Scylla and Charybdis, that’s what I’m saying. I am of several minds whether to write at all, knowing that there is essentially blood in the water (forgive the vivid, corporeal reference), but I have to ask myself in the end what will serve me best?

Here’s the deal. I have a job. At that job, I spend an enormous amount of time, and for the most part I believe the quality of my work is frequently unparalleled. I have a bizarre attention to detail and comprehension of context, both of which generally serve me well. And, I have workaholic tendencies. For better or worse, I am more than willing to roll up my sleeves and work until the work is done, regardless of the hour of the day, or far too frequently, night. Several people seem to appreciate that trait, quite a few enjoy working with me.

I have gone to lengths to not mention my employer here by name. The stories, the diatribes are actually intended to be non-specific; they are amalgams of people and personality types, not actual walking beings, and software, systems and meetings, those are universal themes. I have generally minimized any specific mention of work and the actual entity anywhere on the worldwide web, except if I had something positive to say. (I would link to such an example on a public bulletin board, but if you keep reading you’ll easily discern why that ain’t happening.) I have met some truly wonderful people, who I will always respect enormously, no matter what I think of the organization overall. I have made friends, I have worked on good works and for that I am grateful, because really, sometimes that’s all you can get.

Moreover, I do not provide co-workers with my website URL or use my website email, and, unlike most people with whom I work, I rarely use my work email for personal business. I also don’t advertise my writing (or comedy shows) at work, although I have invited to shows people who I have thought, perhaps mistakenly, were friends. (Good God, think of the trust issues I might have had before that I had entirely separate emails, etc., and imagine them now.) I try as best as I can to keep work and my private life separate, although it’s difficult to be fanatical in a world filled with ordinary people not robots.

But, here I am right now, pondering my future right now. Why? Because I am on administrative leave, pending an “evaluation” (presumably of the psychiatric kind). Apparently this site (full of who I am as a character, as a writer, as a stand-up, dedicated to my writerly view of the world (and I mean view, not action plan) and more than anything else helping me to create a voice worthy of publication, sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes successful overall in creating something from nothing) anyway, this site has been found by my employer and deemed threatening. I don’t know who felt threatened or how they found me. (Although, by performing publicly, I cannot be truly stealth.)

I will say this one thing, even though as a stand-up performer and writer it goes against the grain of everything I have done in the name of art and communication, I apologize to anyone frightened or intimidated or concerned about me as a violent threat. My response, feeble as it may seem to anyone who perceives such things, is IT’S A JOKE. IT’S A FUCKING JOKE. This site, my writing, my life, my stand up, it’s all about finding humor and creating something positive from this little whorl on the planet. Get it.

I thought about removing the site, but for now it stands, while I think through some decisions.

Here’s today’s random phobia — I’m in my car in a parking garage, roof down. As I am paying, the chick in the booth is really quick to raise the gate, but then she’s slow in taking the money and counting back my change. It looks like all the cash register-type stuff is done, but she’s moving glacially (probably because she’s talking into a telephone headset). It’s been so long since the gate was raised, I’m convinced it’s on a timer and is going to crash onto me right as I pass through it. While I wait, I envision the ensuing decapitation.

Here’s today’s random nice thought — I think I like my beau, because he takes my ridiculousness at face value. Earlier I left him voice mail in which I said I was “looking for my baby” and then I formally introduced myself and babbled something stupid about needing to introduce myself, because I couldn’t be certain there weren’t other callers referring to him as their baby. I’m pretty sure he won’t hold it against me.

Here’s another random nice thought — (Jesus, two? I’m a regular ball of flaming sunshine.) Anyway in about the span of a week two different friends from two different past periods have been in touch. Always fun to hear from the past and find out what’s up in the current.

Here’s a random stupid observation — As of today, 42 people have voted as to whether I should stay or go (It’s running about 75%/25% in favor of my getting the hell out of Dodge). Of course, 42 is the answer to life, the universe, and everything. Which, incidentally, I took as a good sign when I bought my house. And, 42 is the age of a certain boy I like. So, there you are.

Here’s a random Internet tidbit (courtesy of fark.com — From the NY Post:

Luke and Katrina Grant have tied the knot � a month after he stabbed her in the chest during a drunken attack. Katrina, 36, of Warwickshire, England, needed 12 stitches after Luke, 22, attacked her for having pre-wedding jitters. “People think I’m crazy, but no one knows him like I do. I love him. He’s worth a second chance,” she said. Bill Hoffmann, Wire Services

Ahhh, womens, they sure be crazy when they in love. Thank god I’m impervious to human emotion.

