Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

[jen]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

That is awesome I want to hang it in my cube.. but I think my meeting-obsessed management team may not like it.

 

[Tiggsy]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

blech meetings. I always want to ask.. do you want to talk about how I am going to fix the issue, or do you want me to ACTUALLY fix it?

Exactly. I think someone needs to call a meeting to discuss the fact that we have too many meetings.

The thing that still irks me about this is I was working on the same project!!!

 

[Tiggsy]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

Maybe I do need to hang this one up in my cube because then maybe someone will get the hint and bring donuts. Nothing worse than a donut-less meeting.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

Reminds me of my best meeting story ever. We had an IT consultant come in to build a database, and to double-check the calculations for accuracy, we built a parallel model in excel to make sure all the output would work. We had a rate table that started at age 25.

So the consultant calls a meeting with all the team members because he is having trouble deriving the logic that would extend the rate table down to age 18 (the rates for ages under 25 were the same as the rates for age 25). I said, "you don't need any 'logic': just copy the age 25 rate into the table for the younger ages." He said, "oh" and the meeting was adjourned. Took less than a minute all told once we started.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

One thing that grinds my gears is cyclists pedaling at high rates of speed through crowded areas. People have gotten seriously hurt. This problem can be particularly acute in Manhattan, as some cyclists think that they are so virtuous they are entitled to run over people.

Yesterday after work I am walking from the office to the train station. I'm carrying my lunchbox with the strap over my wrist, with the box dangling below, waiting at the curb for the light to change. I get the walk signal and start to cross the street. I notice that there is a cyclist moving toward me at a high rate of speed, apparently determined to run through the light that had just turned red. I stop, step back, raise my arms in case I need to protect myself from a collision, and he veers past me, just missing me. My change in direction and momentum causes my lunch box to swing around on its strap, and it brushes his backpack.

He then circles around in the intersection (the one he was just racing to get through moments before, now starting to fill with cross traffic) and rides over to me, stops, and punches me in the shoulder!

For a long moment, I thought seriously about grabbing his front tire with both hands and pulling it straight up in the air as hard as I could. If his punch had hurt at all, perhaps I might have. this dolt obviously had no idea how vulnerable he was, straddling his bike! I hear witnesses at the bus stop at the street corner yelling at this guy to go away and leave me along and stop hitting me.

It's hot, I'm tired and I just want to go home. I decide not to say or do anything, and merely give him the kind of look I usually reserve for canine fecal matter right after I've scraped it off the bottom of my shoe, turn and walk away shaking my head.

I would have really loved to have kicked in the spokes of his wheels though, right after I dumped him off the bike and left him writhing with the sharp pain in his groin I could have delivered so easily had I chosen to.

 

[Hammer]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

The only decision I would have had would have been between a two-handed shove and a straight right to his chin.

 

[bigblue_dl]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

One thing that grinds my gears is cyclists

Could have ended this here.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

Maybe I do need to hang this one up in my cube because then maybe someone will get the hint and bring donuts. Nothing worse than a donut-less meeting.

Egad. If I had a doughnut at every meeting I attend, I'd weigh 400 lbs inside of a year.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

The only decision I would have had would have been between a two-handed shove and a straight right to his chin.

Yes indeed, I felt very much the same way!

Yet with over a dozen people not 15 feet away standing along the curb waiting for a bus, watching us, I felt limited to something I could justify as self-defense without it being seen as escalation (this is Manhattan, after all. ) Also, I was in work clothes, which for me is good slacks and a dress shirt, and I had a notebook computer in a carrying case slung over one shoulder. Shoving his bicycle seat as hard as I could muster into his crotch would have sufficed quite nicely, since lifting the front wheel is a way to keep him from running me down, and also it gives a short-term disabling injury from which he'd soon recover, perfect for a self-defense non-escalation move.

Basically, I didn't want to get my hands dirty because then I'd have to wash them before getting on the train. That kind of scum isn't worth the aggravation. Had he done anything further, he'd have been toast, but he recognized, I think, that I knew I could take him easily and merely chose not to, which I communicated quite emphatically through my overall demeaner and body language.




I have ambivalent feelings about physical confrontation. I don't fight, I dodge and defend and wait to land a disabling blow, and I am conflicted about that. Most often, either I stomp on their foot so hard they can't walk for a few minutes, or I goad hiim into a wild swing, which instead of blocking, I step outside the arc and push the swing even further, throwing him off-balance so i can shove him to the ground face first. I don't really feel right causing someone permanent knee damage even though I could quite easily. Most of the time I am able to deflect the confrontation into a non-physical resolution, since I am quite content with a tie, and as long as the other guy is certain he isn't going to lose, we can both walk away unscathed.

 

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

That is awesome I want to hang it in my cube.. but I think my meeting-obsessed management team may not like it.

It's been hanging in my cube for months, even though I'm occasionally the guilty party (however I apologize when it becomes apparent that I've called an unnecessary meeting).

 

[jen]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

this. again. and always, until further notice.

