Don't Be This Guy

I'm talking to you Papular Paper Pusher.

It's Not Me it's You

Do restraining orders work against vendors? This is something I might have to look into.

For over three months a certain office supply company (none you've ever heard of unless you work for them... and if you do run away!) has been trying to get me to order from them. I really wasn't interested but they did the old salesman show up at the office routine after I said I wasn't interested.

(Sidenote: I've started allowing these unsolicited visits ever since my DHL rep said he was going to take me to lunch which I interpreted as I will gladly stuff my face if you're picking up the tab and you can talk all you want while I order my third milkshake. I might need to rethink this idea, especially since I haven't received that free lunch. Alas, perhaps there are no free lunches.)

What could I do with that sad little puppy on my doorstep? I showed him a good time of course. Well, not really.

But I did get to look all important--look at me booking a conference room for my "business meeting"--and we "talked numbers" as the kids like to say. Well, not really.

First, Papular Paper Pusher asked me what my main concern was. Any economic students out there? Want to take a guess as to what I told him? I told him "lowest price combined with timely delivery." I don't think I coined that phrase but he thought it was worth writing down. He then gave me a whole bunch of mumbo jumbo, or malarkey if your prefer, that made me click my mental "sleep mode."

One of his big sells was that he could save me money on paper purchases. Great idea, we use paper everyday. Literally every day if you can believe it. And it's not like paper grows on trees. Well, not really.

I gave him the figure for a box of 10 reams of 24 lb. stock--hang on dear audience, we have to work through the minutia--and he told me he could save me money because I didn't need to use 24 lb., 20 lb. would do just fine for the copier. (I won't bore you with the reasons I order 24 lb. paper but there are reasons dammit! I will only point out that 20 lb. paper costs less than 24 lb. from Staples and any other vendor.)

That was the big sell? To get me to order a cheaper quality of paper. What's his next suggestion to give people foldy chairs instead of plush office chairs? (Okay, the office chairs are a bit lavish at $1,000 a pop but they weren't my choice.)

Still, nice guy that I am I printed out my spreadsheet of items that I regularly order. A week or two later I get an email from PPP explaining that I have a login to their website. I ignored it as I did all the other attempted follow-ups. I got caught on the phone once and so I agreed to check out the website.

Well, as it turned out I was in for quite a treat. It was like the Staples website except much harder to navigate with far less items to choose from. And here's the clincher: more expensive than Staples and an extra day to arrive.

Did he really think he was going to lure me with higher prices? All he had to do was go to the Staples website, see what they were charging and charge me the same rate. I could have worked around the other stuff. I'm good with ordering from the little guy. I'm no corporate lackey. I have the rap sheet to prove it. But at the end of the year I have to turn in a self-evaluation and one thing that always gets them all excited is when I can show them where I saved the company money. It factors into my bonus.

These year-end reviews are painful enough without me having to explain why I switched from Staples to a company that charges more money for the same items.

Still, because I am an atheistic saint I found two items that were something like a nickel cheaper on their website. I clicked on the link provided in the email and put an order in. Well, not really.

As it turns out my order didn't go through, though I didn't know it at the time. PPP called. I answered and told him that I put an order in hoping that would shut him up. (It didn't by the way.)

He calls me back later that day and explains that I ordered through the demo website as opposed to the regular website. Give me a break. This is the worst wooing I've ever seen. You're trying to get my business? If this were a date I'd be convinced I was being filmed by the Blind Date crew... or maybe even Hell Date.

Fast forward to the day before I left for Amsterdam [pause for the tears of longing]. The Temp is in my office. The phone rings.

The Temp: The phone's ringing.

Me: Yeah, I can hear it.

TT: Are you going to answer it?

Me: You see that code? That means it was transferred from reception, that means it's someone trying to sell me something. Not interested.

TT: Oh, okay.

So what do you think the The Temp did?

a) let the phone ring
b) turned off the ringer
c) hung up on PPP
d) answered the phone and told PPP to never call back
e) answered the phone, and said "Yes, he's right here. Hold on, I'll get him...It's for you."

Yes, sadly, the answer is e). Does the Temp have brain damage? I mean seriously, am I talking to Mr. Short-term Memory? Perhaps a pear-colored apple hit him on the head.

So I talk to PPP and tell him to call me the next day at 4pm knowing very well that I will be on my way to the airport, destination Amsterdam.

