Das Question?

(Originally posted: 5/7/08)

I realize that yesterday’s introduction to working at VW left a lot of questions, considering it’s kind of major news that was casually slipped into a sporadically-written comedy blog. So in the spirit of full disclosure, here is a question and answer session that was recently held sometime recently somewhere inside my brain.(Note: This method of information was perfected by Rob Thompson back in our One Accord days. If you’re reading this, consider it a homage, rather than an obvious swipe of a brilliant idea.)

Were you looking for a new job?
Answer: Yes, I was, albeit passively. Forget soccer, the most grueling test of endurance in the world is coming home from one job and spending your evening on a computer looking for a different job. For the past two years since I had completed my MBA, this ultimately was always the plan. But as I described in my interviews, Life happened. We had a baby. We bought a townhouse. We painted a townhouse (We did not paint a baby.) So two years removed from grad school, I’m finally moving on.

Are you moving to Michigan? The Lions kinda suck.
Point taken. No, it appears that they’ve decided to come to me. Obviously, Detroit is the automotive capital of our country. Not only does it serve as home to the Big 3 (Ford, GM, Chrysler), their tiny German neighbor, Volkswagen, was nestled in the confines of Auburn Hills. (Note: not actually hills, nor the color auburn.) No longer wanting to be in their shadow, VW decided on a move. And because of this area’s surplus of tall, left-handed hockey fans, they decided to move to Herndon, Virginia. That’s where I come in.

Was this a promotion for you?
In terms of level or promotion, and in reference to my old position, I’m now my former supervisor’s supervisor. I jumped two levels, in essence. From my experience, I find that this is rather difficult to accomplish. Take Super Mario Brothers for instance. When you are little midget Mario (LMM), you can jump and barely land atop that low level row of mysteriously floating bricks. If you are fortunate enough to get a mushroom, you grow to be twice your size. That aforementioned jump just got a lot easier. But sometimes, if you’re lucky, Mario acid trips on a bouncing star and your athletic abilities heighten to the point where you can leap tall building in a single bound. That’s what an MBA can get you. It’s the Acid Trip Star of the Job Market.

Wow, that’s an unusual analogy.
Wow, that’s not actually a question.

Sorry. So what do you do now?
My official title is Financial Consultant for Corporate Group Functions. So I consult. Consulting is a magical term that features all the expertise with none of the chopping block. You provide the best financial analysis, reporting, and planning skills you can to the managers to which you are responsible, and then, disappear in a cloud of smoke. Of course, I’m still in training, so I haven’t had time to order a carton of Smoke Clouds from the Office Depot catalog. As for the Corporate Group Functions part, just assume it’s a set of a budgets of departments that are required to have a business. You know, like Marketing, and IT, and Pyrotechnics.

Where you workin’, homeslice?
Don’t get sassy with me, Inner Monologue. I now work in Herndon, VA, right on the Dulles Toll Road (not to be taken literally, I’m not in an insurance commercial with Dennis Haysbert.) It’s an easy drive in to the city from here, and it’s a better commute than to Tyson’s Corner. Besides, I was growing tired of Tyson’s complacency. Dude, Tyson, when are you going to get off your butt and try and annex more of a geometric shape? Corners are for slacker. I want to see you push yourself and annex a whole side. Oh, I love your chicken, too.

Condons Wanted.

(Actual post: 5/5/08)

You see what I did there? I used the grammatical gift of parenthesis to let you know when I actually wrote this. That way, I can re-initiate my pipe dream of destroying the back dating whilst giving you all a timely reminder of when the below happenings were actually scribed. It’s the best of both worlds.

Anyways, this is more of an update posting than anything. Many things have changed around here since I last wrote. First off, the very nature of “here” has been, in the words of one William Smith, “all turned, flipped upside-down.”

Surely your remember the four-letter acronym contractor (that is, they are an acronym, they do not contract acronyms) that employed me for the past five and quarter years? As it turns out, I do not work there anymore. For I have moved on to my next position, which probably has a lot to do with the embedded graphic I’ve used.

Yes, I am now working at a new acronym, this time only two letters. And the current two letter and the former four letter are mutually exclusive, meaning I’ve now been employed by six of the twenty-six letters in the alphabet (how’s that for a career aspiration?) In full, my new place of employment is Volkswagen Group of America. From my research, it seems to be a small German firm that manufactures road vehicles. I’ve always had an entrepreneurial spirit, and I look forward to contributing at a small enterprising start-up. I started a fortnight ago. My German needs work.

Aside from talking Beetles, we’ve got other cars to. Some fast facts:

• Audi: Audi is the official car sponsor of your current box office champion, Iron Man. You think Robert Downey Jr. is impressive? Go see this movie and tell me that the Audi Q7 (the SUV) isn’t unstoppable. Your mother’s SUV has 11 cup holders, how quaint. My company’s SUV RUNS OVER SUPERHEROES. I win.


• Bentley: I figured by now I would have met P. Diddy. With all the free pub he gives this small English branch of our company, he’s got to have an office around here somewhere. Speaking of our office, the company is in the process of moving HQ from Michigan to Virginia. It’s still pretty empty here. Mo’ cubicles, mo’ problems.


• Bugatti: Our annual sales target for this brand is 30 cars. That’s right. Thirty. When each car costs eleventy billion, it makes for a keen profit margin.


• Lamborgini: The other night, I had to stop at 7-11 to pick up some drinks for a dinner party we were hosting. As I was about to leave, a candy red Lambo pulled into the parking lot. Something inside me questioned the need of a Lamborghini target market member to shop at 7-11. But I guess Slurpees have no need for class wars.
  

So, like I said, it’s been two weeks in, and I’m loving the new job. I’m out in Herndon now, which makes for a nice home commute but a trickier softball commute. That’s okay, though. The latter one allows me to swing an aluminum bat at other stupid drivers. I'm back, baby.

Tip of the Hat, Wag of the Finger

You see? That’s just not fair.

About a month ago, our company made a long-overdue strategic decision that kicked our existing maintenance vendor to the curb. Their contract had run out of options, and frankly, even if there were more, we probably would have said, “thanks, but no thanks” and given them the Heisman. In came a new firm, ready to take the torch of HVAC maintenance, landscaping of grounds, and janitorial duties. (Actual torch, however, was frowned upon. All three tasks probably involve some highly flammable material.)

The new guys are very different from the old guys. The subscribe to completely different values – ideals such as “competency, timeliness, and know-how.” It’s a refreshing change, to say the least, knowing that there’s a new sherriff in town – one that knows his way around an electrical outlet installation. The old guard has been run out of town, and while I do my best to clean up their A/R report, it’s unlikely I’ll invite them back for one more drink at the Corporate Real Estate Saloon. Over the last five years, there have been plenty of bullets flying back and forth, and it’s nice to see that the cavalry has finally arrived.

You may have notices a plethora of Old West analogies in the last ‘graph. Why would I do such a thing? Oh, that’s right. To provide an excellent segue to the point of this post altogether.

THE NEW GUYS WEAR COWBOY HATS.

Ok, not all of them. Just the one in charge of this building. But true to form, he walks around the property in a company issued windbreaker, workpants, and YES, a suede brown cowboy hat. Now the way I see it, there aren’t a whole lot of professions that you can get away with donning a ten gallon at work, but apparently being the one blue collar guy in a building full of white collars gives you that authority.

Am I saying I want to wear a cowboy hat? Of course not. That would look ridiculous with even the most casual of business casual dress. But it does bring up a greater point that I would like to address here now.

We need to bring hats back.

Look at movies from the 50’s, like The Apartment (okay, 1960). All the men went to and from work, in complete respectable suits. If it was cold, they were overcoats. If it was warm, they wore blazed. But no matter what, they wore HATS. Yes, hats that matched the suit, and kept their heads from getting wet. They were high-fashion AND high-function. So seriously, what happened?

BRING BACK THE FEDORA.

I would love to make this part of Corporate America’s required attire once again. Remember back in middle school when the teachers would arbitrarily declare one day a year “Hat Day.” Those days were awesome. It gave people personality. It gave them life. Now all we’ve got for that are ties. And half the time and those are a hassle you’d prefer not to wear anyway.

But a fedora? A fedora is cool. Custom-fit, one for each suit – that’s what we need to return to. Who’s with me? Who will wear a fedora?

Sure beats a cowboy hat.

