I’m So… Happy

At work we have an intercom system which serves a variety of purposes for various people.  For myself it is seen as a last resort, if I go looking for you in the typical places I think you’ll be hiding, one of the labs, your office etc. and I can’t find you, then I’ll break down and page you.  And it has been pointed out to me that unbeknownst to me I have developed a “phone voice” when I page.  My pages usually go something along the lines of “**insert name here** call 217 please **name** 217” but I somehow manage to say “two…one…seven” with the voice of an angel.  Others, however, are not angelic with their paging and not nearly so discriminating in their usage.

This cycle of abuse has been spiraling downwards for years. It began with a particular fellow employee who spend approximately 70% of her time attempting to make it look like she’s extremely busy and important despite the fact that she is naturally often neither of these things.  She often begins pages with a giggle as if to show the world, or at least our buildings 40 or so inhabitants how jovial life is in the lab.  She pages repeatedly over and over again and for two people at a time, which I have never managed to wrap my mind around since only one at a time can respond.  She once paged beginning with a straining grunt which transitioned into what seemed like a plea for help, I believe that day half the building was fairly certain she was trapped under a murderous piece of lab equipment. Unfortunately, we were not so lucky and the pages continues year later.

By far my favorite pager of all time is the CEO of our company. His pages,  unlike most,  rarely  indicate a location or a number at which he wishes to me called. They are barked out in his New York accent and usually consist of “**insert name here** would yah cawl me please!” But my favorite are the ones in which he says “**insert name here** CAWL YOUR AAWFFICE!” which in essence means “I’m looking for you where you’re suppose to be and you’re not here fucker”

The latest trend in paging is to use is as a platform for expressing your deepest darkest depression. One of my co-workers sounds like she’s about as down in the dumps as you can get every time she pages, and then fine minutes later when you see her in the hall she’s as happy as ever. I have reached the conclusion that while my phone voice is made of honey and butterfly kisses, hers is made up of ground up Zoloft and Cymbalta tablets. Today at work paging reached a new low in which two members of the warehouse support staff paged doing what I can only assume was their best Droopy Dog impressions (see video below). The first page sounded as if it was in slow motion and the pager was lost in a fog of sadness. The second page actually lasted a full minute and was 50% yawn, “**insert name here** please call 166….**creepy silence…. YAAAAAWN**…. 166.”

It wouldn’t bother me that people paged so much if at least they were quick and to the point and not ridiculous. We have all been paged at work and are therefore trained like Pavlov’s Dog’s by the introductory “Beep, BEEP!” to pause conversation and any tasks at hand to wait to hear which name follows.  We have even all begun to have auditory hallucinations when it comes to our names. “Was that for me?” “No John, they called for Sally”

Which should I do tomorrow? “CAWL ME!” or “I’m so….. Happy” in my best Droopy Dog voice?

Order in Chaos

Lately I have had a lot of friends remark on both twitter and facebook that they just love the feeling of crossing something off of their to do list. I too suffer from this disorder, I shall refer to it as “false accomplishment” disorder. I write post-it notes all the time at work, usually just as reminders, sometimes as lists. The truth of the matter, however, is that these post-it are typically representative of isolated events/accomplishments. And even if I did down and make a list of the 20 things I had to do and cross of each thing one by one I’d feel my false sense of accomplishment, only to have it followed by and inevitable “Oh shit” moment in which I realize the other 5 things I left off that list. The most complete lists I make are grocery lists and even when I get every item on that list I come home to realize another item I was running low on or should have picked up. Or I decide to make a recipe I have only half the ingredients for, because well, that’s life for you.

Lists for life, or “to-do” lists I find function about the same way. You finish everything on your list at work only to have a new project thrown at you, or better yet something you thought you finished ends up back on the bottom of some new list. So at the end of the day why do we make lists, and why do we feel such a sense of accomplishment when we finish them? That’s just humans trying to impose order on chaos, and well… that never leads anywhere good. (that’s how religion was invented and look how ridiculous that’s gotten) So… please, before things get out of hand, put down your notepads and your post-its and join me in admitting you have no idea what it is you need to do, and you have no clear concept of if and when you’ll ever truly be able to finish half of those tasks anyways, because things are constantly changing.

I can haz Job?

Five days a week I go to work, and I marvel at the fact that some of the people I work with are still there, and by that I mean…still have jobs. Why? Because they’re lazy, stupid, more interested in talking and socializing than their work.  Some of them are generally useless human beings. I marvel at their continued employment because the national rate of unemployment is over 10% and the unemployment rate where I live in Richmond, Virginia is 9.8%. This leads me to believe that out of that 9.8% of the local population at least half of them are likely more worthy of employment that some of the people I work with.  Moreover someone who has been out of work for a while would probably be so happy just to have a new job that they’d be far more focused and dedicated than the people I see take their jobs for granted daily. I’m not saying you need to be in love with your job or try to save he world everyday but if you are given a task at least finish it properly and in a timely fashion if you expect your next paycheck.

I mean if 10% of the population is going to be unemployed at least make it the 10% who doesn’t deserve a job in the first place. Maybe they’d finally learn some type of work ethic. Just a thought.

…So Hard for it Honey

(First off sorry I haven’t posted in ages, I’ve had trouble coming up with ideas for posts. If you have any please share them with me here.)

I did some depressing math recently in my head… OK, I lied because I can’t do math in my head. But it’s alright because that’s why God created Texas Instruments who in turn blessed us with advanced calculators. Anyways, getting back on track. I figure the average person works from about again 20 at the latest to say age 60 give or take a few years on either end and  that’s roughly 40 years.  A year as 52 weeks so if you figure about 2-3 weeks vacation/sick time that leaves you working at least 49 weeks every year.  Are you keeping up with me here? And at 40 hours a week that’s (40hrs) x (49weeks) x (40years) = 78,400 hours of an average life spent working.

You read all the time about the amount of time people spend watching TV or sleeping etc. Correct me if I’m wrong but while it might not be productive to watch TV at least it’s entertaining and enjoyable… unless someone else is holding the remote in which case these feelings may be slightly deminished. And sleeping… well a.) it’s not like it’s a stressful activity, b.) you usually feel better after doing it and c.) you have to sleep to live. Work on the other hand for most people, myself included, is often stressful, is not fun or entertaining and I usually don’t feel better after doing it.  So the question is… must you also work to live?

All of these facts plus my astounding deductive reasoning skills have led me to the conclusion that I will most likely spend somewhere in the neighborhood of 78,000 hours of my life working at an assortment of jobs I don’t like. And countless others complaining about people there that I like even less, and dreaming of ways to somehow become independently wealthy. And all for a paycheck. Unfortunately, in the real world in order to have the things we want: houses, vacations, cars, clothes, food, etc. we have to have the money to by them. And unless your last name is Hilton, Trump or Bloomberg,  there is only one way I know of to get that money; working. So that answers our previous question.  I suppose the key at the end of the day is finding a job you really like doing, with people you like doing it with, so the remainder of your days can be spent toiling away in happiness. Who am I kidding… the key is alcohol and drinking it when you get home from work so that you can build up the courage to go back for just one more day, or… get drunk enough to rob a bank.