"I Just Wanted to Shake the Little Bastard..."

I quit my job today. I walked into my manager's office, threw my two weeks' notice on his desk, and stormed out of his office.

Ok. Not completely true. I basically accosted the manager out on the floor while he was walking with the other managers, jammed an envelope in his hand, and stared at my feet while he grilled me about the contents of the envelope. I muttered something about it being my notice and watched him turn purple with rage.

"This really isn't the way to give me your notice. Out on the sales floor? IN FRONT OF PEOPLE?"

Whoops. I knew it was going to be dramatic and uncomfortable but I hadn't exactly planned on getting yelled at for quitting. After leading me into his office to tell me how "shocked and upset" he was that I was leaving, he then asked the super important, all consuming question:

"Was it something I did?"

Hmm. Let's see...was it something you did? I'll have to think about that and get ba.........
Yes. It's something you did. Some THINGS you did in fact. Like not so subtly implying that I stole the beautiful yellow retro bracelet that I bought the day it came in. And yelling at me for not answering my phone when I was in the ladies' room. You storming into my office at 5:30 at night (when I technically only work until 5) and telling me how shocked you are that I'm sitting in my office at that time of night when I have so much to do. Oh and you telling me what I'm supposed to be doing every minute of every day and once it's done, telling me I did it wrong.

On second thought, maybe I'll stay!

Necessity is the Mother of Invention...As Is Boredom

So if anyone reading this blog is as bored as I am, you can now go online and do a puzzle created from my avatar of Easter the cow.

My Puzzles Jigsaw Puzzle Gallery - JigZone.com

Holy Mother of Beaver...

I was in a photography chat room that I frequent discussing with friends my plans to put in my two week notice tomorrow and how much I'm looking forward to it. I noted that, while I plan to do the traditional letter of resignation, I was also considering doing a little dance. Maybe even a song or two. While I babbled on about the crazy things I'd like to do after I hand my notice to the store manager, another member of chat had this to say:

When leaving his job at a credit union where he maintained the computer files, Dorian decided to leave his mark in an extra special way. See, each employee at the credit union had their own account as a benefit of working there, an account that Dorian maintained. On his last day Dorian went into each of his fellow employees' accounts and itemized them...with everything he felt made them what they are: OBNOXIOUS. I wish I could have been a fly on the wall when they all opened their accounts to see their worst personality flaws detailed electronically!

So this inspired me. I believe I'm going to spend 10 days (my last two weeks of work) doing something special for my personality challenged coworkers. Every day I'm going to greet them with a smile and let them know one thing I dislike about them. I've found that, as long as it's said with a smile, many people don't even notice when you're calling them a mentally challenged jerkoff with a bad haircut. Can't wait!

I Agonized Over a $35 Squirrel...

Standardized testing makes me want to hurt myself. And yet, every time a new issue of NEA Today comes in, there's something on the cover about high stakes testing. High stakes testing has become THE hot button issue in education. Basically, kids have to pass this test to prove that they've been educated well enough to function in polite society. However, what this does to the field of education in general is completely cripple a teacher's ability to teach creatively. Didn't get to the Mayan ruins because you did an interactive art project with the kids? You fail. Hell, you may even get fired.

The worst part is...I can't even pass the standardized high stakes test here in my state. I graduated from high school a year early, then finished my undergrad in 3 years. I scored high on my SAT's and blew all my teacher's tests out of the water. I was in the top percentile of my class and yet if I went back to high school now, I wouldn't pass the MCAS and wouldn't graduate because of it.

So why am I prattling on about this? Well, because I'm going back to teaching as of May 12th. I'm tired of my little vacation in visual merchandising and I can't wait to get into a classroom again. It's like being away from home for a while. It was nice while it lasted but you're thrilled to be home where you belong. In preparation, I've started reading through all of the education magazines I've had piled up here and there in my apartment to make sure I'm not missing anything vital in my field. Good to see not much has changed. Also good to see that standardized testing still makes me want to hurt myself.

Excuse me...I have to go die now...