Hello, Saddle.

So this is what my office looks like.

Going on vacation over the Christmas holiday is both good and bad. Any time away from the commute, the meetings, and the water cooler is of course a luxury worth taking, but it makes the inevitable return to the office a mixed bag. And unfortunately for me, everything bad in the mixed bag far outweighs the good.

It’s like trail mix. Trail mix should be awesome. 2 of the 3 main ingredients – M&Ms and peanuts – are excellent snack foods. Unfortunately, they are forced to share that bowl on the end table with raisins – a food that I loathe. Raisins were a mistake on God’s part – they are defective versions of other foods that are successful and delicious. However, they’ve stuck around because some yokel ate a few once and didn’t die. I can’t blame God for ruining trail mix because he didn’t say “Eat the shriveled ones” to his Creation. But he did give us free will, which is what allowed us to eat shriveled waste. That leaves me with an untouchable, albeit healthy, snack mixture by the lamp.

Like I was saying, the first day back from any vacation is full of surprises. Most you can account for – thanks to the Blackberry (decidedly more delicious than raisins), you didn’t miss a single email. But there are the unexpected things that you can’t read on a helpful handheld, and provide excellent fodder for a comedy blog that took December off. Let’s recap.

• My mouse feels weird. Yeah, I know. I put my hand down on it, and the ergonomics just didn’t feel right. I actually looked around my office to make sure I sat down in the right place. I don’t have a mouse that is superfancy or anything – it’s your basic Dell Microsoft rollerball mouse with that tracking wheel that only works 47% of the time. That should be a sign that you should go home. What if you picked up your toothbrush after a week and instead of being smooth plastic, it was the sure-grip rubber material? Sure, it’ll get the job done, but you’ll question its whereabouts from the past 7 days. (ADA Note: You should brush your teeth more than once per week.)
  
• Who stole my trash can? Since I have an office, it is my responsibility to place the trash can outside my locked floor at the end of the day. Having last left my office 9 days ago, my trash can has been sitting in the hallway, apparently for the taking. Because it’s gone. It’s not that my trash can is anything special – I didn’t buy it and it looks like every single other one in this office – but man, oh the time we had. For reasons unknown to me, I had the Chili’s trash can. It was a black rubber receptacle like any other, except for the minor fact that it had a giant Chili’s Bar and Grill bumper sticker emblazoned across one side. Now I do my best to maintain a professional visage, so I made sure that the Chili’s side was always facing me and not the passers-by. Now, it’s gone.
  
  On the bright side, I am no longer constantly craving baby back ribs.
  
• In a very nice gesture, my West Coast boss got me a gift card for Christmas. That was extremely thoughtful, and now I feel like a bit of a doof for not reciprocating. But hey, that’s why she makes the big money and I don’t – to appease the underlings with shiny plastic merchandise vouchers. You see, you really can’t go wrong with getting me a gift card. I’m going to open it (this one was in a standard business envelope), and I’m going to be happy. Why? Because I have now been given the green light to go to a store and buy whatever I want for Christmas. My East Coast boss got me an iTunes gift card that I promptly turned into a stellar mix CD for all the interstate driving we just did. So what will this card be? Target? Best Buy? iTunes (again?) Really, I’m going to be happy with anything, since I’m not picky.

Starbucks. Figures.

(99-97) Red Luftballoons

Some would find it pretty awesome that I have a window office. However, I have to say, it’s pretty overrated. I must be going on 3 years or so with a workspace that is bordered on one side by freedom, but you rarely find yourself staring out into the yonder. For one, the window is 180 degrees from my computer monitor. For me to check the weather for myself, I’d have to swivel in the completely opposite direction. Enough swiveling and my chair is likely to unhinge itself into two parts, leaving me sitting on the ground with a sore back and no meteorological knowledge whatsoever.

This is why God made Weather.com.

The other reason I don’t find myself spending hours gazing outside is that my view isn’t that great. Now I understand that Tyson’s Corner is a Corner full of other office buildings, and the likelihood is pretty high that I’m going to look out at some doofus in another company who spends his break time starting right back at me. I could only be so lucky. No, I’m on the 2nd floor (of 9) in my building, which means I’m at least fortunate enough to not stare at the traffic or the parking lot. Whew. Instead, however, I have the roof of the building’s cafeteria in my sights.

Man, that is one sweet air handling unit I’ve got to look at. Awesome.

Yep, I’ve got an obstructed view. It’s like sitting on the inside seat of the Metro. You can look at the Monuments as you cross the bridge into DC, but you have a stranger’s head obstructing the view. And judging from the size of this air handling unit, I’m sitting next to a stranger with a head as big as mine.

But finally, there’s a change to the skyline.

Sitting atop the large metal curved roof, as of this morning, is a deflated silver helium balloon. (Granted, there’s no helium in it now – if there was, it wouldn’t be resting placidly on the roof.) I can’t make out the full greeting, but it appears to say “Congratulations, Man!” on it. Granted, all I can actually see is Congr- and Ma, so it could be a balloon celebrating Congruent Madmen. Which seems odd, I suppose, but be honest with yourself. Aren’t madmen that are incongruous even more terrifying?

Question: Where did this balloon come from?
Answer: The sky, probably.

Thanks a lot, jerkpants of an inner monologue.

Of course, this isn’t the first time I’ve encountered a balloon from the heavens. When I was like 5, my family was visiting my grandparents in Pennsylvania. They lived in a wide-open subdivision, with each household having enough land that they all required riding lawnmowers to keep the grasslands at bay. Anyway, while everyone was inside near sunset, I continued to play outside. The game? Throw the ball up in the air and then catch it. So as my gaze was frequently skyward, I saw a hot-air balloon on the horizon. It started small, and increased in size. As it got so big that I could see the people in its basket, I ran inside to proclaim my fantastic discovery.

No one believes the bored kid with the tennis ball.

As I went back outside, I was just in time to see the balloon narrowly miss (ok, 20 feet) the roof of the house and land in the front yard of my grandparents house. Soon thereafter, the house emptied to join me in my revelry. In addition, several vehicles pulled up to pack up the balloon and celebrate the voyage with the airborne ones. A man emerged from the balloon basket with bottles of champagne and plastic drinkware.

And from that day forward, I’ve assumed that all champagne is distributed by God via hot-air balloons.

Gift Card Detail

This week, a member of my department could leave at a moment’s notice to have her baby. I suppose walking around an office with your stomach significantly larger than expected for such a duration of time can more than stand in for a doctor’s note; absences in such an instance are not only welcomed but encouraged. And as the most recent employee in the department to become a parent, I’ve been the focus of so many pregnancy questions on her behalf.

You know, despite the whole “not having a womb thing.” But hey, I try.

A rite of neo-natal passage in our organization is the “surprise” baby shower. It’s a surprise as much as standing on a train track with a whistle in the distance can be. It will be coming to a conference room near you at some point, and you just hope it gets here before you have to go. The one in which we celebrated Katie and Clara was documented here on YAB, in fact. With that in the rearview, I can gladly look forward to my colleague’s shower, knowing I’m out of the spotlight and my only responsibility involves not dropping my piece of baby cake on the floor.

Ok, that’s ALMOST my only responsibility.

As a good friend of the soon-to-be mommy, I volunteered to take a role in the planning and execution of her “surprise” shower. Since most cakes I’ve made have ended in disaster and my handiest balloon and streamer work involved a dorm room and a whole lot of duct tape, I got handed an assignment that seemed much closer to my alley.

Gift card detail.

At first, the task assigned was rather simple. All I had to do was sign the card and throw some money into the pot that would be exchanged for one impressive gift card to a baby store with improper pronoun-verb agreement use that shall not be named. Simple, right? It’s not like all the signers of the Declaration of Independence did the same amount of work – they served their fledgling country in a mere supporting capacity. Who cares if you disagree with the future of our diplomacy? Put some INK on THIS PAPER! It’ll be awesome.

And while the greeting that you leave within the fold of that Hallmark special will likely have a minimal effect on the new baby’s welfare, the cash you slide in the envelope will. For every cute stuffed animal that is bestowed upon a baby, Mom and Dad know that it’s the simple things – diapers and food – that will have a greater impact overall. So how much do you put in? There’s no set amount in the directions. What if you put too little in? What if you put too much?Needless to say, there is a lot of pressure riding on this donation. For bookkeeping purposes, we have a habit of keeping a monetary log on the outside of the collection envelope. It’s a means to keep track of those dreaded IOU contributors. If you follow the fold, and your predecessors went cheap, it won’t make for a very effective gift card. Go too high, and everyone will think you’re showing off.

