Corporate Joe in cubicle land.

Jerk It Out

2009-10-15T22:00:00.007-04:00

In 2007, McKinsey & Company released an article about jerks in the office *. If you don’t have Jerkdar and end up working with one, you have a problem. For those of us fortunate to have solid bosses we owe it to our colleagues to get rid of the jerks.

The best jerks in the business have a cancerous effect. The correlation of their venomous traits is a direct causation to the dysfunction of a team, department, or entire company. People focus less on the work and more on covering their own ass.

So, how do you get rid of a jerk once they have been hired? This is where the McKinsey article falls short. It offers Pollyanna explanations. The reality is firing anyone is difficult, no matter how egregious their behavior. Due diligence, a strong case, and a blessing from General Counsel are needed to proceed with an exit plan. A complicated and often expensive task. Cheap and quick is the better way to go.

I'm an idea man, Chuck.

Take the Jerk to happy hour. Get 'em drunk. Super glue a gun to their hand and then push them into a police station. “Drop the gun, drop the gun!” The Jerk uselessly tries to shake the gun out of their hand. The police misinterpret the histrionics as aggressive behavior. Gunfire. The Jerk will be eating more lead than a junkyard compactor.

Contact a casting agent in your area. Scour through all of the actor profiles and find one who is similar or identical in appearance to the jerk at your office. Bring the actor/impostor to the next big work function of 70+ people. Have the actor drop key lines and questions to high-level individuals, “What is the age for statutory rape?”, "It's nice to see you weren't discriminated against because of obesity.”, “Where’s the shitter?”

A strike to the knee with a crowbar.

(murmuring through breath) You're going down, bitch.

O.K., so that last one isn’t very creative, but it works. And trust me, you will gain immediate clout with your colleagues by implementing any of the effective methods above. Once you get rid of the jerk, you can get to the actual work that needs to be completed.

* The article was adapted from a book by Robert Sutton, professor of management science and engineering at Stanford University. The book is titled, “The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn’t”. Link is below.

http://www.washburn.edu/faculty/rweigand/McKinsey/McKinsey-Building-The-Civilized-Workplace.pdf

Call Waiting, and waiting, and waiting....

2009-10-08T21:52:00.019-04:00

Our client is habitually 15 minutes late to conference calls. (Numerous conference calls) x (numerous people) x (high hourly rates) = a dizzying amount of waste.

C'mon, I really have to pee.

This week we had a 2:00PM call scheduled for one hour to talk about a training presentation:

2:00 – All contractors dial in. An orchestra of "BEEP-BOOP"s. Approximately 12 people on the line. We are not allowed to speak with each other as directed by the client. Silence for 15 minutes.

2:15 – Client logs in to indicate that another meeting is in progress. “Please hold”. Silence for 15 minutes. "Hello darkness my old friend, I've come to talk with you again..."

2:30 – The half-hour tipping point. Contractors start dropping faster than Kate Gosselin’s bank account. A cacophony of “BEEP-BOOP”s. The mono sound should be identical as joining the call but instead it expresses a hint of frustration. Yes, I’m dumb enough to stay on. 15 minutes of self-inflicted silence. "In restless dreams I walked alone, narrow streets of cobblestone..."

2:45 – The client logs in asking where everyone is. Really? A five-minute discussion to explain that nothing happened on the conference call and no one talked to each other.

2:50 – The client explains how they want to save money on training. In order to alleviate costs, they do not want to implement an operator-assisted call. Projected savings, $500. Great idea. But you probably could save money by....nevermind.

2:55 – Schedule a time for the following week. Top agenda item is to further discuss penny-wise pound-foolish cost savings for training.

Hello? Was that a BEEP or a BOOP. Hello!

Oh well. Hang up and get ready for the 3:00PM call.

Jock-Blocking My Fantasy

2009-10-05T20:21:00.008-04:00

The Internet destination you have requested, Yahoo Fantasy Football, has been blocked in conformance with company policy. A record has been made of this particular event. Specifically, your attempted trade transaction. Aaron Rodgers for Andre Johnson? Yes, Johnson is a beast but your backup quarterback is Jason Campbell. C.J., if your commissioner, “Fat Jesus” didn’t bitch slap you yet, we’ll send someone from IT to do it.

Even I wouldn't make that trade.

The Company reserves the right to monitor your activities. Especially after trying to re-enact the Jonestown massacre on your roster. Are you trying to dump your team and pump up someone else’s? I know, “Say You, Say Me, Seau” needs help but you don’t have to hand him the keys to the castle. Wheel and deal! Thank goodness we blocked the site. With that short bus move I’m surprised you even know how to operate a mouse. You should rename your team, “Enron”.

A violation of this policy may be reported to government authorities if necessary. But after reviewing how many points you left on the bench this week the Company will pass. You sat Rashard Mendenhall against San Diego’s porous run defense? Attention dumb ass, Willie Parker has turf toe. In order to protect the Company, your activity won’t be reported to the government. We don’t want them to know your I.Q. is equal to Paris Hilton’s Chihuahua.

You left Rashard on the bench, C.J.?

Violation could result in termination but IT is taking over your team instead. This is for your own good. Do you want to be a cellar dweller? We are going to leverage your stable of running backs to command a high caliber receiver. “Tequilaman Chokehold” is desperate for a running game. That’s the first door we’re knocking on. Next, dropping the Tennesse D. Time to let it go

Now get back to your regular work. Something tells me you’ll be fired for that anyways

Thanks for Nothing

2009-10-01T22:51:00.006-04:00

I think it is important to acknowledge every day accomplishments of those we work with. Whether it be your boss, colleague, or nearby cube mate, recognition is essential to self esteem, regardless of pay grade. Keeping this in mind, make it a point today to tip your hat to those who impact your 9 to 5 life. I know I am going to have my hands full. So many things to be thankful for…..time to spread the joy.

In the hallway. "Thanks for canceling our meeting last minute and ruining my lunch plans."

On the elevator. "Congrats on the presentation. The amount of inefficiency was impressive. So many words, so little to say."

During the meeting. "Thanks for forgetting my name, again. It’s nice to see you’re not bogged down with those kinda’ details."

After hanging up the phone. "I love your personal stories, can you speak up next time?"

In the strip club. "Nice dress. You know Halloween isn’t until the end of the month, right?"

My hair style looks good? Thanks!

You won’t walk away empty-handed. The compliments will come back faster than a gas-powered boomerang. It’s a win-win. Every thank you sent out as a penny will come back dressed up as a quarter.

In the cafeteria. "Thanks for sending me those charge codes. They were for the wrong project, now I have to resubmit my timesheet for the last two weeks."

Before the presentation. "Good job on the conference call today. Next time, use the mute button."

On my way out. "Thanks for coming in late and leaving early."

During my performance evaluation. "Douchebag."

Now go out there and start changing the world. One thank you at a time.

Please Stop the "Click" Clock

2009-09-29T22:07:00.009-04:00

Most people measure their job tenure in pre-defined increments of time: years, months, days. And for the new hire who accidentally dropped the f-bomb in a meeting….minutes. For me, I have an unorthodox measurement that visits each time I reload my Swingline with a new sleeve of staples.

F*&%! Did I just say f*&%ing?

One box of Swingline standard staples holds 24 sleeves, each sleeve has 210 staples, totaling 5,040 staples per box. My supply is dwindling. The rattle of the box is less jovial. Reload with the few remaining sleeves that are the drunks of last call. Party over. The “click” is an auditory hourglass of how many staples have passed.

As long as I have my staples, they can't touch me.

I remember picking up the box after orientation. That was almost 4,626 staples ago, but who’s counting. At the time, each staple had yet to be randomly united with various deliverables not even conceived. I have moved within my own building three times, burned through three laptops, and have seen co-workers leave for PhDs and MBAs. My hair is thinner, my eyes dimmer, and my six-pack replaced by an impostor oddly resembling a gut. Through it all, my staples have been my touchstone. The one constant in my cabinet drawer, always within arm’s reach.

I can’t say I have come as far as I’d like. I’m not sure if I’m heading where I want to go. Only two sleeves left. I am 400+ “clicks” away from a possibly unwanted watershed moment. Maybe I’ll start using paper clips.

My fountain of youth

Scheduling Time On

2009-09-24T22:46:00.021-04:00

My vacation is planned as far in advance as a junkie’s next hit. Even when I know weeks in advance, there is still a tendency for me to hedge. Maybe it all relates to that white-water rafting vacation I took with my friends in the Georgia wilderness. Nahhh, that couldn’t be it.

Man, this vacation sucks.

Anyways, I have found a solution to leverage my lack of prior proper planning against Management’s top priorities. Schedule excessive vacation, notify management, then cancel vacation at a later date. There will be a mental harrumph upon the initial request. Management will reluctantly accept the eye raising scheduled absence from the office. Not because they agree, but because they have to choose their fights carefully. Discussing vacation policy with a subordinate just isn’t in the cards. Especially since there are clients to please, proposals to complete, and C-level execs to discuss pipeline. All is well that end’s well. With the imminent arrival of the scheduled vacation, I cancel some of the dates.

"Did you hear what C.J. did?....."
"He canceled some of his vacation because of deliverables."
"He was here until 10:00PM last night."
"He was planning to scale Eiger but said it would be there next year."

Thanks, C.J. Last time I plan a vacation with you.

An overnight rock star in the 9 to 5 world. All due to some advanced planning on scheduling vacation I was never going to take. I know, genius. Now if you’ll excuse me, today is another vacation day for me and I have to head into the office.

Landline Ambush

2009-09-22T22:08:00.016-04:00

Ready to break for lunch. Grab my wallet, keys, and badge. Push in my chair, turn to leave, and the phone rings. Caller ID, it’s the client, answer the phone. No time for “hello’s”. I’m immediately hit with a barrage of questions spewing from the other end of the line like Hurricane Camille hitting the coast. It’s official, I’ve been ambushed.

He's about to head to lunch. We have to call, NOW!

CLIENT

Do you have a minute? I have the project lead, seven subcontractors, the contracting officer, Roger Goodell, and President Obama on the line.

C.J.

Sure, I guess?

CLIENT

Great! I was wondering about the report that I’m emailing you as we speak. Have you had time to read it?

C.J.

I haven’t received it yet.

CLIENT

Great! The GAO, NFL, NASA and some White House staff members are trying to gather preliminary numbers for a press release. Don’t worry, nothing overly complex. High level stuff.

C.J.

O.K.

CLIENT

Great! Don’t worry about running any quality assurance checks on it. Have you received my email yet?

C.J.

Yes.

CLIENT

Great! Basically, we need the 14 data sets compiled into one database and de-duped. Next, create some standard deviations on the confidence intervals regarding the median scores for each of the approximately 2.5 million observations.

C.J.

That doesn’t sound high level?

CLIENT

Great! We won’t hold you to anything unless it is incorrect. Then we’ll ask why you decided to skip some quality assurance checks. How long do you think it will take?

C.J.

At least two weeks?

CLIENT

Great! Tomorrow works perfect. I’m going on vacation for three weeks. It will be nice to review before heading out of the office when everything comes to a screeching halt since no one makes a decision without me due to fear of unemployment.

C.J.

O.K.

CLIENT

Great! Any questions from anyone else on the phone? (a harmonious chorus of no’s). Great! Any questions Corporate Joe?

C.J.

No.

CLIENT

Great!

Corporate Joe hangs up the phone with a thousand yard stare.

Shoulda' gone to lunch.

CO-WORKERS

You coming to Blimpies?

C.J.

No.

CO-WORKERS

What happened?

C.J.

I don’t know.

CO-WORKERS

Great! We’re going to lunch.

Share the Road, Share the Rage

2009-09-17T22:09:00.004-04:00

I have noticed a larger number of people commuting to works on their bicycles. I like the idea of this. A solid cardio workout before work. I don’t like when it’s put into practice.

The larger number of people I was referring to also happen to be larger people in general. Biking to work is something these individuals should strive for, not put as the first item on their workout list.

And then there is the gear.

Only two types of athletes can wear tight clothing: boxers training for a fight and outside linebackers working on free weights in the gym. The bikers in the Tour De France can’t even pull off the cycling look, and they are supposed to be wearing it.

The commuter cyclists (CC’s) that I encounter further bastardize this unsporty fashion statement. The weakly styled spandex gear is degraded to a new low by being stretched to a new high. Maximum capacity. Every flaw revealed. Cookie dough shoved in a tube sock.

Perfect, I'll take it! Does it come in XXX small?

Is that a logo on the spandex? I am a runner. That doesn’t give me the right to wear a USA Track and Field tank top and spikes while running a victory lap with an American flag. The only thing these CC’s should be sponsored by is Smuckers Jelly and Pepperidge Farm Snickerdoodles.

And then there is the pace.

I’m all for sharing the road as a commuter. It is unfortunate the CC’s don’t share the same view. Scoot over a little. Don’t pedal harder and then look back at me. You are not keeping pace. You are just in my way and I can’t pass you. The posture is not helping. Head down, back arched, conforming to an aerodynamic frame. Well great, now you’re flying….at the blistering pace of 21 miles per hour.

Cycling to work is fine as long as you don’t have me spinning my own wheels. So move over Chubb Rock and hit the gym before you hit the road.

Hummingturd

2009-09-16T22:39:00.005-04:00

For lunch, I’ll frequently patronize Blimpie’s for a Buffalo Chicken sandwich. Inevitably, I’ll whistle “Buffalo Soldier”. Then I’ll replace the profound lyrics of a legendary musician with my asinine words involving a sandwich with hot sauce.

Buffalo Chicken, hot sauce with pickles.
It is a Buffalo Chicken, with some bread but no paprika.

Purchased by MasterCard, brought to my cubicle....

And by then my sandwich is ready and the tune immediately disappears. I guess the point of the story is that Bob Marley is going to rise from the dead and kick my Caucasian ass.

You're going down Kingston style, bitch.

No Relief In Sight

2009-09-14T22:54:00.007-04:00

Men can do peculiar things in the corporate restroom. I’m not sure if the exhibited behavior is an extension of who we are or if it’s a place to act like an idiot without any retribution. Either way, there is a wide spectrum of head scratchers. Some men bring in their coffee, set it on the counter, do their business, and then drink their java. These men are called, “disgusting”. There are also women who accidentally enter the men’s room only to realize there are urinals. These women are called, “whores”. Then there are some things, like I witnessed today, that are difficult to categorize.

"Can't wait to enjoy my coffee!"

There are several types of postures men can have while relieving themselves at a urinal. No, I’m not trying to stare at anyone’s junk. It’s my uncanny ability to deduce what is occurring by noticing the absence of items in my peripheral vision. What I cannot see from the chest up allows me to understand what’s happening south of the equator. Yes, a gift, I know. And with this gift I have categorized my subjects into three general categories:

Two Hand Sam – this gentleman uses the traditional approach of keeping both hands on the unit. He is there for business. If this person knows you from roaming the same halls every day, they are likely to stare straight down at the Crane Plumbing symbol, make a statement that qualifies as conversation, “Redskins are going to suck this year”, then move out.

One Hand Willy – a non-traditional approach where one hand deals with the work downtown and the other is occupied with important papers or a cell phone. He is there for business. Except this type of business should be held in his cubicle, not a urinal. I’m all for multi-tasking but I don’t need to brush my teeth while shaving. Some “to do’s” are meant to be completed separately. Might as well bring in your laptop, grab a seat in the stall and work using the D-Net wireless connection. Willy, please, both hands on the hose.

Penis Knievel – this is the disturbing behavior I witnessed today. A gentleman with both hands on the wall. A single hand on a bathroom wall is reckless hygienic behavior. Placing both hands on the bathroom wall? They might as well juggle rusted hypodermic needles. And who’s minding the store? It’s guaranteed that a pair of pleat-front gabardines will not walk away scot-free of splash shrapnel.

A call to arms for the Two Hand Sam’s. Next time you see someone exhibit Penis Knieval behavior, tell them to have some pride. Ten and two on the wheel, buddy. And if they can’t abide by normal behavior, tell them to use a stall. People pee all over the place in there anyways.

Underground Garage Banned

2009-02-05T21:46:00.012-05:00

Dear Mr. Vandelay,

This letter is to inform you about the parking garage designed by your architectural firm. I have been using this garage on a daily basis for the last five years of my employment. By my calculations, I have parked there approximately 1,180 times. My research comes with a lot of insight into the nuances of P1, P2, and P3. I apologize if this letter is duplicative of other people’s efforts to bring certain items to your attention.

A few concerns:

You did not use the correct instruments to calibrate the final design. It appears that the underground garage was not built to full scale. Most cars designed for the road today aren’t the size of mopeds with the turning radius of Matchbox cars.
There are no road spikes installed for individuals who want to back their cars into a spot. Ideally, this should not be an issue since it is only one extra turn. Unfortunately, the majority of people attempting to back-in their cars suffer from mild hand-eye retardation coordination. One extra turn becomes five extra turns, six brake pumps, and a line of cars waiting to pass. Having spikes for cars backing in would be a helpful deterrent for those who failed Easy Method due to their heads being lodged up their ass.

The arrows pointing the direction for one-way traffic in the garage are very helpful. However, these arrows might need to be changed from a simple white to a fluorescent blinking green for select individuals with either 1) a poor sense of direction, or 2) the inability to comprehend basic shapes (i.e., the shape of an arrow). Or perhaps a patrolman could monitor the parking lot to find offenders going in the wrong direction. And perhaps that patrolman could have a gun with live ammunition. And he would be fully authorized to use that weapon against violators. And we would fondly call him, “Tackleberry” as he lays waste to the directionally challenged.

"Reloading and heading to Level 2, Sir."

The lighting lacks light. The Silence of The Lambs appears to have been the inspiration for your garage. I don’t want to have to worry about putting the lotion on my skin in order to not get the hose again. All I want to do is see my parking spot without using my high beams and fog lights in tandem.

"You were looking for a parking spot? Follow me."

After successfully avoiding all of the pitfalls listed above, there is one minor obstacle left: avoiding death as a pedestrian. There are no sidewalks or crosswalks. No lights guiding you to the safety of the elevators. Pedestrians are viewed with as much empathy as squirrels trying to make it to the other side of the road. There have been five pedestrian deaths in our garage…this week. Hitting pedestrians is not only viewed as normal, I believe it is encouraged. All that is left for the pedestrian is instincts as they imitate an extra on the set of Death Race 2000. Just thought I’d let you know.

I’m sure these items are minor oversights by your firm. If you could research and provide a written report as to how these issues will be addressed, it would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Corporate Joe

Gift Getting

2009-02-03T20:59:00.024-05:00

FADE IN:

A father and son gather around his birthday presents. The father beams with pride as his son carefully chooses the first gift. The son's eyes lock in like radar on the largest box of the bunch.

SON

Dad, can you help me open it up?

FATHER

Sure thing.

They work together in perfect synchronicity tearing the paper with purpose. They pull back in awe of what was found.

SON

Cool!

FATHER

Let me help you open the box.

SON

Oh, man, a Power Ranger. Awesome!

FATHER

Let me pull this out of the plastic.

Hold on, there are some wires to untangle.

