59%: The Best Get Better

Does life get more exciting than this?! Probably not YOUR life!

Reach for the sky!

Oh sweet zombie Jesus, it's time for Performance Evaluations again! Being a new employee at a company, it's important to set realistic goals that also demonstrate your commitment and dedication to the new position. Here are a few examples from the performance goals I set for myself.

1. Limit wine consumption in office to one glass per day, and at least attempt to disguise it.
2. Develop office nickname. Preferred: ConnMan, C-Dawg, "Big Junk". Acceptable Alternative: Snowflake
3. Read two Lolcats per day, minimum.
4. Email hilarious partially nude photo of self to engineering group to promote interoffice camaraderie.
5. Have at least one person refer to me as a "snappy" dresser.
6. Show that bitch lunch lady in the cafeteria who's REALLY the boss.
7. Figure out if I have developed "Tyler Durden" alter ego. If confirmed, attempt to limit fatalities on company property.
8. Exude confidence and raw masculine sexuality.

Accidental Creepster...

There’s a cute girl who sits in a block of cubicles on the other side of the big engineering bay where I work. Believe me, this is a rarity in The Company (apparently). At the very least, I would be content making a friend and having someone to talk to when work gets slow.

I had the perfect, convenient excuse to introduce myself to her. The employees in my bay are organized into clusters of six cubicles each. I refer to them as “cube farms.” As it happens, I had to ask a work question from one of the people in her farm. So I could pop over there with valid work business, and quickly worm my way into her heart.

We have an IM client at work that displays an employee’s status. That way, people can see if you’re at your desk, or in a meeting, or on travel. So I planned to use that for it’s (kind of) intended function, and just check if she was there before I go ask my question. What I DIDN’T know was that the IM client will notify the person if you add them as a friend on your buddy list. So I threw her name into my list, saw she was there, and started walking over to ask my question.

I’m just around the corner when I hear her ask “Who is this Connor Dolan?!” in a puzzled exclamation to her other cube farmers.

So then I ran away.

Of course, the worst part is that I still have to ask the other person in her cube farm my work question. But I don’t want to introduce myself to him if they think I’m a random creepster! *Sigh.* All I wanted was a friend, and instead I’m going to end up with a restraining order…

Spoilerz Alert

Don't read this post if you don't want to know anything about the Twilight series. I'm serious. Just stop reading my intoxicating words now and come back some other day.

I am not fucking around. This post is going to reveal some heavy plot stuff and you probably don't want to have it spoiled.

I'm trying to create lots of line breaks here to push the main content off the page, but you're running out of time.

Still here? You've made the right choice. Not like those others.

I'm proud of you. You know what my grandfather struggled to whisper to me while he was dying from liver failure and the entire family begged him to give up the bottle?

"God hates a quitter."

So read on, my fellow dedicated souls! Drink deeply from the mouth of my 90 Proof blog-a-bottle.


Ok, have you noticed that pretty much NOTHING happens in the entire first half of Breaking Dawn (I'm bored and re-reading it)? All that they do is have weird sex and then get knocked up. All of that takes up as much space as the first Twilight book. I could write most of the plot in just one paragraph:

Bella: Oh you're so impossibly handsome! You have marble skin. I'm going to refer to you as being "marble" a lot.
Edward: You're kind of a dumbass. Like, mentally not that bright.
Jacob: I love youuuu, Bella!
Bella: I love you too!
Jacob: REALLY?!!
Bella: Hahaha dummy! Not really!
Jacob: Wha--Why not? Edward's kind of an asshole. Like seriously, he lies to you all the time and stalks you. How do you not have serious trust issues?
Edward: Don't listen to that wolf dude. Let's have violent sex, where I rough you up a bit. My semen-venom also somehow doesn't hurt you because we both waited until we were married.
Bella: I am rewarded for my sexual inexperience with a creepy, blood-drinking baby now.
Edward: I'm going to try and abort the child without your consent, because I'm such a good male figure.
Jacob: I hate ur baby.
(Bella has baby.)
Jacob: I love ur baby.

Office Antics

So I just ate my lunch and afterward I was feeling kind of cold (I always feel colder after eating, for some reason). Anyways, I was sitting in my chair and I started rubbing my hands together to try and get blood flowing to my fingers. But I accidentally rubbed my palms together too hard and they made a little farting sound. I immediately froze and then carefully looked around. Everyone in my little cube farm had also kind of frozen, but were avoiding looking at me. They totally thought I let one rip.

What's my next move at this point? Declare that I'm not an office farter? Say nothing and let the rumors spread? Maybe blame it on the dude next to me.

Blog entry? Check!

I like to set goals for myself. Not because I’m an over-achiever, but because I like to check items off a “to-do” list and make the little check mark symbol in the air. “Daily bowel movement? Check!” This has not made me popular in the men’s room stalls.

