freaks & geeks

after last friday's visit to a popular restaurant with my staff it became very clear, years of talking to people over the phone has seriously retarded their social skills.

i arrive fashionably late to allow them to get work talk out of their system. i walk over to the table, one is texting and will continue to do so for the next 2 hours, one is staring in awe (possibly frightened by the lack of fluorescent lighting), one is regaling my padawan with tales of things they clearly haven't done in an attempt to dispel rumors of latent homosexuality. here we go.

work talk. awesome. buy round to show appreciation. nod. smile. fake laugh at work related humor. note that they cant help but treat me like the boss. is it possible they are dependent on a strict hierarchy to function? this is what i see before me
one grabs texter's wallet, sending coins flying everywhere in the restaurant. our 8 minutes without incident record was set. another arrives and expresses disappointment at having brought a drink on the way in rather then having me buy them one. this combined with previous incidents including "hey couldn't we celebrate their birthday when i get back from holidays so i can have cake?" and "if i'd known you were going to surprise and pay for us my partner and i would have stayed" causes me to publicly address her lack of tact and self centered behaviour in a playful manner. one down.

waiting on one more to arrive, latent has already ordered their meal and tactful isnt far behind. texter has sat at the end of the table away from everyone else and has divulged that he wanted to go to maccas instead as it was a good price. awe has not spoken and resembles a deer caught in headlights. late arrival walks in, time for the rest of the table to order while the other two eat their meals.

between mouthfuls latent has been talking about girlfriend #53. padawan and i begin to ask a series of questions about said girlfriend and ask to see a picture of her on his phone. nada, must have been deleted. mid-chew, tactful states loudly "we think she doesn't exist". latent proceeds to search through his iphone for a number, attempts to dial and says that he can't get through, else he would have put her on. i note to padawan that an iphone display switches off when you put it to your ear when its making a call, his stayed on. this is why im paid the big bucks.

before eating i test boss powers by declaring work talk punishable by death. conversation killer. wait the price of my steak is now the subject of discussion which naturally leads to questions about how much i get paid. inappropriate much? my internal monologue is interrupted with questions about where i live, including exact street name and number. pass. latent has narrowed it down to a small area that includes where i actually live. im scared now.

post meal, tactful has gone to look at the view, texter is cleaning his phone, awe is still in awe, latent is trying to get someone listen to his story and im conscious that people might want to go out for more drinks in yet another public place. i politely advise im going to head. cue everyone to leave as the lack of an alpha would cause widespread panic. i politely decline offers for a lift home and head in the opposite direction from where i need to go.

i need a career change.

/fin

the tropics

its now been 5 long miserable days since returning to the real world. there are no dive in bars, alcohol with breakfast is frowned upon and there's a definite lack of backpackers willing to serve cheap mexican food. Overview:

there were no coconuts drinks. hollywood lies yet again

our accommodation was run by eric estrada who provided a full range of services, including picking up RAT's forgotten underwear and placing them in her bag.

the local pub reserves a large section of seats for a biker gang every sunday who may or may not turn up. i was inspired to stand up for the locals and win back seating rights through a 60's inspired surf-off, but i was on holidays after all.

my eyes appeared to have developed an odd immunity to the stinging power of seawater, possibly because im extremely blind. whilst this super-power could prove very handy (especially in the surf-off) i apparently freak out now when im swimming offshore, panic attack style and find myself confined to boats or within a short distance to the shallows. its great discovering new things about myself

responsibility #1: lead RAT (blinded by the after sun I put on) off the balcony through to the bathroom to wash her eyes. forgot what i was doing and about 5 steps in lead her into a table. this does not bode well for her trust in me

responsibility #2: ensure even coverage of sunscreen on RATs back. unrelated incident, at the end of day 1 she had an odd patch of non-sun burnt skin that looked like a hand print...

in a party town filled with 20 somethings, maccas was staffed with geriatrics rather then the standard voice-breaking pimple brigade

sat next to a blind guy at the dock. even though he needed a stick to hit us with to know we were there, he was going on the sunset cruise. this intrigued me.

had my fortune read by a tarot chick. oddly enough when i arrived she had gone home for the day and obviously couldn't read her own future very well.

my constant impression of Mr Roarke's "welcome to fantasy island" every 5 minutes whilst accurate, may have gotten annoying.

im not going to write more, less it become the blog version of watching someone else's slides.

