Going Under the Virtual Knife
Being on the phone with credit card companies for what feels like hours causes me to draw marching ants and tropical fruit on the conference room dry-erase board.
Some other boring activity causes someone else to draw razor-toothed monsters eating them on the conference room dry-erase board.
All in a day’s work…
Back when I lived in Austin (the first time), Flash Mobs were somewhat prevalent. I hadn’t seen or heard of a successful one happening for awhile (then again, it’s hard to have an ear to the ground when your head is in the clouds), so I was happy when news of the pillow fight in Pike Place Market hit my inbox. I didn’t participate, but I took a few pictures, which you may enjoy as part of Kat’s fourth installment of a flickr account:
(Note: If you want to be flickr friends, befriend platkat. I may be keepin’ it classy in Seattle, but I still won’t go pro on flickr!)
Today it snowed very hard. It was a big surprise, as evidenced by all of my coworkers unnaturally conversing about the snow, all of my friends asking me about the snow, the TotalFark thread about the snow, and random people I saw throughout the day reacting moronically to the snow. Snow, snow, snow.
Snow.
In light of this natural phenomenon, it was only fitting that I save myself the grueling walk to the cafeteria in another building 100 miles away and instead walk to my friend’s car 10 feet out the door and go get sushi. After we finished our lunch and I made a football out of my chopsticks wrapper which I erroneously flicked over my friend’s head and onto the table of a couple seated near us, we quickly escaped to the Asian market next door. There, I purchased three items: /$!3@#s^&, Hello Panda, and Choco Digestive.
/$!3@#s^&
Oh /$!3@#s^&… what are you, /$!3@#s^&? Your package is a mystery wrapped in a riddle, and can be used as a short strand of oversized anal beads. The only indication of its contents is a strawberry at the top. But upon opening my sex toy candy, I found there was much more than met the eye: In addition to strawberry flavored gummy candy slightly resembling fun-fruits, there were little balls of chocolate mixed in. Score!
Hello Panda
Well! Hello yourself, little guy–Ah shit, it’s gonna maul me to death! Take cover! Whew. Now that we’re safe, Hello Pandas are chocolate-filled chocolate cookies that tasted exactly like the discontinued Koala Yummies of yesteryear, which can now be obtained under the moniker, Koala March.
Choco Digestive
This is perhaps the boldest purchase of the three. Though its package is unassuming, the name was too curious to ignore. It has always been a given that I digest my chocolate after I’ve eaten it, but this product seemed intent on driving the point home. Would these cookies help me digest food better? Would they give me indigestion? Would they accelerate the digestion process? What is going to happen when I eat these?? So far, nothing. I ate at least four of them, but they seem to be moving through my digestive tract with the same ease as regular cookies. The day isn’t over yet, so if I end up shitting rainbows (instead of the usual rose petals), I’ll post a follow-up.
At the suggestion of a very wise person, I joined the poker group here at work. As I mentioned before, there are no buses that go directly from Seattle to the casinos nearby and I haven’t been able to find a live game in town through word of mouth. Naturally, I was overly giddy to find that they hold tournaments in the cafeterias four times a week.
I correctly assumed that the MSFT games would match the demographic of the NI home games I used to hold/attend: Almost all male, twenties and thirties, maybe a few older guys in the mix, almost all engineers, and everyone knows each other. I was on the fence about going (the natural nervousness that comes with the idea of attending a function by yourself, knowing that you won’t know anyone there), but decided that I could totally do this. So I did.
Everyone was incredibly nice, but there was no escaping the inevitable. I got called out for being the young white chick at the poker table.
This happens so much that I’m pretty well used to it. It happened as early as my first trip to Vegas (“Smile, honey.”) and Garden City (“Tell your boyfriend to give you some money so you can go play pai gow.”) through my assimilation process at Bay 101 and my stints at various casinos in AC. Some guy always has to say something that he obviously wouldn’t say to anyone else at the table.
Last night, it was an innocuous “Are you here with someone?”
Just to be clear, I’m not offended because I know that the question came so naturally to the guy that he didn’t mean it as an offense. Also, I know that he was not trying to hit on me, as we’d been discussing a trip he and his wife took to Texas prior to his question. The guy was not a gregarious “player” type, just an average dude. If he were simply trying to hit on me, this blog post would cease to be.
