A circle has too much symmetry

Wednesday, June 29, 2005

Women and Trucks

Today Ms. Chung and I went “off site” for lunch. When we returned I noticed the Mr. Universe of our work place was driving a gold ford Taurus. I was horrified, really, how is it possible that Mr. Universe is driving such a bland, ugly and utilitarian vehicle? Ms. Chung then told me that Mr. Universe actually has a really big truck, I sighed in relief. The reason for that is; as all women know, (and now I am telling all the men out there), there is not a vehicle that is more universally appealing to women in the “I am a sexy man” category than a big truck.

I know that in DC a truck is not a reasonable vehicle to own, but they are so manly. I also know that they are bad for the environment and a little blue collar, but did I mention they are super manly and sexy. I don’t know what it is about a man in a truck, perhaps us women think a man in truck is a man who does things. They can help us out, help us move, tow our stranded cars and in general take care of us. I think I have got it! A man with a truck sends the subtle message that he can protect us. Wow all men should have a truck!

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Endowments

I am becoming one of them! I can’t stop it. My eye is twitching and it won’t stop. I will be on some anonymous blog as the eye twitching woman. I have been in this high pressure, high stress environment for so long that I have developed an eye twitch. Granted my previous work was high pressure and stress but I had way cool friends there to counter balance the stress. Here I am surrounded by freaks and geeks and I have no one to help me out, no way to take the edge off, hence the eye twitch.

The only person here that I can talk to that is normal and a woman is my secretary (a.k.a. Pixie).

I just got back from lunch with Pixie, and as you all know, women can not be together for more than 2 minutes before the talk turns to men. Now I know this is not appropriate talk between us women; but we started speculating about which men at work are good in bed. OF Course, our standard response to this inquiry is if a man can dance then a man is good in bed. However I have not seen any of my co-workers dance so I will have to use another standard in order to speculate. Finally Pixie and I were also speculating about the endowments of the men at work. Is there truly a way to tell if a man is well endowed without seeing him naked? I don’t know but now I am going to try and see if there is…….

Monday, June 27, 2005

White Water Rafting

I am not a trouble maker or a trill seeker, contrary to the labels I was given this weekend. Let me start by saying white water rafting this weekend was a riot! Now I want to explain my side of the story so you all will know that I am not a trouble maker. Then again I am the type of person that no matter where I am I try to make the most to the situation.

The day started a little slow with the James River being mostly bathtub water with a current. This was fine for me; I was outside, with friends and swimming in water that is so much warmer than the river water from back home. However, the rest of my party was extremely upset with the river condition, I think they expected some serious white water but this was VA and not Cataract Canyon. I mean come on! Still, after a few hours of soaking up the sun, lazily swimming the river and a few water fights I needed some excitement too. About this time the river picks up a bit, and we run a small rapid called Hollywood falls (which was stupid!). I am not the type of girl to miss a opportunity to spice things up so I jump out of the boat and head up stream, because (of course) I was planning on swimming the falls. My plan was squashed immediately, when the river guides start flipping out and yelling at me to get back in the boat, reluctantly I returned to boat, with assurances from my guide that the river would really spice up in a minute. The next part of the river is:

Class IV : Long rapids; waves powerful, irregular; dangerous rocks; boiling eddies; powerful and precise maneuvering required.”

Now what happened next is the truth…. We hit the first set of rapids in the class IV pipeline and I fell out of the boat. Honest, I fell out, I did not jump out. The boat quickly maneuvers over to calm water and the guide tossed me a life line. At this time, I was positioned in front of a rock and I getting pounded; and in order to grab the lifeline and get back the boat I could see that I was probably going to get hurt, and I thought these rapids are boring and it would be so much better if I swim them so I ignored the lifeline and swam the rapids. It was fabulous! It was such an adrenaline rush! The rapids appear huge when it is just your little head floating above the surface of the water, and yes it was a little dangerous, but it was so worth it. I got of the river (after the rapids) pumped! There were times when I was swimming the rapids that I could have gotten myself out of the river and I did think about it briefly, but I was having so much fun I decided to keep swimming and not wait for the boat. After this, the rafting guides labeled me as a thrill seeker and a trouble maker, and I am not! I was just making my own fun.