(Personally, I like to keep my showing off at work to a minimum – you know, by rolling into the parking garage in my Honda. Sweet ride, man.)

Anyway, it was also in my charge to actually take the collection of monies and exchange it at a local store for the gift card. I figured since I am currently in possession of a baby, a weekend trip to the store in question could be likely, so it would be no problem to do this for everybody. However, this weekend was very busy and by the time I remembered on a Sunday night, the store in question was near closing. Fortunately, I know Wegmans has a gift card center, so I thought that the old grocery store could be my Obi-Wan.

And they were…sort of.

Armed with $200 and a fleeting hope, I entered the store. I figured this would be an easy transaction. I give them money, they give me a pastel gift card. Done. I did not anticipate the gift cards already coming in set increments – namely $25, $15, and $10.

Out of time and out of options, I did the math and left the store.

After all, 8 gift cards are better than 1, right?

Advanced Merit Badging

There’s an order form on the counter of our office kitchen. Damn it.

Office kitchen order forms are WAY more than they appear. What may seem like a simple way to procure basic luxury or recreational goods has an intense amount of responsibility and office cultural overtones affixed to its high-glossy formatting. Don’t think your boss doesn’t look at the order form to see who is contributing to the social welfare of their fellow worker. He knows that a happy office is a sharing office, and a sharing office buys the crap of the office’s kids’ fundraisers regardless of use or need.

Yes, for decades parents of enterprising young sales children have been bringing in their offspring’s order forms to take advantage of a cubicle kingdom full of suckers. However, the day’s take depends not on order form location, but rather the quality of the merchandise. Take Sally Foster, for example. It is from a combination of quality gift wrap, various home gifts, and gourmet edibles that make a Foster order form a success in the office. 8 months from Christmas? Who cares! Buying some wrapping paper off the break room counter top will 1) save you a trip to Hallmark, 2) make you feel good for planning ahead and 3) make you feel less guilty for purchasing a box of those caramel filled chocolate meltaways you just signed up for as “emergency desk food.”

School children often hawk the wares of the mega candy corporations as means to earn some green for a future class trip or other fundraising activity. However, an office kitchen is a difficult marketplace to move product. You see, when it comes to candy, the names of the game are selection and availability. First off, an order form for standard candy bars makes little sense – since if someone’s ready to drop a buck fifty on a candy bar for a good cause, there’s a damn good chance that they’re hungry…now. I can’t see myself placing an order for a candy bar, only to wait in fevered anticipation for its arrival 10-14 business days from now. God, what if it’s all melty? Secondly, if the candy is on the premises, it’s likely limited to one or two varieties. Guess what, charity – the vending machine gives me twenty varieties. Sure, my money may not be going to support a worthy cause, but I am going to dine on the Snickers bar of my choosing. Limitations to the system are no doubt the downfall here.

Of course, we’d be remised to discuss sympathy order forms without mentioning the perfect business model of the mighty…Girl Scouts. Now YAB has covered everything there is to cover back in this classic early 2005 post, but everything I wrote back then holds true today. Ultimately, the Gals in Green have it right. By signing up to their order form, you are agreeing to buy something of which there is no other supply chain. You’ll have cookies, you’ll be contributing to the welfare of a colleague’s family, and you’ll prove to everyone that you don’t hate children. Girl Scout Cookies are the product that sells themselves; and this is a good thing because there’s no way I’m buying anything from a creepy sales rep who spends his entire day pacing the linoleum of my office kitchen.

It’s pretty damn easy to be a Girl Scout.

Boy scouts need money, too, so they of course must compete in the market with a product line of their own. But if they were to roll out cookies, no matter how brave, clean, and reverant they may be, people would simply accuse them of being market copycats. So somewhere along the line, boy scouts adopted...popcorn.

Funny, the only popcorn ever in our office kitchen is burnt microwave popcorn.

Not exactly the best billboard for the product.

Dick, The Send Receipt Master

Two quick points before we get to today’s funny.

• Thanks for putting up with all of the football over the last (gasp) nine posts. We here at YAB find the Dueling Previews to be a challenging assignment, as well as one of our better works of the year. If you aren’t a fan of television or football, thanks for sticking with us. As the great Ed Rooney of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off once exclaimed. We will do it. We will do it NINE TIMES.
• I know that for those reading this on IE that you’ve seen some crappy code in several of the more recent posts. My apologies; we just switched to Firefox and Microsoft Word isn’t playing nice. Way to stick up for dear old Microsoft Father, Kid Word. We’ll get that resolved soon.
  

(Thanks for the great segue, Intro Chris. Not a problem, Column Chris.)

99 out of 100 of you are sitting at your desk right now in a corporate environment that lives and dies by Microsoft Office. It’s not that you don’t have a preference in your productivity software; it’s that the powers-that-be for which you work does not. Microsoft grow so fast and so large that soon it became clear that those trying to make it in today’s working world would crash and burn the first time they sent a proposal to their customers in WordPerfect format. It’s like showing up for a pick-up basketball game wearing Converse Chuck Taylor’s – you may think it looks cool, but ultimately, they will be rupture your Achilles heel.

(As for that other 1 out of 100, you’re not a Microsoft rebel. We just assumed you’re standing at your desk.)

One of the nicest features in Microsoft Outlook is the Read Receipt. Of course, it’s a bit of a misnomer. By practice, the read receipt is meant to indicate to you when the recipient on the other end, has in fact, read your e-mail. Of course, there are a few preventative factors that Microsoft fails to consider. First, it registers receipt to you only when the e-mail has been opened; not necessarily read. Second, your recipient may not know how to read. Regardless of literacy, Microsoft will send you that note that your e-mail has been read. You then pick up the phone to call your colleague on his newfound ability to process words and sentences, only to insult his heavy burden of illiteracy. Jerk.

‘Course I will Rob, no problem.

But today I’d like to educate you all about the opposite of the read receipt. In my office, its converse is alive and well, in the form of one of our junior staff members. People, I give you the send receipt. You’ve been warned.

No problem at all. I’ll tell him the next time I see him. Definitely.

The send receipt exists in the computers of only the most proactive and naïve members of our workforce. You see, e-mail operates differently from regular U.S. Mail. When an e-mail is sent, the e-mail arrived in the recipients inbox at a near instant clip. This inbox is located on a computer screen, likely within 18 inches of the face of the recipient. By this clever means of proximity, the recipient will likely know that they have received your e-mail, at that same near instant clip. The U.S. Mail is delivered into a mailbox out by the road, or on the first floor of your apartment building. You don’t know for sure if the mail has come, and if a certain letter is or is not in that daily mail run. You’ll have to wait until you feel like checking it, or some pen pal calls you on the phone to direct you to your nearest correspondence collection depot, that metal box that oncoming traffic comes dangerously close to destroying on a daily basis.

In e-mail, that pen pal phone call is a send receipt.

I've ah... got some other stuff to tell him anyway, so it's no problem.

So when my junior staff member sends me an e-mail, he gets up from his chair and walks the 20 feet into my office to tell me that he has sent me the e-mail (which I just read) and explains its content and intent to be in purpose. Aren’t we defeating some purpose here? And the thing is, there’s NOTHING I can do about it. I can respond really quickly, sure, but he’s already halfway to Chrisville when I hit send. I could meet him halfway in the hallway and explain, “Hey, I just sent you an e-mail. It’s to thank you for the information you just provided me in your e-mail.” Instead, we meet at my desk, and I am trapped.

I’ll just tell him about, you know, Laura, when I tell him the other stuff.

And as you may have guessed from the interspersed Todd Louiso dialogue from High Fidelity, each of these send receipt conversations ends with a recap of everything we had discussed in the past 12 seconds. It’s painful. Phillies bullpen painful. Jose Mesa with the bases loaded painful. Navy Seals painful.

So I ask the Microsoft gurus in the audience: how do I turn off Send Receipt?

You Enjoying Training, Boy-O?

