Metal Tubing

Recently some guys came into our office to replace the fire alarms and sprinkler system.

Functionally, this meant that I had a guy on a ladder over my desk with his head up in the ceiling. He was rubbing metal tubes. A lot. He really seemed to enjoy his job.

WHEEE!hoo WHEEE!hoo WHEEE!hoo WHEEE!hoo WHEEE!hoo WHEEE!hoo WHEEE!hoo ...

He paused and panted. "Do you need some privacy?", I asked, trying not to make eye contact.

"No," he confided, grinning. "I like having an audience."

His smile was kinda creepy, so I hid in the break room until he went away.

Read More

Yoda!

Target is AWESOME

Read More

Hot Dog Expert

I had a "People Of Walmart" experience last weekend. I was walking down the lunch-meat aisle when I saw a very large woman in one of those motorized scooters. She didn't appear to have any specific medical problem other than her tremendous hinder.

Along beside her was a man I assume to be her husband. He looked to be in his 60's, slightly bent over and walking with a cane. Completing the tri-defect-a was a woman with a shopping cart who appeared to be part of the herd. I'm not sure how she was related.

The wide load lady pulled up next to the hot dog section. She pointed and barked, "Get those Armour hot dogs! I won't eat Bar S!"

This spurred some conversation from the apparently "normal" lady. "What's the difference in those hot dogs? I can't ever tell a difference."

"They're not the same!", roared the scooter sloth. "I won't eat Bar S!"

The other lady was unable to take the hint. She looked at the packaging. "There's no difference in the ingredients on these. I never can taste a difference."

"I CAN!", shrieked Lardy Lucy. Nearby, her husband nodded sadly. "Trust me, she can."

I had to leave before my choking laughter was noticed. I am truly sorry I couldn't get a picture.

Read More

Sew Nice

I'm teaching myself how to sew.

If you can't already hear the screams in your mind, then you just haven't been paying attention.

I have no particular project in mind. I'm going to try and mend a couple of minor seems on some sweatpants without bleeding.

I called my mom to tell her the news. "Mom, I bought a sewing machine!"

Silence.

"It actually fits in my hand, it's so small. It's a tiny little thing, portable, meant for light use, arts n' crafts, that sort of thing."

Silence.

"I've been running some test fabric though it, learning how to thread it and such. I never knew there could be so many bits on a single machine called 'bobbin'."

Then my mom said a very wise thing.

"Don't get hurt."

I'll try.

Read More

Emailing Yourself

A couple of years ago, a developer where I work wrote a program. It wasn't a very exciting program... it got some information from a database, wrote it to a file, and put the file out where our web site could use it.

The thing is, that particular project was cancelled about halfway through. The program still faithfully made its files, but the web site never used them. The program was not disabled, but forgotten.

Fast forward to modern times. I found the program. It was on a schedule, running automatically once every half-hour. I opened it up to see what it was doing. I'll leave out the really techie details, and just say that for the past year and a half, the program had been failing.

You'd think that a program failing every half-hour for a year and a half would be noticed. Not this one! The developer set it up so that on failure, it would send an email notification. The email was labeled as being FROM the developer's email address, TO his email address.

Unfortunately, the developer in question had left the company several months before the program starting failing. His email address with the company had been removed.

This program was running every half-hour for a year and a half, failing every time, and sending a notification email FROM a ghost, TO that same ghost.

The elegant uselessness of it all made me weep with laughter.

Heh.

I guess you kinda had to be there.

Read More

Let's See How Long It Takes OoRah To Notice

I was blessed with some Cotton Candy in my Christmas stocking this year. It came in a handy little cup thinger.



Once I completed my snack, I decided to re-use the cup. I'd hate to see it go to waste, after all.



These are the toys on OoRah's desk. Cute, aren't they? I decided to cage his giraffe.



After all, he's much bigger than me and he's combat trained. Why would I pick on anybody else?

He gets into the office about an hour earlier than I do. I wonder if he'll notice before I arrive? :)

Read More

Short Christmas Stories 4: Santa, Coffee

SANTA

The Oklahoma Christmas Eve Blizzard of '09 took a toll on everybody's inflatables. Our Santa was buried under 8 inches of snow and ice.

My dad also has a Santa inflatable, but his has a little reindeer standing next to him. Dad told me that he had to unplug his inflatable because he got waterlogged and was sagging so much that, "... it looked like Santa was doing naughty things to Rudolf."

Poor Rudolf.

COFFEE

My in-laws got me a BUNCH of coffee for Christmas. They forget that I'm the only coffee-drinker in the house, and I only have one cup per day at home.

There are 17 coffee packages in that picture. I'll be drinking holiday-themed coffee well into April.

Outstanding. :)

Read More