Damp

Today started off with a bang. Well, more like a whoosh.

It took more than two hours to get to work due to a torrential downpour.

I wasn't expecting a problem. I'm used to the drive now, and most people behave on the commute.

Apparently reasonable behavior gets washed away with the rain.

For example, I was tired of being tailgaited by an H3, so I put my turn signal on and waited for a tractor trailer to finish passing me on my right. This was meant to indicate to the dipshit behind me that I planned to get out of his way.

Except Dooshie McTwat took that opportunity to lurch into the right lane, pull up next to me, and slosh back into my lane and cut me off. So apparently he showed me.

So.

Rain. And MORE RAIN. Wet water. Flowing.

After an hour, I realized I wasn't getting to work anywhere near on time. Then my bladder let me know it was unhappy. Very, very unhappy.

Some fun factoids:

The urgency starts with a dull throb, then works up to a prickling pain. Like a sea urchin stabbing it's way out your bellybutton.

Then the sea urchin goes to sleep, and your entire lower abdomen goes numb.

Then you throw up. Well, almost anyway.

Vomit-time hit around the last ten minutes of the trip, and I began praying that I could keep both ends sealed until got to the office. God took pity on me, because I made it to work without soiling my car, or myself.

The other highlight of my day was our weekly staff meeting. One of the developers was burbling on about crappy code. I guess he's not thrilled with everyone else's methods. He went on and on about writing beeYOOtiful code. So elegant. So gorgeous and eclectic.

Except.

We're application support. Troubleshooters. Problem solvers. MASH 4077. There's coding involved, but it's not the main part of this job. Most of these guys would rather sit and code all day long. They're happiest in a code tunnel.

That's fine, but personally, I don't enjoy coding. I like the mystery issues. The detective work getting to the bottom of a problem, and the thrill of solving it.

I guess it's just personal preference, but I can't live in a code tunnel all day.

Besides, my code tunnel is dark, smelly and lacking the proper amount of cheese doodles and red wine. I could die of the damp in there.

Ga Ga Gaaaaargle

I'm soooo ashamed. I downloaded a Lady Gaga song.

I don't usually like music from my daughter's generation, but I was lured in by an infectious hook. I'm also a sucker for pop music that goes BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM.

Alas, the chorus is great, but the rest of the song sounds like Madame Gaga is gargling :

"RaaaghraaahOOhhLAlaaaaGAGARomaRomaaaaaaaaagh.....BAD ROMANCE!"

Like she's being throttled by one of her wacky costumes.

Speaking of, I heard a good joke about that:

Didja know Lady Gaga is going to be the new spokesperson for Polaroid? Because you gotta wait a few minutes before you know what the hell your looking at.

Spam Spam Spam Spam Spam...

Wooo Hooo! Every time I log into Blogger, I get a notification to moderate new comments! Yay!

But no. Not yay. It's sad. So, so sad. My comments are filled with retarded spam and advertisements.

Today's spam came in the form of a hyperlink, which was not even in English, but looked like Kanji characters. However, since I do not read Japanese, I cannot confirm that.

I noticed when I moused over the comment, several links appeared, and since every other word in the links had something to do with sex, I'm assuming it was spam. Either that, or someone in Asia is really excited about this blog.

So spammers, for future reference, I do not read Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean, Laosian, or any other Asian language. I can barely read Spanish, despite having four years of it in high school, and living in America for 41 years.

However, owing to a bizarre turn of events during those high school years, I can read Latin. Mostly.

Cicero is my friend.

So, in the future, if you're going to spam me p0rn, at least know which part of the world you're spamming and give it to me in English. Or Latin.

The Code Whisperer

Major breakthrough: I finally have a working test environment.

Yep, it only took an entire month of security requests, and then another month of diddling around with what everyone kept telling me was a code problem.

Interrupty Guy insisted I was using the wrong code version, and someone else told me to get the code from another place, because the original code base was screwed up.

Well, THAT really gives me the warm and fuzzies.

