Diary of an Ex-Employee - Day 13.0

There's a global recession, you're out of work, time to make some changes.  But don't worry!  Because you're already....

Saving money without even trying!

1. You're not commuting to work anymore, right?  Well - and this is especially true if you used to drive every day - you're saving money!  Just think how much money you spend a month on commuting.
2. You're not showering every day anymore are you?  It's OK - you can admit it.  Think of the water bill - you're saving money!
3. If you're a woman who shops at a department store for cosmetics, you have tons of little samples lying around all over the place.  Are they in your makeup drawer?  In the medicine cabinet?  In your business travel bag?  Wherever they are, get them out cos you're about to excite your skin with all sorts of gels and creams instead of stocking up on your usual stuff.  There you go!  You're saving money!
4. You're eating lunch at home instead of the cafeteria or the local Cheesecake Factory, aren't you?  You're saving money!
5. You don't have a Starbucks or Tulleys too close by so I figure you're drinking 0-10% as many overpriced designer coffees than you used to.  You're saving money!
6. You're so depressed you can't get off the couch, can you?  Just think, if you were still working, how many Happy Hour, dinners and movies you would have been to by now in a futile attempt to distract your overactive mind from the nightmare of your Inbox, the maze of office politics and that annoying colleague who just won't leave you alone.  So, by being antisocial, you're saving money!
7. You're sleeping later and later, aren't you?  When you sleep, you don't eat, drink, smoke, turn on the TV - you don't do anything that could up the bills.  By sleeping, you're saving money!
8. You're not washing and styling your hair nearly as often as when you were working, right?  Just think how much shampoo, conditioner and styling spray you're saving, not to mention the electricity that goes into that hairdryer.  By dragging a comb through your hair, sticking in an elastic band and looking like crap cos you're not gonna see anyone today anyway, you're saving money!

So stop worrying about rebudgeting.  You're already cutting back!

Being a Doggy Mama - Puppy Dog's Peccadilloes 1

No cuddle if you wriggle

One of Puppy Dog's more annoying peccadilloes is that, if he is lying next to you on the couch or on the bed, and you make the slightest movement, he jumps off, sometimes with a low growl.

The other day he was curled up next to me on the couch and his head was leaning on my leg.  His soft little ear was flapped over my shin and I reached out to stroke it.  Grr! Jump!  He was gone.

He's a rescue dog so it's hard to know why he does certain things.  Was he invited up onto the couch and bed and then kicked off it?  Poor little thing.  If you ask really nicely, sometimes he comes back and lays with you again.

 

Unwind

Puppy Dog has been taught the command "Unwind".  This is for when he has run around something - a tree for instance, and his leash is caught on it.  We say "Unwind! Unwind!" and he usually understands that he has to retrace his steps to undo the damage.

Sometimes, though, Unwind doesn't cut it, especially if has has gone under a tree with low branches and completely tied himself up in knots, like he did outside the coffee shop this morning.  His back left leg was trapped, pulled up along his side, the leash was curled all around him like Shibari rope bondage.  He just stood there, perfectly still, looking up at me.  I burst out laughing and ran to call Fluffy Bear out of the coffee shop to see it, but he somehow managed to disentangle himself while I was away.

Unwind can also sometimes be confusing for Puppy Dog.  He isn't always sure which way he came around the object so, when he's trying to undo the leash, he makes things worse.  This is how things were in the park today when he went around a wooden post.  The more Fluffy Bear yelled "UNWIND" the more loops of leash snaked around the post.  Fluffy Bear gave up, went up to the post and tried to pull the leash off it.  Of course it snagged on something and he had to yank and yank until a thwock! of wood coming loose occurred simultaneous to a swish of leash coming off the top and, this being an extendable leash, a fssst! of leash retracting, full speed, into the handle.  Fluffy Bear got a nice little jolt, 

I laughed my ass off and Puppy Dog, sensing the issue was resolved, gambolled off to sniff something or other.

Stuff Female People Like - No. 11: Receiving Flowers

This series is inspired by the blog/book Stuff White People Like.

