This week the Metro has been more unreliable than usual. Wednesday evening, the trains were so packed I got pushed out when I stepped out to let people off and couldn’t get back on. I didn’t try that hard either because it was hot and I was sandwiched amongst so many people I didn’t even have to hold on. Not that I could. I stood upright, arms at my sides with people all around me and an old man breathing on me. And I thought oh look, 1 minute til the next train. No big deal. The next train came and went, too packed for me to squeeze in. Then the next, then the next. A 5 year-old nearby started wailing to his mother. The station was hot and crowded and the trains were just coming and going. Every interval between trains more people arrived at the station and a few managed to push themselves in the crowded trains. A half hour later, when they ran two of the same lines one right after the other we finally had space to board.

Yesterday, I was on a crowded car with no air conditioning when a train ahead of us broke down. We were stopped in between stations with no A/C and it was hot and humid and suffocating. I stepped off at the next station and went into the car behind it. The train had to wait to move and again mid-way to the next station there was more stopping than going. By the time we arrived at the next stop, I decided to hop off and just walk the rest of the way home. Not a smart idea given the heat. I figured it was evening enough to be a bit cooler but it was still very hot.

Tonight, I need it to be reliable!! It’s Friday and I have things to do!

I was heading home from work today head tilted back snoozing on the metro when this girl hauling a big red bag plops down next to me. She whips out a pen and starts to do the crossword from the daily paper, I look up and catch her quickly looking away. Creepy. I sleep with one eye open and she’s stealing glimpses in my direction. Hubba hubba. Oh wait – WTF is her problem? Do I have a booger hanging out of my nose? As we get to the end of the line, she finally says, “Do I know you from ABC?”
“No.”
“XYZ?”
“No.”
“Oh, I swear I recognize you from somewhere. Where do you work?”
“QRS.”
“Oh yeah? How do you like it there?”
“It’s pretty good there.”
“I could’ve sworn I’ve seen you at work. What do you do there?”
“I’m an attorney.”
“Oh. Cool… Weird, you look so familiar.”

We follow the swarm down the escalator and as I’m walking to the exit, I turn to look behind me. There she is again!! She waves to me as she approaches, “I figured it out! I see you at the bus stop.”
“Yeah, I realized it on our way going down the escalators.”
“Duh! I’m slow.”

I haven’t had coffee for almost two weeks now.  Vacation helped break the cycle and I’m trying not to get back in it.  It’s too hot outside to be drinking hot beverages anyway.  And yet… I catch myself nodding off at my desk.

Beside the point: I think my boss is a really nice, amiable guy.  But.  He’s a bit of a bungling idiot.  And I mean that in a nice way if there ever was a nice way to call someone a buffoon.  I sat in his office yesterday where he had no fewer than 30 emails opened.  He was looking for a specific one he’d sent me a few days ago.  Granted half this job is about archiving paper and emails and documents so the task can be somewhat daunting but I tried hinting that wow he had a lot of windows open.  And one of the emails had an attachment and he had 5 Excel files open looking for the attachment even though it was a Word file.  And then in an Excel file, he didn’t know how to unhide a column.  Again, not an expert on all things Microsoft here, but shouldn’t the basics of an operating system be sort of a given in working in the 21st century these days?  I must’ve forgotten to check my common sense at the door yesterday.  Nice as he is, much as I like him, I wanted to snatch the mouse right out of his hand.

When I started at my job two and a half years ago, I joined a team of five people. One woman left and one woman came. One intern came and went. One woman left. Another woman left. One intern came. One man left. One woman left. And today I learned, another man is about to leave. So if your head hasn’t spun yet, we’re down to me and the intern. There are no more people left from the original team. Not quite the revolving door I thought it to be. More like a one way street.

First day back at work from vacation. I was glad to catch up with everyone. Seems nothing changed except the boss is a year older, my plant looked kinda’ droopy, and the inbox reached capacity. I’m kinda’ glad to be back in my usual routine again though. I’ve quickly readjusted to the going to bed late, waking up late deal. The only bad thing about it is the traffic. My parents were really glad to be back at work too. Guess we’re all creatures of habit.

So this weekend, on a random trip to Best Buy, I found Ever After in a movie bargain bin for $5!! As of today, I’ve watched it 2.5 times. Great movie.

My boss likes to reminisce about his old army days.  Most of the time, he busts out with an old-fogey “Back when I was” story. “In the Army we’d yada yada yada.” “There would never be this kind of issue in the Army because they blah blah blah.” He was a drill sergeant or something once upon a time. He said “you’d always get a few people who were ‘the smilers.’ They always got something to smile about and they look so stupid smiling about nothing.” But training people to fight to kill is very serious so on the first day he would yell at people to “Wipe that stupid grin off your face!  What are you smiling about?!  How about you give me some pushups and you can smile about that??”  The unbelievable thing is, he can’t even keep a straight face himself most of the time. But I guess once upon a time, he was a trained a-hole. I asked him if he’s ever tried those methods on his 12-year old. “No. It doesn’t work.”

