So I took a couple of days off last week, and I’ve been in a bit of a slump ever since. Sometimes that means more posts, sometimes less. I don’t know if it has been the inescapable “Welcome to London” weather or my job that brought it on. Maybe it’s a combo of the two. Don’t get me wrong: By no means can I sit here and pretend that my job is bad. It isn’t. I get paid ok, I don’t have to wear a uniform, my co-workers are generally smart and funny, but it’s not like I’m a playboy photographer or race cars for a living, either. After 11 years with the same company, it’s feeling like a walk down a dead end road. It’s a relatively pleasant walk down a tree-lined dead end in a safe suburban neighborhood, but it’s a dead end just the same.

So, I’ve been in one of those funks where I start bouncing my crazy ideas like the drift racing team, the bikini car wash, and other ways to make a million dollars off of my friends. Then, I try to calculate how long I could live work-free on my current savings. Most of the time thinking is done without showering while staring blankly at the walls. And the malaise usually fades away over time like a nagging cold.

And today, something changed.

I threw on a couple of t-shirts and set out for the beach, where the waves were crashing so heavily that they sounded like a busy highway from a quarter of a mile away. And when I got there, I just ran until I was sufficiently worn out. And then, I simply walked home in the rain.

When I got to my mailbox, two things were there. The first put an instant smile on my face. Brian over at www.schuss.net answered the CD challenge all the way from the great state of Washington (one of the few states that I have personally and aimlessly toured in a rent-a-car). Although the world champion distance in the challenge so far has come from the home office in Eskilstuna, Sweden, I think this edges out San Fran for the Continental US distance title.

Thanks, Brian. Way cool of you.

The other thing was a letter containing all the newspaper articles about Chris, my childhood friend, who died back in August. His mom sent them along with a really nice note thanking me for the post I wrote about him. When a mother loses a son, and she thanks you for a small post in some small corner of the internet, you might feel very, very humbled. And when you stop to think that Chris’s sisters and parents live with his death every day, while you sort of dumped your heart into a post and moved on, you might feel like you really don’t deserve the praise.

I can only say that the articles were fucking heart breaking, but had the right effect of making me think: I’m sober, I’m alive, and the small stuff really doesn’t matter.

Thanks, Barbara. I mean it.

Before I moved to my new building, I used to sit within a few feet of a guy who needs to sneeze twice. If he doesn’t, he finds no satisfaction. Once, he even claimed very matter-of-factly that some people were single sneeze people, but he, in fact, was “a 2 sneeze guy.”

Of course if someone tells me a “fact,” I will feel a need to prove the theory, right? Don’t we all need some modicum of proof in our daily lives? Well, I do. I needed to test my co-workers theory about himself by greeting his initial sneezes with a sarcastic “gubleshyou” or by cupping my hand to my ear as if waiting for that second sneeze just to see if he was what he claimed to be.

Within a very short time, the jibes began to actually prevent him from sneezing a second time. Naturally, I began to feel bad about it (a little) and would just sit quietly after the first sneeze and let him take the second unfettered. But then he began to notice me actively keeping quiet, and my mere presence became enough of an influence to prevent the second sneeze, whether I said anything or not.

It wasn’t long before his entire theory about being a “two sneeze man” came into question when the mere thought of me waiting for him to sneeze a second time began to influence the situation. I didn’t even have to be present anymore. I had somehow built a tiny sneeze prevention robot and implanted it into his brain.

If I had been born a bespectacled Norwegian with a lab coat and some zeros in his name, I would get a fucking Nobel Prize for this sort of thing, but as a corporate American citizen, all that I can hope for is that the gunshot wound won’t be in a lethal area.

Anyway. We recently moved to a new location, and the new seating arrangements prevent me from checking on the status of the robot or exerting any direct influence in the sneeze prevention department. After two long years, the guy was finally free to sneeze at will.

Here’s a fact for you that 90% of you will understand: I am someone’s big brother. Whether I want to accept it or not, torture is genetically imprinted in older siblings.

After nearly a week in his new desk, when he finally felt comfortable enough to think that he could sneeze his first and second sneezes with both authority and impunity, I arranged to have the guy who now sits across from him to say,

“Jon says god bless you.”

Give me a sneeze, Vasili. One sneeze only, please.

Update: The guy who sits across from my sneezing co-worker came over to my desk this morning and we had a laugh about our little prank. Then he told me that he couldn’t do anything else because the sneezer made him promise that he wouldn’t mention my name and “bless you” in the same sentence again. Because of those big brother genetics, I wrote something on a piece of paper, sealed an envelope, and put the sneezer’s name on it. “Next time he sneezes, you give him this. Since you don’t know what’s in it, you are within the confines of your promise.” I think I laughed for 15 minutes afterward, because the only thing in the envelope was a piece of paper that said “Bless you.” I had to wait all day for the results, but I guess it worked, because I found the note and the envelope crumpled on my desk, and heard the guy had been gearing up to tear my desk apart before he suddenly regained his composure.

Co-worker1: You don’t like House? But, he so sarcastic and funny! And mean!”
Me: “Not really. I can’t sit through a whole show for a few good comments.”
Co-worker1: “But, he’s just like you.”
Me: Actually, I think he’s kind of an asshole.”
Co-worker2: “Bingo!”

