Injuries while Studying

Eight Hours

While sitting at my desk today and finding myself shifting every few minutes, I began to wonder

If they can make 18-hour bras, why can't they make 8-hour tights?

My thought for Wednesday....

This week's theme for GBE2 is Time.

Why are you being so mean?

This week's GBE2 prompt is Work

At my job we purchased this handy in an out board. We have a lot of tutors working for us and the board helped us to know who was in the office when students asked. I purchased colorful magnets and we used the board all semester. I noticed this last week
All the pink buttons have been pilfered.

I suspect a college student. I don't think it was one of my employees. More than likely, it was a student visiting the office. The theft occurred between the last week of the semester and the week after that. I bet the person responsible has a Hello Kitty themed dorm room.

Source http://magimg.chinayes.com

I expect a certain level of pilfering from university students. It is for that reason that all of my pens have silk flowers taped to them and all of my office supplies are labeled. Or I could purchase some of these ☛

source: http://www.moxiebird.com

I used to have name badges for my student employees. That is, until I realized that despite being able to maintain a smartphone, college id which doubles as a library and ATM card, and a mp3 player with monsterbeats headphones, these students could not keep up with a name badge for work.

see more Funny Graphs

I had to start ordering badges every semester (without names) for students when I learned that my graduating student workers were taking them home as souvenirs. I love my job. I really do. I love working with college students. But,I am still baffled by the magnets. I bought them from Wal-sucks because of the color choices. What do I do now?

Taking magnets from an in and out board is just wrong.
I want them returned.
But not if they were in an HK themed dorm room. ...


This blog entry is dedicated Sayyidakitten

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From my junkmail folder is quite incoherent. Let's take the sentence apart

Or is it.

I simply do not know.

Perhaps, I spent entirely too much time on that.


eh....


Summer continues and I am still getting veggies from the garden.

Last week's garden haul.
Basil
Zucchini
Cukes
Tomatoes
Cayenne Peppers
Jalapeno peppers
And eggplants

I have been watching the acorn squash. I might be picking it next week.


Yesterday, had to be one of the oddest days so far this Summer. 
Wait.
Despite what you have heard, it is still Summer until next week. I wear white until the equinox. You can deal with it.


 
As a matter of fact, I will be attending a White Wine party. Yes, I thought it was a party featuring only white wine initially. I reread the invitation and pulled out some of my favorite white pieces that I shall wear one more time.

Now, my story
Last week, the storage room emitted a mildew-like smell. We shut the door. This week the stench overwhelmed anyone required to view old files. By Wednesday, the odor lead to the quarantine of the room. I contacted plant facilities.

"Hi, I have a storage room that smells like something may have died it in."
"Oh, that is terrible. I will have the maintenance guys head over to your location after their lunch hour."

That was easy. I waited. An hour latter, four big guys in blue coveralls pile into my office suite. The first guy, I shall refer to him as Al, says

Where do you smell smoke?
I looked shocked. "Smoke? No, it is a dead animal."
"We received a report for the smell of smoke."
"Let me take you to the room and you can smell it for yourself."

I lead the huge guys to the backroom. Two, I recognize as the electricians and the other two as the overall maintenance men for the building. The electricians look annoyed at being called out for a dead animal and not an electrical fire. I guess, we look for different types of excitement in our jobs. 
I open the door and quickly jump back.

"Oh, that is just mildew. You should have the custodians disinfect this room" says Al.
"That is not mildew."

Al, motions to one of the electricians.
Apparently, I am to be ignored for being a woman.

"This is just a strong mildew smell. She should call the custodians to disinfect."
"That is a pretty strong smell," says the electrician at the frame of the storage room door.

In his defense. The room is pretty narrow and is filled with furniture. If he had entered the storage room, it would have been a tight fit. I inform the gentlemen that the smell has gotten worse over the last ten days.

"I am telling you that is not mildew."
"It could be a mouse. Probably in the ceiling tiles," says the electrician

Al begins to walk back and forth in the small room, looking under things and behind boxes for what he assumes to be an nonexistent carcass.
While he searches one of the smaller electricians joins him in the storage room.
The remaining men begin to discuss the time-frame for small animal decomposition. I asked them to stop talking about it.

