Monthly Archives: March 2004

Lazy Friday Night

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Made some not incredibly enthusiastic attempts to go out tonight. Instead, I ended up home with my ‘puter and TV, which is fine by me. And, because I am truly a pillar of high art and intellectualism, I’m watching Madonna and Antonio Banderas kind of mess up Evita. I’m mildly annoyed at two things, one that Madonna essentially takes the song “Another Suitcase, Another Hall,” even though in the original Broadway soundtrack and the version I saw in London in the ’80s, that’s not Evita’s song. It’s the song of the lover she kicks out of Peron’s bed to make room. They give her a reprise, but it’s wrong. The second thing is Jonathan Pryce (who lacks an official site) is very unattractive and creepy. I periodically have a thing for him, but eewww.

OK, it’s Friday night and I’m reviewing a shitty musical. How far can I fall into a gutter of despair?

Truth is, I’m fucking exhausted. The cycle of endless meetings to implement what promises to be the largely excremental Peoplecrap system, followed by an evening of trying to get something actual done at work is taking it’s toll. I can’t fucking wait until the computer system is on hold for two weeks (Yup, two weeks to implement, that’s Jim Dandy, modern technology, post fin de siecle, super, cyber speed, don’t you think?) and there are no grant deadlines. I’ll just put my feet up and smoke a stogey in my office in a universal gesture of relaxation. Hope the doctors I work with are hip to cigar smoking.

In a complete 180, here’s a cheer for modern technology. Dogging and toothing in the British Isles. Why do the societies with the sticks jammed furthest up their collective rumps of repression come up with the most innovative sex games. Almost makes me wish I was a little less earthy and more reserved. Nah, fuck that, I can cope with my personal status quo.

Quick before sleep

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TG-Fuckin’-IF. Yeah, two whole weekend days coming and no meetings in sight. It’s almost getting to where I don’t want to have a conversation, since that’s practically a meeting, isn’t it?

While talking out one situation, though, I realized that in the meeting I was most feeling stab-by at this week, I sodomized myself, metaphorically speaking. Instead of handing in the proofreading and corrections I had done for “our team,” I let myself be convinced that I should let the upcoming executive power broker I bitched about below hand the information in for me. D’OH!

Yay, me! In the first meeting with the new Chief Administrator, long may she rein (safe in a cocoon of blissful ignorance), in this the meeting as the queen ascends the throne, I let some one else provide her the shit I did, signing the card from “us,” I’m sure. Tip to anyone out there with a job with, say, a heirarchy and the possibility of figurative anal rape-age: Always hand in your own work. Don’t help the wicked or dim to steal from you. Yup, I left my front door open with arrows pointing to my stereo, and guess what? No more tunes.

I wonder why I find it more fun making spoof ads than going into work. Cartoons are more fulfilling. My job must be really, really good.

Coloring

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Worked late today. Kept my head down pretty much most of the day. I have to at least periodically produce some work on paper to feel a little less pointless. All of the meetings, all of the time at work just meeting after friggin’ meeting, it wears you down. So many stupid people, so many ways to get nothing done; It hurts. If you’re sitting in a meeting and you can’t decide whether to stab yourself in order to get out of the room or stab whoever is inanely nattering just to make the noise stop, it’s a bad meeting. Thoughts of stabbing never bode well, I find.

But, today, I sustained myself by actually doing something. A document that needed to be completed, words to be written, a tangible result of labor. Sometimes something as simple as that helps the stabbing thoughts fade.

More importantly, I entertained the current fantasy — renting a beach house in Santa Cruz. Hanging on the board walk, cruising my convertible around the bay. That would be pretty cool. I could get the kind of admin job that starts and stops in non-intense intervals in a day or week, you know, like 9 to 5. Something in which I say, “Sure, I’ll collate that,” and I go home. Then, I have a little more time for me and a lot more energy. Writing, performing, animating, whatever. No stabbing thoughts.

Could I make any more fucking lists in this post?

So, here’s what I came home and did. It’s one drawing that will be part of an animation idea I have.

Penguin 1

Exhaustion and angst

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Today was one of those days at work that would be better if you were unemployed. It was a day where I think my bumper sticker should read “A bad day getting punched in the face repeatedly is better than a good day working.”

Unfortunately, I’m theoretically promoted. I say unfortunately, because so far it has meant that my responsibilities are less clear, what little sense of power and ownership I had has been diminished, and I’m fucking frustrated as all get out. The intrinsic issue with my job, which is unsolvable despite being able to pinpoit it, is the person above me. He means well, I think he truly doesn’t want to hurt me, but he is often myopic. His view is his view, and any stretching to understand our very different points of view has to be initiated by me. In the first couple of years I worked with him, he made it pretty clear that he was a lifer, not looking to make waves, just relaxing to retirement. But, in the past year or so, he’s had a lot of personal issues that have changed his point of view. In addition, he has developed a relationship with someone who is a political activist, so he has become more forceful, more assertive, less apt to live with the status quo.

