reset

I got a new job! I could only give my old job three days notice, and then I was out of there. I left on great terms, I even brought in cookies on my last day. Sitting down and writing this is actually the first time I've thought about things like my old cubicle, and I've been at my new job for two weeks. I haven't been looking back.

My new job is with the state, and the training investment they put into their new workers is ridiculously great. One week training in the office you'll be working in, five weeks in the classroom, eight more weeks of training in the office, and then another week in the classroom. Fifteen weeks of learning how to do a very complex job. I'm loving it.

And remembering some things about myself. For the last 18 months I've been sitting quietly in a corner. Now, back in the classroom, I'm remembering who I am. I answer all the questions. When we work in groups, I grab the paper and take the lead. I'm smart. I don't need to feel sheepish.

I've really been pushing myself to talk to people more, to sit down with people at lunch and breaks, to be less self-conscious and just put myself out there more. And it hasn't been that hard, because I'm back in an environment where I feel confident. We'll see how that carries over when I go back to the office, but for now I feel like someone's pushed a reset button and given me myself back.

exactly how intelligent should the monkey be?

Yesterday I was tasked with some data entry. Usually this is a welcomed change from the usual, but I guess I just wasn't in the mood. After two minutes I had the hang of it, and the thought occurred to me: "You could train a monkey to do this."

I started wishing someone would ask me how the data entry was going so that I could say, "Like most of what I do here, you could train a monkey to do this."

Then things got kind of meta when I decided that that sentence needed an adjective. I spent at least an hour while I was entering data trying to decide which adjective would make the phrase the funniest.

"You could train a smart monkey to do this, like most of what I do here."

"You could train a kind of dumb monkey to do this, like most of what I do."

I repeated this sentence over and over, for an hour, substituting different levels of intelligence. I tried out smart, pretty smart, unexceptional, mediocre, kind of dumb, pretty dumb, and mentally challenged.

A smart monkey is funny because of its precision. The job is too easy for a dumb human being, but just right for a smart monkey. Unexceptional and mediocre appealed to me because I was trying to picture teaching a monkey how to do what I was doing, and I liked the idea that you could go out and pick any monkey, you wouldn't even have to find a smart one. The more bitter I became, the more "pretty dumb" appealed to me.

By the end of the day, I was trying to decide whether you would have to teach the monkey how to read before he could do the job. I reasoned that you wouldn't, as long as he was really good at matching pictures. Letters are pictures, words are pictures, etc. I decided that you would first want to try to teach an illiterate human being, just so you knew what you were getting yourself into with the monkey.

What can I say? I have a brain, and it demands that I find something for it to do.

i'm a google girl, but thank god for outlook

I totally forgot to pay the rent for our two Canada locations. Again. Outlook totally just saved my ass.

this is your brain on new moon

I just spilled sweet and sour sauce on my desk. Here are the thoughts that followed, in the order they occurred:

1. Don't get it on the carpet for fuck's sake!

2. Ooooh, that kinda looks like blood. Mmm, Edward. *Homer Simpson slobbering noise*

3. Don't get it on your pants for fuck's sake!

At least I kept my priorities in order throughout the emergency.

michael's new trick

Five or six times a day, Michael asks, "Is there anything I can help you with?" The first few times he did it, I was unnerved. I wasn't really doing anything at the moment. Should I be doing something? Is there something I'm supposed to be doing that I'm not, and this is his subtle way of getting the ball rolling?

No, he was just being nice. I interviewed Michael about his new habit tonight. His first reaction was to ask, "Is it bad?" Umm, no, unless you're another husband who is totally being shown up. Here's what I learned:

• He does it at work too (this made me feel a little less special, but okay, moving on)
• He asks it because he asks a lot of me
• It's not like when someone asks you how you're doing and expects to hear "good" and move on with their life. He's totally okay with me assigning him a task if there's something to be done.