The hardest days to sneak in a daily blog are no doubt the days when you are stuck in training. Typically, these columns get written in small periods of time between various tasks, assuming I’m feeling inspired and don’t have to get up to refill my water bottle or use the restroom. (Note: I fill the water bottle with water, not inspiration. That’s what the inspiration bottle is for.) They are written at the comfort of my own office, at my own desk, on my own keyboard. But when someone decrees that you need to spend the day away from home in some barren room filled with computers that have OVERLY NOISY keyboards, it’s tough to ensure that the funny will be brought.

I’ve said it before – I hate training. It has a similar effectiveness rating that group projects did back in college. It’s the assemblage of many people with better things to do, and the amount of time you sacrifice to attend one of these get-togethers does not match the amount of new, important, useful, information you leave gleaning from the barrage of PowerPoint slides and in-class exercises. Consider your favorite NFL team’s final pre-season game. A lot of money is spent to get that thing played, but ultimately, there’s only a decent catch and a missed blocking assignment somewhere idly in the 3rd quarter that will ultimately help the head coach finalize his roster.

This is why web-based training rules. With online courses, someone had to compact everything they want to impart to a session that should take a set amount of time. There’s no room for fluff. There’s no time for fluff. Unless it’s that marshmallowy substance that used to come in a white plastic jar and was used for sandwiches. If that’s the case, there’s plenty of room and time.

Oh, by the way, it’s lunchtime. Can’t you tell?

But today’s training is particularly eerie, for two reasons. First, out of the 24 workstations here in this room, only 3 are currently being occupied. That’s right, only three. There are two instructors for this course. Either we have an enrollment problem, or this lesson is a tad overstaffed. (Not unlike the Redskins coaching staff.) And the second reason for this particularly eerie training session?

The one instructor is James Cromwell.

What do you mean you don’t know who James Cromwell is? He’s a tall Irish guy that’s been in tons of movies. (No, James Cromwell is not Chris Condon – but I like your moxie, wise guy.) He was the farmer in Babe, the President in Sum of All Fears, the crazy scientist in I, Robot, and the warden in The Green Mile. His sunken face, grandfatherly demeanor, and imposing stature make him an excellent casting choice for your public official, elder statesman, or father to a revenge-seeking-nerd.

But how has he fallen so far, so quickly? Training instructor doesn’t match up to his past roles, now does it?

Easy. I blame Spider-man 3.

For those fortunate enough to miss it, Spider-man 3 was terrible. I blame the story and the directing, mainly. Sorry, I just didn’t get the whole midsection with Emo Peter Parker, and Clara could have provided more convincing dialogue (she also has achieved Level 2 web-slinging capabilities, but who’s counting.)

In SP3, James Cromwell played Police Captain Stacy, father of Gwen Stacy and all-around incompetent officer of the law. There’s a scene where Captain Stacy pulls Peter and his Aunt Mae into his office, and explains that there have been some recent developments in the case of his murdered father. Turns out that it wasn’t the blond-headed freak guy who killed Uncle Ben (and his delicious rice) – it was the guy who ultimately becomes Sandman. What the? I’m mean, sure I get the screenwriters needing a reason to make sure Peter Parker wants revenge on one of the movie’s main villains, but what? A new development has emerged how many years after the death of a guy near his car? This wasn’t exactly a national news-type murder. What cops were still working this case? Shame on you, James Cromwell. Shame on you for not objecting to a convenient loophole correction.

Don’t even get me started on the Osbornes’ butler.

Hey James, I think I’ve taken this training before, and before it was WAY better. Who was the instructor, you may ask? I don’t know if you’ve ever met him.

His name is Rollo Tomasi.

The Steve Zahn Principle

Free Food in the Kitchen!

Now that I have your undivided attention (works every time), I’d like to comment on the most recent break room offering that I encountered just yesterday. I wish it could say it was a delicacy of choice – perhaps donuts or cake would have been nice. However, it’s not an uncommon practice for a colleague to bring in more than they can chew with the intent of leaving the rest in the name of communal goodwill and sharing. And while I can’t identify said colleague, I can thank him for yesterday’s sacrificial offering of…

Cheese Balls. 25 ounces of cheese balls.

There are so many things to consider here.

First off, the mere size of this canister was staggering. Now it’s common practice for people to buy snacks at their local supermarket to keep in their desk at work. By nature of most people’s desks, these containers must be small, compact, and easily concealable when the boss walks by. The cylinder was slightly bigger than a regulation NBA basketball. No wonder the thing had found a new home in the kitchen.

Secondly, you may have glossed over the fact that this canister, when it was once full, weighed 25 ounces. I know that doesn’t seem like much, but it’s a legit pound and a half – of strictly puffed cheese and air. And 1.5 pounds of cheese balls weighs just as must as 1.5 pounds of brick, feathers, hammers, whatever. So in order to amass that amount of load, you’re going to need a whole lot of cheese balls.

384, to be exact.

You see, a serving size (according to ye tub grande) of Cheese Balls is 12. There are 32 servings in the container. I could eat one cheese ball every day of the year and still have some left over to watch next year’s Rose Bowl. (However, 4 out of 5 doctors strongly advise against this diet staple. The 5th, conversely, is crazy and is likely the type who prescribes pain killers to park benches and elm trees.)

Ultimately, cheese balls are not a filling snack, so it’s a bit of a mystery as to how they’ve managed to survive in a market with so many other satisfying options. In digestion, all you’re doing is turning puffed cheese into tightly compressed cheese powder, devoid of the nutrients that keep you (and those park benches and elm trees) healthy. So how have the Cheese Balls done it? How are they still lining the shelves alongside much worthier offerings, like Sun Chips?

I give you the Steve Zahn Principle.

Steve Zahn is one of our generation’s That Guy in That Movie. He really isn’t much of an actor, and his comedy stylings aren’t in the league of the guys who can carry a movie. He’s a bit player, who since 1992 has amassed 42 credits to his name. And of those 42, 18 are flicks a good portion of the population has seen. And while Steve Zahn isn’t the reason to go see the movie, you don’t mind that he’s there and actually enjoy his screen presence once in a while.

The secret to his success? Diversification of roles.

Every movie Steve Zahn does is a completely different genre than the last one in which he appeared. You want romantic comedy? He’s done You’ve Got Mail. Horror more your liking? Check out Joy Ride. In the mood for some action and adventure? He stars alongside McConaughey in Sahara.

Indie? Reality Bites.
War? Crimson Tide.
Animated Voice Over? Chicken Little.
Musical? That Thing You Do!
Crappy Martin Lawrence Cop Movie? National Security

You see, Cheese Balls are just one of the many forms the idea of air-puffed cheese powder takes in order to maintain shelf life. Whether it’s a curl, a rod, a doodle, or a Cheeto, it’s still the same damn thing. And yet, we’re never unhappy when it’s on a party snack table, but we never run to the store specifically for it. Like I said, it’s the Steve Zahn of snack food.

Get Out Of My Testing Facility and Into My Car

Forgive the scarcity of posting as of late. You see, I’m helping my company buy a new car.

(Ok, that’s not entirely true. There’s no reason that my company would ask me to consult on a new vehicle purchase. I’m far from a car guy, and while my Honda Accord screams sensibility to any government auditor who may roll up alongside at a red light, it’s not exactly the taste that a mega technology firm. A mega technology firm like ours would make their own cars. That transform.)

As you may have guessed, we’re speaking in metaphors.

As I’ve alluded to in the past, my company is completely switching out its existing software mainframe for a new, much shinier, product. I was not part of the decision making team – my pay scale is nowhere near a conference table that such a decision would be made. We’re talking a multi-million dollar contract award here. But, while I may not have a seat in the table, that doesn’t mean they don’t want me in the room – you know, to bring them fresh coffee.

I have been assigned as an official pilot program tester. My goal is to carry out instructions that mirror things we do in our current system, to see if the new system can handle what we’re so accustomed to. How I was selected for this task, I’m not quite sure. Regardless, I’ve been given a very specific directive to complete my part of the systems testing, so that others may complete their parts – all before week’s end.

Yeah, it’s mid-day Thursday. What?

After being given the green light yesterday, I encountered a few uh, issues. First off, they want us to do this testing in a special testing room. This special testing room, sadly, is across the parking lot. This parking lot is long, and the temperature is hot. Yesterday, I valiantly crossed the asphalt inferno to complete my testing – for the good of the project. When I got to the special testing room, I found out what made it so special. It’s so special that only people 2 mm tall can enter. Or it was just locked. One of the two, I’m sure of it.

