Hablan de ella como si fuese la cura definitiva para cualquier tipo de mal, un remedio infalible para toda clase de problema, la receta de la felicidad.

Es la escusa perfecta para ningunear y ser ninguneado.
Es como una casa, se levanta como una fachada insondable que permite ocultar los rencores más profundos de los cimientos que la sostienen. Las ventanas son una invitación para visionar los defectos de los vecinos, la arrogancia con la que ensalzan sus hazañas.
Por dentro de la casa están los enseres personales, cada uno dedicado a alguien en concreto, cada uno esculpido y elaborado con egoísmo y afán de superar a los demás, porque tras la fachada de ladrillo se esconde la certeza de que uno es mejor que el resto, a pesar de la aparente humildad que expresa.

Y si, hablo de la humildad.

Nunca he sido de extremos.
En mi caso prefiero ser humildemente arrogante.
O arrogantemente humilde.

Once again I must warn you there are some medically nast pictures.  I am sure you have seen worse especially is you have given birth. But you have never seen foot cheese like this.  Just thought I should warn you.

Ok so here is a pic of my first cast coming off.  Before that I had surgical wrapping for 2 weeks.  When they took that off I didn’t look, not even for one second I knew I would never make it.   When they took this cast off I looked and that’s why there is only this one pic.   I passed out and they had to get smelling salts.  I am so cool.  Besides the point.

 So I had a massive bigger than a baseball, smaller than a softball knot of muscles on the side of my ankle because they tightened EVERYTHING in my ankle.  That is why the muscle spasms are no joke and we don’t know how much longer they will last.  The Valium is helping them as well as making me more aloof.  Heh.

OK so this is now.  It took many painful rounds with a pumice stone to clean it up, some.  This is an average, or good-looking picture.  It doesn’t look ANYTHING like it does when I get up and walk some.  My foot gets so swollen it looks like Stay Puff Marshmallow Foot.  When I wear my camboot (the huge boot/leg jail) that I am supposed to wear to help me walk, my whole foot turns purple.  It finally just calmed down today from everything I did Saturday. FOUR DAYS AGO.  Although the boot helps with the actual mechanics of walking, my whole foot feel like a giant bruise still. Sometimes I can’t even have a blanket on it.  So the boot and I have a love hate relationship.  I haven’t started physical therapy yet, we will talk about it in 3 weeks when I go back.  It was about 4weeks into PT before I could drive, so of course that goal has been pushed back.

 Swollen but not *that* bad.  I used to have an ankle. I swear.

No matter how many times I fixed this the format messed up. When I passed out it looked fine and when I woke up it was all messed up.  So I am posting it like this. Figure it out.

For today, all I EVER want is for him to send me an email (or if you are feeling really generous towards me, then a call) screaming at the top of his voice that he got his passport and that he’s taking the flight in the evening and I will see him tomorrow night!

Really.

Please.

I AM BEGGING.

Yesterday I ate only half a sandwich. In the entire day.

Oh wait. I should also tell you that I downed three big cans of beer in one hour.

I think you know where this is leading.

Yes. More ex-wife drama.

I slept fitfully, if you can call that sleep that is (I don’t).

I woke up at 3 AM to check my email. Nothing.

I woke up at 5 AM to check my email. Nothing.

At 6:30 AM I woke up with a start because I had been dreaming this dream where it’s Ray-ray (wtf?) who comes to visit me and tell me that she’s not coming back to India and she wanted to tell me in person and she’s sorry she hurt me. And then goes on to tell me that he’s (um…what?) very confused but he has made this decision. And so not only I had vacuum tummy in real life, I had vacuum tummy in my dreams too.

I feel nauseous. I really do. Am I preggo?I feel THAT nauseous. I am hoping it’s just because of yesterday that my stomach is SCREAMING for some real food with carbs so that it can sustain my body.

Then I went up to check my email and THANK GOD FOR SMALL MERCIES there was an email from Pilot. He was using his friend’s computer. His own laptop will come on Tuesday, overflowing with SPYWARE I am 100% sure!!!!

What I don’t get is this pansy behavior on Pilot’s part. He fucking every time lets her call the shots? EVERY FUCKING TIME? I mean, I just don’t get it!!! Yes they were married for 18 years, but seriously WHAT THE FUCK? She uses the kids EVERY FUCKING TIME to twist his arm. And then she gets him to send me emails that say that we are through. This has happened before.

Honestly, I am so sick of her behavior. Hurting is one story, using your kids is another. People like her don’t deserve kids. Honestly.

But wait, I am not done with my rant. He has no fucking balls to put his foot down??? Why does he let her do this EVERY TIME?

He seriously has no balls!

He has no guts to do the right thing!

THEY ARE DIVORCED!!!!!!!!!!!!! And she is still ruling his life? WTF?

I didn’t reply to his email because I am afraid that I will rant like I am ranting here. And right now, as hard as it may be (and trust me. It is VERY VERY VERY hard) I am trying to be supportive and understanding.

All I want for him to say is I AM NOT SENDING ANY EMAILS TO HER AND I AM NOT TELLING YOU THAT WE ARE BREAKING UP. If you want to take the kids away, so be it. I will contact my lawyer so that it’s legal that they will spend all their time with me when I next come back for my three-week rotation and then you won’t be able to do anything about it. Call her bluff. What the fuck does she mean she won’t let him see the kids? She CANNOT do that unless she has proof that he’s physically hurting them.

I can’t believe he’s acting like such a brain-dead person. I can’t believe that he’s dancing to her tunes.

And I just can’t relate to that. Where is the strength you showed when you were here? All gone in the air, huh? Are you one of pansies who are strong only when the other person is weak? Can you not stand up for yourself? Can you not fight back?

I mean, I don’t consider myself a strong woman, but Jesus H, look at me!

And I’m a girl!!!!!!!!!!!

IN INDIA!!!!!!!!!!!

And I still fought for the things I wanted. And yes it was difficult but I did it.

WHAT THE FUCK?!

I have no idea what will I say to him when he calls me this evening. Because it’s Tuesday morning and she’ll go to work and he will have some fucking peace. See? He’s acting like a 12-year old trying to steal cookies, which is not right.

I don’t ask him to throw our relationship in her face at all.

Heck, I am even with him when it comes to laying low.

BUT DEAR LORD IN HEAVEN SHOW SOME SPINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Am I wrong here?