11. Receiving flowers

Yes, Female People genuinely do like getting flowers.  

Why?

Well, flowers are:

• pretty
• a treat (assuming the sender obeys rule 2)
• a surprise (especially if the sender obeys rule 1)
• a sign the sender really cares (only if all rules are obeyed)
• something that has been hyped by the media and the Female Person has bought into.

The rules of giving flowers

1. Don't drop any hint that you have/are about to/are thinking of buying flowers.
2. Don't be stingy.  Three small tulips won't cut it.  A single flower can pass, but only if it is a long-stemmed rose.
3. Don't buy and give, send.  The Female Person loves to get flowers from the delivery guy, wonder for a moment who sent them, and open the card to find that it's you.
4. Don't buy on impulse, plan.  Flowers bought at the grocery store or gas station do not count.  Getting the flowers delivered at a time when you ought to know she won't be at the office will be an automatic deduction of points.
5. Do know what the Female Person likes and doesn't like.  If you buy flowers she both hates and is allergic to, you're so screwed.
6. Do know what the flowers mean, especially if you are breaking rule 5.  White lilies are for funerals, yellow roses are for friendship.  Look up the rest, or ask the florist.
7. Rule 6 does not apply if you have followed Rule 5 and know that the Female Person likes a certain flower in spite of what it means.
8. Make it public.  If you have a choice to send flowers to the Female Person's home or her work, send them to her work.  She'll never admit it, but she wants everyone to see that someone thinks she is so special that they send a massive bunch of flowers.  Be warned, if you choose to send the flowers to her work, you better make sure you follow Rule 2.
9. Let the professionals do it.  If you are at the flower shop and you're asked if you'd like to choose the flowers, decline unless you are one of the 0.5% of men who actually knows what they are doing with flowers and definitely decline if you are one of the 7% of men who are color blind.
10. Add the vase.  If possible, buy a vase too, so she doesn't have to scrabble around cutting stems, pulling off leaves and arranging the flowers.  Make it easy for her.

Diary of an Ex-Employee - Day 12.0

How do you know you are an Ex-Employee?

1. You hang up your washing and it is all tracksuits and T-shirts
2. You automatically decline evites to charity events without even reading them
3. There's an indent shaped like your butt in the couch
4. You find yourself wanting to make cupcakes like Martha Stewart
5. You're suddenly as lot less fussy about which shirts need ironing
6. When one of your favorite TV shows has one mediocre episode, you wonder if you should cancel your Cable
7. You buy your latte with a double shot, drink half, take it home, top it up with milk, microwave it and congratulate yourself on economizing
8. You start to turn out the lights whenever you leave a room
9. You pack the dishwasher so tight you and your husband both have to lean on it to get the door closed
10. You take everything out of the old Nordstrom bag that was put aside to donate to charity.  Doesn't mean you're gonna wear it, of course, you just have to accept that, these days, charity starts at home.

Quote Unquote

"Hey!  Blessings in disguise!  What are you hiding?"

Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report, Comedy Central, summing up my feelings towards bad things that you know happen for a reason, you just wish the sodding reason would hurry up and show itself.

Quote Unquote

"I only drink diet soda.  I'm hoping the preservatives will add some stability to my life."

Fisher, a character on Bones, FOX Channel

Diary of an Ex-Employee - Day 10.0

My cold is like a distant relative that comes to stay and, enjoying the free room and board, just bloody well refuses to leave.

Yesterday I thought I was really getting over it.  Then, last night, I started to get a really bad headache, then I got really hot and sweaty, then I got nauseous, then I threw up.  Drinking Cranberry juice all day makes for psychadelic pink vomit... who knew?

I can't even remember the last time I threw up and, back then, it probably had something to do with alcohol.   If you are drunk, at least you have the boozy glow to protect you from the horror of the feeling of throwing up.

And so today I am trying to take it easy again, but the kitchen doesn't clean itself, the trash is piling up and the dogs are shedding fur balls all over the house.  So some washing up, some vaccuuming and some trash-lugging later, I finally got to hit the couch.  