Then I just had to ask. "Does this have anything to do with Kate Gosselin?" His answer: "Well, I don't want to end up like Jon..." Jon & Kate Plus 8 is like a Scared Straight program for husbands!

that door thing again

Someone did the whole "holding the door for me while I'm still uncomfortably far away" thing to me today and then she said "you're welcome" before I could spit out my "thank you." She was just a little premature to every part of our interaction.

the sociology of doors

This seriously just happened. I saw someone I work with walking ahead of me, approaching our door, and I took a left turn and walked through a bunch of side hallways to avoid "the whole door thing." You know the thing.

She opens the door and looks behind her. You make eye contact. Now she's required by our ridiculous office culture to hold the door for you. Except you're still, like, 10 yards away from the door. So you shuffle forward as quickly as you can. You can't run, because she'll tell you not to rush, and it'll be all awkward, like she inconvenienced you by holding the door for you. This whole little period is excruciating for a shy person.

This, like so many other things, was simpler in college. The culture at my school, at least, required nothing more than pushing your arm out while you walked through the door at your normal pace. If someone was behind you, they pushed their arm out for the next person. No looking behind you to see who's coming, no waiting for people. You could walk in a crowd of hundreds of people with barely any human interaction. Bliss!

The shuffle to walk through a door someone held for 30 painful seconds isn't the only "thing" about doors in my office. There's also an important decision to be made about thanking people. In order to exit my building, you have to walk through three doors in quick succession. I'm sorry, but I'm not thanking the same person for holding a door three times in 20 seconds. By the third time you sound like an idiot. I've adopted what seems to be the most popular pattern: I thank on the first and the last door.

Finally, you can judge a person by their door-holding technique. Holds the door back for you and gestures for you to enter before him (it's always a him)? Gentleman (and usually an Executive or someone in sales). Walks through the door and pushes his or her arm out to hold the door open behind them? Normal (this is by far the largest group). Walks through the door first and then stands there in the doorway holding it open behind them? Douchebag (and usually middle management).

if i got a competent phone, what would I write about?

(Wow, has it really been almost two weeks since I posted anything? I feel like I should post something good, to make up for my absence, but this is all I've got. Sorry.)

Okay, so someone is sitting at my desk helping me set something up on my computer. My cell phone vibrates. I read the display, "Unknown caller," and ignore it. 20 seconds later it vibrates again, quickly. They left a voicemail, great. A few minutes later it vibrates again, reminding me that I have a voicemail. Yup, I'm all over it, thanks.

My co-worker leaves and I listen to my voicemail. It's an automatic refill from Target. Like, yawn.

5 minutes later, my phone vibrates again. Could it be a text message? Excitement!

Except it's not. It's my phone telling me that I missed that call 10 minutes ago. I imagine my phone's bumbled justification for the delayed reminder:

"You know, like, 10 minutes ago when I vibrated? And then the person left a message, and I told you about it twice, and then you listened to it? Yeah, that was great. I just wanted to let you know that when that person called, you know, the person whose voicemail you just listened to? You didn't pick up. I vibrated, and I saw you looking at me, but then you didn't answer me, and it was all embarassing. Not for me! For the person whose phone call you screened. I know it was an auto-dialer, but machines have feelings too, you know? I don't want this to be all awkward, but I just wanted to bring it up again." *Sob*

you just did

Jen, Michael and I were watching Glee on FOX.com, and a commercial came on.

Jen: Can't we fast-forward through this?

Me: Nope. Someone should invent Tivo for the internet.

Jen: You just did.

letters to inanimate objects

Dear first aid cream,

Pain relief my ass!

Love,
Kiki

PS, Freaking ouch!

ouch

I was having a great, productive day. I was actually enjoying my time at work, and talking to people, and being pleasant and everything. No, really!

And then I gave myself a papercut

on my palm, between my thumb and pointer finger

with a MANILLA FOLDER.