For some reason I feel compelled to weigh in on this situation with Nic and the TSA.  I do not usually get involved in so called “Twitter Drama” or “Mommy Wars”  or any of the like.  For one, my opinion is usually NOT of the norm, and I am not a shit starter.  Not my style, because when I fight it gets ugly.  I border on a hippie mentality.  Peace man.  Also twitter fighting is so Summer 2009.  I also believe there are three sides to every story.  The truth is usually what is left out.  It may be huge differences or small discrepancies, but things are usually left out or misinterpreted on both sides.     However I have (or had) a relationship so to speak with Nic.  I am close to this.  My name was posted on some sites with hers.  This affects me in many ways.  This post is not for hype or bashing.  It to try to express my feelings to my friends.

Now granted I never RT’ed, commented, or was outraged about this from the beginning.  Basically because of what I stated above and I am not the type to jump on the band wagon. (Just because I didn’t RT, doesn’t mean I have not been affected by the situation.)   I also am a regular reader of Nic’s and I chat with her through email and on twitter daily, even multiple times throughout the day. (Yes, I am on the computer that much.  No it is not awesome.  I am slowly recovering from my second ankle surgery.)  So I know she is an emotional writer, I know she suffers from anxiety, I know she has been looking for a publicist, I know she is working on book deals including fiction, and I know she will RT the dog shit out of something she feels passionate about.  So honestly I always figured it was over dramatic, that’s her style.  It’s funny as heck when she is writing a story about her family and can come off as very aggressive when she feels she’s been wronged.  I don’t have to agree with everything someone else says in order to have a relationship with them.  I mean hello, I AM married.  I was sure that whatever went down was traumatic and stressful for her & Jackson and that if in fact laws were broken, justice would be served.  If it were my child I would see to it.  With or without the Internet.  Talking of moving on would not happen if someone wronged my child.

I was SHOCKED to see the huge differences in the TSA’s video and Nic’s story.  I mean, my chest gets tight every time I watch it, I get anxious thinking I am going to see something.  Catch the flub or glitch.  Prove Nic right.  I never in a million years would have thought the video would be so far off.   I know nothing of video equipment, CCTV, or editing, so I have no clue how it could be altered.  I do know that I am not a conspiracy theorist and that the TSA has done much worse and been caught.  The likelihood that the video is doctored seemed out there to me.   I kept waiting all day to see Nic’s response, but I knew she was traveling and it would have to wait.  I knew she had a lot to digest before she could properly address the situation fully.  I figured either she was going to say it was doctored or apologize and explain her anxiety had gotten the best of her.

Then came Nic’s rebuttal.  If you can call it that.  It was disjointed and confusing, at times not even sounding like herself.  I can’t imagine what the last 24 hours were for her because of the trolls.  (Not the people disagreeing with her, but people saying she is a drug addict lunatic and remarking on her tattoos.)  However, I expected more.  Way more.  She had ample time to get things together, a lot is on the line here.  Serious accusations have been made, people put their faith in you, helped you, defended you, it was time to validate them.  The theme from the original post was SO strong that the TSA TOOK Jackson, yet it is hardly addressed in the rebuttal.  We need to know what you mean by “being handled between my family and the TSA” because later on you state you haven’t spoken to the TSA.  WTF?   Show the phone records, you can screen shot that in five minutes.  This should be black and white.  Were you on the phone or not?  I think you get my point without having to rip it any further apart.  I am disappointed.  I expected an articulate, well thought out response covering all the angles.  Instead it was all so vague. If she felt like her anxiety got that best of her and she was annoyed as well and it got out of control, say that.  Owning up to it is better in my book than turning on the fog machine.  If you guys are going through legal actions and you can’t speak or be honest, at least say that, because what was posted made the situation worse, and I am saddened by that.  I kept reading it and re-reading it trying to figure it out and piece it together, but I just can’t. 

I kept thinking I was going to get a secret DM or email explaining the “real” story or bottom line from Nic.  There are a group of us on twitter and the blog world who have invested friendships with her and deserve more than this.  I can understand being a little under the radar for the masses…but it’s me Nic.  It’s me and Jenn, Issa, and Jenna and many others who need to be able to stand behind you and hold you up.  Where is our explanation?  Where is our personal apology?  Because THIS will not do.   Perhaps I am foolish for thinking our interactions, conversations, stories, and secrets we shared meant friendship.  I don’t know, I am new within the last year to blogs and twitter but I can tell you I hold myself to the same measures online as I do IRL.  I try to make friends with people who I believe hold the same standards.  I am afraid I was wrong this time.

I know some people think she did say the video was doctored and we should not further question that.  We should be rallying and fighting the trolls, but all the other stuff mucked up what could be the truth.  I waited for her to speak her peace before I judged either way.  Unfortunately she made me doubt her.    She forced me to have to concede to the haters.  It caused some very close people around me to suffer from trolling and worst of all their feelings are hurt.  Some of my friends are fragile, and sensitive and I don’t like for them to feel betrayed and hurt.  I am talking about Nic too.  I know she is feeling awful.  There is no good to come of this.  No one wins.  She has had an extremely rough two days.  Yes, she brought it on herself, to an extent.  But for people to say she is a drug addict, bad parent, or money-grubbing whatever and whatever other revolting lies is just un-called for.  Speak your peace, disagree, throw in a curse word if you have to, I understand, but there is a line.  She will pay a heavy price for what has happened.  It is not up to me to see that carried out.  Everyone is entitled to their feelings and opinions on this, especially her “friends.”  So sadly I will not comment on her blog and stand up for her or send an email making sure she is supported, because her friends need her support through this but it’s not there.  You would be amazed by how far the truth could have gone with my amazing group of friends. 

I run with this crowd because we encourage each other and hold each other up.  We cheer for each other and want to see one another succeed.  We support each other because that’s what strong women do.  We love each other because it comes naturally for us to do so.  I am sorry Nic will be missing out on now, but we deserve to be treated more fairly than that.

Basically, this all just really sucks.

Eles dizem que nos amam,

Mas tudo é uma grande mentira.

Eles dizem que querem o melhor para nós,

Mas tudo é uma grande mentira.

-

Eles querem que façamos boas escolhas,

Mas querem que sejam as dos desejos deles.

Eles dizem que somos livres,

Mas na verdade só nos aprisionam mais.

-

Eu já estou cansada de brigar e chorar,

Mas é o único jeito.

Deixando as lágrimas rolarem,

Eu me impeço de fazer algo pior.

