A Beam Of Light In the Dark...
Glad everyone got a good giggle out of yesterday's story. Hilarious really. [scowls] :/ I'm not supposed to be old yet. I don't wanna grow up, I'm a Toyz R Us Kid. Anyway.
Yesterday's flick was Reign of Fire which I went to see basically because I'd seen everything else decent at the theater, and my friend wanted to meet up and watch a movie, so watch we did. I actually expected it to be largely lame other than some pretty cool dragons, and it was somewhat better than expectations. Some very cool dragons, and although the whole concept of dragons ruling the world is somewhat weak, there was some pretty good action whenever they attacked. Had to go check my rating scheme and example movies to decide where this one should fall, and I think I'm gonna have to go with 4 M's. Seems like just about everything I see these days is 4 or 5 M's with the occasional 6, but I guess that's because I try to avoid the really terrible stuff, and certainly don't pay to see anything that I think will fall into the 1-3 M's area. Maybe when I start catching up on all the old stuff I haven't seen we'll see more excitement in the ratings. Only disappointing thing here was not only did I actually pay the full student price of 7 bucks because it was a night show, but I forgot to use my AMC Moviewatcher card when I would have gotten a free movie popcorn and soda for reaching 100 points on it. BUMMER. Guess next time I hit up the movies I'll have to see something good, and bring a date even, can't eat all that popcorn by myself...
Managed to get the people I work for to run out of dirty work for me to do today a little early, so left around 5 instead of 6. Better yet, I pointed out they probably won't have anything for me tomorrow early, and I might as well just skip a day and come on Friday. Yeah, it's less money that way, but I figure I'm wasting my time if I'm not even getting a full eight hour shift and am spending all that money on parking gas and food. Sushi place downstairs sure is good though. Actually I think I'd like just about any place that made sushi, I'm not too picky. It's good stuff. Going to have to get a lot of exercise tomorrow, working commuting and sleeping doesn't leave much time for it when I have to go all the way to LA. :/
Tuesday, July 30, 2002
It Starts.
The young man wanders across the mall, killing time before he's to meet a friend. He's early as usual, so he spends some time browsing. He ventures into the Disney store, his favorite as a child. Confused at first, he sees nothing but costumes: princesses, Buzz Lightyears, Peter Pans... He ponders to himself for a moment, and figures out that Halloween is a mere three months from the following day. Never too early to start promoting, he supposes. As he shuffles past the counter, an elderly woman with a nametag calls out to him. "May I help you with something today, Sir?" "No thanks, just looking around." replies the man with a smile. After a pause during which the woman gives him a once over as he watches the music video playing on the big screen, she grins helpfully and exclaims "We have some very nice costumes for little girls..." with a genuine smile. He gives a polite chuckle, thinking she was referring to possible changes in his wardrobe. It is only a few seconds later he realizes the true intent behind her words when she adds "And if you have a boy, some very cute ones for little boys as well." He stops dead in his tracks as he realizes his mistake. "No thanks," he stammers, as he makes his way towards the exit in as expedient a manner as possible without being impolite.
I'd managed to go 21 years of my life without someone thinking I was old enough to have children. Alas, someone from the general public has now made that mistake. My how the years have gone by. Wasn't too long ago I thought I was cool because I got into rated R movies by myself. Now some people obviously think I'm old enough to have a child. I suppose retorting back "CHECK WITH ME IN TEN YEARS" would be a bit much. I suppose I'm just around the corner from lines like "You don't look a day over 50." Well maybe over the river and through the woods even.
Today went only slightly better than yesterday at work, but since I caught a movie afterwards and am spending two and a half hours on the road commuting each day, not a whole lot of free time involved. I'll talk about it tomorrow, maybe.