SON

Hurry, hurry!

FATHER

I'm trying, hold on. There are some fasteners in the back.

Man, they are not playing around here.

FATHER

Voila!

FATHER

For Christ's sake, there are more fasteners!?

SON

Mommy says that's a bad word.

FATHER

You're right son, that'll be our little secret.

Let me get these off.

FATHER

Are you shitting me?

These are wrapped around the axle!

SON

Mommy says that's a bad word too.

FATHER

No one likes a tattle-tale. So just zip it.

Let me get this wire out of the axle.

FATHER

Rubber bands? Rubber f*cking bands!

SON

Mommy...

FATHER

I know what Mommy says. Do you see Mommy around? No.

I just see you and me. So why don't you just

sit criss-cross applesauce and shut your trap.

The Father struggles impatiently with the tangled web of rubber bands and wires. His grunts morph into a loud roar. His son scootches back on the linoleum in fear.

SON

Dad, you're turning green.

The Father's pants begin to rip at the seams as he continues to struggle with the imprisoned present.

FATHER

Let me get this out. AHHHHHHHHHH!

SON

Daddy, No!

FATHER

Run, son. Before it's too late.

This is between me and the present.

RUNNNNNNNNNN!

FADE TO BLACK

25 Things You Don't Need To Know

2009-01-28T22:20:00.014-05:00

Rules:

Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.

1. I hate the T.G.I.Fridays menu. Enough with the Jack Daniels sauce.

2. The majority of presentations I’ve seen, suck.

3. I believe people lead far more interesting lives outside of work. But I don’t really give a shit.

4. I remember being fresh out of college in 1992 and a friend told me about a company called AOL. They were hiring at the time. I thought to myself, “AOL? What the f*ck is that?”

5. I’m amazed at how two people can make the same amount of money in the same type of position yet one is socially retarded and the other is a class act.

6. I have taken a ton of business trips, I would label maybe two of them as actually being, “fun”.

7. I believe individuals who give credit to others go much further in Corporate America than the hyenas that hijack their team’s accomplishments.

8. I have found out that if you think someone is full of shit, most likely everyone else thinks the same thing.

9. I have freakish metabolism.

10. I like working during the holidays. Nothing beats a quiet office. Or beating off in a quiet office.

11. I am the most ineffective employee when working from home. The refrigerator has been put to memory by 10am. A good example of a bad example.

12. I like having SAS programming skills instead of soft skills. You can either do it or you can’t. There’s no hiding.

13. I’ve always wanted to be named Joshua Rainwood.

14. I believe confidence mistakenly trumps intelligence too much. And there are a lot of overconfident people out there.

15. I refuse to touch food left in the pantry with a post-it note labeled, “Help Yourself”.

16. I want to leave food in the pantry with a post-it note label, “Keep your f*cking hands off this.”

17. I have a Bengal Tiger affectionately known as, "Bitey".

18. I believe nothing beats the taste of an ice cold Coca-Cola from a vending machine. Even when mistakenly priced for the year 2046 with inflation.

19. I think the position of CEO is easy to vilify. The inconvenient truth is that most of them are extremely smart and have worked their asses off ascending to that position.

20. I have found out that an awful day/week/qtr/year for a company is a great day for the press.

21. I think it would be funny to write a movie where a guy is stuck in Corporate America and hatches a plan to rip off the company. Call it something like, "Office Space". That would be some funny shit.

22. The best bosses I have had are women, not men.

23. I actually left the building for lunch at 10:30AM one morning to go to Wendy’s and have a Baconator.

24. Based on the extensive algorithms on the back of my Wendy's napkin, I have calculated that 99.9% of employees a) do not show up to meetings on time and b) are not prepared for the meetings they show up for.

25. Please stop talking about your kids, please.

Office Booty

2009-01-27T22:57:00.011-05:00

One day my cubicle looks like it was designed for an Office Depot commercial, the next day it’s a post-riot TV store. Another victim of a supply-jack; stapler, tape dispenser, pencils, pen, gone. It was not always like this. There used to be peace among the villagers.

Once my company lived in a world where employees could nonchalantly arrive at the fifth floor, speak with Facilities, and walk away with supplies for various day-to-day needs. But something happened on the way to heaven. Employees took something beautiful and made it ugly. The booty of office supplies were pillaged. Facilities had nothing left to give except a judgmental look to anyone who requested the smallest item. Rumblings regarding the misappropriation of supplies reached the penthouse. Gone were the salad days. Hello, Corporate Policy.

There’s a new sheriff in town enforcing draconian measures. Corporate Policy wants to ensure that the office supply requested is 1) put to use and 2) applicable to client work. Unfortunately, the application process is so difficult that no one wants to go through it. The laborious request form rivals a passport application. Name, employee id, department number, project code, holy shit I just want a f*cking pen. Facilities now hoards the supplies knowing that few want to deal with the paperwork. This action dramatically increases the demand of limited supplies remaining in the rest of the building. You can’t borrow a pen from anyone. You can’t even ask to borrow a pen.

Co-workers who originally exchanged pleasantries now turn on each other like survivors in a nuclear holocaust battling for the last piece of bread. Except the bread is a green Sharpie Accent highlighter equipped with a chisel tip and patented smear guard. Damn-it, I would kill to have that back!

You stay alive, no matter what occurs! I will find you.

No matter how long it takes, no matter how far, I will find you.

We’ve turned on each other and there is no end in sight. We steal each other’s supplies with one hand while pointing at corrupt CEOs with the other. There is only one source to refresh the weathered office supplies frequently changing hands. New hires.

Instead of filling out all those cumbersome forms the employees wait for the new hires to do it. “Oh, you need post-its? Just go to the fifth floor. You might want to stack up on everything”. We give the new hire a nice smile to hide the venom in our hearts. The plebe doesn’t know any better.

The new hire is light on their feet with a whistle on their lips. Here’s your form and here’s my supplies! Until they see their violated desk the next day. Welcome to the snake pit.

Booty Call!

Next thing you know another new hire is shouting over the cubicle. They need some help on how to set up their answering machine. Sure, we’ll be glad to help. “You should order some supplies to get you started. Just go to the fifth floor. You might want to stack up on everything.”

You Snooze, You Lose, Your Job

2009-01-22T23:46:00.005-05:00

BEEP BEEP BEEP

6:30AM

Practice presentation one more time
Regenerate analysis based on latest data transmission, troubleshoot if necessary.
Lunch with the client.
Write performance review and meet with manager.
Have to account for traffic.

snooze

BEEP BEEP BEEP

6:45 AM

Presentation won’t take but five minutes to go through.
There haven’t been any issues with data transmissions for the past five weeks.
Lunch with the client.
Write performance review and meet with manager.
I’ll take the backroads to work today.

snooze

BEEP BEEP BEEP

7:00 AM

I have that presentation memorized.
Press a button, the analysis is done. Troubleshooting, puh-leez.
Does the client really need me for lunch?
I can write my performance review blindfolded.
People probably took a 3-day weekend, no traffic.

snooze

BEEP BEEP BEEP

7:15 AM

Do they really need me for the presentation?
I can send that analysis on Monday.
Client always wants to eat at Panera. Hate. That. Place.
My performance review is already written. All in my head.
I’ll work from home in the morning.

snooze

BEEP BEEP BEEP

7:30 AM

That presentation is a joke. No one gives a shit. It’s Friday.
I can send last week’s analysis as this week’s analysis, by the time they review it, I’ll say it was a mistake and have this week’s analysis done.
Panera? F*ck Panera.
I’ll recite my performance review to my manager.
As long as I log-in by 9AM.

snooze

BEEP BEEP BEEP

7:45 AM

My wife makes decent money.
Do both of us really need to work?
I can stay at home, take care of the kids, clean the house. I’m a good father damn-it.
How many times can I hit snooze?

Washingtonianidiot

2009-01-19T21:31:00.013-05:00

This is a big week for the most powerful city on the planet. People are excitedly waiting for the eyes of the world to descend on the inauguration ceremony. It makes me proud to live in the shadow of Washington, DC. The history, the museums, and the fluctuating murder rate all feel like home to me. Especially when I’m driving on the parkway along that river where the airport is with the monument that looks like a pencil.

O.K., let’s face it, what I don’t know about DC could fill up DC itself.

Hey, there's that thing-a-ma-bob I was talking about!

I am from Northern Virginia, lived here all my life. People ask me where I’m from and I immediately answer, “Outside of DC” because chances are that more people have heard of “Outside of DC” than “Oakton”. Then the conversation naturally spins into politics, museums, or the Mystics. And as quickly as the conversation starts, it ends. The sad reality is that I don’t know squat about the city right next door. All these years and I am rarely tempted to head “downtown”.

The ones who take full advantage of what the city has to offer are not from this area. It’s a transient town based on the politics. The one thing that will not change about DC is how it is guaranteed to change at least every four years. Right now, there are so many people packing up boxes to move here based on the new administration. These are the same people who will be able to school me on DC knowledge inside of the first five months of their stay. It should upset me. I should be humiliated. The sad part is, I’m not.

There’s no reason for a local to visit DC if you don’t work or live there. Yes, the museums rock; Air & Space, Natural Gallery of Art, Spy Museum, etc. But that’s about it. The city is humming 9 to 5 on a weekday. But the weekends? Forget it. It looks like Times Square in “Vanilla Sky”. Hell, the Washington Redskins aren’t even located downtown.

Let's party! Hello? I said, let's party!

Don’t be angry with me for my ignorance. There are thousands of others just like me who will be comfortably nestled in the suburbs watching the inauguration on TV. Seeing one of the biggest events on the grandest stage on a flat screen.

I need to ride this new wave of hope that is flooding the city and get my ass downtown. If change is going to happen, it has to come from within. I’m looking at the man in the mirror. But for now, I need to get to a non-looted Circuit City store and buy a flat screen.

Degree of Difficulty

2009-01-13T22:29:00.014-05:00

Three letters carry a lot of weight in the consulting industry, “PhD”. Those three letters make the client uncontrollably drool. Outside of a congressional inquiry, it provides the necessary trump card for anyone who dares to question the project's methods:

Don’t like our approach? Well, the girl who designed our statistical sample has a PhD!
You want to question our findings? Well, the guy who completed the quality assurance has a PhD!
You’re cheating on me? Well, I’m banging a PhD!

Don’t get me wrong, PhDs do provide some value besides infidelity. They are the fossil fuel for brainstorming, they tackle and resolve the high-level approach to solutions, and they are hardly around long enough to get on your nerves. But don’t expect to be called “Doctor” unless you plan on successfully administering surgery during one of our WebEx conferences.

O.K., I don't know where the patella is.

But I can answer questions on my abstract involving the randomness of bees.

The MBAs are helpful too. They determine the business flow of the project, the timing of key deliverables, and serve as the consulting voice of the project. Then comes the work and just like Keyser Soze, poof, they’re gone.

After this MBA wins the work, my guess is that you'll never hear from him again.

After the brainstorming is done and the project plan is laid out, there is the nagging work that is left over. The endless deliverables; spreadsheets, flow diagrams, presentations, survey results, datasets, meeting minutes, on-site training, off-site training, oh my goodness please stop. The lower the degree, the larger the workload. Any guesses where I am categorized in the pecking order?

Work won. Work begin.

Bachelors Degree translates into completing all of the deliverables and receiving none of the credit. And the best of the lot take the initial instructions from those with superior degrees and run with it. The PhD’s and MBA’s become more obsolete as the project exits the incubation stage and hatches more work products than Evander Holyfield can impregnate women. They are only re-integrated at the end of the project when all the findings have been compiled, all the answers provided, and all the subordinate talent tapped out of any ambitious urges to replace them.

And who can blame them. What a great gig. I plan on reviewing some PhD online programs. But first, I have to get this deliverable out.

C.E.Oh No

2009-01-11T22:12:00.014-05:00

Each year our company brings in children from a local under-privileged elementary school to shadow executives for the day. The children represent various groups of minorities within the overall population. The executives they shadow represent white males. These are the same suits that re-aligned their school district all in the effort to keep their daughters away from these kids.

The kids tour the building while listening to the grey-haired men spin tales of adversity from having to choose between Stanford and Harvard. The children smile back knowing these elitist clowns would be shiv'd inside of 5 minutes on their playground. The executives feel good about themselves. This is their chance to give back. Plus it alleviates the guilt from this morning’s layoff, which coincidentally, increased their salary.

One lucky kid hits the jackpot and shadows the Big Cheese. He or she is known as “CEO For The Day”. Unfortunately, it’s just a powerless title on paper. The kid is used as a token at a press conference so the company will get its volunteer kudos from a local newspaper. They might be taken for a tour of the office, the board room, and other places where only the elite gain access. And that’s too bad. It’d be nice for the person to wield real power.

In a perfect world, the “CEO for the Day” and General Counsel would draft a Power of Attorney document fully authorizing all decisions to the 24 hour CEO. All of these rules would impact the high-level executives, while the 24 hour CEO watches the madness of his rules ensue. Just in case this ever happens and my son is chosen, I’ve drafted some items for consideration:

Dunk Tank. A dunk tank for the CEO (i.e., the real one), CFO, CPO, CTO, and COO. The tank is located near the “Open Bar For The Day”. One key feature of the tank is that it has no water. It is a ten foot drop onto a cement floor.
Shock Collar. Pre-programmed shock collar for any executive using the buzzwords, “Robust”, “Streamline”, “Cross-Pollinate”, or “Synergy”.
ATM Bailout. CEO is required to supply the PIN number to his ATM card. Five employees are chosen at random and empty the CEO’s bank account to be bailed out for food, clothing, and shelter.
Stock Price. Full disclosure required on the plummeting stock price. Explanation must elaborate outside the excuse of “market conditions”. Voltage on shock collar is tripled if any buzzwords are used.
Corporate Jet. Full access to the corporate jet for the janitorial staff. Beer, cigarettes, and full Mexican buffet supplied during round trip flight to Cancun. Bonuses for janitors correlate to amount of litter, stench, and bodily excrement left in the cabin. CEO’s wife responsible for cleanup.
Diapers. All executives required to wear diapers and scream, “I doodied my diapers” after taking a bite of food. They are only allowed to consume Gerber's baby food over the course of the day.

Before

After

Success is when preparation and opportunity meet. My building plans for the dunk tank are complete and I've stocked up on Gerbers and diapers. Now I’ll patiently wait for the opportunity to present itself.

Site Under Construction

2007-11-17T22:03:00.000-05:00

To all my insane fans,

I finally bought a Mac. All my blog pictures are being transferred to my new computer. Give me some time and I'll have it up and running again.

Corporate Joe.

No Need for Alarm

2007-10-30T21:53:00.000-04:00

Everyone sits in their respective cubicles working diligently. The sound of clicking keyboards, phones ringing, and copy machines humming. The harmonious sum is greater than its tone-deaf parts. Folks, it's official, this is the sound of productivity.

And then the fire alarm goes off at work.

A shrieking sound emanates from the intercom and quickly crescendos and diminuendos in rapid succession. Each iteration picking up steam as the sound reverberates off the wall and feeds into the next pulsating wave. This ear-bleeding shriek dances in perfect synchronicity with the red lights. Satan just opened up a nightclub in our hallway and the cover charge is your hearing and sight.

Press button to ignite fire.

Naturally, you would expect papers to fly in the air as people madly rush for the exit while elbowing catering service out of the way. And of course, two or three employees plowing through a plateglass window that is carefully being carried by two extras from the set of Dukes of Hazzard.

However, the reaction is counter-intuitive. The reaction is no reaction at all.

No sense of urgency. No panic. Recognition only through small talk. Question from a female who is filing paperwork, "Should we go?". Followed by the answer from a male who is masturbating, "Nah, just a drill."

Then Satan kicks it to a higher gear. Not by upping the voltage on the sound nor by bursting corneas with an orb of red light...he just uses the power of persistence.

The light continues, the sound continues, and the lack of urgency among the staff is replaced with heavy sighs directed towards the intercom. Question from a female who is doing her nails, "What's it like outside." Followed by the answer from a male who is still masturbating, "Mid-50's, bring a coat."

The employees nod at each other in recognition. They know what must be done. The only way to stop this out of tune Ozzfest is for a mass exodus down the staircase. A display of unity for the fire department. The masses clog the stairwell. They rapidly descend using short staccato steps. A centipede comprised of hundreds of people twisting and turning to exit. Finally, everyone is outside. Question from a female putting on her makeup, "Are you still masturbating?" Answer from the male, "Yeah, sorry. I like my junk."

The fire department, drunk with power, is happy with the outcome. They observe the monkeys in their suits. They confirm everyone's morning is ruined and wave everyone back in.

Alright, you overpaid asswipes. Back inside.

Except no one is heading back in.

Hmmm, it's 11:15. Technically, not too early for lunch. Plus all the fatties waiting for the elevator will clog the lobby. That's at least another 15-minutes. Screw it, going to lunch. All that masturbating has made me hungry.

Two Ounces of Common Cents

2007-09-20T19:34:00.000-04:00

We have a new coffee machine and cups to not go with it.

Here's the drill. You choose from the assortment of descriptive coffee packets ranging from "richly complex" to "buttery" to "I dare you". Insert the coffee packet and choose either four, six, eight, or a 10 ounce cup of coffee. Newbies can be spotted a mile away when their choice is greater than or equal to eight ounces.

As a cost-cutting measure and an effort to save the planet, our company recently has decided to replace our normal eight ounce styrofoam cups with six ounce cups. It's an insidious change that everyone has to recognize through baptism by fire.

The newbie picks up the six ounce cup and stares at it quizzically thinking, "My hands are swollen today". The cup is placed under the machine, eight ounces is selected, and the java begins to take a pee. Estimated time to completion, approximately 30 seconds.

"Yes, the coffee machine is that way. The cups are tiny."

0-15 seconds - newbie whistles, dumps his lunch into the refrigerator and/or checks out the contents of the vending machine.

15-20 seconds - newbie checks the status of the coffee and the whistling goes out of tune.

20-25 seconds - first stage of panic, the newbie's eyes widen as the rapidly rising tide of coffee approaches the brink of the cup.

25-30 seconds - "Oh cryin' won't help you prayin' won't do you no good. Whenever the levee breaks mom you got to lose."

The only choice for the newbie is to watch, wait, and clean up as the two ounces overflow the limited volume allowed. A laconic but spirited acknowledgement arrives in three possible ways, 1) "Oh Goodness!", 2) "Holy Shit!", or 3) "Mother Fucker!".

I prefer, "Holy Shit".

Think of all the coffee being wasted in order to save on styrofoam. Maybe they make two ounce styrofoam cups? I think that's what I get my butter in when I go to Outback curbside takeout. I can use those to collect all the spilled coffee, consolidate it into one big pot, boil it, then pour it on the crotch of the executive who saved the company a few bucks.

Sex and the Pity

2007-09-20T16:42:00.000-04:00

I couldn't help but hear two female workers giddily exclaim the return of "Sex and the City", this time, to the bigscreen. How cute. The show premiered in 1998 and by my calculations, both of you were 14. A time when Alanis Morissette was at the top of the charts, Clinton was being impeached, and Sarah Jessica Parker had a horse face.