-

É triste, admito.

É uma grande depressão.

Mas quem nunca ficou abaixo do nível do mar

Ao menos uma vez na vida?

Winola Weiss.

Being and IT professional, one thing that comes default is SUCKING!!

Team members get sucked by managers or vice versa, but in each project you’ll find atleast one guy who is being SUCKED !! When do you feel its sucking?

• Money Matters : When your bread and butter for IT I would be say your movies and shopping is not what you thought of. If you are unable to view film at PVR/INOX or buy LCD because of budget constraint, fasten your seat belt. Your project/company is sucking you.
• View : If early morning you get up and you feel like wearing just anything and if it becomes a routine , you need to think again. If you neighbourhood(I mean your desk/cubicle) dosent has a single beauty/handsome looking hunk its useless to go and work for such a project/company. Man you should switch!!!
• Eating Habits : If your canteen/food court/cafetaria dosent offer a wide range of eatables, trust me you are working at wrong place. Do you remember, empty stomach even you cant sit and say SAI NAAM…then how the hell could you even think of working man.
• Managers : Yes, those are someone “reduntant for IT” but still they exist I wonder HOW?? But if your manager is working and working and not delegating… boss you are caught at wrong place. Login into naukri.com and monsterindia.com and search two jobs one for you and another for your manager
• No Parties : Yes, parties are our BIRTHRIGHT. For every small sucess you have the full right to get TREATED by you managers. If no party he is sucking you !!

What else do you think of?

Pilot left last night. He’s gone for his three week rotation. He’ll be back on October 24.

24 days without him. Few emails and even fewer phone calls.

Today is Day # 1. I am sounding like this is Day # 1 from a break-up.

It’s far, far away from a break-up.

I spent the day with him yesterday. And in the night when I left, it took all I had to not cry.

… though I did once I was in the cab.

His flight was at 1:10 AM and we were talking till the very end.

Thankfully, he got upgraded to business class.

I’ve never, EVER traveled in business class. I’d like to one of these days.

Tonight I am going to Josie and Tallman’s place. I think it is perfect because otherwise I would have just killed myself thinking about him.

I miss him way too much.

But look at it this way – only 23 more days to go! Easy-peasy right?

Yea right!

We finally said bye, see you soon last night and then about a minute later, he called me again. Because it was finally settling in that he wouldn’t be able to see me for the next 24 days (23 now!).

I am sad. And I get a bit teary-eyed and choked up when I think about it.  But I think it will be okay. I must ask Pitterpatter for tips. I know there’s just one tip – KEEP BUSY.

Work’s been lousy lately. I have not felt like working here for some time now. Oh I think from the day I joined I felt like this. But now I feel like that even more. Though the progress on the other project is going well.

It’s my birthday in 13 days. And after 10 days of that, Pilot will be home. I envision that sweet day! Of course I will go and pick him up at the airport. Wild horses wouldn’t be able to stop me.

Can I hibernate and wake up 23 days later?

Yes, I will miss my own birthday and diwali and Josie’s birthday but I don’t care. At least I won’t miss him so much.

Alcohol, you’re going to be my BEST friend, ever!

Again the weekend with the Pilot. And like always, this one wasn’t without drama either.

Pilot was supposed to come back Friday morning. This was the plan till Wednesday night. Thursday morning/afternoon, he’s being told that he won’t be sent back Friday and that he has to do a flight on Friday and then he’ll fly back Saturday night.

When the Pilot told me this on Thursday night, I blew my top off! Of course, not at him but god how many f***ing times is this going to happen? I plan my days around his schedule only to have his schedule change last minute which leaves on hanging in between, wasting days and moments and of course, let’s not even talk about how BAD it feels to have your hopes squashed!

This time Pilot was sick of it too. You see, according to the original plan, he was supposed to fly out back with me on Monday. Which didn’t happen. Then he was supposed to come home on Tuesday, which didn’t happen and now this.

So we decided to do what any normal, frustrated, angry as a red ember person would do. He called in sick.

On Friday morning. I had told him to just go to dispatch in the morning and just get on the morning flight and come back home. He said no no I have to confirm it with dispatch and then wait for someone to cover my shift. I’m like Dude, you’re sick! You shouldn’t have to care who does your shift, because YOU. ARE. SICK! So stop this holier than thou and just come back home already. He still wasn’t comfortable taking the morning flight, so I said fine, take the later flight. The later flight, turns out, wasn’t till 5 PM.

WTF?!

Then I suggested that I’ll book a ticket for him on another airlines and he can get it reimbursed (at this point, I really didn’t care about the reimbursement). All this is happening in the night, okay? He’s like wait for my call in the morning and then go and book a ticket.

In the morning, basically anything that could have gone wrong, did!

It continued to rain cats and dogs.

• Rain = Traffic jams.
• One major airlines’ pilots went on strike so all the passengers were shifted to other flights.
• Which meant, ALL FLIGHTS WERE BOOKED!
• I got stuck in traffic for 3 hours!!!
• In between I wanted to go pee.
• Have you tried to hold your pee for an hour? Trust me, not something that you’d want to do EVER IN YOUR LIFE AGAIN!
• At one point, it was either knock on a stranger’s house and ask if you could use his/her bathroom or pee your pants. I chose the former.
• Luckily, there was a community center 200 meters from where my car was stuck in traffic.
• PEEING AFTER HOLDING IT FOR AN HOUR = PRICELESS! (Mastercard, you’re welcome!)
• Reached the airport 3 hours later only to find out that there was no flight available till 8:45 PM to bring back Pilot.
• Hung around the airport till 3 PM in the hope that something might open up. Nothing did.
• Finally booked the flight that was supposed to reach back Delhi at 11 PM. I said to Pilot I don’t care what happens, I’m getting you back home TODAY!
• I think lady luck finally gave up being a sadistic b***h because Pilot called to say that his airlines people were trying to get him on a flight that will leave at 5 PM. Which means he would be home by 7 PM.
• I went home to wait for his call. Even if they couldn’t, he still had the 8:45 PM flight. That was Plan B.
• Thankfully, at 4 PM, we were told that we wouldn’t need a Plan B.
• When Pilot walked out of the airport at 7:15 PM, guess who was shining the brightest? You’re right!
• I felt dizzy, I was SO HAPPY.