I guess I should try to do one useful thing today, so I've chosen to do my Excel contacts database. I need to go through my emails and Outlook contacts and extract the name of everyone who might possibly be able to help me or know someone who could. 

I'm going to list:

• Name
• Company
• Who the contact came from (if they are not someone I know personally)
• Contact details
• Date of my contacting them (you don't want to hit them up too often)
• Notes of what happened when I contacted them
  
• Date I should contact them next
  
• Notes of what I want to do when I contact them next

So I'm going to sit in front of the mind-numbing trashy joy that is Bravo TV and get this done.

Or maybe I'll have a nap.

Quote Unquote

A friend of mine works in the mobile industry.  He saw a conference in his local area where he could go to network, promote his company's offering, etc., so he asked his boss if he could go.  His boss said...

"What is Twitter and why should we care about it?"

True story.

I am Woman - But I ain't no frickin' Della

Dell have decided to market to a new segment: Women.

So they've created a lovely new site called "Della" which talks about cute notebooks which can fit in your purse.  

It also has helpful hints and tips, like "Seven Unexpected Ways a Netbook can Change Your Life" because women need to learn that "Once you get beyond how cute they are, you'll find that Netbooks can do a lot more than check your email."

What "more" I hear you ask?  Check the stock portfolio?  Run a small business from home?  Create a presentation for the Board?

Nope.

• Schedule mini meditation breaks for you throughout your busy day
• Find recipes online 
• Watch online fitness videos
• Map your running routes

Well, this is interesting.  I've just gone back to the Della site and the article has already been changed.  Looks like this shite is already hitting the fan, then. 

The text has changed.  Now there are apparently only 5 ways to use a Netbook and the content is more politically correct.  But there are still other pages...

Ooh!  Ooh!  The Products page!  You can customize your laptop and put a snazzy design on it!  Because that way, you'll be the coolest Yummy Mummy at the Starbucks!

And there's an Accessory shop!  I can get a laptop sleeve that matches each of my Juicy Couture tracksuits! 

And of course, there's a Give page, because women who sit around at home all day like to give to charity so they can feel useful and superior at the same time.  Look!  It has Green tips, because we all know that housewives have bugger all to do so they get their knickers in a twist about the environment.

This is completely un-fecking-believable.  

Let's see if this would be an acceptable prejudice if it was sexual-preference or race based...

The Dell site for gays... De-llite!  As you log on there'd be some pumpin' tunes, a hot guy with his shirt off, an androgynous woman with short hair in a suit and lots of colors! Colors! Colors!  There'd be a link to sign the petition for gay marriage and an Events page listing all the gay pride events accross the world.  Laptops would come in either lavender or a rainbow design.  And there'd be tips on how to fly under the radar when you visit a small town in a square state, how to get to see your life partner in hospital without being actually listed as family and how to behave at a BBQ with straight people.

Sound acceptable?  

The Dell site for African Americans... Dellah!  As you log on there'd be southern blues and Mammy would pop up and ask howya doin' chile.  There'd be advice on how to search out black history, a map of towns that have the biggest Klu Klux Klan numbers (we ain't gonna holidayah theyah, Clarence!) and a tribute to Mr King.  In fact, the strapline would probably be something like "He had a dream of freedom, and with Netbook we're making yours come true."

Sound acceptable?

Well neither is a pastel blue site that talks about recipes.

Whoever came up with this at Dell is a pillock.

Quote Unquote - Close up

"The Swedish singer’s face is so rigid and mask like that the small child of a friend of mine burst into tears on her first close up to camera."

Everywhereventually, on the Eurovision 1st Semi-final

Hello from Puppy Dog - I want to play!

Hello Friends!

OMG I am sooooooo bored!

Mama and Dada are giving me two different pills in my peanut butter, so I am feeling a lot better. 

I want to play!

And Dogette is staying with us this week, so I have a playmate!

But Mama and Dada won't let me.  They only let us out into the garden for a little while, there have been NO walks, and Mama keeps asking me to go back to bed and "rest".