His changes have made him my own personal glass ceiling. He wants to stay, and he wants to develop his position in a way he had not previously.

All of the dynamics forceably remind me, when he and I have to go against each other, that I have choices. I am not captive. I can leave.

And, now, M. is far away. It seems we both miss each other, and whether we are together or apart, we talk in a warm, comforting way.

Do I turn my back on a job that has in many ways developed more than I expected? Do I walk away from the person with whom I mostly work, who encourages me that the glass ceiling is crackable, that if I trust her, she will ensure that my skills are used, my job satisfactory?

Do I move West, and try something new, simultaneously safe with M. and also taking a chance on the unknown?

Help me out, see my poll on the right.

If only I were born rich

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I’m sitting here toiling away, and I emailed a friend. While emailing, I realized how much I hate the endless minuet of office bullshit and politics.

On the agenda for today is a little team meeting with our new Chief Administrator. I, and just about every other administrator in the room, have more experience than this woman. The office gossip in the circles affected are pretty much focused on why was she hired, what will she do and how can we avoid her like the plague of locusts (at best) she represents. She’s a particular kind of fun stupid (and by “fun” I mean excruciating pain). Unflappable and uber-confident while sallying forth into the realm of un-fucking-believably stupid. Drooling on yourself eating with a spoon stupid. So stupid you don’t even realize that what you just say has no bearing in the world that you are alledgedly managing. The confidence is amazing, though. I once saw her give a presentation on how faculty are appointed to the department (you know, professors and stuff and how they get their titles). There are a wide variety of people who can become faculty, some are physicians who exclusively work in the clinic, others are laboratory scientists, who have never seen a patient but know a lot about animals, some straddle both worlds, and other themes and variations. So this chick, uber-admin is talking about how it’s supposed to work, and everything she says is about what physicians do and their credentialling and patient loads and what not. A hand raises in the crowd — “Ahh, what about Ph.D.s?”

The quick, confident, self-assured, unflapped answer, “We don’t have any in the department.”

BUZZ, wrong answer, but I guess I applaud your moxie.

Also on the agenda for today is interviewing a job candidate who had the following phrase as a bullet item in her “Profile” –

“Bottom line conscious with attention to detail and deadlines”

Where do I begin?

Monday

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The title says it all: “Monday.” I’m not a big fan of starting the work week anew.

I’m also far too busy with that which pays me to be writing this now. But, imagine my little fist of rage, the man can’t keep me down. You can make me work, but you can’t stop me from thinking. Little fist shake, little fist shake.

Here are a few jokes I tried last night, which I can’t decide if I like. For a first outing, they essentially worked, but I don’t know.

1 – For the past year I’ve been dating a Chinese man, and you know what people say about Asians, well his pussy isn’t tight at all. [The problem with this joke, is I said it spur of the moment, after a Korean woman comedian talked about Asian fetishists and sexual stereotypes, thus mentioning her “tight pussy” repeatedly. I don’t know if email spams regarding Asian porn are prevalent enough that this joke is actually funny, or whether I’m just riding on stupid shock value. Maybe if I had a point other than dating an Asian.]

2 – M. took me to an Asian market and showed me black chicken. It looks just like any other chicken, like Perdue parts, whatever, but it’s black. I’m not saying that I won’t eat black meat, I’m just saying I won’t pay for it. [I think this might work, if I do two things, not stumble or rush through it, and somehow make it clear it’s a double entendre. Of course, the real question is why I find it necessary to be both sexual and racist.]

3 – I got a comment on my website that just made me feel good. All it said was “Joy.” I think I should email my thanks back to “fistinghard.com.” [You bet I’m proud of that comment, and that I have no shame and will gratuitously mention fisting.]

Insomniacal rambling

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I wonder if I move to California, will I still stay up until 4 a.m. doing stupid stuff. Essentially, that would be 7 a.m. to my New England soul. Maybe I am born into the wrong time zone, and in the West I would rise and sleep in more usual patterns.

Maybe in Japan I could be a farmer, because the schedule would so well suit me.

I am frightened that soon daylight savings time will be upon us again. On April 4 (I think), I’ll be forced to “spring forward.” Since for a little bit now I’m been going through a particularly disruptive patch of not sleeping when I should be, I predict I will be fucked. Fucked by an economic decision a bunch of irrelevant years ago, enacted into law and designed to fuck me up.

Maybe if I move to Alaska the seasons of constant light and constant dark would fix me.

Most unfortunately I shudder at the thought that as daylight savings fucks up my rhythm, I will likely be sleeping alone for at least a month more. Oh, Woe is fucking me.