Friday, June 24, 2005

Happy Hour

Tonight is the monthly happy hour that I organize for me and my fellow co-workers. It should be very entertaining; one of the main question for the evening is the Shannon and Geek-Boy drama. According to Geek-boy they have been on 6 dates, and have another date scheduled for tomorrow; according to Shannon, she is dating nose-hair man (who will not be there). It will be interesting to watch them together tonight. I wonder if she will ignore him tonight and try to flirt with Jean-Marc. She has asked me about Jean-Marc more than once, and was very upset that he ignored her last time we were all together. He said she left "Nothing to the imagination". Shannon was convinced that Ellen and Jean-Marc are a couple and that is why he was not responding to her.

The second reason is that I have partially lost "on and off the list" control. Ms. Chung and I have been taking people off the list for months, and now that I am public I am still trying to maintain list control. I have removed two of Ms. Chung’s co-workers (the Greek and Bree) for being too annoying to deal with. (Here in the land of geeks that is actually a huge thing to be so annoying one would rather be put in sensory deprivation than deal with these people.) GB is not as sensitive to annoying behavior as the rest of us, and spends a lot of time with the co-workers. In addition, GB has turned into a mini-cheerleader for all the social events around work, and had started asking people who are off the list to my social events. Bree had the decency to realize that he was off the list, and told GB that the reason he did not get an invite was intentional (which it was). GB thinks he is such a good friend of mine that I will put someone on the list just off his recommendation. I am so tempted to take GB off the list, but he is great blog material! As I mention, tonight should be interesting, I am going to keep track of all the “off the list” people that show up. You never know I might get lucky and only people “on the list” will attend.

Thursday, June 23, 2005

Good bye small town girl

I am not the small town girl any more! As you all have noticed I can not say no when asked a favor. Tonight an acquaintance of mine is coming into town and is going to crash at my place for a week. Initially when the old man asked me if he could crash at my place I said yes, but as I gave it more thought I felt that it was very bizarre request boarding on inappropriate. However I am from small town USA and I never say no to requests. So being the small town girl that I am; I was going to let the old man sleep in my bed and I was going to sleep on the futon. However I am not a small town girl anymore and the old man is getting the futon and I am staying in my nice soft big bed. I don’t even give my best friend the bed when she comes to visit, why should I give this acquaintance my bed. I know it is not logical to give him my bed and now that I am a big city girl he can sleep on the futon!

This Saturday I am going white water rafting. This trip was organized by a co-worker that I do not know, she sent out a lab wide invite. Of course, I and a few of my posse members signed up immediately. Now every morning I go to coffee with geek-boy (GB) and one morning I asked him if he was going with us, because he never misses any social activity. GB replies that it is too dangerous and he would not be joining us. GB was so serious; it was like a huge neon sign flashing above his head saying. “I’m a Geek!”

The trip should be fun and adventurous, but I am not looking forward to the 3 hour car trip to the river. I am riding down with hop-hop and the Bavarian. Hop-hop drives me nuts if I have to spend any length of time with him, which I seem to do a lot. Hop-hop has a very unique way of talking to me, for example the other day he said

“Why are you not fat?”

This was his why of telling me that I looked nice that day. I guess hop-hop takes some getting used to and I am still not used to him.

I am going to leave the old man (a.k.a. current house guest) to fend for himself on Saturday. I think he will manage; he did climb Everest for his 70th birthday. In fact I am not planning on changing my busy schedule while he is here. The old man claimed that he just needed a place to crash, I know it seems weird coming from a man of his age. Perhaps he is going through a second childhood.


Wednesday, June 22, 2005

One down and one to go.