Because we don't have anything to do, and we're tired of chewing my toys, Dogette and I are starting to get a bit tetchy with each other.  She actually had the cheek to tell me, when I was chewing my bunny that, if I moved my head to the side, I'd break through the toy skin faster!  I told her it was my toy, thank you very much, and I know how to chew it and maybe I don't want to get through the skin faster because if I don't get to the stuffing straight away, the toy will last longer and she didn't think of that, did she, so there!  She told me I was being a wiseass and I told her she was being a bitch and she said that she thought coming here was going to be like a mini-vacation with lots of tug of wars and ball chasing and growlyfighting and now I was just being so boring she might as well be at home because I was sore and sick and I couldn't move a lot.  I told her that she shouldn't have bloody well bit me then!

There was a very, very quiet pause.

Then she said oh, hell NO, I didn't just say that and I said hell, yes, I totally did and what was she going to do about it and she said that she just might bite me again and I told her my Mama was right there and she'd probably send Dogette home.  Dogette said that she'd be happy to go home where she had much better toys than I have.  I told asked her if her stuff is so much better than mine, why does she always want to lie on my cushion and she said maybe it's because it smells of me and she started to cry and ran into the bedroom.

I felt really bad.

So I went into the bedroom, slowly, and walked up to her.  First she turned her head away so I waited and lowered my head.  Then she turned her head around a little way and I gave her nose a little lick and she gave me a little lick and then everything was OK again.

I do love her, but I also figured I better just make up with her because that bitch got fang, if you know what I mean.

Lots of licks and woofs,

 

 

Puppy Dog

Diary of an Ex-Employee - Day 9.0

The cold virus really seems to be exiting from my body today, but I instinctively know that I should still be resting.  But I can't.

I should be:

• Putting on some washing
• Sorting out all the emails I got after I left my job to make sure those people are all in my Contacts
• Filing all the admin crap that has been piling up in the office
• Researching what the fricking frack COBRA is
• Unpacking the dishwasher
• Cleaning the bathroom
• Doing my UK tax return
• Finishing off my It's the Economy Stupid job-hunting mind map
• Reviewing my resume
• Updating my resume on Monster
• Checking out the Ladders site
• Brushing the dogs
• Dusting the coffee table
• Creating an Excel spreadsheet of contacts, their companies, date of contact, notes, and when to ping them again
• etc. etc. etc.

Instead I fart about playing Lexulous (Scrabble) on Facebook, I open a few pieces of mail, I write a note to myself to remember to do something...

So I do nothing particularly productive but, at the same time, I don't rest.

And so, I am finding a First World Solution to a First World Problem. 

I have taken some of the cough medicine with codeine and I shall soon be completely comatose.

See you when nap time is over...

Memory Lane - Playing the little doll

My sisters are much older than me and, when I was a little kid and had long hair, they used to like playing hairdresser with me, especially on Sunday mornings when we were all a bit bored.

I remember them standing, one on each side of me, plaiting my hair.  When my Princess Leia hair do was complete, I was sooooo proud of it, and pranced around the house feeling the round plaits flap against my ears.

Thank God there's no photographic evidence!

Memory Lane - A Question of Time

A funny little childhood memory popped into my head today, so I decided to start this series called Memory Lane.

I was about two months past turning four, and we were at a picnic.  I was chatting to another adult - I don't remember who - telling them a story about something I did - I don't remember what.

"And when was this?" he asked me.

"Oh," I waved my hand and rolled my eyes, "it was long, long, loooooong ago when I was three."

I remember being annoyed and confused at why he started to laugh.

Wish I could charm men that easily these days....

Divided by a Common Language - Eurovision again

So.... let's see how well Everywhereventually and I did with our scoring.  Remember people in the UK can't vote for the UK, so we are leaving our home country out of our scoring.

I've put our top ten down below according to how points are awarded in Eurovision.  Then I compare them to the songs that actually got through to the Final so we can see how accurate EE and I are.  Don't hold your breath on that one.