O.K., so some things have changed. However, the draw of the show has not. Females are pumped up in their slingback pumps about this movie event. For those who live in Siberia the show centered around a tight-knit group of fashionable women with drinking problems who sleep around. Which is strange since HBO already had a documentary about those same issues called Atlantic City Hookers.

"Do I get naked now? Or wait 5 seconds?"

I find it sad that Giddy 1 and Giddy 2 are stretching their limited experiences of womanhood in order to relate to the ensemble cast. Then again, they find it sad when I'm digging through the loose change slot on the Coke machine. Ladies, that's not sad, that's cheap....big difference.

Attitude About My Latitude

2007-09-06T21:45:00.000-04:00

On my first day of orientation I received a Dell Latitude laptop. That was in the Spring of 2004. Several years later and I still have the same piece of equipment. I am in desperate need of a new one since mine is now showing its age through various symptoms that include but are not limited to:

Logging In
I timed it today...13 minutes 42 seconds to log-in. I come into work, power up my computer, go to the restroom, go get coffee, say my hello's and by the time I'm back to my desk I'm still waiting to punch in my user id and password. I need to ask our accounting department to generate a charge code for logging in.

Mr. Van Winkle, we're ready for your user id.

The F'in F Key
The "F" key ejects when my fingers prestadigitatiously spell certain words and terms. The faster I type, the more likely it is to happen. Particularly with words I use in business emails like "Fuck", "Fuck you", "Fuck me", "Fuck Off", etc. My digits come to a screeching halt when it happens and everything immediately turns to slow motion when the "F" key goes airborne and flips end over end as it struggles to find its rip cord. After it crashes onto my desk, I jam it back between the "D" and "G" keys with my thumb only to look back at my screen and see, "ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff". Yeah, F you F key.

Crumbs
My keyboard has approximately 1/2 pound of food in it. I eat at my desk for lunch, often. This involves perusing the internet while scarfing down a foot-long Blimpie's sub and some Cheeto's. This event repeated continuously over a three year timeframe has resulted in an obscene accumulation of crumbs nesting under my keys. I actually saw mites in there the other day with their own Blimpie's. They were making a killing.

Where does the line start? This place is packed.

The Fan
The fan that cools down my laptop runs continuously and voluminously. I could be on an Antarctic expedition with my laptop and the fan would keep humming with sub-zero temperatures. Why I would have my laptop on an Antarctic expedition is rather odd. But I'd bring it just to prove my point. And the noise the fan projects is impressive. It sounds like a chopper preparing for liftoff. I keep waiting for propellers to jut out from the USB ports and start spinning to elevate my laptop out of the cubicle. Bye-bye laptop, safe travels.

Told you the fan would still be on.

I might pull a Filbert. Next thing you know, I got a brand new laptop with keys that don't pop out and quick access to the internet.

As for the mites, well, they're going to have to franchise because I'm opening up a new store.

Watch Your Tone

2007-09-05T22:35:00.001-04:00

In the busy world of consulting, a landline is not enough. Most consultants have to be strapped with a cellphone at a minimum, while others of a higher pay grade carry a Blackberry. Either way, it's another line on your business card and email signature indicating that there's no way in hell your dodging the client.

I understand the necessary evil of mobile phones in the world of consulting. It is a mobile industry; cubicles, metro, cars, airports, strip clubs. Consultants can be anywhere at any time when the client needs to reach them. But these devices should serve as a backup to the landline. Several co-workers in my immediate vicinity don't understand this. And the futile ritual begins with a simple yet annoying ringtone. Here are some of the samples I've heard firsthand in the past few days:

Snoop Dogg's "Drop it like it's hot" - Princess, the only thing you know how to drop is your daddy's Amex Gold Card at The Banana Republic. Quit trying to be so urban and go back to your one bedroom rented townhouse behind Quizno's.
Classic Telephone - Wait, I hear a ringer from an old telephone. Oh, it's just the ringer on your cellphone you say? What a crazy shenanigan! You got some attention doing that. HAHAHAHAHAHA! Kill yourself.
(Operator's Voice) "YOU have an incoming call" - I'd rather listen to Tiny Tim sing "Loving You" by Minnie Ripperton than that smug operator and her condescending voice. Although I'm sure Tiny Tim has some righteous ringtones of his own.
The default ring - The fact that someone is either too stupid or too lazy to figure out the variety of ringtones on their cell is more annoying than the default ring itself.

Yes, Miffy, I am dropping it like it's hot.

The rings are just the beginning since my building is a deadzone of cell coverage. Over the course of a day, my battery drains faster than a strip club's ATM since it constantly struggles to find a signal. Some co-workers still try to pick up a call within the building despite the years of dropped calls haunting the ether of our workspace. Insanity is repeating the same behavior but expecting different results. And trust me, they look insane.

The volume in their voice immediately increases exponentially peppered with the words "Hello" and "Can you hear me now?" as they frantically pace for a pocket of coverage. It's almost as if they are in a shuttle run with no fixed points. Someone witnessing this with no prior knowledge of human behavior might mistake it for a cryptic mating ritual.

Your powers are useless in my building, four eyes.

The rare but enjoyable scene is when two employees in close proximity answer separate cellphone calls at the same time. If you close your eyes you can pretend that two half-deaf retards are trying to talk to each other.

HALF-DEAF RETARD 1
Hello?

HALF-DEAF RETARD 2
What? Pardon? I CAN'T HEAR YOU?

HALF-DEAF RETARD 1
Can you hear me now?

HALF-DEAF RETARD 2
HELLO?

The two half-deaf retards hang up their phones and get their retarded lunches.

Oh sorry, my eyes were still closed.

Here are two ideas 1) put the cellphone on vibrate so you won't wake everyone up from being bitch-slapped with excessive calls from the client and 2) look at the phone number and call it back on a landline. What a psychologically exhausting solution. But it's hard to think above the din of a thousand rings.

The Hunch on My Lunch

2007-08-29T21:57:00.001-04:00

Approximately once a quarter I decide to give myself a break from the overpriced deli meat and pack my own lunch. Usually leftovers from the night before or a PB&J when I'm in a hurry. Packing my lunch makes me feel like I'm back in high school when my life was all ahead of me. Except unlike high school, I don't have to worry about some jock who lettered in three sports taking my lunch.

The building I work in doesn't employ the high-school jocks I once feared. It is filled with people who fit the suggested criteria of an ideal roomate; single, non-smoking, well-paid professionals with a weekend drinking problem. There is an inherent level of trust with these existing standards. Unfortunately, my belief system was destroyed this week when some jackbag stole my lunch out of the community refrigerator.

There are two refrigerators on each floor of our corporate office. Both are well-equipped with enough cubic space to handle the capacity of food imported daily by the employees. The late arrivals usually have to jam their bags into the vegetable drawer but there's always space if you make it. My lunch bag is marked not because I don't trust anyone but because it's easier to spot when I open the refrigerator to peruse a stunning assortment of dimly lit lunches waiting for their respective owners to pick them up.

This day was no different than others. My arrival was at a decent time in the morning so I got a nice piece of real estate in the refrigerator. I prefer the bottom shelf of the refrigerator door. This is strategically chosen because most people are 1) too lazy to bend over and 2) my lunch cannot be pushed deeper into the tundra of a regular shelf by late arrivals. Despite the tardiness of others, my food is only a knee-bend away. I know, genius.

This lunch was good too; a Walton's sized portion of chicken, green beans, and rice. The meal was accessorized with a 20-ounce Coca-Cola, grapes, and a bag of Cheeto's. By 11:00AM I was already salivating. No waiting in line at the deli, no visit to the ATM, just stroll down to the pantry, open the refrigerator door, and where the f*ck is my lunch.

Umm, what the f*ck?

Gone, conspicuously absent from its habitual nesting place. My disbelief was quickly replaced by rage. The normal default for my narrow-minded self would be that either cleaning services or maintenance was chowing down on my grub. But this was office hours, too risky an operation in broad daylight. No, this crime was willingly committed by a single, non-smoking, well-paid professional with a weekend drinking problem. Someone qualified enough to be my roommate.

Then my rage exited as an epiphany entered. I began maniacally rubbing my hands together and let out a shriek of laughter that would have made Dr. Shrinker proud. As the veins popped in my flushed face the pantry filled with another shriek that rivaled mine. This was from an intern who was staring at me in complete fear. She dropped her Lean Cuisine and headed straight back to college (note to self, internalize diabolical plans).

I realized my stolen lunch didn't deter me at all. In fact, I vow to pack my lunch every day with no intention of ever eating it. My next PB&J will be filled with an intolerable amount of Dave's Insanity Sauce containing capsaicin extract which makes habanero-pepper sauce taste like iced milk. I'll be able to find the at-large criminal by following the piercing screaming and the trail of scar tissue left from their tongue. Like they say, if you mess with the bull, you're going to get those two pointy things or something or other.

Excuse me, I think you have my lunch.

We'll shall soon meet, jock roomie. And this time, things will be different than in high school. Moooo-oooooh-ahhhhh-ahhhhh!

Goodbye for Now

2007-02-28T22:28:00.000-05:00

Dear Readers,

It is with mixed emotions that I take a hiatus from this blog.

I have thoroughly enjoyed writing "Corporate Joe in cubicle land" but I'm afraid this blog has kept me from my true love. What began as a casual hobby has taken up more time than I originally anticipated.

I am taking a four month break to focus all of my writing efforts towards finishing my third screenplay. Right now I'm about 1/3 of the way through and I have to converge all of my energy towards completion. This means my near future holds late nights in my basement devising plot points, character arcs, and finding scenes for product placement and gratuitous nudity.

There will be a few moments of joy when the final product is ready for submission. I'll have delusions of grandeur about people watching my film on the silver screen, acceptance speeches, and owning a Toyota Prius to stop the glaciers from melting. This joy will quickly be replaced with despair when a producer on the fringe of the industry tells me my story is "sophomoric", "predictable", and "perfect for Tina Yothers". Eventually, my 110 page document will be used as a coaster by a location assistant in the soft-porn industry who lives in La Mirada.

For those of you who are curious, the subject matter of my screenplay is the same information in my blog. It's all about Corporate America and the story involves an ageing CEO, a newbie, and their reluctant alliance to challenge a corporation. Think "Pippi Longstocking" meets "Full Metal Jacket" with a touch of "8 1/2". Yeah, I know, it's gonna' be good.

In all seriousness, I am a believer in pursuing your dreams. And I do dream that one day my screenplay will be picked up. We attract what we believe, and I believe it will happen. It's a longshot for every screenwriter. Except for Joe Ezterhas, that guy was money.

Sorry about that last paragraph. Tony Robbins got a hold of my keyboard. I'm surprised he could even type. His hands are freakishly large.

You can do it, Corporate Joe!
That'll be $500.

I do want to take the time to thank everyone for the encouragement, flattering comments, and even the occasional criticism. I appreciate all who have taken a few minutes out of their day to read the stories that I have put effort into writing. It's nice to know that I have an audience. And it doesn't bother me that my audience is very small compared to the majority of blogs that are out there. I actually take comfort in knowing my message isn't diluted for the masses. And that I'm too lazy to advertise my own blog.

I'll be back with a vengeance in June of this year. There are plenty of stories left to write about concerning the day-to-day drudgery of 9 to 5 life. In the meantime, if you would like to be on my distribution list (for when I return in June) please send me your email address to cubicle.land@gmail.com. I'll be happy to add you. My emails usually have a bit of humor in them also. The more the merrier.

For now, take care and I'll see you in June.

Sincerely,

Corporate Joe in cubicle land.

Oh, The Places You'll Stay

2007-02-12T22:14:00.000-05:00

B.F. Skinner was an American psychologist who believed that if science was able to psychologically dissect human behavior down to the molecular level then every future human action could be predicted. The sobering part of this behavioral theory is that free will is an illusion. We have no choice in what we take in our coffee, what time we go to bed, and how long we keep watching a "Diff'rent Strokes" marathon on TV Land.

Wha'choo talking about B.F. Skinner?

After reading over my company's current goal-setting matrix for future performance, I'm beginning to think our executives are big fans of B.F. Skinner's school of thought.

This year our company has given us the unique opportunity to create our own careers. We actually get to choose our goals. Employees can take the corporate journey on their own terms. We can go only as far as the limitations we impose on ourselves. May the force be with you, NaNoo NaNoo, and all that other shit.

Orson, these humans are crazier than shithouse rats.

So let's begin...

The first thing I realize is that my future career is quarantined by my current capabilities. As long as my career dovetails with my experience and business line, the sky is the limit. This makes sense. If I was hired to be a consultant in let's say, writing code for Homeland Security, then my company wouldn't want me spending my days writing for a blog. OK, bad example, but you get the point. The corporation would want my work to speak to my expertise and vice-versa.

Mental note, keep goals that speak to my skillset.

Now before I can go crazy with my goals I am politely reminded within our performance database that goals are preassigned by position and level. That makes sense. You can't create subpar goals for yourself and expect to succeed. Conversely, you can't expect a new hire to be operating at the same level as the CEO.

Mental note, set reasonable and achievable goals that speak to my skillset.

Metrics are pre-populated. Hmm, options are dwindling. The metrics detail the amount of chargeability that is expected of me. They also list how much money I should bring in for the company, and the necessary training I need to complete in order to remain compliant with corporate standards. These metrics are based on my current position and skillset.

Mental note, adhere to pre-determined metrics and set reasonable and achievable goals that speak to my skillset.

Here's the section I've been waiting for. Individual goals. Sweet freedom! Time to let it rip and shoot for the stars. Oh, the places I'll go. Oh, the fine print. Let's see, "goals should be linked directly to your business line and sector". Alright, so basically my individual goals are what I'm already doing. I have about as much freedom as a prisoner on furlough.

The sky's the limit! Scratch that.
According to our monitor, your cubicle and the restrooms are the limit.

Mental note, just get back to work. Not because I have to but because I want to. That's right, SSSSSSS, burn on you executives. I'm here by choice, man.

Well, Come to the Dollhouse

2007-02-07T21:29:00.000-05:00

Every 14 months Senior Management gets an itch to juggle their personnel. In corporate jargon it's called a "re-organization". In layman's term it's called "f*cking shit up". A reorganization is the leveraging of available skillsets with projected business needs to fully optimize the potential of a company. Sounds fancy, doesn't it? In reality, it is the opportunity for Senior Management to play with their dollhouse in the belief that they are building a better Weeble home.

I'm Jack, please keep me.

I'm Jane. Please fire Jack.

He wears that red shirt every day and refuses to leave his wife.

The first step involves business theory among the executives. They not only lock themselves away in their inviolable* conference room but also from the day-to-day operations of the very business they are restructuring. These intense meetings are filled with trays from catering service and mind-numbing PowerPoint presentations. The brainstorming is electrified by ideas that are conceived from the intellectual seeds of grown men who weren't laid until their early 30's. From this process, the reorganization begins to take shape.

The second signature step of a reorganization is creating a rumor that is thrust into the ether by Senior Management. This rumor of a reorganization grows exponentially until it is squashed with feigned disgust several weeks later by the same individuals who perpetrated it. This allows Senior Management to read the initial reaction of the masses and buy time on how they'll drop the real bomb.

The long conference room hours pay off. A reorganization idea is officially born, cradled by Senior Management, and passed around the room to all the proud parents. All the tension from grinding out the work dissolves once birth is given. It is the very moment that Senior Management recognizes their own power by designing a plan that guarantees them job security. They know that Weebles wobble but they don't fall down.

Cigars are lit and Martinis flow at an unofficial happy hour. Nirvana is felt by all and also happens to be playing on the dilapidated jukebox. As "Lithium" blares from the foam covered speakers they all reminisce to a time when they weren't getting laid. Reassuring nods are given and nervous joy is felt prior to the release of the news. Senior Management is so proud of their newborn. This baby is really going to change things.

He's an angel when he sleeps.

The workforce receives the news regarding the birth of the monster. Chaos will reign due to its entry into their corporation. The intellectual fetus is grotesque and will devour salaries and bonuses with its insatiable appetite for overhead.

I'm up. Tommy want wingy!

Senior Management is disturbed and upset by the initial reception. How can this be? We love this idea. We'll be stronger in our core skillset. We'll have more flexibility to react to the marketplace. We'll have increased salaries while yours will decrease. What is wrong with you people?

Senior Management is disgusted with how the reorganization is being implemented. Their initial vision has become a harsh reality of disgruntled workers. The workers push, "What about our jobs?" Senior Management pushes back, "It's not an option, it's a mandate."

The newborn has entered into a hostile world that is not ready to accept the reality it represents. A counterattack ensues by the workforce that involves jobsearch engines, longer lunches, and offline conversations. This Weeble is wobbling and it might fall down.

All the qualified workers that were unimpressed with the newborn make a mass exodus for similar industries that involve higher pay and less responsibility. The dust settles on the reorganization and all that remains are employees who were either a) too lazy to find a new job or b) unqualified to find a new job. Senior Management is left with the weakest links in every facet of their company.

New personnel is hired from competitors. These employees are in their own personal exodus from their company that is in the midst of a reorganization not favorable to their careers. Senior Management has now found individuals who are onboard with their message, their goal, their vision.

The new team is in place, but just like that, it's 14 months later and the marketplace has changed. Priorities have been re-prioritized, the portfolio of the business requires different skillsets, and different workers. This Weeble has wobbled and it has fallen down.

Senior Management rebuilds the foundation of their dollhouse. With selective amnesia they remember all the promise of their last reorganization. Bloated with blind hope, they lock themselves away in their conference room and line up all the Weebles for another round.

*Merriam-Webster's Online 10-point SAT "Word of the Day", bee-otch.

Preoccupied with Reservations

2007-01-29T20:42:00.000-05:00

My company's process for conference room scheduling is an organized riot. I recently called the "Hoteling Department" to book a conference room. This department is manned with an elite force of operators specifically trained to keep track of reservations. I gave my name, employee id, first born, and reservation time. Once the laughter subsided on the other end of the line, the operator ensured me that my reservation would never see the light of day.

You want a conference room? You're hilarious!

Through deductive reasoning, I concluded that the operater did one of two things with my reservation 1) nothing or 2) double booked a room for the ga-gillionth time, whatever they were inspired by at the moment.

Inevitably, it's time for the meeting and I hold my breath while approaching the conference room. Shocker, other people have squatted on the reserved property. Shocker again, the squatters are smug gentleman from a higher pay grade. I have to pop my head in the room and probably resemble a puppet to those inside. I politely tell the gentleman that the space is reserved.

If you're not inside, you're outside.
Corporate Joe, get outside of my conference room.

One of the silver-haired gentleman responds in a polite but firm tone that I must be mistaken. According to their records, they have successfully booked the room. Oh, I see, prison rules, that's cool by me. The only way to solve this is to call Hoteling and see what they have in their records. Unfortunately for me, no one picks up. Hoteling notices the conference room extension (which is never good news) so they don't answer the phone.

It's a conference room number! Quick, everyone under their desks!