Jean-Marc has claimed on numerous occasions that my ability to party is shameful when compared to a French or German’s ability to party until the wee hours of the night. I am offended by this, mostly because it means that I am aging where my European counter parts are not. I used to be able to party like a rock star, but that was a few years ago. However I now know that my German friend is also aging, after a few hours of drinking (5 hours), she could barely stand up. This lack of equilibrium on Ellen’s part was not because she had too much to drink; it was because she was sleepy. No partying like a rock star for her anymore. One down and one to go, age catches up with all of us.

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Geeks and Sports

I am back! My faithful readers; and I have so much to tell that I do not want to overwhelm you in one evening. I hosted a barbecue for all my friends back home and everyone showed up. We had so much fun, drinking, eating and most of all talking. The friends that you make in college are the friends that last a lifetime. Your college friends are finally friends of choice and not friends of convenience or location. I imagine that we will all get together once a year for years to come, or at least that is what I hope. I had almost forgotten how you can be infected with the giggles for hours with something as simple (and stupid) as people walking into a glass door. Ellen, how is your head? I also found out this weekend that I do not have infinity for bocce ball. Oh well, I guess I can’t be talented at everything. Or it might be the geek in me that prevents me from being good at sports.

Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Cold Shower!

Today I am in need a serious cold shower! The first reason is the air conditioning is still not working in my building, and it is hot. The second in my current BAW is hot today. He is wearing a very tight fitting white shirt and he has a 24 inch chest (I know I just measured it) that is solid muscle. I can’t stop myself; I have been touching him and that fabulous chest all day! The third reason is Ellen just sent me some pretty provocative pictures of a man that I have been dying to see naked for years. Now these pictures are not of DB actually naked, but it reminded me of how much I want to see him naked. How about it DB are you willing to give me a show?


My libido is out of control today, I have not got lucky in a very long time, and this is too much! Now in stead of thinking about work I will be thinking about sex all day.

Tuesday, June 14, 2005

Locker room talk

I was so wrong about GB (aka geek-boy) and Shannon, tonight is their official fourth date. GB still will not talk about it with me. However Shannon just emailed me out of the blue and I am sure she wants to talk about GB. In case my readers did not know, GB and I go for coffee every morning together. I interrogate him about Shannon, but other than telling me everything is going great I get nothing from him. Are men normally this quite about the women in their lives? What happened to all the locker room talk I have heard so much about? Women will talk about all the details to complete strangers, and our coffee buddies know everything there is to know about our sex lives. Mine is very boring so I never have anything to share.

Monday, June 13, 2005

Please be careful with me

Why is it that people assume if I am confident I am incapable of having my feelings hurt? Perhaps if I were truly confident and I knew my own worth no matter what any other person in my life thought about me, I would not care; I would know my own worth. Let’s ponder this scenario, I am generally a very strong person, I know my own worth; I’m intelligent, ambitious, hard working and attractive enough. Out and about in my daily life I meet people, neighbors, co-workers etc, and a very select group of these people I meet actually become my friends. Now these are the people that care about. I am concerned about their lives and their feelings. I want them to be happy in general and happy with me and our relationships together. This concern is often judge very harshly and not from the place of concern that it originates from. Now these same people find me too sensitive and insecure. Is the solution to never really care about other people, or is the solution for people who want to occupy a special place in my heart…. In the word’s of Jewel, please be careful with me I am sensitive and I would like to stay that way.

Sunday, June 12, 2005

Wine Glasses

In the end everything is better in a wine glass, because it is not about the content it is about the container.

With many thanks to Jean-Marc!

Saturday, June 11, 2005

Dance the night away

Why is it when you are in a relationship you miss the single life? Like dancing all hours of the night, flirting and keeping your own hours. Then when you are single all you want is to be in a relationship. Is there some middle ground, like the perfect relationship or the perfect single life? I am getting ready to go out and about the town, when all I would really like is to spend some quality time with that someone special. However, like the good girl I am, I am getting all dolled up and will dance until the wee hours of the night. Well, at least until midnight, I do have a little of the Cinderella syndrome. Oh but not confuse my readers, before I dance my pants off I am going to go to work first.