Anyway, I have my annual review with him today. Hopefully he doesn’t wipe the stupid grin off my face by the end of it.

It snowed yesterday. First of the season that actually stuck to the ground and got snow trucks out on the highways. It was really cold too, highs in the 30s. But that didn’t stop our lunch group from ordering a huge mountain of shaved ice for dessert. It’s topped with melted brown sugar sauce and sweetened condensed milk along with mashed taro, red beans, peanuts, grass jelly, boba, lychee, and ai-yu jelly. No matter how full you feel after a big meal, there’s always room for this dessert. The food at Bob’s isn’t all that great but this, you can’t mess this up and it’s fun to eat with a group. It’s probably the thing I like best about eating here. The seven of us ordered the large which is supposed to serve ten. Turned out only six of us ate it because one person didn’t like it, and we still managed to clean it up! I should’ve taken a time lapse of this Asian snow cone. It disappeared pretty quickly.

Step-by-step instructions on how to not complete your finance homework assignment.

1. Download the assignment files.
2. Read question number 1, “Estimate the value of a share by forecasting cash flows for the ten years.”
3. Wha?!?!!
4. Make a big pot of coffee, it’s going to be a long night.
5. Blog.
6. Read other peoples blogs.
7. Open Excel and attempt to do a 10 year free cash flow chart.  Get stuck.
8. Laugh at other peoples parents.
9. Check email.
10. Check Facebook.
11. Chat on the phone to complain.
12. Re-read the question.  Go back to the Excel File.
13. Pick out wedding dress.
14. Edit blog entry.

The month of the holidays. You’d think we’d be in semi-shutdown mode at work, but it’s like suddenly, we’re actually busier. Or at least I am. My ineffective boss threw yet another project on me because he can’t get the crazy non-performer to perform. Grrr… Not that it’s really ever that busy in my office, so I shouldn’t even be complaining, but like what gives right? She makes more than our boss and she doesn’t do anything. My boss tries to give her projects and put her on different teams/projects but she drags her feet about things, pawns work off on teammates, and has a bout of crazy and then she’s off the hook.

So a week or two ago, our whole team was in my boss’ office for a meeting about succession planning. For some reason, she kept bringing up the fact that me and our new hire got to go downtown for some meeting with people she considers important. So she was basically complaining that she was getting shafted by the boss for all the worthy work and was getting assigned stupid stuff. Stupid me, I open my mouth and tell her it was a dumb meeting; she didn’t miss anything; it was poorly run and way disorganized; and people were frustrated and confused. She interrupts me saying people were confused because they were the wrong people to go. They didn’t know what was going on. Blah blah! In other words, me and the new hire did not have the knowledge and background to be attending such high level meetings. She was the better person to attend. Whatever! It was such a waste of my breath to try and explain anything to her. All she heard was opposing view! Why are you contradicting me?! This is a conspiracy, you are all out to get me! So my boss kept telling her to listen as I was trying to explain how insignificant that meeting was and how it was just them assigning more work on us. Work which she, of course, had no interest in contributing to anyway. But she just kept going. Then my boss told her to shut up and listen. Then she stood up and said he was acting like a jerk. Then he says, “no you are!” Then she gathers up her things and storms off back to her office. The end.

She plays the dumb card a lot too. That one is pretty effective. To her credit, she’s a great shopping and beauty products consultant. Speaking of shopping, uh, I didn’t go Black Friday shopping but was there anything even worth picking up? I got The Devil Wears Prada at Target for $4 on Saturday and that was it. I’ve already watched it twice.

Some person named Steve left a message for Molly on my voicemail at work. It was such an endearing, awkward, yet sweet declaration of love. Only he got the wrong number!

He-hey Molly it’s um uh this oh man this is this this is gonna take
Hey guys can I just hang up? Gah! uh
Hey Molly this is Steve from school and um, uh
It’s taking me a lot of balls but like like we’re about to graduate and everything and you know in a couple of years and uh
And I’ve been thinking about my life and everyone’s been calling me a big nerd ever since like you know middle school since like I hit 6th grade and I started getting pimples and like my eyes became like I couldn’t wear contacts and stuff so I had to wear them glasses and …
But but I’ve always had a really big crush on you and like and um and uh
Guys why’d have to make me do this?
Well Molly I just wanted to tell you uh I’m in love with you and I always will will be and um and uh I want I want you to call me back okay?
This is Steve and I know I know I don’t know if you know me but I
I like you ok?
And um I just I just I just I can’t I can’t keep I can’t I can’t keep watching from afar okay?
I-I-I want to be a part of your life okay? Um uh
Just gimme a call okay?
Bye.

I felt like it was such a pity that Molly didn’t hear it after he scrounged up the courage. So I went through my call log to call the person back. The first person I called had no idea what I was talking about. Woops! The second number I called I recognized as Steve. Only Steve didn’t say he was Steve. He played it off like he had no idea who it was. But he was curious about what I thought of the message. So I told not-Steve that I heard this message to Molly and I thought it was very sweet and it’s unfortunate that Molly didn’t get it because she may have appreciated it.  I hope he tries again.