Co-worker1 walks up to Co-worker2 and starts talking to him as if they had been conversing for the last 15 minutes. You know, he sort of hits the ground running in mid conversation.

Co-worker2, diligently wading through a bog of server support, turns to him and in a very even and almost ethereal tone means to say, “You need to slow down. I’m having trouble shifting gears and understanding what you’re talking about.”

What he actually says is,

“Every time you open your mouth, my. Fuckin’. Head. Wants. To. Explode.”

After the peals of geek laughter died down, all I could say was, “I’m putting that on this little scrap of paper so that you can’t claim that I misquote you later on.”

A co-worker came in, took one look at me, and gave me a look like “What do you have to say?”

Trying to be clever, I ripped an expression right out of some poor director’s mouth and said, “Ever feel like you’re climbing the wrong ladder?”

He just looked at me for a second and said, “Ladder? You’re at the top of a step stool. Even if you climb down and try to climb another ladder, you’ll just find yourself at the top of another step stool. You’re surrounded by step stools. Hell, there’s not a ladder in sight.”

I know what you think I should do. I’m already on it. Once I put together the most kick ass band in the world, I’m going to invite that guy to the concert and put him in the front row. When I sing my smash hit, “Satan’s Stool,” I’ll put a spotlight on him and keep it there during the whole song just like Phil Collins did to that dude back in ‘86. Then, to really make my point, I’m going to end the set by climbing a giant ladder right into Satan’s mouth just as all the explosions go off.

And the crowd. will. go. Nuts.

While he’s holding up his lighter and weeping, he’ll be thinking, “Whoa. I was wrong. I was so wrong.”

I’ll send a roadie out to get him and we’ll laugh about what a fool he was. Then, I’ll probably invite him backstage so he can hang out with the band and see the big pile of hookers and leather arm bands we keep stashed back there. I’ll probably even give him a couple of our “Wretched Agony: Live II” tour shirts to take home to the wife and kids. And don’t think that I’m going to skimp and give him the cheap shirts, either. He’ll get the $40 ones with baseball sleeves and the big demon laughing behind that angry, half-naked warrior chick with the big boobs on the front, and all the tour dates on the back. You know the one. It’s the one you wanted right before they sold out.

And he’ll wear that $40 shirt and tell the story to his grandkids about what a fool he was to doubt me that day about my clever, stolen ladder idea.

And I will finally be climbing the right ladder. Every night. All around the world.

Right into Satan’s mouth.

[pyrotechnics]

When I arrived at work this morning, I got a Vulcan salute and this:

“You know, technically, Kirk would never have touched a communicator on his chest. Those are from the later generations. He would say, [flips Nextel open like a communicator] ‘Kirk to Enterprise’…hey, you’re not writing this down, are you?”

Yes. Yes, I was. People need to know about this.

0. We Encourage Productive Discussion
Agreed Upon at lunch: “Death metal is categorized by vocal style rather than subject matter, making Shadows Fall death metal but Slayer plain metal. It is undetermined whether Black Sabbath is or is not be metal, but it is agreed that they shall be honorarily grandfathered in to the category. Anthrax is metal, and Metallica used to be, but is not anymore. It is agreed that Van Halen is definitely not Heavy metal: They are hard rock at best, and maybe just plain rock.”

1. We Have Productive Meetings
Said to me: “[Employee #3225582] swears he’s going to get you into our weekly battlefield 1942 game one of these days…”

10. We Share Available Resources
“What are you doing down here?”
“We’re here to play in the test forest.”
“I see. Be you in need of a cloak?”
“Of invisibility? Yes. Have you any swords that are +2 against ogres?”
“Nay”
“[Group] Awww.”

11. We Share a Common Customs
If given a bluetooth headset (example), co-workers will agree that talking on the phone without wires is theoretically cool. Unfortunately, half will, without thinking put their hands to their ears like Uhura and say, “Sir, the Romulans are attacking,” during their first use. Only 50% will come up with the correct response of immediately putting the device on their chest, tapping it, and saying “Kirk to Enterprise. 2 to beam up.”

100. We Are Courteous to Others
If I happen to abandon my usual “So long, Suckers!” by silently walking out the door giving a Vulcan salute, it is met with returned salutes and “Live long and prosper,” rather than confused looks and “Nanoo Nanoo, Mork.”

(Note: I know that you think that I should’ve written 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 in binary as 1,10,11,100, 101, but any good Perl dork will tell you that the 1st element in a list is, by default, element 0. No, I’m not fucking kidding.)

Co-Worker: [Looking at my shirt] What, did you just buy all the primary colors? Or did you branch into the secondaries, too?
Me: Only the primaries, I think.
Co-Worker: They do make shirts in patterns other than solid, you know.
Me: Not for me they don’t. Solid pants, solid shirts, monkey to monkey, giraffe to giraffe, less thinking, less mistakes.
Co-Worker: You know the next step is a closet full of all black pants and all white shirts…
Me: …a row of skinny ties, and a shotgun. I know.

*I refuse to explain Dorf references citing concerns that someone may bring that piece of crappy pop culture back from the dead.