Fast forward to today. I get a phone call from some phone number I don't recognize. It's PPP on my cell! WTF? Leave me alone! (Unfortunately, I need to list my cell on my business card for a variety of reasons.) PPP called a few weeks back but his number came up as unlisted and I don't answer unlisted calls. I checked the message, erased it, and didn't think twice.

Today, however, I foolishly answered an unknown number and paid the price. He told me he would set up someone to call me to walk through the website. No, fix your website. It sucks. I'm web saavy. It's on my resume. I don't need to talk to someone who's going to talk to me like I'm feeble-minded--"Okay, do you see a blue 'E,' it should say 'Microsoft Explorer' underneath the 'E.' You want to click on that with your mouse."

If I'm on the phone I might as well put the order in over the phone--Temp style.

I told him I'm not interested and to stop calling me. I think that's the last I'll be hearing of PPP. Well, not really.

Are You Minutes from Death? I'd Love to Help but I Didn't Sign my Certification Card

So we had CPR training at the Happy Cappy Investment Team the other day. Bravo for HCIT. I am now able to potentially save someone's life. That makes me a potential hero. I deserve a potential medal.

Is that worthy of a blog entry? Of course not.

What IS worthy of a blog entry? Let me tell you.

Once the hour-long course was over we were given these cards certifying us. However, one person would not sign their card.

Now, you're probably asking yourself "D Money, why would they take the course but not sign the card?" Good question my attentive storytellee.

As it turns out, because HCIT paid for the certification all of us who attended the class are legally obligated to perform CPR on anyone who goes down and needs CPR attention within HCIT as well as the rest of the building.

HCIT paid for the class and I have to save someone's life who needs it. Sounds like a good deal to me. But this person doesn't want to have to be that person who's "obligated" to save some selfish asshole who's too lazy to make his own heart beat.

Now, keep in mind this person is protected by both the Good Samaritan law and HCIT's insurance. This person wants to pick and choose who lives and dies I guess. (I believe that's called a god complex.)

The nerve of some people.

Return of the Temp!

So the Temp is back in my life...sorta.

I needed to call him for some info that he's been hoarding. Specifically, the password to his online account with one of our vendors.

This man never met a phone call he couldn't drag out past 20 minutes if you let him. He seems to thoroughly enjoy them. It gets to the point where telemarketers hang up on him.

He was so pleased with himself when he "informed" me that the Happy Cappy Investment team had its very own sales rep, like he had found the lost city of Atlantis. Yeah, you tend to get a your "very own rep" when you literally order tens of thousands of dollars of supplies from a company annually. I'm sure he called her up as soon as he got her number and bored her to death. My sincerest apologies to the rep.

I bring this up because while I was having the time of my life in Amsterdam (alas, it was only a month ago) the Temp was supposed to order desk fans for some of the traders who work late into the night. After a certain hour the building turns off the air and the floor can get pretty warm until the AC comes on again at 6am. Well, the Temp ordered the fans but they were backordered. By the time I got back the fans hadn't arrived. So of course he went to cancel them in the manner of a crazy person.

Here's what I, a sane person, would have done. I would have logged into my online account and canceled the order. Ta da! [No need to applaud.] In fact, that's what I do every time I cancel orders.

Shortly before I left for Europe I set up an temporary account for the Temp that had some restrictions on it. I won't bore you with the details. Let's get back to Crazy.

So the Temp's attempt to cancel the order over the the phone was a little tricky since he didn't have the order number, the company account number or the date of the order when he made the call. This man can't bring himself to throw away one sheet of paper yet he does not have this information in front of him. I don't get it.

In short he made a call that went something like this "I'm the Temp from the Happy Cappy Investment Team and I need to cancel an order of fans...No I don't have the order number...No I don't have the company account number...I don't remember the date...I'm the Temp from the Happy Cappy Investment Team and I need to cancel an order of fans..."

Needless to say, this was too painful to watch so I left my office. I came back 20 minutes later. He was still getting his phone groove on so I left again. The next attempt to enter my office finally found him wasting considerable energy on some other ridiculous endeavor. I then ordered the fans from another company which arrived a few days later. Traders rejoiced.

Skip to yesterday, more fans arrive. In fact, the exact amount I ordered but from the original company the Temp ordered from. I wish I could say that the Temp lied and never canceled the order. I could respect that. He's a temp. By the time anyone figures it out he'll be gone so, whatever. Sadly, he's not that smart. I fully believe that he really thought he canceled the order.