However, I am listening to some really old 80s music and I think going out is exactly what I want to do right now!

Friday, June 10, 2005

Nuts

I am nuts and not because I am eating nuts because I am still at work! It is a Friday night, and I am living the single life but I am still at work. Oh yeah I forgot to mention that the AC at work is broken. Luckily for me though, Cartman (my office mate) doesn't smell too bad today. He had his weekly bath today.

Boyfriends (or Girlfriends) at Work

I wrote this yesterday in the middle of one of the most boring seminars that I have ever been too.

I have just been introduced to a new term BAW (aka Boyfriend at Work). Now on the surface this term seems trivial, but upon further thought it is quite profound. It states no matter what your relationship status outside of work, married, single or in a relationship you have another relationship with someone else at work. In other words you always have a BAW or GAW at work. It is a relationship in the sense that there is an emotional exchange with the person at work. Note a BAW or GAW relationship is almost always a non-sexual relationship, but it is a relationship. You are affected by the BAW or GAW actions on a personal level. After hearing about BAWs I thought do I have a BAW, and the answer is yes of course I have one! In fact I have always had one. I even had more than one at my last job; I had a spare BAW in case my first one was out of town. So now the real question is, is having a BAW an emotional affair? Or is it a normal healthy part of the work environment?

Wednesday, June 08, 2005

Global Happy Hour

I am going global, not that I was not already but truly global this time. Let me explain; when I first arrived in DC I did not know anyone. I work at a huge place and thought I would naturally make my friends among my new co-workers. I know I have said they are all geeks, but there is usually a few gems hiding in there. For example, at my last job, which was full of geeks too, I found some great gems (Ellen, Dead Body, BAW 1). However this was not the case in DC, I was totally isolated, there was no social structure to my work place, I mean nothing. I ended up organizing a monthly happy hour for me and my co-workers, to network, socialize and just to do something non-work related. Initially I invited everyone I knew and their friends too, but as time progressed and the happy hours grew I started to get a little more selective. Ms. Chung and I are frequently talking about who is on the list or off depending on how much they annoy us. Where is the going global part? I just received this notice from the director’s office that they are adding this link to the company webpage.

Monthly Happy Hour. Contact:Spin_Doc1,notmyrealemail@yahoo.com; 404-****

Can you believe it! I have lost list control and I am going global. I would like to say that I am no longer hosting happy hours but with the directors attention I can not do that. I wonder what kind of freaks are going to attend the next happy hour. I am already overwhelmed with Geek-boy, Shannon and Humming woman!

Tuesday, June 07, 2005

Adventures in Dating

The latest with Geek-Boy and Shannon; GB searching for advice on Shannon came to me today. As a bonus to this whole drama, Shannon has finally figured out that I do not like her and has stopped calling me.

A little background...... GB and Shannon had there first official date on Sunday, but GB would not give me any details. However, he wanted to know if he should take her to this concert this evening that she showed an interest in. It is a Foreigner concert, which might be a problem for some but not for the super trendy people that work here. The dilemma is that the concert tickets are expensive in GB's view; too expensive for even that love struck/sick geek boy. I was shocked! GB makes $75K; lives rent free with his parents, does not own a car and can’t pay for concert tickets? I knew he was a geek but this is weird even for where I work. My advice was to buy the tickets.

Deeper than the ocean

My friend M. just suggested that a certain man (let’s call him Berry), is secretly attracted to me and that is why he has been intentionally offending me lately. I tried to explain to M. that Berry can in no way possible be attracted to me. The reasons are purely physical but I am 8 inches taller and 40 lbs heavier than Berry. I mean he is a super small man, boy sized even, and there is no possible way that I would be attracted to him, so I imagine that the opposite it true. M. started talking about all the positive qualities I possess that Berry could be attracted to, besides my physical appearance. This line of reasoning from a man really shocked me, because (now correct me if I am wrong) men are the most superficial of the sexes. M. insisted that the male sex was not superficial and that I was being too superficial to which I replied I am the ocean (because I have so much depth) compared to men.