I'm going to go put a giant bandaid on it so I don't pass out from looking at it.

oh ralph

So, I was reading an interview with Ralph Lauren. When asked his favorite authors, Ralph answered "Ayn Rand and Ernest Hemingway." Interesting, I thought. Makes sense, he's a self-made businessman. And then I got to the second-to-last question.

What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Selfishness.

I'm guessing he's a fan of her fiction and not her nonfiction, notable among which is a little book called "The Virtue of Selfishness." Actually, it's more likely that he hasn't actually read Rand, and just thinks he'll sound interesting saying he likes her.

That sounds you hear is my eyes rolling, hard.

murder and ice cream!

There's an article on MSNBC today that's making me a little stabby. The headline: "Study: Spanked kids have lower IQs."

I assumed the headline was a bit of sensationalism on MSNBC's part. Anyone who hasn't heard "correlation does not imply causation" over and over again in the classroom could be fooled by this headline into believing that spanking causes low IQ. (The example we were always given is the strong positive correlation between murder rates and ice cream sales - both of which rise in the summer). That can't possibly be what the study concludes. Right?

Except that is exactly what the researcher is trying to say. He claims that he controlled for socioeconomic status and other factors in his study, and therefore that the lower IQ scores were actually caused by the spanking. Says the researcher, ""You can't say it proves it, but I think it rules out so many other alternatives; I am convinced that spanking does cause a slowdown in a child's development of mental abilities."

I'm pretty sure this researcher was "convinced" that spanking causes lower IQ before he ever started his experiment. He goes on to explain how he thinks spanking lowers IQ, something his study could not possibly have told him. Then I get stabby and have to close the window before I hurt my computer monitor.

resumes are funny

I was skimming more resumes today, and I found a couple of tidbits I just had to share.

First, someone listed this under "Activities" at the bottom of his resume:

"Winner of doubles-competition and runner in singles-competition at Company X's yearly Table Tennis competition." [sic]

I think that's supposed to be funny? I hope? But I'm not endeared. I mean, I'd like to hear that you organized the thing, but telling me where you placed? At table tennis? That has to be "funny because it's absurd," right? Please?

Okay, so I guess the next person was using a template. At the top of the resume, I saw this string of nonsense:

123-456-1234 (p) - N/a (f)

This one took me a few minutes, but then I realized that they were trying to indicate "not applicable" for a fax number. Which, I mean, gahh. Template FAIL.

I also realized something about myself when I was going through these. Whenever I saw a gap in someone's resume, I would always scroll to the top to see if the person was female. Like, did she take off because she had a baby?

And then finally, hundreds of resumes later, I realized that I was being sexist. I mean, it's more likely that a woman would take off after having a baby, but it's not impossible that a gap in a man's resume could also be baby-related. Duh.

Later in the day, I found nothing at all amusing, and couldn't wait to run out the door at 5. I'm going to spare you the little stream-of-consciousness rant I wrote then. You can thank me in the comments.

i am one spineless, nerdy smart-ass

Okay, so recently there appeared a sign above the copier in one of our break rooms. It reads:

"Copy Machine Usage is for Business Purpose's Only!"

I've read the sign like a dozen times, but today was the first time I noticed the inappropriate use of an apostrophe on this sign. This sign, which someone printed out on pink paper, laminated, and then hung in a professional setting. Duh, people.

As soon as I noticed this, I had the urge to run to my computer and print a sign reading:

"Apostrophe for Posessive Usage Only!"

Then I did a wikipedia search for the word "apostrophe" to make sure I wasn't missing any appropriate usages, because there's nothing worse than being all snotty and correcting someone and saying something incorrect in your correction.

Turns out I was missing two basics (in addition to lots of ridiculous particulars that no one would really hold against me): contractions (e.g. couldn't) and abbreviations (e.g. gov't). But my sign doesn't pack quite the same punch when it reads:

"Apostrophe for Possessive, Contraction, and Abbreviation Usages Only!"