Everywhereventually's Top Ten:

12 points to... Ukraine

10 points to... Albania

8 points to...   Estonia

7 points to...   Armenia

6 points to...   Turkey

5 points to...   Norway

4 points to...   Moldova

3 points to...   Greece

2 points to...   Hungary

1 point to...     France

My Top Ten:

Well of course, EE scored his out of 100 and I scored mine out of 10 so I have a bunch of stuff that's rated the same.  So excuse me while I take the time to listen to some stuff again to rank the songs properly.... D'oh!

12 points to... Turkey

10 points to... Belgium

8 points to...   Hungary

7 points to...   Estonia

6 points to...   Azerbaijan

5 points to...   Norway

4 points to...   Ireland

3 points to...   Montenegro

2 points to...   Denmark

1 point to...     Armenia

So let's see if EE and my top picks even got into the Final.  As you know, UK, Spain, Germany and France are automatically in the final, as is Russia, because they won last year.

We'll see what happens soon enough...

Well, actually, I won't see what happens, because it isn't broadcast here, which is annoying.  Not even on BBC America.  I'll have to wait till EE comes to visit and he brings the DVD.

Divided by a Common Language - Eurovision 4

I am soooo behind on this.  I think Eurovision is about to happen and I haven't finished my reviews yet.  So, here goes.

Here are the reviews of the songs from the countries who automatically make it through to the final.  You can find the songs on YouTube or eurovision.tv.

You can find posts which explain what the feck Eurovision is, and two posts reviewing the other songs, if you search under the "Divided by a Common Language" series of posts.

I have included the scores of my dear friend, Everywhereventually, a Eurovision aficionado. You can see his take on Eurovision and his reviews on the songs on his site, here. 

France - S'il fallait le faire (If it had to be done)

The French language has a lot of words that end in soft vowel sounds, rather than hard consonant sounds.  Therefore it is not a language conducive to pop songs.  France also has a tradition of poetry to music rather than pop songs.  Perhaps these two things explain why this is yet another tedious ballad from France as their entry.  

Yawn.

Score: 4/10

EE Score: 86/100

 

Damn, now that I've listened to a French song my brain has started doing it's internal monologue in French and I am struggling to express myself in English.  It will only take a minute or two for it to switch back.  It's amazing how the brain can do that, when you know more than one language.  Mine switches pretty easily - it just doesn't always switch in the right way.  I remember taking my final exams in High School and, when I was in my German exam and I tried to translate a word into German, the French word would pop into my head, and vice versa.

 

Anyway, back to Eurovision.

 

Russia - Mamo

Russia is hosting this year and they obviously don't want to be doing it again next year because this song is just shit.  A  young girl with badly dyed black hair is singing as if she's in a death scene at the opera.  It's a pop song, so why is she acting like she's going to die any moment?

Crap.

Score: 2/10

EE score:  6/100

 

Germany - Miss Kiss Kiss Bang

Upbeat big band.  Interesting and fun.  More America than Germany though... the secret at Eurovision is to do a pop song that is mainstream but still has a flavor - an instrument, a sound, a beat - of your country.  This is nice, but gets point deducted for not evoking Germany in any way.

Score: 7/10

EE score: 71/100

UK - It's my Time

 

This suffers from the same lack of cultural reference as the German song.  This is very Whitey Houston.  The song has some flavors of Andrew Lloyd Webber, which I supposed could be iconically British.  It's reasonably good, but there are other songs that are better.

Score: 7/10

EE score: 100/100 (perhaps a little partisan?)

 

Spain - La Noche es Para Mi (The Night is for Me)

At first I was going to level the same criticism at Spain re this song not having a national flavor, because it is more of a Middle Eastern beat.  But then I remembered that Spain does have a strong North African experience, being very close to the African coat at certain points.  This is a song which will definitely be played in all the Spanish clubs over the summer.  It's pretty good, but it just doesn't grab me in any way.  I much prefer Turkey's.

Score: 7/10

EE score: 66/100

 

So now you have my full two cents on this topic.  