The young man wanders across the mall, killing time before he's to meet a friend. He's early as usual, so he spends some time browsing. He ventures into the Disney store, his favorite as a child. Confused at first, he sees nothing but costumes: princesses, Buzz Lightyears, Peter Pans... He ponders to himself for a moment, and figures out that Halloween is a mere three months from the following day. Never too early to start promoting, he supposes. As he shuffles past the counter, an elderly woman with a nametag calls out to him. "May I help you with something today, Sir?" "No thanks, just looking around." replies the man with a smile. After a pause during which the woman gives him a once over as he watches the music video playing on the big screen, she grins helpfully and exclaims "We have some very nice costumes for little girls..." with a genuine smile. He gives a polite chuckle, thinking she was referring to possible changes in his wardrobe. It is only a few seconds later he realizes the true intent behind her words when she adds "And if you have a boy, some very cute ones for little boys as well." He stops dead in his tracks as he realizes his mistake. "No thanks," he stammers, as he makes his way towards the exit in as expedient a manner as possible without being impolite.
I'd managed to go 21 years of my life without someone thinking I was old enough to have children. Alas, someone from the general public has now made that mistake. My how the years have gone by. Wasn't too long ago I thought I was cool because I got into rated R movies by myself. Now some people obviously think I'm old enough to have a child. I suppose retorting back "CHECK WITH ME IN TEN YEARS" would be a bit much. I suppose I'm just around the corner from lines like "You don't look a day over 50." Well maybe over the river and through the woods even.
Today went only slightly better than yesterday at work, but since I caught a movie afterwards and am spending two and a half hours on the road commuting each day, not a whole lot of free time involved. I'll talk about it tomorrow, maybe.
Monday, July 29, 2002
Corporate America, and Why I'd Rather Chew Glass.
Well, it's taken me one day to start hating work again. One day in some random office in downtown Los Angeles where everyone is in their own little world inside their cubicle, somewhere between "I'm a total loser I have the one closest to the door" and "wow I'm so neat I have a corner office with a view." Everyone hoping they're on a path to somewhere, a bigger cubicle maybe, maybe even one on the END. The whole concept of an office basically causes the gag reflex. I can't even tell you how many times I've had to take care of the most retarded work because someone was bored of getting stepped on so they hired someone else to do the dirty work for them. The WORST kind of jobs however, is when they don't really need you. You end up sitting around, looking over their shoulder from time to time, waiting for work to be given to you. Once you're given it you finish it in a short amount of time, and therefore need something else. They become irritated that you're always in their face, and decide they're better off being irritated about having too much work to do, and you're forced to move on to the next job.
Today was no different, other than for some strange reason they wanted me from 10-6 this week. What that means is when I'm forced to take lunch just because they are and there's no more work, I end up with a less than 40 hour workweek. Of course the paycheck is already hacked into from the $30 I'm paying for parking on the week. Oh and then there's the gas. The fun part was trying to FIND the parking structure, which although it has an address of 818 W. 7th St, actually has no entrances or address numbers of any kind on 7th, and actually has its entrance on S. Flower St, on the complete other side of the block. Luckily I always leave an extra half hour on the first day of temp jobs, knowing I'll probably get lost somewhere along the way. It's interesting walking around downtown, even though I'm from Los Angeles, I've probably actually walked around the downtown area with the largest buildings maybe a dozen times in my life. There's just nothing really there, other than a major hub of Corporate America.
The really irritating part of today was the fact she didn't get back from lunch until 4:30, having left at 1. I was back from my quick break by 3, having not left until after 2, since she said she'd be back "for sure no later than 3." Well, I sat around reading Ender's Shadow for an hour or two, and then finally one of the other cubicleites from across the way noticed I wasn't actually doing anything, and decided to try to give me work to do. "Yeah, do me a favor and um, research this company on the internet they're one of our competitors, just you know, facts and figures and basically come up with a proposal on how we can better compete with them than we are already." Riiiight. As if I even know what she's talking about, have any experience in the field, or even care. Eventually she comes back and decides I'm incapable of that task and gives me a list of colleges to call and find out who their Director of Admissions is. Seems simple, until you realize I got the list at 4pm, long after all the eastern and central timezones have closed for the day. Eventually the person I'm supposedly working for comes back, and says at 5:45 she's going to show me what I'm going to be doing tomorrow while she's in a meeting. She then spends (not exaggerating) thirty full minutes trying to figure out her password into one of the systems they use. She tries four different combinations of logins and passwords, over, and over, and over, as if the 9th time through they'll work. Finally she sighs and says "I guess we'll do this first thing in the morning" before going back and engulfing herself into her laptop and her cubicle, not saying another word to me. I take my book and leave, quite irritated that this is what I'm having to do in order to earn money this summer.