The weekend was proceeding great till last night. We were enjoying early afternoon happy hours in one of the pubs near his house when he went to the restroom. While he was gone, I sent him a text saying You make me SO happy. I love you! I thought it would be a nice surprise for him when he got back.

He gets back. Checks his cell phone. Sees the message. Then immediately goes back to the main screen. I act innocent and ask him who is it? What’s the text? What’s happening?

Now grab your bowl of popcorn because this is where it starts getting very, very… MESSY!

He refuses to show me the message (normally he always does!) and doesn’t even tell me who it is. In my head I’m just like whoa why are you acting weird dude? I know it’s my text because I JUST F***ING SENT IT! Why are you not admitting that it’s my text? What’s your deal?

After numerous attempts, Pilot still doesn’t tell me anything. We go get some more beers and once we’re back home, he drops the bomb.

He thought it was the HP Girl.

WHAT THE…WHO THE…WHAT THE…. WHAT????????????

Yes, the HP Girl who he once met in the HP store where he bought his new laptop and then ran into again in Spencer’s where she does some part-time shift. The HP Girl who’s been asking him to take her to the bank (why? don’t you have money for a rickshaw? what did you used to do before you asked the Pilot to be your ‘escort’ eh?) and then something something. And why did he think it was the HP Girl?

Wait for it.

BECAUSE SHE HAD EARLIER SENT HIM A I LOVE YOU TEXT.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WHAT IN THE NAME OF THE DEVIL ARE YOU F***ING TALKING ABOUT?

He *tried* to explain to me that this was way earlier when he had just met her and he dismissed it because he’s like how can someone say that when she doesn’t even know him blah, blah, blah. And I’m just like… seeing red, flipping out, stomach hit the ground and repeat.

I was still reeling from this shock when he dropped another bomb. Oh yes, apparently he wasn’t done yet!

He had taken her to the bank.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!… you know how this goes…!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HE HAD TAKEN HER TO THE BANK?

And… while they were waiting, it was lunch time and he was hungry and so they went to McDonalds where he treated her.

!!!!!!!!!! okay okay, so eating at McDonalds does not really deserve exclamation marks.

But honestly, at that point, I was seeing red and if it were possible, smoke would have been blowing out of my ears. But you know that’s not possible.

I just went ballistic.

What the fuck’s happening? The girl tells you she loves you and you still don’t get it?

I’m just trying to be a nice guy.

OHHHHHHH MAN, this has Richard written all over it.

The Ex Part 2. Where he had to be a nice guy all the time. So went super bitch used to call him at 1:30 in the night because there’s no one else in my cab and I don’t like traveling alone, won’t you please come pick me up and drop me back home? I told him that I smelled something fishy. But obviously The Ex Part 2 pish-poshed it away saying that she was just a friend and that he wasn’t interested in her.

Fast forward to 3 months later, she’s got him hooked by playing damsel in distress and his man ego LOVES the feed from the damsel and soon MY BOYFRIEND is going around telling other people that HE THINKS I HAVE FEELINGS FOR HIM SO WOULD THEY PLEASE NOT TELL ME ABOUT HIM AND SUPER BITCH BECAUSE HE THINKS THAT THAT WILL HURT ME.

I tell you, I sure know how to pick them!

What ensued after that was a lot of arguing and screaming (me) and a lot of explaining (him) and eventually tears (him again) because I had been hurt.

THAT’S F***ING RIGHT. I AM HURT AND I AM ANGRY.

So in my angry state, I wrote him this email:

This morning when I woke up, instead of starting my day with happy thoughts of you, I was filled with anxiety, dread, and felt very uncomfortable. I know we talked a lot about this yesterday, but we never did reach any conclusion.

• I started running again. Ran for 5 minutes and then felt like my lungs were on fire and I couldn’t breathe AT ALL! Ugh. And to think I could run for 30 minutes straight. Okay, okay. 20 minutes. Stamina? You’re my bitch. (I’ve used that phrase so many times before and yet to this day I don’t know what EXACTLY it means! Do you?)
• Thanks to my mind-numbingly exhausting interesting Libra personality, I find myself constantly yo-yoing to find a balance. Be it work or personal life. And when there is a boy involved, it’s like I am manufacturing yo-yos. That analogy sounded much better in my head.

  ANYWAY. Yesterday was a very…. uncomfortable day for me. Our original plan would have seen the Pilot and I coming back to Delhi in the morning and then spending the day at his place and coming back home in the night. Instead, thanks to a call on Sunday night, Pilot was asked to swap his morning flight duty with another Pilot’s Monday evening duty. So it was only me who traveled back to Delhi on Monday morning and went home. Feeling alone.

  And lonely. VERY lonely.

  Now, I am tempted to give full marks to PMS for making me feel like the layer of scum that comes after the layer of shit and so blue that I don’t think they have a RBG combination for that shade of blue. I would not be kidding if I said that I felt borderline nervous breakdown. I had all these feelings for the Pilot and no one to share them with. I felt lonely and I felt cheated. Because he didn’t ask me before he said yes to swapping the shift. True, the other pilot said that he was feeling ill and wanted to be home, but c’mon! It is your RESPONSIBILITY to check with me because I have taken a day off for you. Changing plans without even asking? SO NOT COOL! Sunday night was a bit of pickle because I was really upset and I told him so. I am ashamed to say that I made him cry. It was a funny feeling at that point. It broke my heart to see tears in his eyes because he thought that I was mad with him but at the same time I was still just as upset with the situation.

  So yesterday was a complete waste of a day-off.

• In the evening, a little light bulb went off and I remembered that I had to visit my thyroid doctor A MONTH BACK and maybe, just maybe a tiny reason behind me feeling wretched might be my thyroid? He took a blood test. The results will come in today evening.
• I finally called Tin Tin and asked him to come meet me. I was tired of feeling this mushy, sad, love-sick puppy with insecurities swarming around me like bees around honey and I needed some guy time. Yes, I sometimes consider myself a guy. Don’t say anything.
• A beer and a cig (I’m sorry! but yesterday was truly epic) and 30 minutes with Tin Tin later, I felt better.
• Both of us decided that I was losing the balance in my life. Ever since I met the Pilot, I’ve done everything, went out of my way to make sure that I spend all my time with him. Which, regardless of how much he loves me (yes, we are now actually saying that to each other!) is just not healthy. Balance has been lost and balance needs to be restored.
• So we decided that since weekends I would mostly be spending with the pilot, I must, must, MUST make it a point to meet Josie, Pitterpatter, Tallman during the week as much as possible.
• A distraction is definitely needed. In terms of additional responsibilities at work, in terms of additional helping out with friends, and most importantly IN TERMS OF ME!
• I’ve lost track of the me time. I can’t remember when was the last time I did something good for myself. Working out is priority # 1 now. I’m also trying to schedule a consultation meeting with a doc for liposuction.
• Liposuction –  I never thought I’d consider it. I am not sure I’ll even go ahead with it but I am willing to consider it. Because the fat stomach? can definitely use some help. The workout is going to continue, but any additional help I can get, I will take. The Pilot is in excellent shape and while he loves my body, there’s no harm in upgrading his subscription, is there? I just laughed out loud on that sentence!
• I forgot to practice running, striking a balance, giving myself some TLC, paying attention to my friends and this is why yesterday happened. It was an ugly, knee-jerking, jarring wake up call.
• I have to practice.