So I've started reading Jen Lancaster's blog as often as possible. Jennsylvania is perhaps some of the funniest stuff I've read in my entire life, though that's really not saying much since I'm pretty easily amused. However, I love Jen's sense of humor and her biting sarcasm. Not to mention the fact that she is shameless in displaying her narcissism and general retardation which leads to many of her comedic episodes that wind up in her books. If you want a good laugh from a hell of a well written book, pick up one of Jen Lancaster's memoirs.

I'm on vacation this week and after three days of "relaxing" I'm ready to lose it. I'm climbing the walls, I'm so bored. I've rearranged my furniture. Twice. I've cleaned every visible surface in my apartment. I've done my grocery shopping, weeded through my old magazines, paid my bills, and done all my paperwork for my summer classes. I can't for the life of me figure out what else to do.

Work on the book you say? Enter all those edits I so painstakingly inserted so that I can finally send the introduction to my layout guy? Feh. I don't have the attention span for that right now. I haven't had nearly enough caffeine today to keep me focused on a project like that. As I have said since last Friday when my vacation started....I'll do it tomorrow.

Southern Hospitality

Back in the winter of last year my best friend moved to Tennessee. Clarksville, to be specific, and no she did not take the "last train". That joke is dead. Move on.

Anyway, I hadn't spoken to her for a while after she moved so one night I decided to look her up and find out how southern living was agreeing with her. Apparently she fits right in- eating grits, drinking sweet tea, and going to see donkey basketball. I kid you not. It actually happens.

One of the reasons she moved was to be closer to her mother who has slowly but surely been taking leave of her faculties. My best friend refers to her as "bat shit crazy". I believe that is indeed the official medical diagnosis. She explained to me that her mother has developed some obsessive tendencies recently that seem to revolve around toilet paper, paper towels, and Fig Newtons. One afternoon my BFF was driving in the car with her mother and her uncle when her mother announces loudly that she needs to go to Walmart to buy Fig Newtons. Of course the uncle immediately says he can't take her, in which case she zeros in on her daughter and pleads with her to take her to Walmart in a tone that suggests she may have a temper tantrum if she doesn't get her way.

Once they're in the store, my BFF explains that it's like shopping with a slippery two year old. Her mother has no short term memory and frequently wanders off in stores, though she somehow seems to remember exactly where the Fig Newtons are. Go figure. Finally she herds her mother over to the checkout line where she carefully places her Fig Newtons on the conveyor belt and steps back, looking angrily at her daughter.

"Now I wish you had told me we were going shoppin' cuz I'd have brought more money. I need more toilet paper."

"I'll Leave You to Look for Your Crack..."

It's been ages since I've made a blog entry. In fact I haven't thought about "blogging" since my ill-fated encounter with the world of MySpace idiocy. There's something about being separated from someone by miles of network cable that gives morons the courage to say things they wouldn't normally say to someone's face because IRL (In Real Life) it would get them shoved off a bridge. However, I miss shamelessly catering to my demographic, ie: my real friends who enjoy reading about the asinine idiocy that IS my life.

Without yet providing any background about my recent career choice, I will first share a quick conversation had between my good pal Crystal and one of the less than stellar MENSA candidates (insert sarcasm) who is one of the managers. For purposes of protecting the innocent (read: slightly less than averagely intelligent) we shall call said manager...Manager. The creative genius is back people.

Manager is wandering around with a packet of papers in one hand, a pen in the other, seemingly staring into space with a rather confused expression on his face. He paces a bit, jots something on his paper then moves on. As Crystal and I continue our conversation, Manager gets a little closer and seems to be staring right at us for some reason. It bears noting that this particular manager is known for being a tad socially awkward and occasionally mildly creepy so when he approaches us, Crystal is already backing away before Manager has the chance to invade her bubble (personal space people...read the memo). Finally Crystal and I ask the burning question...

"What the hell are you doing?"

Manager says in his most professional, game show host voice, "Why, I'm doing a safety audit. I'm supposed to be finding cracked floor tiles. Do you have any cracked floor tiles?"

Crystal smiles sweetly and says, "No I don't thank you. We're going to go eat lunch now. I'll leave you to look for your crack..."

Sadly the joke was lost on him while I tried to keep from laughing out loud at Crystal's unintended double entendre.

And Crystal, no I don't want to come over and "sniff your stuff".