March 28, 2005

I'm that jerk at work

The one who comes into the office with sickness oozing out of his pores. I didn't want to come in today. In fact I would happily (well, as happily as possible bearing in mind the sickness) have worked from home but I left all of my project notes at work. I did this on purpose so as to avoid the temptation of working over the weekend. I made a special effort not to work over the weekend because my dad and step-mom were visiting us for the weekend.

Incidentally, that's why there wasn't anything here on Friday. We were enjoying 80 degrees and sun as we traipsed all over Stone Mountain.

We had a great time with the visit. Bacon was attached to Papa's leg for close to 4 days straight. Bear taught him how to get pummeled in record time playing his favorite video game. Sunday's festivities included hunts for two baskets per child (I told them the Easter Bunny was overstocked so was liquidating some of his stock), egg decoration with Nana and Papa (I have no idea how they kept these three ruffians so clean during the dying phase), an egg hunt (Burger won hands down with 21 eggs), and dinner out at our favorite family restaurant the Golden Corral (when you have three kids, the buffet is your friend).

I've been battling the sickness all weekend. I think I'm past the contagious part but just in case I've taken steps to avoid infecting my coworkers. I have a spray bottle with bleach in it and any time somebody walks into my cube I squirt them. This works well not only to kill any germs they may have inadverdently picked up but also to discourage future visits.

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March 23, 2005

Coworkers unite in support of the BBMRE*

It seems that I'm not the only person offended by the frequent flushing violations in our 2nd floor mens room. Yesterday somebody printed out and posted the following sign on the inside of the bathroom door:

Way back in 1953, the U.S. Department of Health (now the CDC) determined that flushing toilets and urinals in public restrooms reduced the spread of disease by more than 88%. Today's society has acrimoniously decreed that flushing should be an automatic function (hence the many infrared toilets today). This company has determined that the use of a paltry 1.5 gallons of water per flush is worth the investment to keep its workforce healthy. So, the question to you is...

Why Don't You
Flush?

It's disgusting, rude and unsanitary.
Go back and flush.

(and then wash your hands.)

more...

Posted by: Jim at 08:52 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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March 18, 2005

There's a story here somewhere...

Just got a friendly "TO: Everybody" email about mailing things from the office. Item 1 reminded us that the deadline to drop mail in the mail room is 4:00 PM, M-F. Item 2 reminded us that the post office picks up from the mailbox out back at 4:30 PM, M-F. The third item dealt with personal mail:

Metering your PERSONAL mail is a COURTESY and not a company requirement. As always, your payment should accompany your personal mail unless youÂ’ve communicated otherwise. With that being said, please place your mail in the appropriate outgoing tray before 4PM. NOTE: If your personal mail happens to include renewal subscriptions to any pornographic magazines, materials, and suchlike, please make sure you take care of that on your own personal time!

I really want to know what inspired that note but the receptionist isn't talking.

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March 17, 2005

May you live in interesting times...

Well today was definitely interesting. I arrived at work to a message from my boss asking if I could join a meeting. He's remote and was having connectivity problems and there was too much visual going on for him to follow well over the phone. When I got into the meeting he dropped out.

So I was in a meeting with the execs from a new division of the company. The division is new because we just acquired their company. A morning and most of the early afternoon was spent helping them define their business objectives and doing business analysis and requirements for their web portal and consumer online presence.

Weird activities for a quality assurance specialist, eh?

Got a call from my boss during the meeting, asking me to call him back when I had a few minutes. Don't you hate messages like that? Ones that give you no clue why you're calling? I sure do.

So I called him and he explained that the very large project I am consulting on now was being reorganized. He was taking over management of the project himself. Problem being, he can't be on-site here to actually manage the project. So, could I help out by doing the business analysis and business requirements locally?

There's those words again. Business Analysis. Business Requirements. Not QA stuff. Program analysis and standards are QA things. But I love doing this stuff so I said of course I'd be happy to help. That's when he popped the question.

Would I consider leaving QA for a Project Management position? He wants me on the business side of the business, said I excelled there. Yes, QA is very important but he has a critical shortage on the BA side of his house. He reassured me that it wasn't a do or die thing. I was hired for QA, I am doing a fantastic job here, this job is secure if I want to stay in it. But, would I like to step to the next level under the executorium?

I said "Hell, yeah. What took you so long to offer it? I've been here waiting for five freaking months already! Hello?"

