The Four Day Wrap-Up

Hiya!

Well, as you noticed, I didn't post Friday. Too busy. Can't recall all of it but there was much 'workage' happening. Friday I finally finished entering the receipts for the VP, it came to just under a grand in cash back to him.... No wonder he was after me about this. Got another tiny batch to do that he gave me after the monster batch so I'll be doing that today (hopefully). Heard back from the girls in Accounting today, I entered his stuff right... the first time! Go me!

My Saturday was mostly internal battery charging. I slept late. I played a little online, Puzzle Pirates. Then checked on the Mother-figure... still sleeping. Hey, she works nights. Then I went back to my computer and played Sid Meyer's Pirates... Fun but a bit monotonous after a while. Batteries weren't totally charged so I catnapped with my cat eagerly hopping up to join me. I could almost hear the "yes, that's good. Nap time. See? It's only taken me forever to teach you this trick."

After a bit, the Mom-person awakes and demands food. FOOD. So I stall her a bit. And take her out for an early dinner, rather than a late lunch. What's the difference? About $12 bucks and better main course and appetizers. I was being a 'good' daughter and surprised her with a plate of raw oysters on the half shell that I picked out myself from the hill of them. That's about 7 raw oysters and 3 or 4 lemon wedges. Don't 'ew' me. I don't eat them. She does, I just like hunting for the best ones for her. :-D We get home after a small shopping trip for the necessities and she goes back to bed. Me? I get to put stuff away and entertain myself. Oh, no! Whatever will I do? Er... read a book, watch a series of the boob-tube, watch a movie, play a game... pet the cat... feed the cat... throw cat-treats for the cat... try to trim her claws... find and use the bandages. See Mom off to work. Stay up late watching... er... Animal Rescue Heroes. I think... I was sleepy, I might have been watching my eyelids more.

Sunday rolls around, I sleep in late. (See a pattern here?) Shower, dress and race out the door to pick up junk for the gaming table (veggie tray, chips, chocolate, etc.) I see that the doughnuts are on sale. So I add a dozen doughnuts to the order. Expensive trip. Fruit for Mom's snacking at the office, all the gaming junk, my treat (olives off the olive bar & a marinaded artichoke), and few drinks for the home and the office totaled around $46 and change. I give $5 to whichever charity the store is sponsoring. I give another $5 to a woman begging as I'm loading the car. Felt like a total bitch, here I am cramming crap in the car and she's literally a walking post. I'm seen her around, there's a homeless shelter a few miles down the road and she stays there sometimes. So I gave her $5. I mean, it's not like I do that frequently.

Got to gaming before anyone else. Killed a little time trying to play Oblivion again. Woohoo. I remembered how to slash. Oblivion ended quickly when the others showed up. Gaming is a bit boring at times. Then another player & I had words. Ended with me taking my freezing self upstairs and curling up on the sofa under a blanket for a half an hour. I got summoned back down to gaming after everyone was done screaming. I wasn't going to have any of that. Gaming ended fine. No one's feelings apparently hurt. Yeah! Then I stayed up too late playing on the computer.

Work has been fun, lots to do and no energy to do it. But that'll teach me. (No, it won't but I figured that I should say it before someone else did.)

Got lunch ordered. Last minute again. These people don't understand how hard it is to feed a group this size on short notice. ::sigh:: Anyway, one meal got forgotten but three people weren't here who I had orders from so the 'owner' of the lost meal got to pick from the three options. He seemed happy enough with his choices.

Just finished cleaning up after the animals and sorted the mail... now to scan it some receipts and do the next batch of the VP's expense reports. Joy. ::stifles yawn as she shambles off to the scanning room::

Another Lovely Day at the Office...

Last night passed, there. Updated about that. Mind you, you missed really good macaroni and cheese that Mom made last night. Oven-baked, real cheddar cheese... ::drools::

Anyway, I brought two dozen doughnuts (Dunkin, thank you) for everyone. Why? Because I do this like... every Friday, but I had an urge for a doughnut and since I was stopping anyway... it's lunch... only 1/2 the office is in the office today with many of them out on the road at events... Most of a dozen remain.

This morning's been hectic. Tally scores & Typing up some handwritten notes for the Director of Staff. Ordering lunch for the CFO & a few others. Delivering it once it got here. Breaking down about 20+ old cardboard boxes for recycling. Emptying the shredder and putting a new bag in. Shredding some stuff for the executive assistants' of the Pres. Making client folders for Accounting. Sorting the mail. Delivering the mail. Starting the processing of the payments we got today. And this was all before lunch.

