache caused by lying around for two days abusing eyes and eating MSG-laden junk food. Make a large pot of homemade soup to cleanse system. Watch more movies and eat ten bowls of soup. Go to bed at reasonable hour and read; fall asleep with book in hand.
The Solo Weekend of Indulgence is delightfully simple, but extremely effective. And, it's even more fun if the weather is totally disgusting...either super cold or raining non-stop...thus relieving me of any nagging guilt about letting the leaves pile up in the yard. | | Tuesday, September 13th, 2005 | | 12:04 pm |
On to the next thing
As I predicted, I have lost interest in the blog. Not because I'd rather be working instead of blogging. No way, no how! Instead, I've gotten interested in writing something longer. Like, a novel. A novel about work. Written...at work.
It's impossible to have friends who write books (or blogs) without thinking to yourself "Hmmm...that looks like a pretty good gig! Wonder if I could get in on that?" But after two weeks of trying to come up with an idea, developing character sketches, plot summaries, and outlines, I've come to see that it's a lot harder than tossing a blog entry together every day. But it's also a lot more interesting to me--I find myself thinking about it all the time. I might be hooked!
Anyway, so long for now. I may be blogging again in a few weeks after the novel goes up in flames. I'm sure I'll be able, somehow, to blame my boss for it.
(I'm only kidding about writing the novel at work. I actually do have a few standards regarding what is justifiable shirking in the office and what is downright irresponsible!) | | Thursday, September 8th, 2005 | | 12:03 pm |
Apology
I know, I know. I've been remiss in blogging this week. Sue me! (Does that sound defensive?)
This has been a tough week. The Labor Day Holiday totally threw me off, and I've been about a day behind ever since. In my version of reality, today is Wednesday, not Thursday. Other people are not helping. If one more person says to me "What's today, Tuesday or Wednesday?"--causing me to ponder the question for a full five minutes before eventually guessing at the right answer--I think I will go insane.
Which leads me to worry that I may already be insane, as dissociation with reality figures prominently in a number of serious mental illnesses. Could I have post-traumatic stress disorder brought on by the extreme mental anguish of being forced to endure my boss's incessantly obnoxious telephone voice for hours at a time, day-after-day? (Although the "post" would indicate that the traumatic event was no longer occuring, so maybe not.)
I'm beginning to notice that bad experiences involving telephones are a frequent subject of my blog postings. | | Tuesday, September 6th, 2005 | | 4:32 pm |
Voice mail
Someone has been calling me here in the office all day long, but since I don't answer my phone, I have no idea who it is. I keep waiting for my voice mail light to blink on, but the mystery caller won't leave a message. This is very frustrating. Could Alice have gotten my work phone number? | | Thursday, September 1st, 2005 | | 12:17 pm |
Reprieve
Some days you have to laugh to keep from crying. And today is one of those days!
I giggled all the way through the online employment ads. I looked at them twice this morning (in case I missed something the first time). I think I may apply for the "furniture installer" postion, or perhaps the "long-distance trucker" opportunity. I bet I would meet some interesting new people, and save a lot of money, too. The next time my husband and I buy furniture, I could ship it and install it myself!
The good news is that I just overheard my boss on the phone with her daughter. She's leaving the office for the rest of the day, which means the in-case-of-emergency razor blades go back in the drawer. What a relief! Slashing my wrists might get me out of work early, but then I would miss Chinese take-out night! | | Wednesday, August 31st, 2005 | | 4:00 pm |
Vive Che!
Due to lack of interest (mine), I have abandoned the Weekend Retrospective Part II. I was going to write about my and my husband's potluck neurosis--a timely subject since we attended a wedding shower-slash-potluck this weekend (except we forgot to bring any food!). But like most mental illnesses, it takes a hefty amount of time, introspection, and darn hard work to tease out the root of the problem and let the healing begin. Frankly, I just don't have it in me today! In fact, I have developed a neurosis about our potluck neurosis, so I feel compelled to avoid the entire subject!
