Office Crap

I worked at a German faucet compnay for 8 yrs. until just a couple of monts ago when I decided to stay home with my new baby. For 4 1/2 yrs. I did Cust Svc/Inside Sales. After that I was promoted to a Supervisor of my dept. by my new Manager & acted in that role for the remaining 3 1/2 yrs. When the position became open, I applied for it along with a few other people in my dept. I won out because I was able to convince my new boss that I had the most knowledge and could help him manage the team the best (which really was true). I did, however tell him that I really did not think of myself as the "supervisor type" that I really just wanted to help my team gain the tools that they needed to do their jobs successfully. He choose me anyway. My team mates accepted my new role pretty well, even a couple of people that I thought would not.

My manager (Roy) ended up heaping a lot responsibility on me -some good, some bad. I was responsible for keeping up with everyone's time punches, vacation, tardiness, training, monitoring phone calls, conducting team meetings & a whole slew of other things. It became so overwhelming that I wanted to ask Roy so many times "And what exactly do you do?" It seemed like all he did was sit in his office & try to sound like he knew what he was talking about. He decided that instead of learning anything about the product or our customers, he would just ask me. Then, he would take the info that I gave him & use it to make his dumbass look good. Do I sound a tiny bit resentful?

Eventually, he even had me going through the applications & resumes for potential new hires & picking out which ones "we" should interview. At first he was conducting the interviews & then later he decided we should do them together. The fun thing was discussing the candidates after they left. Sometimes Roy & I were on the same page and we were like "what the heck was that? Who would say that? or who would come to a job interview looking like that?" Other times it was like my boss was completely oblivious that a person had been through 6 jobs in 2 yrs. and had a criminal record, missing teeth, had never used a computer & didn't have a car. Somehow this person seemed "trainable and worthy of giving them a shot" -Roys words. Of course whenever he hired someone against my wishes, inevitably the shit would hit the fan. They wouldn't show up for work or they were totally incapable of doing the work or they just plain didn't work while they were there. Meanwhile, there I was having to deal with it because my boss was too nice & didn't want to fire anyone and he was too afraid to come out & actually manage the dept. It was like a big friendly Gorilla had taken over the department & locked himself in an office leaving me to clean up the mess.
It's not like I really like the idea of firing people, it's just that I wouldn't have hired those imbeciles in the first place. And what's the point of me having to supervise them if I don't have the right to hire or fire them? I swear, I get frustrated just thinking back on it. I decided I didn't like being in that position in the long run. Roy was eventually shifted to another position in the company & was let go shortly after that. Hmh, go figure.

Life on TV

Sometimes I pretend like my life is an ongoing sitcom & my friends & family are characters on the show. Sometimes I give them different names & stuff just to make it interesting. Sometimes I pretend that strangers I encounter are also characters. Like for instance, there's this old foreign guy who bags my groceries at Publix. His name is Vitaly & he can't speak good english. Like I said, he's old and this means he also moves at a snails pace. He has barely any expression on his face. He's not mean or anything, he just isn't happy or full of expression. He just sort of exists. One day I told my husband that I thought it would be funny to act like Vitaly is something totally different than that. I said it would be funny to describe him to someone & say "Oh, there's this guy named Vitaly & he's like this super cool old dude who bags groceries at Publix". It really got me laughing because he's anything but that. Maybe it's only me but, it gets me laughing every time I go there.
Sometimes I try imagine people I know in place of characters on actual tv shows. For instance, like Seinfeld. I try to think who I know that would be George & who's the equivalent of Kramer. I also try to imagine who I am in these shows. Like am I Laverne or am I Shirley? In most of the shows, I'm never the crazy one or the quirky one. I'm usually more of the mainstream sort of straight person. However, in someone else's sitcom, I probably am the quirky one. Go figure. By the way, I'm Shirley, not Laverne. I think it would be cooler to be Laverne but, I'm too much of a neurotic wuss so, I'll have to settle for Shirley.
I think doing things like this helps get me through life. It helps me see the humor in the world around me & helps me retain my imagination. It also helps me to deal with the jerks & dumbasses in my world.
I also think I've watched too much tv.