(I also liked the mouse chewing and the bathroom crucifix. While I welcome a miracle, I wouldn’t want to have to tidy up for the parade of tourists.)

Finally, here are a couple of random things for anyone interested in these hear newfangled weblogs — From Time magazine, “Meet Joe Blog.” And, by way of Paul, my jesting/jousting nemesis on the bane of my comic existence (apart from open mikers), there’s Project Blog with folks doing this kind of shite for charity. Sounds like a good idea, but I’m on the fence about the requisite sleep deprivation. (I wonder how fast I could lose my job if I decided to blog for the non-profit that pays me. Somehow, I don’t think they’d groove on my complete blood red hatred of the goddamn DEMONware conversion. Not that losing my job would be a bad thing.)

Oh, and what’s up with the random blank post below?

Write the following in a list on this space about your boyfriend:

Doesn’t say “Goodbye” at the end of a telephone conversation

Sometimes ends a phone conversation so abruptly I’m not sure it’s ended

Less than 24 hours later, you receive a well-vocalized, punctuated “Goodbye” notifying the phone conversation’s end.

Hmmm. Must use this power, somehow. But, how?

So, I’m in like month two or so of the horrible computer plague known as DEMONware. As I’ve written before, it’s a bizarrely regressive system, like going all old school with an Atari set hooked up to a black and white TV. I couldn’t write any more yesterday about the time sucking, soul draining content of the meeting after meeting spiral with which the day had dawned. I couldn’t write on account of the pain, the haunting, aching throb. Here’s the deal on what I learned and needed a day to digest. Apparently, this “enterprise system” that promotes full “business integration” blah blah on it’s website is comprised of various modules that DON’T SPEAK to one another (or at least in a mutually satisfying language).

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, in the meeting we were talking about various reports that might be generated from the various databases for financial management (‘cuz, like I thought getting reports, like, you know, output, was the purpose of databases). Turns out (Even though, and here I’m just bluesky estimating, quite a few organizations, and by quite a few I mean every single fucking one of them, has to manage paying people) the payroll component (where the money comes out) doesn’t speak directly to the rest of the financial system (where the money comes from). Now grok this, will you. They aren’t sure if they can write a report that shows who got paid, how much and from what account on a single report, because those are different areas. Think about that. Imagine, a huge fucking multi-million dollar system, supporting a team of scurrying implementation experts, and quite a few well-paid consultants, for over a fucking year, and a fucking abacus is more efficient. Not only can my credit union tell me who I wrote a check to, when I wrote the check, which account was debited, and for how much, it can also provide an on-demand image of the check, all on the Internet. But DEMONware cannot tell me any obvious details, like annual salary on what account. (It will give me weekly (even for people paid monthly), and I have been advised by several implementation experts that if I multiply by 52, I will have the total. Oh.)

Words like integration, relational and fucking tools are lost in this database maze. I am not the databases’ master; I am slave, I must submit. If it tells me to open a new screen, I must. If it needs a numerical code, it is up to me to look it up on paper, as I must feed the machine. (I shit you not, after many help desk calls and discussions at meetings, they are rolling out tools to help with input and look-up and whatnot. And, what do you need when you have a fully integrated, web-based information system at your fingertips, according to the experts? Word documents to print out and hang on your wall, so that you know what fields mean.) Wasn’t there a whole magical computer movement when junk started getting, say, labeled and you, end user, could throw out your paper cheat sheet of codes? Did I dream that wonderful sense of freedom from memorizing shit and instead having intuitive tools that worked with me, the end user? Is that my Brigadoon?

But, my favoritest part of all? Imagine say a free angelfire.com or geocities.com website. Imagine a teenager with 1,000 friends, a gigantic buddy list, the ability to cut and paste every flash animation, icon, wacky font, color or widgit, available on other free sites, and full-sized jpegs galore of every day since junior high began. Now, picture that page loading, strobing banner ads and chockful of design-nightmare toys. As it loads, go make yourself a sandwich, IM thirty people, and just let that puppy load. Imagine now, a DEMONware inquiry page loading simultaneously.

GUESS which one would win?

The brightside? Thanks to this man, I now know where headquarters lie. So, if later in this life, I happen to be driving cross country, and there’s a mishap in Peoplecrap land, I will swear it’s a coincidence.

Back in the office, after a morning of back to back meetings. Same issues, same people equals a new formula for inertia. Actually, it’s the same old formula for inertia, the one where a body at rest stays at rest. In this case, no matter how many meetings you have to discuss doing something, it ain’t the same as actually doing something. Is there anywhere in the known universe where meetings are actually productive and there are direct results attributable to them? Doubt it.

