Raina Nathair & the Electronic Quill

Raina Nathair's personal thoughts and bad puns/jokes as she navigates the choppy waters that her little lifeboat seems destined to rock upon forever.

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Location: East Coast, United States

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

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!

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Monday, March 24, 2008

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.

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Friday, March 21, 2008

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?

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Thursday, March 20, 2008

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!

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