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Monday, November 26, 2007

And You Thought That You Like To Party??

I found this link to a story about some of the best supposedly true drinking stories.

I like the drunk elephant story.

The one where the largest drink was made back in 1694 with 250 gallons of brandy, 125 gallons of Malaga wine, 1,400 pounds of sugar, 2,500 lemons, 20 gallons of lime juice, and 5 pounds of nutmeg. The fact that the bartenders paddled around in a small canoe to get the drinks for people is hilarious. You don't see that around here.

Can you top those??

Friday, November 23, 2007

For the Lazy Beer Drinker in Your Life

Thought this was funny...

Why do I think that A, K and StB would do this?? Of course, E would help it the design and manufacturing part. Could be useful when camping. Just think about it guys. I have the fridge in the basement....



Thursday, November 22, 2007

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to all. Hope you had an enjoyable day.

My day turned out better than I expected. After telling my mom and sister again yesterday that I was not going to eat any food at my sister's house, my mom relented and had dinner at her house. My dad decided to come home on Wednesday evening from up north so that made the decision a bit easier for my mom. The nice thing was that my sister was still pissed at me and did not talk to me all afternoon. That was a good thing for me.

Dad did not get a deer. Nor did my uncles or cousins. All the deer they were feeding at my uncle's land suddenly disappeared last weekend. I told my dad he should just drive down Puetz or 15th Ave by my house. I see deer almost everyday. Granted you cannot shoot a rifle in Milwaukee county (legally) but he could try to hit it with the truck. He didn't see that as humorous as I did.

Both the Packers and Cowboys won today. It will make next week's game between the two very important for both teams. It could mean home field advantage for the winner throughout the playoffs. I am glad that I did not go out for last week's game as some wagers were made. Should be interesting to see who get the new tat. StB or A... I do plan on being at Big Momma's for the game, so watching the game should be fun.

We have a realtor coming out tomorrow to look at the house and we will be putting it on the market soon. I am hoping that my half of the house will afford me to buy a nice place somewhere else. I started looking in the paper an online a bit. I am torn between a house or a condo. No yard work would be nice especially in the winter but with the dogs a yard would be nice as well. I promised my dad that I would try to find a place that did not need too much work for him to do. He laughed and said that if it did need work he would help me do it.

ZOBMONDO!!

Would you rather....

Wet the bed when you're with your partner for the first time

----OR----

wet your pants in a college class?

I so have to go with in college. I can always pass it off as spilling a drink on myself.

Have a good weekend :)

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Dinner Anyone??

So, my sister calls me today at work. My dad is up north hunting and is planning on staying up there over Thanksgiving. So, sis, thinking she is being nice, offers to have Thanksgiving at her house. It will just be my sister, her kids, my mom and me.

I declined.

Am I wrong??

I called my mom and told her I would not be there and she said it wasn't that bad. Ohhh yes it is. I asked if we could go out to eat. No dice. Can't hurt sister's feelings. I can and will. That does not bother me in the least.

If anyone knows or has been in my sister's house, you will know why I declined eating there. Her house is DISGUSTING!! When I picked up me niece for a movie on Sat afternoon, sis told me she has a family of mice living upstairs. She has killed at least 5 of them so far and has seen a few more running around upstairs. But, the good news is that the mice live upstairs and do not come downstairs. Huh?? I am sure they are downstairs. She had to bags of garbage sitting on the kitchen floor on Sat. Can't tell me the mice aren't eating out of there. That is the the Old Country Buffet to them.

I refuse to eat in a place that first of all, is so dirty that just looking at her refrigerator door (can't even bear to look inside the fridge) makes me want to puke and now has mice running all over the place.

Did my sister ever wonder why I don't come over for birthday dinner unless they are at my parents?? That is why. I will not eat off of her plates or use her silverware, unless it is plastic and I just opened it out of the little bag it comes in.

In her living room, in the corner is a toy pile. Literally a pile of toys. It has to be about 6 foot wide, 6 foot long and about 5 foot high. I have told her that the kids will not get any toys from me for Christmas until that mess is gone. They don't play with the crap they have now. Why should I add to it?

My sister says that it is not her fault that the house is a mess. WTF?!?! She is the parent. The kids are 12, 6 and 5. They should not be made responsible to keep the house clean. Half the time my sister does even cook dinner, just opens a can of Spaghettio's for the kids to eat.

So.... I will have to call them both again tomorrow and tell them I will not be there. Will probably have to do the same on Thursday morning. Oh well. Anyone up for dinner somewhere on Thursday?? Preferably after the Packer game.