What's sad, is I actually look FORWARD to the traffic. The commute is actually interesting to me. I'm actually DOING something, and can see progress being made. The radio is on, and generally something entertaining is being said, or good music is blasting. You can stare at all the other drivers, trying to figure out who they are, and what their life is like. It's just a world constantly changing, as you plod along from car to car. UNLIKE a cubicle, and a clock, which only changes once a minute, every minute, for the whole day.
This is the most irritated/bitter I've been in a while. I just wish I could find some work available that I actually enjoyed. Unfortunately the economy is not ripe these types of jobs, and so I have to take what I can get, as irritating as it might be.
Check back after the end of this week, I should be better. Who knows, maybe there will actually be stuff for me to do tomorrow. I'd much rather spend time copying and collating a six foot high stack of paper than just sitting there, pretending to be busy when people walk by really you have nothing to do. I was even playing chess against MYSELF today. Like on a piece of paper, erasing and writing where the pieces are, treating each move as if I was playing it to the best of my ability. Black was winning I think before I decided to read instead. Maybe I'll finish the game tomorrow, who knows. Good book by the way, the 5th in a series by Orson Scott Card. Basically a parallel novel to Ender's Game, possibly the best Sci-Fi novel I've read. Quite fun for little boys anyway.
You'll have to excuse me, I've been home for four hours but it's time to go to sleep so I can immediately wake up and leave again so I can hurry up and do nothing.
Well, it's taken me one day to start hating work again. One day in some random office in downtown Los Angeles where everyone is in their own little world inside their cubicle, somewhere between "I'm a total loser I have the one closest to the door" and "wow I'm so neat I have a corner office with a view." Everyone hoping they're on a path to somewhere, a bigger cubicle maybe, maybe even one on the END. The whole concept of an office basically causes the gag reflex. I can't even tell you how many times I've had to take care of the most retarded work because someone was bored of getting stepped on so they hired someone else to do the dirty work for them. The WORST kind of jobs however, is when they don't really need you. You end up sitting around, looking over their shoulder from time to time, waiting for work to be given to you. Once you're given it you finish it in a short amount of time, and therefore need something else. They become irritated that you're always in their face, and decide they're better off being irritated about having too much work to do, and you're forced to move on to the next job.
Today was no different, other than for some strange reason they wanted me from 10-6 this week. What that means is when I'm forced to take lunch just because they are and there's no more work, I end up with a less than 40 hour workweek. Of course the paycheck is already hacked into from the $30 I'm paying for parking on the week. Oh and then there's the gas. The fun part was trying to FIND the parking structure, which although it has an address of 818 W. 7th St, actually has no entrances or address numbers of any kind on 7th, and actually has its entrance on S. Flower St, on the complete other side of the block. Luckily I always leave an extra half hour on the first day of temp jobs, knowing I'll probably get lost somewhere along the way. It's interesting walking around downtown, even though I'm from Los Angeles, I've probably actually walked around the downtown area with the largest buildings maybe a dozen times in my life. There's just nothing really there, other than a major hub of Corporate America.
The really irritating part of today was the fact she didn't get back from lunch until 4:30, having left at 1. I was back from my quick break by 3, having not left until after 2, since she said she'd be back "for sure no later than 3." Well, I sat around reading Ender's Shadow for an hour or two, and then finally one of the other cubicleites from across the way noticed I wasn't actually doing anything, and decided to try to give me work to do. "Yeah, do me a favor and um, research this company on the internet they're one of our competitors, just you know, facts and figures and basically come up with a proposal on how we can better compete with them than we are already." Riiiight. As if I even know what she's talking about, have any experience in the field, or even care. Eventually she comes back and decides I'm incapable of that task and gives me a list of colleges to call and find out who their Director of Admissions is. Seems simple, until you realize I got the list at 4pm, long after all the eastern and central timezones have closed for the day. Eventually the person I'm supposedly working for comes back, and says at 5:45 she's going to show me what I'm going to be doing tomorrow while she's in a meeting. She then spends (not exaggerating) thirty full minutes trying to figure out her password into one of the systems they use. She tries four different combinations of logins and passwords, over, and over, and over, as if the 9th time through they'll work. Finally she sighs and says "I guess we'll do this first thing in the morning" before going back and engulfing herself into her laptop and her cubicle, not saying another word to me. I take my book and leave, quite irritated that this is what I'm having to do in order to earn money this summer.