Start Here
My day started with a conference call that was interrupted by security personnel evacuating our area, because they had found a suspicious package. I figured it must’ve been a mistake, because security didn’t seem freaked out and sent us all off toward sealed exits, from which we would have to back track to find a way out. My thoughts were less on being safe than about the reasons why security is a low paying job.

We’ve been through a thousand fire drills, so I don’t think any of us took the situation very seriously until the bomb squad yelled “Fire in the hole” and blew up the package in the parking lot. Hearing a loud explosion at the workplace really wipes the sarcastic smirk off of your face pretty quickly.

End Here
As if a bomb threat doesn’t make the day feel strange enough, while I was driving home, something strange passed in front of my rental car. As I sat there listening to some jazz, waiting to get through a neighborhood intersection, a 70’s model orange car passed in front of me. Nothing unusual there…except for the fucking FLAMES POURING OUT FROM THE HOOD AND UNDERCARRIAGE. If you’ve ever seen a car on fire on the side of the road, it’s kind of weird. If you see the fucking thing bombing through an intersection in front of you leaving you with only a trail of smoke and the nagging feeling that there is no way you just saw what you just saw, you know how I feel.

When I had pulled through the intersection, I confirmed that I was not insane, because the driver actually pulled into a parking lot and managed to open the hood. He was standing there talking on his cell phone as if driving a comet through the streets of Quincy was a normal part of his daily routine.

“Yea. It’s me. Mmm hmm. Guess who owes me ten bucks. That’s right, fuckhead, you do. Yes way. The test comet made it 2.7 miles before it started burning, and 4 before my sneakers melted to the pedals. Fuck yea, I pulled over! These sneakers are practically new. What? No, no it’s still burning, all right. Can’t you hear it? Hey, can you come down and pick me up? Oh, you are a di-ick. Fine. Ok, FINE. Yes, I swear you can keep the ten bucks. Just get down here before Ma figures out who has her car.”

On the way out today, I was talking about the recent revival of my fascination with DJing since seeing “Scratch.” I happened to be talking about Mix Master Mike, and ended the conversation with, “Once I get 2 turntables and a microphone, I’m outta here.” I think the minute that I had uttered “…tables” a guy in the next row was already on his way over to intercept. He got me on my way by.

MC Interceptor: “Come on, man. You wouldn’t know what to do with two turntables and a microphone.”
DJ Electricujon: “Well, actually, I was a DJ in college all four years and ended up being the Production Director of my college radio station my senior year, so…”
MC Interceptor: “What kind of turntables were they?”
DJ Electricujon: “Technics 1200s, I think…”
MC Interceptor: “S Arm or straight?”
DJ Electricujon: “S arm, I think…”
MC Interceptor: “So you were using magnet drives rather than belt drives…”
DJ Electricujon: “It was a while ago, so I’m not…”
MC Interceptor: “making rotating the turntables back smooth…”
DJ Electricujon: “Oh, they were smooth, I guess…
MC Interceptor: [phone rings] “I gotta take this…”
DJ Electricujon: [to everyone] “Why do I feel like I just got schooled? I’m actually feeling shame here. ”

I’m not claiming to have been Z-trip, but man, I felt like I had been slapped like a pimple-faced poser wearing an Adidas jacket with “Battle Master DJ Jon” sewn on the back for merely mentioning the word “turntable.” Make no mistake about it: I may be nerd school on the outside, but that’s just the coating that keeps the creamy, old school center from oozing all over the room. I really should’ve just stopped talking and started popping and locking right there. No one can find the strength to battle you after you break dance electrocute them.

Yes, yes, y’all. To the beat y’all. Yes, yes y’all. Steady rock, y’all…

(I’ll be cold chillin’ in my fantasy world if anyone needs me.)

Friday
I was supposed to have the day off, and ended up working from home all day. At what point did work take highest rating spot in my life? When will what I enjoy get more time than that which I don’t?

Saturday
I was thinking that it was odd and slightly cool that a carload of girls was so into Star Wars that they yelled, “3P0!” out the window at the #1GF! and me. “Oh that’s nice” the #1GF! said sarcastically. Knowing that the #1GF! doesn’t like Star Wars, but doesn’t hate it enough to get offended by the mere mention of C3P0, I asked “Wait, what did they yell?”

“Eat Me Out. What did you think they said?”

Sunday
I went out on my porch to read the housing section and I somehow started talking to the woman downstairs. As a pretty anti-social guy, I found it pretty interesting that we talked for an hour. Even more amazing was that the #1GF! came out and we all talked for another 2. You have no idea how much people will tell me about their lives, and how little I will provide them about myself.

Monday
Jerry Springer presented me with this point to ponder: What will the woman do for a face when the dog calls to get his ass back? I guess only Jerry and the dog know for sure.

When someone gets their car smashed into, good responses are things like “No!” or “Dude, that fuckin’ sucks” or even “The next hooker’s on me, brother.” In no case where it is not your loss are you allowed to say something like “Well, at least no one was hurt.”

Ugh. I know you may not know what to say, but saying “At least no one got hurt” comes across like “It could’ve been worse, so look on the bright side!” And there’s nothing worse than a Professor Positive making light of your losses, when you’ll be spending the next month fighting the insurance company and driving a gray Chevy Impala that smells like ass and cigarettes.