As we collectively listen to the ring through the speakerphone I feel the weight of their stares getting exponentially heavier with each passing second. I finally hang up. Either the Hoteling Department double-booked the room or the edgy corporate clones never booked a room, squatted, and are lying to me with impressive poker faces.

We officially have a Mexican standoff.

My options are rapidly diminishing. All I have left is my quick wit which I deftly use in the response, "There must have been a mistake, sorry for the disturbance". I briskly walk out the room. Yeah, take that sucka's. I don't hold back when it's prison rules.

Defeated but not demoralized, I scan the adjacent conference rooms to see which ones are empty. Jackpot! This isn't the adequate size but it will do. So me and my fellow employees huddle inside. Once everyone is settled, we look like a Seattle ticketbooth for a circa '92 Pearl Jam concert.

Who has the agenda?

The meeting begins and I respectfully address my peers in corporate speak that would put most humans to sleep while standing up. In the middle of one of my oh-so ordinary sentences the meeting is interrupted by an intern. Her head pokes in the side of the door like a puppet.

Apparently this intern booked the room in advance. That's strange? I respond in a polite but firm tone that she must be mistaken. According to my records, I have successfully booked the room. She is more than welcome to call Hoteling if she likes. I even pick the phone up and dial. The weight of her venomous stare is like a feather in a helium balloon compared to my previous experience.

She shuts the door. I begin to speak again and realize that I have become one of "them" and a smile reluctantly curls up on the side of my face.

About Corporate Joe

2007-01-16T21:20:00.001-05:00

Corporate Joe is one of the five original people who was born, raised, and still lives in the Northern Virginia area. After completing college at the only school that would accept him, he decided to venture over 15 miles from where he grew up to start a career. Armed with a Bachelors Degree in something "ology", he used his well connected network called "The Five" to land a job as a secretary. Through rigorous hands-on training and knowledge gained from his B.S. degree, he learned to copy, collate, staple, and fax.

By using more advanced tools such as the mouse and printer, Corporate Joe ascended the ranks of Corporate America. To further rocket his career, he embellished his resume and endlessly harrased superiors who eventually promoted him to avoid further contact. With a great wardrobe and a natural ability to bullshit about topics in which he lacked any credibility, Corporate Joe knew it was time to make the career move to consulting. Plus he was broke from liquidating his 401K and investing it in Kozmo.com.

Corporate Joe's tipping point for becoming a consultant whore.

He hit full stride in the world of consulting. Through constant use of the word "robust" combined with perfectly executed head-nodding, he was handed the indispensable position of Project Manager.

Systems Integration, Business Process Improvement, Customer Relationship Management; you name it, Corporate Joe doesn't know about it. But that never stopped him or the endless army of consultants with similar outfits to be self-proclaimed subject matter experts in the area they happen to be working in.

View from Corporate Joe's cubicle....into another cubicle.

Despite all his successes, there was an unfulfilled need for Corporate Joe to express his slice of life experiences from Corporate America. He needed to have a creative artistic release that didn't involve porn so he did the next best thing...he joined an elite group known as "bloggers".

Thanks! Now take your shirt off.

Corporate Joe's stories do not involve watercooler talk in the office. They are geared more towards the watercooler itself. He writes of his personal experience in cubicle land; fax machines, office etiquette, underground parking lots, bonus structures, etc. Everything that millions of corporate clones despise but only a few hundred thousand have dared to write about.

So make Corporate Joe a part of your weekly routine. Take a few minutes from work, read a story, and spend some time on the company dime. Comments are both welcomed and encouraged.

Corporate Joe lives in Oakton, VA with his Bengal Tiger, Bitey. He can be contacted at cubicle.land@gmail.com. If you prefer to know more about Corporate Joe before stalking him, please use this link.

Building, My Confidence

2007-01-16T21:18:00.001-05:00

At the same time George Clooney was announcing the award for Best Supporting Actress at the Golden Globes I was fully entrenched in my consulting cubicle to meet a deadline. I could not help but laugh at the uncanny similarities between me and Clooney. Both of us had blood being pumped to our vital organs along with sharing some of the same letters in our name. The list goes on, but let's just focus on my story.

Good job Corporate Joe. We'll catch up never.

Checking back into work at 8:00PM after leaving only 3 hours earlier was a Deja-F*ck You moment. The hours this week have been relentless in pursuit of a deliverable that will inevitably be shipped to a graveyard called Iron Mountain Storage. Because of this bizarro world schedule I have been exposed to the alter ego of our building that I never knew existed. And I wished I had never found out.

During the day, our office is alive with the humming of lights, the buzz of printers, and the firing of employees. However, the environment changes in an instant based on the sinister plan of our building engineers. I was the firsthand witness to this account and reacted the way most humans would. I pissed my pants, cried, and fell asleep in the fetal position.

The 12-story structure of brick and steel takes its final breath of the evening when the digital clock strikes 11:00PM. The ceiling lights shut down in perfect synchronicity with the auxiliary lights that struggle to stay alive. No humming, no buzz, no traffic. The lighting transmogrifies into an eery blanket of charcoal darkness occupying every space that was booming with electric life a moment ago.

After waking up feeling refreshed from my involuntary coward nap, I sat back down and was immediately distracted by the oppressing silence. Occasionally I'd look over my shoulder to see if someone was there. In particular, the twin girls from The Shining. The poor lighting and deep hallways seemed to be a perfect invitation for them. After misaligning my vertebrae from looking behind my back so many times, I returned to work.

Come play with us forever and ever and ever.
And by the way, what the f*ck are you still doing at work?

The clock now read 12:30AM and I did not put a significant dent in my deliverable. Why am I still here? Why am I hearing the elevator? Who wet my pants again? Oh goodness, the elevator stopped at my floor. I take a breath and hope the killer will murder someone else dumb enough to be working at this hour.

The elevator doors open and the "click clack" of dress shoes reverberate in the lobby. Then silence...which speaks volumes since this means the psychopathic killer is on the carpet that is one step closer to me. Then comes a "beep" indicating a security badge, the psychopathic killer molester now has access to the inside of the floor.

That call is coming from inside your cubicle!

After sucking my thumb and trying to wet my pants for the third time I realize that neither of these techniques have been very helpful. I decide to grab my kahunas (which are saturated at this point) and summon the courage to hunt down the last face I'm going to see before I die. There was a need for me to find the psychopathic killer molester pedophile with a fetish for nylon and look him right in the eye.

I rounded the corner and was immediately met by an intimidating physique. His clothes were dark and his shoes were black mirrored pools. He took a step into the straining light and I saw the true face of....Security. The dread replaced joy faster than the lighting had changed in our building. Naturally, I embraced him and cried.

In his best English he managed to reassure me with the words, "Your pants are wet." God bless you, Babukar something or other. It's hard to read your name tag with all this salt in my eyes and the shitty lighting, but either way, you know I've been through. After this encounter, I left the building tired from the ordeal but refreshed by the outcome. I had put my fears and deliverable to rest.

Upon entering the same building only six hours later the sounds of office life were frighteningly reassuring. The humming, buzzing, and firing had returned. Together they harmonically whistled a tune that let me know I share the burden of a paycheck with endless others.

I had made it through the night with my manhood intact. As long as Babukar keeps his mouth shut based on that C-note I gave him. If he doesn't, I swear to God I'll murder him while he's working the night shift.

I'm Mr. Blue

2007-01-09T23:12:00.000-05:00

The majority of people who take the Princeton Review Career Quiz are recent college graduates whose entrance into the workforce is imminent. I have always been a late adopter so I decided to wait until the quiz was tweaked. Fourteen years after graduation, I felt that all the kinks had been worked out. Upon completion, the results already confirmed what I was feeling. I'm blue.

The quiz has a total of 24 questions. Each question provides two possibilities but only one answer can be chosen. Upon answering all the questions, you are assigned two colors. One is based on Interest and the other is Style. Mine was blue for both.

I guess we have been down in the dumps lately.

Initially this upset me. I'm not racist, but I think we can all agree that blue people are lazy as shit. Based on this sweeping generalization, I decided to look further into the test.

Here are some sample questions:

Question 1
a) I would rather be an auditor.
b) I would rather be a musician.

Question 2
a) I would rather be a clerical worker.
b) I would rather be a carpenter.

Question 3
a) I would rather be in Corporate America.
b) I would rather suck on a 12-gauge.

My Interest was blue:

Blue people like job responsibilities and occupations that involve creative, humanistic, and quiet types of activities. This is often due to being witness to a traumatic act in their formative years thereby stunting emotional growth. Blue people repressed this horrific experience and escaped by disengaging with the outside world to create their own. Their personal world extensively involved video games, comic books, and torturing handicapped animals.

Neato mosquito! Get 'em Green Lantern!

Blue interests include theorizing, masturbating, knitting, writing, and murder, which often lead to work in teaching, masturbating, knitting, mediating, murdering, and other activities ending in "ing".

My Style was also blue:

People with blue styles prefer to perform their job responsibilities in a manner that is supportive and helpful to others with a minimum of confrontation. This is due to their fear of once again being socially isolated from the outside world and forced to play Dungeons & Dragons in their parents basement.

My half-orc has darkvision. Or is it dorkvision?

They prefer to work where they have time to think things through and desperately need others to validate them. People with blue style tend to be insightful, reflective, masturbating masturbaters, selectively sociable, thoughtful, and imaginative. Usually they thrive in a cutting edge, informally paced, future-oriented environment where mistakes are not easily spotted.

Go on, take the test. Unless you are Blue. Then I'm sure you'll make up an excuse not to take it. Lazy ass.

http://www.princetonreview.com/cte/quiz/career_quiz1.asp

Hold the Line, Add the Toner

2007-01-03T20:35:00.000-05:00

My printer ran out of toner today. And everyone quizzically asks Corporate Joe, "Did someone call this in?" which translates to "Can you call this in?" And as always, I cave and reluctantly phone our help desk.

The HP LaserJet is approximately two feet away from my cubicle but if I want new toner I have to call across the world to Delhi, India and speak with a tech specialist named Balachandra Janakibhushan aka "BJ".

BJ is an extremely decent human being. All of our lives would be more peaceful if there were more BJ's in this world. His level of politeness is unmatched. Unfortunately, so is his understanding of the English language.

The routine usually transpires in the following manner...

My call is immediately put on hold. The ironic Muzak of Toto's "Hold the Line" echoes through the receiver. Except this version sounds as if Ghandi became the sound engineer for Zamfir's coverband of Toto's Greatest Hits.

"Take it from me, Ghandi's got mad skills as a producer."

Once BJ picks up the phone, he asks me a series of questions that are equivalent to applying for a passport. After the tenth question, I actually have the mappings for my latitude and longitude ready, just in case. Then, for good measure, I'm put back on hold.

Hold the line, love isn't always on time.

At this point, I imagine BJ is typing my words into a decoder to unlock the secret mystery behind the statement "My printer needs toner". Normally, this would upset me. But I actually get upset because I have the inability to become upset due to BJ's level of courtesy.

It's not in the way you look or the things that you say that you do!

He's just getting by, trying to make ends meet.

Hold the line, love isn't always on time.

If he lived near me, we'd definitely be drinking some Mango Lassi over Aloo Tikki.

Woah woah woah!

"I am one with nature. Your ticket number is H279Q-4."

Finally, we are on the same page and he orders the toner. So where does Mr. Janakibhushan call now?...thousands of miles across the world to the very building I work in. A few hours later an employee from Facilities replaces the toner. I notice this employee because he works on the same floor as me.

I have the audacity to ask, "Why can't I just..." and before I can finish the sentence Dr. Facilities gives me a look like he's answered the question a million times.

I imagine BJ politely laughing at the absurdity of it all thousands of miles away.

Jerking From Home

2006-12-28T20:39:00.000-05:00

My friend and I recently argued over working from home versus working at the office. As always, our heated verbal disagreement escalated to physical violence. Once he was done picking up his teeth with broken fingers and I threw my shoulder back into place, we boarded the ambulance together. With sirens blaring, I sat upright in my stretcher, looked him straight in his good eye, and said, “We're going to have to agree to disagree on this one”.

My view has always been that the office encourages workers to be productive. Not in a bad way but rather in a China sweatshop sorta' way. Fear is a powerful motivator. As humans, we adapt to our surroundings, even if we live in cubicle land.

I attribute this productivity to the stationary environment I work in and the sad predictability of my schedule. The humming of the flourescent lights, the ticky-tacky sound of keyboards coming alive to fire off emails, and the homeless man I pass every morning who has a pet squirrel and uncannily resembles Mama Cass in a muu-muu. The sights, sounds, and smells trigger innate responses that I should get to work.

"Dream a little dream of me"
(if you can actually fit me into your head)

My friend's opposing view is that working from home removes daily distractions of the workplace and increases productivity. He doesn't have to worry about co-workers pulling him away from his desk for lunch and/or a blowjob. He can fixate and obsess over the task at hand without any diversions other than what he has created on his own.

And this is where the disagreement morphed into an argument. I immediately went nuclear because I was jealous of my friend's discipline. Fact is, I am my own worst enemy while working from home. Every single diversion is my own creation.

Working from home for me entails; checking the refrigerator, adding songs to my iTunes library, weighing myself, reading my own blog, and hanging out with the Mama Cass homeless guy and his pet squirrel. That dude can eat (and so can his squirrel).

Stop making fun of my owner.

I guess it all comes down to who you are. For me, I emulate productivity when placed with fellow co-workers in a productive environment. For others with extreme self-discipline, zero friends, under-developed DNA, a clown phobia, low immune system, and a high propensity towards drug addiction, they prefer to work at home.

To each his own.

Go Ahead and Ribbit In

2006-12-18T17:12:00.000-05:00

Two years ago our holiday party occupied an entire hotel with fully stocked bars and numerous feeding stations with sushi, prime rib, and crab cakes.

Holiday Party 2004

This year's party was a little different...

Holiday Party 2006

The layout of the 2006 holiday party captured the essence of how far our company image had fallen within a two-year timeframe. The sushi and prime rib were replaced with spinach dip and cupcakes. No tuxedos, no dresses, no late night Karaoke. I was jammed in a conference room with other co-workers on a Thursday at 3:00PM. The DJ was replaced with a radio that was broadcasting holiday tunes from the moon through a bullhorn.

Upon seeing the potluck desserts before me I realized the power of denial. I have been able to convince myself that despite all of the company's negative publicity, poor bonus structure, and lack of identity, that things were still the same. Why did I not see the warning signs? How could this have happened? Why does this cupcake icing taste like paste?

Fact: If a frog is placed into boiling water, it will jump out. But if a frog is placed in warm water, and the temperature is slowly raised, it will become acclimated, until it becomes cooked.

I'm not going down alone, bee-atches.

While removing a Little Debbie oatmeal cookie from its wrapper, I casually scanned the smiling faces of those who were still here. At that point I knew my name was Kermit and I was officially cooked.

Basura Blanco

2006-12-11T22:48:00.000-05:00

A message from Dominga in Janitorial Services.

Corporate Joe was kind enough to let me borrow his audience. So all three of you pay attention. I'm patronized every day by you suits while trying to get through my job to pay the bills. Here are some pointers next time we bump into each other:

I'm fluent in English. Quit practicing your eighth grade Spanish on me. The extent of your language is "Dos cervesas porfavor" which you learned from your $600 honeymoon package in Cancun. Cheapass.
Quit huffing and puffing when I need to get to your trash. Maybe we can switch next time. I'll surf the internet for soft porn while you empty every trashcan in all 500 cubicles of the building.
Through my extensive janitorial training I can successfully identify trash. You don't have to explicity label "Basura" for every item. Since I'm from Mexico does not mean I'm retarded you retard.
My co-worker speaks Portugese. So unless you're imitating Gwyneth Paltrow, stop trying to impress her with your Tarzan Spanish.
Don't start conversations with me (regardless of Spanish or English) about the pictures of your wife/wives and kid(s). If you loved them so much you'd be home by now.
Yes, I saw "Spanglish". Yes, I liked it. Although I thought some of the plot points suffered due to the intense focus on the character arc of the white mother. Duh.

"Tea Leoni ain't got shit on me."

So next time you see me, step aside bitch. Have the decency to let me vacuum in peace because this job is putting me through business school.

The Rules of Engorgement

2006-12-07T21:52:00.000-05:00

It is important to maximize a lunch hour by saving precious minutes out of the day. However, I draw the line at having my lunch cross the plane of the bathroom door.

Believe it or not, I understand this logic. It is done in the spirit of efficiency for the world of male consultants. Grab your lunch in the pantry, go to the bathroom, take a squirt, then head to your cubicle and cozy up to the latest edition of Highlights.

I know what the women are thinking. Why not go to the bathroom first then head to the pantry? Legitimate question, let me explain. There is an innate synapse in men that dates back to cavemen. The only time we realize we have to drain it is at meal time. So Zog eating a saber-tooth tiger had the same problems as Zack eating a PB&J. The trigger of needing relief is not realized until we're ready to take a bite.

"Why Zog have pee-pee come out of wee-wee when eaty?"

Most men recognize this need and do one of two things:

Head to their desk, drop off their lunch, then go take a zee, or
Head to the bathroom with their lunch, cross the plane of the bathroom door, place their lunch on the counter of the bathroom sink, take a squirt, wash their hands (optional for some), then take their lunch back to their desk.

Based on my years of observation, a large majority fall into the former of these two scenarios. However, for those disturbing amount of individuals who can be categorized in the latter, listen up, I've got something to say.

If you break the plane of the bathroom door with food you plan on putting in your mouth then you might as well eat it on the toilet. Crossing through that invisible border just landed your brownbag in a different zipcode of etiquette. It's like bringing your two-month old son to Studio 54 in a BabyBjorn. Flatulence and bowel movements have no place for the nourishment you thoughfully packed the night before.

"Ahhhh, now I can eat my lunch in peace."

So please, enjoy your lunch break and also give your lunch a break at the same time. Zog would be proud of you. Or maybe he would bludgeon you to death. Cavemen are unpredictable.

Movin' On Up?

2006-12-04T00:12:00.001-05:00

My old cubicle was the envy of co-workers. It was my personal compound tucked neatly away from the beaten path of regular office traffic. I could safely surf pornography without having to constantly look over my shoulder like Wild Bill in his final hand at poker. Except Wild Bill probably left his pants on.

"I thought I was the fastest draw."

This past week I was slapped in the face with an eviction notice from the Super. I was being shipped to the sixth floor. My old cubicle was ripped away from me faster than the virginity of a Laguna Beach cast member. I was disgusted at the thought of moving and disgusted that I actually got caught with my pants down by the Super....again.

To add insult to injury, my company has no internal support for moving. I was given a pushcart to help me with the move which oddly resembled my chair. Glances were followed with whispers as I wheeled my belongings down the hallway. I had to go through the humiliation of being fired without actually losing my job. Time to venture to the sixth floor and get a glimpse of my future home.

Let's put it this way, I went to bed at The Wynn in Las Vegas and woke up in a Super-8 off the Jersey Turnpike. My new location was jammed in a cluster of bush-league cubicles that might be comfortable for employees dedicated to the art of contortion. Each of my movements involves bumping into a calculator, cabinet, or bong. And I sit right next to the printer which sounds like a 747 when it prints. Instinctively, I securely fasten my overhead cabinets when I hear it start to warm up.

