Ramblin' Man

[Aberzombie]

Happy Wednesday?!?

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We shall see. Somehow, I doubt it will be for me.

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I might get an adequate Wednesday, but I think that's about it.

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I find myself once again reminiscing about the old days, when there were people in my life who at least acted like friends. None of them ever actually were, of course. But the illusion was nice.

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I would almost say this is some kind of seasonal depression, but it's not. It's just.....life. We deal with it, or we don't.

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Mostly, it's this place. The office I'm sitting in, I mean. It always sucks to realize you can't trust your bosses or coworkers. It makes getting up and coming here every morning seem pointless and annoying.

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I mean, this place...*gestures around* is kind of the same. Except the annoying part is what I like to think other people feel just knowing I exist and I'm not completely miserable.

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Anyway...I got out the house a few minutes later than usual today. You'd be amazed how much those few minutes can screw things up around here. That might be at least part of the reason I'm a bit cranky this morning.

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Today and tomorrow is the FREE tradeshow for above ground storage tanks a few miles away. I sent my boss some information, especially that the tradeshow portion was free.

He never responded to me. Which is typical for him. Hell, I've been trying to get him to verify my employment with NCEES (something that only requires he respond to an email) for about a week and a half now.

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I have no doubt he already gave the go ahead to the new hire for attending that tradeshow, though. They like her way more than they like me. Which is understandable. She's a very nice kid and probably gets paid way less. Which means she costs the company way less to keep around.

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The scout meeting was at least kind of fun last night. We had a small turn out, but they attempted to make pancakes. Some of the scouts even succeeded. The boy showed up late, and dressed in his tux from his orchestra show, so we all joked that he was the Maitre'd.

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So this all meant that while my wife was taking him to orchestra, I had to pick up the daughter from pottery class and bring her to the scout meeting with me. On the way there, I got us Sonic for dinner. Not the best option for me (health wise), but at least it was food. And better than what I have planned for lunch today, which is a protein shake.

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Anyway, not sure what else is going on today. I don't have anywhere to be tonight, so it shouldn't be too long a day. The Universe, of course, may have other plans. As it often does.

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And I see from the news the WBD-Netflix-Paramount fiasco is continuing. It's like something out of a soap opera. Except soap operas are more entertaining and have less potential to help in the destruction of my most beloved hobby.

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And before I forget....

Wishing the happiest of birthdays to my baby girl! The wife was pregnant with her when we moved here, so I consider her to be the only one of us lucky enough to be a native-born Texan!

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Hmmm...apparently my supervisor is off golfing with clients. Glad to know he's engaged in something important, rather than helping out the people who work under him.

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In other news, I think someone is either trying to annoy me or my phone number was accidently put into some website asking for insurance quotes. I've gotten several phone calls and one text related to such.

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And now - Lunch! Such as it is....

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So, I did a little research, and apparently one of the numbers I keep getting calls from is some a-hole company that acts as an "online insurance marketplace". From what little I can see, they have a reputation for being aggressive buttheads who consistently harass people.

Now I'm debating actually answering the next time they call, but maybe answering as the "city morgue" or something like that. Could be fun to troll the trolls.

[Aberzombie]

Truth.
Justice.
Whatever.

I'll go whatever and take my business elsewhere. Thank you very much.

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sigh

I settled for blocking as many of those scam numbers as I could find.

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I've never been a fan of Doctor Who, but even I find it horrifying to hear they might be editing old episodes from decades ago to better fit the stuff they want to do today. Sad.

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Damn! I saw some news of a plane making an emergency landing on I-95. Crazy.

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AAAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!

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This last half hour of the work day is crawling by at a snail's pace. A snail that has taken a large dose of valium. And is currently frozen nearly solid.

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One of my coworkers, the guy who manages the designers, told me that management is making plans to make training a higher priority. I tried not to laugh in his face and mostly succeeded.

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Our office assistant/document controller just came by with a birthday card to sign for one of the upper-level managers. I don't really know the guy all that well, but figured I'd be nice a sign it anyway. Even though he sometimes heats up really stinky crap in the microwave for lunch.

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Happy Thursday!

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At least, that's what I plan to try and convince myself of. Might be easy, considering tomorrow is work from home day so I don't have to come back here. That'll be like a 90% improvement on my day already.

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Spent a good portion of yesterday evening cursing at my in-laws for buying my daughter a cheap, piece of crap art rack for her birthday. It was so piss poorly designed I actually logged on to Amazon so I could leave a review.

The main problem I had with it is the same I have with many of these put-it-together-yourself items for the home. The idiots who design them are bound and determined to go with the government model of one size fits all when it comes to as many pieces parts as possible. In this case, the top of the rack has two boards that attach to it, but the bolts used to attach them aren't long enough to get proper thread engagement without using a clamp. Which, in turn damaged the wood a bit.