Ever since the last week of August, I have no work to do at work.

This does not mean that I finished the instructor’s manual. But I am just not excited enough about this anymore.

What’s more is that they here have no clue about where to go next. What to do? Do we scale up in the same industry or do we skip to other industries. They don’t know. And till the time they find out, I will have no work. Now some might say that it is actually a good thing because it just means I come to work and finish whatever little work I have and then spend the rest of the time searching for another job goofing around. And yes, in theory it does sound wonderful. Except that 1. I don’t like it when I don’t have enough work and 2. I don’t have people here to goof around with.

Plan fail.

The Pilot and I have been wonderful lately! This last weekend, I was with him from Thursday evening till Sunday night!!!! And what a weekend it was! I took a day off from work on Friday. I met up with him on Thursday and according to the original plan, he was not supposed to work on Friday. But when I reached, he told me that they had put him on a Friday morning shift that would have taken him to Cal and back to Delhi on Saturday morning. Do you know it hurts when you jaw hits the ground? Yea, neither did I!

Anyway, crazy people that we are, we booked a ticket for me to accompany him!!!!!!!!!!

YES!

TO CALCUTTA!

LAST MINUTE!

SPENT Rs.9000!!!!!!!!!!!

LAST MINUTE!

DID YOU GET THAT? LAST MINUTE TRIP TO CALCUTTA!

And yes it sounded crazy but also wonderful at the same time. Being with Pilot in a 5-star hotel with free alcohol from 6 PM – 8 PM, dinner on the house in the wonderful, lazy, noisy city of Calcutta? HELL YEA!

Come Friday morning, we get up at 4 AM. Yes! FOUR IN THE MORNING! Ugh!

Got out of the house by 4.30 AM. There was another Indian older pilot in the car already when we got on. I have never done the walk of shame, guys, but I am sure this is what it feels like!

Anyway, Pilot was his sweet, charming, sexy (SO F***ING SEXY IN HIS UNIFORM) self. Held my hand…absently kept rubbing it while talking to the other pilot. I of course had swallowed my tongue!

At the airport, I am about to check-in, when Pilot calls on my cellphone. I’m like hey let me call you back, I am about to check-in. He’s like no, no, don’t check in. The plane I was supposed to fly is broken and it looks like they might send me home.

WTF???????????????????????

Something to do with the temp of the engine blah, blah, hot pilot talk.

So, okay, what do you want me to do now? How soon will you know? My flight leave in 45 minutes. He’s like I’ll try and find out.

My only worry at that point was that my flight will leave and then I won’t be able to get any refund and then they will declare that he can fly his plane and then he’ll be gone and I’ll be alone at the airport and just go back home to my lonely bed!!!!!

Pilot, the sweet thing that he is, came to my terminal to wait with me. We walked hand-in-hand looking for a place to sit, while making quite a pair. I mean, every one there turned to look at us. Okay maybe not every one. But for sure 90% of the people did. There were these two guys, who are walking HAND-IN-HAND towards the RESTROOM… go inside come out STILL HOLDING HANDS and then one nudges the other and points at us and the other looks at us and then there is this weird smile on their faces……..

YOU ARE THE WEIRDOS YOU F***ING MORONS WHO ARE WALKING HAND-IN-HAND INTO THE RESTROOM AND THEN WALK OUT STILL HOLDING HANDS AND YOU DARE LOOK AT US AND LAUGH?

The clock declared 7:30 AM. We had been there for 1.5 hours. We’re talking and laughing (we really have a GREAT time together!) and we’re getting turned on (again!) and there are looks that are exchanged that tell each other just what we’d like to do to each other if we were given a chance RIGHT THERE. So yea, an otherwise pickle situation but I didn’t feel it because he was there and he didn’t feel it because i was there. We make a good team.

No, I am not in love with him. Stop.

After another 45 minutes of waiting, he gets a call from his first officer (you tell me that it does not sound sexy and I will send you off to whichever planet you came from!). The flight has been canceled and he can go back home.

YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!

The 9000 has gone down the drain but YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!! Pilot said we’ll just eat the ticket. With salt and pepper.

Saturday was pretty uneventful… I think… I mean of course there were earth-shattering moments there…and massages and loads of beer and food and wait… I cooked PASTA! And Pilot’s roommate pilot make meatballs (yum!) and a third Pilot came to eat dinner with us.

And then all of us went to Rockman’s. Where, unknown to me, the third Pilot, we’ll call him Goliath, was flirting with me. I was just being nice to him, but it turns out, as Pilot told me when we came back home that he actually thought that something would happen between him and me!

WTFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF??????????????

Does Goliath Pilot does not know that I am with the Sexy Pilot? Pilot says yes he does, but then I was all flirty and I almost screamed I was not flirting with him. I was just being nice and helping him figure out where he could meet women and if he needed assistance then Pilot and I could go with him!!!

Apparently in Goliath Pilot’s world it means yeah I’m game, come jump me!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Pilot and I had a little bit of showdown on that where he was like I don’t blame you but you have to realize what guys actually think when you do this and this and this and that and that and that. And I’m like I am sorry but you do realize that I have a brain of my own and I HAVE done this and this and this and that and that and that my ENTIRE life and made loads of GUY FRIENDS and not lead a life of a hooker, so yea I am sorry but it looks like there’s something wrong with your friend. And I am ashamed to say that I cried. I think it was the combination of beer plus lack of sleep plus the knowledge of wasting 9000 being stirred in the backburner of my mind, and something that went cuckoo in my brain. But Pilot being the MAN that he is, just gathered me in his arms and hushed me and stroked my hair and kissed me tenderly and said that he’s sorry he made me cry and that he’ll take care of all this mess and just that I should just not flirt/be nice to the Goliath Pilot and he’ll make sure that no one touches ‘HIS GIRL’.