"Welcome to the sixth floor! Some of this will have to go offsite."

Things got better though. I was fortunate enough to inherit a papermill from the previous occupant. Every available inch of cabinet space was taken by reports, binders, and boxes that had nothing to do with my workload. These papers were coupled with a sea of misfit office supplies ironically designed for saving space. It looks like Office Depot took a dump on my desk.

Gotta go now, the printer is warming up. I have to put on my seatbelt.

Dispensing Advice

2006-10-29T21:38:00.000-05:00

I visit a nearby deli every day that makes the best chicken salad. However, I never take napkins from their dispenser because it is eerily similar to what one would find in a bathroom stall. As a matter of fact, I do my best not to look at it because the implications could be socially catastrophic.

There is a slight possibility through visual recognition that the mapping in my brain would trigger unacceptable muscle memory. Before you know it, I'm wiping my ass in the middle of the deli. I'm not sure where that kind of behavior is categorized on a performance improvement plan. And I don't want to find out.

"I'll take two. In case I'm barking out of both ends."

My House, My Car, My God Please Shutup

2006-09-27T10:16:00.000-04:00

The superiors in my office enjoy discussing their latest financial adventures amongst themselves but within earshot of subordinates. Gentleman, your salaries and stock options are listed in the annual report. Don't rub salt in the wound, especially during cutbacks on styrofoam cups and plastic forks in order to "Go Green!".

A jury of your lower-income peers would conclude Justifiable Homicide if our overweight secretary (who has not received a raise in three years) stabbed all of you with her scissors. Actually, there have also been cutbacks on office supplies. She'd probably have to stab all of you with a fork she brought from home. As long as it's not during her lunch hour, that girl can flat-out chow.

"We're going to knock it down and build our dream home."

The discussion among the high-level execs always begins with harmless mention of either 1) their home, 2) addition to their home or 3) addition to the addition of their home. The conversation slowly begins to ante up and a verbal poker game ensues to ensure that everyone is keeping up the Jones's.

Exec 1

I'm thinking about buying a new car.

Exec 2

You're thinking about buying a new car? I just bought a Rolls Royce.

Exec 3

You just bought a Rolls Royce? I just bought a Bugatti Veyron.

Exec 4

You just bought a Veyron? I just bought the world. Rock beats scissors, paper covers rock, and owning the world beats a Bugatti Veyron.

Exec 1

SSSSSSS, you just got burned!

The executives disperse and go to a meeting they scheduled at The Palms but can't remember why.

"Enough about my car. What do you think of my car?"

So to all the C-level executives reading my blog (what's zero times zero?) Please keep in mind that conversation about your excesses cuts to the bone of underpaid and overperforming employees. And if you find a fat woman clenching her own fork while running towards you yelling "Mutha' F*cka!", you've shot your mouth off a little too much.

Crimes of Fashion

2006-09-19T21:44:00.000-04:00

Top 10 fashion crimes in the office and their punishment:

10. Men in Pink Shirts
Yes, you're completely comfortable in your own sexuality. You're also still waiting to pick up your dry cleaning. It's fine if you're a cabana boy in South Beach or a banker in Bermuda.

-Punishment-
Wear a pink tu-tu sprinkled with strawberry hearts and parade around new employee orientation waving a wand. You are required to greet each new employee with an eskimo kiss. But hey, you're comfortable, right?
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
9. Men in Diagonal Striped Shirts
Let me guess, you're from Jersey City, are on your second cycle of HGH, and were nominated as fitness member of the month at Gold's Gym. Treat yourself to a sideways striped shirt.

-Punishment-
You will continue to live in Jersey City.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
8. Too much cologne
You're still from Jersey City.

-Punishment-
You will still continue to live in Jersey City.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
7. Glitter (eyes and/or hair)
Glitter is great, if you're a whore.

-Punishment-
You like glitter? Good, now you can bunk with Gary Glitter while watching Mariah Carey in the movie Glitter.

Hey, roomie!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

6. Glasses from the 80's
That's really cool how your prescription glasses cover 90% of your face. Last time I saw a pair of glasses that big I was doing a bunny-hop on my Mongoose.

-Punishment-
Have to watch a 24 hour John Hughes film festival with special focus on plot points in Uncle Buck. In Chinese with English subtext.

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5. Winter, Spring, Summer, or the other one
It's February, it's 40 degrees outside, and you're dressed for a bonfire on the beach. Get your seasons straight.

-Punishment-
Tropical climate, we've got the ticket. A one way ticket to Sudan where highs will be in the 90's with a 50% chance of death from stray bullets. But hey, warm weather.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
4. Men in Tight Pants
"Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk,
I'm a woman's man, no time to talk.
Music loud and women warm,
I've been kicked around
since I was born. "

-Punishment-
Severe fist blows to the crotch. But that's probably a fetish for you, Mr. Pervert in Tight Pants.

Who's making fun? Scoundrels!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
3. Women with Big Hair
I love the way your hair looks like a blonde batch of cotton candy. You're living proof that AquaNet comes in 2-liter bottles. And you're a cosmetologist? You don't say.

-Punishment-
Culprits will have to part their hair on the opposite side and will be stripped of all hair products for one month.
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2. Goth Interns
You're such a rebel. Sticking it to the man while working for the man. The all-black attire and body piercings are dead-on. Of course you dress like that because you don't care. Now continue to listen to your i-Pod clogged with Siouxsie and the Banshees.

-Punishment-
New i-Pod playlist with Bread in endless rotation while dressed in white and strapped to a chair. Not much different than how you'd be in 10 years anyways. Except I don't think they lend out i-Pods to people in psych units.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
1. Flip-flops
You're "pushing summer", I love that term, it's straight out of the fridge. Now shutup and listen. The painful onomatopoeia of "flip-flop" is equivalent to rolling around in broken glass.

-Punishment-
Nothing too severe. Feet will be removed with a hacksaw.

V for Vendetta on Vending

2006-09-12T21:23:00.001-04:00

Upon exiting the office elevators, I saw shadows dance across the wall coupled with flickers of lights. I entered the hallway to see what was causing this display and unknowingly walked into the line of fire. A mob with pitchforks and torches was descending on the vending machine operator. My Spiderman senses tingled and I quickly assessed the situation. Another price hike on the vending machines.

The vending machine guy a.k.a. "Asswipe" was trying to dispense change out of the machines faster than Pee-Wee Herman pulling his root at a peepshow. The witch hunt quickly surrounded him. The mob's intensity matched the fire in their torches, they were out for blood. Unfortunately, I was caught in the middle and did my best to diffuse the situation.

Pay up bee-otch.

With my quick wit and reflexes I stepped aside, directed my gaze towards the vending machine operator, and said, "Good luck Asswipe." I could tell he appreciated my efforts, but they were to no avail. The corporate mob engulfed him like Katrina hitting the coast. Asswipe walked away with his life but left behind his pride and a pair of dirty underwear.

At first I thought the mob overreacted. After twenty-six kicks to the groin, I think he got the point. However, upon reviewing the new totals on the vending machine, I understood everyone's frustration.

The pricing structure skyrocketed into another economy. A minimum 25% hike across the board. I became angry and continued kicking Asswipe in the groin. Imagine my surprise when I realized it was our janitor. Wrong place, wrong time. What can you do but apologize and hope no one saw.

I wasn't about to pump my hard earned quarters into any of the machines. Plus there was nothing left to buy from the looting. That's when my consulting experience gave me an epiphany. I needed to create a cost-friendly concession stand for our office that still maintained respectable profit margins.

My new cubicle

Using the corporate Costco Gold card, I bought cases of sodas along with boxes of candy bars and chips. My cubicle now has an adequate display of assortments that are reasonably priced. Plus it's a great way to meet people. My cubemate keeps bitching about having to leave the cash register on her lap but I constantly remind her, "Think of all the money you're saving on snacks!"

Here comes someone now, time for another sale. It's the janitor and he's still crouched over. Maybe I'll extend the olive branch and give him some free M&Ms.

Happy Hour Premiere

2006-09-12T12:40:00.000-04:00

I'm not invited to happy hours in my office because I'm two standard deviations higher than the median age. Things change quickly though. I accidentally pulled a co-worker's email off the printer with the subject line, "Don't invite Corporate Shmo to the happy hour". Denial is such an ugly thing. I thought everyone in the group deserved a morale boost so I decided to come along.

After driving through the unusually crowded streets of Washington DC, I realized my happy hour directions were useless. I decided to trust my instincts and follow the spotlights that were shining into the sky a few blocks away. That's gotta' be the place. Upon finding the source of the light I realized this happy hour was da' bomb.

Limos everywhere, quarantined paparazzi, and screaming teenagers in bleacher seats. Why had I missed so many of these before? Valet parking was the only option so I pulled my Hyundai Santa Fe right in front of the bar. Someone quickly opened my door and the first thing my feet hit were a red carpet. Flashes of light bathed me while I headed to the entrance labeled "The Guardian". The lights stopped as quickly as they started with mutterings of "It's not him". All the photographers behind the velvet rope stopped to change the batteries in their camera.

What the hell kinda' bar is this?

That's when things started to get a little weird. I walked into the bar and it strangely resembled a theater. Movie posters, popcorn stands, ticket attendants, the works. On top of that, Kevin Costner and that kid who dates that girl from St. Elmo's Fire were standing next to a movie poster. Here's the crazy part, their own photos were in the movie poster labeled The Guardian which is the same name as the bar. What are the chances?

I wasn't about to miss rubbing elbows with a celebrity. I approached that girl from St. Elmo's Fire and grabbed her hand to press the flesh. In a move straight out of G.I. Jane she used my own motion against me and twisted my wrist. I immediately dropped to my knees and was given the wood shampoo by two of her actual guardians. Needless to say, it was pretty cool.

Watch it handsy!

Looking like a tomato with an eyeball, I was aggressively escorted out the same way I came in. I think Mr. Costner felt bad because he paid for my ambulance to the hospital. Some celebs are all talk and others step up to the plate. I salute you Kevin, you totally didn't have to pay for my ride.

While receiving stitches in my head I reviewed the tattered, bloodied happy hour email and realized I read the address wrong. All is not lost, I found a new celebrity bar for our next happy hour. My co-workers are going to love me.

Mufasa, King of the Bagels

2006-09-06T22:00:00.001-04:00

Mufasa is the alpha male marked with gorgeous colors in his Brooks Brothers tie. With quiet confidence, he adjourns the meeting in Conference Room A as lower ranking members of the pride throw furtive glances towards the bagels. They think wiser and slowly back away from the untouched tray. The room is now empty with dimmed lights. The bagels and an eery sound of the struggling A.C. unit are all that remain.

Lurking in the Accounting Department, Shenzi catches the scent of the assorted bagels and cream cheese. This could be a good kill for her. A potential free breakfast, and with proper stealth, a free lunch as well. Under the cover of her wool pickstitch pinstripe jacket she is able to blend in the shadows with her clan following closely. She hisses at them to move away, she will handle this on her own. Her clan reluctantly retreats back to their cubicles barking at each other in disgust.

I love me some garlic bagels.

Shenzi's eyes lock on the the bagels as they remain motionless, unable to fight off their impending doom. The corporate environment has not been rich with food due to recent cutbacks so Shenzi knows she must strike quickly. This opportunity may not present itself again, especially due to third quarter earnings. She reaches for the garlic bagel and begins smothering it with sun-dried tomato cream cheese. "This is too easy", she whispers aloud as her crushing bite pierces the bread.

Who's grabbing my grub!

The lights come alive in perfect synchronicity with Shenzi's first bite. Mufasa stands at the lightswitch with a dissapproving growl. He puffs out his chest to challenge her. The eternal enemies stare at each other. Shenzi knows the matchup is not in her favor. With haste, she grabs another bagel, lunges towards the exit, and immediately bumps into members of Mufasa's pride. In defeat, she drops the bagel on the conference room table and exits. She regrets having left her clan behind and will have much explaining to do at lunch (which she now has to pay for). Next time this confrontation happens, she'll be prepared.

Mufasa switches the lights off again and motions the pride away. He is the only one remaining. Another victory. He meticulously prepares three bagels while awaiting his next meeting. He knows the only way to get rid of Shenzi is to kill her. And there is more room for cutbacks in accounting. He peruses his BlackBerry and realizes his next meeting is with the head of accounting. The clan will be rudderless without their leader. He roars with laughter at this thought while gulping his bagels down whole.

Konfuzo Powers Activate!

2006-09-06T20:42:00.000-04:00

Form of a question!
Shape of a Visio diagram!

When a straighforward business process is transformed into a labyrinth of Rube Goldberg contraptions, Konfuzo is at work. When all you have to do is write an email and a superior morphs it into War and Peace, Konfuzo is responsible. When an HR form for claims reimbursement is lost in the abyss of your insurance company, Konfuzo is the guilty suspect.

Think "Superman and Kryptonite", "Spiderman and the Green Goblin". Now think "common sense and unnecessary bureaucracy" and you will understand the powers of Konfuzo. It is a malleable force which can take a variety of shapes and move from person to person in the business world. Sometimes it might be an incompetent manager and other times it might even be you.

If you find yourself creating unnecessary steps to a simple solution or comparing your job to splitting atoms, take a step back and acknowledge Konfuzo's presence. Some of the following mantras can be helpful in exorcising Konfuzo from your body:

I am not a doctor, no one is going to die. *
In five years, no one is going to give a #$@&.
God I could use a drink, I could really use a drink.

I'm hoping this little piece of advice will prevent Konfuzo from entering your business world. Squash its presence as soon as you recognize it. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some atoms that need splitting.

* If you are a doctor, stop reading my blog. Somebody might be dying on your watch.

Dunkin' Donuts, it really is worth the trip

2006-08-29T21:57:00.001-04:00

I have the privilege of passing by Dunkin' Donuts on my way to work every day. I stopped there last Friday and bought a dozen for the office. With my personal donut artist behind the counter I was able to assemble an impressive assortment of debfibrillator inducing breakfast treats. After ringing up the total, the donut artist glanced at the chosen 12 and whispered to me "I am in the presence of greatness, Godspeed".

Upon arrival in the office, I casually placed the donuts in our pantry and was promptly assaulted by co-workers. "What kind you get?", "Can I have one?", "Hey everybody, Corporate Joe bought donuts!" I was greeted with hearty handshakes and high fives. Janitorial Services hoisted me on their shoulders and I was paraded down the halls and showered with confetti.

Is there anything they can't do?

Despite the blare of trumpets and sea of streamers I was able to distinguish an angelic figure down the hall. The bleached daylight pouring in the window that backs up to our dumpsters made her a vision. I had seen her a million times before and a million times she had looked the other way. Things were different now, I was somebody, I was Mr. Donut Guy.

The astute janitors saw the electricity between me and hotty cherub and they instinctually released me from my perch. I approached and firmly kissed her with both confidence and lust in equal measure. After our mouth music she gently pushed me away and asked, "Where is orientation? Today is my first day." I wittily responded, "Down the hall, two doors to the left." Needless to say, the place went wild. Even more confetti poured from the vents followed by cannon blasts in the background. The marching band was in full swing seamlessly intertwining John Phillip Sousa with Jay-Z. It was turning out to be a pretty good day.

News spread and it wasn't too long before I was rubbing elbows with the corporate brass. Once the CEO took a bite out of my Cinnamon Cake Stick I knew things were going to be different for the both of us. You change inside when something like that happens.

Hey, it's the guy who bought donuts!

Things moved quickly from there. My regular duties of changing toner and tipping the soda machine were distributed among my former peers. I managed a few goodbyes and a 1/2 dozen thumbs up. It was all a blur as corporate security forcefully led me to the elevators for my own safety. I was scheduled to break ground with the governor that afternoon on a new wing named after me.

As I blog from the corporate chopper, last week seems like years ago. Some people might say I got lucky. Others only sit back with envy and wonder. But to tell you the truth, I'm not surprised. Never underestimate the caloric intake of a donut or its power to blind a businessman's common sense.

Editing the Edited Edits

2006-08-29T21:57:00.000-04:00

The following is a true story:

Over the past two weeks, there has been a deliverable exchanging hands among me, my client, and my subcontractor. Unfortunately, my client has felt the need to make this document adhere to the editorial standards of Simon and Schuster even though the intended audience will most likely hit "delete" upon receipt. Below are the series of events that led to my hospitalization:

Thu, Aug 10 - I was personally admonished by the client for lack of sentence structure in the first draft. It was then my pleasure to let her know that I used the same content and format signed off by them from the previous year. Silence on the other end of the line.
Fri, Aug 11 - Upon instruction from the client, edits were to be applied by different sources at the same time to make the process go "smoother".
Mon, Aug 14 - Spent five hours consolidating edits from three different sources. Client insisted on faxing me her edits since she does not know how to use "track changes" in Word (see The Fax of Life for more details). Process went as smoothly as sipping crushed glass through a straw. Devoured two Excedrin.
Tue, Aug 15 - Submitted latest version of document to the client. Upon receipt, client notified me that more edits would be applied since her manager did not initially review. Took a swig of DayQuil.

Just a little taste to ease the pain.

Wed, Aug 16 - I received the edited document via fax and email from my client. She indicated some edits were applied through "track changes" and others were applied to a hard copy. Drove home and found an expired prescription for Vicatin in my medicine cabinet.
Thu, Aug 17 - Applied all edits and submitted latest version of the document. Notified by the client that the document would not be approved because her manager was out of town. Stole two percocet from my co-worker recovering from a broken leg.
Mon, Aug 21 - Manager of my client approved the document and also added another page which I was asked to proofread. I proofread the document and submitted it back to the client. They made another change and asked me to proofread again. I proofread the document again and submitted it back to the client. Held up a pharmacy at gunpoint for their stash of Oxycotin.
Tue, Aug 22 - Document is approved and emailed to correct recipients. I tally up the damage; 58 emails, 17 phone calls, 12 hours of my time, 10 hours of the subcontractor's time. Did I mention the document was only eight pages? Went to the Methadone clinic for my fix and chased it with a shot of Wild Turkey.
Wed, Aug 23 - I am hospitalized for depression and addiction to painkillers.

I did learn something from all of this. Drugs aren't so bad after all. I just wish the nurse would speed up my morphine drip.

Stop, Drop, and Run Like Hell

2006-08-23T22:39:00.001-04:00

Recent terrorist threats have reopened the wounds of 9/11, caused everyone to dump their travel kits, and created lines at the airport that move slower than a sloth with diarrhea. This prompted me to re-evaluate the emergency response system my company has implemented for our building. After review, it has created a fear equal to what the terrorists are trying to inflict.

The cover page of the emergency brochure has several pictures to remind employees of what a disaster is. There is a trailer park devastated by a tornado, the swelling banks of a river, and Michael Jordan in a baseball uniform. The second page is an Emergency Team phone list without any specifics as to why the individuals listed should be called or what constitutes an emergency. The titles range from "Colonel" and "Guard" to "Ozone" and "Turbo". Several of the numbers listed went straight to voicemail. It's good to know I can sleep safe at night knowing that I'm not sleeping at work.

