Allison and I dropped into Barnes and Noble on the way home from work today. We were out and about, taking care of some miscellaneous errands before tomorrow's dental festivities. Generally speaking, our B&N trips are pretty straightforward: Allison goes one way, I go the other, and we meet up later. Usually she returns with a guilty look on her face and three books too many, and I make her put at least one back. Sometimes. That expression is one of the quirks that I love about her.
Tonight we arrived and, as per normal, scattered. I turned a corner and found myself face-to-face with the old COO. Yeah, the guy I mentioned yesterday. Wasn't expecting that one little bit. I also wasn't prepared to see him dressed down (jean shorts, a t-shirt and some beaten-up sandals). Intellectually I understand that he had to own casual attire (everybody does), but it threw me. Call me flummoxed. My brain went through a little reboot right then and there.
I recovered pretty quickly (I don't think he noticed), and we chatted for a couple minutes. Exchanged some pleasantries and I wished him the best of luck in the future. Prior to getting hired he'd spent years doing various consulting work, so I don't expect him having any issues landing on his feet.
He left to find his wife, and I beelined it back over to Allison. She and I snooped for a couple minutes, before heading over to the checkout line to be accosted by the old French lady, Elizabeth, who works the cash rep. Allison, you see, also worked at that particular store for a couple of months before landing a position at the current job. Elizabeth is the top seller of memberships at the store (easily doubling everyone else) because (1) she's an adorable tiny old French lady, (2) hard to understand, and (3) will not – repeat, will not – let you leave until you've signed or re-upped something.
It took somewhere around five minutes to purchase a a blank journal for Allison along with a pair of books and I had to sacrifice an email address to the Barnes and Noble Marketing Gods, but we made it out alive.
Then we went for sushi. Well, I had sushi and she had beef teriyaki. Allison doesn't do fish... yet.
18 September 2009
17 September 2009
Counterbalance
It's all about equilibrium this week.
To celebrate our anniversary Allison and I went to see Dave Matthews over the weekend. The show, while great — it's Dave — was slightly disappointing. Understandably, they're touring to promote The GrooGrux King, but they didn't play much else. Seriously, I think they played every single song off the new album. But no Ants Marching. No Stay (Wasting Time). I think they only played Crush to avoid an outright mutiny.
The overall sound of DMB is changing. I'm also not sure how I feel about the new sax player. The new guy's got skills (Allison wasn't aware it was possible to play two woodwinds simultaneously), but I miss LeRoi. Something was just different, the vibe of the whole evening. We got our money's worth and both enjoyed ourselves, but without a doubt the last show was a much better time.
You take the good and the bad together.
Bad: The upcoming weekend is going to be full of suck. My wisdom teeth are coming out on Saturday. Not looking forward to that one little bit, no sir. Cross off the whole weekend plus Monday. Welcome to Vicodinland, population me.
Bad: Work is also getting scary again. We had yet another round of "workforce reductions." While it was only around eight people, several of them were close friends, and all of them seemed immune going in. Hell, nobody expected this, not a month after the last cut. I can't help but wonder if they were the lucky ones — they got severance. What happens if the doors close?
It all started Monday, when the owner of the company fired the Chief Operating Officer. It's sounding like they had a fundamental disagreement about the gameplan, and the boss decided that the COO was holding us back as a company. Who knows? But the timing is curious: not three days later and there are boxes in the hallways.
Tomorrow is our quarterly communication meeting. Unlike the previous ones this is a mandatory thing, and they're apparently locking the front doors and turning off the phones so everybody's around.
Good: I got some great news last week, unrelated to the office chaos. I don't want to jinx anything, so that's all I'm going to say on the matter for now.
A lot of highs and lows lately, as my world tries to stabilize itself. Dear World: knock it off already.
To celebrate our anniversary Allison and I went to see Dave Matthews over the weekend. The show, while great — it's Dave — was slightly disappointing. Understandably, they're touring to promote The GrooGrux King, but they didn't play much else. Seriously, I think they played every single song off the new album. But no Ants Marching. No Stay (Wasting Time). I think they only played Crush to avoid an outright mutiny.
The overall sound of DMB is changing. I'm also not sure how I feel about the new sax player. The new guy's got skills (Allison wasn't aware it was possible to play two woodwinds simultaneously), but I miss LeRoi. Something was just different, the vibe of the whole evening. We got our money's worth and both enjoyed ourselves, but without a doubt the last show was a much better time.
You take the good and the bad together.