So after coming back to my own office (which required another trek across the red hot blacktop – good thing I wore shoes to work), I sat down to try and do the testing regardless from the confines of my own computer. In order to do the testing, I needed to pull data from two sources. Of course, after carefully reviewing the data, there was a bit of a disconnect.

Like getting a chipmunk to speak Swahili.

But that’s okay; I’m a smart guy and know who to call (other than the Ghostbusters) in this type of situation. With that resolved, I sat down to access the system and get moving, having already wasted an hour with these two problems alone.

“Problem with your User ID/Password. Please contact your administrator.”

WHAT?

As you can see, this isn’t exactly going as planned.

The problem here is my name is linked to every test that has yet to run, yet I have done nothing wrong. If the higher-ups are checking progress, I’m going to be the one in hot water, rather than those who set the whole thing up.

“So Condon, what do you think of our new car?”

“Well sir, I look forward to the new features that will make it way better than the old car. Its ability to hover above and blow by traffic will give us a great advantage on the roadways. However, I’m concerned that the ignition button doesn’t work, the door trunk release requires the strength of a bear to activate, and I have to climb through the sunroof to get in, but, hey I’m excited.”

What Does MINE Say? Suite!

Most corporations these days are forever entangled with the one-stop document management package that is Microsoft Office. I can’t speak as to whether or not it is the best office suite on the market today, mainly because I have no basis of comparison. As long as I can remember, it has been the dream team of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and Outlook that has been running my professional life, whether I like it or not.

We pause a moment to pay our respects to Microsoft FrontPage, an early web publishing tool that was pre-loaded on Mookie and on which I tried to develop and administer my first-ever Fantasy Hockey League. Those were the days when I made the league GM’s pick up free agents by filling out actual paper work. Needless to say, they were plenty of shiny objects in my peripheral vision that grinded this e-project to a screeching halt. Hey, I was 17. Sorry guys. Let’s go ride our bikes!

I like Microsoft Word. 98% of the blogging that occurs on YAB has its initial draft typed up in Microsoft Word. It allows me to keep a much closer eye on column length, word count, and spelling and grammatical errors. And most of the time, it succeeds in that job. You know where Microsoft Word chooses to fail me, however? Homophones. Why couldn’t the wizards behind grammar check write in some code that would prevent the most obvious of homophonic errors from happening? We here that it will be hear in future versions.

I like Microsoft Excel. But then again, I kind of have to. When you devote your career to the inner workings of financial number crunching and other miscellaneous calculations, it’s a love or die proposition. It’s an organized way to make math do the work for you, and it has so many lines meeting a right angles that even Nordberg can appreciate the simplicity of the design. Of course, I’ve never tried to pen a blog post in Excel, nor have I found a way to incorporate everything I learned in AP Calculus within the program’s confines, but it does serve as the Oscar Party Standings Engine, does it not? Shockingly, no derivatives or binomials make appearances in that fine workbook, either.

I like Power Point. There’s nothing like the fast moving combination of professional headers and overstated bullet points to make something appear organized, yet user-friendly. However, a successful Power Point presentation must thrive on content, not bells and whistles. For example, in grad school I once attended a marketing course where the professor opted to use a Power Point to outline a chapter. As part of her knowledge, her slide said that “Local Print Media and Word of Mouth are Major Tools in Forming a Grassroots Campaign.” Why she chose to capitalize everything is beyond me. However, the phrase “Major Tools” stayed with me long after class was dismissed. It just sounded official. Since then I’ve been sending Christmas cards to my state’s senator from Retired Major Edolphus K. Tools, in hopes that Jon Rogers will open said card on behalf of the Senator, and immediately fall out of his office chair.

I’m completely indifferent about Access. Databases are something I’d pay someone to design for me. Other than the once I made to organize our wedding guest list, they’ve all been failures. If I only had a friend who loves to collect DVDs, create microbews, and design databases. That would solve all my problems.

I hate Outlook.

It just told me I’m going to be in training for the next five hours.

Flushing in Fear

There are dangers in this world. Dangers that people need to be warned about. Natural disasters, potential terror attacks, movies about above-average intelligence infants – the public deserves to know what’s coming to them. Fortunately, we’ve evolved as a species to the point where we can put alert notification protocol in place long before it becomes too late. But before we continue, we pause for this message from the Emergency Blogcast System…

Eeeirrrrrgg. Eeeirrrrgg. Eeiiiiirrrrrrggggh.
This is a test. This is only test. If this were a real blogging emergency, we would have shifted from original, well-crafted comedy in favor of some YouTube video of a guy getting hit in the groin with a baseball. And the screen would flash red. Or something. I don’t know. Never happened before. But it could.This is only a test.

Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooop.

You see, just like the EBS, we’ve come up with perfectly good ways to alert people of nearby danger. On highways, we have electronic overpass signage. In Homeland Security, we have a Skittles-sponsored Taste the Rainbow of Doom System. Natural disasters, if meteorological in composition, can be tracked and trumpeted by our friends at the National Weather Service. Their wide array of brightly-colored precipitation maps will let you know when to bring an umbrella and when to get in your car and drive to Arizona.

But what will be in your Flagstaff-bound Camry, praetell?

It’s one thing to warn people about when there will be gale force winds and cows flying through the air. It’s another to remind them to be prepared for the next Aerial Bovine attack. YAB fully endorses the efforts of www.ready.gov, in hopes that the next time a pal of Katrina chooses to blow, we as the American People will be prepared.

But there? Really?

Like I said, FEMA has the aforementioned website to instruct people what they will need in desperate times. Of course, the FEMA website may not be on your morning blogroll of things to check out before starting work. That’s understandable. So by partnering with a grassroots effort (and that likely includes the Health and Safety guy that works for us), they’ve designed posters to remind you to be prepared. They’re far more omnipresent that a website. Seems like perfectly good bulletin board fodder to me.

I said BULLETIN BOARD.

In recent years, restaurants have become quite adept at discovering a great way for men to spend just as much time in their bathrooms as women. They call it the Urinal News. (Although I would prefer the much-truncated Urinews.) Above a standing stall, one can find a glass-enclosed front page or sports page of the day’s paper before them. This is cutting edge current events acquisition, people. And I’m all for it.

What I’m not for? Public Service Announcements above thy wall-fused throne.

This is where I found the huge picture of a cyclonic weather system over Louisiana, accompanied by the big red letters “ARE YOU READY FOR AN EMERGENCY???” Good God, people. I don’t exactly find this to be the appropriate time for a FEMA Shock and Awe campaign, do you? Way to catch a guy with his pants, er, open. The last thing I need to think about in this situation is where I’m going to get a flashlight and canned food on such short notice. Lesser men could be shaken by this.

And as I don’t need to remind you – this is the last place we need shaking.

The Project Management is Strong with This One

It’s no secret that I’m not a big fan of sitting in corporate training sessions. Given, it’s the best way to collect many well-intentioned employees and make them as unproductive as possible during a multi-hour block, when in realty, a handy quick reference card could have taught the same thing, but hey, it’s old school. You may remember that the last time I sat in a conference room learning about our new project management software package, I took the time to blog by hand in my notebook, and that was no easy feat. This training is better than that one for two main reasons:

1) Lunch is provided.
2) They let me have my laptop.

I’ve always said, “The best way to teach a new software package is with hands-on experience.” Ok, I haven’t always said that, but that’s only because I try to avoid giving strangers the idea that I’m some sort of software package dork who can’t talk about anything else. I’d be an extremely boring individual if that were true, and you people probably wouldn’t even read this blog, considering I would just be wax poetic about the capabilities and add-ons available with Version 13.2 of Project X. So I guess I could have hit backspace over the past 85 words and changed the word “always” to “occasionally,” but well, the train of thought came roaring through the station and wasn’t making any stops. I hate when that happens.

The reason I was allowed to have my laptop this time around is because we were to participate in a Data Exchange session. For those who are unfamiliar with the term, Data Exchange is an online meeting module that allows you to see everything that is happening on the presenter’s own screen. It sure beats staring up at a projected version, and by logging into the DEx, you can ask questions electronically. That part of the DEx operates much like a standard chat room.

Frank has entered the room.
Hilary has entered the room.
Gary has entered the room.