Instead, and with a heavy heart, I must confess that I have officially abandoned the Che Guevara biography I've been struggling with for almost two months. But I did not give up without a fight! I lugged it to the gym on Monday, resigned to another 45 grim minutes sweating on the bike while Che sweated through the jungle. But about ten minutes into my ride, something in me broke and I realized I'd had enough of the fighting....enough of the killing....enough of the damn Gutierrez’s! (So on Tuesday, I brought T.C. Boyle's Tortilla Curtain, a much faster and entertaining read, although quite possibly even more depressing!)
Nevertheless, my time with Che was not a total loss because I discovered several startling similarities between his war and my own guerrilla efforts here in the office!
1. Dress for Success: Even though Che was actually a physician and philosopher, he wore the filthy, bloodstained fatigues of a hardcore revolutionary soldier. None of the men he gunned down ever suspected he spoke 3 languages and wrote poetry! As for me, I go to the office every day dressed like a trustworthy and competent professional. No one looking at me would ever guess that I spend most of my working hours shopping online and blogging!
2. Camouflage! Che was a master at hiding himself and his troops from government forces. If the enemy got too close, he and his men would simply melt into the jungle, using the natural flora as a shield. I prefer to hide behind an SOP I've been "working" on for close to a year. I open it up on my computer, minimize it while I type e-mails or blogs all day, then pop it up on my screen when my boss comes in to ask me to do a pointless and idiotic task. "I could handle that for you," I say, "but I'm really making good progress on my SOP. Can it wait?" Obviously, it can, because she usually forgets about whatever it was she wanted.
3. Win Hearts and Minds: Because they fought to bring prosperity to all the people of Cuba, and in spite of the murders, rapes, and thefts they committed, Che's rebel army was nearly universally adored, particularly by the powerless peasant class forced to work to fill the coffers of the corrupt Batista regime. As the de facto leader of the office populace, I successfully battled our penny-pinching boss when she tried to take away some holidays and institute a policy of mandatory (and unpaid) weekend work. Now, I could sit here all day twiddling my thumbs and my co-workers will still love me!
4. Use Misinformation: One of Che's favorite strategies for outwitting the enemy was to "leak" information about his whereabouts, thus fooling the opposition into believing he was someplace else while he went about his business undisturbed. I employ a similar strategy to avoid being unnecessarily dragged into my boss's client meetings. When I hear her on the phone scheduling one of these time-wasters (without, of course, checking first to see if I'm free), I scribble a fake appointment on my calendar for the exact same time as her meeting. "Oops!" I say, pointing at my calendar when she finally comes into my office to tell me about the meeting. "Can't do it. I've got a conflict." Then, she meets with the clients herself and I go off to the gym for an hour. | | Tuesday, August 30th, 2005 | | 12:24 pm |
Weekend retrospective, Part 1
My boss is MIA again this morning (yay!), so here's the scoop on Alice....
We officially said goodbye to her this weekend! It turns out that the people who bought her house couldn't postpone moving-in, so Alice left on Friday to stay with a niece until her recently vandalized condo is ready. That morning, we walked our dogs by her house for the last time, except instead of breaking into a run as we passed her door, we actually went up and knocked on it! Alice was inside packing up a few last-minute items, and she came out to tell us that her house was begging her not to go! This frightened me, mostly because I thought she must have overheard me begging my husband not to make me go up to her door, but then I remembered we were still half a block away when I'd said that. Whew!
We ignored the house comment and redirected Alice's attention toward saying goodbye. There were tears (hers) and joy (ours) as we both gave her a brief and awkward farewell hug. Then there were more tears (mine) when my husband reminded her that we'd come visit her in her new condo! I'd completely forgotten he'd told her that a couple of weeks ago, and I bet Alice had, too (damn!). Now, instead of dodging her phone calls to come visit us, we will be forever dodging phone calls to go visit her. As we walked away, I suggested changing our telephone number, but my husband didn't think that was very funny.
On Saturday morning, we went out for our first walk in an Alice-free neighborhood. The possibility that we might complete our circuit without resorting to humiliating evasive measures or being trapped into talking to Alice for an eon made us positively giddy. But as we rounded the corner onto her ex-block, we stopped dead in our tracks--Alice was still there! She was standing in her yard staring at her house, no doubt carrying on a lively conversation with it. It was just like old times...I tried to duck behind a car, and my husband slowed to Easy Reader pace in the hope she'd go back inside before spotting us.
