Obsessively checking Facebook to see if anyone likes my posts.
Obsessively checking Facebook to avoid issues at work that I don't understand, which happens every five minutes or so.
Feeling like an awkward thirteen-year-old when I'm at weddings and they play a slow dance.
Blogging at work.
Fart jokes.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
I Don't Want Advice.
I get asked questions I don't know the answers to.
I go to my boss to get answers that I barely understand.
I try to remember what I'm told well enough to communicate it to other people, but it seems silly to have me as the middleman in these exchanges.
I don't care about this stuff. I don't care whether compositors get their files in Word or PDF format. Apart from being concerned for the trees, I don't care whether an Instructor's Resource Manual is printed or only released electronically.
I don't want to be here.
I go to my boss to get answers that I barely understand.
I try to remember what I'm told well enough to communicate it to other people, but it seems silly to have me as the middleman in these exchanges.
I don't care about this stuff. I don't care whether compositors get their files in Word or PDF format. Apart from being concerned for the trees, I don't care whether an Instructor's Resource Manual is printed or only released electronically.
I don't want to be here.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Welcome to the World, Baby Girl!
My new niece is on her way into the world as I type this. I've been given an update regarding centimeters. I had to ask for an explanation, though (assuming my brother has the opportunity to do a lot of texting during this process, which, understandably, he may not). Not having had any children myself, nor having had detailed discussions with friends who have, and not having grown up on a farm, there's still a lot that I don't know. I mean, hearing just about any number of centimeters sounds like a lot, considering what it is that's dilated, but does that mean things are coming into home stretch? Does it mean that, after 8 hours, you're finally getting to the hard part? I don't know.
Fortunately, you don't have to know squat to pray things like, "Yes to a healthy mom and baby!" And, also fortunately, I don't think God needs prayers to be hyper-detailed and articulate before He responds. So I think I'm doing OK in that department. But when it comes to the biology, I'm not much better than a 1950s dad pacing around the waiting room with cigars in his pocket.
And I'm several states away from the center of activity. It'll be a week or so before I get to meet Babygirl. So I'm looking ahead to that, and visualizing successful interactions in which I do not break the baby (though my brother reassures me that those soft spots on their heads are for shock absorption).
OK, so there's one tweak to the above prayer: Lord, I pray both mama and baby will be perfectly healthy, and that none of that will be undone when I come on the scene. Amen.
Fortunately, you don't have to know squat to pray things like, "Yes to a healthy mom and baby!" And, also fortunately, I don't think God needs prayers to be hyper-detailed and articulate before He responds. So I think I'm doing OK in that department. But when it comes to the biology, I'm not much better than a 1950s dad pacing around the waiting room with cigars in his pocket.
And I'm several states away from the center of activity. It'll be a week or so before I get to meet Babygirl. So I'm looking ahead to that, and visualizing successful interactions in which I do not break the baby (though my brother reassures me that those soft spots on their heads are for shock absorption).
OK, so there's one tweak to the above prayer: Lord, I pray both mama and baby will be perfectly healthy, and that none of that will be undone when I come on the scene. Amen.
Sunday, September 05, 2010
The Customer is Always (Convinced They Are) Right
I meant to take a train to visit family this weekend, but the trip -- and all trains for the rest of the day -- got canceled because of downed trees and lines farther down the the tracks, thanks to Hurricane Earl. Bummer, and I'm sure a major inconvenience for a lot of people. No picnic for Amtrak, either, who must have lost buttloads of money on a high-travel holiday weekend. I can understand being annoyed. I can understand not being thrilled with the long line to get your ticket refunded. What I have trouble with is people abandoning all reason simply because they're a customer, as if "customer service" is a value that can overcome otherwise insurmountable obstacles.
Perhaps I still bear some scars from my years behind the counter, but I will tell you flat-out that I do NOT believe the customer is always right. Sometimes the customer is both a jerk and a moron, and is only free to let loose this lethal personality combo when faced with someone who's paid (not nearly enough) to take their shit.
Example: Dude behind me in line wanted to know if the trains would be running come morning (bear in mind that it had only been determined a half hour before that our train should be canceled). The employee at the train station said it depended on the hurricane. Made sense to me; not being intimately acquainted with hurricanes, I nonetheless understood them to be unpredictable. Yet Dude said, "Hurricane's don't last forever! It passes, you fix the damage, you move on!" Perhaps. But that doesn't mean that the employees on the ground in Boston are supposed to be able to predict exactly how that will play out in advance. They got into a longer discussion which I did not care to hear, and I wondered if this customer really thought, "Amtrak doesn't want my money. They'd rather punish me, personally, than try to fix the train tracks. Therefore I must go on the offensive!" Why else would you treat the representative that way? Did he expect Amtrak to somehow thwart the hurricane? Some things are still beyond human control, Dude.
I have a theory. My brother was a biology major, and he confirms that this theory holds weight: Many customers are able to fit their heads so far up their asses because they themselves are, in fact, gigantic assholes.
And here I thought I wasn't scientific.
Perhaps I still bear some scars from my years behind the counter, but I will tell you flat-out that I do NOT believe the customer is always right. Sometimes the customer is both a jerk and a moron, and is only free to let loose this lethal personality combo when faced with someone who's paid (not nearly enough) to take their shit.
Example: Dude behind me in line wanted to know if the trains would be running come morning (bear in mind that it had only been determined a half hour before that our train should be canceled). The employee at the train station said it depended on the hurricane. Made sense to me; not being intimately acquainted with hurricanes, I nonetheless understood them to be unpredictable. Yet Dude said, "Hurricane's don't last forever! It passes, you fix the damage, you move on!" Perhaps. But that doesn't mean that the employees on the ground in Boston are supposed to be able to predict exactly how that will play out in advance. They got into a longer discussion which I did not care to hear, and I wondered if this customer really thought, "Amtrak doesn't want my money. They'd rather punish me, personally, than try to fix the train tracks. Therefore I must go on the offensive!" Why else would you treat the representative that way? Did he expect Amtrak to somehow thwart the hurricane? Some things are still beyond human control, Dude.
I have a theory. My brother was a biology major, and he confirms that this theory holds weight: Many customers are able to fit their heads so far up their asses because they themselves are, in fact, gigantic assholes.
And here I thought I wasn't scientific.
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