Thursday, April 30, 2009

Nice Hand Cream

Double standards.

The world is full of them.  I try not to get too excited about it.  For the most part, I find them amusing.  This one especially.

Today I found myself in another coworkers office sitting at their desk.  This is not an uncommon occurrence as I am the IT guy.  I spend WAY more time at other peoples desks than I do my own.  I also spend alot of time watching a computer screen.  Usually the prominent visual on that screen is the scrolling percentage counter of an installing application or ongoing process.  That is, you see, my raison d'etre.  I install and reconfigure stuff to make it work better.

In the cases where the caravan of pixels takes a longer time to populate than usual, I sometimes look around at the various items of personality that satisfies the users need of identity in the workplace.  Where a lesser being would take the time to urinate in the corners and at various key locations within the space, we bring in pictures, juvenile artwork, Dilbert calendars, vases, etc.  I particularly enjoy the pictures.  Some are fairly benign.  Simple poses at a favorite locale.  All smiles, and no worries.  While others are goofy or whimsical.  There are also some people who don't take the time to scan the background of a picture to make sure the setting is appropriate.  Exhibit 1- Four people sitting in a living room on a sofa. Sodas and beer on the coffee table in front of them.  Everyone sporting exuberant grins and mild sunburns.  However, if you looked in the corner of the picture, way up at the top, you would see the arched back of the owners dog, and his furry pucker dropping a "cigar" on the hallway carpet.  Exhibit 2- A vacation photo.  Based on the decor in the room, somewhere Mexican...perhaps Dominican.  This is a boudoir photo.  A picture of the boyfriend (thankfully fully clothed) laying on the King sized bed in the hotel room.  All smiles, and no worries.  Again, if you look in the background, on the nightstand, you can clearly see the telltale accordion-fold of a sizeable bandolier of condoms.  And right next to the condoms?  A vibrator.

But I digress.




The reason I thought to post today was the picture here.  Comparatively this is a far more dressed down work space than usual.  Nary a photo in sight.  Although, the freaky, whimsical pencil is rather interesting.

Hand Cream.  Swift and broad would be the judgement assessed on me for having hand cream figure so prominently at my desk.  I mean, seriously, the mouse is less available than the hand cream.  But girls don't have this issue.  Had it been a whole cucumber, perhaps.  But thankfully it wasn't.   

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Car Shopping

Increasingly over the past few weeks it has become evident that it is time to retire my trusty companion, the Ford Taurus SE that I have been driving for the past 10 years or so. It was around December that I started to notice a shimmy in the steering that told me that the mechanic at Fountain Tire was not just pulling my leg when he said that I needed to replace my ball joints and tie rods. Being that I had just spent some 800 dollars fixing a far more critical issue, I couldn't bring myself to spend another thousand dollars replacing the front end of the car as well as all four tires.

So the shimmy has graduated to more of a shake. Like most other unfortunate palsy victims, some days are worse than others. On a particularly bad day, Tannis decided to take the car for a quick errand. Upon her return, she didn't even have both feet in the house before she announced, no DEMANDED, that we buy me a new car. And so it begins, the confusing, tiring and expensive (albeit exciting) search for a new vehicle.

I have enjoyed my relationship with Ford so far. We have had a Mercury Tracer, A 1994 Ford Probe, A 1996 Mustang GT, and a 1998 Ford Taurus. All good cars. Aside from a mishancled incident with the Probe, for which we were generously compensated with a fantastic deal on the lease of the Mustang. So I decided to first look over the Ford product line to see if they had any offerings that I would like. The first thing that jumped out at me was the Ford Escape.

I have been looking to get a slightly larger vehicle with more versatile cargo space. The security of the trunk on the Taurus is fine, but it has just become an overstocked catch-all.