I can tell you that after my house burned down, people would to say that all the time. And I’ll tell you, there’s nothing that incites the urge to burn someone at the stake than telling the story of how everything you owned was turned into a smelly, black pile of crap, and having people offer that pearl of wisdom to cheer you up. I mean this was only a small fender bender, and not a huge deal, so I was lucky that only a couple of people said this to me today. Being gracious, I only offered to light only one of them on fire, which was politely declined.

But, at least no one got hurt…

The next time you find yourself playing the Professor Positive card, just skip it. Instead, show the person a sympathetic furrowed brow and pony up the cash for the free hooker.

Ever just look around and think to yourself, “This is it. This is all I’m ever going to be.”

Hopefully, your life is as gloriously fufilling as mine and you don’t follow it up with “now where’d I put that .22?”

Yesterday, while walking down the hall at work, I passed by a trainee that was so tall and pretty that the first thought that went through my head was “Oh that’s just Bullshit. She should not have to work. Women like that do not become fund accountants.”

Then, I wondered if my level of agitation with the situation would be considered flattery or downright sexism. Thank goodness no one knows what I’m thinking. Oh Fuck. Please pay no attention to the aforementioned ramblings.

Sir Dennis: They are not gonna release the album…because they have decided that the cover is sexist.
Nigel: Well so what? What’s wrong with being sexy?
*See Spinal Tap for a complete reference.

I worked from home yesterday, and I guess I missed the new intern’s first day, which is fine, because I am under the distinct impression that interns end up costing way more in productivity than anyone ever gains from them. No offence intern, if you happen to find this, but the most productive thing that any intern has done for me in the past was to fall asleep in the middle of a question, because I at least got a chuckle out of it. But, I don’t blame any of them, because they’re young, impetuous, and short timing the minute they start. That’s the way they’re supposed to be.

When I got in today, the following conversation ensued with my fellow dungeon mates.

Elf: I warned the new intern about you.
Me: About Me?
Elf: Yea, because you’re the resident anarchist.
Me: I am?
Elf: Like you didn’t know this.
Me: I had no idea.
Wizard: Oh, Everybody knows that.
Me: Well, I didn’t. I had no idea.

They then prattled on about something like where the “Sword of Illumination” was hidden and I begrudgingly accepted my new title by setting their waste baskets on fire and dancing around them shouting “An-ar-chy! An-ar-chy!”

Ok, maybe the fire thing didn’t happen because of recent revisions to the company conduct policy, specifically sections 224, 227, and 229: No booze in the drawer, dead cats are not funny, and setting random fires is strictly prohibited (even in cases of self defense).

All kidding aside, I was actually slightly offended by being called an anarchist, but I wasn’t willing to explain why at the time, so I just moved on. I’m sure that there are some bomb toting Che Guevara motherfuckin’ badassss anarchists out there that blow stuff up, steal from the rich, and eat nails and broken glass in their corn flakes, but I’ve never met one of them. I think the only anarchists that I’ve ever come in contact with have been fat, greasy morons in combat boots who had no friends, bad haircuts, and the inevitable black T-shirt with a big red A on it. They were always such painfully big pussies that I could hardly stand to look at them, nevermind take them seriously. So, whenever I hear “Anarchist” I don’t think of the nihilist, bomb toting psychos of the 1800’s. I flash to this…

At a rock concert in my youth, the concert promoters had set up this open mic tent where anyone could get up on stage and say whatever they wanted. Normally, I would’ve avoided something like that as if it were the “Voting is Cool” tent, but as luck would have it, when I walked by there happened to be the stereotypical Mr. Anarchy up on stage. He stood mightily telling the crowd how government was tearing the world apart and how beautiful life would be if we dumped our political system for anarchy. There was some light applause and a few encouraging whistles, so he pressed on… and on… and on…

Even though I had nothing to do with the moderation or organization of the show, I can tell you that I simply walked through the crowd and onto the stage without taking my eyes off of him and took the mic out of his hand mid-sentence. While standing close enough to smell the sweat on his freshly bought, $25 anarchy T shirt I glared at him and said, “This is anarchy. I walk in and take your shit. What the fuck are you going to do about it?”

And even though he was taller and heavier than me, he just stood there staring at me looking scared and stupid.

“What the fuck are you going to do about it?” I asked again through gritted teeth. And all he could stammer out was “Anarchy, man. Fuckin’ Anarchy. The revolution, man.”

And that’s why anarchy will never work: It’s backed by people without the brains or the brawn to sustain it.

Then, turning to the audience, I said, “What the fuck are any of you going to do about it?” And they all sat there silently staring up at me. Trying to elicit some response, I started pointing to individual members of the audience saying, “I’m going to take your shit… and then your shit… and then your shit… and none of you are going to be able to do a fucking thing about it. That’s Anarchy. Get used to it. I’ll see you all after the revolution, assholes.”

And during all this the moderator called some security to make sure that the microphone was removed from the man who was ignoring his signal to stop and give the mic to the next genius with something smart and popular to say.

So, when I hear that someone’s an anarchist, I think of them as the local fat pussy who won’t stand up for himself. And in this case, that was me.

And that’s just hurtful, you fucks.