I like dreaming, cause dreaming can make you mine

One day at work someone had the radio playing and "Hotel California" came on. One co-worker who is about 40 said "oh, this brings back good memories" and another guy in his late twenties said "oh, yeah it brings back memories for me". The 40 yr. old turned to him & said "what, of the smell of your crib!?" I laughed but it made me think about how music is a soundtrack to your life. When I was a child my Dad played Elvis records & danced around the living room pretending to be Elvis. My Mom had a Seals & Crofts tape & I remember riding around in the car listening to "hummingbird don't fly away, fly away". As a kid, my sister had record albums of "The Monkees" but, I had more refined taste in rock n roll & bought a Beatles "Magical Mystery Tour" album at a neighbors garage sale for 25 cents. I'm sure then (in the 70's) those people had no idea what a collector's item that would become. I remember going to the rollerskating rink & skating to Rush's "Tom Sawyer" and feeling cool. In my teen years I enjoyed all types of music from New Wave to Hard rock to R&B. I remember riding around in the car with my sister & her friend listening to Duran Duran and feeling important because they let me hang out with them. I remember my first concert I went to was Hall & Oates at the Omni & I felt like "Wow, I've made it!" I finally knew what it's like to go to this magical thing called a concert. Music defined my life. When I was sad, I liked sad songs & when I was happy, I still sometimes liked sad songs. My wedding song was Paul McCartney's "My Love" & I never realized how long it was until I had to slow dance to it in front of 80 people. I like sappy & cheesy songs & songs that people probably think are dorky. So what if I like all of the BeeGees songs & Barry Manilow & Rod Stewart. And so what if I like Dolly Parton's "Hard Candy Christmas". And so what if I like all of the Rocky soundtracks & that I've seen all of the Rocky movies dozens of times. So go ahead & make fun of me because Dan Fogelberg's "Same Old Lange Syne" still makes me all sentimental or if I can bowl a spare or strike by playing "Brick House" or "dancing Queen" in my head. I like what I like. And music completes me.

And I really do think my infant son likes me singing Minnie Ripperton's "loving You" to him.
JLW

Who am I?

I am fed up with the IT business. Each time you change jobs, which is every two years or less, you have to requalify yourself with a technical interview. "But G, you have been programming eleven years, you should be able to pass that tech interview with flying colors." That is what one would think anyway. I have been fishing around in the Atlanta IT market for a few months now, and have had to take the dreaded tech phone interview. Phone interviews are bullshit anyway. It is so easy to say no, when you can't see the person or be effected by his or her humanity. I could say no to the Pope if he called me promising everlasting life. I could turn down a bj from Carmen Electra. I could deny a cripple kid selling raffle tickets for his next operation. Last week I went through a particularly embarassing tech ( as we call em in the biz ), with IBM. I answered a correct question here and there but soon fell into a big streak of wrong that I could not shake. I ended up feeling defensive and desperatly trying to convery my worthiness to the guy on the other end of the phone. I even began doubting that I had ever programmed. Maybe it was all a dream. Maybe I am still a landscaper. But wait maybe I was just a laborer who was dreaming that he was a landscaper. It pisses me off to no end, trying to pass the tech. Eleven years of programming must be worth something. Just the fact that I held the title of developer and was paid and was never fired should mean something. But hell no, someone wants to grill me on linked lists, the proponents of object oriented programming, and database theory. And that is another thing, why in the fuck do developers have to know about datbases but database people don't have to know about programming! Anyway, the whole process makes me want to puke, and it just seems to be getting worse, the older I get. The competition is cut throat. I have to compete with uber geeks from tech who stay up all night playing World of Warcraft and have photographic memories. Most of these freaking geeks don't even study, they are just quick to understand. I try not to confuse what I do for money with what I do for a living, but it is a hard mother fucking thing to do. I am a good programmer. I really am. You belive me don't you?