To summarize the last year and a half at work: #$^&@($%^(&@#%$^&#@%$^@#&($%^#@&(%$^&#@&*)^&$(&#%$^#%@$^&%@#$^%#@t*(t@#)*&$!@^$&*!#%^&#*@)%^&#*%^&*#@(%^&#@*(%^!&*@()^#$&*@!%$^&*!(@)%^@&#*$)^@#&*%^@#&*(^%&*#)@^%#@*(%^#@&*(%^!&@_%^&*#@^%&*(@#^t&*!^$&*%^&$!%&~!_^&*$^&*(#%^*!&%#$%!^&@*$%^&@#%$^&*!$%t^*)(!%^&*!@%$^&*!@(%$^&!#%$&!*($%^&!$%^&!@%$^(&!@%*^!^(~*)^#&!*@%$^&!%@^&!@$%t^&*!)#$^&*!%$(*^

and also - people who have no sense of work boundaries grind my gears. I don't carry my work cell phone when I am not oncall, and I don't need to account for every minute of my day, 24x7x365, when I'm not oncall. If I'm not home, I can't help anyway. if you want me to be available to work every minute of every second of every day - you need to pay me a lot more, and p.s. I would quit if that happened.

 

[bigblue_dl]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

I, again, saw 2 different bikers riding on the road, a busy road, in rush hour, when there is a bike trail running parallel to the road not 20 feet away. I'd have no sympathy for this kind of ******* if they happened to get schmucked by a truck. "No, I don't want to use a bike trail that has been built SPECIFICALLY FOR RIDING BIKES ON, I want to ride in the middle of the ****ING ROAD, and backup traffic for 3 ****ING MILES!!!!"

 

[leswp1]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

This goes along with the nitwits who need to walk on the road when the sidewalk is right next to them and no one is on it

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

One thing that grinds my gears is when people say, "we're going out after work" and then hold a contest to display who's most important by being the last one ready to leave. If you ask people to join you after work, then be ready to leave when work is over.






I guess I'm old-fashioned: my parents always insisted that I finish my chores before I go out to play, and so when I'm at work, I work, so that I can leave on time and have my social life unencumbered. Many of my younger co-workers spend time during the day chatting and hanging out with each other, then feel compelled to finish the day's work before they leave. I don't work late very often: if I have a deadline pressure, I'll get up early and start early. There's no point in doing sloppy work.

 

[bigblue_dl]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

One thing that grinds my gears is when people say, "we're going out after work" and then hold a contest to display who's most important by being the last one ready to leave. If you ask people to join you after work, then be ready to leave when work is over.






I guess I'm old-fashioned: my parents always insisted that I finish my chores before I go out to play, and so when I'm at work, I work, so that I can leave on time and have my social life unencumbered. Many of my younger co-workers spend time during the day chatting and hanging out with each other, then feel compelled to finish the day's work before they leave. I don't work late very often: if I have a deadline pressure, I'll get up early and start early. There's no point in doing sloppy work.

Eh, as long as the work get done, I don't care if people are there early or stay late.

 

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

One thing that grinds my gears is when people say, "we're going out after work" and then hold a contest to display who's most important by being the last one ready to leave. If you ask people to join you after work, then be ready to leave when work is over.

I guess I'm old-fashioned: my parents always insisted that I finish my chores before I go out to play, and so when I'm at work, I work, so that I can leave on time and have my social life unencumbered. Many of my younger co-workers spend time during the day chatting and hanging out with each other, then feel compelled to finish the day's work before they leave. I don't work late very often: if I have a deadline pressure, I'll get up early and start early. There's no point in doing sloppy work.

You're old-fashioned. Flex-time is the wave of the future in young companies.

But I do agree, if you commit to happy hour, then hold everyone else up because you procrastinated, you should be left behind.

 

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

You ever get a sunburn, then in a day or two develop the Itchy Rash From Hell? I have. Can't sleep and am going crazy. Mrs EoDS thinks I'm being a baby. I'll keep that in mind next time she gets a charley horse.

 

[Handyman]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

Those are the worst! I had one once that was so bad I could not sit still my body twitched!

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

One thing that grinds my gears is when people say, "we're going out after work" and then hold a contest to display who's most important by being the last one ready to leave. If you ask people to join you after work, then be ready to leave when work is over.

I guess I'm old-fashioned: my parents always insisted that I finish my chores before I go out to play, and so when I'm at work, I work, so that I can leave on time and have my social life unencumbered. Many of my younger co-workers spend time during the day chatting and hanging out with each other, then feel compelled to finish the day's work before they leave. I don't work late very often: if I have a deadline pressure, I'll get up early and start early. There's no point in doing sloppy work.

Never really had that problem. When we have our happy hours, it basically plays out like this: Wait until two people are ready to leave (usually right as the HH invite goes out) and then it's show up when you want. There's a standing happy hour every Friday and one every Tuesday (tacos) for a smaller group. If you can't make it, that's just one less person to buy a round for and one less person to play cribbage.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Ginding away- stop putting sand in my oil... Part 4

You ever get a sunburn, then in a day or two develop the Itchy Rash From Hell? I have. Can't sleep and am going crazy. Mrs EoDS thinks I'm being a baby. I'll keep that in mind next time she gets a charley horse.

Only when I'm not rubbing Solarcaine every hour on the affected areas before I go to bed.