That Girl's Blog

Oh, good.

Thanks to our awesome economy, my hours are being cut from 40 to 37.5 per week.

Since we just barely squeak by week-to-week as it is, a 6.25% pay cut will make things much easier.

Awesome.

Yeah, I need to look for a new job... which I'm so hopeful about, given that it took me about a year to find this one, and given that this one paid the best of any prospects I had in that year. So I'm sure this time, now that everyone's in an economic panic, I'll find an awesome job with better pay in no time.

Oh, snap!

A manager here just asked me if I could switch my work-at-home day next week so that I'll be here on Monday, because some fancy-pants bigwig is going to be here. Obviously I agreed willingly, because that's just the kind of girl I am, even though inside I'm like, "Ugh!" I thought he just wanted an extra hand around, but no, he wants me here to cover the front desk because he's actually going to ask The Douche to stay home.

You know you're really shit when they try to hide you in the closet when company is coming.

(Lest you think it's not fair that he gets a day off for sucking, worry not; we'll just switch work-at-home days, so he'll have to come in next Friday when he would normally be at home.)

Stuff I like right now. (2009, mid-March)

I put the (rough) date in the subject with the idea that I might try to do this with some regularity, and if I do, I wouldn't want a bunch of posts with the exact same title.

1) Death Note (the anime series): It does have its small share of cheesy Japanese-anime moments, but it doesn't matter; this is a great show with a compelling premise. And here's something different: The characters that are supposed to be intelligent are actually written to be intelligent, as opposed to most shows, wherein they just keep telling us how smart the characters are, but they are not demonstrably so, probably because the writers are not themselves intelligent enough to write an intelligent character.

We're currently around episode 29 of 37. I would say it's weakened a smidge since something big happened in episode 25, but maybe I'm just being a little resistant to change.

A lot of you would recognize the voice of L, one of the main characters — it's Gaeta from Battlestar Galactica. I occasionally find this slightly distracting, I guess because I find Gaeta so irritating, but no big deal. He does do a good job, as do all the English-dub voice actors.

The only thing I really don't like about the show (and it's trivial) is the second version of the opening credits. Specifically the song. The credits themselves are fine — rather bizarre, but that's to be expected — and I love the shot of Ryuk dancing with his apple. But the song... shudder. (It's on YouTube here, but don't judge the show by this!) Thank god for fast-forward.

We downloaded it, but I believe both Netflix and Blockbuster.com have it.

2) "I Like You So Much Better When You're Naked", Ida Maria: This is one of those songs that was just catchy and fun on first listen. It's about a girl who, basically, wants to shag a hot guy even though she doesn't really like him much. Lyrics; album at Amazon.com.

3) "Sometime Around Midnight", The Airborne Toxic Event: Sweeping, cinematic, epic — I'm not typically prone to describing songs in words like these, but this one I will. I can see it play out in my head like a scene in a movie or tv show. This one didn't immediately grab me; it grew on me over the course of a few listens until one day I realized that I loved it. Lyrics; album at Amazon.com.

Both songs can be downloaded from drop.io here — hover over the file, right click on the "Download" text link, and then choose the "Download" option. (You could save the MP3s on this page, but the bitrate on them is only 64kbps to keep the load time down.) Death Note you'll have to get yourself. ;-)

Battlestar Galactica finale. (No real spoilers.)

1. Mostly, I'm just kind of glad it's over. I only stuck with it after it started getting boring and lame because I knew it was ending soon. I guess I hoped they would make it up to me with a great ending. They didn't.

2. Snooooooooooze. Felt like it was about five hours long.

3. I did, for the most part, like the flashbacks with Kara and Lee. I think I just like seeing happy Kara.

4.

Confession.

I think I kind of like John Mayer. I still despise "Daughters", still think "Your Body is a Wonderland" is boring and just kind of gross, and still don't think I really know any of his other songs. (No, that's not true, there is "Waiting on the World to Change", which isn't too bad.)

But he is (sometimes) pretty damn cute (it varies wildly with this hair — both long and buzzed are not good). The main thing, though, is that I've seen some clips of him on YouTube and such, and have been following him on Twitter, and I actually find him pretty funny. He definitely has the kind of sense of humor I like. And we all know how girls feel about a sense of humor.

Edited to add: Forgot "Say", another boring one, which possibly has no other lyrics aside from "Say what you need to say".

Betty Crocker on steriods?

One of the managers I assist just told me I'm "Betty Crocker on steriods." How completely bizarre. I don't cook, and we weren't talking about cooking or anything like that. I said "FYI" at one point, which he found strangely funny. Then he was telling me that I'm very different from his last assistant (she trained me for a few days; she was older than me, probably in her late 40s or early 50s, and I think she was more serious and a little bit sort of "Yes sir"). Then he was talking about working on Sundays and I said that he shouldn't do that, that one needs to keep a personal life separate from one's work, and he also found that funny and then called me Betty Crocker on steroids.