I had an e-mail volley with a co-worker the other day that I thought if seen by a non-nerd type person, it would seem like complete gibberish. What is really going on is a series of subtext containing references to geekish culture that must be met, understood, and returned akin to the Masons’ secret handshake or the challenge/response mechanism of the network server. For the non-geek, I tried to decipher just what the fuck is going on.

E-mail to Me
Hi there. How are you doing down there in the dungeon? I’m glad you enjoyed Sideways (Subliminal text: We’ve never discussed the movie, Sideways, but I know about your blog, and I saw your review of it in there.). Anyway, [SNIP: Work question]

-Mr. Employee

E-mail Response

10 print “Hello.” (Subliminal text: I am a Nerd. I am making a comical reference to the Basic programming language that I used with my Commodore 64 and saved to a tape drive in the years surrounding 1983. Every line in a Basic program had to start with a number for the system to process it. Programmers typically numbered the lines by tens so that if they needed to insert lines later they would not have to re-number every line in their code.)

20 print “The dungeon is great. My power is growing every day. With a 5th level sword of power, a cloak of invisibility, and a short sword that’s a +5 against ogres, I will inevitably be dungeon master soon. (Subliminal text: Even though I never played Dungeons & Dragons, it is required that nerds be capable of speaking about it. Do you understand the reference?)

30 print “Your happiness with my choice of movies is, as you know, paramount to my success. For $5 extra per month, you can upgrade to the gold plan, and I will be glad to agree with ALL movies of your choice, eliminating all the aggravating guesswork. Limited offer. Act now.” (Subliminal text: So, you read my blog. Whoopdeedoo. I’m sarcastic and witty. Fear my line. (Subliminal within the Subliminal: “Fear my Pink line is a reference to a 2 year old article in Electronic Gaming Monthly where today’s kids played 80’s video games and told an interviewer what they thought of them. While playing Pong, one of the kids said, “My line is so beating the heck out of your stupid line. Fear my pink line. You have no chance. I am the undisputed lord of virtual tennis. [Misses ball] Whoops.” which, for some reason, can still be heard occasionally in the dungeon where I work. ))

40 print [SNIP: work related]
50 print [SNIP: work related]
60 print “Thanks.” (Subliminal text: I’m professional.)

70 print “King Magnus Resillius”(Subliminal text: …but not that professional.)
80 print “Heir to the Dungeon Throne”(Subliminal text: …at all.)

E-mail to Me:
Echo off (Subliminal text:I caught your reference, and I’m dropping a DOS reference to counter. Although “Echo Off” means that you shouldn’t see any of the following text, I thought that a simple mail with just “Echo Off”, even though accurate and funny, would have been a waste of an e-mail. But, I get it.)

I see. [SNIP: Work related] I think the silver plan is fine for me, seeing that my raise isn’t even $5/week. (Subliminal text: Monetarily they’re choking me more than the air in that fetid basement chokes you.) FIND THE HALFLING!! (Subliminal text: I see your Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master reference and raise you a Lord of the Rings Reference. I have seen the trilogy, but I didn’t wear a cape or make the woman selling me popcorn call me by my Elvish name.)

E-mail Response
[SNIP: work related]
It is not the halfling that is the issue. It’s the valkyrie and the elf: they keep shooting the food. (Subliminal text: I see your Lord of the Rings Reference, and I raise you a reference to the 1985 classic arcade game Gauntlet, in which four players: A wizard, an elf, a warrior, and a valkyrie ran around fighting cooperatively. In the game, the elf shot so fast that he would invariably shoot the food that was required to repair the health of the other players. The game would announce things like “The elf shot the food,” or “Warrior needs food badly,” or warrior is about to die.”)

E-mail to Me:
[SNIP: work related]
I am intrigued by the elf and the Valkyrie shooting the food. That must be annoying. I got a kick out of that. Have a good one. (Subliminal text: Caught the references. I have completed all tests successfully.)

Despite 11 years on the job, I fear that I will always be the junior member of my team. There is no need to bitch. I am aware that my options are to seek other opportunities or deal with it.

Despite 33 years on the earth, I feel that I will always be saddled with childish pursuits. Today, I played as many hours of video games today as I spent at work. Some call that sad. I say that I finally had a day where work and play were in complete harmony. Now, if I could only tilt the scales the other way…

While at work, I find myself hopelessly and unconsciously saying “I can’t take this anymore.“

Today, I sat reading Lion Taming: Working Successfully with Leaders, Bosses, and Other Tough Customers which proposed the view that high level managers are “lions” and to deal with them, one needs to learn be a “lion tamer.” The book expanded on this by describing managers as seeing people as either part of their pride, their prey, their enemy, or something ignored. For the first few pages, I was pretty interested, but soon the book began describing upper management as not only a different breed, but as people that should be treated as carefully as if they really are lions, capable of killing you on the spot.

At that point, I got really irritated and wondered why I was reading such a load of elitist bullshit. If upper management are a different breed, then corporate America is a fucking circus. And as I sit here listening to Minor Threat, I wonder how I digressed from the kid who didn’t take anyone’s shit to the man who eats enough shit that he feels the need to read books on what some elitist fuck in a tie wants to hear.

I think Corporate America is slowly choking the fight out of me, and the fight in me is one of my favorite parts.