Ain't no stoppin' us now, we're on the move.

Then the document gets serious and begins to address specific situations and how we should act.

Bomb Threat
There is a checklist employees should use when receiving a bomb threat. Questions such as 1) When will the bomb explode? 2) What kind of bomb is it? 3) Can I get your name, number, and social? Also have to be in tune with the caller's gender, speech patterns, accent, and manners.

Let's face it, bombers are a nuisance and there is alot of information to absorb in a tight timeframe. In case this situation does occur, there is a tested Transfer Method that can prevent detonation. Below is an example of how the Transfer Method would be implemented.

INT: OFFICE BUILDING, CORPORATE JOE'S DESK - DAY
A telephone rings, CORPORATE JOE wakes from his nap and answers.

CORPORATE JOE
Hello?

BOMBER
Listen carefully, there's a
bomb set to explode...

CORPORATE JOE
Hold on, I'll transfer you.

BOMBER
Excuse me?

Corporate Joe hits "Transfer".

INT: OFFICE BUILDING, CINDY'S DESK - DAY
Cindy's phone begins to ring. CINDY picks up her line.

CINDY
Hello?

CORPORATE JOE
Hello, Cindy.

CINDY
Look creep, I said
stop calling me.

CORPORATE JOE
No, it's not about our date.
This call's a transfer.

CINDY
Oh, who is it?

CORPORATE JOE
Someone who's planted a
bomb in the building

CINDY
Transfer him through.

BOMBER
Hello?

CINDY
Yes?

BOMBER
Listen carefully, there's
a bomb set to explode...

CINDY
Can you hold please, I'll transfer you.

BOMBER
What the %&*@!

While on hold, "Islands in the Stream" plays Muzak style.

FADE TO BLACK:

The reality is that bombers want credit for their actions. If they get tied up in a phone system, they cannot receive acknowledgement for their madness. The bomb will never detonate. The Transfer Method is a bombproof procedure to keep you safe.

Extreme Weather
Many parts of the United States are prone to extreme weather. The midwest has its tornadoes, the west coast has earthquakes, and Virginia has volcanoes. Wherever you are, it's important to note that FEMA is right around the corner for help. That's all you need to know for extreme weather.

Chemical Attack
Chemical attacks can consist of agents such as mustard gas, cyanide, and the microwaved fish that our intern from Ghana eats. No need to panic. Duct tape your eyes to protect them from burning, then duct tape your nose and mouth so you cannot inhale any toxic fumes. Wait for approximately 15 to 20 minutes then remove the duct tape from your nose only to take a sniff and see if the coast is clear. If not, cover your nose, wait for another 15 to 20 minutes, and repeat until fumes have dispersed.

Please keep this list handy in case you experience any of the situations listed above. If you would like to take a more pro-active stance on terrorism, then attack anyone who appears to be of Middle Eastern descent. Chances are less than .0001% that you'll get your man. Hey, with odds like that, you gotta' get in the game.

Print and the Revolution

2006-08-23T22:39:00.000-04:00

There are unwritten laws of printer courtesy adhered to by the majority of my co-workers. However, there are a few fascists who play 52 card pickup with other people's print jobs without any remorse while yelling "O'Doyle rules!". For those of us who are tired of having sand kicked in our face, the reckoning is here.

Most of us understand that the printer is an informal waiting area. The print job occupying the HP LaserJet dictates who should be in pole position. Standard operating procedure is to approach the printer, take a glance at the current print job, and act appropriately. Figure 1 accurately captures this protocol.

Figure 1. Obtaining your print job (click to enlarge)

Unfortunately, there are employees who hijack the printer with a document that would choke a fully-staffed Kinko's store. They goose step to the printer and elbow onlookers in the sternum to momentarily stun them. This quick blow allows them to cut in front of the line. The coup de grace is how they caress their work with meticulous care and turn other papers into a ticker tape parade.

My print job is next, do you have a problem with that?

These printer bullies are often the work horses ascending the corporate ladder. Be sure to earmark them for future aggravation. From personal experience, confusion is the best method. Approach the printer at the same time as them and fire rhetorical Gatling gun questions in their presence while fumbling through papers, "Did I really print 110 pages?", "I loaded pink paper again?", "How many trees am I killing?".

Another method of confusion involves four steps 1) steal their print job, 2) scan it as a pdf, 3) print the pdf file off of your computer, 4) then complain about how someone is hogging the printer everytime you see the original offender. They'll recognize the document as their own but will be dumbfounded as to how it keeps printing out.

The examples above are effective techniques but one piece of advice; don't fly solo in your efforts. Printer bullies can only be eliminated in a unified front. During recess, alert other members on the same printer network that a revolution is coming. Together, you can take back what is rightfully yours and also have the pleasure of tasting the sweet nectar of vigilante justice. Repeatedly oppress the bullies with the confusion techniques listed above and they will reluctantly migrate to another network printer.

Someone just goose stepped by me at a blistering pace. I think they're heading for the printer. Time to print out all 40 spreadsheets of my Fantasy Football picks.

The revolution is now.

Strangers In the Cube, Exchanging Glances

2006-08-09T22:16:00.000-04:00

I spend approximately 40 to 50 hours a week in my cubicle. This time is filled with meetings, emails, conference calls, and massaging my bare feet. All these hours in the same confines with fellow cubers would logically tell someone that we know each other very well. Wrong.

There are numerous employees who work in close proximity to me that I know nothing about. We have been randomly assigned to the same arena of 8x8 cubicles but we might as well be in different galaxies. No icebreakers or how-do-you-do's. Just the hum of flourescent lights, ringing of the phones, and Steve's* uncontrollable flatulence. The only acknowledgement of each other's presence is a nod of the head.

This is partly my fault. Some psychologists might diagnose my anti-social attitude as a repression of anger. And to them I say, "I'll land severe blows to your crotch with my steel-toed boots you lousy..." Where was I? I blacked out. Oh yes, my anti-social attitude. Despite the proximity and duration of being in each other's presence, I don't know anything about my cellmates. And the sad fact is that my time at the office almost exceeds my life at home.

My introverted approach and belief is that we openly curse the idle chit-chat at the watercooler but clandestinely know it's a more attractive alternative than having someone spill their guts. We have the option of not letting anyone know our secrets. Plus our reticent behavior allows us to stay out of the office gossip. Jessica is having an affair, glad I don't know. Harold's** a crossdresser, ignorance is bliss. The hot new secretary thinks I'm cute! Crap, so it works most of the time.

Steve's letting them rip this morning.

So if we don't interact with individuals, then we can only observe. Is it fair to size people up by their behavior? That's so narrow-minded. And the answer is "yes", of course we can. I have drawn many conclusions about employees juxtaposed in the same tight area of office space as me. Selective observation is a powerful tool. A few noteworthy items:

Krissy enjoys talking about her husband as if he were the second coming of Christ.
Translation: she is trying to convince herself that she didn't marry a loser.

Jay speed dials numerous women every Friday at 4 to unsuccessfully make weekend plans.
Translation: he is trying to convince himself that he is not a loser.

Travis accuses me of stealing his lunch.
Translation: I did steal his lunch but he doesn't have to get all accusatory about it.

We are so tightly crammed together and yet worlds apart. I believe Jars of Clay sang something about that. Or maybe it was Korn. Either way, the only words that are exchanged are hello's in the morning and goodbye's in the evening. Sometimes Sarah will say to me with her timid voice, "let go of my arm, you're hurting me". She's so funny.

The reality is that I'm afraid to open up. Afraid that people won't like or accept me. Afraid that in the end I'll just get hurt. And the loss is mine, I'm probably missing out on some great friendships. But once I start telling people that I was sent from the future to help the rise of the machines, they're never going to look at me the same way again. Especially Sarah.

* All names are fictitious to protect the guilty.
** Except for Harold, that dude is a cross-dressing fool.

Arrive Late, Leave Early

2006-08-08T21:19:00.000-04:00

I've noticed a sickening trend in the office that is a disservice to the workers disciplined enough to beat the morning commute. The employees arriving in the office before 7:30am are getting no props and the snooze button bandits aka "lazy asses" are stealing their thunder by staying late.

To add insult to injury, the late arrivals inconspicuously check their watches, raise their eyebrows, and shrug their shoulders for anybody packing it in before 5:30pm. The late arrivals were the same individuals bullied during their childhood and unknowingly suffer from mild retardation. Sad, but true. Wikipedia doesn't lie.

Arriving early is effective. You can steal loose change from co-workers drawers along with their office supplies. More importantly, you can put a dent in the day's workload without immediate reverberations. There is a communications serve-and-volley that's to the advantage of employees waking up the rooster.

Answering emails without a knee-jerk response from the recipient. Plus you have a date and time stamp to shove in their face. Yeah, that's right, I sent this at 7:15am while your lazy ass was still in bed.
Calling fellow co-workers on business related matters knowing that you'll be in voicemail land. Yeah, that's right, I called you at 7:17am while your lazy ass was still in bed.
Finally, leaving post-it notes on the boss's door. Yeah, that's right, I left this post-it at 7:20am while your lazy ass was still in bed (be sure to only think that in your head and not actually write it on the post-it note).

COCK-A-DOODLE...you know the rest.

My ass is going back to bed.

Early birds are a lonesome breed who rifle through their work in pre-dawn hours with little fanfare. Their efforts slowly depreciate as the hours progress. And by lunchtime, their morning deliverable is a Brontosaurus in the Fed-Ex mentality of Corporate America. There are no kudos from a perception advantage. The late arrivals have that honor. They end up working the same amount of hours but seem to manage a pat on the back for it from superiors with various one-liners:

What are YOU still doing here!

Burning the midnight oil, huh?

So you can't get laid either.

Most of the "late workers" I've seen are playing solitaire or surfing the internet waiting for the gridlock from the evening commute to dissolve. I understand this approach, it's more comfortable to be at your desk than pounding the steering wheel and cursing (before you even started your car). But they should not get extra recognition for it.

There are the rare few who combine hard work and late hours. These are the same individuals that either 1) own the company or 2) would like to think they own the company and don't have a life outside of work. They are the engine of Corporate America and I salute them. I am a piston of Corporate America. A rusted piston. A rusted piston that has been removed from the engine and sold to a scrapyard for pennies. It's nice not to struggle through life knowing where you belong. This scrapyard feels like home.

Living in the scrapyard, my whereabouts are of little concern to the greased up gears of the company. This leaves me in an envious position. I can combine the best of both worlds and arrive late and leave early.

Time flies when you work 5 hours a day, it's 4pm...quitting time.

My Paternity Leave is Petarded

2006-08-02T23:39:00.000-04:00

I called my HR representative to inquire about our paternity leave policy since my wife is expecting in late September. Fortunately, my current employer does have a paternity leave policy which is spelled V.A.C.A.T.I.O.N.

When my first child was born I was with a different employer and they granted me two weeks of paternity leave. I was able to successfully fulfill my rookie fatherly duties which consisted of cleaning up puke, changing diapers at the pace of a Flint Michigan auto worker, and walking around like an extra in Dawn of the Dead.

In a minute honey, just resting my eyes.

Little did I know I was actually spoiled by my previous employer. The use of my current vacation is important to note since its accrual has the shelf life of Kajagoogoo. Once I have a full eight hours saved, the muscle memory in my hand grabs my mouse and begins searching three-day weekend destinations on Orbitz.

Of course I was upset at the response from the HR rep. It's hard to live without something once you've had it, kinda' like heroin. My initial reaction was to reprimand her for the poor policy. I'm supposed to use my vacation to take care of my newborn. Then I thought to myself, that actually sounds reasonable. So instead I yelled at her for not properly addressing me as "Magnum", then I hung up. That's right, trump card.

So my curiousity actually served as a catalyst to do research. I originally thought the Family Medical Leave Act involved taking the whole clan to the hospital and pretending to be ill. Turns out I was close, it was a high profile bill signed by President Clinton in 1993. Based on Wikipedia's description:

The law recognizes the growing needs of balancing family and work obligations and promises numerous protections to workers. The leave guaranteed by the act is unpaid....blahbitty blah blah blah.

Ugh, the word "unpaid" in the first paragraph like a slap in the face. So this leaves me with three options 1) Use up every ounce of my vacation for paternity leave or 2) leave without pay or 3) quit my job, get paid out for my remaining vacation and head to Vegas for all or nothing on 13 black.

I'll need to sleep on this one.

Hating Our Rating

2006-08-01T22:02:00.000-04:00

Every summer each employee in the company has to complete a Mid-Year Performance Review. This document compiles work related year-to-date accomplishments. After putting time and effort into the review, it is skimmed over by a respective manager, signed off on, and filed away with zero correlation to a raise or bonus.

Mid-year raises do happen but they are rare. If you are able to perform DNA sequencing while splitting atoms and solve the crisis in the Middle East (within the same six months) then you are eligible. At this point, your accomplishments are reviewed by the upper-echelon of the company and then filed away with zero correlation to a raise or bonus.

The real purpose of the review process is to ensure that your manager knows your still alive. Also, it helps you remember your accomplishments for the yearly review which has the same raise and bonus structure as the mid-year review. Not only is the mid-year process unnecessary, it's also ambiguous. Advice from superiors on writing the review ranges from, "Don't spend too much time on it" to "It's your accomplishments, make sure you spend some time on it". Clear as mud, wrapped in mud, deep-fried in mud. Surprisingly, I have little to write about for the past six months due to the fact that my job can be completed by a monkey in diapers.

I've had it with these performance reviews,
and my non-absorbent diapers.

Now it's time for self-reflection at the past six months. Pretty impressive stuff, I have managed to stay awake for almost every working day, shown up to work sober on Mondays and Tuesdays, and not scratch my car in the parking garage. Time to pat myself on the back. Here are some other expectations that I was able to meet and often exceed:

Process improvement through technology. Through the use of data filters and several macros in Microsoft Excel, I was able to create a menu of area restaurants. Now with the click of a button I can search by price, cuisine, and mileage from the office. This has drastically reduced the amount of time my co-workers and I discuss where to eat for lunch.
Ramp-up coding skills. Through the use of coding I created a random number generator. This random number generator is restricted to a range that is equal to the number of co-workers I go out to lunch with. Each number within the range corresponds to a specific co-worker. The number that is randomly chosen by my code decides which co-worker will drive to lunch.
Enhance communication skills with the client. The client has relied less on my manager and more on me over the past six months. Due to this level of trust I have been able to communicate my priorities to them. Through effective communication, they understand that I am not to be disturbed from 11:45 to approximately 2:00pm. This time has been set aside to run my macro to decide where I am going to eat lunch, the random number generator to determine who will drive, and my actual lunch hour.

Wow, what a difference six months make. That's one of the wonderful components of my job. No matter how well you perform, you can always do better and strive for the next level. And my superiors have always been kind enough to remind me of this even when I perform outside the scope of my regular responsibilities. Here are some of the expected levels that I must perform at to reach the next stage of my career

Synthesize findings. Sounds great if I knew what it was. Last time I synthesized anything was on my circa 1984 Casio keyboard trying to learn the Axel Foley theme from Beverly Hills Cop.
Contribution alignment with client. A euphemism for "shutup and do what the client says".
Actions with purpose. Prior to learning this, I was running around the office with just my boxers screaming, "the hurricane is near, everyone duck". A co-worker was kind enough to tell me that my actions had no purpose. With her advice, I've drastically reduced this action to only one time per week.

Job well done!

Do I get a raise?

No, but I'll continue shaking
your hand with a blank stare.

Enough of my complaining. It's time to get to the next level and be the difference! But first, I need to tell everyone that a hurricane is coming. Off with the pants and shirt. Maybe I'll even try commando this time.

Need the Microwave? Take a Number.

2006-07-25T22:10:00.000-04:00

The perfect storm for bringing in a frozen dinner for lunch occurs about once every three weeks for me. The storm involves two key elements 1) I'm low on time in the morning and 2) payday is too far away for another unnecessary ATM fee. This combination forces me to dislocate my shoulder and reach into another dimension of my freezer to pull out a frozen dinner that is from circa 1997. Cool, this one has Andre Agassi on the back showing off his long hair, wonder what ever happened to him? Oh well, here today, gone tomorrow.

I'm dreading my frozen meal not only because of the lack of taste and third world serving size but also because I'll have to fight the inevitable microwave line at high noon. The microwave per employee ratio on our floor is approximately 1:758 which leads to a packed pantry that is the square footage of a kitchen island. Just thinking about avoiding this scenario accelerates my hunger pangs so I head to the pantry. I know there's a five-minute window before the line of hyenas start forming to microwave their zebra meat.

Today I'm prepared. My body and my frozen dinner are promptly facing the microwave at 11:50. I position myself in front of the microwave in a manner that resembles Shaq fending off Duncan for a rebound. I get a concerned glance from the first hyena entering the kitchen. She tries to feign lack of comprehension but she knows she'd be doing the same thing if the roles were reversed. That's right, I'm boxing you out bitch along with the rest of your carnivorous clan.

My lunch has successfully completed the unfreezing process and I can't help but smile at the mad rush I have so calculatingly avoided. The next time this place will be empty is 2pm. The line quickly forms and the late-comers are forced to either completely ignore each other or engage in painfully polite conversation. The ones who choose to ignore, tap their toes and stare at the T-minus countdown on the microwave timer. Others ask, "what do you have?" followed by a dissertation on the recipe, its ingredients, and how it has been passed down from generation to generation. Really? You are doing it such an honor by placing it in the microwave.

The next hyena in line has to microwave...a sandwich. No, it's not a homemade sandwich. It's a pre-made sandwich specifically designed for microwave use. I can understand not having time to make a sandwich in the morning but at least go to the deli during lunch instead of showing up with that. Those lunches should be renamed to "I F*cking Give Up." The dark stripes on the bread did not come from a Wolfgang Puck panini sandwich press, they're more likely to be pumpernickel flavored magic marker.

And then there is the motherlode, the employee who pops in a frozen pot-pie that takes 10 full minutes to microwave. Anything that needs to stay in the microwave longer than it takes most humans to run a mile is not a food product, it is a chemical reaction. Something heating up this long leads to the "ooh, that's hot" comment.

When you have something cooking in a conventional oven at 450 degrees for 15 minutes, common sense tells you that it’s hot. You put on oven-mitts and remove the meal. Somewhere along the heating evolution chain, people have forgotten this when it comes to the microwave. We pull items out and drop them on the counter with the comment "ooh, that’s hot!". Really, it is? I wonder if it has anything to do with the ionizing radiation that’s heating your food at a frequency of 2450 MHz inside of one minute. Cavemen didn’t put their hands on a burning log, they knew better. We can’t seem to grasp this concept.

Does microwave radiation make my food hot?

The lengthy cooking process of the plutonium pot pie inevitably produces a line cutter who, growing impatient, waltzes past everyone and tries to fire up the microwave. At this point, all of the hyenas have to grit their teeth and politely tell the alpha female that not only is she out of turn but they will resort to cannibalism if her index finger advances one inch closer to the "Start" button. The alpha female meets their eyes, respects their malignant threat, and slowly backpedals out of the pantry in her Luciano Padovan pumps.

