there's no place like home

i've spent the last couple of weeks sitting in on an ethics seminar. as boring as it sounds, for me it was a very refreshing change of pace. for one thing, all i had to do was sit there and listen. i was also free from the oppressive thumb(s) of my countless bosses. i guess i also learned some stuff...
but the most exciting thing about the whole experience was the people watching. these people were not part of my usual entourage, and while i found most of them to be friendly and insightful, there were a couple who definitely cought my attention.

in third place was a very high strung young lady who is in my line of work at a parallel institution accross town. her research mentor (who also happens to be my research mentor- ok, i guess there was a little bit of an oppressive thumb factor) sent me her way, thinking that we had similar research interests, not knowing that he was sending me into a land mine of, "look, i just can't deal with having to help anyone or keep any appointments. i don't think i have the time or energy to deal with you!" from this is i drew the conclusion that there are those of us who are filterless, and those of us who are neurotic and rude.

coming in second was a rather charming, very metro-sexual canadian guy of some exotic-looking ethnicity that i couldn't put my finger on. in casual conversation i actually found him to be pretty charismatic, but man did i get tired of hearing him say, "that's ridiculous! that would never happen in canada!" he lost his cool every single day about the various and sundry stupid and/or nasty things that americans do driving everyone crazy (and this was a pretty mild mannered bunch). but while i found his approach a little off-putting, i do have to ask myself, "why in the world do i not live in montreal?"

finally, there was little miss philosophy. little miss philosophy was a very intense, very put-together platinum blond who was so stylish it was kind of ridiculous (i didn't know cole hann made flip-flops), and was either very pretty, or kind of scary looking (i couldn't decide). little miss philosophy is finishing up her PhD in philosophy while sitting on various important sounding boards and committees and was really really really passionate (more like aggressive) in her arguments with everyone about everything. she was always going on about things like personhood, and had a special way of throwing around lofty words that don't actually mean anything. my personal favorite was, "how can you say that? it's counterfactual!" i've done alot of thinking about the possible meanings of "counterfactual," and have come to the following translations:
1) you're wrong
2) that doesn't make any sense
3) i don't get it

so as much i've enjoyed my little sojourn back into the world of academics, i'm looking forward to being a droid again.

power trip

i seem to have gotten to a place at work where people do something they've never done before: listen to me. it's odd. i'm not a terribly loud person, and my prevailing theory on work so far has been

1) don't screw it up so badly that i get called to any of my million bosses' offices (try saying "bosses' offices" five times fast)
2) don't do so terribly well that i call too much attention to myself and draw extra work
3) try not to make enemies
4) try not to make such good friends that i get hit on by same-sex co-workers who send me flowers and wine

so far i'm running 75%. but my point is that i try to fly under the radar. how, then, is it that in the past 72 hours, that when i ask a question i get an answer, and when i wonder if everyone could just be quiet and reasonable for a minute, people are actually quiet and reasonable, and when i have something to add to a conversation, people pay attention? all, really, in the last 3 days. i am the same person. and let me be clear that at work, i am definitely a lowly minion. (not a peon anymore, as ng has pointed out, but the next step up.) it's starting to get to my head already, i think - i've come just short several times of telling other arguably-more-important minions exactly what i think of their ideas.

so i need suggestions on what to do with this fun power while it lasts. my thoughts?

1) convince my underlings to launch peta-like crusade to free all the trapped office paper into the wild where it belongs
2) give everyone ridiculous, slightly degrading nicknames and refuse to call them by their real names (hmm, sounds like this blog!)
3) count how many days in a row i can find someone to go and bring me a cookie without asking me why i can't get off my butt and do it myself
4) something involving my power drill, which i bought excitedly a year ago and have never used

taking ideas.

everyone sucks except you.

ok, so maybe it hasn't been the world's finest 24 hours, what with getting called in to work extra last night at the last minute for someone who will never pay me back, locking myself out of my apartment, finding out that today is ticket-the-cars-in-chicago-that-don't-have-city-stickers-and-laugh-all-the-way-to-the-bank day, and getting back to work today to sort through a bunch of paperwork only to find out that the office people pulled all the wrong paperwork for me to go through. but for all that, still lots to smile about:

1. thanks to my gracious and more-organized blogmate for spotting my lunch since i didn't have my wallet.
2. thanks to the lovely m for being excited to see me at work last night, and telling me i'm better than [the missing girl] anyway.
3. thanks to l for making me a cup of tea when she saw the stack of papers i was lugging around this afternoon.
4. thanks to the weirdly grumpy but affectionate woman at the currency exchange where i bought my belated city parking sticker, for barking lots of orders at me like "you have to be SURE about your license plate number. are you SURE?", "cash only," "$120. and 50 CENTS. FIFTY CENTS!" but still managing to follow the whole exchange with a big left-sided smile and thank you.
5. thank god i'm not leon, my creepy downstairs neighbor, who i think is in serious financial trouble, as evidenced by the "citibank versus leon" signs all over his front door.

and last but certainly not least:

6. thanks to my weird little building manager for at least having the modesty to wear his tighty-whiteys when he answered the door to my request to be let into my apartment. (ew. i mean, does it take that long to throw on shorts???)

a birthday apology

in honor of quick-shot's birthday today, i would like to hereby retract any statements my blogmate and i may or may not have made regarding any distaste we may have for fanciness. we support fanciness, and yuppieness, and all going out and fun in general. it's just the prevalence of said fanciness, as evidenced by floofy martinis in every sports bar in the city. yes, we want to go out for dinner with you the day after you're done hanging out with your boy. and yes, i will wear clothes without holes in them. just maybe not fancy jeans and heels. i might even order a martini in your honor.

righteous indignance

first of all, a warm welcome to two of our newest blog readers! as my good blogmate and i have stated before, we think the best way to encourage our readers to comment is to write directly about them. with that, let me begin my protest of a recent conversation:

my blogmate and i are lucky enough to work with these two women who, although they work in a department related to ours, don't see us every day, and we know each other better socially than professionally. this is generally a good thing, because they're fun girls (and not just because one of them used to be a bartender and can mix 26 drinks in 4 minutes). but i stopped by their office to say hi the other day, and we started discussing their impressions of the people in our department. it turns out they've decided that my blogmate is the more laid-back of the two of us, who can tolerate more disorganization, and i'm definitely the anal-retentive one who can't stand it if someone doesn't adhere to policy. this they base on a particular day where i showed up wearing an orange shirt and orange socks.

now, it doesn't actually bother me that they think i'm anal retentive, although my blogmate is the one who keeps getting nominated for stuff like the form-making committee and i'm the one who has lost my work id five times in the last year. and it doesn't bother me that they're making this decision based on one of my apparently notable clothing choices. i would, however, like to protest that they think my outfit was consciously put together, since this was my extensive fashion reasoning:

1. i have a pair of bright orange socks with little daisies on them, and as much as i love them, you can't wear orange socks with just anything.
2. i had a clean orange shirt which is furry and comfortable, but which has a hole in the side that needed covering.
3. too much orange and a need to cover the hole in the shirt meant i stuck my black fleece vest, which i bought for $4 from unique thrift store in bridgeport over the top of the ensemble. (it's funny, quick-shot, that you think this was a put-together look, because my blogmate asked me repeatedly the whole winter when i was going to stop wearing that thing and put it in the laundry already.)
4. add the less-wrinkled khakis and head for work.

quick-shot's partner in crime will note that when she read our blog profile, she questioned me on our dislike of designer jeans, and i couldn't even answer her question about what constitutes designer jeans, since the only jeans i know about are the the one pair i have with a huge hole in the butt, and the other pair i have without the huge hole in the butt.

so. miss quick-shot and miss fancy-pants (your official blog names until you start participating enough to give yourselves new ones), i may do a lot of quirky things, but putting effort into my dress is not one of them.

ps. don't think i'm letting you get away with "oh, j___? he's nobody..." either.

revenge of the nerds

conversation between ng and i seems to keep coming back around to our respective dorkiness. it's a natural instinct, i think, among those of us have always been a little nerdy, to put it out there all at once, lest you inadvertently give the impression that you're actually cool and then get all tangled up in maintaining the illusion. it all started as i was trying to give him a little bit of blog back-story to get him caught up. i put my foot in my mouth trying to explain about the bizarre events staged by my blogmate's theater geek neighbors, forgetting momentarily that ng actually is a theater geek. he absorbed the ribbing rather well, and put out his theory that we all have some degree of inner dork. i argued rather adamantly there's nothing closeted about my dorkiness- that i wear it all on the surface for everyone to see. i'd like to think that it's an endearing quality, but i'm probably wrong... actually, i might even be wrong about the inner dork part.