/fin

super mega awesomeness

i'll write about the trip later when i have time and the sunburn fades, so look forward to me regaling tales of eric estrada the hotel owner, panic attacks while swimming offshore and my musings on the demise of the seafood pizza. in the interim:

thanks to good boyfriend me, RAT now owns a copy of Gears of War II and is currently debating if she should play this now or play wow instead. the latter wins tonight but its GOWII "all friday night".

if saturday is declared pron and steak day, marriage proposals are definitely on the cards

/fin

aloha

4 more sleeps and ill be lazing back on a tropical island, drinking something with lime out of a coconut and copulating every hour. if i could bring my barbecue with me, i'd never leave.

since it feels lame to do so, i haven't packed a thing and wont till the last minute in the event that it gets back to someone that i cant keep my cool. i have however purchased $500 worth of island shorts and shirts made of 100% cotton so i look like a casually dressed island fellow....whose blindingly white in shirts that still have the store tag on

a quick check of google maps between paragraphs has enlightened me to the fact that our accomodation is a costal town and that whilst visiting islands will occur, i may have gone overboard in my purchases and researching how to crack a coconut

travel thoughts thus far:

• is back fat back in fashion or should i pack a tee? is wetsuit material flattering?
• will work call because im important? as cool as my iphone is, the 5 minute battery life could be an issue. pack charger. no, i cant leave it. what if? exactly.
• should i get someone to log my wow account and do dailies? i'll have a heap of rested xp when i come back for the expansion. kickass.
  
• heroes isnt on next week so i wont miss out. thank god, that would have bugged me all trip.
• if i dont shave and get a kickass tan, i could look like this guy:

/fin

engrish

god bless foreigners with a limited knowledge of the english language who are happy to give it a go. 30 something devout buddist lady came out with these gems today:

"I got a happy ending" after walking out of a meeting room with me where she thought she was in trouble

"I will swallow you" when organizing how she will get to the pub after work. follow perhaps?

these are stored away with the memory of her stating "you finally got someone in your team pregnant" in earshot of human resources. "someone in your team finally got pregnant" would have been far more accurate, but a good try nonetheless

and in other news today, the world financial crisis gets worse:

outraged. prepare for my first ever "when i was a kid" story. this is the bill for having my lawn mowed.

when i was kid 20 years ago this was a $2 job regardless of lawn size (and most lawns at the time were bigger then modern houses). here is my lawn, that bush is about waist height if that gives you a sense of scale.

this represents an increase of 2787.5% which is definitely not inline with inflation. im calling on the government to regulate these money hungry bastards. if they don't, i'll raise an army of younglings to put them out of business

in environmental news:

why the hell did i get a phone book delivered? does anyone use them anymore other then these guys?

heavily medicated

i am dying.

summer flu (or spring in this case) is the worst. it's nature's way of saying "remember how smug you were in winter when you didn't get the flu?"

after spending the last couple of days housebound and sounding like a crack-whore i went into the office determined to will myself better. soon after arriving i decided that coughing and passing out was an ineffective use of company time and went home for some manly recuperation time (RATs hot-chocolate with marshmallows with a side order of soap opera and Entertainment Tonight)

some pseudo-ephedrine induced moments on the way home:

realized that my breathing and walking changes significantly when i go past the blind guy who asks for donations. i firmly believe that he can recognize me with his other heightened senses and will ask me directly if he senses my presence. i would feel compelled to give money, so instead i have developed skills that would make a ninja jealous. yep, going to hell

coming up to a pedestrian crossing i noticed a policewoman stopping traffic as the lights were out. this immediately made me nervous as im conscious that i never use the lights and that i would be someone's bitch if i ever went to jail. when i arrived and was the only person who wanted to cross, she casually said "cross whenever you want". entrapment. thanks to my finely honed frogger skills i made it across and when i looked back to see if her weapon was drawn, all i could see was her asking a man my age to wait while she stopped traffic. the police force is against me.

this could be the energy drink combining with the pills causing me to see stuff, but as i type RAT's cockatiel is masturbating while mine watches from afar, clearly unimpressed. it's the first time i've seen him do this since last breeding season when he discovered it (and like most good men he proceeded to do it as much as physically possible). i feel uncomfortable and slightly dirty for watching

/fin

corporate folk

in large companies you'll always have at least the following 3 people on your payroll. this could be wacky coincidence, but im starting to think that governing bodies require companies hire a specific percentage as part of equal opportunity

knee jerk

responsible for decisions that are as quick (and dangerous) as lightning, knee jerk is typically a middle manager who appears to have miraculously defied the laws of natural selection. kj believes in exercising his keen instinct rather then asking informed questions and prefers wide-scale decrees based on the lowest common denominator. There may be a .000032% chance that your peer could bring a weapon to work, but thanks to daily cavity searches and quick thinking by kj, you're safe.

the bullet dodger

the bullet dodger is renown throughout the land for their inability to be fired, despite averaging 3 days at work last year and being involved in a scandal that rivaled watergate. to peers and subordinates, bd is as trustworthy as a Nigerian banking email but thanks to over-zealous workplace laws escapes prosecution time and time again.

deathbed

able to diagnose any illness by recalling when they had it last, deathbed will experience more cases of flu this year then a major hospital and will cite a good day's rest as the reason why they are out drinking that night. deathbed is kind enough to provide a courtesy cough when calling up sick and when returning to work for the first 20 minutes or so. thanks to quality medical professionals who worry about loosing an easy patient, deathbed will always have a valid medical certificate and may go as far as having a supply of flu tablets clearly visible on their desk for extra authenticity.

theres a lot more then this im sure, but white chocolate rocky road calleth.

/fin