"Hey there is a beer can in here," shouts Al after a minute or two.

"Don't tell me there is mildew in that can."

I am mortified. He picks up the can to demonstrate.I immediately begin to wonder if one of my staff members has a drinking problem. A problem hidden in the storage room where few people venture.

From where I stood, it looked like a beer can. I am so embarrassed. How do I address this? Do I call HR? Do I start smelling the breaths of my staff? How do I accomplish this being the shortest member of the office? 
Fortunately, Al pulls me from my thoughts.

"This is the source of your smell."

He carries the can out of the room and attempts to induce the electricians into smelling it. Everyone smells it (even his partner in maintenance).  I decline.
Instead, I note that it is not a beer can. It is a meal replacement shake.

I have an employee trying to secretly lose or gain weight.......Arghhhhh


He carries the can out of the suite with an extended hand. Everyone in the office pinches their respective noses as he walks past them. Being too dignified to pinch my nose, I opt to holding my finger under the bridge while glaring at each member of the office.


In conclusion,
it takes two electricians, two maintenance men and one stubborn woman to remove a nasty smell from the storage room.
P.S. 
No one admitted to leaving the can in the storage room. I really don't care.

I"m going to tell my top secret! You will be delighted!

At work today we discussed creating new training sessions for our student employees.
It became a giggle fest as we presented topics to cover.
I will share them with you as I wrote them down with our commentary.

Not what the designer intended

Clothes should fit the current weight of the wearer.That Freshman 15 does a number on some of our workers and their understanding of garment sizing.


Name badges should be worn so we know that you are actually working and not hanging out. It keeps us from bothering unceasingly.


No shirts with vulgar slogans, however clever.

Sigh...

Pants must be fitted along the waist. Do not flash us. I might go blind - again.

Find your natural waist

Furthermore, tights are not pants unless you are into Cosplay and it is Dress Up Day as Robin Hood at work. Seriously, leave something to the imagination and keep the jeggings at home.


Cell phone conversations should remain private and not shared with everyone around you. No one cares and don't make us.








There are no such things as breaks when you work less than 5 hours a day. Take care of your errands before you arrive for work.

Stop goofing off.

No one needs you to pick up lunch

Speaking of errands, do not call staff members to do special favors for them on your way into the office- if you are going to be late just call and admit it. You are not fooling anyone.

No hanging out in staff members offices while on the clock. Get busy or clock out. We have earned the right to "meditate" in our cubicles for a few minutes a day. You have not earned the right to join us.

Don't plan appointments while on the clock without permission. This is your job and you have no office.

Only if you are a lifeguard

No shower shoes (seriously). If it has a tab in the bottom of it for the thong, then they belong in the locker room or the pool not in the office.


Don't make us find you, you will not like it when we do - Use the in and out board and follow your schedule.

Maybe you over did it.

Keep perfume/cologne below the obnoxious threshold.No one should refer to you as Stinkie behind your back. Only lots of water will remove evidence of last night's bender or lack of a shower. Also, no one should guess that you just rolled out of bed. It is never a good look. If you can't be bothered to dress and groom yourself properly then don't expect us to be bothered with turning in your timecard.

I don't know what these demands (policies) will look like after we develop the training sessions. It was just good to get it all out without resorting to attacking this Fall's employees without warning. The things I saw last year made me go blind.

Get Harder and Longer Lasting Erections Naturally

If any of you work in an office setting with a break room you are probably have some great times. One just needs to follow Passive Agressive Notes.com in order to share in the bedlam that is the Office Break Room.
From today's post. The use of the box to reserve "space" is genius. And utilizes out of the box thinking.

I am writing today about the office microwave. That device that cause more unexpressed anger than any other.
More posts from Passive Aggressive.Com. Seriously, why is cleaning the microwave so difficult?

When we moved locations and gained a break room, we placed the microwave in it. Previously, the microwave sat in Jibjab's office. He could watch if the microwave was left messy or stop someone from warming up smelly foods.He felt this was fair since he had purchased it.
Well now, since the microwave has no bodyguard, I have found myself cleaning it all the time. All the time. Nasty, nasty stuff. Finally, I started checking on it every few hours. It took a few weeks but I discovered the identity of the microwave mess maker: Jibjab.
This led to intense discussions about the proper use of the microwave. Discussions where he threatened to take the microwave home because he had originally bought it.
I know. He bought it. It stayed clean when it was in his office. Now that it is out of his office, he doesn't seem to care if he leaves it a nasty mess.