While all these dramatic events occurred, I was able to scarf down my Weight Watchers spaghetti dish that consisted of approximately eight noodles. I'm still starving. Good thing I brought two frozen dinners for lunch. The microwave will be all mine at 2pm.

The Benefits of Smoking

2006-07-24T21:24:00.000-04:00

The smokers in the 9 to 5 world are a dying breed, literally. They used to be in full force during the 70's when they openly smoked in the office during the day and wife-swapped at night. The 80's and a litany of data against the tobacco companies forced them outside the office building to get their fix while debating the importance of “St. Elmo’s Fire”. The 90's brought the next round of analysis against tobacco use and finally reduced smokers to areas the size of hamster cages in the bowels of underground parking where they discussed the demise of pets.com.

The facts against smoking are astounding. It is an originating point of numerous health problems; lung disease, emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and gonorrhea to name a few. Without any research on my behalf I have been able to estimate that smokers are unhealthy and cost employers billions of dollars a year in health benefits. But those are just minor details. The yellow-toothed truth is that smokers have a secret they don't want to share with us second-handers. And I think I figured it out.

The trick is realizing that being 55 and retired is a dream for many workers but tobacco can make it a reality. Sure, smoking takes an estimated six years off your lifespan but who wants to live until you're being fed through a straw (unless that straw has Bombay Sapphire Gin flowing through it). With a shorter lifespan you retire earlier. It’s time we inhaled the aroma of Class A Cigarette happiness. Remember that lake house you’ve been dreaming about? Take a puff, now it’s closer. The cross-country motorcycle tour? Take a puff, you can see it now. Each cigarette will chisel away your working years and put that retirement date within reach.

Back off! I'll be on the conference call in 5 minutes.

Not only does smoking lessen your career but it shortens your day. Fact is, smokers don't work as many hours as their non-smoking counterparts. Four cigarette breaks per day reduces the eight hour workday to seven and a half hours. Toking a fleeting high off of a death stick in a concrete basement seems like a nice alternative to pretending to work. Fight back by smoking. Job's a drag? Take a drag. The hidden bonus is tapping into a new social network by bonding with other smokers who have been ostracized because of their habit. Chances are they will be suspicious of your initial visit to the smoking area but a simple icebreaker will win them over, “Hey, I have an addictive personality and I’m too weak to kick a nicotine habit, plus I wet my bed until I was 27”. Trust me, they’ll be putty in your hands.

The benefits of smoking don’t stop once your smoke break is over because the nicotine is racing like the Baja 1000 through your bloodstream. Now get back to your desk and start plowing through your “to do” list:

Items for grocery shopping (done)
Surf youtube.com (je suis fini)
Assemble pens and pencils by height (check)
Refill stapler (chickity check)

How productive was that! Thank you nicotine, you’re not so bad after all. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a pack of unfiltered Lucky Strikes with my name written all over it.

Rest Assured

2006-07-12T22:34:00.000-04:00

The guy in the bathroom stall next to me was giving birth to a calf this morning. It smelt like burnt egg-salad deep fried in gorgonzola fondue. And it sounded as if the Iron Sheik had him in the Camel Clutch. The cold from the bathroom tile combined with the hot gas exorcising from his body created a weather pattern that caused the barometric pressure to drop. The chance of precipitation in my stall was 40% with a high in the 70's when he was finally done. If a person is capable of emitting such horrific sounds and oppressive odors then I'm not completely comforted by my "safe-t-gard" toilet seatcover. Chances are 100% that someone took the Browns to the SuperBowl on the same toilet seat I was using.

The tissue seat covers always glare back in judgment at eye-level when entering the stall, "you're not going to use me?" No, I'm not. I don't have a degree in epidemiology but a transparent piece of flimsy tissue paper is not going to prevent ringworm. It certainly is not going to protect me from what I heard in the stall next door. We have every right to be paranoid in the corporate bathroom, they are rife with disgusting cooties; lice, herpes, rashes, ringworm, and ebola to name a few. However, the elaborate olympic ceremony of unveiling and administering the seatcover only prevents us from going to the bathroom sooner.

The not so easy-to-dispense seat covers serve as an emotional security blanket for our germaphobic minds. Our conscience has gotten the better of us. We think we're scuzzy bacteria whores if we don't place the flimsy tissue on top of the toilet seat. When in reality we're just whores, forget about the scuzzy bacteria part. The false prophets of paper products speak witchcraft when it comes to seat covers because they will not protect us from the residue of a previous inhabitant's germs. It's time to stop allowing the paper companies to feed off of our fears.

Take a stand and protest. Or in this case, take a half squat. If you're too scared to slap your bare skin against the white enamel finish then hover over it like Luke Skywalker with his landspeeder in park and fill the pond with some boneless brown trout. Trust me, no one is looking and no one is judging. I'm the only one being judged at this point and I'm O.K. with that. But wash your hands with Howard Hughes-like vigor before you leave that bathroom and keep a paper towel in your hand when you use the door to exit. Those doorknobs are filthy.

Cocky in my Khakis

2006-07-08T17:43:00.000-04:00

I'm not very passionate about my job and my wardrobe reflects this lack of career enthusiasm. Lately my apathetic sense of fashion has transformed into unintentional rebellion. I recently passed by an EVP in the hall and his gaze drifted towards my khakis. His eyes locked on the conspicuously frayed hems at the bottom of my pants which were hanging like tassles from a Bon Jovi concert t-shirt. His eyes said it all, "clean up your act son". Like a parent being dissappointed in you instead of being angry. Just the worst.

After this encounter I knew I had pushed the envelope of business casual to got no business being that casual. It was time for my five year clothing outing. Shopping for work clothes is a costly nuisance. I'm a t-shirts and jeans man but our office maintains a business casual policy. Occassionaly we're allowed to wear jeans to work but it's only if you cough up money to support an obscure cause. Last time we wore denim was to save the flying tree frogs in Bacabal. It's nice to know I had a little something to do with that.

Before my clothing expedition, I sadly departed with my previous "dress pants". The frayed ones were the first to go. Next, a pair with the faded imprint of my bulging wallet on the back pocket. Next, a pair that had a rip near my upper-hip area revealing my tighty whities. Finally, a pair that were obscenely tight with my refusal to believe my waist had expanded another inch. Farewell pants, we had some good times together sleeping in my cubicle, may The Salvation Army have the guts to throw you away.

Time to head to the store with the cheapest khakis coupled with a waspy environment, The Gap. The hardwood floors, the bleached lighting and the bleached employees always give me a leery feeling. But for $23 for a pair of khakis I'll overlook the casting call for "Boys from Brazil". Since I'm starting with a clean slate I have to buy at least one pair for each day of the work week. Three stressfree relaxed fit flat front khakis in three different colors; black, stone, and khaki. And to show that I mean business I'll throw in two dress pants. One hundred twenty nine dollars and twenty minutes later, I'm done, and completely set for half a decade from the waist down.

After placing all of my new slacks in the washer and dryer(even the dress ones), I tried everything on again. All a perfect fit, I felt like a new man. Actually I felt like the same man with a new pair of pants. Things are going to be different in the office now. Look at my trousers, listen to my words, I'm meant to be taken seriously. If you don't think I'm essential to the future of this company then may I remind you to look at my pants. That's right, they're $23 a pair, kneel before Zod.

I walked briskly down the hall with a purpose this time, the EVP once again on the opposite end of the hallway with the same gait. You and me, we're the same amigo. That's right, new pants. He sent another gaze towards my shoes and once again screamed, "clean up your act son". I stared down in horror. My black Kenneth Cole shoes that cost more than all my pants combined had a white streak on both of them from those offsite storage boxes that I keep meaning to send...offsite. Looks like I'm going shopping again. This time to purchase a black Sharpie.

Post Vacation Depression Disorder

2006-07-05T22:11:00.000-04:00

I'm back from my 4th of July vacation and some of my predictions were correct. The Big Dog outlet store had the gravitational pull of Jupiter for white people over 300 pounds and the beaches were ridiculously crowded. One unexpected event was witnessing Guatemalapalooza when forty Latinos set up a compound next to me on the beach which included four tents, three tables, fifteen chairs, five blankets, and a partridge in a pear tree. You haven't lived until you've heard Gloria Gaynor's "I will survive" sung by a man en Espanol. And you know what, I had a great time because I wasn't at work.

Making the drive home today I began to suffer from Post Vacation Depression Disorder (PVDD). This disorder is often referred to as "F*ck, I have to go to work tomorrow" and affects a large majority of the American workforce.

Symptoms include:

Heavy sighing
Temptations to liquidate 401K
Feelings of worthlessness
Yelling "F*ck, I have to go to work tomorrow"
Uncontrollable flatulence.

If you begin to experience any of these symptoms towards the end of your vacation and/or on Sunday evenings please begin looking for a new job immediately. This will not cure PVDD but it will surpress your symptoms for approximately six months. Never underestimate the power of denial and never underestimate your weakness to use it. Once you find a new job, the symptoms will resurface with a vengeance whereby you start over. Wash, rinse, repeat. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to post my resume.

Out of the Office

2006-06-29T23:14:00.000-04:00

I'm heading to the beach for the 4th of July holiday to get it away from it all. And by 'getting away from it all' I mean entering the seventh circle of hell. Traffic and the beach are as enjoyable as listening to Yoko Ono Unplugged.

I'm hanging with my wife, my son, and my wife's family which will be great. Seriously, I'm cool with them. But there are things completely out of their control which we'll all have to endure on an east coast beach that's the width of my driveway:

Fighting for a spot on the beach that would barely fit Karen Carpenter only to have every toe-headed toddler run by you kicking up sand followed by a parent running by you kicking up sand yelling at their kids to stop running by you and kicking up sand.
Dealing with more birds than Jessica Tandy did in "The Birds". The seagulls have an endless supply of feces to pummel you into submission. Only choice is to run for cover and abandon your curly fries in the sand for them to devour. Savages.
Seeing older men and women in bathing suits that appear to have been purchased for their five year old grandchildren. Their clothes have pulled a Freaky Friday but the bodies forgot to go with them.
Shopping at the outlet malls to fully witness the super-sizing of America and wonder if there is an actual whiskey tango weight quota to shop at "Big Dog". Big Dog, you slay me with your overdesigned fashion. Put some more paragraphs on the backs of your t-shirts in five different fonts. That's so funny.

Besides that, it should be pretty fun. Enjoy the 4th and check back into Bunkum Junction on July 6th.

The Fax of Life

2006-06-28T21:07:00.000-04:00

I fulfilled my quarterly quota of fax machine usage today. After wiping the blood from my ears from hearing the analog transmission go through I was confused as to how fax machines still exist. They were a common office item starting in the mid-1980’s and have elevated to a spot on the corporate business card. However, the fax machine should be obsolete since email eclipses all of its purposes. Despite this incontrovertible evidence, these machines won’t die and still have a strong enough following to exist, just like Cher.

Today is a perfect example of why I had to reluctantly use the facsimile. The business mind of my client is about as dated as the fax machine itself. The client does not like to use "track changes" in Microsoft Word because they are "too unclear". However, they do like to proofread and edit Word documents using a printout and then send a fax of that edited document. Our toner has diarrhea which places vertical skidmarks down each faxed page. It's like trying to read hieroglyphics off of a tractor trailer's mudflaps. To me, this defines "too unclear".

I tried deciphering the pages character by character using my original document as the map and decoder. Unfortunately, my efforts failed and I had to inevitably call the client who instructed me to "look into" the poor resolution my fax machine emits. Sure, I'll write that down next to my other priority labeled, "drive nails in feet". At the very least, they could jump into the mid-1990's and scan the document into a pdf file then send it via email.

This brings me to my ultimatum. Next time, I'm not budging, no more faxes. I will force the client to adopt more recent technology. If they insist on sending it via fax, then the fax machine will either be broke because it works and I'm lying about it or because I accidentally spilled my Double Big Gulp on it. I refuse to use that outdated piece of plastic that takes up more real estate than Rosie O'Donnell's lunchbox only to create a barely legible image that transmits one page every five minutes. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a purchase to make at 7-11.

Elevator Etiquette

2006-06-28T20:56:00.000-04:00

My office is 12 stories tall and has six elevators that service every floor. For a significant amount of the working day, this is a sufficient capacity to accomodate the number of people in the building. When you arrive before 8:45 in the morning, you never have to wait more than 10 seconds for a spacious elevator to welcome you. And it's great service; want me to hold the elevator, no problem, got all the time in the world, I'm early. No stopping in the lobby or hitting another level of the parking garage. A personal expressway to your cubicle. Sounds like such a trivial moment to enjoy. But I'd rather roll around in broken glass than arrive late.

Once you start hitting the peak of the rush hour bell curve, the options for parking and the borders of your personal space dwindle at an incredible rate. You plummet into the depths of the garage where the flourescent lights flicker, exposing the petri-dish puddles. I saw Gollum down there the other day. He kept asking me to help him look for his "precious". Sorry Gollum, I'm f*ckin' late.

At this point, things are more screwed up than Neverland Ranch. The elevators purposely disregard the lower-levels of the parking garage for the 9:00am-9:15am arrivals. The C-level executives collude with the building engineers to punish late arrivals even though the early risers get no props. I have the emails to prove it but I just can't risk the safety of my family. The dwindling number of available elevators is inversely proportional to the explosion of employee arrivals. This chaotic combination destroys the common decencies we enjoy in our everyday lives. The very moral fiber and structure of our society begin to crumble.

The collapse of common courtesy takes shape through body language which appears harmless on the surface but speaks volumes of its true intent. Everyone begins to position themselves for what they believe will be the next elevator. Small groups form and cluster near different doors, all of which are closed. Chips on a roullette table. Six elevators and six possibilities of which one will open next. You've been waiting five minutes, I don't care. You were the first one here, I don't care. You're our CEO, I don't care. It's survival of the luckiest to see who picks the right one. Let's spin the wheel!

"Ding", a light above one of the elevators comes to life and an organized riot ensues. Everyone starts pushing themselves into position and the scene resembles a Tokyo subway. As always, I'm caught right in the middle. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. After pummeling an Amish guy in the face with a cane I stole from a geriatric admin assistant I am safely on board the corporate vessel. Once the dust has settled, there are two worlds staring at each other; the ones who picked the right elevator and the ones in a galaxy four footsteps away, still waiting in the elevator lobby. I'm staring back at the poor souls who fortune did not favor. I've been on both sides of the coin my friend, I feel your pain. Now get your foot out of the way before I have to use my stolen cane again. Ready to breathe a sigh of relief I realize I'm right by the panel. I'm the unofficial elevator operator. Way too much responsibility.

"Floor six please", "Seven", "Twelve", "Lobby", "Mezzanine". Everyone slow down! I'm tempted to light up all the floors just to shut everyone up. First things first, hit the "close door" button I tell myself. Too late, a silver-haired gentleman jams himself into the elevator with luggage that's older than he is. He gives a forced smile to everyone on board in a feeble attempt to relate. His smile is met with sneers of disgust. The elevator gallery gives a collective groan at my slug-like reflexes. Everyone knows this guy shouldn't have made it. I hope no one on board is a fire marshal because we're definitely at maximum density. "Packed like lemmings in shiny metal boxes, contestants in a suicidal race". Ready to hit the button for takeoff, my eyes accidentally lock with a scared girl on the other side of the elevator tracks. So young, so green.

There potentially is one spot left if you're the size of Calista Flockhart on the last season of Ally McBeal. I begin to receive mixed messages from the girl. Her head and feet twitch with indecision. My pupils scream, "Go for it". I don't want to be the one responsible for holding the "Open Door" button because some neophyte doesn't know the rules of rush hour survival. I can't shirk my duties again or I'll have a mutiny on my hands. Do I give her the school of hard knocks or a get out of jail free card? She twitches again, it's borderline OCD. School of hard knocks Ms. Greenyoung. I'm a nice guy, but at this moment I can't afford to be. The elevator door shuts and the silent approval from my fellow elevatorpool is deafening. "One of us, one of us, one of us."

Buy CTXE now, it's hot!

2006-06-20T23:22:00.000-04:00

I've been inundated with junk email in addition to the junk email that is my work email. Somehow my company is unable to siphon through the hot stock tips on penis enlargement and give me the genuine work emails that I detest. And we're not just talking about a few, it's as if the National Association of Spammers emerged fully energized from a Tony Robbins seminar. A blitzkrieg of impressively misspelled emails with subject lines such as "Lower Home Payment bye 30 purcent", "HiRollerKasino", "Fawlen low on dough?" and of course, "That report was due yesterday, come see me in my office".

All these emails give me an Arsenio Hall "hmmm" moment, does Spam actually work? Internet service providers hate it, it costs businesses time, and rips grown men away from their porn. Despite these negative impacts it keeps coming like another season of Friends. The fact is it's a numbers game. The hit rate might be 1% but if you email 100,000 people that's like, you know...alot of people.

What is the collective IQ of people responding to Spam? These people must be in the same demographics as those dialing up at 2am to talk to a psychic, sex phone line, or to buy something on QVC. Maybe not the sex phone line people, I'm told they're misunderstood and really nice people if you don't judge and give them a chance.

As for the latest stock Spam, Cantex EnergyCorp (CTXE), it had a volatile day today. Opened at .45 and closed at .44, cue "Rollercoaster" by the Ohio Players. That's shortsighted of me, let's look at its 52 week range. Oh wait, it doesn't have one. According to their website, "natural gas show well within the 2D swath imaging area to image, drill and discover trillion cubic foot (TCF)-potential natural gas". Talk about a slam dunk explanation to buy buy buy. You're going to argue with that?

I'm actually glad the six-figure salary system geeks in our company don't have time to filter Spam from my email. I'm going make my company pay dearly for their mistake by buying an obscene amount of CTXE shares, watching the stock price skyrocket, then dumping my shares at just the right time when it peaks. And dumping my current job with it. That's right, who's going to take the time to change the copier toner now? Don't f*ck with me, fools.

CONFERENCE CALL!

2006-06-12T21:49:00.000-04:00

Using the phone seems pretty easy. An enduser picks it up if it is ringing, says hello and converses with person(s) on the other end of the line, then hangs up. Or pulls up their pants and then hangs up, whichever they prefer. Unfortunately, there is a minority of workers in my office building (who tend to be at a higher pay grade) that use speakerphone for all circumstances. These are the same individuals idiotic enough to associate it with a sense of power.

I understand there is a certain time and place for a speakerphone (e.g., multi-tasking while listening, being an actual presenter on the call, posting a resume on Monster.com). However, there are more common and less legitimate reasons that I witness when a speakerphone is in use (e.g., kicking feet up onto a desk and clasping both hands behind head, flicking pencils into a cup, masturbating).

I'm not sure I understand the difficulty in putting the phone to your ear and keeping the business conversation private. I certainly don't need to learn someone else's acronyms, deadlines, and priorities. And why do people feel it's necessary to speak at a volume used only in mosh pits. Nothing captures this scenario better than what I actually experienced today. A fellow co-worker with an office decided to leave the door open for the beginning of the conference call. Multiple beeps in quick succession, each beep representing a person joining the conference call.