But it was all in vain. Alice caught us in her tractor beam and dragged us toward her house one last time. Apparently, her furniture movers had done some minor damage the day before, and her niece had driven her back over to inspect it. Luckily, Alice was too distracted by the screams of her wounded house to desire a repeat of the previous day's touching goodbye, so we fled up the street with a couple of waves and a few "see yous!" tossed over our shoulders---finally free!
Well........mostly free. Free until Alice gets her new phone connected, anyway.
Sigh.......... | | Monday, August 29th, 2005 | | 1:11 pm |
Maybe tomorrow will be better
Hmmm....I'm feeling depressed and slightly nauseous. Must be Monday! The only thing keeping me from slitting my wrists is the fact that I'm the only one in the office this morning. Brief moment of panic when I thought I'd shown up for work on Labor Day, but a quick glance at the calendar calmed me right down. Guess everyone else is either coming in late or running errands.
So many bizarre things happened this weekend that I am having trouble deciding which one to highlight in my blog. Alice moved away, I accidentally painted our Adirondack chairs neon pink, and my husband and I committed several egregious faux pas at a wedding shower!
And, as much as I'd like to dive right in to one or all of those topics, I am short on time today because there's all this pesky "work" to do. I swear, if this keeps up I'm going to have a talk with my boss about respecting "me time" when I'm in the office! | | Thursday, August 25th, 2005 | | 4:14 pm |
Brain Drain
I've got absolutely nothing to say today! It's annoying, and slightly scary. Is this writer's block? Will I ever be able to write again? Why has nothing seemed blog-worthy today? Have I lost the will to blog? Is this yet another hobby that I'll drop after a couple of weeks?
It's not easy writing a blog! Some days, it seems less like a fun diversion and more like...work (spit, spit). Since I originally began the blog as a distraction from my job, there's some irony going on here. And probably a few meaningful life lessons, but I'm too tired to wonder what they might be.
Maybe that's all it is. Some sort of blog fatique. I'm blogged-out.
I just need a rest. A couple of days away. Yeah, that's it.
I'll return on Monday better, stronger, faster. It will be a new kind of blog next week. It will be......the Bionic Blog.
Stay tuned..... | | Wednesday, August 24th, 2005 | | 4:10 pm |
Work is interfering with my blog
Good grief! I've spent the entire day working.
I know, I know. I can hardly believe it myself. I have very little time left for blogging this afternoon, which has put me into a foul mood. Must look into getting a job with less responsibility so that I can spend more time writing!
No Che today...went over to the gym at lunch for circuit training and nearly expired during the third set. You won't catch me making fun of my gym experiences in this blog because I'm too afraid my fitness instructor will find out and kill me. It would be too easy to make it look like an accident--a heart attack or stroke during one of his especially sadistic workout sessions!
Best Save of the Day: While changing into my exercise clothes at the gym, I put my shirt on inside-out. I happened to notice my mistake mere seconds before walking out to join the rest of the people assembled for the class. That was a close one!!
| | Tuesday, August 23rd, 2005 | | 4:34 pm |
I should have just bought the T-shirt
Che Guevara is killing me. Not the real Che, of course. He died many years ago in some jungle in one of those countries where that sort of thing happens. So, while it's less dramatic, it's probably more accurate to say that Jon Lee Anderson's massive biography about Che is actually what's doing me in.
For one thing, the book is over 800 pages and is heavy as lead! I lug it back and forth to the gym so I can read it while I ride the recumbant bike, but just carrying it around in my duffle bag is work-out enough. The gym is only a block away from my office, but I started walking to it after one of the fitness instructors made fun of me for driving. By the time I arrive, my entire right side is numb from the weight of the bag pressing down on the major arteries in my shoulder.
The book is no light read, either. Wading through pages dense with detailed descriptions of every minor skirmish of the Cuban Revolution, I feel exactly as Che must have felt as he slogged through heavily-forested mountain terrain with his ragtag band of patriots/despots. It all looks and sounds the same, and I can't seem to get anywhere!