Strange. I blame it on the gonads. So this is what the microwave looks like now after our truce.

I have been able to keep it clean and Jibjab has been covering his food lately. I think the part-time staff are afraid to use it. This is good. Fear me and my expressed microwave related rage.
The truce has taken months to accomplish.
I have had to nag him and chase him down to keep the microwave clean.

As you can see, near the microwave is a sink, a soap dispenser, and a towel dispenser. Conveniences that many a break room has.

The other day Jibjab says to me, "You know Frizzy, what we really need to do is stock the break room with saran wrap. If we had saran wrap we could cover our food with it and there would be no mess."
I am not making this up.
Saran Wrap.

He said we needed saran wrap in the break room to cover food in the microwave.
What is this 1985?
Who covers their food with saran wrap any more?
Of course, as soon as he made the suggestion to me I freaked out. I thought "oh no, he made another unapologetic mess in the microwave." It is amazing how angry I became. Not at him but at the idea that he would not just USE THE FREAKING PAPER TOWELS SITTING NEXT TO THE MICROWAVE TO COVER HIS FOOD AND CLEAN UP SPILLAGE.

He was not joking. His goal was not to get under my skin. This man was quite serious. And I am banging my head on my desk.

Now, what have I learned from this? That it is time for me to take a vacation.

Revive Your Staying Power

I am still using the subjects from messages in my Spam folder for today's topic.


I held my first staff meeting for 2011. I felt that we were too giddy on Friday mornings, which had been our original staff meeting day and time. I set the meeting time at 11 am to ensure that staff would be there before leaving for lunch. It also gave us an excuse to have lunch meetings. I am very clever. Unfortunately, it led to a lot of silly antics.  Staff tended to get off track due to fatigue or hunger.

I felt that Monday after lunch would be the best time for a staff meeting. Everyone would have eaten and had the weekend to refresh.

First, I had to gather my staff together for the meeting. I think they consider it a tentative meeting until I call out, "Where is Ambriel" I don't blame them. There was a time not to long ago where staff meetings were at the whim of the supervisor (not me). I do not like staff meetings, but their important in documenting administration and in evaluation.
At today's meeting we discussed how to take our office to the next level. You know. Thinking outside of the box. We have a unique opportunity to distinguish ourselves from other offices and I want start the memento.
I looked out of the corner of my eye and spied Jibjab cleaning his ears with the cap of pen. I found that distracting. Earlier, I asked him if he was speaking in staccato style. The half of the room that sat nearest him, thought I was hearing things. The staff sitting next to me, agreed with me that his speech was muffled.
 We ended the meeting discussing the staff get-together for this weekend. Since a member is house sitting and had no house rules from the owner, he decided to host the office party. Well there is a rule. Whatever he does in the house is fine as long as he washes the sheets.
Yes, I have a great staff. And we have great staff meetings. And better staff outings.
We were finalizing the menu options for the party when I noticed that Jibjab had fallen asleep.

This was my staff member. Okay not really, he was leaned back in the chair with his eyes closed. Just as obvious.

So, I pressed my index finger to my lips, nodded my head toward the door, and gathered my notebook. All of us quietly progressed out of the conference room. Leaving Jibjab to his cat nap.
By the way the meeting took 35 minutes.

Happy Monday.

Office Shenanigans and such

I received my Vampire Swap package at work. We have Halloween and Fall decorations around the office. The table was the perfect place for opening my box of goodies.

I am excited about the tea and the Care Bears shirt. Getting the shirt was the best part of the swap. The lavender scented, candycorn sachets were made just for me. I have placed them in my sock drawer.

One of my co-workers and I have been having an ongoing battle of wills for the past 12 months. I am winning and not because I am the boss. I am wining because I have been using his coffee mug and leaving lipstick stains on it. And it has been driving him crazy. He will not wait for me to clean the mug either, he takes it off of my desk when I walk away. Can you believe that?

