The Plan

I left work for class that night feeling pretty good. It was a nice day, I got a great deal. The problem with me is that I am such a creature of habit that I often ignore things that are unusual in my traveling habits. I am not used to carrying around a large bag with a camera and printer, so when I got off the 166 bus to go to class, I ignored the bag. It's not part of my habit. It didn't help that I was reading an interesting book at the time, either, and it was all I could do to get out at the right stop. I overshot it the week before, and I determined not to let that happen again. About eight minutes later, I realized what had happened, and got on the next bus going in the same direction, the 51. The bus driver got on the horn and tried, but to no avail. It was gone. And it's still gone.

All in all, I think that I'm a pretty good guy. I quite like myself, despite some faults. I do, however, hate myself when I lose things, and I do not use the word "hate" lightly. I hated myself. I wanted to injure and punish myself for being so stupid. I felt as though I weren't worth spending any energy on, that I didn't deserve...anything, really. I really couldn't stand the even the thought of me. Und dann...

The next night I had an oral presentation in my French class. I was very unprepared. I was so drained from all the work I had done for my Projet Spécial (which you don't really see reflected there) that I totally neglected the oral exposé that I had to deliver last Wednesday. I had meant to work the previous night on it, but I was a mess. The subject was something along the lines of whether or not boys are being threatened by the scholastic success of girls.­ Oral presentations are my strength, really. I can pull those off rather successfully without people thinking that they have been subjected to Chinese water torture. They even feel well informed, and maybe a little entertained.

As stated, my sales quarter was going down the tubes. It was probably my worst in about five years, and I thought that I was making a decent effort. I was beginning to seriously stress about it, and I don't seriously stress about much. This stress nearly brought me to tears when coupled with my deadline. Last Wednesday, the day of my exposé, I asked Rose to come to school with me so that I could cram as much information into my presentation without sounding like a complete fool as I could. In 35 minutes, she polished it off and acted as my audience. It was brilliant. If it weren't for her, I would have lost it in front of the class. As it turns out, it'll probably be one of the best presentations in the class.

The next day my sales quarter ended with a whimper. And the Friday afternoon was simply a pain in the ass because we had to switch desks. Christ, that's annoying. And they didn't know what they were doing, which caused further aggravation.

But the Monday, well...Everything was in disarray in the office, and I had an 8:30 meeting. The CEO is sitting in the office with us, so we know that it is going to be a shit-giving session. It didn't help that half of us weren't there on time. After the initial meeting with my sales manager in which he was silent, The Master of the Universe laid into us, particularly me, BIG TIME. He pulled no punches. He liberally threw around the words, sucked, shitty, etc. After this meeting, we all had private one-on-ones with the sales manager. His words to me the second I sat down were: "Ya got 30 days." As if I didn't already know.

I could go on and on, but this entry has been days in the writing, and I can't cram anything else in here right now. I want this month to be over with one way or another, just so that I can start blogging again the way I used to. There will be more later.