Ghosts, shrimp and beer

Three days alone sounded good…REAL Good. I managed to wiggle out of going to Allentown, Pennsylvania with my significant other by the hair of my teeth. She even understood…”I am only going up to see my nephews and give them their Christmas presents.” Deep down inside of her, she knew and she did not want to give me a lot of shit about it. I just needed some ME time. I could have gone anywhere. Things were slow at work, people were taking vacation…projects were entering into a state of hibernation. It was a good time to disappear. I had actually never driven that far…five hours, plus or minus an hour, depending on your speed. RButler told me that he had driven there in 3 hours and 15 minutes one time…half the time normally allotted to the speeding impaired. I would be lucky if I made it in seven. Savannah. The name sounded complete without any verbs, adjectives, adverbs or direct objects. It could stand alone. A beautiful word…mysterious, sexy and as foreign to the Yankee tongue as a Varsity Chili dog, walking through the garden, painted red. Close enough to Atlanta, to be considered a neighbor but far enough away to be a complete stranger. I could go there and melt into the scenery. I could be just one more tourist on River Street. One more target for the pick pockets. I could be just like everyone else.
The drive down was not so bad. It had its boring moments. I stopped off in Macon, to let Duane Allman know that thirty-five years after he ate a peach, someone still thought his guitar work soared like an eagle. Rosehill Cemetery’s carriage sized roads is not exactly easy to traverse in a big old Lincoln Towncar. If H & H Soul Food had not been closed for Christmas, then my trip to Macon would have been complete. I however, had to content myself with a few Krystal burgers, and then I was on my way.
The drive down to Savannah is a boring one. Straight as hell, all the way there, although it crosses crooked across Georgia. I made a single turn into Reynolds’s Square, and jutted my lengthy automobile’s ass out into a side street, assuming a valet would jump to my service. You know what assuming does. The Planters Inn is a nice hotel… three and a half stars according to the Expedia website. However, I have been in cheaper hotels and felt richer. The room was nice and clean but a bit small. The water was hot and the towels clean, and there was no lingering cigarette smoke from 1966, so I guess that things were…suitable. I am not trying to be a snob but for…well as much as I paid for 3 nights…well, I thought I would get my ass kissed.
The hotel room turned out to be the worst part of the trip. I can’t remember anything that it did to harm me, or deliberately annoy me, but the room sucked. Maybe it was Reynolds’s Square sending up some of it’s ghosts. Maybe it was the rude, young Indian male hotel attendant. Whatever it was, nothing could wash the stench of loneliness off of the place. The best part of the room was the TV. I watched episode after episode of banal, Bob Saget crap TV, and loved it. My brain rested…my eyes had candy. I laughed at stupid shit. I was King of the Planter’s Inn trailer park, and I mucked about in my sty.
River Street is really the only reason to go to Savannah. It is not particularly great or special, but you can eat fat shrimp and drink cold beer. Bay Street runs perpendicular to it, and you can do the same…big freaking cargo ships, run as slow as sludge into the river from the sea. I actually saw one from China. It is easy to forget that Savannah is actually a port.
I tried earlier in the month to get some friends to meet me in Savannah, but December is not the best month to drag your buddies away from their families, so I spent my three days alone for the most part. I met a retired Major from the Navy, and a guy that looked like Jim Croce, and his partner, a lady that worked at Lady and Sons (the most popular restaurant in Savannah). She even gave me a box of salty country fried chicken and I did not even wait in line.
By the time that Saturday came around, I was glad to leave my haunted hotel room. It was not haunted because of ghosts; it just suffered from a bad vibe. I was glad to get the fuck out. Savannah is a beautiful place, on the outside. But like a friend of mine said of Edinburgh, Scotland: “underneath the surface, there is always something ugly.” Savannah, certainly felt like that too, but I figured that I would come back again anyway. A little evil can be tolerated if you have enough shrimp and beer.