Being lazy and not doing your work doesn't take any time, so hats off to that. But spending all that time to do your job badly. I don't get it.

Long story short, I called up the Temp to get his password to his online account and now have to re-establish his account since it expired and then send back the fans.

This is all very annoying.

Is That Mine?

Good people,

Shortly after I began my employment at the Happy Cappy Investment Team I ordered a label maker. Nothing fancy but it got the job done. The first thing I did once it was up and running was to label the label maker (how postmodern!). This is because traders are thieves--it's in their job description. They don't actually trade they just take take take. People take my stuff all the time: my tissues, my pens, my tape, my stapler. Someone once stole the removable pad from my mousepad-with-wristguard set up. (Did they honestly think I wouldn't notice or do they just feel entitled to anything and everything they see?)

Now, what is so frustrating about this is that I will gladly order any office supplies for them--it's in my job description. Why they feel compelled to steal things--used things, my things!--instead of waiting one day to get their very own is beyond me but they do. Especially since I very often have said item on hand. It might shock you to know that I supply the supply room with supplies. Supplies-ing ain't it?

So back to the label maker. Many months ago, like 2007 "many months ago," I lent my label maker to someone. I, of course, didn't get it back so I ordered another.

Now, I understand that sometimes you borrow something and you forget who you borrowed it from or if it's been awhile you actually think it's yours (historically, white people are especially prone to this condition) but it had "MAILROOM" on it.

Fortunately, this person finally remembered where the mailroom was and returned the label maker today...because it was broken...and this person then asked to borrow my label maker...on the grounds that this person rarely uses a label maker...so they'll return it as soon as their done.

Yeah right.

Add This to My Resume

I know how to work a tape gun aka tape dispenser.

Now, this might not seem like much of a skill but working one of these things seems to absolutely baffle people here...even the smart people.

What I don't get is that there's no trick to it, it's as obvious as it looks. I have no training in this art; I am not certified; I do not come from a long line of tape gunners who have passed down the secrets of the tape gun over many generations. No, the first time I had to use one I looked at it and tried to figure out how to load the tape. It turned out I was right.

Yet, when I lend out the tape gun I get all sorts of crazy configurations back. Keep in mind that I'VE ALREADY LOADED IT FOR THEM AND IT'S WORKING FINE.

I've received the tape gun with the tape on backwards so the sticky side is facing the wrong direction. I've received it with the tape going over the plastic flap. I've had people try to thread the tape over the wheel. I've received it with the tape all knotted up.

What are these people doing? Here's a hint people, sticky tape is, well, sticky. The sticky side will stick to things, hence you don't want to put it in backwards (making it stick to the underside of the wheel) or put it over the flap (causing it to stick to the flap and having no way to tear the tape on the sharp metal teeth) or try to thread it (which won't won't work since the wheel will cease to move now that it's stuck to the tape) or whatever the hell you did that caused the tape gun to come back with knotted tape and little pieces of tape shrapnel on the handle.

Am I Too Hard on These People?

No, I am not. They really are children.

Exhibit A: Due to the $700 billion injection by the Fed into the financial system we had a pizza party today. Pizza. Party.

Oh, and as for how I'm doing? Today was worse than yesterday plus I have to stay (even) later and I'm sick.

And possibly the most frustrating thing of all? I went to go punch some stuff in the stock room--I can't even remember why at this point--but some repair guy was in there so I couldn't go all Tommy DeVito on the boxes.

My Hand Hurts Almost as Much as My Brain Does

Good people,

I punched many boxes of individual coffee servings and now my hand hurts. This in itself is not worthy of a blog entry so let me share with you the email that instigated my stock room fit.

As you already know this is not a day to give me shit.

So imagine my delight when I received the following email from Stone Cold Killer:

"Please ensure we have regular liquid hand soap in addition to the alcohol based hand cleaner at all sinks and restrooms. I have noticed we have been running out of it regularly."

"Regularly" falls under the category of "numerous incidents" and we've already discussed that. Since people aren't aware of where I keep the hand soap I doubt others haven't been replacing it when I'm not looking, so I think I have a pretty good idea of the soap flow in the men's bathroom.

That being said, I refuse to make a pledge that I will be on top of the "soap situation" in the women's bathroom. Me walking into the women's bathroom everyday under a pretext of "checking out the soap" is a surefire way to get fired in less than a week.