in spite of my constant complaining about having to work all the time, here i am, putting in an entire day that is totally self-inflicted. granted it's for exorbitant amounts of extra money (see multiple past blogs referencing my love of shopping). this action in itself might be considered dorky, but really it's about shoes.

anyway, as i was getting settled into my temporary work space (i.e. surfing the internet), i discovered that not only could i not print anything, but that my computer wouldn't even acknowledge the big fancy laser printer sitting right next to it. after trying all the tricks i know (high-tech stuff like making sure it was plugged in) and even attempting the add-printer wizard, i gave up and called IT.

aside: i think that the all the installation wizards so graciously provided to us are actually some kind of cruel joke being played on us by the microsoft computer geeks (probably well-deserved, given the forthcoming computer-geek mockery that ensues). it looks like idiot-proof, user-friendly stuff, but i, for one, still can't ever accomplish the task at hand and feel even dumber about it because they make it look so easy.

the IT guy on the phone was pretty patronizing until it became quite clear that he couldn't fix my problem. he did, however, access my computer remotely- i'm always a little creeped out when that happens- there's something freaky about your computer executing all these commands (with the mouse arrow moving all around) when you're not the one doing the commanding. (for those of you who are mystified by my intense hatred of horror movies, my fear of possessed computers ought to convince you that i'm not faking it).

so phone IT guy (PITG- p could also stand for patronizing) gave up and dispatched live, in person, frenetic IT guy (FITG). FITG was every bit as peppy as PITG wasn't. he was tickled pink to even have found me (and more importantly the printer), and i have to say that he got full credit for finding his way through the maze of hallways, as i was totally incapable of explaining where i was. i spent the next 15 minutes in a tiny room with one highly energetic dude who was so surprised by his inability to fix the problem that he crawled under my desk on hands and knees to check things out (i wasn't sitting at the desk at the time)- he'd correctly surmised that only frank mechanical failure could explain his apparent lack of computer prowess. he was the happiest computer geek i've ever seen. i was less happy, since it turned out that my problem was lack of some kind of internet access so that my printer can talk to the server which can talk to my computer- this problem can only be fixed if someone takes financial responsibility for my office and pays for the service.

though i've already demonstrated how un-computer-savvy i am, i can't deny my fascination with FITG. besides, doesn't it seem like connecting the printer directly to the computer would eliminate the proverbial middle man and obviate the need for funding? maybe i have some inner dork after all...

cat dung, fake dragons and beer: a week in review

in an effort to catch up on my blogging, here is a clif's notes version of my last several days...

1. my neighbor's cat poops in my pepper plants. thankfully, my neighbor seems to notice and comes to clean out the peppers. even more thankfully, i just learned last night that the cat belongs to someone else, because the distraught owner was standing outside wondering if my neighbors were home because she really wants the cat back. despite what happened last time i let a stranger into the building (see the story about the chatty wet goth), i reeeeally wanted to let her in so her cat could stop pooping in my plants.

2. mb is especially dismayed that even though my plants are getting pooped on, his plants are still suckier than my plants. he did some kind of pruning job on his hanging plant that leaves about five leaves drooping over the side of the pot. maybe if we leave it on the ground for the cat to go to work on it, it will survive?

3. my musical-producer-wannabe neighbors have been back regularly. seriously. how can college boys singing in british accents in a back courtyard take themselves this seriously? how can i find out what they're doing? i already tried showing up at intermission with a gin and tonic wandering around their "stage" smirking. taking suggestions.

4. 4th-of-july bachelorette party antics in minneapolis: great weekend spent with my brother's fiance (known hereafter as butterknife for her amazing ability to need stitches when using said dull object), saw their new house, bridal shower went well. let me just say that no bachelorette is as noticeable in a bar as the one who shows up with a veil decorated with white lights that run off a battery pack that sits on the back of her neck. three cheers to our friend who designed that one. :)

5. my love of vicarious living is continually aided by my blogmate's new boy, who works in stage design and seems to have opinions on weighty subjects like where to purchase the best theater dragon and how to apply latex face masks. ooohh... maybe he could come critique my theatrical neighbors? or bring them a dragon?

...last week butterknife told me that from my stories, it seems like i don't actually work. point taken. but who wants to hear about paperwork? if i had a job where i bought dragons, i might tell those.