I don't get it. [shrug]

Flickr Meme (Procrastination)

Yeah, this little meme is about 12,000 years old in interweb time. It's still a good way to not be doing work right now.

(I have a really hard time with questions like these — I have so many favorite foods, dream vacations, celebrity crushes, etc. Plus I have NO IDEA what I want to be when I grow up, which is a problem that troubles me often, and is why I went with the easy out of "rich".)

1. Favorite food: Tom Kha Gai soup
2. Hometown: Orange County
3. Favorite color: Black
4. Celebrity crush: Gerard Way
5. Favorite drink: Breve Latte
6. Dream vacation: Greece
7. Favorite dessert: Chocolate Cake
8. What I want to be when I grow up: Rich
9. Your name: Jamie
10. What I love most in the world: Elliot
11. One word that describes me: Homesick
12. Username: That Girl

Attribution:

1. Dusk, 2. (Formerly) My Drive Home, 3. Tower Bridge of London, 4. Gerard Way, 5. latte art from corner coffee in indianapolis, 6. Oia - Santorini, 7. Untitled, 8. The Rich are Wrecking the Planet, 9. Jamie, 10. Seattle At Night, 11. Winter makes me homesick, 12. An Electric Night in Times Square

Want to do this yourself?
a. Type your answer to each of the questions above into Flickr search — this link will let you search for images licensed under Creative Commons.
b. Pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into this mosaic maker.

Natasha Richardson

I can't say Natasha Richardson was ever really at the forefront of my radar, but jesus, this is sad. [ http://www.imdb.com/news/ni0714386/ ] I feel so bad for her family.

Can I speak to the big boss?

We have a sort of generic phone number that is piped to both admins' phones here at work. It's not a reception number (we really don't have a "main" or reception number here); the Phone Guy says it's the number that 911 would call back if someone in the office called them, and it shouldn't really get any calls (other than that). But it does — it gets lots of spam calls.

Often, they ask to speak to the owner. Note that this is a very large, publicly owned company (the same company Cassie works for, which I will call XBM). This amuses me. I've had a few of these conversations:

Me: XBM, this is Jamie.
Them: I'd like to speak to the owner.
Me: The owner. [raised-eyebrow tone of voice]
Them: Yes.
Me: Of XBM.
Them: Yes.

At which point I brush them off with a suggestion to find a number for the corporate office. I'm sure they have great luck getting "the owner" on the phone.

Today's was better, though — this guy first confirmed that this was XBM and then eagerly asked to speak to "The Big Boss". Hilarious! I asked who, specifically, he was trying to reach, and he said, with great enthusiasm, "The Big Man! Whoever is the highest in charge of the company!" What a goofball.

(Despite my amusement, I still did not give him the number to The Big Boss's office. I'm sure his assistant(s) have better things to do.)

Apparently I need to put up a sign.

I think I'm going to make a sign, to leave on my desk when I'm away from it, saying something like:

Please do not take supplies, etc. from my desk. There are supplies in the supply room (3302). If you can't find what you need there, please let me know and I will order it for you.

I don't recall having this problem in previous offices, but people here apparently feel entitled to just take whatever they want off of my desk. Pens, post-its, floor map, phone directory, whatever. I keep spares of everything in my (locked) drawers because I have to be prepared for anything on my desk to disappear.

Similarly, I have a cabinet thingy right by my desk, which matches the desk and is close enough that I think it's obvious it must be mine. (All the cubicles have a similar thing, though smaller, so it's a familiar concept to people.) The key for it is missing, so I can't lock it, and last week people kept walking up to it and opening the doors and drawers. They ask, while they're already looking inside, "Is this the supply cabinet?" And I say, "No, that one is mine" and explain where the supply room is, and they keep looking, and then they'll go, like, "Oh, your coat is in here," and I'm like, "NO SHIT MY COAT IS IN THERE YOU FUCKWIT IT'S MY CABINET NOT A SUPPLY CABINET!"

Side note: Why the fuck am I hearing bagpipes?

Okay, that's not true, I don't quite say that. I just want to. I've now put labels with my name on the two little doors and the three file drawers, and so far no one else has gone barging in there (while I'm around!). But I'm also going to put a note stating that it is not the supply cabinet, and where the supply cabinet is. (Facilities has a locksmith who can probably make a key for it, but he's out on leave for a while.)

Back to the desk thing, I have a conception that it's common in offices for people to swipe supplies from other peoples' desks, but like I said, I haven't really seen it in other offices I've worked in. So, the way I see it, these people just suck.

Edited to add: I was hearing bagpipes because a guy (who works here) was walking around the office in Scottish garb playing a bagpipe. (Or should that be plural?) Obviously.