Today's Mood Is...

It is an interesting phenomenon (and by "interesting" I mean "something that is rattling around in my brain that I need to share with whomever feels like reading this") here in Purgatory that because one of the Brothers Chinn has a workspace in our semi-cubicle space (the other one has a private office, TYVM), whenever he is here (which varies by day dependent on weather as it pertains to the ability to golf), anyone on the phone makes it VERY APPARENT that they are working. This involves any number of possible happenings, including

• keeping the phone on speaker so that EVERYONE can hear the voice prompt system and the ensuing hold music / helpful hints from Aetna, the insurance that cares (for the sake of this entry, anything in italics is sarcasm and/or bullshite)
• placing the phone to your ear, but instead of using the option of keying in your selection when prompted, you instead speak loudly and with as much exasperation as you can possibly squeeze through your voicebox. So you hear "Claa-aims", and "Pro-VI-der"
• and as soon as you are done on the phone, immediately telling everyone how difficult the call was by talking loudly to yourself, like an angry homeless person "The next time I ask you to look up a claim you are gonna DO IT, Jack!", and the like.

Now since I am sitting at my desk posting this, it should be obvious that Golfer Chinn is off to the races, or wherever he decided he needed to be. Golfer has 3 distinct modes of dress. If he is in "dress" clothes (usually w/out the tie while he is in here, but put on in the truck before he leaves) he is going to some kind of meeting and needs to look all PRO-fessional. Casual dress (the man does love a polo shirt) usually means golf or in and out throughout the day. Then there is today's dress. In this case it was t-shirt, jeans, and sandals. He has been known to rock the shorts, both with and w/out the ability to haul cargo as well. These are wildcard days. He might be here all day, he might be here 20 minutes, he might be in a joking mood and have fun, he might be in super serious mode and if you're smart you'll keep your nose to that proverbial grindstone. He was in for about 45 minutes to an hour today. He could be back at any time. But since Private Office Chinn hasn't come in at all today, there is a very good chance that it is clear sailing for the slackers for the remainder of the shift.

And I am completely okay with that.

Today's Mood Is...

So here in Purgatory (remember, it is just like The Dungeon of Olde, except that it has windows to mock you with the freedom you are being denied by being in your assigned cubicle!), we do the billing for many different offices. I am the dental person (Gaza Strip Club had the unenviable task of trying to cover for me the 7+ months I was out, but she is back in he domain again), and it takes pretty much the entire work week EVERY week to keep up with things (minus those moments of sanity doing things like posting on your blog before your official lunch break). Approximately 99.9 out of every 100 phone calls that come in on the main line are NOT for me (since my bills all have my direct line printed on them, the vast majority of my calls come straight to me), but I will answer the phone when it rings. If it is a payment I can write down the info no problem, and other than that I usually pass that buck on to someone else and go on taking care of MY business. Well, it seems that is no longer good enough here, and now I am going to get the system installed on my computer so that I can now handle all of these calls and basically do everyone else's work, even though none of them are doing mine.

And when I am 2 weeks behind at the end of the month, they can all shut the hell up about it.

Today's Mood Is...

Unless you work the 3rd shift or you have a newborn infant, you really should never have to see 4AM on a Tuesday morning. In fact, I think that should be a federal mandate.

So when there was a loud, repeated banging on our door at 4 this morning, Wifey and I were understandably confused / concerned. 4AM is never going to bring good news. Now even before all of the crap with my feet I was never all that fast, and now I am even slower. Add to that the fact that I had taken a couple of Tylenol PMs before bed (every few days I have to do that so that I can get SOME sleep), and I was not very quick to answer the call. But when I finally got upstairs, I saw my wife and Larry the Upstairs Neighbor talking to a couple of police officers. The officers were walking away as Larry walked outside, wearing only his boxers, to move his car forward a few feet.

Why in the hell would he do this?

Because the guy who lives in the house next to us is a monumental cocksucker of the first order. Apparently he arbitrarily decided that Larry "constantly" parks too close to his Precious Snowflake-mobile, and that he "is always" scratching up his bumper.

Just so you know, that is utter bullshit. Jackass is the one who will only park in certain places so that the birds don't poop on his car and the sap doesn't damage his finish (and yet the tree is in HIS front yard!). So he will park in one of his designated spots, and I have on many occasions come out to find his car parked an ass hair off of my bumper. But it is always the other person, right Cocksmoker Jones?

I don't know if I named him in the past, but even if I did THIS is now his name.

And God forbid that he try speaking to someone like a real live human being and adult. He is incapable of walking up to Larry and saying "Do you think you could possibly not park so close to me?" Nope. It's straight up "CALL THE COPS!!!!" time with Mr. Jones.

This is the same guy who threw a shit fit because I was grilling, making a point to close all of his windows and then to call the cops because of the smoke getting into his house. I gently explained to Mr. Police Officer that I had no control over the prevailing winds, so I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do in order to appease him. The officer agreed and (after turning down my offer of a cheeseburger) left without issuing me the citation Mr. Cocksmoker thought I surely deserved. He called Animal Control so many times because of the supposed dog poop that was in my yard from my dog (even though Wifey is extremely diligent about picking it up) that Animal Control put a flag in the computer about our address and that particular complaint. They will no longer come out for that called in complaint, they just tell the caller that they will take care of it and then hang up on him (kind of like Verizon!).

Well, once I had a bit of my wits about me, I told Larry that he needed to go take pictures of both his AND Cocksmoker Jones' bumpers, and that he needed to call in the morning to get the police report number. Other than that, all we can hope for is that the cops get as tired of Mr. Jones' shenanigans as Animal Control did, and they start ignoring him, too. And THEN his car gets broken into / stolen.

Sometimes it is okay to have a petty thought or two, right?