Who ever said make-up sex is awesome, didn’t know shit! it’s not awesome! It’s FANTASTICALLY SPECTACULARLY FABULOUS! *HUGE GRIN*

Sunday – I am getting ready to leave from his place to go to Josie and Tallman’s place and he’s getting ready to go and meet the Goliath Pilot and Roommate Pilot at the steak and beer place when suddenly he gets a call. The number shows that it is the Roommate Pilot, but when the Pilot answers it is some Indian guy who answers telling him that Roommate Pilot has been in a motorcycle accident!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes! Just when you thought this could not get any more crazy, it just did. The shit hit the fan!

Thankfully, the cab I had called for arrived in 15 minutes and we were on our way to the hospital. The first plan was to drop him off to where he had left his bike the previous night and from there he would carry on to the hospital and I to Josie and Tallman’s place. But it just didn’t feel right… I mean… I have gotten to know the Roommate Pilot a little bit now. So I asked that is it okay if I come to the hospital and then later drop him off to where his bike was? He’s like I wanted to say that but didn’t know how!!! See? See? We just work so well together it is scary. No, I am not in love with him.

We reach the hospital and Roommate Pilot has a LOT of ugly bruises all over his face, his arms. He’s nose is like Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer. Except that it’s blood and not because it was cold there. Ugh. He said he felt that he might have broken his shoulder and some ribs. They took his CT and X-Ray. Sure enough, he had fractured his collarbone. In three places!!!!! The stupid hospital people did not seem too competent to begin with and our suspicions were confirmed when they suggested surgery. Roommate Pilot said NO WAY JOSE! Earlier he had been to this other hospital that is in sector 51 in Gurgaon (name withheld) that had given really great assistance to him. So he said he’s going to take a second opinion from another doctor. Checking out of Hospital A took 2 hours! And 10,000 trips from the room to reception 1 to reception 2 to lab reports room to reception 2 to reception 1 back to the ER and so on and so forth. Pilot and I were getting so tired of all this running around, but then again, guess why it felt like a breeze? Yep! THE TEAM. Him and me. We even managed to make Roommate Pilot laugh with a joke about the Pilot being his domestic ‘partner’. Anyway, by the time we got into the other hospital it was already 4 PM! No one had eaten anything. Roommate Pilot had refused to eat anything so far, but finally relented at the new hospital. The three of us got a subway each. Again, there were 5000 trips from the lower basement pharmacy to the 5th floor pharmacy and the payment counter and the doctor’s office and here and there. The good part was that they said that he DIDN’T NEED ANY SURGERY. That he just needed to put on a shoulder brace that will make sure that he doesn’t move his shoulder much and take some meds and three weeks will do their magic and he will be healed.

PHEW!

I have to be honest, I was pretty shook up when I heard surgery!

Plus, they said we could take him back home and there was no need for him to stay the night. With this good news, some food in our tummies, everyone was looking just a wee bit better.

By the time we got back home, it was 6 PM! Everyone was T-I-R-E-D! So Roommate Pilot took his painkillers and was down for the day/night.

The Pilot and I…well… I guess we really like each other… really, really like each other way too much. And now with some fresh beers (what? after all that hard work, we had literally EARNED our beers) and some food, we were feeling good and ready to go. So. That’s what we did.

It was 8:30 PM when I finally took a cab to my home.

Crazy weekend? YOU BET YOUR ASS IT WAS!

And now, on to future plans.

According to his schedule, he is supposed to be in Calcutta this weekend. They fly him on Saturday morning, he stays there Sunday and then he comes back Monday morning.

Plus.

He goes back to the States on September 18 for his 3-week rotation. Which actually might be a 4-week thing because of his training in between.

So then, we can’t just sit back and stay away for a weekend, now can we? Well maybe you can, but I can’t!

So!!!!!!!

Too Nice works for the same airlines except that he’s in back office. I checked rates online and they are about Rs. 7000. Too Nice is going to find out if he can get me a discount. And if he can and if the tickets cost me Rs. 5000, guess who is going to Calcutta on Saturday morning ON THE SAME FLIGHT AS THE PILOT!!!!!!!!!

Oh, please Universe. It would be so grand!

Plus, thanks to my sneaky mind and my not to cluttered work schedule, I’ve managed to arrange a meeting with my vendor in Gurgaon in the first half. And I am trying to go over to his place tomorrow evening. So Thursday evening, Friday half day (after my meeting), Saturday and Sunday! This will be the third weekend that I will not be with my family or with Josie/Tallman. And yes, I feel a little bad, but you know what, when he’s gone, I’ll be with them every other day!

So yeah… all in all… no work these days? it isn’t so bad, now is it?!

Also, I’ve spent more than one hour writing this post and making it look at least a wee bit interesting, so ahem, Mr. Stats? please show me some love!

Why must IT block all the good websites.  It makes no sense that even the lottery website is blocked.  How long can someone possibly spend on a site to check 6 numbers?

by Jozef Racekar

Drew looks at me, I fake a smile so he won’t see
That I want and I’m needing everything that we should be
I’ll bet she’s beautiful, that girl he talks about
And she’s got everything that I have to live without

Drew talks to me, I laugh ‘cause it’s just so funny
That I can’t even see anyone when he’s with me
He says he’s so in love, he’s finally got it right,
I wonder if he knows he’s all I think about at night

[Chorus:]

He’s the reason for the teardrops on my guitar
The only thing that keeps me wishing on a wishing star
He’s the song in the car I keep singing, don’t know why I do

Drew walks by me, can he tell that I can’t breathe?
And there he goes, so perfectly
The kind of flawless I wish I could be
She’d better hold him tight, give him all her love
Look in those beautiful eyes and know she’s lucky cause…

[Repeat Chorus]

So I drive home alone, as I turn out the light
I’ll put his picture down and maybe
Get some sleep tonight

He’s the reason for the teardrops on my guitar
The only one who’s got enough of me to break my heart
He’s the song in the car I keep singing, don’t know why I do
He’s the time taken up, but there’s never enough
And he’s all that I need to fall into..