Bad: The upcoming weekend is going to be full of suck. My wisdom teeth are coming out on Saturday. Not looking forward to that one little bit, no sir. Cross off the whole weekend plus Monday. Welcome to Vicodinland, population me.
Bad: Work is also getting scary again. We had yet another round of "workforce reductions." While it was only around eight people, several of them were close friends, and all of them seemed immune going in. Hell, nobody expected this, not a month after the last cut. I can't help but wonder if they were the lucky ones — they got severance. What happens if the doors close?
It all started Monday, when the owner of the company fired the Chief Operating Officer. It's sounding like they had a fundamental disagreement about the gameplan, and the boss decided that the COO was holding us back as a company. Who knows? But the timing is curious: not three days later and there are boxes in the hallways.
Tomorrow is our quarterly communication meeting. Unlike the previous ones this is a mandatory thing, and they're apparently locking the front doors and turning off the phones so everybody's around.
Good: I got some great news last week, unrelated to the office chaos. I don't want to jinx anything, so that's all I'm going to say on the matter for now.
A lot of highs and lows lately, as my world tries to stabilize itself. Dear World: knock it off already.
07 September 2009
Bliss
Yesterday marked my one year wedding anniversary. And things are just as good today as they were then. Better, actually. We've got something strong, and I'm looking forward to many more wonderful years.
Say what you will about eHarmony and the hokey commercials, but don't doubt their results. They found Allison for me.
Say what you will about eHarmony and the hokey commercials, but don't doubt their results. They found Allison for me.
31 August 2009
War of the Handles
My eighty-six year-old grandfather beat me to Twitter.
I signed up today, which doesn't mean much in the here and now. It probably won't mean much later, honestly. I doubt I'll be using it much, beyond following a couple of bloggers and online personalities that I find intriguing. I've been told — commanded really — that I need to get on the bandwagon. So, we'll see. Call it a new experiment.
I know myself too well, when it comes to communication and networking. Bottom line: I suck at it, outside of folks that I physically interact with regularly. I've got a feeling that fragmenting my attention into yet another "social communication tool" will only make matters worse. But here's hoping that I'll turn a corner.
What really gets me is the proliferation of online identities. It took me a good twenty minutes to come up with a Twitter handle. Damn near every single iteration of my name was taken. My primary online pseudonym, "kakuzo" (see blog address), was taken. As an experiment I started typing in random stuff, and it was quite amazing how many are already allocated. I've already lost a couple of those battles.
The other day, for example, I found out there's another Designing Me on Blogger. Thank you Maja from Arizona for stealing my thunder, both here and on Twitter. I was around first, just for the record (neener, neener!), but (1) she did come on the scene while I was off on one of my various Blogger hiatuses and (2) she seems to be fairly active on both fronts. So I don't mind too much.
The second I found something I liked Twitter-wise I immediately went around and snatched up the corresponding gmail address (and variations on it), since I'd like to try and keep a handle (pardon the pun) on my internet branding.
I signed up today, which doesn't mean much in the here and now. It probably won't mean much later, honestly. I doubt I'll be using it much, beyond following a couple of bloggers and online personalities that I find intriguing. I've been told — commanded really — that I need to get on the bandwagon. So, we'll see. Call it a new experiment.
I know myself too well, when it comes to communication and networking. Bottom line: I suck at it, outside of folks that I physically interact with regularly. I've got a feeling that fragmenting my attention into yet another "social communication tool" will only make matters worse. But here's hoping that I'll turn a corner.
What really gets me is the proliferation of online identities. It took me a good twenty minutes to come up with a Twitter handle. Damn near every single iteration of my name was taken. My primary online pseudonym, "kakuzo" (see blog address), was taken. As an experiment I started typing in random stuff, and it was quite amazing how many are already allocated. I've already lost a couple of those battles.
The other day, for example, I found out there's another Designing Me on Blogger. Thank you Maja from Arizona for stealing my thunder, both here and on Twitter. I was around first, just for the record (neener, neener!), but (1) she did come on the scene while I was off on one of my various Blogger hiatuses and (2) she seems to be fairly active on both fronts. So I don't mind too much.
The second I found something I liked Twitter-wise I immediately went around and snatched up the corresponding gmail address (and variations on it), since I'd like to try and keep a handle (pardon the pun) on my internet branding.
13 August 2009
Day of Days
How often do premonitions come true, I wonder. Myself, I'm not overtly sensitive in that sort of way, so I've got no experience on the subject one way of the other. But people talk about them all the time. "I just knew X was going to happen."
Twenty three employees at our office had a bad day today. Each walked into work, for what must have seemed like a normal day. They left around midday, carrying cardboard boxes.
