Grow Up Already

I don't know what Isaiah Washington's problem is, but I know he's not making things any better. Last week, it was all T. R. Knight's fault (mmm, yeeeeah. Let's blame the victim.) Or was it the gay mafia out to keep the black man down? I can't keep the crazy straight, so to speak.

Before that it was all the mean ABC's fault. I mean he did everything they wanted him to do so he could keep his job. Bzzzzz. Wrong. Thank you for playing. The correct response here should have been "I did everything in my power to show my regret and remorse over my actions." not "I did everything in my power to keep my job." As they say in crime, motive is a factor.

This week we finally get the racism card. The trump card that is supposed to excuse all bad behavior and make everyone in the U.S sympathetic to what he's went through. I'll be the first person in line to admit that black people in the U.S get a raw deal. Bigots abound, and life is probably 10 times harder than for a white person. However, this whole incident isn't really about race. People aren't scared of Isaiah because he's a tall, dark, non-submissive black man. People are scared of him because he's a crazy-ass pyscho that physically assaulted a coworker. Does he not realize how lucky he was that ABC let him finish out the year? Does he not realize how lucky he his that no law suits have been brought against him for attacking Patrick Dempsey? (Talk about creating a hostile work environment.)

I can't wait to see what the excuse is going to be next week. Maybe it will be flying pig-beasts from Mars. Or maybe body thetans. Yeah. I'm going with Scientologists for next week.

Walter Mercado Says ...

I was checking my AOL mail this evening and came across this article on AOL. The main point of interest to me is

Cancer is usually sensitive, family and home oriented, helpful, and nurturing. These nesters need a great family room. Cancer wants everyone together, and perhaps the best idea is a basement remodel for the whole family: a game room/teen hangout/tv room/home office. Whatever best suits your family. No basement? This is a perfect home addition because everyone will want to gather in the new space. That's what it's all about.

Um, yeah. I'll get right on that. I'll let the people who park below our condo know they have to give up their parking spaces because us Cancers need a basement addition to be happy. My AOL astrologer told me so. While we're at it, I'll also need a conversation pit to keep someone else happy -- since we're already digging down there. I don't really know what a conversation pit is, but I assume since it contains the word pit it would have to be below the main living area.

Not Suitable For Underage Consumption

Ganked, shamelessly from Jen's:

Mingle² - Online Dating

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:

pain (7x) , gun (3x) , steal (2x) , gays (1x)

I first did this at work at it ranked my blog as NC-17 earlier this afternoon, but now at home I'm only an R. The word ranking is exactly the same. Personally, I liked the NC-17 rating better.

Confidential to 13

Not to happy with the results I gave back to you, huh? Looks like you made some serious heavy duty mistakes, huh? So instead of looking into the mistakes I reported, your solution is to have me go back and double check my work?!!? Because you couldn't have possibly have made all those errors? What makes you think I wasn't thorough when I went through that train-wreck in the first place?

Confidential to x11

Don't throw a hissy-fit just because I did exactly what you told me to do. It's not my fault that you don't remember the specifics -- I do because I wrote them down. [I wasn't trying to show you up when I pulled out the documentation to prove my point, I was merely demonstrating that I did exactly what was requested of me.] Additionally, it's not OK to change your mind about what you want after the fact in a lame attempt to make me look bad. Finally, don't act surprised when I throw a bit of attitude your way about your behavior. Seriously, who taught you it was acceptable to treat people this way?

Whipping Boy

I don't know what I've done to offend people at work, but I am now the official office pariah. Nothing I do passes muster these days. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say it's because I've been sticking up for myself lately. In the past, I'd just grin and bare it. Now, I call them on their shit. I think it really started when then neck went all WWE and busted itself and I decided to do whatever it took to take care of myself. The boss wanted me work PT around what was convenient for him, I decided that wasn't going to work and did what was in my best interest. I know he's royally roasted that I'm back at PT again -- he's made it clear he thinks PT is a waste of time. However, just because he's thrown his back out and refuses to see a doctor, doesn't mean I'm going to suffer the same way. I'm quite over living in pain, thank you very much.