Usages? Usage? I can't decide, so I guess I'm going to have to give the whole thing up.

Not that I would actually be brave enough to hang the sign, anyway. There could be cameras! I could be called into offices!

top 5 reasons why yesterday was better than monday or tuesday

1. White cake with whipped cream frosting and chocolate mousse filling. One piece at the little corporate cake gathering thing, and one later while I scanned those stupid double-sided phone bills.
2. Something new and interesting (no, really!) to do at work: Reviewing resumes! (Quick tip to all job applicants ever: get yourself a nice, staid, firstnamelastname@gmail.com email address for job hunting, because seriously, people. The "quirky" "creative" address you give to your friends looks totally ridiculous on your resume.)
3. I got an examiner newsletter suggesting that I write articles about exactly what I was planning on writing articles about this month. I'm a total genius, and I rock at this job, even if I did only make $1.86 yesterday. How much did you make for writing an article about 5 new sitcoms that are airing this fall? Yeah, that's what I thought.
4. Getting exactly what I wanted for dinner. The Wii Fit board is going to weep on Saturday, but whatever, this is no time of the month for good choices.
5. Listening to Josh Groban on the way to work. Rolling my windows down and positively blaring Josh Groban on the way home. (Suck it, guy blasting hip hop in the car next to me!) Singing along loudly to all the Italian songs and feeling all smugly superior about it.

self-medicating with tween romance and dusters

Saturday was a nice day. I wrote a movie review for examiner.com and cleaned my kitchen while watching HGTV. Renovation shows always help motivate me!

Sunday started getting sketchy. I couldn't get certain parts of Breaking Dawn out of my head, and I started itching to read it for a third time. Michael and I went to breakfast, and then Michael went to work. I watched television or something for a couple of hours, and then I caved and read like 400 pages of Breaking Dawn.

Monday was just downright strange. Michael left for work early. I finished reading what I wanted to in Breaking Dawn (I lose interest when the action begins), and then I thought that maybe I should watch Twilight again. After ransacking the bookcases twice, I finally found it.

I'd heard the audio commentary was kind of ridiculous, so of course I decided to listen to it. I enjoyed it, but I didn't actually get to watch the movie, since they were talking over it, so I decided to watch the movie again. Or listen to it, really, since I also re-cleaned my kitchen (there were new dishes to be done, I needed to clean the counter and stove again, etc.)

When the movie ended, I played it again. I cleaned the living room (I even dusted!) and cleaned the bathroom. The movie ended again, and I played it again. I straightened our bedroom, and then there was nothing else to do, so I sat and watched the end of the movie. For the third time, not counting the first time with the commentary. I was kind of afraid to turn it off, I think, like I would have a panic attack if I didn't distract myself enough.

I teetered between distracted and downright miserable yesterday. I can't really believe I got so much done yesterday. Usually when I'm unhappy I just want to curl up and do nothing. I think the same thing that made me watch Twilight three or four times yesterday also made me spend the whole day cleaning. Like I needed to be busy with something so that I wouldn't be forced to think.

Michael was feeling pretty down when he got home, too, so we went out to dinner, and then to Target, where we bought the first season of Mad Men on DVD. We joked about being miserable, and I pretended to hyperventilate. We watched two episodes at home, and then it was time for bed. I read Infinite Jest before I went to sleep, instead of Twilight (which I had re-started before dinner), because really, my use of Stephanie Meyer's crack had been excessive enough.

i was not abducted by aliens last night

Last night a nightmare was pretty much inevitable.

Ever since seeing the trailer for “The Fourth Kind,” I can’t stop seeing the pixilated face of Dr. Abigail Tyler, and hearing her say “Someone… or something… came into my room… and took me away.”

For most of last night I had to sleep on my left side or my back, because I was just too freaked out to have my back to the bedroom door. I tucked my blanket around my body carefully, even though I was hot. I thought about how alien abductions only happen in the middle of nowhere. It’s not like there was going to be a spaceship hovering in the middle of town, right?