Well, maybe it was more along the lines of a gracious acceptance. The position switch will come about in the near future after we wrap me out of some QA projects.

Say hello to Jim Peacock, Project Manager elect.

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March 15, 2005

Behold, the Ides of March!

It's March 15th and that means The Grande 2004 Peacock Invitational has come to a close. So, how did we do?

Of the five of us, two made it. Tiffany's breasts did not get bigger as planned but except for this small setback she made it through a smoke free year without a problem. Tig made it too and keeps his last unsmoken ciggarette as a war trophy.

I lost it sometime during my pain filled unemployment days. Ironic, eh? Lose a job and pick back up an expensive bad habit. Jeremy didn't make it either. Busy stress life brought this valiant warrior low. And what of Joey? He got busy with school and work and disappeared many moons ago. It's possible that he survived but signs point to no. If he ever resurfaces we'll ask him and collect cash if what we suspect is true.

So over the course of a year we had a 40% success rate. That's hella better than any professional system out there. Think I should pattent this?

Posted by: Jim at 05:51 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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March 14, 2005

Adventures in email

Over the weekend I received an email from a phisher trying to get my eBay log-in information. I'm not exactly sure why my eBay log-in information would be of any value to anybody. It's a buy-as-you-go type of place so it's not like they would have gotten any of my money or anything.

But it really pissed me off. It pissed me off enough that I went through the email headers to find the originator domain and sent this email to their abuse address:

One of your customers is a motherfucking, cock sucking, phishing bastard. I sincerely hope he dies with his severed cock shoved up his ass as he gags on his own vomit.

Just thought you'd like to know. Headers below, followed by the phishing email:

[headers]

[original email]

You can tell I was really angry because I never say "gag" unless I'm seriously burnt.

Unbelievably, I got an actual answer back, from an actual email address, from what (if I close my eyes and click my heels together three times) could be confused with an actual person!

Hello,

We are currently investigating who sent that message.

Kind regards,
Vlad Georgiev
Technical Support

Sure, it's an auto-response and yeah, it's probably from the same group that is doing the phishing. Still, through an alcohol induced haze it appeared like I was making a difference, and isn't that really what it's all about?

Appearances, yeah.

Posted by: Jim at 11:07 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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March 11, 2005

Stink update

Yesterday's stank source has been identified. I was more correct with the stink bomb theory, except the perpetrators were our IT guys.

We have a large server farm located downtown (production) and a smaller farm locally (development). The server room is protected by an advanced fire retardant system. If fire is detected it floods the room with a gas that eliminates all oxygen therefor extinguishing the fire. The gas is harmless to electrical components and is odorless.

Odorless, that is, until a chemical is added to it to produce a strong odor. This is done to give an olfactory notification that the system was used and the room is compromised and possibly dangerous until completely ventilated. A very good idea.

Unfortunately the chemical used produces a smell like burning sulfur or Zeus's own gaseous expulsion. Why in the world would they choose such an obnoxious odor for the telltale? What's wrong with cinnamon or vanilla? Maybe a fresh pine scent would give just as much notice that something happened and yet allow everybody within the building work without constantly fighting their gag reflex. Hell, I'd settle for new car smell.

Personally I think it has something to do with the fact that the corporate IT guys work downtown. I bet their system smells like roses when it goes off.

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March 10, 2005

Stinky

Got on the elevator this morning and was immediately assaulted. Somebody had fouled the beast.

Got off of the elevator and was met with a stronger version of the same odor. Apparently somebody had done a preliminary attack in the elevator and then launched the atomic blast in the atrium.

Walked to my cube and found no lessening of the odoriferous monstrosity. The terrorist must be somebody in my department.

Went to the break room for coffee. Stank present. Now I began to worry.

In amazement I made a full tour of the floor. The smell of anal exhalation was everywhere.

Either we've been stink bombed or somebody's guts have turned feral.

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March 08, 2005

Say what?!

Lovely Wife is a huge U2 fan. She even likes the crap that came out after The Joshua Tree. Now THAT'S dedication.

Anyway, they're currently touring and there's a decent chance they'll be coming through Atlanta. They're continual teasing about it anyway. Lovely Wife went online to find out how much U2 tickets are running at their other venues on the tour.

Here's a serious question for y'all. What flavor of stupid do you need to be to pay $4,800+ for a ticket to see a band? Any band. Led Zeppelin reunited - not worth it. The Beatles in their prime - not worth it. Lynrd Skynrd's Back From The Dead Tour - with an intermission show where they "Go Southern" on the Dixie Chicks - not worth it. Well, maybe. Depending on what I meant by "Go Southern".