When none of these suggestions worked, I started my own investigation and I traced it back to bad data.

So I sent an email to the team, detailing what I found, and asked who can help me get the data fixed.

No response.

Sent same email to Interrupty Guy. He thought I was crazy, and asked me if I received the most recent version of the code. Again.

After subduing The Fist Of Death, I told him the problem is data and explained why.

"But that's impossible." stated Interrupty Guy.

"I'll show you." I said. "Just let me log in to the app and..."

"It won't make a difference, you need to..." interrupted Interrupty.

"Ccchht!" I blurted, invoking my best Cesar Millan.

"But...."

"Ccchht! Just... Let... Me... Finish!"

So I showed him.

Guess what? It was bad data.

And Another Thing....

I was going to write a about the second half of Doctor Who, End Of Time, but decided against it. The folks over at Behind The Sofa managed to sum everything up nicely.

Not Dead. Yet.

So yeah. I'm not dead.

Not yet, at least.

Just a bit of blog neglect. Sorry about that.

I took some vacation over the New Year's holiday, and heartily ignored my work laptop as well as my personal one. I couldn't even look at the internet.

I was trying to think things over and get my life organized. It didn't work.

About a month ago, I wrote that this new position could be very rewarding. I was optimistic that I'd make myself a useful member of the new team. Except no work came my way. No training either. I could've sat in my cube and got paid for breathing. Nobody seemed to care.

Well, I figured if the company had no game plan for bringing me up to speed, I'd dive in and ask for work. I requested a few assignments and said if I had questions, I'll flag someone down and ask.

They unloaded on me. Bulldozed and buried.

Now I have fixes for applications I've never seen before, much less have access to (I'll get to that in a moment), crazy deadlines on coding assignments, and no test environment.

Yeah, I know. I did it to myself. So here's another whiny post about how I can't have everything my way.

Like I said, I have assignments for applications I don't even have access to. Obviously, the first course of action is to obtain said access. Easier said than done.

Requesting this can only be done with an online application. Then it's routed to the proper department, ignored, lost, re-routed, and ignored again.

About three weeks later, access is granted.

If the assignment requires any special software - that'll be another request. If it requires any configuration, settings, etc., there will be NO instructions.

So I've been asking lots of questions and generally being a pain in the arse. A necessary thing too, since no one seems to know, much less agree, on anything - except to give out as little information as possible.

For example, don't tell me the server names or the url of the application I'm supporting. When I do finally manage to dig this info out of you, make sure it's piecemeal, doled out in small bits every week. This way, I'll need to open a new request daily. Hey, it'll keep the security guys hopping with plenty of work!

When I ask a specific question about functionality, or where documentation is located, just smile and pretend you don't understand the question. Or better yet, interrupt me halfway through my question – because you read minds and know what I'm asking before I ask it! UGH. The guy that does this, has never let me finish a sentence, and has never been helpful.

The bureaucracy and red tape is mind boggling. Until I learn to navigate the system, it'll be impossible to get anything done.

In the meantime, I guess I'll just do what I can.

Russell T. Davies......WTF???

Which is what I was thinking the entire time I watched the Doctor Who Christmas Special, The End Of Time Part One, last night.

In summary:

The Master is dead.

The Master is resurrected.

The Master is dead again. Maybe.

No, he's definitely still alive. With a flashy Skeletor head, electric jazz hands, and can leap tall buildings in a single bound.

Oh, and he's got meat cravings. Including people-meat. Like a zombie Time Lord on crack.

Then some homeless people discuss how Obama is going to save the world economic crisis. Overnight!

The Doctor is chasing The Master! The Master gets away.

Hey it's Donna's Grandpa!

Hey didya hear that Obama is going to save the world economic crisis. Overnight!

The Doctor chases The Master again!

The drums! They're real!

Some EVIL dude and his daughter have an EVIL machine that needs some fixin'.

Hey, EVIL dude wrote a book.

EVIL dude kidnapped The Master and is forcing him to fix the EVIL machine.