In the end, it'll still be functional. However, I doubt those boards will stay on there for any reasonable length of time. My guess is they fail within a few years.

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After that, I had to unwind by rewatching Bullett Train with Brad Pitt and Hiroyuki Sanada. Great movie.

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My drive to the office was adequate. Some good parts. Some idiots. At least one dude probably thought I was following him on the interstate. And I actually was, but only because he knew what he was doing.

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One thing I did notice on my drive, a certain style of headlight. It's the main headlight, with a thinner, angled light above it. The overall affect is to make the car look like it has angry eyes. I find it rather amusing.

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As I was about to go to bed last night, my Iphone was asking if I wanted to update the software. I picked the do it later option. So the damnable thing did it while I was asleep. Stupid a-holes at Apple.

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And looking at the phone this morning, it reinforces my long-suspected thought that a lot of software updates are unnecessary and only made to justify the existence of some employees. In that case, they'd make perfect government bureaucrats.

There's been no actual improvement in the phone's functionality as near as I can tell. Things just look different and some stuff is actually a bit harder to do now (but only so to the point it's annoying).

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Interestingly enough, it's a perfect hand-in-hand accompaniment to what happened yesterday, with multitude of phone calls and text messages about car insurance. All because someone or some program put my first name and phone number into some skeevy online company's system.

My phone number has been on the National Do Not Call Registry for 12 years. It hasn't done a single thing to prevent those unwanted phone calls. I recall the government making a big deal out of it when it first came out, and it really didn't do a damned thing. The a-holes of the world just found a way around it.

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So all the hullabaloo and nothing much to show for it. Yep. Software folk would make great government bureaucrats.

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Otherwise, not much going on today. I suspect another boring day here in the office. Huzzah!

As luck would have it, my stomach is bothering me a bit this morning. If it gets any worse, I may go home early and finish the day in comfort.

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I'm curious to see if my supervisor is back in the office today. Or if he's off playing golf again. I know some folk are flying to Florida this morning to meet with a client. One of the guys in my group conned his way into that trip. You'd think they may have wanted to take the only engineer who's actually licensed in Florida....

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I'll probably be back in here later to relieve some of my boredom. I really should find a better company to work for.

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I have noticed that as we get closer to Christmas day, Amazon gets less concerned about combining shipments to maximize delivery efficiency. I'd imagine they have so many deliveries to make they're just like "Naah, get it to them whenever. We're passing through that area like five times in one hour anyway."

It's amusing.

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In other news...the big boss of our group has set a group meeting for this morning. That typically means some big change is coming along: Usually someone leaving (or getting let go) or some major reorganization/policy change.

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Ah well. I got let go from work today. I wasn't the only one, however. Another five people were let go with me. Basically, most of the engineering group.

Included in that number was a guy who just returned from paternity leave, after his wife had their third kid. Also an older gentleman who was just a year or two away from retirement. Just to demonstrate how much d*!&&eads management is. Then again, they wouldn't be management if they weren't d***+eads.

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Of course, I am sure there are people around here who will revel in my bad turn.

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But, yeah, basically most of what's left of my former group is the terminal people we were forced to merge with, as well as the new hire.

It didn't really surprise me. I knew my time was coming, but I also had a feeling more people might be on the chopping block. Management was incapable of bringing in more work, and the lead terminal guy had it in for the rest of the EPC group anyway.

[Aaron Bitman]

Aberzombie wrote:

I got let go from work today. I wasn't the only one, however...

Included in that number was... an older gentleman who was just a year or two away from retirement...

It didn't really surprise me. I knew my time was coming...

I'm sorry.

I've been there. I mean to say that the parts I quoted here were basically what happened to me, back in 2019, only in my case the older gentleman was only a few months away from retirement.

I mean... while some of my co-workers didn't like my work, or my working methods, I'm pretty sure that no one reveled in my bad turn.

But after I lost my job, a lucky turn saved my career. I wish you similar luck.

[Aberzombie]

Yeah, this isn’t my first time. It’s actually my third since entering the oil and gas industry. It’s kind of ironic. I’ve heard plenty of managers lament the lack of loyalty from employees, but they regularly cut people who become too expensive. It’s a well-known industry cycle.

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Anyway, I’ve already applied to five jobs today. And I’ve got some contacts in the industry that might help me find something. I’ll also try to help out the other guys who got laid off, since I know our former employer won’t.

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And I know it’s petty, but I find myself hoping the people who made the decision to shutter so much of our group learn what it’s like to lose their careers. Even temporarily.

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Anyway, for tonight I’ll just try to relax and forget that crap hole. I’ll try to find something interesting to watch on TV.