Drew looks at me, I fake a smile so he won’t see.

photo: Jozef Racekar

I know my manners. See there? I said please. I always say pleases and thank-yous. For the past many, many, many years I’ve been busy being an awesome friend, a great person, and a good daughter.

SO WHY OH WHY HAVE THE TOOTH DEVILS DECIDED TO HAVE A PARTY IN MY MOUTH?

Is it just me or did that sound a bit…um..objectionable? Whatever.

It started on Sunday afternoon. Sunday is the day that all doctors and dentists (they are different from doctors! Have you seen The Hangover yet?!) take the day off. So I took some painkillers that he prescribed to me last time I went to see him and he diagnosed it as ’slight inflammation’.

Monday morning, I’m going out of my mind. My tooth felt like ants were scraping it away from inside while huge elephants danced on it from outside. I was in a meeting showing the various elements of the course to the headhoncho and big boss and other team members and all I could do to keep myself from shouting out in pain was to drink ice cold water and keep it on the left side of my mouth. It gave me some relief.

As soon as the meeting got over, I told boss man that I’m outta here because if I am not, you will have to roll my dead body to my house because THIS BLASTED TOOTH IS MAKING ME CROSSEYED WITH THE PAIN. I think everyone in the room went quiet for a little while. I wouldn’t know, my ears were full of the elephant pounding. Apparently they also had drums with them. The elephants, not the team.

Took a cab back home and on the way asked the driver to stop at a pharmacy. It took him TWENTYFUCKINGMINUTES to find out. I had almost passed out from the pain.

Yesterday, I took 10 painkillers in a matter of 5 hours. And by the time I got to the dentist, I was literally in tears. In my mind, I was like I prefer dying to bearing this pain so help me God, you will never find a willing person more willing than me! Of course since I was praying to the wrong team (I should have had a conversation with Satan and he would have hopped and skipped his way and taken my soul away!), all I got was you are in way too much pain because there’s been a terrible infection and the infection has now reached your bone. But I can’t do anything about it because we have to first wait for the pain to subside and some swelling to go down before I can do anything about it.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME? You’re kidding right?

The dentist, bless his soul, prescribed these SUPER DUPER ULTRA STRONG painkillers and he warned me that I should definitely have eaten something before I pop those and also not to take them in the day.

Yeah, right. I’d like to see you bear this. hmph.

Thankfully, the green pill worked like magic. It takes it’s time but when it does, it is magic, because I can’t feel any pain and I can like see things again instead of them being all blurry and me being all cross-eyed. He took my x-ray yesterday. I’ll see him in the evening where I will be told what is my next step.

In the meantime, I am the citizen of crankytown. While my family is being super nice. Seriously, I cannot remember the last time I showed such empathy to anyone. Everyone’s being nice to me. My mother even made me breakfast for work today. Something that’s soft and cool. Aw. Thanks Mom!

My deadline is 4 days away. I wonder if the stakeholders would be okay pushing it back a bit because the head instructional designer just died of a toothache.

over the last year or so I’ve been loading my pictures on a host called imgplace.com. it’s worked out pretty well. I can load the pics up in a zip format, and the pics come out in a gallery setup…I cut and paste the code into my post and Voila!

that’s all changed

over the last few weeks some pictures have been disappearing a few at a time .today they are all gone and all my galleries as well.

the entire site has been wiped clean. I can’t even log in…

so check out the photo page… you’ll find mostly nothin. looks like i’ll be loading the pics to another host….any suggestions?

I texted him to confirm our italian dinner plans for tonight. He called me back and we’re meeting at 6:30 PM.

And maybe it’s just my imagination, but he didn’t sound terribly excited about it.

And it’s definitely NOT my imagination that I don’t sense any attraction from him.

This blows.

Have you experience something that’s within your interest and it keeps bugging you all day all night like you’re so addicted to it? well most of us does!Well i think everyone has their own different story! Just like mine, yours, him and her! Have you watch the twilight movie and you keep watching it for so many times? or a korean series that you went as far as divisoria just to have your own copy and  finished it w/ in a day?  have you finish a good book and read all over again after 2 or 3 days?  your at school and you keep thinking about edward cullen? f4?robert pattinson? lakers? Oh,day dreaming! I think people who experienced all of this things are sick! but don’t be bothered because still time will past just like the old days when mask rider balck, bioman, maskman, marimar, rosalinda and titanic had hit our televisions!

Today’s going to be a whopper!

I have a status meeting with the MD and my boss. On my way back home yesterday evening, my boss calls me and asks me why haven’t we been following the process that was decided on. I’m like, um..well we have. You have two lessons to review. One was sent last week and another was sent today evening before I left work. Then he’s like okay why aren’t we sending lessons for copyediting? I replied because your other manager (the one who really should keep his nosy nose outside things that he knows nothing about and stop asking me to make mindless reports) has asked me not to send anything to copyediting lady till the time we have assessments. To which he’s like but the assessments are going to be online so why do they need to be copyedited. Beats me, go ask your manager. Because obviously when he asked me to hold the lessons, I clearly told him that dude, this vendor is as it is having issues writing the lessons so it will be some time before you see any assessment questions, are you ready to wait till that time? He’s like yea yea sure we’ll wait. And till that time we will okay the content between the three of us. I’m like okay sure! And I sent an email recapping this decision. Including the boss. I now know who reads my emails and who doesn’t.

The saddest part is that time and again I am made to feel that it’s them against me. And time and again when they feel that they’ve pushed me too much into a corner and I will now either push them all back or just walk out, then they back up and tell me that oh we are a team, we should work together as a team and I’m like well don’t just keep saying it, DO IT! Next time you ask me to make a bloody report, I am going to turn around and ask you to make it. I fucking hate reports and stupid reports? people should be killed.

In other news, digital vendor guy is now ill. Great!! Don’t get me wrong. I am sad that he’s ill, but again WHY THE FUCK DO THEY NOT TELL ME THIS THEMSELVES??? The content vendor guy sends me stupid messages that he thinks are funny but when it comes to giving me an update, then he’s never forthcoming. I have to ask him WHERE ARE THE FUCKING LESSONS, YOU MORON? And then, THEN he replies with the status.

I know I am not overreacting. I just know it. I am spread thin here. Have been from the very beginning. And then they have those HR issues which make my life oh just so swell! No?

I agree we are on shaky ground. But trust me, we will soon be okay. I will make sure. But if you keep breathing down my neck, it’s really not going to help. So back off and let me do my thing.

