So yesterday I was going to get up at 7a, leave the house at 7.30a, and get to work by 8.30a so that I could finish what I had left undone the day before, since The Raccoon was matching the check run and I wanted to file everything away, not to mention get all the crap out of the files before she saw it.

To that end, I went to bed at midnight the night before, which is early for me, and fell asleep pretty quickly, even though it was still pretty hot. Until 1a, when I was woken up by the most godawful screaming! And I don't mean the "Dear me, I need to call 911!" kind of screaming, but more the gang of girls hanging around the end of my street with nothing better to do than scream, kind of screaming.

I hate to sound like an old lady, but I think I would have found it pretty annoying even if I hadn't been asleep, since they were basically standing right outside my bedroom window. Screaming. At one o'clock in the morning. On a Tuesday.

I finally had to close the window, and fortunately it had cooled down in the hour since I had gone to bed, because I could close said window without then having to boil in my own juices all night long.

However, this interruption of my beauty sleep meant that when that alarm rang at 7a, I hit that snooze button so fast it didn't know what had hit it. I kept hitting it until 7.54a, when I finally wrenched myself out of bed, threw some clothes on and went to work.

I got there at 9.20a. So much for getting in at 8.30a, though I did beat The Raccoon, who had hit the traffic from hell on her way in and didn't make it until 9.45a, so I was able to get the work done anyway before she got around to matching the checks.

It was bloody motherfucking cold again in the office. And no reason for it to be, since it was pretty cold outdoors as well!

We finally complained to the Facilities guy, who has a crush on The Raccoon, which you think would be useful at a time like this. He came around and said that it seemed fine to him, (he must not have noticed the icicles hanging from my nose), so I offered to move into his office and he could take my cube if he didn't think it was cold.

I said that I thought the problem was that we were right under two vents, and he asked if I thought closing them would help. Like I am suddenly supposed to be the big air conditioning expert? He said he'd send the janitor around to close it, which did not fill me with gleeful hope, since the janitor is kind of an idiot.

The vent closing never occurred, but later in the day I was actually able to take off my sweater! It was warm enough to sit in my shirtsleeves! The heavens opened and the heavenly choir sang hosannas! For a couple of hours, and then the temperature crept back down again.

I don't know why they seem to think that Accounting needs to keep so cold. Perhaps they are under the impression that we make snow angels during our breaks, or need to keep ice cream at an appropriate temperature. Or, more likely, that we need to remain icy in order to not pay the bills.

There have been balloons all over the office the past couple of days, and I was wondering where they had come from, when I finally noticed that they said "You Are an Owner!" on them, and I figured out that they must have been giving them away in the stock options meeting.

Since our stock is currently in the crapper like everyone else's, I'm not all that interested in the meetings, but I sure did want a balloon. I whined about it around Shawn, and he gave me his! I have a balloon! Or, as I insist on calling it in an admittedly way too cutesy fashion, a b'loon.

I have a b'loon at my desk! Tied to the stapler! It makes it seem almost as though I'm not at the office, because how could I be in a place of work and toil and have something as fun as a b'loon?

I need to be beaten soundly to get rid of the cutesy, clearly, but I think it's staying until the helium seeps away.

I was trying to FedEx something, and the Powership was not accepting the zip code I was trying to enter, so I called Shipping to have them look up the zip code for Scottsdale, Arizona.

"Hi, can you look up something in the zip code book?"
"We haven't got a zip code book."
"You used to, I know you did!"
"That was when we were using Airborne, we don't use them anymore."
"You had another book, way before Airborne."
"We don't have a book anymore."

I hung up, but then it occurred to me how completely beyond stupid that was. We stopped using Airborne so we got rid of a book of useful information that has nothing whatever to do with Airborne other than the fact that it said Airborne on the front of it?

Because Airborne uses different zip codes than FedEx does, apparently. And a shipping department certainly doesn't need such information lying around where people might be able to get some use out of it. That place has gone way downhill since Nik left.

After work, I decided to go and spend some money, so I went to Virgin and dove headfirst into the DVD section.

I got Hitchhiker's Guide, Truly Madly Deeply, and The League of Gentlemen, all of which are British, and they were having a 25% off British sale, so I saved $20 and got a free cd and two coupon books.

Man, do they know how to seduce me or what over to Virgin?

Got home and watched Firehouse, which I had TiVoed last week.

What a wonderful series! I decided to TiVo it because I like firemen, and I'm so glad I did. Each episode is about a different firehouse, and the first one was about six months in the life of Rescue 4 from Queens, starting at the Father's Day fire, where they lost four men, and ending with Christmas of last year.

Of course, this covered the WTC, and the plane crash in November, and it was one hell of a year, but it wasn't just this long list of sadness, they showed practical jokes and Thanksgiving at the firehouse, and Christmas at Rockefeller Center. And I wept, of course, but I laughed, too, and these men were incredible. And the most incredible thing about them, of course, is how ordinary they are.

They are just regular men, ordinary, everyday men, but they decided one day that they wanted to spend their lives doing the greatest work possible to do, saving people from tragedy. And that's what makes them amazing. They are not heroes because they are stronger or faster or more powerful than mere mortals, they are heroes because they are mere mortals, and they do heroes work anyway.

And, just to make this the longest non-vacation, non-weekend entry ever, welcome back Cameron! My almost constant whining while I was in Toronto worked! Of course, she says that I am not the only one, that there has been much whining from many quarters, but I have decided to take all the credit just because I'm like that.

Today's horoscope:
You can increase your effectiveness on the job by doing things a bit differently. Make small changes (not too much) for better results.

One year ago today:
I hope this heat breaks soon. It's been three whole daaaaaaaays!

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Last Updated Thurs 25 July 00:59:09 2002