Monday, June 06, 2005

Bootie Bumps!

I had a fun filled weekend that felt like it was going to last forever! Saturday evening I went to an open house at http://www.dcglassworks.com which was super cool. It might just be the geek in me, but I get a super kick out of watching the people blow glass there. The place also has a cool vibe. It is like; artist meets hippie meets grunge all rolled into one. Not to mention the scenery in not hard on the eyes, and I am not talking about the art either. Ms. Chung and I went there pretty early Saturday evening and I was having a great time, though it was a bit hot, but Ms. Chung was not having a good time and wanted out of there right away. Courtney says she looks for friends that can adapt and make the most out of any situation you happen to drag them to, and I agree. Besides it is not like there wasn’t plenty to do at http://www.dcglassworks.com. I left with Ms Chung and we ended up at Murphy’s where we were not drinking, not having fun and not looking at attractive scenery. Saturday was a complete bust!

Then Sunday at 6 am (that is right 6 am on Sunday!) I helped out a child of a friend of mine, by child sitting until 7pm! That’s right folks, people trusted me with their children, and not just for one hour, but for 12 hours. I did my best to corrupt them in the time I was given. I started with letting them (two girls, 11 and 12) put make-up on. The whole works too. Then I taught them some hip-hop dance moves, you know the standard hip rolls, chest rolls and bootie bumps. After awhile I realized this might get me in trouble, so I did what every normal responsible adult would do in the situation, and advised them to only do these moves at school and not at home. Finally at 7 pm the father returned and I was exhausted! I think this weekend will be filled with restaurants, wine and perhaps a few bootie bumps!

Friday, June 03, 2005

What to do?

Geek-Boy wants to get a drink after to work tonight and the only reason I am considering it, is to get information for my blog. That is terrible; maybe if I can get Shannon to join us…. Suffering with their company might be worth the entertainment.

Thursday, June 02, 2005

Wild Animals

I have come up with the perfect geek-o-meter. Quick, if you could have any wild animal for a pet what animal would it be? I read this question on a children’s place mat at a restaurant yesterday and asked my secretary the question and she immediately answered chimpanzee. Now this is a very simple question with a very simple answer, it is not like any of us are actually going to get a wild animal for a pet. There is no need to analyze the question. After lunch I conducted a small experiment and asked my co-workers the question;

If you could have any wild animal for a pet what animal would it be?

The responses were wild, not one co-worker actually picked an animal but they all asked me questions, about the logistics and responsibilities that come along with owning a wild animal. Geez!! They all over thought the question. In fact most could not even answer the question because they were too concerned about the organizing of this wild animal into their nice logical lives. I finally had to say, Oh my God! It is not like this is a real question. If you asked a child this question they would answer in a millisecond, for example Tiger! If you asked the follow up question, where would you live? The child would start telling you about their super cool tree house in the jungle and their tiger that protects them. The object of this exercise is to test if you can use your imagination, turn off your logic centers and just be a kid at heart. The lessoned I learned by asking this questions to my co-workers is, no they can not turn of the logic processing centers in their brains, they are serious lacking in imagination and they are all geeks!

Wednesday, June 01, 2005

Revenge of the Geeks!

I am an amazing queen of the geeks! I tried something new in the lab today and my experiment totally worked! I feel like I have won the lottery, no one should get this excited over an experiment working. The other crazy thing about being a geek is that most the time your job is hell. You come to work day after day to failure and if that was not enough you are surrounded by crazy people. Then one day your experiment works and you LOVE your job, LOVE your work, hell you even LOVE your co-workers. Wait a minute, love my co-workers? Nope I don’t think so, I guess I am not that happy, but I still LOVE my job (today).