I'm at lunch. I've still got a huge job ahead of me... Entering the one of the many VPs we have at the company's expense reports. A lot of them. That are still not done. And he called me about them... days ago. Er... oops...

::blushes::

But ShadowRider posted a reply! Yeah! She realizes that I'm alive! And she offers cool things. Whoa. Nice.

Tuesday PM/Wednesday

Yes, I know. A brillant and titillatingly title for a post... Come on, what do you expect? Creativity? Hah!

To set the stage for last night, I was working (shockers) when the CFO of the company (one of my superiors, but not a direct boss) came back from a trip to the bank to get money out. She was trying to close on a home to retire too in a few years. The bank was having problems so she had a lot of trouble getting the cashier's check she needed. She came back in a fowl mood after fighting with them for over an hour.

A little later she was mucking about in the storage room that also houses our color workhorse of a printing station. I hear this yell of anger about how she told me to unpack these four boxes of paper (40 reams) the other day and it's still not unpacked and how I need to do what she says faster. The she starts on about how the printing stations were out of paper and 'blah, blah, blah'. I protested that the printing stations were not out of paper, they were at least half full and the storage areas beneath them were at least half full as well. She stalks out and slams open the closest print station... looks at me and snarls that she said 'full' not half full. Then storms off back to her meeting.

She rounds the corner and is out of sight, every eye in the place is on me, and I literally pantomime blowing her head off. Snickers follow. Feeling stupid and embarrassed for being dressed down in front of the whole office just because she's having a bad day, I limp into the storage room to do as the mistress commands. I'm bent in half over the boxes, cutting the plastic thingies, slapping the reams from two of the boxes into the storage room's paper supply area. Only two fit and barely considering that I pride myself on it being well stocked. I have to shuffle a ream into the various print drawers of the workhorse printer to not have a single spare lying around. Then I start loading the two remaining boxes onto a spare rolling chair to move about the office and re-fill the print stations.

Queue CFO screaming my name again demanding to know if I pulled her office door closed. Ticked to high heaven by this point, I snap that I was just leaving the storage room and was stocking the print stations like she asked and hadn't been near her office. Silence as she snarls about her door being locked and having to go fetch the spare keys. Another co-worker, one of the President of the company's personal assistant duo, comes out and corners me going 'why is she yelling at you now?' I explain what's going on and she gets angry red talking loudly about how if I won't complain, she will. "She can't treat you like that. If I feel that you are being harassed, even if you don't, then it IS harassment" and she was complaining to the Office Manager. Joy. This'll brand me a bigger trouble maker than I already am. Nice.

I fill the two other print stations, barely took one box. So I push the last box around giving everyone with a private printer a ream... Accounting gets four and so does the CFO. (Who's office is open again.) I carefully place the four reams on the closest surface in her office, test the lock, close the door, test open the door, close the door and go to the conference room where she, her husband and the agent are talking over forms and paperwork.

She's ignoring me, but her husband smiles at me. I tell him to please tell her that there are four reams of paper waiting for her and that I didn't lock her out of her office. That said I leave and get back to work.

Meeting over. She's fuming. She didn't close one the house because she couldn't get to the money in time. Now I'm just stewing in anger and she wisely walks off bitching to herself.

It's 20 minutes to closing. I hear her giving BAD directions on what to do with the items in the spare office to her son (who's interning for us). I shrug and say NOTHING. Let her screw it up. Her son, however, is smarter than that and came over to ASK politely for my help. I walk in, sort stuff into "storage", "trash", "media property", & "uncertain - requires senior staff decision". He thanks me, I grab a few of the little things and go stow them away in the proper places. I don't do a single other thing to help with the office move. She didn't tell me too. ::raspberries:: I leave only a few minutes late... like 20 minutes late.

Now I have to wait for her to finalize who is moving into the other empty office now. I have my suspicions about who is going to get the office, we'll see. We've lost two people this month and gained two. But we have one or two too many interns and not enough seats, thus the rush to get senior staff into offices and the interns into their old desks. Me? Oh, in all likelihood I'll be moved to the front desk. ::groans:: That sucks... it really sucks... You have to deal with the morons who wander in asking for directions. (Does my desk have a 'please ask me shit' sign on it?) People asking for charity. I'm a poor working girl, I live paycheck to paycheck and slide deeper into debt every day, f*ck off. People handing out fliers, cards and trying to bully their way into the office to talk to 'someone in charge'. In charge? I'm in charge of keeping people liek you from wasting the time of the senior staff, there's the door. Use it. Once. Don't come back unless we invite you.