"Is everybody on? (beep) Sounds like someone else joined. (beep) That everyone?(pause) (beep) Anyone else? (pause) (beep, beep). OK, my office door is still open (beep). Sounds like we got one more."

The door shuts but somehow the volume level increases to compensate for the closure.

"OK, LET'S GET STARTED!"

Now there's an echo because the person in the office next door has logged into the same conference call and also has decided to use a speakerphone. I can understand the reluctance to sit together on the same call. The office is an excruciating two yards away and there's also that cumbersome HP LaserJet 8100 to walk around, that adds about another yard to the excursion.

"THAT'S A GOOD POINT point point."

Oh goodness, now the person's voice is echoing through both doors and reverberating in my cubicle. Acoustically, I feel like Moses listening to God on Mt. Sinai except this God says "robust" alot and uses more acronyms than a Pentagon employee.

"ANY QUESTIONS questions questions?"

Mental note to self, find out their conference call number, dial-in, and wreak havoc on their next meeting. Ideas such as:

Call from an animal shelter.

"RUFF RUFF, meow, RUFF!"
"Can you please mute your phone."
"RUFF meow RUFF!"
"Please, will everyone mute their phones."
"RUFF meow RUFF RUFF HEE-HAWW!"

Consistently dial in and hang-up so listeners are bombarded with beeping noises

"Did someone just log on?"
"Did someone just log off?"
"Did someone just log on?"

Have a choking episode

"Who is that?"

"Oh dear God!"
"Could you please mute your phone."

Implement a laugh track every time the word "robust" is used.

I wouldn't resort to such impish measures if co-workers had the common courtesy to use their receiver the way it was engineered. Now if you'll excuse me, my phone is ringing, and I need to physically pick it up and place it against my ear.

When I win the lottery

2006-04-09T20:55:00.000-04:00

Once Powerball starts flirting with 100+ million, workers in Virginia make a lunchtime exodus to Washington, D.C. to buy their tickets. Because anything less than three digits before the word "million" just isn't worth the effort. When nobody wins and the jackpot increases in astronomical increments then the main topic at the water cooler becomes, "If I won the lottery". The subject matter makes for good conversation because it allows us to dream beyond our balsa wood office walls and also learn how others less deserving than ourselves would spend it. Some would strive to make the world a better place, others would make life easier for their families, and others would pay disgusting amounts of money for really high class whores.

The lottery teaches us very important lessons about winning, excess, and mortgaging your house on Powerball tickets in hopes of living the American Dream. If you think your life wouldn't change because of winning then you are either; filthy rich already, just heard from your doctor that you have 12 hours to live, or believe O.J. Simpson is innocent. Millions of dollars will change you, trust me, I want to know. I overheard a lottery discussion the other day while sleeping at my desk and I thought this would be a fun exercise to really delve into the details. I've always talked about it on the surface but never obsessed about it. I think obsession for this topic is important, especially since I plan on winning the lottery. A man has to have goals in life.

So let's say I won. First things first, how would I quit my job? For the overwhelming majority of Americans who work there's always that sense of worry upon quitting; bridging the financial gap between jobs, getting vacation paid out, or double checking the corporate 401k for a vested status. Imagine no financial burden upon resignation, how would you quit? So many options and so little time. There's the option of making a huge scene during peak work hours. Get everyone's attention with a bullhorn, air your grievances, then politely drop your pants and urinate on your laptop while it's plugged in so everyone can see it short circuit. O.K., that's a little too aggressive and involves an inevitable lawsuit. The last person you want to give your money to is the company you work for. Plus people might be laughing for unintended reasons when you drop your pants.

There is a super stealth mode that yields greater satisfaction. The object is to treat the day you are quitting no different than any other day except for the fact that you now have an offensive amount of money in your bank account. Come into work, turn on the office lights, fire up the laptop, and grab your coffee. Be sure to answer emails and drop a few phone calls to let everyone know you are around. When the clock strikes noon, tell all your co-workers that you have to "run an errand". Promptly throw on your jacket, walk out the door, change your home number, change your cell number, and never talk to another co-worker again for the rest of your life. Leave them all guessing. I take so much pleasure in the thought of doing this. I know, I'm sick. It's hard to type in a straight-jacket using only your nose to hit the keypad.

Shewww...quitting was fun, now I have the rest of my life. Based on projections from life-insurance actuaries I have approximately 45 years left in me. Here's my list in no particular order:

Learn Italian
Learn Spanish
Learn Japanese
Hit all 50 states in a cross-country trip with my golf clubs
Join a country club
Take piano lessons
Take saxophone lessons
Take golf lessons
Take boxing lessons
Become a black belt in Jeet Kune Do
Attend the Superbowl every year
Attend the Final 4 every year
Attend the Masters every other year
Go camping in Alaska
Get into insane shape, run a sub 5 minute mile
Write a book
Write a screenplay
Go to film school
Make a documentary
Make a short-film
Try a stint as a late night D.J.
Create my own cable access show
Buy a lake house, give all immediate family members a key
Buy a beach house, give all immediate family members a key
Start a foundation to help consumers battle debt
Give an obscene amount of money to my high school
Give a little bit of money to my college
Become a venture capitalist for my friends and family

I came up with that list in ten minutes. I realize several things bullet pointed above cost little to no money. But unfortunately time is money and that's what having alot of money can give you, the luxury of doing the things you want without worrying about the time it takes to do them. I have been babbling so long I almost forgot to go buy my ticket. See you later, keep your fingers crossed.

User ID and Password Please

2006-04-05T09:02:00.000-04:00

Passwords place quite a demand on our memorization skills, especially if you are a member of Corporate America. The first thing I have to do in the morning when I arrive to my gorgeous government grey non-descript cubicle is log in. First the computer; user id and password. Now it's my phone powered by Cisco Networks; user id and password. Oh wait, I have voicemail, let me check my messages; user id and password. Before I've even had time to sneak in a sip of vodka from my bottom cabinet, I have three user id's and three passwords plugged in. And that's just the beginning.

The number of PINs, passwords, and user id's increase exponentially if you have access to the internet. Yahoo email, Google email, Shutterfly, Clark Photo, Snapfish, online banking, and checking up on the underperforming 401K plan. To add insult to injury, our company has PeopleSoft which has even more "access rights" for end-users; want to forecast vacation...type in your password, want to find out about your W-2's...type in your password, want to use the restroom...type in your password. Not to mention memorizing the non-internet associated ATM PIN and accessing voicemail through home and cell. Hell, I even have a user id and password for creating this blog. Fortunately for me, any hacker would fall asleep at the keyboard while reading my blog before gaining access to it.

I have approximately twenty user id's and passwords on a daily basis. Twenty variations of case-sensitive characters and stand alone numbers just to technologically function throughout the working day. And to make matters worse, the latest craze in keeping websites, cell phones, and computers "hacker safe" is to force the end-user to change passwords after a certain amount of time has transpired from the creation of the previous password. Once the muscle memory in your fingertips becomes accustomed to "Boraxo69GO", it's time to switch it up all over again.

The final kicker is HAL 9000 telling us not to write down passwords. Please memorize them. Domo arigato but no domo arigato Mr. Roboto, I have enough problems trying to remember where I put my keys and wallet, I'm writing my passwords down.

Brown Bag Mathematics

2006-03-31T14:02:00.000-05:00

There are thousands of ways to save money and a million ways to spend it. I'm faced with the imbalance of this equation every night of the working week. A challenge that I consistently fail when I decide not to pack my lunch before going to bed. Such a simple task could annually save me a significant amount of money. But the other side of the grass is so much greener.

Eating out has a major upside, getting outside for fresh air, a mental break from your work, drinking a yard beer of Guinness. And the food factor: thinly sliced deli meat from Boar's Head, springy lettuce, hot waitresses, and the option of eating a fresh Cobb salad. These are honorable reasons to venture out for lunch. But when I look at it strictly from a money standpoint, it seems like a short-bus move not to brown-bag my office meal.

Let's do the math, shall we? Last time I checked, there were 365 days in a year.

throw out Saturdays and Sundays, 260 working days
subtract Federal holidays, 249 working days
minus vacation for a mid-career hire, 234 working days
sans sick days, 229 working days
take away days with beautiful weather to call in sick and play golf, 225 working days.

The number 225 seems so harmless by itself, let's do some multiplication, shall we? The average lunch in the D.C. Metropolitan area is not cheap unless you don't have an appetite due to chronic diarrhea and/or you have to eat through a straw. Otherwise, if you are ready to chow, start memorizing your PIN number for the ATM visit, you'll need it. Let's review from a Deli perspective:

sandwich - $6, chips - $1, soda - $.75, indigestion...priceless or $7.75.
225 working days multiplied by $7.75 per day equals $1,744 per year.

I'm comfortable in saying that a total for eating lunch at a slim $7.75 is a conservative estimate. Let's stop being naive and have a real corporate clone lunch. Let's get a pager in the shape of a coaster that blinks, a waiter, and a bill. Now we're living large. Oh, our table's ready:

entree, drinks, tip, uncontrollable flatulence.....$16.00.
225 working days multiplied by $16.00 per day equals $3,600.

The final step is to morph the conservative and liberal estimate into a hybrid amount. Half of those lunches are spent peeling back the white paper wrapping on the chicken salad sandwich at $7.75. The other half is having a beautiful waitress remind you how old and perverted you are while munching on a salad the size of a campfire at $16.00. Divide 225 days by two and assign the divided amount by each dollar amount then combine them and vee-oh-la, $2,671.88 per year. That's alot of coin....what's available for approximately $2,671 in 2006 dollars:

42" widescreen plasma HDTV
Full set of high end golf clubs (including driver and golf bag)
Down payment on a Harley Davidson
American Express gift card for $2,671

Why not just pack a lunch? Now I won't save the full $2,671 because my grub money has to go somewhere but I could guesstimate a savings of $1,500 per year by brown-bagging it. A loaf of bread costs $2.99, a 24 count of sliced cheese is $4.99....oh f*ck it, I'm not doing this math all over again. Just trust me on this one, you'll save money by packing your lunch.

Why is it such a herculean effort? I can find time in my predictable schedule to brown-bag it. It'd be easy to squeeze 5 minutes between my TiVO'd Family Guy and falling asleep on the couch to make a sandwich. It has the appearance of being a breeze but it is such a royal pain in the ass, kinda' like changing banks. Lousy leftovers, deli meat on the cusp of expiration, not to mention my 70's style refrigerator that was engineered by a midget contortionist from Cirque du soleil. I was in traction for a week from grabbing a jar of pickles hidden in the back on the second shelf. Damn midget engineers. Then it hits me, it's not about the act of making my lunch, it's the baggage that goes along with it. Being stuck at my desk for the whole day, breathing in the oxygen backwash from 1,500 co-workers, and toggling between the internet and my excel spreadsheet when someone walks by. There has to be a compromise.

Fact is, I shouldn't eat out every day of the week and coax a possible Lipitor prescription. On the other hand, I shouldn't be inside the office every day of the week suffering from mental health atrophy. The happy medium is to eat out two days a week and pack my lunch three days a week. On the days I do pack my lunch I'll just find a secluded corner in the break room to cozy up to my latest issue of Maxim, great articles...seriously.

Now if you'll excuse me I have to think about packing my lunch. Or maybe I should just go to bed, it's getting kinda' late.

Taxicab Confession

2006-03-28T08:19:00.000-05:00

Whether I'm the driver or the passenger, I'm religious about wearing a seat belt. All those Driver's Ed videos from high school (in hi-fi Betamax format) were enough to put the fear of God in me. Images of a body impaled on a telephone pole after being launched from a car, a distorted face blasted through the windshield and frozen in its final breath, a Jedi who had been cut in half by a black knight's light saber.

I am a strong believer in the "Click It or Ticket" mentality. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, alot of people die in car accidents each year. Furthermore, a large percentage of those alot of people could still be living today if they wore their seat belts. Chilling statistics. Despite being a seat belt nazi, I realized what a hypocrite I am. Because today I called for a cab ride.

The driver promptly showed up and I hopped in the cavernous back seat and that's when it hit me, I never buckle up in taxis. And to highlight the height of hypocrisy, there is no more appropriate time to "Click It" then when you find yourself in a yellow and black checkered vehicle. I try to stay away from sweeping generalizations but taxi drivers are extremely aggressive on the road, and they all smell.

We proceeded out of the parking lot into traffic and I grabbed the "oh shit" handle above the back seat window as the cabbie accelerated into rush hour traffic, switched over four lanes, then slammed on the brakes in disgust when the light turned red. All of these evasive maneuvers transpired over a stretch of approximately 50 yards. I felt like an epileptic break dancer in a bumper car. The back seat strangely began to resemble a coffin. Despite all of this, I was stubborn and firmed my grip, I'm always up for a challenge. It's go time.

The driver anticipated the flow of traffic and jammed the accelerator in perfect synchronicity with the green arrow. Why is he taking this way? What's under this guy's hood? Who wet my pants? I haven't pulled this many G's since Kings Dominion. I'm trying to decipher what they are talking about on NPR but based on our hyperspeed all I hear is a blurb about tighter immigration laws coupled with the wind whistling through the crack in my window. Great, immigration laws. At least it's not a contentious matter for a cab driver. We're cool, right? You're a documented worker and I'm a white male. No problems here. The buzzword "immigration" seems to directly correlate to his speed. Would NPR please stop saying that word. Why are we accelerating through the acceleration?

Oh goodness, a tricky U-turn at a busy light. Through the use of complex breathing techniques which can be mistaken for hyperventilation to the untrained eye, I physically and mentally prepare myself. There's his chance, just a half-mile up, where the light turns red for opposite traffic. Firm grip...check, locked door...check, rock-solid 20 year term life insurance policy for my loved ones...check. My seasoned taxi driver sees another gap which I was unaware of. A gap which measures the approximate length of the car we're in. Sure, we can squeeze in while accelerating to upwards of 40mph in a strip of road that's the size of a suburban driveway. Yeah, no problem. I think I saw this on an episode of "Dukes of Hazzard" where someone was selling moonshine and Boss Hog was eating food. Boss Hog, you slay me.

The cab miraculously fits into the moving target that is our pre-designed space on the road. And no horns! I can see my building now and breathe a sigh of sweaty upper-lip relief. At the very point I begin to drink the Kool-Aid and start to enjoy the ride, we reach the building entrance. I get out knock-kneed and hand the cabbie my voucher, with a cottonmouth voice I manage a crackling "Thank You". The most exciting part of my day speeds away in a yellow and black blur. I'm left nostalgically smelling the fumes of burnt rubber and gas while wafting in a sea of smoke. His driving adventures will continue while my waking hours will consist of staring at my laptop on a morphine drip. Godspeed Mr. Achmed Andretti, you are the most fierce cab driver I never knew.

So remember, always buckle up unless you're in a taxi with a driver speaking Pashto on his cellphone. This has been a public safety announcement.

TheraFlu, Taste the Music

2006-03-25T21:10:00.000-05:00

At least three times a year I find myself battling the common cold. And hell if I going to waste a sick day at home. My M.O. is usually a preemptive strike against influenza with obscene amounts of orange juice and jewish penicillin. When the light ammunition doesn't serve enough of a defense I have to call in the howitzer, TheraFlu.

Through my high school and college years I was never tempted to do drugs. Even though marijuana, cocaine, and shrooms were all within my social grasp I was always satisfied with a can of beer. Plus the pricing schemes for recreational use were ridiculous. I was not about to waste my beer money on drugs. Little did I know that in a far off land called New Jersey, mad scientists at Novartis were creating my achilles heel of addiction called TheraFlu. I was able to eschew readily available addictions in my pixilated days of college but regrettably find myself looking forward to taking a swig of TheraFlu when my throat becomes sore.

When the flu hits I'm groggy, grumpy, and it always seems to hit right before the work week. A good night's sleep is just what the doctor ordered. In this case I have two doctors; one named Acetaminophen and the other named Dextromethorphan, both in the form of a powder. When you've known them as long as I have, you just call them Ace and Dex. At this point you might be concerned. Trust me, it's just a quick fix to battle the flu, and so much more.

The big payoff is uninterrupted sleep piggybacked by entertaining dreams. My usual routine is to take a full dose at 8pm and wait to become comfortably numb. By 9pm it's flowing through my veins and my head hits the pillow knowing that dreams and a healthier tomorrow await. I eagerly progress into my deep slumber with a smirk on my face.

With TheraFlu, my hallucinogenic zzz's have been officially injected with anabolic steroids. Time to dream. Time to leave it all behind. Time to have sex with my ex-girlfriend while hang-gliding over Tahiti. Time to fly with a great white and swim with a hawk. That's right, bizzaro dreams that seem to make complete sense while they are happening. I'm not even breaking the law, just an OTC prescription to get rid of those nasty body aches and fever. Time for an absinthe nippy-nap before I have to wake up to the sobering reality that is my 9 to 5 life.

My dog is getting old

2006-02-16T12:55:00.000-05:00

Every weekday I reluctantly crawl out of bed to participate in the morning commute. And whether it's 5am or 8am, my dog gets up with me. Ears perked, head bobbing, her paws scraping at my heels, trying to will me to the front door for her morning walk. Although lately things have changed. My dog is getting old and it sucks.

The signs are small but significant. She's been grabbing extra shuteye in the morning while I get dressed. She's added an extensive stretching routine to her morning repertoire that resembles canine Tai Chi. Her usual leap has been reduced to a hop and her brown muzzle is morphing into a distinguished silver. She is 11 years old, so if she was a dog, she'd be 11 years old, which she is.

I would use the same term to describe her that Robin Wright used to describe her husband, Sean Penn, "a loving nightmare". There are differences though. My dog was smart enough to turn down the role of Glendon Wasey in "Shanghai Surprise" and never shook paws with Saddam Hussein. Besides that, "loving nightmare" is a solid fit between the two.

The nightmare: needy, clingy, neurotic, barks in her sleep, freaks out when my shoes squeak on the fake wood floor, and is unpredictable around other dogs.

The loving: never barks when she's awake, hates cats, miraculously survived Parvo, bladder of a dehydrated camel, snarf-o-matic hog-a-tron on our kitchen floor, and is great with our toddler son.

She's not flirting with death just yet but seeing the first signs of age made me miss her before she is even gone. It's a sad observation with a silver lining. She's sitting beside me now, catching some zzz's. I think I'll wake her up and we'll go for a walk.

I'm scared, hold me.

2006-02-15T20:46:00.000-05:00

My first chance to express myself online without having a cumbersome webcam and those uncomfortable assless chaps.

Upon encouragement from my friends and the voices inside my head I was inspired to showcase my lack of talent in the form of a blog. It feels good to join an elite club of millions whose journal entries, opinions, and insight are actually being read by people that are less motivated than I am. Whoever is reading this, I didn't mean you. Trust me, I was just on imdb.com for about an hour catching up on mindless movie trivia. OK, two hours. OK, it was porn. You happy?

I'm hoping to create some amusement for my audience with anectodal information about my happy, average life which will be served with a healthy portion of self-deprecation. More than two people can be considered an "audience", right?

Enjoy.