By the way, I wish there were a gameshow scoreboard in every conference room. Then, whenever the same people who invariably comment or ask questions that pertain only to their tiny specific world with no translation to the larger world involving a group (you know, the people with whom you are having the meeting), you could press the scoreboard controls and create that annoying buzzer noise that universally means “wrong answer there, sport.” If I wanted to wake up early and jump into a conversation sans coffee about the one piece of paper that is important to you, I’d call you. Else, how’s about we keep it general. (The scoreboard idea is my compromise from writing that those folks could be stabbed with meeting quality, jailhouse shivs. Ever since that blogger got fired from Harvard for various unprofessional wackiness, I figure no reason to cause unnecessary suspicion over the quality and quantity of my psychotic nutbaggedness.)

And, for the chick who thinks she’s in charge, the word is “USE.” “UTILIZE” is the most over-utilized (yeah, that’s a joke) word in meetings. I don’t utilize reports I use them, the same way that I don’t utilize a spoon to eat my cereal.

I really should be trying to purge myself of a morning of meetings by actually doing something besides writing here. But, one more point of order — A big shout-out, or whatever the young people say, to a fellow D-Rob. I always knew at heart that I was an adolescent boy (thus explaining the over-active and immature libidinous thought patterns), but now I have the synchronous nickname to prove it.

Another morning and I’m up at dawn, because I never went to bed. Why? Because I was watching a stupid movie. That, and screwing around with web design. Why? How the fuck should I know.

I’ve barely made any effort all weekend to make any human contact. I was supposed to go to a party. I got in my car and drove to the neighborhood, but never parked. Sometimes, I just get so convinced that I have no ability to socialize. So, of course, I act that out and don’t socialize. I could easily be a hermit, I think. In fact, one reason I don’t spend enough time writing something “serious” is that I think I could easily step into an intellectually masturbatory haze in which I retreat from all human contact. Which, would be pretty fucked up. I would have to face that I don’t enjoy my own company THAT much.

I mean masturbation is fun and all, even the virtual, intellectual kind, but every now and again a girl’s gotta get the real deal. You know, intercourse, social and otherwise.

Tomorrow, I shall strive to not be a freakish hermit and seak some kind of company.

(The worst part, because of course this is like my junior high journal right here, is that I can’t be with the boy I like. I need physical contact to remind myself that there’s an outside world.)

For days my mind has been a jumble of contrasts: California versus New England; work-quitting; sleep-wake; man-woman; love-what? hate?; death-life, blah, blah, blah. Yeah, I know it’s bullshit, and I also know that when I get moody and introspective nothing comes of it (other than my ability to demonstrate the profound reserves of my utter bitchiness).

The weekend was a contrast to life back east, and I wasn’t prepared to jump right back into work and bad weather.

Then, there’s Pat. I was thinking about Pat, because either as a kid or an adult, I generally knew where she stood. And, then, probably more often than not, I would force my actions in the opposite way. Not just rebelliously, but deliberately, determined not to end my life with a laundry list of regrets or might have beens. I wonder what she would think about M., about my probably foregone likelihood (Jesus, could I hedge that more?) of moving west. No doubt she would be skeptical, but simultaneously open to my doing my own thing. Who knows if she’d be happy for me (of course, if she were here right now, she’d be a pain in the ass and not tip her hand, so I still wouldn’t know if she were happy for me).

It’s not so much that I feel alone or ungrounded. It’s more like I’ve lost a soundtrack, rather than, say, the actual script.

With all previous relationships with men, she wouldn’t necessarily give an outright endorsement or dismissal of the guy. No, it was an undertone, an understanding, a catch in the conversation to let me know. Actually, she was like that about every friend I ever made. Nancy, who she hated absolutely from the age of 11 into adulthood, for her, any mention would be followed by a pause, not exactly thoughtful, and maybe an intake of breath and then a flat statement of her name or whatever. Leaden, I guess would be the best characterization. By contrast, Kevin, who I also knew from junior high and am friends with to this day, would engender a pause and then questions–where was he living, where was he working, when would he be home (east), what happened to his old girlfriend and my old roommate, how is his mom? When Kevin’s dad died, she called me (a rare occurence, since she was clearly the one to be called) immediately and made sure I had all of the particulars of the services. When Nancy’s dad died, she was far more abrubt, the reference made in passing with no real push for me to attend anything. I guess, in short, subtlety was not my mother’s strong suit. You generally knew where she stood, regardless of her protestations to the contrary.