Now, my conference room, in a rare move to overkill, allowed you to follow along on your laptop as well as follow along on the projection screen. So, I could participate without actually logging into the chat. However, had I decided to enter the chat, which I almost did, I paused for a second at the place where it asked me to enter my name. Had I done it, I would have followed the above syntax and used solely my first name. But if the wickedly bored side of my brain took over, the big screen would then show in the corner:

Darth Vader has entered the room.

I think that would be the scariest thing ever for a presenter to have to read mid-slide. Are you kidding me? I didn’t know Darth Vader was planning on attending. I don’t see him in the room anywhere, so he must be in the McLean office. It doesn’t matter where he is – I think he’s capable of sending the mental death choke cross country if I screw this up.

This could send shivers down the presenter’s spine, even if Lord Vader chooses to sit back, passively participate, and breathe heavily on his laptop keyboard. Hey, he may find this training session incredibly informative. After all, the goal of this software package is to create a formal process by which to carry out construction and large-dollar maintenance projects. And after his bratty son and his friends blew up the Death Star, I can only assume that someone had to fit a construction manager’s helmet on top of his pre-existing Sith warrior dome, no?

According to the original trilogy, Return of the Jedi shows a second Death Star as a construction-in-progress. Furthermore, the events of “Jedi” occur only one year after the Empire Strikes Back, and four years after Luke’s one in a million prayer. Now I don’t know about you, but that seems like a hell of an accelerated schedule to build Version 2.0. Think about your local interstate appropriations project. That thing’s been under construction for like 10 years, right? Considering the Empire probably spent the first 6 months or so in shock, early schematics probably weren’t really finished after 18 months (after the Achilles’ heel of the first Death Star, there’s no WAY intergalactic building permit services would simply green light a carbon copy of the first set of plans.)

Ah, the benefits of Darkside Autocracy.

If I were an accountant working for the Empire, my job would be easy. Project approvals come from the guy with the black hood and bad back. If he wants something done, he points that arthritic finger my way and I open up the financial coffers. He’s a spare-no-expense type of guy, so if he wants a plasma TV or little weird rolling droid things in every room, so be it!

But this is Free Market Capitalism, not the Empire.

Darth Vader was no doubt hired by the Emperor to build the Second Death Star, and his ability to intimidate is what put the project so ahead of schedule by the time the Ewoks get involved in the saga. He’s lucky to have been able to expedite such a massive undertaking, considering he has to deal with vendors like Watto for parts, and they drive the hardest of bargains.

Eh, there’s no way the blackest brother in the galaxy waits for six electronic budget approvals before he commences work.

Darth Vader has left the room.

What, No Trenchcoat?

You don’t run into that guy every day.

I’ve been assigned to a special task force team to evaluate vendors for a multi-million dollar service contract to be awarded by Corporate. I assure you, the inherent coolness that comes with the title “task force” is by no means reached by the duties that this collective of functional experts shall carry out. Most task forces get to do things like recon, espionage, and the occasional elimination of their mark. I get to read maintenance proposals and come up with intuitive questions to gauge their capabilities.

(The questions I’ve written down? Yeah, that’s a blog for another day.)

As enlightening as 80 page performance index proposals are, all the competing bids say essentially the same exact thing – “Hire Me! I’m Awesome!” And while they read like tax code but with the vigor of Ashton Kutcher, they don’t exactly differentiate the all-stars from the scrubs. And since we don’t want no scrubs, we bring in the vendors one-by-one for a formal presentation. We do this for two reasons. First, it allows us to get to know those who will be potentially working hard for the money over the term of the new contract. Second, we want to see if those public speaking courses they took in B-school are really worthwhile.

The first vendor today, we’ll call them Dinder Mufflin, had a very nice presentation, strong enough to warrant further consideration. They arrived as a team of three, but clearly, one of them was more comfortable fielding questions that his team members. In this regard, he was Throckmortonesque. While he may have been wearing a sharp black suit with a slick yellow tie, and spoke with a slight Midwest accent, the thing I will remember most about him will be his name.

“Good afternoon. On behalf of Dinder Mufflin, my name is Derrick McGruff.”

The initial reason for the name recall? You don’t meet many Derricks these days. In history, the 5 most famous Derricks (or other spellings thereof) are Jeter, Jacobi, Lowe, Zoolander, and the frontman of the Dominos. I mean, if this guy leaves the full-service commercial maintenance field, he could have a legit shot to enter that list. He’s nice enough, and could really excel in politics, we think. (With a frontrunner list of St. Christopher, Columbus, Reeve, Marlowe, and Wren, I don’t stand a chance.)

But then I got the guy’s business card.

Handing out business cards at presentations is a formality that most companies abide by. Upon the entering of a conference room where more than one firm is presence, everyone suddenly becomes a veteran blackjack dealer, whisking tiny rectangular rolodex fillers in every direction to the point where nobody knows anyone else, but they at least have proper documentation to study up on later. Derrick and his team provided no exception. In fact, I’m staring at the keynote man’s info right now.

C. Derrick McGruff. Regional Account Manager.

Ah, he’s one of those guys. In every group, there’s someone who prefers to eschew his or her given first name in favor of professionally rocking their middle one. Sometimes it’s to create a separate identity from their father, who bequeathed his name to them in the name of lineage and tradition. Sometimes, the first name is just plain embarassing. If your name was Melvin Jake Connors, you would go by Jake, right? Jake gets invited to come to the movies. Melvin gets tripped in the hallway. Of course, this was a formal setting, so I didn’t have a chance to ask C. Derrick McGruff what the C was for. Hell, he could be a Christopher, and that would create some interesting small talk when their Power Point presentation freezes, no?

Wait a minute.

Let’s look at this a little closer. Let’s disregard that Derrick is a cool name and that’s why he goes by it and truncate the business card a little further.

C.D. McGruff.

“On behalf of Dinder Mufflin, I’d like to thank you all for listening to our pitch and we hope to be in your future plans. Have a good day.”

“Whatever you say, CRIME DOG!!!!”

Pockets 1, Schrute 0

The Prodigal Roommate and I have collaborated on many a project in the 9 years of our friendship. There are the seasons of Madden that we’d let the Playstation know who’s boss. There was the Home Depot stripper cake that was as anti-climactic as Mattias entering a spelling bee. There are the 9 Levels of Mafia-Dan, which really deserved more attention for our ridiculous use of the English vocabulary. Throw in a movie classification system here and the best board game ever there, it’s clear we have a chemistry when it comes to comedic uprising. To date, we’ve often used our power of funny for good.

Now, we go all Emperor Palpatine on ya.

A couple weeks back, I took the time on this very blog to mock a Frozen Meal Feedback sheet that appeared on our office fridge. For those who don’t recall, my co-worker (Dwight Schrute as we’ve been referring to her) thought to create a spreadsheet where one and all can evaluate the flavorocity of various Lean Cuisines for the benefit of all. We, in turn, ridiculed the idea irreverently, so much as to suggest a rival spreadsheet be posted alongside it in hopes of fostering some grocer’s freezer competition.

And the Prodigal Roommate answered.

The next day, while in the middle of writing my ode to pilot programs, I got this e-mail from Spud with a peculiar attachment. Call him inspired by our call to arms, but the man had indeed created a rival spreadsheet. A sheet that would once and far all prove the superiority of a certain frozen food, while at the same time make my co-worker cry. I couldn’t ask for a better situations. So I printed it out and later that day, adorned the refrigerator with Spud’s Creation:

Hot Pocket Feedback.

On a spreadsheet eerily similar to the original (eerily because Spud had never seen the original, yet channeled his inner Schrute to parody it), he had pre-populated the Meal column with every variety of Hot Pocket known to man. Sure, he may have gone to the HP website to get this listing, but I’m pretty sure he can rattle them off from memory.

You see, he’s a bit of a fan.

Back in ’05, my roommate wrote to the good people of Nestle to heap some postal praise on a certain meal-on-the-go product. In return, they sent him a personalized letter of thanks (which he’s since had framed, embossed, and hired a painter to do a wall-size rendering of), with additional coupons for his continued loyalty. At any given time, our freezer held more boxes of Hot Pockets than ice trays.

Which is good, because ice trays bubble up terribly if you microwave them.

Back to the Rival Sheet, though. I hung the Rival Sheet immediately adjacent to the Frozen Meal Feedback. After all, the latter had been posted for about two weeks, and not a single rating had been provided. It’s like when a gas station moves in across the street from the other gas station – competition can spark interest.