Today, I found a brand new royal blue mug on my desk. A gift from him. Funny thing is that I can barely see my lipstick marks on the new mug. I wonder if that means something.....

I work with a great group of people in my office, department and the larger university. I have made some great friends, friends with whom I can have a beer, glass of wine or a shot of tequila while discussing the latest novel, news or movie.

Natural Habitats

Another mystery flower. I think it is a a visitor from my neighbor's yard. It just seemed to creep under the fence and situation itself. 
And that is okay. The fountain grass that I planted to cover the ugly chain link fence has crept into her yard. She likes it. Using the web, I found it.  It is the Asiatic dayflower and is non-native to the Americas. 

More tiger lilies.  These flowers are like the heralds of summers. 

The easter lilies have yet to bloom.  Maybe next week.
I see that the cannas have erupted from the ground as well as the gladiolas that I planted.

Lil Cat wanted to say goodbye to me today as I left for work.  

 

Or maybe she was just sunbathing.    I suspect she uses the floor mat to sharpen her claws.  It can handle it but my furniture cannot. So carry on.  

I spotted more wildlife on the way to work.  There are lots of ducks and ducklings waddling around campus right now. 

IT personnel in their natural habitat.

  You can observe by their attire that these specimens have reached a higher status among that computer techs.  Lower status computer techs wear red shirts to identify themselves as members of the IT department and the first to die.  These specimens earned promotions this past Fall season.  Unfortunately, the promotions have not increased their skill in identifying the problem with this CPU.  For months the pair have attended to the CPU and its mistress, the assistant director.  She is easily identified by her causal business attire. Finally, determining that user error is the not problem the duo have stopped the mistress from attacking both themselves and  the CPU and have exchanged it for a newer model. 
There had been a lot of beard scratching , shoulder shrugging, and side eyes. 

Just before I snapped this pic I spotted them leaned back in the chairs. One held his phone and appeared to be reading it and the other looked bored at the screen.  When I pulled out the camera they stopped doing what came natural to them and began to look intently at the screen of the malfunctioning computer.  So much for my wildlife study. 


Crafty Update
The skirt that I am making for my conference in July has 500 st in the first row..  I swear that each row takes me an hour to complete.  Damn my big hips.

Here is a picture of a completed project.  The knitter did a fine job. 
I hope mine looks half as good as hers.

My Back Hurts

 

Updates

Projects

I rearranged bedroom.  Now the draft is at the foot of my bed.  The electric blanket is working again. I upgraded my cell phone package.  All of you who have my number.  Text away.... The garage door closed yesterday but not today.  Go figure. To pass the time, I thought I would give you a tour of my office.    Come In.  There are three major suites on my floor.  The floor plan has three thermostats.  The really smart computers have determined that my suite is classroom space and automatically turns down the heat when classes are done.  It is located in another area that is obviously warmer than my office area because I am always cold.  If I walk two yards to the right, there is warmth.  The right suite has its thermostat in different area.  Sometimes the difference is as noticeable as walking into a heated building from the outside.  It gets that cold.     My Desk.  I have everything close to me.  I have no choice.  Yes, there is a doll by my telephone wearing a sorority t-shirt.  Sometimes you need to have some fun at your job.    Planning.  I must keep things within reach in order to stay on task.   I like pretty things in my office.    I keep pictures of my family on top of the hutch.  Everyone is there.  Mr. Twinkie and Hostess Bread were gifts from my Grandpa who worked at Hostess for 33 years.    I painted that picture as a Junior in High School.  It makes my office girly.    Mysteriously, my bad aches whenever I bend, hiccup or walk.  This workout ball allows me to work.  This has been going on for two days now.  I hope you enjoyed my tour.  This is where I spend more than 40 hours a week.  I love my job.  I have made it very comfy here.  Stop reading if you are a man...... I am back to working on the openwork shawl.  Last year, I unraveled it twice.  Third time is the charm.      I am blending two yarns. A red mohair and this gold speck yarn.  My progress.

Frizzy Hooker Yarn Stash Afghan Blanket Almost Done! I B Knitty Great Escape Cape These buttonholes are driving me crazy. Baby Blanket About 8 inches completed.  Will get back to this one when the shawl is complete. Knotted Openwork Shawl     Still working on it.  IBF Reader