Normally, I only link when I have nothing to say, but an incident at work the other day has forced my hand. Pete walks up to me and is all like “I aint checked your site in a while, biotch. I should check that shit up, but pfft. I liked it in the old days when you were all like, ‘look at the funny links on the web! linkity link link link.’ Now you’re all, ‘movie movie movie, bla bla bla.’ That shit ain’t funny, motherfucker!”

Just as I was calmly asking him to keep his voice down and to use proper corporate vernacular when addressing a co-worker, someone else piped in with, “I don’t read that shit, no more, neither. that shit is wickety wickety wack.” And another with, ‘Zackly. Fuck that shit. Fuck it up its stupid ass.”

Then they all started talking about throwing a biotch in a diotch, while I just sat there pretending not to hear them and winding the giant clock around my neck.

So, because of Pete’s insatiable need for amusement, I will turn this little bitch box into an actual honest to goodness weblog for a day. I read a very nice article at googletutor.com that explains a neat little google hack that allowed me to fish all the links below from the stuff that people stash up on their web sites (article here). Some are movies, some are pictures, and there’s a flash game in there somewhere.

Linkity Link Link Link:

http://shogun.shafted.com.au/temp/Mcleodowned.jpg
http://www.n3t.net/humor/jesusbrb.jpg
http://www.kvak.com/slike/200105b.gif
http://www.bordergatewayprotocol.net/jon/humor/video/
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/american_gene_pool.jpg
http://leech.dk/beatbox.wmv
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/cooltshirt.jpg
http://leech.dk/funkypong.swf
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/ft031003.gif
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/happynewyear.jpg
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/hit-ctrl-A.jpg
http://leech.dk/japan_national_yoyo-contest_2003.mpg
http://leech.dk/pop.swf
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/popecore1.jpg
http://leech.dk/redvsblack_switch.mov
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/stone.jpg
http://leech.dk/swearing.swf
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/whocares.jpg
http://leech.dk/bubblegum.php/word.jpg

A couple of quick accounting tricks that I learned while doing multi-class mutual fund accounting with nothing more advanced than a pencil and a big-ass eraser. I don’t know why they came to mind today, but they did, so I spread the love.

1. If the sum of the digits of a number are evenly divisible by 3, then the number itself is divisible by 3. For example, 2235 (2+2+3+5=12) is divisible by three, while 2235525 (2+2+3+5+5+3+5=25) is not. This might be useful when pretending to be Rain Man or when dividing up a large number of M&Ms.

2. If you are actually one of those humans that balances their checkbook by hand, it is useful to know that transposing two numbers (writing 132 instead of 123) is easy to spot with a simple trick: Take the number that you were supposed to end up with and subtract the number that you actually ended up with. Then take all the digits of the result and add them up. If it is evenly divisible by 9, then it is very likely that you transposed 2 numbers when doing your math. Or you can simply follow the old accounting method of forgoing the math, over and shorting the difference, and spending your time on more useful pursuits.

There’s something very satisfying about piecing together what you’re about. I was thinking about how I used to promise fund accountants that if they allowed me to interfere with the 237 steps that got them through their day, I would save them enough time that they could eat lunch. I can remember a lot of wide eyes that thought that it was impossible, and groups of trusting people who were overjoyed at gaining nothing more than an hour away from their desks. That’s the environment that I’ve spent my entire career in.

I thought about all the scripting and other processes that I’ve introduced over the years that have saved people time, aggravation, and errors, and eventually about the global structures that I’ve set up to protect our network.

In a moment of clarity, I expressed the driving force behind my work: My greatest satisfaction is building the better mouse trap.

At around the same time, I found out that the only thing more discouraging than the nagging feeling that all the extra effort that you donate to the company won’t do you any good is hearing your employer express it to you directly.

I have the sinking feeling that my career is simply a job, and I have officially exhausted all my avenues. And I’m exhausted.

Mr.EngineerPal: So wait. You’re telling me that you’re actively trying to manage your career?
JonVonJobi: I’ve been at my company for 11 years, I’m consistently busting my ass, and I’m nowhere. I really don’t know what else to do.
Mr.EngineerPal: But, that’s so corporate and unlike you.
JonVonJobi: Maybe you’re right. I don’t think that it’s going to get me any closer to the dream.
Mr.EngineerPal: The dream?
JonVonJobi: Owning the strip club/car wash.

*The next line is “…of making real cream? Big Shot, Heavy Hitter on the main Scene.” You’ve heard it a thousand times. Identify sans Google.

On the way to work, I looked over at the sun rising over the water and thought about how I’d spend my day if I weren’t going to work. I imagined sitting for a little while with some iced coffee, just watching the sun transform itself from the fiery red giant into a pale impression of itself. Instead of then imagining myself spending the day as fully as if it were my last, I could imagine nothing other than myself walking home at 9AM, bored shitless with a full day in front of me.

I wondered to myself, “What’s it all about?” As usual when entertaining something important, I distracted myself. I punched the gas simply to hear the whine of the turbo, and sped off only semi-secure in the answer “cash equals turbo, and turbo is king.”