Gah! Plus, everyone hangs out at the front desk talking. The closest office has a tiny little angry Bronx boy in it and his taste in music is questionable at best. I had to sit at the front desk for a week right before Easter. I kept having to get up and close his office door. Think he took the hint? No. Not once. Now I know why "Pepper" wears headphones a lot.

Aye!

This morning, I'm juggling an iced coffee, an orange juice, the paper (from the front door), my purse, and my lunch as I manage to finger open the door, hold it with my foot and elbow it open and get in. This done, I'm half way to my desk when an intern accosts me telling me that I'd 'better take a call from D in the NY office'. I look at the intern with death in my eyes and say "I just got in the front door. I need to put all this crap down and away. I need to see what is happening in the office today BEFORE I can handle the NY office's issues. Tell D that I will call her back."

The intern hovers, 'you sure?' I sigh, "yes, I'm sure." She wonders off shaking her head like I am making a huge mistake. I get everything taken care off, plus I spitefully do my morning routine before I bother to talk to D in the NY office. So I empty the dishwasher, start the iced tea, load the printers with paper, and make sure of who's in the office today and who's not and why they aren't.

D in NY? She wanted to know if I could let her hear the voicemail message people hear when they call in after hours. This is the urgent business that I was supposed to drop everything for? I handle it. Find the intern and tell her in no certain terms that I am NOT so low on the company's totem pole that I HAVE to take a call from anyone short of the Presidents. Honestly, I could beg off talking to them too if I was HONESTLY elbow-deep in something unless it was life-threatening. She paled, apologized and scampered back to her desk. I felt bad so I apologized later. We're good now.

She realized why I got so mad when I mentioned the load I was carrying and the nature of "D in NY's" emergency. D does that... every time she calls it's an emergency.

So... after a crappy morning... it's become a fairly nice one. Ordered good and cheap chinese for lunch, had my cooking complimented by two employees (I let them sample my cheesy-herb whipped redskin potatoes), had the Office Manage need my help on something trivially easy that he couldn't figure out, then he needed my help with some help wanted ads, etc. All in all... a good afternoon.

::knocks on her wooden desk:: Here's hoping my luck holds.

Monday Night/Tuesday Morning-Afternoon

Oh joy! Work was so slow for some of the crew last night that they felt comfortable with sneaking out a little early. So I was sitting in a mostly abandoned office for 2 hours. Actually, this was a good thing. Fewer distractions.

Dinner consisted of part of a cheap sausage & double-cheese pizza, the last of my mixed greens salad from Easter (with Buttermilk Ranch dressing) and a large birch beer on the rocks. Georgia was angry. No pizza for her. No salad, yuck. And she hasn't yet developed an appreciation of birch beer. So she spent dinner bathing against my left hip, rocking me slightly with each new pass. I was nearly seasick. ::laughs::

Skipped my Starbuck's run this morning in favor of hitting snooze twice. Wound up with a McDonald's' Hazelnut iced coffee and a sausage, egg & cheese McMuffin. My day of filing was given to an intern to do, yes! And the final clearing out of an empty office we were temporarily using for storage was given to the CFO's two sons later today. So... yeah!

So I've finished my weekly task of tracking where the big boss was this week morning, noon & night (trust me it's necessary for accounting purposes). I sent off the file to the CFO. Now I'm doing more on the never-ending task of updating the big boss' contacts. I've got to bind a few more of the booklets we provide to clients and interested people. (Intern-fare coming up.)

::Kiri puts on her favorite 'fishing for interns' music and starts casting::

Nope, too stuffy. ::release and re-cast::

Nope, wrong target career. ::release and re-cast::

Oh, this one might be a keeper. ::into the bucket and re-cast::

And so forth...

Honestly, I don't have to do anything in the intern hunt. That's all "Pepper's" job.

I brought in a huge batch of my cheesy-herb whipped redskin potatoes to share with the sweet pregnant girl in Accounting, Vanessa. But she called out sick today. Rats. So I shared with her office mate, Carlita. Made her a huge bowl and she's still eating it. ::I can hear the spoon against the sides of bowl.::

Made myself a big bowl too, but I've got avocado sushi and hot pork dumpling soup coming. Lunch tomorrow! ::soup going in the refrigerator::

Ok, back to work. Love you!

