The Coming Battle

Good people,

Things are tense up in this hedge. Last month it was announced that there would be downsizing at the Happy Cappy Investment Team.

Aside from a slight gloom in the air though, things have been pretty much the same since then. People have been making bizarre requests, the Stone Cold Killer freaks out when fruit supplies run low (you'd think we were running a type 1 diabetes center the way he flips out), and people have been stealing my supplies. However, I must add one important detail about the contraband: they are boxcutters and scissors. That's right these are the items that have been disappearing at the fastest rate of anything in the mailroom. I'm ordering scissors and boxcutters every week now.

Where are they going? Who is preparing for the inter-0ffice war? Is it the layoffers or the layoffees that is arming itself? (I can dream can't I?)

All I know is that the air was thicker than ever today. When I said hi to my boss I couldn't get one word out of her. When I took a breather at the front desk for a second I was told I am no longer allowed to sit up there (a week ago they switched it up so I don't ever cover the front desk anymore--fine with me--instead the EAs do.) When I pointed out that a lightbulb (a weird, specialty one) burned out at the coffee bar I asked for the corporate credit card. Apparently, it wasn't such a big deal so I should do it later. Yeah, right.

Stone Cold Killer has an aneurysm when there's ONLY one container of hand soap in the men's bathroom (not to mention the hand soap in the wall-mounted pump). Like I said, people are weird, and it's obvious as fuck what's going on. Oh, and HR's been on lockdown all day printing up a forest worth of trees.

**We interrupt this blog because I just "the call." I'm supposed to go to a different floor with no explanation. If this were a mobster movie I'd get the fuck outta dodge, right now.

Stay tuned.

Water Water Everywhere but You're a Fucking Idiot

Good people,

Forget the economic crisis. Forget the environmental crisis. Forget the crisis in Gaza. It's time to focus on the office water crisis at the Happy Cappy Investment Team.

Now, I know what you're thinking: "D Money, I read your blog which means I know how to read and clearly possess above average intelligence. There are real water crises in the world."

True, my compadre. There is the lack of clean, usable water for much of the Third World, many of whom have easier access to Coke than drinking water. (How fucked up is that?) Of course there is the polluting and dumping (some of which is the plastic of bottled water I might add) which is taking a major toll on the earth and its rivers (over half of which are dangerously polluted). And then there's the looming possibility of "water wars" which will probably lead to Americans buying Waterworld on DVD and feeling like they've done their part to help.

No, I'm talking about something far more dramatic: the hot water is not hot enough at the HCIT. Or at least this is what was conveyed to me by the Stone Cold Killer.

So SCK is in a tizzy about the hot water situation and instructs me to order these electric tea kettles like we have in another office. So of course I didn't do anything about it. Why? I figured there was probably nothing wrong with it.

So he asks me again in that really annoying way which lets you know that it's not actually a request. He hasn't gotten any less annoying but I do it anyway.

I go to test the water and almost melt my hand off Raiders of the Lost Ark style. I'm a little more cautious with the second cooler.

D Money: Guess What?
You: What?
D Money: There wasn't anything wrong with the water coolers.

Motherfucker can't seem to figure out how to get hot water out of the cooler. Maybe the name cooler is what is throwing him. Perhaps he tried to get water out of the heater and was unsuccessful in that endeavor.

You see, there's a trick. Listen up close. You have to push in the tab BEFORE you push it down. It's what prevents people from accidentally scalding themselves. Is the SCK trying to kill me, to add another ear to his Vietnam necklace?

(Sidenote: One of the things those great patriotic soldiers did in Vietnam was to cut off the ears of the Vietnamese--dead or alive--and then wear them on their dog tags as souvenirs. How sick is that?)

I mean I never got the privilege of being made into a mindless robot babykiller like our beloved SCK but don't they teach things in the Army like how to sleep in trees and live off baboon dung and shit like that? Now SCK's main concern is that his Apple Delight Sleepytime Tea is not hot enough.

(Sidenote: *Sniffle*)

So I inform him there's nothing wrong with the coolers. A couple of days later my boss asks if I've ordered the kettles. Uh, no because there's nothing wrong with the coolers I think.

I then told her I would order them right then. It seems SCK is all eager to tell my boss what I need to do, haven't yet done, etc. The fact that I don't have to do something doesn't seem to get communicated to her through the SCK with quite the same enthusiasm or speed.

I'm done with this shit. I'm just ordering whatever-the-fuck they ask, no questions.

You'll be glad to know that the kettles are now up and running...right next to the watercoolers.

Oh severance package save me now.

Hi, How Are You, You're an Asshole

Good people,

Let me tell you that coming back to work from Costa Rica was rough. No more vacation days for me. I keep telling myself I won't be working a five-day work week until 2009. It does little to soothe me.

The C Rizzle is the most beautiful place I've ever been too. It really gives you an idea of just how beautiful the world would be if we hadn't fucked it up so bad. Did I mention that I canopied over a rainforest? Well, I did and it was amazing! Did I mention I saw a leatherback turtle come ashore and lay her eggs? It was not unlike that first part of that National Geographic special--sorry folks but it ain't on YouTube--that traumatized us as kids. You know that one where those adorable baby turtles were awkwardly making their way to the ocean only to be scooped up and eaten by birds just before they made it. (Sidenote: Everyone my age seems to remember two PBS experiences as a a kid, the baby turtles and the crayon factory. Why is that?)

By the way, is canopy even a verb? Did I just turn a noun into a verb à la the business world? (Dictionary.com has just informed me that "canopy" can, in fact, be a verb. So we're good.)

At this point you're probably wondering what does the title have to do with the tangential tangled tangent above?

I'm glad you're paying such close attention savvy readers. Long story short, everyone who knew where I went for vacation asked me how CR was and I told them how amazing it was and how traumatic it was to be back at the Happy Cappy Investment Team except...for the Stone Cold Killer.

What did SCK do ten minutes after I arrived at the HCIT? "We need those round hand wash things in the men's bathroom?" Huh? But I said I would get on it so I could quickly end that inane encounter which would only have gotten more awkward with each additional second. Besides, I would just go to the bathroom, see what was missing and from there I would be able to deduce what a "round hand wash thing" was. Right?

But lo and behold, the bathroom was completely stocked with the holy trinity of hand care--hand soap, hand sanitizer, hand lotion. I eventually concluded that the complaint regarding the "round hand wash thing" must've have been referring to the fact that the men's bathroom closet didn't have any of the OVERSTOCK hand wash in it. You see, the hand wash containers have rounded bottoms--giggle if you must. That's the best guess I could come up with.

So SCK, yes I DID have a great time in the Rica. Thanks for asking... asshole.

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.

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?

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.