Today is boss's day. Typically I don't like getting gifts, it embarrasses me, and my people know this so they leave me out of all the gift exchanges and stuff like that. Today, however, I come back from a meeting and my desk is decorated in balloons and crepe paper. While I was in a meeting they swarmed my desk and decorated it to the hilt. Then they gave me a gift. Of couse now I'm embarrassed and my ears and cheeks are turning red so they are loving it.

They got me a new lunch cooler. The one I had was over 10 years old and looked like I pulled it from the bottom of a lake. In fact I know for a fact that one time I did exactly that after I dropped it while fishing. They got me a brand new, lighter and nicer looking cooler that has all kinds of pockets and compartments for different things.

To make it even better they packed it full of water and carrots. Since that 's mainly what I eat and drink at work is water and carrots. I thought it was a cool Boss's day gift. I think they just liked the facts my ears were red for about two hours.

Posted by: Contagion at 04:44 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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ItÂ’s the magical Karma thing. You know, you do something good for someone else and something good happens to you. I went to an off site retreat today for work. I was kind of dreading this, as these things are usually nothing more then how to be more sensitive to your employees crap. As we all know IÂ’m the most farking sensitive arsehole in my company. Thinking that is what this was going to be, I really was not looking forward to it.

It was held at a log lodge owned and operated by the local YMCA. It’s a nice location and I love the atmosphere of the place. The problem is that the heat in there is not exactly the best, but it does have two fireplaces. When I walked in the building had a good chill to it. Outside it was about 45 degrees and inside it was about 55 degrees. Everyone was complaining about the cold. I looked at the fireplace and made the offhand comment, “Well, we could always build a fire.” Our Director (Above manager) emphatically said yes, lets build a fire. Now I was just joking around, I like it cold and thought it was fine in there. But I thought, hey if they want one, I can build it. Then someone stated, “You can’t build a fire, we don’t have any fire starters or newspaper. All we have is wood.” Oh it was on. I’m a re-enactor; if I couldn’t get a fire started then I don’t deserve to call myself a re-enactor.

I look at the wood supply, nothing but big logs. Okay, no problem. I pull out my handy dandy pocketknife and get to work. I peal the bark off some of the logs, scrape the inside and get a nice bundle of fiber. As I was digging through the pile I found a birch log with some bark still on it. Score! This stuff is fire making gold. Then I used my knife to whittle off some smaller kindling and tinder. When I asked if anyone had a lighter, no one did. But they found a book of matches… that had two matches in it. Again I heard, “You’ll never get it started with only two matches and no newspaper or fire starters.”

I scoffed.

I chortled.

Hell, I even giggled.

One match was all it took. I touched the burning match to the bundle I had made and it went up faster then house set to torch in any movie. People actually cooed and awed as the bright glow of warmth spread across the fireplace. They actually took peoples pictures standing around warming themselves by it. I had a lot of people thank me and tell me that I was there hero. These were sincere thanks and actually appreciated what I did.

Then Karma set in. Not only was the retreat anything but sensitivity training, it was actually kind of fun. It got out early and I was able to hit Carlyle Brewing Co. I needed to pick up some growlers of beer to take with down to Fort Obie for my friend Will. When I got there I noticed they had some new beers, including a Walnut Stout. I couldnÂ’t help but to sample a pint. OHÂ… MYÂ… HECK. If you like their regular stout, you should get down to sample one of these before itÂ’s gone, they only ran single batch, but itÂ’s damn good.

It was a good day.

Posted by: Contagion at 05:59 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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I was talking to one of my peers at work as we were putting together an appreciation gift for our employees. We were in the middle of it when out of the blue she asks me, "What were you doing Saturday night?" My first thought was, "trying to kill off enough brain cells to not think about this place." But I responded, "Oh, just hanging out with some friends. Why?" She then tells me that she was just curious since I called her.

uh.... what???

Okay, as we all know last Saturday was the BlogCrawl. Which, I would like to personally thank each and everyone of you that participated or stopped by to see what kind of trouble I was getting into. During the time to get drunk phase of the crawl, I was down at Fritz's. After getting a damn good drunk on I decided it was time to start making some drunk calls. Hell, the only time I like talking on the phone is when I'm lit.

I started making my calls and I decided to call Boudicca to say "Hello! I'm drunk!" I picked up my phone looked her up in my directory and made my call. I start talking to her on the other line, only she has no idea who I am. I confirm using her real first name that I am indeed talking to her. And it takes forever to get her to recognize who she is talking to. She then tells me she is heading out with her husband so before I get a chance to pass the phone around to everyone, we hang up. At least five minutes of this conversation was trying to establish my identity.

I was a little hurt that Bou wouldn't recognize me to the fact I left a drunken comment on her blog about her not recognizing me on the phone. But then again I never call her so how would she recognize me. It never occurred to me that I called the wrong person. Because you know there is only one person on the planet that has that very uncommon first name of hers. (note sarcasm)

So now I have to back peddle and try to protect myself. This peer knows nothing about "Contagion" or Miasmatic Review, or the fact that I blog and apparently I made some references to myself that way. Fortunately enough for me, she and her husband were drinking too so she doesn't remember everything, that and because my phone call started a fight between her and her husband. Apparently he is the possessive and jealous type and wanted to know why another guy is calling her on Saturday night.

I guess next time I need to double check who I'm calling before I dial.

Posted by: Contagion at 06:12 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Guh, it was one of those fun days at work. Besides everyone of my football buddies confusing the hell out of me regarding what the plans were this weekend for the games (It's at Bruce's, no it's at Bob's, It's at Bruce's, Bruce has to spend time with his kid, so it's at Bob's.... etc), I also had to have one of those meetings. Actually I ended up having two of them.

You know what I mean by those meetings. Yea, the "Can I see you in my office, please close the door." meetings.

The first one was because of something I did. I guess my disgruntledness was getting the better of my tact filter in my brain and I slipped into old time Contagion. Not the "You're a farking Idiot" guy, but the one that would say things like, "You have no clue what you're talking about do you?" I guess it just irritated me that someone was preaching to me about inventory management when A) It's what I used to do for years and at one point they corporation modeled the position off of my style and B) It's from someone that has no clue about inventory management other then saying, "The inventory is too high!" Well no shite, anyone that can do basic math could figure that out. It was a fun two hour meeting.

The second one was because one of my employees did something that they really ought not to have done. I mean on a serious level. I had to get a private room for feedback and get everyone's sides of the stories and try to alleviate the situation. That was good hour long meeting that I think will result in another one tomorrow.

So from today I think I'll be seeing sensitivity class again. Or they could fire me... I don't think I'd get that lucky.

Posted by: Contagion at 04:53 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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