Oh, joy. Just shoot me already.

Well, update.

Duran Duran concert? Deader than a doornail. Why? Because I had a fight with my best friend over the costs of the tickets. She's smoking something illegal if she thinks the CHEAP LAWN seats at Merriweather Post Pavilion would run (after 'taxes and stuff') over the $140 that I was expecting to pay for a really good seat. So... after going around and around with her "are you saying that I can't look up tickets online?" etc. I felt so sick of the whole thing that I'm not going unless I happen to win tickets from a radio station (highly unlikely as I can't really listen at work) or one of my boss' friends/contacts gives them to him and he miraculously decided to give them to us in the office and miraculously his two executive assistants think to give them to me rather than putting them up for anyone to take. (I never get those kind of things as RANK in the company matters.) So my Duran Duran concert is dead. ::cue Taps:: Someone going... post and let me know if they play 'Nice.' I love that song.

I have a mental video of that song, Simon on stage looking great... really belting it out and meaning every word and note. ::sigh::

On Easter... yes, even my Easter got messed up. It started well. I slept in. Woohoo. I drug my tush outta bed and into the shower about an hour later than I'd planned. Nice... long... HOT... shower over. My mother jokes about me not leaving her any hot water. I quip back "depends on how fast you are in there." Mom and I go out for Easter breakfast. Spinach quiche, bacon, sausage, mini Belgium waffles, and a vast array of beverages. Yeah! Good start.

Then we stop at the grocery so I can pick up my part of the Easter meal we're having with friends. Mom's too full, so she stays in the car napping in the warmth of the sun. I find the cutest cream colored bunny toy with a Happy Easter balloon in it's arms along with a bag of chocolate eggs. Perfect. Whoops! It has a little dirt on it. So I put it back and grab it's twin.

Well, anyone who knows me knows NOT to let me TOUCH a stuffed toy if I can't buy it. My eyes dart back to the first one I picked up. My over-active imagination telling me that the bunny is hurt that I didn't want it. There are no other bunny toys like it anymore and it was Easter. Into the discount bin tomorrow if no one buys her today. I grabbed it, dusted the dirty spot. It came right off. So I gave one of them to the girl who's house we were cooking and celebrating in. Mom got the balloon. She refused the chocolate, so Maria's husband got it instead. The bunny is cream-colored with pink pads on her feet, a pink nose, pink ribbon bow and pink lined ears. Her big floppy ears! She's got a daisy embroidered on each foot and a felt one tucked between her ears. It causes one to flop forward and the other back. Really cute.

So I grab the stuff the make my famous cheese-herb whipped potatoes and a lovely mixed greens garden salad. And soda. And drinks for the office. And I pay and leave. A lovely uneventful drive gets me to Maria's cozy home. Mom has to work tonight so she heads home in spite of a generous offer to sleep there and have dinner there.

So we play PS3 games for a bit then I drift off to start the ham heating, the potatoes boiling and I throw together the salad. Red onion slices, portobello mushrooms sliced chunky, tiny chips of carrot, some celery, a tiny bit of broccoli and plum tomatoes. Tossed in a ginger sesame dressing. Yum.

I go back and we play more games waiting for our four other people to arrive. Check on the ham. Play. Glaze the ham. Complain that the others are a bit late. Ham's done. whipped potatoes are done. 30 minutes late.... where are they? Maria calls one of them on the phone, Jarhead. Jarhead says he's got a migraine. He's no coming. Er... so he's hung-over and didn't think to call us. NICE.

One of them is at work and will come after work, okay. We knew that. Where's his brother? We don't have his direct line. Joy. The other guest opted not to come when Jarhead told him he wasn't picking him up. Er... we'd have come and got you and taken you home. No, he's going over to his sister's instead. Joy. The guy we were waiting on from work shows up on time for his ETA. Where's your brother? Oh, he called me at work but it was crazy busy. He went to 'insert someone I don't know's name here' to celebrate.

So here's twice as much food as we need, cold as a rock. We pack it all up and he's not hungry yet. And off we go down to the game room to pull out a game and forget the losers who didn't come over. I lose, by one point. :-P

So I get home and think about the Duran Duran concert... I check the seats through the online ordering system. One adult seat in the Right Stage section, Row M, Seat 34 would set me back $120 plus fees. Two adult seats were in the Left Stage section, Row CC, I forget the seats, would set me back $75 a piece plus fees. No way. These are as close to nose bleed as I go. Agh.