As the day wore on, and I became embroiled in more and more minutiae at the expense of larger initiatives, I became more and more aware that my morning question was hanging in the back of my head, stalled like a hung application waiting for input before it could shut itself down. By the time I made it to the gym at the end of the day, the question was eating nearly 87% of my system resources begging to be answered.

Whats_it_all_about>
It’s about breathing and avoiding not breathing?

Jackass>
North

Jackass>
42

Jackass>
Fuck

I don’t know how to…oh you’re going to pay>
Ok. Maybe, it’s about goals and achieving them?

You seem to be asking. What are your goals?>
Dunno. House. Promotion. Kids. 8 hour hard on. Whatever.

And why do you need to a promotion?>
Respect? Validation?

Why?>
To make more money.

Why?>
So, that I can have nice things.

Why?>
Because having a big TV, and lots of music is nice.

Why?>
Because they make like more pleasant?

Why? Isn’t sitting watching a sunrise better than any Hall & Oates album that you can imagine?>
Definitely, yes, but complicated things make life more fun.

You don’t think that simple things are fun? Do you really have more fun with your big TV than that bent paper clip on your desk? Didn’t think I knew about that, did you? C’mon. You don’t really believe that consumer electronics are the keys to your happiness. They make you tired. They clog your head so that you can’t even think. I mean right now you’re talking to yourself, man. But, if you say that happiness is what you’re after, what is the point of being happy? Or is that the point of life?>
Happiness is makes the time go faster, that’s for sure, but I’m not sure that it’s the point of life. I mean there are people out there that derive happiness from the pain of others. Who is perusing the end goal in that situation? That can’t be it.

And the more I tried to delve into the answer, the worse the problem became…

What if Jesus really is the answer?>
I think the biggest cop out in Western civilization is that if you follow a set of rules then you will receive eternal paradise, payable only to you, and only after you die. That’s REALLY burying your head as to the point of life. It’s the perfect cop out to not have to think about any big questions at all. It’s all laid out for you very neatly in verse to quote whenever you feel threatened. But, if you think that life is some sort of dress rehearsal for a pageant that is to take place after you are too deceased to get the invite, you may be wasting what little life you have on things that don’t really matter. Imagine what your reward in heaven will be for a life lived well. That may be what you see as your road to happiness. Whatever that is, you really might want to strive for that now, because you might not get another chance.

Ok, suppose that there is no God at all. We’ve removed that option from the system. No heaven, No Mel Gibson, No George Burns, nothing. What is the point?>
If you eliminate the religious rules, what do you have? Social rules? Governmental rules? Under whose authority do all of these rules exist? Who says you can’t just live on a piece of land, or walk along a “private” beach, or copy some music to further drown out any possibility of thinking? Someone says you can’t. Under whose authority do these rules exist? Yours? If they are not rules that have been developed by you and for you, you are really not bound by them, are you? I’m not saying that there are no consequences to breaking them, but you are not truly bound by them. To follow rules is your choice.

If, then you are not bound by any rules, and living in a world where you are subject only to your own authority, what then is the point of life? It’s just you. What do you say it is?>
Say it>
Say it>
Say it>
And then ask yourself what imaginary blockade is keeping you from seeking it.>

[CTRL][BREAK]

Two cool things happened to me today: A high level manager suggested that it may be beneficial to sit down talk with his boss about my career (or lack thereof), and my GF earnestly said that I could quit my job if I really needed to.

Who’s livin’ the life, wage slaves? Me, that’s who. If anyone needs me, I’ll be sitting on the couch fanning my sugar mama.

Someone came up to my desk today and asked

Do you ever write anymore?

And I knew exactly what he meant. I don’t. I crank out these retarded little movie reviews that are as boring to read as they are to write, but make me feel like I’ve written something. I haven’t, and I’m wasting both your and my time. And I think I may know why.

Last week, even though Friday was a holiday, I still managed to put in 45 hours, and it’s getting to be the norm. I know other people do that sort of time standing on their heads, but I don’t. I’ve worked nearly every weekend, never eat lunch, and rarely get out of work on time. By the time I get home, I really don’t give enough of a shit about anything to move my ass out from in front of the idiot box, nevermind getting my mind clear enough to sit down and pour something coherent out.

I suppose if all of our jobs were these wondrous hours where we dedicated ourselves to projects that bring out the best in us and the world, rather than just whoring ourselves, selling the only commodity that giant corporations haven’t figured out how to undersell us on (our labor), then when we got home, we wouldn’t even need to spend time unwinding, or shutting down our brains. We could scrutinize our time, and not be faced with the reality that for a good portion of our time, we’re completely wasting our lives (You can accuse me of being overly dramatic on this if you can think back to the last meeting that you were in, and tell me that you couldn’t have thought of a better way to spend your time.) And even when I look at a maximum lifetime of 100 years, it just doesn’t seem like enough time to figure things out, nevermind get anything done.

And this week, this has been bothering me. It’s not just the job. It’s everything: The TV and the radio always seem to be on, derailing any ability that I have to sit and think clearly. I’m not sure if I’m living the life that I want to lead, and I don’t know if the life that I want to lead is made up of my own desires or desires manufactured from a well-targeted marketing scheme. And I really have this nagging feeling that I will never be president.