The point is that if I'm paying $4,800 to see U2 the concert better end with Bono giving me a blowjob while The Edge juggles my jewels. Whoever else is in the band can serve drinks and pastries and provide towels as needed.

I'm just saying.

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School daze

I've written a short essay on the fundamental problem in our current public school systems. You can find it at Zero Intelligence.

RP's post here is what sparked it and his post is a good read as well.

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March 07, 2005

It's official! I'm a published author

The first issue of the Vacant Funhouse, an online webzine featuring short stories and poetry of a horrific and macabre nature, is up. Issue #1 features the short story Hunting Todd by everybody's favorite blogger with an alarm clock themed weblog title.

Spread the word. Do links and things to the Funhouse. Make them ubersuccessful so they'll buy lots more of my stories and make me rich so I can retire to a tropic isle and blog full time.

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Author's Grant

1. The Author grants permission to include his/her story entitled ___”Hunting Todd_," a work of approximately _2726____words, hereinafter referred to as the Work, in THE VACANT FUNHOUSE...

What's that about? Well, I've just sold my first story! The Vacant Funhouse is "A Webzine of horror, mystery, suspense and crime short fiction and poetry." More importantly, they've recognized my genius and purchased one of my light horror short stories for their debut issue.

Said issue will be up later today at which point I will link it prominently. Y'all should do likewise so they become amazingly successful and continue to buy my short stories.

Posted by: Jim at 11:22 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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March 03, 2005

Radiant heat

It's one of those mornings...

It was very cold this morning. Cold enough that I cranked the heater in the van up all the way. As such things go it eventually got too hot.

So I turned the radio down. Amazingly it was still too hot.

I turned the radio down some more. Still too hot.

In exasperation I turned the radio off. The heat did not diminish.

Great, I thought, now I have to replace my radio.

Where's my coffee?

Update: We have a nice coffee set-up here. For creamer we have those little half-and-half containers that you peel the top off of. The first creamer went into the coffee cup normally. The second one emptied successfully. The third one caused a spill. It took me several seconds to realize that container two and three had been poured into container one.

Now you see why I need a secretary.

Posted by: Jim at 09:15 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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March 01, 2005

What the hail?

We just had a hailstorm here. It was beautiful but short. You wouldn't think frozen precipitation would delight an old Buffalo son but I think this was the first real hail storm I've ever seen.

The granules were very small, maybe a millimeter, and came down strong and steady. Looking out through the hail was a curious mixture of snowstorm and rain shower. They fell like rain but had the luminescence of snow. The tiny balls of ice bounced through the leaves of the trees like the disks in a Kerplunk game. Just beautiful.

It's been over for a couple of minutes now and the accumulation is already melted. Ah, nature's wonders are ever transitory.

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February 22, 2005

MTV - where did the videos go?

It's almost an oxymoron. MTV - Music Television. Turn on MTV at almost any hour of the day and you'll see partying teens or a reality show. The few videos they still play are during request shows and it's the same 10 videos as last week, every week.

Over the weekend Lovely Wife and I watched an hour or so of "classic" music videos on VH1. These are videos from the 1980's for the most part. It was quite a trip through retro-ville, let me tell you.

And I now know why MTV started moving away from actually playing videos in the 1980's. It's because these videos suck with the terrible and inexorable strength of a black hole.

I'm just saying.

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February 21, 2005

Bad neighbors

Yesterday evening we got a visit from some new neighbors. It was not a pleasant experience. They just bought a house down the street and moved in a short while ago. They've got a fenced back yard where they keep two dogs.

Nine-eye, our much loved neighborhood dog, went visiting. Although he is very timid with people he is very social with other dogs. Being a large boy and an experienced fence jumper he has no difficulty getting into their back yard. Our new neighbors are not pleased with his actions.

Perhaps "not pleased" is a bit of an understatement. What they are is angry enough that they threatened to kill Nine-eye if he goes into their yard again.

Yes, the mister said flat out that if we didn't keep Nine-eye out of his yard he would kill the dog.

This upset me greatly, but wasn't what brought me within inches of my first adult fist fight. What pissed me off even more than his threat was his qualifier, which he kept mouthing as if it absolved him of any consequence of his actions.

"I don't mean to be hateful, but..."

"I don't want to sound hateful, but..."

"I'm not trying to be hateful, but..."