Why was everyone in Che's rebel army named Gutierrez? It's impossible to keep them all straight! There's Gutierrez the Doctor, Gutierrez the Deserter, and Gutierrez who was killed in a skirmish a few pages back. I'm constantly wondering why they're letting that dead traitor operate on the wounded!
There are also way too many organizations and factions to keep up with. There are leftists, rightists, centrists, and communists, all of which have about a dozen sub-groups with paragraph-long names that give no hint as to their policial affiliation, but all have the word "Liberation" in them somewhere. It's maddening! For God's sake, I just wanted to read a book about that cute guy from The Motorcycle Diaries. Who cares about all this military mumbo-jumbo?
It's been weeks now and I'm only about half-finished, and I may not make it to the end. I really don't like to give up on a book, especially one that makes me look so intellectual. I enjoy propping it on the bike's reading stand and watching the other gym patrons stealing looks at the cover. I frown slightly while I'm reading, which looks thoughtful and studious but is actually confusion. Why did Che just make Gutierrez a captain when he stole food from the starving peasants three pages ago?
In spite of my serious concerns that finishing the book will take me about as long as the revolution itself, I guess giving up now would make me a sissy. If I can press on to Castro's eventual overthrow of the Batista government, maybe Che and all the Gutierrezes will slow down and relax a little bit, have some fun for a change. I skipped ahead to read the photo captions in the last third of the book, and it seems as though better days are ahead for me and Che. For one thing, the photos reveal that he dumps his shockingly hideous troll of a wife after meeting the gorgeous woman who becomes the second Mrs. Che. Finally some real human drama! And her name isn't Gutierrez! | | Monday, August 22nd, 2005 | | 12:53 pm |
Suggestion box
Monday again. It's starting to seem like this happens every week!
9:30 a.m.: I've checked my e-mail, both personal and professional, read a couple of my favorite blogs, re-read my own blog, fruitlessly scanned the weather websites for hurricanes nearing our coastline, and insincerely welcomed my boss back to the office after her week off.
I guess there's nothing left to do except eat my breakfast and stare vacantly into space..................
Now it's 11:30, and some woman in our (empty) reception area is screaming (to no one) that she will not be in this country next year and that she hates the U.S.! Oh, wait, our receptionist has finally come up from the basement to help her, which is a relief because I was about to shut my door to block out the noise, and it gets kinda hot in my office when I do that.
Tenants (and employees) yelling in our reception area no longer freak me out. And yet, I can't help but feel that something could be done to stop the yelling before it starts. Since hiring enough people to do the necessary work to keep tenants happy seems to be out of the question, another option is to rethink the people we're renting to.
Which leads me to ponder that if I were the leasing agent here (and I thank God at least once a day that I'm not), I would have a strict set of criteria for determining whether to approve a person to rent one of our properties. Credit checks are meaningless because they only tell you if a person can pay their rent. They say nothing about their mental state and how long they're likely to remain calm after their repeated requests for maintenance are ignored. A financial picture also doesn't give you a good indicator of how distasteful or obnoxious a person will be to deal with on a day-to-day basis. Since I have a low threshold for distasteful and obnoxious behavior, I'd just as soon not have to listen to our receptionist deal with it. Therefore, I'd refuse to rent to anyone with 1.) an overly-developed sense of their "rights," and 2.) people who need a lot of hand-holding because they've got "problems." Anyone falling into categories 1 or 2, plus those people exhibiting any of the following characteristics should be immediately red-flagged as unsuitable:
1. The wearing of unitards or clothing that jingles.
2. The inability to use an "indoor voice".
3. Uncontrollable sobbing.
4. Angry before we've even done anything to them.
5. Extremely attractive physical appearance.
6. Extremely unattractive physical appearance.
7. A lawyer by profession.
8. Related to a lawyer.
9. Willing to "get rid" of a beloved family pet. (Okay, they don't fit into either of the categories above, but they're either lying or despicable.)
10. In need of "a ride" to/from the property in question.
(I could add "obese" to the list, but I don't want to over-generalize. Besides, I have this fear that I will one day become extremely fat as karmic payback for all the times I've made fun of really large people.) |
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