Today, as if timing were everything, a friend asked me if I could’ve be doing anything at that moment, what would it have been? Because I had just completely wasted 2 hours in a meeting trying to listen to a very knowledeable security expert speak while an audience member consistently derailed his presentation by trying to make themselves the focus of the meeting, and I had messages from two local, and two global sites that needed my help to get them back on track, all while trying to keep my own corporate-wide initiatives moving along, I went just the slightest bit

blank.

I imagine that the purpose of the question was to unconsciously unleash the direction of my true calling in life, but all it did was provide me with an image of myself laying on my back, on the floor in my apartment, simply listening to myself breathe.

And if that is the best dream that I can muster, then something is wrong. Laying on my back should be some sort of recovery from climbing Everest, not the Everest itself.

So, today I had a meeting with a major virus vendor, and they brought me a freebie. I was pretty psyched about it, as it is only the 3rd freebie that I’ve gotten from them in the last five years. The other times I got a 2 inch by 2 inch notepad, and an ugly-to-the-point-of-unwearable T-shirt. The notepad is still on my desk, and I think I somehow got paint all over the T shirt. Or maybe it was oil. I can say for sure it wasn’t any form of excrement, which, I suppose, is something.

This time, I got a pen, and its simple usefulness shot it to the number one position on the vendor’s freebie list with a bullet.

As I sat staring at it’s shiny surface, imagine my surprise when found a little card next to it that read exactly as follows:

Ensure Years of Uninterrupted Pleasure! Please accept our gift of 5 FREE Refills for this beautifully crafted Basics writing instrument. ($4.95 shipping and handling.)

So, the manufacturer doesn’t exactly understand the meaning of the word “free”, but even in Thailand, $4.95 seems like a very cheap price to pay for even a couple of hours of ensured and uninterrupted pleasure.

Then again, I’m forced to wonder what the voltage of these refills could be.

I’ve been working with my host for a month to get my site moved to a new server, and they finally got it working in the last week or so. Because I am a lazy bastard, I haven’t explored the options that this affords me, nor even made a single post.

I’ve been busy working every spare moment that I have. I see it as the first in a series of unavoidable steps toward becoming my father. I’m sure that he didn’t want to work 14 hour days, at first. He probably did a few extra hours here and there, and then 8 hours a day became 9, and a little weekend work to complete a project became working every weekend. And here I am looking down the slope with open eyes and trudging right the fuck down.

So, I buy new CDs, read books, watch movies, or just stare blankly at the TV to take my mind off of it, but it’s always there sewing itself to my other thoughts. I’m donating more and more to the cause and getting less and less satisfaction from larger and larger accomplishments that become standard fare.

If anyone wants to open a warehouse-sized used record store in Boston that just sells CDs to people at a reasonable price and makes money through pure volume, let me know. I will need capital, expertise, and vision to get it off the ground. Oh and we probably need a plan and some sort of logo. And I will probably have to be some sort of silent partner, because with my music addiction, the old pusher’s adage of “Don’t get high on your own supply” would inevitably drive us out of business. But it will be quite a ride, won’t it? Those two weeks where we owned a giant record store? Man, won’t we look back on that and laugh?

Good times, Good times.

Bad Brains I
Last night I dreamed that my forearm was achy so I slid all the meat off only to find that part of my bone was made of rock candy. It seemed to be rotting, so I broke it off and slid the meat back on to the good portion of the bone. I think I was in a bowling alley.

The only thing that seemed to concern me about the situation was that the meat on my arm was no longer very even and I wasn’t sure if I should stitch it up or just leave it as it was.

Jon.Virus.b
After being told of increased IRC traffic on our network, I set out to try to figure out what was wrong. I tracked the issue to a file called SecureAntiVirus.exe that held port 6667 open on the infected machines. As McAfee had no pattern file to detect the virus available, I submitted the file to them for review.

Normally, if McAfee knows about the virus but hasn’t included it in a pattern file, they return a previously created pattern file within 5 minutes. For the file that I sent, it took them about 45 minutes, making me think that I might have been the first person to submit the file to them. I’m not saying that I’m the first person in the world to discover this infection, but it seems likely that I was the first to submit it to McAfee. This may or may not be true, but this virus description page didn’t exist before my submission. Because it’s only the second unknown virus that I’ve “discovered,” I’m taking it.

It’s boring, but who cares: W32/Spybot.worm.gen.f

Bad Brains II
Even though my job has kept me very busy over the last week, throwing problems at me that were taking days of research to resolve, I find myself overly tired, but not disgruntled. After dealing with two particularly trying issues simultaneously, I found myself deep in thought. In a brief, but very serious moment, I thought,

“This would all work out faster if I just had two brains.”

When you view yourself as needing a processor upgrade, you might need a little time away from the computer.

A week of a solid vacation in Hawaii will wipe out any stress that may have accumulated over the past few months. On one’s first day back, one might briefly entertain the idea that one doesn’t belong in the basement before being distracted by the accumulated workload. After nearly an hour of unconsciously dribbling coffee down one’s shirt, one knows that he does.

But now, I’m a nerd that hiked for 5 hours just to stand 2 feet away from 2000 degree lava. And accidentally cut my hand and bled all over it.

I may have superpowers now, but I’m not sure. I’ll know more when my LavaMan Super Suit is finished.