Physics

Grappling with a new water bottle, I've managed to spill a substantial amount of liquid on myself after only two drinking attempts. More as it happens.

A city's ruined reputation

Now I like to torture myself just as much as the next hapless individual, and part of this passive-aggressive self-suffering comes in the form of travel emails. Once in a while I'll get these ones entitled "Deals and Steals" that detail four or five travel packages that go from one city to another and are usually never relevant. Today's edition though featured an amazing offer for a "weekend escape" from Memphis to BOSTON. Now these things all have images next to each blurb showcasing each destinations luxuries, adventures, or sites to behold. A trip to Denver? Climb a snow covered mountain side against the backdrop of a crystal blue sky. Love Vegas? Soak up the night with the greatest light spectacle of any city. Hitting up New Orleans? Enjoy the old southern charm and warm hospitality in the region's great mansions. Or maybe Houston's your thing. Witness the magnificence of the universe itself and man's enduring quest of discovery at NASA's Johnson Space Center! Boston you say? Have some tea:



Really? This is what happens in Boston? You sit at some bullshit coffeehouse in late afternoon and dip a tea bag in some water? And whose glasses are those? Arsenio Hall's? Why are they translucent? Is it 1989? And what in holy hell do you need silverware for? You're drinking tea, you jerk. Give me a break. I'm getting a headache just thinking about how boring this is.

This is all incredibly unimportant. I have to go write 5000 words. BYE.

I think I just caught a teen runaway!

Here I am working away for once, and out from the bushes emerges this young kid with a black hooded sweatshirt (hood extended, light blue jeans (the kind a kid's mom buys for him at k-mart) and a huge red backpack (again, mom's decision). Mind you i wasn't outside working in the bushes,that would kind of be great. I was sitting at my desk facing our serene pond-scape out the window.

So this kid's pretty shifty, looking behind him and all over the place. But here he is traipsing around a tiny pond next to this office building that from the packed parking lot clearly has people working in it. One guy was even getting out of his car as he walked by.

He goes around the length of the pond, and st this point I'm forced to stand up to see what he's doing on the other side of the building. He ends up getting hemmed in by the water, as there's a stream that separates the half he'd been walking. So the kid takes a giant leap over the thing and practically falls in. Actually he might have dipped a foot in there from what I could tell. So it's clear now that this kid's insane.

He heads directly over to a picnic table like he'd reserved it. He starts going through his bag and I don't know, jumping around with something in his hand. They were either matches or those paper bombs you toss at people's feet or cats and freak them out. He was surrounded by grass, so I don't know what the hell he was doing.

Then he zips up the bag and takes off again, this time underneath the effing building! So I lose sight of him, and as fast as possible head over to that side of the building. I have a choice of office to trespass into, so I pick Peter's cause he's cool. I got over to the window and he's like "What's going on?" all excited and shit. And I'm like "I just saw someone walking along the pond. He had a hooded sweatshirt and a backpack." And Peter's like "Oo, we got a hitcher!" And just then there were like a series of honks from somewhere, but I couldn't see where. Now our office is at located at the left thigh of the Route 2/I-95 crotch, so this kid might have been crazy enough to cross the highway.

My vantage point here was no longer ideal, so I headed downstairs, shirking all work responsibilities and went for a brief foot search for this kid. I came out of the emergency exit (this was a fucking emergency) but didn't see him, not around the pond, not in the parking lot, not careening across the highway, not even flying through the air after impact. Nothing. He was GONE!

This was around lunchtime, so his attendance had to have been missed somewhere. I know this kid probably has problems that he just can't bear to face anymore, but I was thinking about REPORTING his ass. Yeah? Get the fuzz down here, make a day of it?

Anyway, it was like the most exciting thing. I promise the ol' novel won't be a series of 'like's and 'so's, though who knows where my mental capacity will be come 40k+. If a day was ever a bitch, yesterday had her period on top of it.

15,000...tick tick tick....

BREAKING NEWS: 40+ Year Old Divorced Coworkers Flirt, Headphones Firmly Implanted In Ears

It's been a busy week for R. Petti now that he's a one man tech support show at his Lexington based small business employer. Phones ring, pagers buzz and requests for favors and "critical issues" seem to surface out of nowhere. But through it all, he keeps an even head. After all, the breakneck pace of computer networking support requires a clarity and sense of urgency not seen in many disillusioned twenty-somethings.

But occasionally, something hits home for our IT hero. Some days it's a missing lunch or an inappropriate ramble from a conservative coworker or yes, even a simple question. Today though it takes a different form: flirting amongst the senior (read: elderly) ranks.

And these are only the beginning stages. A recent new hire has quietly been exposed as a divorcee, which in turn proves to be a titillating opportunity for other males of the species that find themselves in the same life situation.

The following takes place through a cubicle wall, requiring volume levels grander than those heard in a typical one-on-one (God forbid) conversation.

The male arrives, fumbling with bags, jackets, bumbling with chairs and such, causing a general disturbance. He is shushed by the female. This is dovetailed with an immediate giggle to signify it was all in jest.

"Did you miss me?" he prods.

"I was crying all morning," she replies. Wretching can be heard in the distance.

It was at this point our hero calmly placed his trembling earbuds in their destined home. Thusly the terrifying back and forth continued, but was glazed over with the sweet crooning tones of Sam Beam, instantly causing a calming of the senses and a tapping of the feet.

Petti lives to see another support ticket.

My Job Is Pulling My Hair Out...Literally

The fourty-five minute drive to Lexington is totally worth it. Especially when twenty minutes after I arrive, I'm handed a phone headset to wear to cut down on speaker usage disturbing those working within three feet of me. I've officially entered the world of the phone operator.

It took a good half an hour to setup myself. And even after that it didn't work. I got one of the Voice engineers to come over and tell me I needed to push the "Headset" button. Brilliant.

After that, the day proved trying. The thing is comfortable enough, but only after swapping out the hang-on-your-ear hard-as-nails configuration. From then on, I experience several things you'd expect to see in an hysterical montage of workplace buffoonery: the headset ripping my glasses off, a mess of confusing wires, hitting the wrong buttons and swearing at customers, cutting back to me entangled in the previous chaotic mess of wires, hitting things, hitting people, writhing on the floor screaming amidst a wire cocoon. Then I saw it: the headset hanging on its out of place holster, and a single hair alighted atop it, follicle and all.

Twenty-seven isn't that old is it? Time to go!

Where's my giant looney tunes gangsta t-shirt?

Right now I'm completely stuck in 1996. I blasting Silverchair, stuffing my face and tuning out everyone around me and not even GIVING a shit. 

Granted some things are different, like I'm at work and I have headphones in so as not to disturb my coworkers with my rock...and I'm eating an apple instead of a hot pocket.

Man.

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UPDATE:What's weird about this post? I hadn't even watched the latest LOST yet. That, and Donnie Darko is randomly on-demand now. WTF is happening?