The Master looks awesome in that straightjacket.

The Doctor and Donna's Grandpa will save the day!

Ooops! Sorry......The Master got free and is using The EVIL machine to change every human on the planet into a copy of himself.......WTF????

Donna's brain is burning up, and, oh yeah - it looks like the Time Lords are back, and they might possibly be EVIL as well.

Part One ends......

I've been dreading this episode, afraid that it'll be too contrived, or just completely fizzle. So far, it ain't lookin' so hot.

I hope next week's episode will redeem this mess.

Let's do the time warp again?

Merry Christmas

This is NOT Leo.

The tree is still standing.

There is more Bailey's to be had.

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas 2009

The day after Thanksgiving, we put up the Christmas tree.

It's still standing.

This illustrates two things:

One - In our household, it's a Christmas Tree, not a Yuletide Evergreen, Winter Festival Spruce, or Non-Deciduous Holiday Fir.

Two - Leonidas has not destroyed it. Yet.

It's on his list of things to do, of course. He's working it, limb by limb.

Since it's a fake tree, Leo's spending his spare time (in between naps and flooding the kitchen) bending the bottom section only. I figure he's saving the final annihilation for tonight.

Which reminds me, I still have a ton of wrapping to do. It's just not Christmas without staying up til 2:00am wrapping gifts with Bailey's Irish Cream by your side.

Speaking of gifts, I thought I'd tempt death, and make one last trip to the mall this afternoon. I was nearly killed at least three times. For serious.

There was so much stupid on the road. A big, fat, giant, stupid party, filled with stupid morons, driving stupid. And I don't mean drunk – although I'm sure the guy fading into my lane on Route 33 began his Bailey's a few hours ago.

My favorite was the douche bag in the mini van. See, traffic was backed up outside the mall, and I was waiting in line, being nice and taking turns letting people into my line. Out of frickin' nowhere, this guy makes a hard right into the one foot space in front of my car.

He was completely perpendicular. To. My. Car.

He turned so far sideways into our lane of traffic, he had to back up a little before fully pulling into the lane.

F*cktard.

Well, I'm off. Those presents won't wrap themselves.

Let me tell you, I earned that Bailey's tonight.

The Crocodile Hunter On Laundry Day

I've been falling behind on my laundry lately. I planned to do some last night, then I noticed the towel hamper was filled, so I did that instead. This created  some minor trauma, since my daughter neeeeeded to wash her khakis for school. Then I realized she just did laundry on Sunday - three days ago.
 
Odd, I was positive I spent several hundred dollars on clothing when school began. Surely, she had enough to get through a five day week.
 
Apparently all the fine clothing I purchased became unacceptable, in favor of two special pairs of corduroy pants.
 
I probably should've noticed that sooner. There's a school dress policy, so the pants can only be black or khaki. This makes it difficult to discern which pair is which. To me. The Mom. Obviously, my daughter knows exactly which pair is her favorite.
 
Then the wave of bad junior high memories washed over me. The pair of Sergio Valentes that fit the bum just right. The vintage t-shirt that was worn out in all the right places. The Nikes that had the proper amount of smudgies. The favorite pair of undies that didn't wedge. Well, actually, that still applies - but I certainly don't wear the same pair daily.
 
The point is, I really do understand having that favorite pair of jeans, sweater, sneakers or undies..... and this is even more urgently felt in the teen years. I get that.

But.
 
Woe, I am old now. This means I cannot reconcile the favorite pair of pants, with the amount of money spent on the whole lot.
 
I made a strong (and possibly cranky) suggestion to wear something else. Preferably a warm ensemble, since it was going to be 20 degrees with a wind chill near zero.
 
The next morning, she came downstairs in a pair of khaki Bermuda shorts and boots.
 
Well then. After some actual long pants were procured from the bottom of the closet, she tells me "other girls are wearing shorts and boots". 

Oh yes. Those "other" girls that must look like a stiff version of The Crocodile Hunter in Uggs, once their legs succumb to hypothermia.