One of my personal goals is to become a regular at the wine bar across the street from my place. To that end, I have been forcing myself to go eat dinner there twice a week. I want the bartenders/hostesses/owners there to know my name and what kind of drink I prefer. I also want them to cheer “Connor!” when I walk through the doors and possibly give me a hug. That’s reasonable.

Sadly, there is a problem with my amazing plan: I don’t know how to say the name of the wine bar, and enough time has gone by that I feel weird asking. The name is “Brix” but is this pronounced like “Bricks” or “Bree”? The only solution I can come up with is to get hammered, pass out and conveniently tumble off my barstool, then “come to” and pretend to be disoriented as I ask “Where am I?” Then wait expectantly for someone to answer my question.

Tactful solution to a trivial problem? Check!

Marina

Dawn of the Browning

Alexis

Momma Bird will miss it, but Baby Bird's gotta fly.

Helping hands

There is a lumbering giant of a man in my building who always walks half a step behind me. I feel his presence constantly looming over my shoulder in hallways. His ragged breath is hot on my neck as I leave a conference room. I cringe when he gets so close that I catch a waft of his distinctive odor (smells like cats)... And he's ALWAYS that close. I feel like Mr. Close Walker wants me to walk faster, and I don't know why he won't just walk around me.

The worst part is when we reach an entrance. Since I'm half a step in front, I will start to open the door. But THEN, Mr. Close Walker will reach forward and grab the door frame... AS I AM IN THE PROCESS OF OPENING IT... and open it as well. So his hand is over my shoulder, and it's almost like he's assisting me in opening the door.

This is one of the worst violations of personal space ever. If it keeps happening, I'm going to go insane and fling myself off the Space Needle.

Trash bash.

I have a major problem with the janitorial staff at The Company. They only empty our bins... ONCE A WEEK! Please take a moment to allow the gravity of this statement to fully mature in your mind. Let it stew for a bit. Then come to the conclusion, as I have, that this is unacceptable!!

I frequently buy a lunch from the cafeteria right across the street and will eat it back at my desk. When I first began working here, I would blissfully toss my used plate in the garbage pail when I was done. But after a few days, I noticed the can was becoming full. Bits of food scraps were turning strange colors. A mysterious odor wafted through the air, and my coworkers grew nervous as packs of wild coyotes drew closer to our group with each passing day. I grew panicked and began to wonder if I had done something wrong.

Was it possible that I had to "activate" my garbage pail to have the janitors empty it? Had I offended the cleaning staff with my charm, good looks, and wild success? "Maybe they just missed my pail for the past three days", I reassured myself. "Surely they'll empty it tomorrow!"

Nope! The next day, the garbage was still full! And it wasn't emptied until I came in to work on Monday morning. So what was the real reason behind this travesty? The janitors (if you can believe this) are unionized and not minorities. Up here in Washington, all they have are Asians and white people. And Native Americans that turn into wolves or some bullsh*t like that. So ship them all up here, Arizona! Load up your huddled masses of shivering, unwanted souls on a bus and drop them off at Home Depots conveniently located across the state!

I'm so clever. I should be a politician.

Who's ready for safe fun?!

I came down with a bit of a fever this weekend. Yellow fever! Yes, I spent the entire holiday weekend with some of my new Asian friends. The fun began on Saturday, when I went to a rooftop shrimp fest in downtown Seattle. The weather was perfect, the booze flowed freely, and I got to sample some new cuisine. You see, part of the shrimp fest was to eat Live Shrimp. It's like sushi... but way more hardcore.

You start with regular shrimp. They're alive and overjoyed at getting to travel new places, like the Seattle fish market! Then they're unceremoniously dumped into a bowl of icy seawater, which paralyzes them. Finally the shrimp come face to face with a ravenous Asian (or drunken white boy), and they are devoured. You break off their head and peel off the shell, dip them quickly in a citrus, soy sauce, and wasabi mixture, and down the hatch it goes! Seriously. This is what I did. It's kind of badass.

Of course, I had to prep myself with a little tequila. Then a lot of tequila. The night ended with me passed out face down in a kitchen downtown, with a bathrobe draped over my body.

Then I rallied for the Fourth of July, which took place at an Asian party by a local lake. Let me just say that Asian people have TOTALLY different concepts of personal safety when it comes to children playing with fireworks! Firstly, Washington State has sick fireworks because all the Indian reservations sell the super illegal stuff. So all the Asian parents were handing kids these insane bottle rockets and what looked (and sounded) like tiny grenades, which they would jam into bottles, tiki torches, aluminum cans, or whatever they could find, light it off and just pray it didn't veer back towards the lakehouse or spray shrapnel.

And as my final example of the stringent safety requirements, I seriously witnessed this conversation:

Kid: Mine didn't go off!
Adult: That a dud. It no good.
(Kid starts to toss the dud in a garbage can near the food)
Adult: What you doing?! That not safe!
Kid: Where do I put it?
Adult: Toss it in campfire.