By the way, all this when last week I met him on Thursday and gave him an update and told him in clear terms that your moron of a vendor is going to miss his deadline of having all the content ready by June 16, which by the way is today. And as of today, we only have 5 lessons ready. Okay tomorrow we will have 8 lessons ready. Still two short.

If this was not enough, I am soon going to have a talk with bossman and tell him that his backup plan of having me work as a sponsor editor is not going to fly. They hired me as an instructional designer. I am an instructional designer because I like this industry. If I wanted to enter the publishing industry, I would have done that. Do you see me doing that? No. So just because you hired a person and now you have no clue about where your project plan is going, you can’t ask me to change my industry. No siree. Not happening. And learing from my mistakes, I am going to get all this in writing. That after the project, if I don’t have any other INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN project available, then they will have to pay me a month’s salary as severance and give me 100% of my incentives, with due tax deduction of course, and we will call it a day. I’ll be okay with not getting a month’s severance as long as I get my incentive dues.

Oh what is happening on that front you ask? Nothing. I haven’t heard from the incompetent HR lady so far. It’s been three weeks? Yep. Ain’t this place grand!

Noelle and I were talking on the phone.

She asked me to hold for a while. Bobby, her cat, wanted to go out, so she let him.

After sometime she asked me to hold again. This time she was frantic as she barked into the phone that she’ll have to call me back because something is wrong with Bobby.

I texted her to text me Bobby’s condition as soon as she gets sometime.

She replies immediately. Bobby was in a crash. Y, Bobby died. I let him out and he died.

Bobby was Noelle’s and Chappu’s almost child.

I feel sad. I don’t know what to do. How can I help her? Sitting these f***ing thousands of miles away.

I’m here baby. is all I could tell her.

The hullabaloo dealing with ray of hope and the course reviews and the course quality reached its final crescendo this morning. To my surprise, Bossman and the (dick head) manager were able to deal with the situation very calmly and with maturity. My Co-worker, on the other had, was not. Sadly, he was the first one who barged into my cabin this morning and with his questions and requests (print all the email exchange you’ve had with ray of hope till date what??? ARE YOU F***ING NUTS?!) drove me crazy! Awesome way to start the day!

Anyway, so then in Bossman’s cabin, all of us quickly reached a few conclusions:

1. it seems that ray of hope has some other issues that no one is aware of, which is why she is suddenly acting ape shit crazy.

2. turns out she’s been sending emails to he-who-must-not-be-named about how she’s concerned about the quality of the course and how it’s so low (excuse me?!)

3. my trying to deal with her one-on-one has given her the impression that we are a divided team. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that not too long back, we INDEED were a divided team. Not anymore.

4. Also, this one-on-one exchange has led her to believe that maybe they are forcing me to be okay with the quality, but in reality I am not. It was true earlier, not anymore.

5. Her way of looking at the course and her expectations are mostly driven by her audience, which is VERY different from my way of looking at the course, which is being driven by the audience.

6. Because of all this, people up there are very shaken up about what the hell is happening with this course.

To set the matters straight, I am going to reply to the last email acknowledging her flags and informing everyone that now the tone the course is taking is something that we had always wanted. It is fun, it is conversational, it has activities, and it has digital elements. They will just have to trust us in knowing what our audience wants.

Additionally, we are making a report of the rave reviews we received and have done a mapping exercise of the course content with the objectives and the elements. Everything is beautiful.

I was glad to see me taking responsibility of communicating with ray of hope on a one-on-one basis, which has backfired.

At the end of the day, Bossman and Manager told me that I will have to take some calculated risks. If I am happy with something, and ray of hope says otherwise,  I will just have to put my foot down and say thank you for the comments but I really think this is going to work. Great advice. The funny part is? it is never given when Bossman and Manager are the ones who would be receiving it. Just something to think about.

I had a 12.5 hour day today. I am on my way back home. The cab driver was asked to take a different route because the normal way ALWAYS has tons of traffic jams. I was informed that since it is now 9:30 PM, there won’t be any traffic jam. We are on that route and there is a traffic jam. I am just too mind dead to care. I don’t even have the urge to tell him ‘I told you so’. I must be tired.

I hope your Monday is much better and smoother. Happy Monday!

PS: In other news, I did something unmentionable last night. It had nothing to do with sex since that is never unmentionable for me.

My company has finally given me the finger. (Well not really finally… they’ve done this before.) How did they do this to me? By blocking both AIM Express and my proxy to access GMail. Bastards.

Apparently they were unaware that I, their star overachieving worker, do my best work while completely distracted by multiple IMs and emails. And instead of letting me just have this, they instead have forced me to spend the last couple hours (and the next few days) searching for a new way around their network filters. I have so far failed, making my time completely unproductive… that is, unless you count this post as “productivity”. I have been neglecting this blog for quite a while, so I’m going to let it count.

Currently my work day feels so… empty. No AIM. Facebook. GMail. Hotmail. AOL Mail. GTalk. 3rd party messengers (i.e. Meebo). Pidgin. All I have left is this blog, most of the websites I visit daily (which will now become hourly), and my corporate email with inter-company IM. I feel like a middle school girl since I have to rely on texting people to communicate with them during the day. So yeah, my options are slim. For now.

Luckily there is a light at the end of the tunnel: I’m (finally) getting a smartphone within the next month or two. The downside, of course, is how obvious it is I’m slacking off when I’m spending more time on my phone than on my computer at work. At least I work with a bunch of dinosaurs who barely know how computers work, let alone new mobile devices. (I had the joy of setting up a couple of the staff level peoples’ corporate Blackberrys. And teaching staff level managers Basic Excel. This included high level topics such as “Opening a file” and “Erasing Data”. I’m not even joking. One woman couldn’t even keep the left and right mouse buttons straight.)

But until then, I will fight the good fight… I will find a way around these damn filters. I think that will be my main task for the week. (Well, aside from from the review with the VP that is directly above my position tomorrow, and the training I have to give to 30 people, which includes some of my former bosses and other high ranking people in the corporation on Friday.) To me, this will be time well spent. I can’t let The Man hold me down!

On a side note: I think this marks my almost triumphant return to blogging. If anything could force me to actually write something once again, it would be being at work (and not traveling) and having to survive without email or AIM. I know you missed me. I would say I missed you too… but I’m not one to lie.

Oh, and for all of you out there who even considered telling me “You’re supposed to work at work”, I have two words for you: Blow me.