Finally I couldn't hear that any more. My blood was boiling and I was about to pop. I looked him straight in the eye and said "I cannot imagine anything more hateful than that". Proud of me? I sure am. What I really wanted to say included colorful expressions about his person and a goodly dose of vitriol.

As it was, my simple words calling him on the carpet difused what was becoming a very bad situation. After I said that he got quiet for a few moments and when he spoke again the belligerence was gone. I got him to agree to call us if he saw Nine-eye in his yard again. Hopefully if we scold Nine-eye it will be more effective than him chasing the dog out of his yard.

It will not be a permanent solution. Nine-eye is very canine social. He wants to be with other dogs. He will return there eventually. Although we were able to reason with these new neighbors I do not think they will remain reasonable for very long. A person who'll come up to your house and tell you he is going to kill your dog is not the kind of person who strikes me as being reasonable for any length of time.

So what can we do? The best long-term solution is to get him out of his dangerous environment. Lovely Wife has started looking for a permanent home for him. He's a wonderfully friendly dog, very gentle and easy to handle. Once he's comfortable with a person, that is. He is very timid with most folk but recognizes "dog people" pretty quickly. He is quite smart and very social. I think he would be an excellent house dog after some patient training. He would also do very well as a yard dog but the fences need to be jumper-proof and he would absolutely need other dogs around him.

If you're in the Atlanta Metro area and would like to own a wonderful animal, please let me know. Heck, if you're outside of the Atlanta Metro area but would like to own a wonderful animal this is the perfect excuse to come see the delights of the area and pick up a pet while you're here. If you know anybody who might be interested please point them to this entry.

Update: Lovely Wife took some new pictures of Nine-eye. They're at the post linked above. Damn, that's one handsome dog! Here's one of them. He's tied up so he won't go into that backyard. This makes him very sad.

Posted by: Jim at 11:52 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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February 18, 2005

Another moneymaker

We've got morning traffic reports. We've got web-based mapping services. Combine the two.

Introducing MyTraffic.com*! Pull up the site before you head out the door. It shows you the best route to work taking into consideration slow traffic flows, accidents, etc.

* This is not a real site. Yet.

Posted by: Jim at 11:38 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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February 15, 2005

Thoughts on VD

Valentine's Day - you either love it or hate it. Or ignore it, I guess. Or, like the vast majority of humanity, have no idea whatsoever that it even exists.

Where was I? Oh, yeah - it seems that posts on Valentine's Day fall firmly into one of two camps. There are those who hate and despise it as a Hallmark Holiday full of false sentiment and overly public displays of affection. Then there are those who embrace it for its celebration of true sentiment and overly public displays of affection.

Once upon a time I was firmly in the anti-VD camp. That changed and I think I've pinned down just where the change happened. I started to enjoy Valentine's Day when it changed from a day of obligatory gift giving to an excuse for gift giving.

Let me splain. We have a single income with 3 kids. We make do with one car and not a whole lot of superfluous stuff because we are willing to sacrifice such things to bring up our kids the way we want. The downside is a relative dearth of expendable income (aka blow money). I don't have very many opportunities to spoil her like she so richly deserves. I welcome Valentine's Day as it gives me a well established excuse to do what I'd like to be doing every day.

So Happy Valentine's Day, y'all!

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February 11, 2005

$100 Million idea

iPod Shuffle is neat but it isn't really random. Everything it plays is one of your songs. Your selection only gets bigger when you add new songs and you have no chance of hearing a new song.

The new Napster is also neat. For a fixed fee per month you can listen to anything you want out of a monstrously huge selection of songs. But in your MP3 player it's still the same old thing - you program what you want to hear and there's really no big help to find new things.

What we need is MyFM. Here are the requirements: more...

Posted by: Jim at 11:59 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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February 07, 2005

The dance sensation that's sweeping the nation

Saturday morning I was working on the computer. Bear came over and we chatted while I did some mind-numbing report review. He started doing the pee dance. That's the move where he stands there grabbing his crotch and gyrating a bit. If you don't have kids you're probably most familiar with this move from its common occurrence in rap videos.

Me: Bear, do you need to go to the bathroom?

Bear: No.

Me: Then why are you doing the pee dance?

Bear: My penis keeps bothering me.

Me: Your penis is bothering you?

Bear: Yeah. The penis part keeps sticking to my sack of balls.

'Sack of balls' has now been permanently entered into the family vocabulary.

Posted by: Jim at 07:59 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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