The amazing thing was she often had an uncanny knack or laser really for spotting the good ones. There were students and friends and random folks that had all the appearance of strays, and she would champion them as the underdog and find something special, and usually turn out to be quite right about them. By the time I was in college, I had met a few old students who singled her out as the teacher who stood up for them or taught them when others failed. (I used to joke with her that her annual performance reviews from school always mentioned that she was a patient teacher. My joke was that she never wasted that patience at home with her own kids, so she could have plenty at work.)

But, that same laser for identifying the misunderstood was also fucking deadly. You crossed Pat and you had an enemy for life. Back to Nancy and Kevin–interestingly when my mother, herself, died, I heard nothing at all from Nancy or anyone in her family, all of whom had met her, except the estranged father of Nancy’s child, who hadn’t actually met Pat, I don’t think. Kevin lives in California, but he stood by me virtually and essentially, calling every week or more frequently, checking in unobtrusively and just talking and being around. So, even post mortem, Pat called that all pretty correctly, the good egg and the bad.

So, what would she say about my life as it is today? The friends I have made through comedy? And, M.?

Readership down, work down, mood down.

God, I have to get out of my head, enjoy life, stop thinking. It’s 3-fucking-a.m. and I’m (a) awake and (b) moody. I hate fucking thinking when I should be sleeping. I didn’t even make time today to bitch and moan about the chick at work who was holding me responsible, because she got overpaid by accident. Um, what, you’re pissed off because why, exactly? You don’t want to lose vacation time, but you also want to keep the money you were paid when you weren’t here? And, I’m the dick?

I didn’t bitch about the moron who sent a lengthy email full of buzzwords and fatuous inaccurate details. I didn’t bitch about how a month or so into the DEMONware perversion, not all accounts are converted, and yet, once again, I have been presented with an array of +6 thousand, yes, fucking thousand, lines to proofread.

Bite me world.

First and foremost, since I ain’t got nothing against same sex couples, or what I grew up knowing only as “faggots,” I’m completely behind anyone and everyone loving and partnering with whoever they choose.

But, I’m not what you would call wicked pro marriage. I like the idea of the celebration and people proclaiming their love and commitment and monogamy and all of the good stuff in an enduring, loving partnership. I just don’t exactly see how it needs to be legally sanctioned for anyone or defined in any way. For example, if two folks who have no intention of ever fornicating want to establish themselves wholly as a household, there’s no name for that. In real life, though, that situation could be as binding or moreso than two conventionally wed folks, who filled out the right paperwork.

So, now, everyone in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts can fill out the right paperwork. Yay! And, so now, everyone in the Commonwealth must conform to the status quo and have a conventional household.

The proof of my theory: my place of employment has honored “domestic partnership” benefits. Now they will no longer. Everyone must get married to be described as a “family” and receive family benefits.

I know I am more radical than most on this issue, but doesn’t that now mean fewer choices for how we can each define our own lives? And, if so, doesn’t that mean the staid, conservative agenda of what constitutes a family (albeit now with a twist) is not only served but pushed forward?

I prefer the olden days when “living together” was the hip thing to do.

Lately, everything is just stressful shit here at the salt mines. But, today, a glimmer of hope, which undoubtedly will suck me into a vortex of despair, has flashed briefly. I’ve made a small dent in stuff due absolutely on June 1, so that brings a little light. The boss, who looked to be getting the mystery ailment that felled her for two months of whispering MIA weirdness a couple years back, looks to be recovering quickly. And, the thing I thought was sent to me and I promptly lost, which would have meant a whole lot of crow-eating, shit-eating, bowing and groveling, was in fact not sent at all.

And, why do I think I feel hope today? Because in the midst of just piled on crap heap after crap heap with two weeks featuring nights at the office as late as 11 p.m., I had an epiphanic moment. When impending failure in the work place is reaching a clanging crescendo of defeat, I reacted as one only can in those moments. I thought “FUCK IT” and went ahead and booked some plane tickets to California for Memorial Day weekend.

I worried, I wrung my hands, I obsessed on details, I sat motionless in my office unable to focus or decide on which burning pile of shit to extinguish first and surfed the Web. One credit card purchase of a mere $208.75, and my bags are all but packed.

I hope the fucking idiots in Accounting who are both culpable and among the tortured in the Demonware enterprise system shitstorm come looking for me on the whole two days I’ll be out of work. Yeah, assholes, here’s your paperwork, fly out here and get it. Better yet, just fuck off while I work on my relaxation West Coast style.