July 31, 2017

Not The Best Start To The Day...

So my morning began the way it usually does, with me desperately attempting to claw a few minutes of sleep more out of my alarm.  Failing that, I began the day properly, with the usual shower, shave, you know the drill.  I was dragging, however: Mondays, y'know?  Eventually I did leave for work, though I was running a little later than normal.


As I walked down the stairs to the parking lot, I noticed that a black SUV was parked perpendicular to the DuckMobile and directly behind it... nope, no driver visible.  Swell.  A few more steps down, and I realized there were two more parked in the lot... and all three were marked "County Sheriff".  There were also two sheriff cars, and a white van labeled, and I kid you not, Crime Scene Investigations.
I had to find an officer and ask politely to move their ominous black SUV so I could go to work.  He asked if I had heard anything strange last night, and I explained that I have five different fans running in Pond Central... I can barely hear myself think, let alone the outside world (...and that's how I like it!).

Off to work I went, walked in, sat down at my desk, started up all the various programs and pdfs and text files I use every day, opened my e-mail to see what the assignment was...

...nothing but the worst type of claim possible.  All day.  All stinkin' day.

I've had better mornings.

Edit: Before anybody asks, I didn't find out what was going on.  It wasn't in Pond Central's part of the building, so I wasn't overly concerned.  Also, once I returned home I didn't bump into any of my neighbors, one of whom I'm sure would have known.  It is a puzzlement.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:09 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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July 24, 2017

Wonderduck - Similar To An Octopus

Remember back when I was employment-bereft (...and would you look at that?  It's been three years since I announced my status to The Pond!  Time flies...) I would sometimes spend entire weeks without leaving Pond Central?  Hermitdom suited me in many ways, mostly the "lazy bum" way.  Shortly before I was plucked from the ranks of the jobless, I found a cartoon that described my state of mind perfectly:


I mention this because some vestige of those days still remains within me.  That is, when I return to Pond Central after work on Fridays, it's quite common for me to not leave again until I have to go back to work on Monday.  Sometimes I don't even open the door to the outside world for the entire weekend.

As I briefly mentioned in my last so-called "post", I had myself a little three-day weekend, but something interesting occurred today.  I went out.  I went out!  In public and everything!  I went out to lunch with the folks, then came right back to Pond Central, elapsed time less than two hours, but I was outside.
Yes, very much like that, including all the controllers and the band... and I'd like to thank Pond Scum member Mauser for mentioning Public Service Broadcasting over at Brickmuppet's place.  Instant fan here.

When your life appears to not have much in the way of big triumphs, you take the little ones with enthusiasm, y'know?

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:16 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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July 23, 2017

Long Weekend

I have Monday off, taking a PTO day.  I've gotta admit, this has been a lazy weekend, even for me.  I've done a little bit more than nothing, but not by much.  And y'know what?


I don't care.  I'll have to be back at work soon enough, but until then t'hell with it.  I deserve this extra day off.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:47 PM | Comments (36) | Add Comment
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July 21, 2017

Impact Warning!

Wednesday morning, I make it into work at my usual time, do my usual things for the first hour, just settlin' in to the routine while easing my way into the day's claim rotation.  Nothing particularly special or remarkable.  A day like any other day, only moreso.  Ah, if only, if only.  Continuing with my regular routine, after about an hour I went off to the loo, then went to the break room to grab a bottle of iced tea out of the vending machine.  Heading back to the production floor, I noticed HR setting up the portable loudspeaker system the business has for the every-two-month all-staff meeting... there's so many of us that people at one end of the office can't hear the goings-on at the other end.  However, and this is what puzzled me, there was no such meeting scheduled for that day!  Upon returning to my desk and signing back into my computer, all became clear: Name That Tune.  I sighed.


See, here's the thing.  Name That Tune is a fun game, and under most circumstances I'm a natural at it... all those years working as a radio DJ, or being the go-to guy at BigBlueBox's music department, or hell, just being a teenager, that's all gotta pay off some way, right?  But the pity of it all is that the songs involved are selected by my boss.  My boss, who loves Barry Manilow and Modern Country music.  The last time we played, it... wasn't pretty.  One of the gamers and I wound up kvetching about the selection later and we came up with out own list, which would have at least separated the music snobs from the children if nothing else.  But I digress.  Not only am I not interested in the game as it stood, it also did a fine job of distracting me from my work.

But something had changed.  The first song was... good.  I mean, really good.  If you knew the tune, you had to get to the HR person and tell her title and artist before anybody else.  Then the song would be stopped, and the next one would come up.  Rinse, repeat.  It became obvious that they had gotten some help with the song list... to the point where I was actually paying attention.  And then it happened.  A song came on that I knew... and after about 30 seconds, I realized nobody else did!  
It's not my favorite Dire Straits song.  It wouldn't even be on the short list.  This was from when the band became a cartoon version of itself, all peppy and cheery and money for nuthin'.  On the other hand, I preferred the Dire Straits that made "Sultans of Swing", but hey, I wasn't going to turn a jumbo Reese's Peanut Butter bar down!  I got to my feet and, leaving my cane behind, I began to walk quickly to the HR person.

I made it four steps.

I actually don't know what happened exactly.  One moment I was upright, the next I had killed all forms of life within a few tens of miles I was getting a closeup look at the office carpeting (light gray, industrial, not at all soft).  I can only assume that one of my shoes, the right one like as not, had been grabbed by an invisible gopher.  I stayed down, taking inventory of my body, when I finally realized that I had just completely wiped out in front of the entire office... and just as the shame and embarrassment began to hit, the HR lady asked "do you know the song?"

I'm sure it's just cosmic coincidence that the song was "WALK of Life".  

Of course my knees hurt.  My right elbow throbbed, as did my left arm in the shoulder area.  By the time the workday ended, I wasn't concerned about my knees: they hurt, but it wasn't an internal pain.  They were just going to bruise (and now, two days on, they probably won't even do that).  My elbow still worked, so I wasn't much concerned about that either.  My left shoulder, though... the next morning, I woke up and it still hurt.  Heck, it still hurts now, though it's much better.  I still can't lift my arm over my head, and trying to push or pull something with it is a cold-rolled b*tch, but it's better than it was.  

But I got a Reese's Bar.  Totally worth it.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:44 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
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July 16, 2017

If You're Happy And You Know It...


... for what it's worth, I'm sorry.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 03:12 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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