I believe his intent was to find out whose wife I was in order to properly gauge the amount of shit-talking he could get away with. Well, that’s why I would have asked the question anyway.
What he implied though, was that in order for a young lady like me to join a poker game, I must have been “brought.” Poker is not a game for women, and while they are generally accepted in most games, it is rare for them to seek opportunities to play.
Such is not the case with me, and since I tend to be a little audacious, I laughingly replied, “I work here. I rode a bus here this morning, saw that there was a game tonight, and decided to play. I know I’m just a woman, but somehow I managed it.”
As I’m saying this, other guys at the table quipped, “You joined the autogroup, right?” and other comments that nodded to the fact that my being there alone was perfectly fine. (Unnecessary, but it feels nice to be accepted.)
So this put him on the major defensive. He didn’t mean it like that, blah blah blah… I just laughed through it all. I think he was more worried about looking like a dick in front of the other guys than upsetting me.
Anyway, I write all this because I think it’s funny how a pair tits and a snatch changes a question like, “I haven’t seen you here before; did you just start at Microsoft?” to “Are you here with someone?”
Addendum: The game was a $20 NL tourney with no rebuys. Around 20 people showed up. I think I played alright, but I didn’t finish in the money. I started off fairly strong, but the blinds went up more rapidly than I could catch a good all-in hand and a caller. To defend myself further, I haven’t played tournament style in a loooong time, as I usually play online where limit games are more lucrative for me.
“No, I don’t have a follow-up scheduled right now. How about you concentrate on doing everything you were supposed to do a month ago and I’ll make another appointment when you get your shit together.”
“Social Quicktip #35: Stop acting like an awkward dweeb every time you are confronted with another human being! And get out of my way!”
“I’d like a taco salad. Oh wait, no I wouldn’t… because I already know it’s going to taste fucking horrible. The salsa is going to have no flavor, the guacamole is going to be littered with extra ingredients, and you’re going to put it in the stalest, driest taco shell that can possibly be obtained from anywhere on this earth.”
“Your status message says you’re away. Where are you?”
“The writers aren’t being difficult because they just received a lot of poorly-kept documents to fix. They’re being difficult because they’re complete social mongoloids who need to learn how to do their jobs better. And since none of them are here right now, you’re wasting an hour of my day talking about this because no one in this room can even begin to take steps toward correcting this problem.”
“TAKE IT OFFLINE.”
“Oh, you’re thinking about leveraging the new editing tool so we can use XML for its intended purposes? Smashing idea, Johnson!”
“You simultaneously creep me out and bug the shit out of me more and more every day. Did you take a fucking class to obtain this skill?”
“Trying to get food when you’re not hungry is like shopping for clothes after gaining weight. Can I hang out at the desk with you for awhile?”
“I can has gloworms please?”
“Please?”
The first time I get flowers all year and it’s from piggy-backing off of April’s date. :-p
Thanks for the flowers, Allen, and thanks for inviting me to join you guys, April. You both brightened my day!
(Now if only I could find the punk who stole my eyeballs…)
Even when used as directed…
1. Coloring/eating/hiding/hunting for eggs.
2. Awaiting the arrival of a human-sized white rabbit who may or may not be my mother.
3. Circling a large, overcrowded building for over an hour in search of parking.
4. Occupying a large, overcrowded building for over an hour in search of self-validation.
5. Worshipping Jesus as the Christ our Lord.
6. Inviting extended family of my own and/or my significant other to eat dinner in my home so I can spend the day in mild discomfort and the evening talking trash about them once they’ve left.
7. Visiting extended family of my own and/or my significant other to eat dinner in their home so I can spend the day in somewhat greater discomfort and the evening wondering if they’re talking trash about me after I’ve left.
8. My significant other. (NULL)
9. Hijacking the family of someone I just met to share/avoid the above experiences.
10. Finishing my lists with an odd number.
I’m a hipster
You’re a hipster
Hipsters are we all
And when we get together
We do the hipster call
Wah-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah
A-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah
Bitch-and-moan-see-a-show
A-wah-wah-wah-wah-wah
Thanks, Jennifer, for bringing out my inner-skank!