Just to get things kicked off, I filled in three random ratings to three different Hot Pockets. Sometimes you need to get the ball rolling. So just like that, a 10 for Meatballs and Mozzarella, an 8 for Ham and Cheese, and an underperforming 2 for Jalapeno Steak and Cheese.

One week later…

To be honest, I didn’t want to check the thing every day, for fear of this being a disappointing foray into co-worker torture. So I waited 5 business days until a day came along in which I stored my lunch in the fridge. When I looked up at the Hot Pocket list, I was shocked. We had 8 reviews.

And we’re not just talking some guy who’s an enthusiast ranked his Top 5, either. I count 4 different pen colors (who the hell writes with a purple pen??) and 6 different Pocket varieties with data. (Good God, we have a 9.667 average on the Meatball!). Spud’s Rival Sheet? Runaway Success.

Frozen Meal Feedback Form? So fresh and so clean.

Winner!

The Pilot Program

Coming this summer to a multi-national corporation near you: Chaos!

Our company is currently switching its entire financial mainframe software from one product to another product. They tell us it will allow our company to operate efficiently in a 21st century environment. Personally, I don’t see the need for change. After all, hasn’t 20th Century Fox been responsible for the X-Men series, the Ice Age flicks, Moulin Rouge, Walk the Line, and Devil Wears Prada in the last 7 years, all without an overdue name change?

(What’s that? Oh – Big Momma’s House, too? Ok, nevermind.)

The evolution of technology in business is something that is increasingly important with each new invention and idea that the science dorks come up with. If a CEO is unwilling to innovate and advance, his firm will be left in the dust. (However, if the firm has invented a way to convert dust into printed currency, then that changes the entire business model.) So I am passively for the upgrade to the new software. I figure the powers-that-be will make sure it caters to all the business processes we are currently carry out in the current system, and then we will all be happy people in the new world. However, the view from the flight deck doesn’t look quite that optimistic.

In a company as large as mine, you don’t just shut down one system and turn the other one with the flick of a switch. Without proper testing of the new system, this would be disastrous just about every time it occurs. Therefore, a pilot program is instituted. A pilot program is a program by which a smaller cross-section of a company engages in the new practice. Their success or failure with the new system will allow the installers to have valuable input prior to the full roll-out.

It’s like a pre-planned trainwreck. (Sorry, Sara.)

My department is part of this pilot program. And judging from the meetings we’ve sat through, the new system is anything but ready to implement. Come the pilot program kickoff date of July 1st, things look to be…well…catastrophic.

Thank God this doesn’t involve actual pilots. On second thought…

PILOT: Alright Control, this is the pilot speaking. I wanted to go over some of the features of this new plane before we try and land this thing in Chicago in a half-hour. Would you care to review the diagnostics with me.
CONTROL: Roger.
PILOT: Ok, the first thing that has me a little spooked is this light here that says, “Landing Gear Missing.” Can you confirm that this is a faulty light, and I in fact, have operable landing gear?
CONTROL: That’s a negative. No operable landing gear found.
PILOT: WHAT? The plane I used to fly had landing gear, why doesn’t this one? After all, it’s clearly something that I need on a daily basis. Where is it?
CONTROL: It’s not ready.
PILOT: GUH. Ok, then, we certainly must have some other functionalities that will allow me to safely land this plane. New planes should be more advanced like that. (deep breath) Control, what futuristic modules do I have to land this craft?
CONTROL: Do you see that green lever?
PILOT: Yes, I do. Will that help me land?
CONTROL: Negative.
PILOT: Then why did you point it out? (pulls lever, two pieces of hot toast eject from the dashboard) We have a lever to make toast?? Why?
CONTROL: Pilots sometimes are hungry.
PILOT: AND SOMETIMES PILOTS DIE FROM NO LANDING GEAR.
CONTROL: Negative. Fatality rates are still in beta testing.
PILOT: Ok, calm down Jenkins, you can do this. Control, surely there must be a contingency protocol I can adhere to, correct?
CONTROL: Affirmative.
PILOT: Please relay the contingency protocol.
CONTROL: You see that easel near the jump seat?
PILOT: I do.
CONTROL: It’s a drawing board. Go back there.
PILOT: Sigh.

Consumer Retorts

I can’t say I’m exactly a power consumer of frozen meals. I know people who swear by them, though. It’s the delicious combination of mini-servings from the major food groups, combined and then cryogenically ice-blasted for your mid-day consumption that Lean Cuisine makes a killing on. Hey, it kills some time at the microwave which you se spent banging your head against thy desk. Sounds win-win to me.

But this is too much.

Look, I’m all for the creation of central information for fans of a common interest. Take Lostpedia, for example. Millions of Losties around the globe have created a compendium of all the Island’s mysteries and facts, so that an obscure reference from tonight’s ep is just a few clicks away. Lostpedia makes sense.

Frozen Meal Central does not.

In a glorious return to break room signage, and perhaps founded by a certain crazy person, there’s a new refrigerator posting that needless to say, has caught my eye. It’s a spreadsheet – finance types are drawn to them like moths to flames – and upon further inspection, it’s got a noble cause. A noble cause that we will now make fun of endlessly.

Hey, that’s how we roll at YAB.

The average frozen Lean Cuisine runs about 3.99/per lunch. That’s A) cheaper than going to McDonalds, but B) more expensive than starving. However, with so many options and so many entrees out there, how is a frozen meal rookie to know which one is a diamond in the icy rough and which one will make you long to have chosen the aforementioned choice B)? If there was only a consortium that would report on individual meal’s quality for all to read, so that we as a nation could stop buying the abysmal Stouffer’s “teriyaki pork with rice” because it “tastes like shoes,” we could all be happier employees. And thus, a spreadsheet was born.

The spreadsheet asks the question (in bold caps and center-justified), “Have You Ever Had a Horrible Frozen Meal for Lunch?” While you pause in front of the fridge to ponder, the sheet hits you with an order. “Please rate the meals you eat to improve everybody’s lunch experiences!” After that it’s an empty form of 15 or so rows, with room for the brand and meal name and ten individual ratings from ten individual reviewers.

(For the record, Olympic figure skating employs only 6 judges. Which means this is WAY more important.)

But how will we rate the meals, oh Spreadsheet of Truth? We demand an objective scale by which to assess the gourment quality of these frozen peas and cauliflower!!! Oh, what’s that at the bottom? “Please rate your meal for taste on a scale from 1-10. 10 being the best meal you’ve ever had.”

If the best meal I ever eat comes in a small rectangular box and requires 2 and a half minutes in the microwave, I’ve completely wasted God’s gift of the sense of taste.

Ok, that’s the whole spreadsheet from top to bottom. Feel free to make your own to put up in your common kitchen spaces. In the meantime, I’ll contemplate how to contribute in my own little way. Here are some of my options.

1 – Skew the tallies. Once this gets rolling, who’s to police whether or not I serve as Judge #3. Oh, the possiblities. Negative numbers, fractions, and letter grades come to mind. Something tells me the origin of this spreadsheet doesn’t work in finance, but someone who works in finance may sure as hell end it.

2 – Invent frozen meals. Not ridiculous things – actual cuisine that could pass in your grocer’s freezer. How does Spring Breeze Chicken sound? Sounds real enough to me. When I give it three straight tens and one 9 (all in different ink color for cloaking purposes), I’ll have the pirates scouring their local Safeway for hours.

3 – Create a rival spreadsheet – I’m a firm believer that competition will make anyone play better. So when I put up a spreadsheet asking people for their take on their favorite office kitchen signage, we’ll see just how mighty Frozen Meal Central. (My guess? Somewhere behind “Please refill the empty coffee” and just before “U.S. Department of Labor Health Statistics.”

4 – Put an actual shoe in the freezer.

(NOTE: I borrowed the still-blank spreadsheet for the writing of this post. It’s been up since Monday and there’s not a trace of ink on it. In the 20 minutes I’ve had it at my desk, a replacement has been drafted and hung. I’m speechless.)

Time to Take the Donuts

Ready for a quiz? No? That’s okay, you never were in high school and look how successful you’ve become. (Moral of the story: Quizzes are a waste of time. Or in this case, an enjoyable time waster. Let’s proceed.)