Also, in addition to the hand sanitizer, the hand cream (you read right), and organic hand soap I stock, the building provides hand soap in the wall dispensers above the sinks. So in the event that one of the organic soap containers is empty suck it up and use the OTHER ONE TWO FEET AWAY or, god forbid, use what us peasants clean ourselves with: the wall-mounted soap dispensers.

You Losing Other People's Money Does NOT Give You Permission to Treat Me Like an Asshole

Two people I kinda-sorta work with are out today and will be tomorrow as well. Hence I have to do my job, the job of one of them, and about half of the job of the other person.

Today is not a day to give me shit people. I am not getting two-and-a-half jobs done as fast as you want them. Boo-fucking-hoo.

I don't see the traders doing two-and-a-half jobs. In fact, I see them doing half a job 'cause they ain't got shit to trade. So why don't you make your $400,000 ass useful and go stock the frig. As far as I know the current financial meltdown is not the result of there being Coke and Diet Coke in the frig but no Coke Zero. Now's the time for belt tightening, you just might have to wait an hour to get your precious Coke Zero.

This is the Last Time I will Explain This

Is there any mail service (UPS, FedEx, DHL, USPS, etc.) that delivers overnight to Europe?

No. Non. Nyet. Nein. Ne. Nem. Ní hea. Ei. Nei. Nu. Nee.

I am very, very tired of having the following conversation repeatedly WITH THE SAME PEOPLE aka the Bother Squad:

[we now return to our regularly scheduled conversation already in progress]

Happy Cappy Investment Team Employee: Are you sure?

Me: Yes, I'm sure.

HCITE: ...Except England

Me: No.

HCITE: Hmm...they used to do England overnight.

Me: Not true.

HCITE: There's no way to get this package to England tomorrow morning?

Me: They don't promise until the end of the second business day and that's not a guarantee because it could get held up in customs.

HCITE: But it usually gets there the next day even if it's not guaranteed, right?

Me: In all my years working in mailrooms I've never sent a package to London that arrived the next business morning.

HCITE: It'll probably get there by tomorrow. Keep you fingers crossed!

No, it won't get there tomorrow. Let's do some simple math to explain why this is.

All international FedEx packages must go through Memphis. The last drop off time for the day is about 8:00pm give or take, depending on your location. So let's say my package has been picked up and scanned locally by 9:30pm.

Then let's say that my package is on a plane by 10:00pm. It's a three hour flight to Memphis from my city. So let's say it arrives by midnight. (I get an hour back since I'm in the Eastern time zone).

The package then gets on a plane and flies "over the pond" for nine hours.

Let's say it then takes an hour-and-a-half to be processed and put on a truck for delivery and an hour to get to its destination. That would make the arrival time 11:30am and this is a very efficient timeline that I've laid out, much more efficient than anything I've ever encountered.

Oh wait, I forgot something... the six hour time difference [from Memphis], which at certain times of the year is actually a seven hour difference. So that puts us at 5:30pm or 6:30pm.

In other words, IT'S IMPOSSIBLE to get something to London the next business morning unless you drive it to the airport, buy it a fucking plane ticket and pick it up from the airport. Not even I, who as we all know has the super hot package, can make this happen.

What's even better than that? Someone once asked me to overnight something to Tokyo. A flight from my city to Tokyo is thirteen-and-a-half hours. Tokyo doesn't recognize daylight savings so it's either thirteen or fourteen hours ahead depending on the time of the year. To get a package there the next day would involve an ability to either teleport or go back in time.

Needless to say, if I possessed either ability I would not be stuck in a mailroom.

I'll Let You Know When It Happens

If I understand it correctly, when the US economy goes in the tank the ONLY way the government can figure out how to fix things is by turning the US into a communist system. I wish! To think, I should have spent my crazy radical youth taking out bad mortgages instead of doing political organizing.

[Jump to 10:26 or the first white dot on the scroll bar.]

I Love It!

Go visit this site:
Sad Guys on Trading Floors

This one might be my favorite but I'm sure there'll be plenty of great ones in the days to come.

Add This to My Resume

I am an expert at removing half full cases of water from the water cooler with minimal spillage. Now, I know what you're going to say: "Why the fuck would you do something so fucking stupid?" Good question my eager reader.

Apparently there have been "numerous incidents" of people going to the water cooler in the morning and it being empty. (At the Happy Cappy Investment Team "numerous incidents" is another way of saying "it happened once.") So now, when I leave for the day I must check to see that the water cooler is full since that's the way the Stone Cold Killer wants it.

