April 2004 Archives

The question of the day comes from those weirdos that interviewed Daisy Blossom: Why are manholes round?

Well?

"To ensure its position at the top, a market leader must ensure that its operating model improves faster than the competition's—which leads to the third new rule: Rule 3: Dominate your market by improving value year after year.
—Michael Treacy and/or Fred Wiersma, The Discipline of Market Leaders

Instructions: Grab the nearest book, open it to page 23, find the 5th sentence, and post its text along with these instructions. Point back to where you got the idea so that we can follow the threads. I would have to enter this game while I'm at work. via christophe

I am actually too busy to make an entry today. This is a good thing. Very quickly:

• Saturday with Rose wonderful, looking forward to more such days;
• bought new digital camera, will play with, but not too impressed so far;
• getting paid differently for a slightly different job;
• expected to do much work this week and hoping that there will be work to do;
• uncovered sinister plot, but can't get into a single detail (yet needed to type something because it is so cool)
• going to an Indian dance recital Thursday;
• wondering why they are called dance "recitals".

Now is this love, or is this love?

She asked me:

As I reported last week, Employee #1 is being shown the door. Her farewell dinner is tonight. Almost half the company will be attending. That's quite an honour, I would say.

I just had an out of body experience.

Actually, I was in a meeting to learn about the American mortgage industry, and how it all works. I was sincerely interested, as it does relate to my job right now. But I have a problem that whenever there is a meeting with more than, say, four people in it, I just can't stay awake. I try so hard to stay awake, but eventually, you'll see me shaking myself awake, recoiling as if from a terrible stink.

Because she asked so nicely:

I would like everyone who reads this to ask me 3 questions, no more no less. Ask me anything you want. Then I want you to go to your journal, copy and paste this allowing your friends (including myself) to ask you anything. Thanks.

Ever feel like this?

On the sidebar (or below the blog, depending on the size of your browser window), there is now a notification form. Please put your email address in there. Sooner or later I will get around to making it worth your while.

Why do parents nowadays just think it’s okay to burden everyone else around them just because they decided to satisfy that deep vast abyss in their egos by having insolent dirty children??

Fucking. Right. I'm not talking about the first paragraph, but the second. Every time Rose and I take a trip, there are these fucking kids that run around the train for 45 minutes screaming and laughing and what not. I hate it every time. I swear, you should have to be required to have a car before having children so that trips under 600 km can be made in peace. The breeders can have their fun-filled family time (ech!) and adults can take a nap on the train.

Sometimes I wish I could take off to a place with adults only and a very few select children. Like the ones I am related to, or Rose's daughter. Maybe the children of a few of my friends. But I cannot abide the children of strangers, especially in a public place.

Gotta go, people are hovering.

I think I am an old hand at meeting online people in real life for sexual/romantic reasons and otherwise. It all started two and a half years ago with a woman that I refer to as "S". But that's a whole other long story that you can still read in the archives here.

My company is funny. Most lay off new employees and keep old ones. But not this company. In the last four and a half months, they have laid off one who was here for five years, another who was here for four. Another four or so up and left. And this is a small company.

Today they let go an employee of eight years. Employee #1, actually. The very first. They no longer had a role for her, so rather than shuffle her off some place, they let her go. Sad for my group, as we relied on her for lots of things, and there is no one to replace her. Likely there never will be. And she was quite hot. Quite.

But she's a hero, really. She's bound to get a killer severance, and she has the rest of the spring and maybe the summer to putz around and look for options. She's in a better position than I was last summer when I got the axe. I was envied by everyone I knew.

At this rate, I should be one of the last to get it. Whooo-hoo.

My friend Saab, living in Cairo, just emailed me from Turkey. He just bought 21 DVDs for 45 million Turkish liras. There's an odd character that changes his "i"'s. Here's what he had to say:

týme ýs runnýng out at the ýnternet cafe. quýck synopsýs of what ýve done so far:

a lýttle shoppýng for DVDs (21 for 45 mýllýon!), explorýng the hýlls of
Kapadokýa ýn central Turkey, had a fewe turkýsh baths (wýth the steamy
sauna, the loofah and massage), and výsýtýng a few fantastýc mosques ýn
Istanbul. tomorrow, we hop on a ferry to výsýt Istanbul on the Asýan
sýde. A lýttle Asýan tomorrow! Tell you more when I get back ýn
Caýro.

later dood!

Saab

For your information, $1 CAD is equivalent to just over 1 000 000 Turkish liras. So he bought 21 DVDs for $45 CAD, or $33 USD. He'll have to hook me up.

I have no intention of doing a lick of work today.

Last Wednesday as I was leaving work, I had a sense of dread.

My counterpart and I, Ned, were to have a meeting with our boss to discuss goals, objectives, blah blah blah. And then at the last minute she cancels and tells us that we are to have individual meetings instead.

I would like to define the term "Marketing Women". This definition will expand as I remember every detail of why I can't stand them.

Marketing Women don't actually have to be in marketing, and they don't have to be women, but they tend to be in that general domain. They are office workers who are very professional, well-dressed and all around nice people. They also do not like direct confrontation whenever there is a problem. Rather, they would go over your head and not get their hands dirty.

Wait, did I say "problem"? Silly me, I meant "challenge".

There appears to be someone here at work that I fear will ask me out soon. This is not good. I'm in a relationship right now, but even if I weren't, there are major issues with this. I used to work with Rose, but we avoided any extracurricular activity for as long as we could because these types of things are just too sticky. There's an expression for this: Don't shit where you eat. What a sick expression.

Another friend has been burgled.

Kill them all, I say. I'm talking about the thieves, I mean. I hate thieves more than just about anyone, I think, but then again, I guess I've never been tortured, beaten or raped.

But I have been robbed, and I hate those people. I don't use the word 'hate' lightly.