The following list is a list of a typical set of 12 donuts that might be found in a box from Dunkin’ Donuts. I’m not saying that any two boxes are the same; however, I would venture a guess that if you asked the cashier to throw one together for you, it would look a lot like this:

Boston Crème-filled, Chocolate icing
Chocolate Cake Donut
Cruller
Glazed Donut, Chocolate icing (hole in middle)
Glazed Donut, Pink icing with Sprinkles
Jelly-filled, Powdered White
Plain Donut
Specialty Order Donut
Standard Glazed Donut #1
Standard Glazed Donut #2
White Crème-filled, Powdered White
Wheat Glazed Donut

Take this list and order them from 1 to 12. The criteria? The order in which these donuts will disappear from the box. We want to see what your opinion is on Donut Vanishing Theory, and then once we have it, we’ll proceed to prove how naïve it is. The actual answers are provided below.

(in order of disappearance)

1. Specialty Order Donut – Look, Dunkin Donuts make good Donuts, but they aren’t the type of gourmet, world-class donut you crave. Instead, they are the convenient road-side donut depot that a generous colleague of yours passes every day on the way to work. If he’s going to go out and be the Office Hero, he’s going to want more than a pat on the back and the good graces of the crazy secretary. He’s going to want his favorite donut, too. So when he gets to work, he’ll put the box down in the kitchen, send out an e-mail notifying all of his good deed, and chomp down on the one donut he ordered – just the way he likes it.
2. Standard Glazed Donut #1 – The next guy to the box got there in so much of a hurry that he probably spends his entire day that way. Always on the go, never stopping at the water cooler to chat up last night’s episode of Lost. He’s Nordberg (assuming Nordberg isn’t phoning it in that day.) He needs a simple, classic choice, to go with his plain, black coffee while he reads his Blackberry. (If this was a mock draft, though, I’d say he reached picking Glazed at #2. Why?)
3. Boston Crème-filled, Chocolate icing – This is why. The jewel of the draft dropped down to Number 3, where you’ve got that worker who was so exciting to get the donut e-mail that they also rushed down to the box to make the primo pick. Guy #2 is more concerned about efficiency, while this person wants a tasty treat to help get through the first hour of the day. It’ll be a grueling one, but it’s okay now. They just took home the Michael Jordan of the donut box.
4. Glazed Donut, Chocolate Icing – Another solid pick. And with less guilt and calories than number 3.
5. White Crème-filled, Powdered White – Ooh, this could totally backfire, but whoever grabbed it should be satisfied with their selection. The real reason we like donuts? The crème filling. It just tastes great. However, there’s very few avenues that one can take to have this delicious crème. Unless you go the “Bowl of Pudding” route, there are few ways one can get this stuff. Donuts are a great crème vehicle; let’s just hope that you’re careful enough that your blue shirt isn’t sprinkled like a snowstorm by the end.
6. Standard Glazed Donut #2 – Similar reasoning as number 2, but this guy was SO busy he didn’t get here right out of the gate. He’s lucky for his choice to still be around.
7. Chocolate Cake Donut – No one quite knows what to make of Chocolate Cake Donut. It appears to be a plain, boring donut, with the exception that it has that dark, fudgesque hue. Looking at the rest of the box, it’s a best option pick. Of course, milk may be a better compliment over coffee here.
8. Glazed Donut, Pink Icing with Sprinkles – There’s nothing like trying to call someone in your office to tell them the bad news about the 3rd Quarter earnings wit a sad, solemn, straight face. At a pause in the conversation, you take a bite of your donut. If you were the 8th to the box, your edible circus in a circle might ruin the tone of the meeting, no?
9. Plain Donut – Wow, safe pick thre, Captain Risk Taker. Let me guess, there’s no ice in your water glass for fear of cutting the inside of your mouth . Am I right? Bo-ring.
10. Wheat Glazed Donut – the donut that’s technicall 4% better for you than the rest has fallen into the latter half of the morning untouched. There’s two reasons for this. First, there’s been WAY better options on the board, so why would someone go for something that tastes slightly less than satisfactory. Secondly, the guy on the diet has spent the last two hours in agony deciding whether to partake on the free snacks, and he’s finally rationalized that since the dough is wheat, it’s going to be just fine.
11. Cruller – If turned up on their ends, donuts are supposed to look like inner tubes. Not the tire of a monster truck. Let’s move on.
12. Jelly-Donut, Powdered White – Somewhere there’s a guy who likes jelly donuts; otherwise Dunkin Donuts just wouldn’t make ‘em. Unfortunately, the odds are slim that he works in your office. As with the Crème-filled, white powdered sugar is an invitation for a ruined blazer, and honestly, who’s going to take the donut that two other people have probably already poked holes in, in hopes that there’s crème inside? Not me, sir. Not me.
    

Give yourself one point for every correctly-slotted donut. How’d you do?

122 Minutes to Go...

Yes, last week we wasted your time by preaching about how March Madness doesn’t waste your time. In our research on said topic, we came upon this interesting article, and decided it was important information that you all should know. Or at the very least, it was important information that we all should mock. Eh, same difference around here.

According to a survey that was conducted in tandem by Salary.com and AOL (the former a guru’s guide to worker’s compensation and the latter being the Rich Kotite of internet service providers), the average worker spends 2.09 hours out their 8-hour workday not actually doing work. I know what you’re thinking – “What if I work more than 8 hours a day, does that mean I’m being more productive?” No, Slackerman, you’re just wasting a comparable ratio amount of time. A 9-hour workday yields 2.35 hours of wasted time. A 10-hour day gives you 2.62 hours to space out. An 11-hour day? Good God, man. Go home already. Your dinner is cold.

2.09 hours may seem like a strange, non-standard way to measure time, so I’ll take one for the team and do the calculation. (scratches head) (carries the 2) (checks his work) (declares himself a math god)

That’s 2 hours, 5 minutes, and 24 seconds.

What does this mean? In order to stay on par with the rest of America, you need to waste 2 hours and 5 minutes of this workday. Any more, and I’ll sign you up for the Penske file. Any less, and I’ll make sure your co-workers snicker and call you a teacher’s pet.

But Condon, however will I waste so much time? Good question, hypothetical reader query guy! I’ll give you 4 choices as to how to waste 2 hours and 5 minutes.

1.) Watch Mrs. Doubtfire in entirety.
2.) Watch Batman and Robin in entirety.
3.) Watch Ocean’s 12 in entirety.
4.) Split the time evenly as per the national averages.

Yes, the article goes on to breakout how their survey takers spend their work time when it’s not time for work. Using simple logic, one can fathom that these percentages aren’t just the answers’ varying levels of popularity – no, no. We will assume that each American worker does ALL of these during the day, and the pie chart of 100% can be applied to the 2 hours and 5 minutes of playtime.

Confused? Keep reading.

1. Surfing the Internet accounts for 44.7% of the time people waste. That would amount to 56 minutes of the 125. Seem high? Yeah, it might be. But remember this about the Internet. Consider the time you spend here, checking your Gmail, watching YouTube, reading the news, looking at box scores, shopping for grills from pro baseball players, and other miscellaneous Yahoo! Searches, I’m sure that time goes by fast.
2. Socializing with Co-workers for 23.4%? That’s 29 minutes. Ah, the all-important water cooler talk. When will you people stopping shooting the breeze about the weather and weekend plans and instead actually discuss the mechanics and artistry of the actual water cooler? A truly unappreciated office fixture.
3. Conducting personal business for 8 minutes? Whether it’s scheduling a doctor’s appointment for the kid, paying your bills online, or running a counterfeit jeans ring out of your car-hole, it’s good you have a little “me time.”
4. Spacing Out – 3.9% means 5 minutes of staring at the wall. For 1 of those minutes you’re contemplating why you’ve never put anything on that wall, and the other 4 you have that song from Tetris stuck in your head. Good for you.
5. Running errands off-premise – 2.3%? 3 minutes? Sure, if your dry cleaner set up shop just outside the lobby and you’re a world-class sprinter. Totally feasible. (Note: are Spandex bodysuits dry clean only?)
6. Applying for other jobs – 1.625 minutes. Ah, 1 minute and 37 seconds dreaming of greener pastures. God, you have a short attention span.
7. Planning Personal Events – 1% = 1 minute and 15 seconds. This is why Evite was invented.
8. Other – 13.5% - Hey, who are we to tell you what to do with the last 17 minutes? Eat something. You look famished.