Sunday, November 18, 2007

Wedding of the Year

Introducing the wedding party: First, the handsome groomsmen and the fine looking groom (in red)










Red ties, black ties, no tie. Mass confusion. "Alright, everyone . let's line up for the picture. Let's see .... hmmm, where shall we .... oh, yes! Perfect! Everyone, please move quickly! Right over there, in front of the garage. Yes, that will be just smashing!" I guess a jacket at a wedding would just be too citified, so let's just pin these boutonniere's right on the white shirts. Bubba, put down that cigarette! And no smoking during the ceremony! I told him it's tacky to light up during the sermon. If we could have put the wedding off for two more months, the groom would have saved enough money for a pair of black shoes. I told him his tennis shoes have black trim....that's good enough.

Next, the lovely bridesmaids and the blushing bride.









Not everyone can pull off such a vibrant red, but I think this group does it. Sassy, I tell you, just sassy.


Last, the cute couple.














Those Wal-Mart slides really enhance her cankles. Too bad they didn't come in white. Note how their "outdoor backdrop" is a clearing probably behind the 7-11 where the weeds actually got mowed just for this occasion.














At least his head is somewhat proportionate. To her left boob.













What's she showing us here? A severe case of knee gout?? Apparently, whatever it is has her husband in more of a stupor than usual - How bout those teeth?














"You SO crazy, honey."













"Here baby, let me help you up here ....."














You can almost hear the banjo music.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Paying the Bills

Occasionally, I use my cell phone for work related calls. In the past, you log into the reimbursement system, and fill out a form that takes about 3 minutes. If the cost is under 25.00 you do not need to provide a receipt. A week later the money is deposited in your account.

Until now.

Last week, the bank implemented a new system. You now have to itemize each call that you make, no matter if it is personal or work related. You then have to print out the bill and fax, yes fax, it to them. So, I printed put the page that had the work related calls on it circled the calls that were work related and blocked out the remainder of the numbers. I was asking for $7.20 to be reimbursed. Not a huge amount but why should I pay for work related calls. We only get reimbursed .06 a minute.

Three days later I get an email saying that I now need to provide my entire bill. All 18 pages of it. So, once again, I print out all the pages and proceed to highlight the work related calls and black out everything else that is not work related or contains and personal information. I pay for my parent's cell phone on my plan and the bank does not need to know who they are calling.

Yesterday, I get an email from them stating that they need to see the entire bill with the charges that I am seeking reimbursement for highlighted and nothing else blacked out. WTF?!?! I replied to them, copying my useless boss, stating that I considered this an invasion of my privacy. They do not need to know the numbers for the calls that were made or received that I am not seeking reimbursement for. Am I wrong in thinking this??

If I remember I will bring home the bill I faxed them and put it on here. For your amusement.

I just received my bill for October and need to get reimbursed for about 11 bucks. I already dread completing this request. From now on, I will use my home phone and use a calling card.

What scares me is that one of the things that I do is manage pagers for the bank. We have been moving people off of their pagers and over to their cell phones little by little. If we begin to move large amount of people over to their pagers and this is the pain in the ass that it is to get reimbursed, we are going to hear shit about it. We are a few months away from rolling out corporate owned cell phones. The users are personally liable for them but the bank owns them. I can see this being a cluster fuck if they have to go thru all this shit to get paid back for them.

To top it off, when I submitted my expenses for my trip to MN last week, my bosses boss did not approve my expenses promptly enough in the old system. Now I have to figure out how to submit them in the new system considering that I already sent in my receipts. Since they require the only the original receipts, I cannot send them the photocopies, of which I did not make anyway. My credit card bill is due next week and I know that I will not have the money for it back from the bank.

ZOBMONDO!!

Would you rather....

While drunk, go rock climbing

----OR----

learn to surf?

I have to go with surfing. I can swim. Not really good at being Spiderman (or girl)

Thursday, November 08, 2007

Am I the Only One....

...who is already sick of the Christmas commercials on TV? All I see tonight is ads for Kohl's and Target. At least they are not blasting you with some obnoxious Christmas music.

No wonder people dread the holidays.

ZOBMONDO!!

Would you rather...

Get stood up for your high school prom

----OR----

take the date you dreamt of to the prom and have him or her leave with someone else??

I'm going with taking the date and having him leave with someone else. Better to have gone and had a bad time than to never have gone at all.

Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Work Still Sucks

It has been a busy couple of weeks. Last week, I was in MN for ITIL training. In geek speak, it was training for learning how to manage your IT infrastructure within a company. Basically, how to run your IT department like a business. Boring to most but it provides me with a nice certification out of it on the bank's dime.