What's sad, is I actually look FORWARD to the traffic. The commute is actually interesting to me. I'm actually DOING something, and can see progress being made. The radio is on, and generally something entertaining is being said, or good music is blasting. You can stare at all the other drivers, trying to figure out who they are, and what their life is like. It's just a world constantly changing, as you plod along from car to car. UNLIKE a cubicle, and a clock, which only changes once a minute, every minute, for the whole day.
This is the most irritated/bitter I've been in a while. I just wish I could find some work available that I actually enjoyed. Unfortunately the economy is not ripe these types of jobs, and so I have to take what I can get, as irritating as it might be.
Check back after the end of this week, I should be better. Who knows, maybe there will actually be stuff for me to do tomorrow. I'd much rather spend time copying and collating a six foot high stack of paper than just sitting there, pretending to be busy when people walk by really you have nothing to do. I was even playing chess against MYSELF today. Like on a piece of paper, erasing and writing where the pieces are, treating each move as if I was playing it to the best of my ability. Black was winning I think before I decided to read instead. Maybe I'll finish the game tomorrow, who knows. Good book by the way, the 5th in a series by Orson Scott Card. Basically a parallel novel to Ender's Game, possibly the best Sci-Fi novel I've read. Quite fun for little boys anyway.
You'll have to excuse me, I've been home for four hours but it's time to go to sleep so I can immediately wake up and leave again so I can hurry up and do nothing.
Sunday, July 28, 2002
Heigh Ho, Heigh Ho...
And you know the rest. Supposedly for at least this full week and possibly next I'll be employed. We'll see how that goes. At least it's 10-6, no need to wake up too early in the morning, the bummer being it's right in the heart of Downtown L.A., everyone's favorite place to sit in traffic.
Relatively uneventful weekend, as I sat around awaiting the impending doom that is work. Stopped by my old middle school during my bike workout, and was pretty amazed at the differences ten years will make. The place is basically a sea of portable classrooms, with half the playground/blacktop area now covered with them. Guess that's one way to increase the number of classrooms without actually breaking ground on a new building and spending more $. Very few places are still recognizable, other than the Resource Center (otherwise known as the library) where I spent many a morning waiting for the librarian to show up around 7am before school and unlock it so I could go in and read or play games on the computer. Can't even remember the games they had, must have been something really old.
Trying to decide how long to give the shin splint thing to heal, I think one more week and then I'm going to go for some easy runs on padded areas like grass and sand to see how they feel. Hoping to get moving with that again, this week marks the beginning of more regular arm and ab routines, and being able to work the running in would be quite helpful. Still got eight weeks before I head back, can make a lot of progress by then.
And you know the rest. Supposedly for at least this full week and possibly next I'll be employed. We'll see how that goes. At least it's 10-6, no need to wake up too early in the morning, the bummer being it's right in the heart of Downtown L.A., everyone's favorite place to sit in traffic.
Relatively uneventful weekend, as I sat around awaiting the impending doom that is work. Stopped by my old middle school during my bike workout, and was pretty amazed at the differences ten years will make. The place is basically a sea of portable classrooms, with half the playground/blacktop area now covered with them. Guess that's one way to increase the number of classrooms without actually breaking ground on a new building and spending more $. Very few places are still recognizable, other than the Resource Center (otherwise known as the library) where I spent many a morning waiting for the librarian to show up around 7am before school and unlock it so I could go in and read or play games on the computer. Can't even remember the games they had, must have been something really old.
Trying to decide how long to give the shin splint thing to heal, I think one more week and then I'm going to go for some easy runs on padded areas like grass and sand to see how they feel. Hoping to get moving with that again, this week marks the beginning of more regular arm and ab routines, and being able to work the running in would be quite helpful. Still got eight weeks before I head back, can make a lot of progress by then.