A couple, for various reasons, had some advance warning. Most of them didn't. How many of the latter felt something was up?
This isn't our first layoff. I've got no reason to think the office is closing its doors, and I'm fairly confident I'll remain employed as long as that doesn't happen. But the atmosphere around the building has changed. The cuts are getting deeper and deeper. The uncertainty and rumor are running rampant.
I trust that the folks making the decisions are making the right ones, and we can find our way back to better times. I have to trust in that, because there's not much else that can be done.
Twenty three employees at our office had a bad day today. Each walked into work, for what must have seemed like a normal day. They left around midday, carrying cardboard boxes.
A couple, for various reasons, had some advance warning. Most of them didn't. How many of the latter felt something was up?
This isn't our first layoff. I've got no reason to think the office is closing its doors, and I'm fairly confident I'll remain employed as long as that doesn't happen. But the atmosphere around the building has changed. The cuts are getting deeper and deeper. The uncertainty and rumor are running rampant.
We're not lost, Private. We're in Normandy.
I trust that the folks making the decisions are making the right ones, and we can find our way back to better times. I have to trust in that, because there's not much else that can be done.
11 August 2009
Fanboy
I have to admit it: I'm an Apple fanboy.
Been using Macs all of my professional life. I'm actually typing on one right now. But it wasn't until Saturday that I truly got all geeky. I just purchased my first iPhone. Man, is it nice.
My old phone, a RAZR, has been on its deathbed for quite some time. The last insult was its refusal to ring. Before that was the random "Invalid Battery" warnings. Though, that one was funny. If the phone is on I think we can safely say that the battery does, in fact, work.
I'm going to get spoiled with the new shiny. I'd wanted one since the first generation models, but have resisted the urge since I didn't need a new phone. I didn't really need one. This time around I couldn't resist.
The novelty hasn't worn off yet, and I'm still making up excuses to play with it.
Been using Macs all of my professional life. I'm actually typing on one right now. But it wasn't until Saturday that I truly got all geeky. I just purchased my first iPhone. Man, is it nice.
My old phone, a RAZR, has been on its deathbed for quite some time. The last insult was its refusal to ring. Before that was the random "Invalid Battery" warnings. Though, that one was funny. If the phone is on I think we can safely say that the battery does, in fact, work.
I'm going to get spoiled with the new shiny. I'd wanted one since the first generation models, but have resisted the urge since I didn't need a new phone. I didn't really need one. This time around I couldn't resist.
The novelty hasn't worn off yet, and I'm still making up excuses to play with it.
04 August 2009
10/6
Coincidence loves allusions, I've decided. There's nothing better then walking into the office and being reminded about the absurdity of yesterday, just by looking at my (immediate) boss's desk.
He just returned from a six day vacation; a full week plus Monday. Like me, he hates making a big deal about his birthdays. Which was yesterday. While I fully support not working on one's birthday (assuming you've got the time), it really was quite futile to think he was getting out of any hoopla.
Why I'm not sure, but the theme for his desk was Alice in Wonderland, specifically The [Mad] Hatter. I really do need to ask around as to the why.
I saw a group of folks started to decorate as I walked out. I really wish I'd made the connection yesterday, but my brain was just too fried from the whole farce. It would have been glorious to drive home with a song in my head:
At the end of the day, though, everything's worked itself out. I made a call, trying to honor everyone's intentions. Y'know, just using reasonable steps. My boss signed off on it, and all should theoretically be good with the world. For now.
He just returned from a six day vacation; a full week plus Monday. Like me, he hates making a big deal about his birthdays. Which was yesterday. While I fully support not working on one's birthday (assuming you've got the time), it really was quite futile to think he was getting out of any hoopla.
Why I'm not sure, but the theme for his desk was Alice in Wonderland, specifically The [Mad] Hatter. I really do need to ask around as to the why.
“Have you guessed the riddle yet?” the Hatter said, turning to Alice again.
“No, I give it up,” Alice replied: “what’s the answer?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” said the Hatter.
I saw a group of folks started to decorate as I walked out. I really wish I'd made the connection yesterday, but my brain was just too fried from the whole farce. It would have been glorious to drive home with a song in my head:
Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!
How I wonder what you're at!
Up above the world you fly,
Like a teatray in the sky.
Twinkle, twinkle little bat!
How I wonder what you're at!
At the end of the day, though, everything's worked itself out. I made a call, trying to honor everyone's intentions. Y'know, just using reasonable steps. My boss signed off on it, and all should theoretically be good with the world. For now.
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