I went there with three other people from my building. 2 girls and a guy. They are all nice enough people but a bit boring. I, like StB, like to try something different when out of town. My travel mates however had different ideas. We ate at a Maggiano's, P.F. Chang's, Cheesecake Factory and Applebees. All great places but I felt like I was at Mayfair Mall. I really wanted to try a interesting brew pub in the Mall of America but since I was not driving, I did not get much of a say. I wish now that I could remember the name of it but.....

I was a bit scared when we got to the hotel and seen that there was a bowel disease convention there. Yeah, you read that right.... bowel disease. Now, that, folks, is some interesting stuff. NOT!!! The only saving grace was that the hotel offered a happy hour from 5-7 each evening. Yeah, free drinks. Bad thing, the only beer they carried was Bud products. YUCK!! I stuck with Bloody Mary's.

Work has been a bitch lately. My boss, who you may remember is in OR. We are in WI. She has no idea what goes on here. One other guy is in MN. All by himself. Well, last week, when I was in training, MN guy was getting on my co-worker, L's last nerve. MN guy has been on our team for the last 8 months. He is still making mistakes that we have "coached" him on for the the last 6 months. These are careless mistakes that have an impact on our company's paging system. It is a pain in the ass when we have to go back and fix his mistakes. There are times that L and I are tag-teaming MN guy. L calls him to coach him on stuff, then I call him and at times L calls him again on yet another mistake. All within an hour. He says he doe not know why he he keep making the mistakes but it is just being sloppy.

A perfect example is a few weeks ago, MN guy and I were in some training for setting up our team's web pages. I know how to code in HTML. Not well but enough to get by. We were tasked with putting some information together. Which is fine but I told him that he would have to do the brunt of the work as I am working on a major server upgrade and will not have the time to devote to it. Three days later, he asks me if I can put everything that needs to go on the website in a Word doc so that he can put it on the website. WTF?!?! If I have to type everything out in Word, I might as well do it myself. I told him that he should ask our boss what needs to go on there and she (being the uninvolved person that she is) asked me if I could get it together for him. I told her no, not until my server project is done in mid December. Add another fucking task to my ever growing pile of stuff to do.

Anyway, I come back to work on Monday to find out that MN guy is moving from one building to another one about 15 miles apart in St. Paul. That is fine but when they told him that they were going to move his PC, he unplugged everything and went home. He was told it would take up to a week to get everything hooked up in his new location. So home he went. When he works from home, he VPN's into his work PC and uses his work PCs resources. Since he unplugged everything before he left on Tuesday, it was very hard for him to connect to it on Wed or the rest of the freakin' week. He did not say anything until Monday when he asked me how to connect to his work PC. WTF?!?! What have you been doing for the last 3 fucking days?? And why is he waiting until now to ask me when he should have said something to our boss on ohhh.. how about 10 minutes after he couldn't get to his work PC on Wed??

I told my boss today that I think it is time to cut our losses with him. It has been 8 months. He is not getting it. He is up there by himself, with no one else from our area to support him or train him. He is too busy with home school to travel down here for a week to train with us. What we are asking him to do is not difficult but there is an order to it that needs to be followed. You need to do A,B, C and then D. If you do it A, C,D and then B things get messed up. I hope that she takes my advice and starts to find him a new home. Otherwise the boss will hate it as every time we have to coach him, she will get a followup email with what was done and why. That should change her mind.

You may ask why I don't get a new job. I like my job. Hate my boss (I like my boss as a person, as a manager she sucks), like my job. I like what I do and am good at it. I am the person that people go to to get stuff done. I get it done and it is right the first time. All I know is that all the extra time and work I have been putting in this past year had better pay off come review/raise and bonus time. Or she will hear about it.

Now on to happier stuff.....


ZOBMONDO!!

Would you rather....

Go to junior high wearing only your tight white underwear

----OR----

after being sprayed by a skunk?

I am going with the skunk spraying. No one wants to see me in tight white underwear.

Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Goodbye, My Friend

Last nite, I get the call from A that a friend from the bar has died. Pat was one of those good ol' guys.

Pat always was the guy who would give you a big, wet, sloppy kiss (sometimes missing your cheek) and a hug. Every time I saw him, which sadly hasn't been much lately, he always asked how the dogs were doing and how were things coming along with the house, had we done anything new. I certainly wasn't very close to him but he always had a kind word.

It seemed like every time I seen him he had a story about how he hit it big on the slot machine or won something at the latest bar giveaway. The guy was luckier than shit. He was thinking about moving to Arizona to be closer to his son.

He had quite a few health problems lately but I think that he went out on his terms. Living life to the fullest till the end.

I'm getting tired of people dying. I guess it is just the whole circle of life thing, but it still sucks.

Pat, I'll miss you. Take care sweetie.