They're also into this whole let's treat AJ as if he were a mental deficient thing. Now, I have my moments, but by no means am I stupid. If I don't understand what you're asking me to do, chances are the problem lays with how you explained it to me. My personal favorite this week was an argument over my timesheet. I don't remember what the hell I had for breakfast today, so I'm certainly not going to remember if I got to work at 8:40 or 8:50 last Monday. We're all salaried anyway, so it's not like it really matters. Also, despite the fact I've been asking, nay BEGGING for work, they haven't been giving me anything to do. So I fail to see how it really matters when exactly I arrive at work. Either way they're paying me to nothing. They may hate the fact that they I'm being paid to do nothing, but it's their own damn fault. To wit:

Of my own accord, I started reading some compnay documentation and one of our products so I could be of help down the line. When people saw what I was doing I was told that a) it was way too complex for me to ever be able to learn and b) it was a waste of my time and c) that I should stop immediately. I was a little amazed at this reaction, because I was sure that surfing the internet would qualify as a waste of my time, but apparently I was wrong.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, I was given a project a few weeks ago with a totally arbitary and unreasonable deadline that I was unable to meet. I couldn't meet the deadline because the project was riddled with errors and I had to stop every 2 minutes to document said errors. Yet somehow that equated to me sucking at my job.

I know this will get better when they get used to the idea of me standing up for myself, I just wish they would grow up already before I snap and go all Jerry Springer on them.

Nah-Nah-Nah-Nah-Nah

I don't want to jinx myself, or bring any further bad luck raining down upon my head like firey thunderbolts from hell, but I think I'm finally in the clear.

The past 3 weeks have royally sucked here in AJ land. It started around Memorial Day with the first of 9 migraines. Four of them happened last week (Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.) Needless to say, I wasn't very amused. I got in to see the doctor and he's put me on a migraine preventative (topomax) and relpax in case I actually get a migraine. He also wants me to get a CT scan to make sure the E-Z-Bake AJ brain isn't cooking up any shrinky-dink tumors or anuerisms.

Outside of the pharmacy to pick up the Topomax, the [insert deity of your choice] delivered the knock-out punch. The crown on my right front tooth just up and broke off at the gum line -- as in it took the post it was attached to. I spent about 12 hours looking like something off of Hee-Haw before the good dentists managed to fix me up. My dentist is seriously the best dentist evar! Using Terminator-Technology, he reconstructed the inside of the tooth above the gum line and fixed the crown. I now have a nice titanium stud in my tooth to match the titanium screws in my neck. I'm the pseudo-bionic-boy. I should make sound effects when I walk down the street now. I've already decided the theme music from Bones is my traveling music so I think I'm set.

Iron Chef: Spinach

There has been a new ingredient added to my list of foods to avoid at all costs: spinach.

Most of my triggers are usually chocolate + (fruit/vegetable). As long as I eat them within 48 hours of each other, it's an insta-migraine. The two notable exceptions to this equation are cranberries and alcohol; they're enough by themselves to send me running for the bed turning off all the lights in my path.

Some well-meaning people brought me breakfast Sunday morning, and it was quite tasty (even if it did have spinach in it). The spinach gremlins left me to my own devices all day yesterday, but they planned a blitzkrieg for 7:21 am Monday morning. I woke up (late) this morning to the sight of a pre-migraine aura dancing in my left eye. To top it all off, the last of Tropical Storm Barry decided at 7:25 while I was walking the dog to go from 'light mist' to 'torrential downpour.' Of course, the dog doesn't like to walk, much less, pee in the rain. Monday just isn't Monday with out something like this to start it off right.

For the record: spinach, cranberries, strawberries, any citrus fruit, chocolate, peanut butter and alcohol.

Rainy Day Swag

You may have noticed some 'improvements' to the side-bar over the past few days. Some of them have been to organize information, others are more self-indulgence. I've been hanging around the internet for so long that I get used to things being a certain way, and I don't really explore anything new. So, I did a little investigating to see what was out there.

In other related news, I've been extremely unhappy with my Vaio laptop. It's been behaving rather unlaptoplike -- it looks like the battery exploded or something, and the net result is that it has to be plugged into the wall at all times if I actually want to use it. The onboard wireless internet card died a long time ago (and if I accidentally turn it on, it will eventually crash XP and then this long nasty reinstallation of the OS is in order.

Today I had enough, and with a little help from the Major, I replaced the Vaio with a brand spanking new Toshiba Satellite A205. It was on sale at Best Buy for the low-low price of $750, and it's pretty cool. You'd never know it from the way I speak, but I am actually quite savvy about technical specs. The new laptop is pretty tricked-out and I'm quite happy with it. So, I shall be having new happy blogging time experiences to bring to the entire world.

AJ in pictures

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