Things I witnessed while peering between my fingers.

7 Oct

Have you ever seen someone’s eye get sliced open? I have!

Alan got LASIK yesterday, and I went along out of morbid curiosity  for moral support. I’m here to tell you: it is not for the feint of heart.

I met him at the office just before his procedure. By that time he’d had about an hour to process some anti-anxiety pills they fed him, so when I greeted him in the waiting room, he was running a one-man comedy show for the benefit of his fellow patients and insisting that the drugs were doing nothing for him.

Since he was only minutes away from having parts of his eye destroyed by a laser, I’m thinking the drugs were definitely working.

When it was his time, I watched the procedure through a glass wall, seeing both Alan in real life and a magnified image broadcast on a monitor. And I kind of wanted to barf.

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A Somewhat Rambling Ode to Steve Jobs.

5 Oct

I knew Steve Jobs resigned in August for health issues, but I had no idea he was cutting it this close. The news that he died shocked me.

At first, I was sad that he had barely gotten a month of retirement under his belt before dying. That would SUCK, I thought. But then, I revised my opinion and came back with: Good for him. 

Good for him. He, who was passionate about technology? There wouldn’t be a pasture engaging enough for someone with a mind like that. It would’ve been a slow death, being killed a thousand times over, sitting on the sidelines and watching technology emerge without having a hand in it. Smart Man to work until he wasn’t able. I can appreciate that.

But that’s not what this post is about. This is about how Steve Jobs changed my life.

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Clearly you love your job. Not.

3 Oct

I’m tempted to start a short film project featuring the concierge in my office building. She’s a heavy set woman in her mid-forties, and she clearly hates her job. Or me. One of the two.

I’m generally friendly to strangers. I go out of my way to say hi in the elevator. I strike up conversations over the bathroom sink. I ask cashiers how their day is going and actually listen to the answer. I figure we’re all in this together, so why not get to know each other a bit?

Apparently the concierge disagrees with my approach. Every time I greet her in passing, she gives me a stare that borders on hostile — a stare that I would probably reserve for people whose incompetence negatively and directly impacted my day. Oh, and she never actually answers me, even when I frame up the exchange with a question.

“Good weekend?” I’ll ask on Monday morning. She stares back as if I formed the words using Pig Latin.

I’ve gathered that she does speak English, because there are sometimes people hanging out talking to her. But for whatever reason, she’s decided she doesn’t want anything to do with me.

Bless her heart – that’s not the best approach to take with me. Because my response to that? Game On.

Fine line between a concierge and an animatronic chicken.

Case in point: Today, heading out for lunch, when I stepped off the elevator, she was in the middle of a huge yawn and we locked eyes. So as I walked by, I tapped her desk and said, “Late night?!” and winked at her. (No response, btw.)

Other days, I’ll make comments that are ludicrous – like whipping in from a downpour and commenting, “Been outside lately? It’s gorgeous!” without a trace of sarcasm.

And still: no response. I’m beginning to think she’s an Animatronic Concierge that our property management company leased from Chuck E. Cheese.

Each day I plan to get a bit more ridiculous in my attempts to engage her, just to see what will happen. In my mind, I’ve gone as far as to imagine walking in pantless and asking her if she can recommend a dry cleaner. Or bringing in a cat in a cat carrier filled with squirrels.

Because those are the places my mind goes. That’s normal, right?

I just can’t understand why she won’t be my friend.

 

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My unsolicited sales advice finds two audiences.

2 Oct

On my way to Safeway this weekend, I got stopped by a guy with a clipboard who was trying to gain support for an anti-hate crime support. Usually I walk past sidewalk campaigners, but for whatever reason, I allowed him to engage me.

His memorization of statistics was impressive, and his delivery of the message was smooth, but it ran a bit long. I cut him off, saying, “I believe in your cause, but I make a practice of only giving online. Do you have a web address I could go to?”

Instead of answering my question, he pulled out a form for sidewalk donations and started a long pitch for how they’re “only looking for a modest donation of a dollar a day…” Still trying to be polite, I said, “Again, I won’t give money on the street, but if you have a URL I’ll visit it when I get home.”

And again, he didn’t answer my question but instead plowed forward with his pitch, trying to close me  to make an on-the-spot donation. It pissed me off, and although I tend to be a polite person, I realized that if he wasn’t going to listen to me, I wasn’t going to listen to him. So I just raised my hand, said, “You need to learn to listen,” and walked away, muttering “asshole” under my breath.

Apparently I’m not good at turning off my job, because it wasn’t the first piece of sales advice I offered this weekend.

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In which we propose bringing back maternity pants.

30 Sep

I don’t even how it came up, but on chat earlier today, my sister and I agreed that pants suck.

(The guys reading this are like, “Huh?” so let me explain.)

Alicia summarized it best, so I’ll just cite her reasons:

  1. If you get them so they fit when you’re standing up, they cut into your gut when you sit down.
  2. If you get them so they’re comfortable to sit in, you can pull them down without unbuttoning them when you stand up.

(All the women are nodding.)

I had to laugh because I had a perfect example. Yesterday, returning from NYC, I was wearing pants that fit well when I’m standing. But on the train, they felt like they were bisecting my muffin top, so I took (what I deemed to be) appropriate action: I unbuttoned and partially unzipped them.

The problem was that I completely forgot until I exited the train. Walking down the platform with my bag trailing me, my pants started sliding down my legs with each step. Hello, Washington!

Apparently, in my home state of Michigan, if the infographic above is to be believed, this would’ve been a punishable offense.

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