 

We'll soon see who wins!

 

Hello from Puppy Dog - Dogette's chew toy

Hello Friends

Mama is sick and so am I.  Dogette has fangs, and she sure knows how to use 'em.  She sunk hers into my shoulder pretty good.

Mama gave me medicine and put hot compresses on me, so I felt better yesterday and Dogette and I ran around and played a bit.

That was a BIG mistake.

When I woke up this morning I felt doggone awful.  I was really sore and it hurt to put my weight on my front left leg.  I've spent all day on my cushion and Dogette is really irritated with me because she's bored out of her mind.  She went into my den and took out some toys to chew, but she said it got old pretty quickly.

Then I heard Mama call the vet and then Dada went out and, when he came back, he gave me a new pill.  They think I don't know when there's a pill inside the blob of peanut butter, but I do.  I just take them because I am a good boy.

I don't know what that pill was, but my shoulder hurts less.  And I am also suddenly reeeeally tired.  So I am sorry to be rude, but I am going to go back to my cushion and have another nap.

Yawn.

Night night.

Lots of licks and woofs,

 

 

Puppy Dog.

Diary of an Ex-Employee - Day 9.0

Just like your car stops making that knocking sound as soon as you drive it to the mechanic, so my cold started clearing up as soon as I went to the Doctor.  I still got a prescription for some killer cough medicine, which knocked me out cold on the couch this afternoon.  Bliss.

Now that the prospect of losing medical insurance looms large, I booked a full physical.  So I was poked and prodded and stuck with needles and weighed and measured and offered all sorts of goodies, like Chantix to quit smoking.  This is the great part of the American healthcare system - that you can get some reeeeeeally good drugs.

But, as I have now lost my job, which had excellent health insurance, I am no longer in the little fluffy coccoon where you get the benefit of the best of American healthcare.  As I sat in the waiting room - saving the other people from my germs by sporting a mask that made me look like Donald Duck - I saw two people come in who don't have my level of cover.  

The first was a young man who struggled to pay an $18 copay.  He had some cash, and put $3 on a debit card.  He was clearly uncomfortable, embarrassed in front of the overly perky Receptionist.  

The second was an older woman who was told that neither Medicare nor her AARP insurance covered the procedure she was there for.  She was clearly annoyed and upset.

And I am about to join these ranks.

This really isn't the best way to get success and performance out of the population of the US.

I am going try and use this as another incentive to get a new job - quickly.

Being uninsured is not an option.

The Doctor also told me about a book that takes a different approach to quitting smoking - the Easyway Method by Alan Carr.   

Apparently he talks about seeing becoming non-smoker as a new freedom, rather than something that has to be given up or overcome.  

He also says that the first cigarette you want to have after quitting shouldn't just be seen as "one little slip" because, as soon as you smoke it, you become a smoker again.  So the first cigarette is:

• All the bad health effects you'll have for the rest of your life
• The money you'll spend on cigarettes the rest of your life.

So that first cigarette means lots of sickness and $10,000.

It's a good way to look at things.  

 

Divided by a Common Language - News

BBC News America is an abomination.  If you can find BBC World News on your local PBS channel here in the US, watch that instead.  

BBC News America is BBC News dumbed down because some cretin clearly thinks that the existence of Fox News means all Americans are stupid.

Quote from tonight's news bulletin:

"Scientists are saying that the polar ice caps could melt in as little as not twenty, not ten but five years.  That's only five Memorial Days away."

This is an insult to the BBC, to the UK and to Americans.  On behalf of the UK, I'd like to apologize to all Americans for the imbecilic editor who is responsible for this drivel.  Mr Rome Hartman, stand up and take a bow, you condescending twit.

Quote Unquote

Bill is on a Lost in Translation trip in Japan.  

He committed the cardinal foreigner sin and ordered a foodstuff that is traditional in your home country but not in the one you're visiting.

He ordered bacon.

He told me that, when it came he took one look at it's color and coined a new phrase:

"I had to call it as I saw it - it was gray-con."