For anyone who doesn't know the drill it's rather simple: you tear the seal off the five gallon bottle of water then quickly turn it upside down while putting the open end of the bottle in the hole of the water cooler. If you're good--which I am--you get all the water in the water cooler's filter without spilling any water. (You also have to be quick as the filter fills up very quickly.) You then remove it when it's EMPTY. But that's not how we do things at the Happy Cappy Investment Team. No, we are--dare I say--mavericks when it comes to water coolidge (no relation to Calvin).

We are going to bring change to the water cooler insiders with their elitist talk of half-full water coolers. On Main Street, in my hometown, we have another term for "half full": we call it half empty.

Seriously, the people who tend to complain about this stuff are the people that go to the gym everyday, something I certainly don't do. They can't lift a water bottle themselves or walk across the floor to use the OTHER water cooler?

A Typical Day at the Office

You Know Where You Can Stick It...

Good People,

There are few things I hate in this world more than faux organization. Some people are organized, some are not. Some people LIKE being organized, some do not. That's all peaches and cream. I get it. I can deal. But don't front like you're all organized and come at me with some nonsense. The Temp might be able to dazzle some higher ups by simply uttering the magical phrase "spreadsheet" but I know better. (Some suits get weak in the knees when they hear "Excel", big fucking whoop.) The Temp's spreadsheet is shit. I've axed most of his columns, added a couple, rearranged information in a way that is *gasp* useful and made this spreadsheet so efficient as to be unrecognizable from the original.

But my current grumble is not about the spreadsheet, so let's move on.

The Temp is out of my life, hopefully forever. But what did he leave in his wake? A mountain of post-its stuck to one another. This, his magnum opus. I don't know if he had some traumatic notebook-related accident as a child that prevents him from leaving information in an organized manner or what but this is just sticky chaos. Did he take my instructions to write down all relevant information and organize it in a cohesive manner literally?

Am I really supposed to make heads or tails of this? Is the top sticky the most important? The most recent? The attention-starved sticky? The supreme leader of all stickies? I feel like I'm looking for clues into the last days of Howard Hughes.

I would have preferred that he just didn't do anything in my absence than leave me his "notes." Back to square -1.

Why I Will Never Be on America's Next Top Model

I could give you 1,001 obvious reasons why this is so but let's go for something a little more subtle: I have been criticized for my walk. It will not cut the mustard in Milan nor at the Happy Cappy Investment Team. Let me explain.

Stone Cold Killer informed me of a study that was recently done. Some company with too much money and too much time on its hands, but not enough brain cells, hired some type of weirdo consulting firm to study its workplace and come up with some type of crazy horseshit that would make the company more productive. Well kudos to that consulting firm because they come up with some bonkers shit! (For the record, I'm not one to throw around exclamation points all willy nilly.) You know, the type of crazy shit that rich people overpay for when the economy's NOT in the tank. (Did I mention we have a physical therapist that comes in and gives massages? Unfortunately, while the Happy Cappy Investment Team is one big happy family--minus the family member who was just fired--not every family member here is eligible for good touches.)

I've just been schooled by Stone Cold Killer on how one can learn a lot from an employee's walk. The description given to me was not that of it being the window to the soul, but it's pretty high up there. Apparently, this is going to be the stuff of ground-breaking PhD theses in the years to come.

An employee's posture, speed with which he or she walks, their movements and gestures, all these things are just chock full of informative goodness when it comes to evaluating an employee's job satisfaction, "team spiritness" (not a word), job-related ambition even. Does how someone walk in a bedroom reveal their sexual ambitions? I wonder...

Needless to say I kept my verbality to a minimum as I couldn't quite fathom how a government-trained assassin was giving me lessons on body-language. This is a man that has probably killed contacts just based on the way they reached for their cup off of coffee.

So, of course, I nodded--but how did I nod? What did my nod say?--and left his office in my most upbeat walk possible, the type of walk that would've gotten kids beaten up in my neighborhood growing up, agreeing to work on my walk like I'm some developmentally challenged five-year-old that never quite mastered crawling.

Oh, and that company that paid for this ridonculous study? They went kaablooey a couple of weeks back. As it turns out, we humans haven't yet mastered the art of reading the body language of shitty mortgages.

Am I a Preschool Teacher?

Someone just handed me an envelope with a booger on it. A grown-ass man gave me something with a booger on it. I repeat, it had a fucking booger on it.