So here I am, Monday... ticket-less... Duran Duran-less... ticked off... and finally going back to work.

More insanity later... I'm sure.

Duran Duran Tickets on sale now

Yes, today at 10 am Tickermaster began selling tickets to Duran Duran's late May appearance at Merriweather Post Pavilion. My sister finally gets back in touch with me after days of silence to tell me that we can go if I want, she'll buy our tickets tomorrow when I give her my money. $140... shortly before PAYDAY. Um... what is she smoking? It's not legal.

It's like 'are you afraid I'll stiff you on my ticket?' I mean, by tomorrow... hell, by NOW, all of the really good seats are gone. By tomorrow, the decent seats will be gone. By the time I have the cash to buy a seat, I'll be behind the freakin' metal support beam like I was LAST TIME I went there to see (right, try hear) a show. (Thankfully, David Lee Roth likes to travel the stage a goodly bit.)

Argh!!!

Anyway, today has been a good day minus a meeting this morning where one of our VPs asked me about the expense report I was working on for him... er... three weeks ago... Um... oops?

So, I need to finish that report. Finish the new reports he's given me. Order the company lunch for Monday. And... ::sighs:: anything else that pops up.

Is it time to go home yet?

Current Interests

Figured that I'm make a list of my current interests (read as "I don't wanna print and bind 40 clipbooks":

Duran Duran - Yes, the 80's band that you secretly (or not so secretly) liked has a new album out called "Red Carpet Massacre". It is insanely good. Justin Timberlake and Timbaland helped on a few of the tracks and this album seriously makes you want to dance. The first single & video "Falling Down" is a ballad. The lyrics are Simon at his best. Emotional, visual and beautifully performed by the whole band.

Other seriously great tracks are: Skin Divers (go to YouTube to watch their performance of this song on Good Morning America), Nite-Runner (a swear I see people dancing a vicious, sexy modern tango to this one), the title track of Red Carpet Massacre (wicked satire), & Tricked Out (a fun and funky instrumental).

My big boo-hoo here is that the closest that their tour is bringing them to my area is when they play Merriweather Post Pav in Maryland in late May. With all of the car problems, I can't afford to go. :-P

Doctor Who/Torchwood - I love these series. Wish I had more time to devote to them. The 'new' doctor is a hottie and a half, David Tennant. Torchwood has that delicious John Barrowman aka Captain Jack Harkness. The fact that they have great storylines and interesting characters only helps.

Transformers - Okay, so this hit the theatres a long time ago and is now out of DVD. I finally saw it, okay? It kicked butt. I want a BUMBLEBEE! And an Optimus Prime if anyone has a spare laying around. LOL

Ack... the first batch of printing is done. Time to start binding. Chao!

The Long Absence

Wow, I have a blog. I'd nearly forgotten. Witchy hunted me down, drug me out from under the rock that I have been under and propped me up long enough for me to wake up and smell the dying blog. Phew! Open a window somebody.

Let's give as coherent an update as I'm able.

Left the old job after the tower I used died, I was sent home on an unpaid vacation with no expected return date. Joy. I waited a little bit and went back to the temp agency that had gotten me my previous jobs. Problem was, it was a slow period. So after many weeks, I got in and took the computer tests they require and did fabulous. I had a few one day assignments offered but turned them down as they were in the middle of no where.

Then a four-day assignment using my office management talents came up, organize a supply room. Er... okay. Done in the first day, now what? Er... did I mind cleaning the refrigerator? ::sigh:: I guess not.

Four days turned into 'come back next week' every week for a long time, until finally I must have whined to the right person or something because I was offered a job here doing what I do best... being an Office Mommie and handling the annoying tasks no one else has the time or interest in doing. Joy!

So I have steady work. Yeah! The car dies. Crap. The car is fixed. The car dies. The car is fixed. Yes, she's alive! And the next day after a week of taxi rides, the car is repoed because we are too far behind in payments due to the repair bills. Joy. So we cash in an insurance policy, (OUCH) and get the car out of hock. So now we're even farther in the hole, minus a policy, and a great deal of cash was poured into the 'get to work' fund.

So... life sucks.

But I enjoy my new job... usually... I get to talk to interesting people. I got an email reply from George Carlin once. NICE! And Morgan Fairchild. Nice.

So you are fairly up to date. I'm several months into the new job. Occasionally doing five miute tasks for the old one... only hoping to gleen some part-time pay outta him eventually.

Anyway, work calls. Must go. Will try to update more often.

Luv ya,

Me