But I was still nervous, because I’ve watched all the UFO shows on television, and I know the scientific explanation for alien abduction: sleep paralysis, a state in which your mind has awoken but your body remains paralyzed. That would be reason enough for panic, but many people also have some horrifying hallucinations during the experience.

I feel about sleep paralysis the way my brother feels about killer asteroids. I wish I didn’t know it exists. Even when I can completely convince myself that I won’t be abducted by aliens (which is a tall enough order when you’re lying alone in the dark), I still have to worry about having the experience of being abducted. Does it even matter if it’s “really” happening if the experience is horrible enough?

I did fall asleep, eventually. I didn’t experience sleep paralysis, but I did have a really strange nightmare.

Here’s the premise: Michael Jackson is sleeping in a bed with a married couple. He may have been sleeping at the foot of the bed like a dog, I’m not sure. Later, the couple are telling someone (a documentarian?) about the noises that MJ made while he was sleeping. You see an image of him asleep and hear these strange, high-pitched noises. They play it back slower, and you hear him calling for his mothership, or something.

And then I woke up. Not in a cold sweat or anything, but kind of freaked out. Still seeing the sleeping face of Michael Jackson. I told Michael I had a nightmare, and he snuggled me. Then I told him I had to go pee, but I was afraid to leave the bedroom.

I expected him to pat me on the shoulder and tell me it would be okay, but he actually offered to come out with me. When you’re with someone for a long time, your displays of affection change. Instead of buying me flowers or jewelry, Michael waits in the living room while I pee so that Michael Jackson won’t get me.

The moment was ruined a little bit when we got back to our bedroom and Michael said, "Don’t worry, the real Michael Jackson will come down in his spaceship and kick his ass.” After a second I understood that he was making a South Park reference, but I still yelled at him. “That’s not funny! We don’t say the “s” word at night!”

Despite Michael's lapse in judgment, I did get back to sleep.

the most gourmet thing i made today was instant cocoa

1. Pour about 1-1/2 tbsp of cold water into a styrofoam cup
2. Pour instant cocoa into the cup. Push the sides of the packet in gingerly, about 10 times, to make sure you get every last molecule of cocoa into the cup.
3. Hold two 7" stir sticks as you would a whisk, and whip the cocoa into the water until they form a paste. Be sure to run the stir sticks along the edge of the cup, as you would with a spatula, so that no dry cocoa clings to the side of the cup.
4. Fill the styrofoam cup to about 2/3rds full with hot water. You should see a chocolatey foam at the top.
5. Holding the two stir sticks like a whisk again, whip the cocoa and water again, being sure that the stir sticks are scraping the bottom of the cup thoroughly, so as not to leave any super-chocolatey deposits there.
6. Pour cold water into the hot chocolate until the temperature is as hot as it can be without being uncomfortably so. You should be able to take a sip, but not a swig, without burning yourself.

why i love it when it rains while i'm at work

I was at reception, and people started coming in and warning us about the clouds coming in from... I was about to say the west, but I actually have no idea from which direction they were coming. They were coming from the right, if you were looking out from the reception desk. If I had a new iPhone I'd use that fancy compass to tell you, but I don't, so I won't.

Since my desk is surrounded by cubicle walls, I took a field trip to a friend's desk to watch the clouds rolling over. These clouds are so thick and black and low that I'm kind of expecting death eaters to come flying out of them. Now that I'm back at my desk, I can hear the patter of rain on the ceiling.

The rain is something interesting to look at, something to listen to. It's a reason to be really glad you're in the building, because right now you're protected from being out in that. Instead of sitting quietly at their desks or making phone calls, everyone is talking about it. "I hope your windows are up!" Lots of laughs. I'm not really participating. I'm just sitting at my desk, glad for the storm that has made my day a little more interesting.