My Job as a Dog

The Analyst grinds his teeth, while I talk, looking into his monitor, idly clicking here and there. She's not going to stop hounding me until I throw her a bone. He looks resignedly into my brown eyes. I can ignore her all day and she won't go away. I can explain how I don't have time to put documents on these websites, but she doesn't understand. Afterall, she's just a temp. The Analyst sighs, pulls a piece of paper from a desk drawer, and extends it across the desk to me.

I can't help but quiver with anticipation. Something to do! I'm thinking, Something to DO!

"Here's a contact list for you! Yes, look, nice shiny contact list! Good girl! Ok, now put it on the website! Go, on, go put it on the website!"

Ecstatic, I grab the document and bound to my office, panting with excessive energy. This is what I live for! This is what gets me out of bed at 6:45 every morning! This is what I give up 40 hours of my week for! I leap into my desk chair and prance across the keyboard, fingers like lightning. Upload! Upload! Must Upload!

All too soon, it is over. The work is done. Five short minutes of work. My ears droop. I curl my legs up into my chair and wonder who else I can hound.

Not everyone here likes dogs. One analyst looks at me over the top of his glasses and flat out refuses to give me anything to work on. He sneers at me that his contacts are up to date. "Really? Well, if you just give me a list..."

"They're up. To date." He sits there in his chair like a boulder, frowning at me, looking slightly bored. He takes me through his credits one at a time, telling me exactly why he ain't gonna do shit with any of them. I slink out of there. Back in my office I try to shake off the cold wet contempt he has dumped all over me, but it's sticky. That fat bastard didn't have to be so mean, I think to myself.

My masters don't seem to have their eye on the ball. When I tell them about my meeting with the fat guy, the little boss is furious, but the big boss says, "Well, he probably doesn't have any documents for these sites. These are unusual projects." She just gives him a pass to keep being an asshole. Meanwhile the rest of the analysts are at least throwing me week-old chicken bones, probably just because I'm cute.

I have better results digging in the backyard. The records department has been able to make enough old documents available to keep me happily chewing on data for several days.

Thankfully, so has the little boss. She was the one who really wanted me, I think. There's always one person in the family who wants a puppy, and everyone else hates to have to feed it. The little boss does a great job at giving me all sorts of work to do. She sits with me when I need to clarify things, she makes time for me, and when she got back from her business trip she emailed me SO many megabytes of documents! I feel so appreciated and needed and loved.

For a dog.

Lunch Tuesday: Corn Chowder and Far-Away Friends

The email which I sent today, to my former lunch buddies at my old job:

Today, and for the next several weeks, I am working at that company with the great cafeteria again. For lunch today, I am having "Jersey Corn Chowder", which is a rich, buttery cream soup full of vegetables, including corn, which is not really a vegetable, but who really cares when it’s swimming in buttery cream soup. I am also having an organic field greens salad with tofu and balsamic vinaigrette, and chocolate pudding for dessert with a fresh blackberry on top. All for less than four dollars.

For dinner tonight, on my 1/2 hour break from class, I will be reheating a frozen organic vegetarian burrito.

G's car, which I am still driving, as my Buick needs new tires, will be dining on the cheapest gas I can find in New Jersey, which is usually at the Mobil station on Route four in Englewood. The Arabic gentlemen who man the pumps know me by now and actually say "Good evening miss" when I pull up to the pump. They do not smile, but then, they're pumping gas at 10:30pm on Friday nights. I hardly expect joviality.

My car, as it's been hobbling on a donut ever since my front right tire blew out two weeks ago, doesn't need to eat much, as Gardiner only drives it from the house to the train station in Nanuet and back again - a few miles a day.

My cat refuses to eat anything but Cat Chow, which pleases me because it's cheap. As much as I love to refer to Marge as My Little Girl, she clearly did not spring from my loins, for if she had I would be forced to buy her Eukanuba or Science Diet or some other exorbitantly-priced gourmet cat food, to the exclusion of all else. Of course I avoid discussing this with my vet. I live in an artsy-fartsy vegan-organic how-can-you-feed-her-that-grocery-store-garbage type of town, and at some point my vet will probably try to guilt me into switching her food. Not this year, but it's going to happen. You betcha.

The only things I can really talk about are eating and sleeping, as work is dreadfully dull, and school-talk involves multi-syllabic words such as neurotransmitters and glossopharyngeal nerve dysfunction, etc. etc, and really, aren't you feeling sleepy already?

So back to food. I purchased a bag of the new Hershey's Kisses with Peanut Butter, and plan to try them this evening. My serotonin levels are rising at the very thought of it. I'm hoping they'll taste somewhat like Reese's. Maybe better.

I miss having y'all to eat lunch with. The salad tastes so much better shared.

hugs
Ouiser

Reverie

When I was in college, I used to play "Baby you can sleep while I drive" on my stereo when I was alone in my room, usually when I couldn't sleep. That was fifteen years ago.

I just got a copy of Melissa's greatest hits. Somehow I managed to go all these years without ever owning a single Etheridge CD. When I was in college, I had the single on tape. So I figured, it looks like a good disc. It's got her oldies that I love, and a cover of Piece of My Heart, and blah blah blah ok I'll buy it.

It came today. "Sleep while I drive" is on there. I just heard it again for the first time in all these years.

Strong effect.

Good music.

So many things from my past have been popping into my mind over the last few months, about since last winter. Good things. Things I'm glad I haven't forgotten.

More later.