Tuesday, July 18, 2006
My Haiku for Las Vegas
Las Vegas
You hurt me so badly
I hate you
OK, so maybe it's not a haiku, but you get the gist. I don't even know why I think it's fun. Vegas is like a woman breathing hotly down your neck, then suddenly she takes all your money. And she keeps breathing, and you keep losing to her, and you go to the ATM, but have exceeded your daily limit, and you think of your options.
Those are never good options. But she keeps breathing hotly down your neck, and you're kinda drunk by now, so the taking of your money no longer sounds like a bad thing. It sounds like a necessary evil, to engage in this privilege. And that's when things really go wrong.
I'm never going back to that treacherous chanteuse, Las Vegas, again.
Au revoir, blackjack.
You hurt me so badly
I hate you
OK, so maybe it's not a haiku, but you get the gist. I don't even know why I think it's fun. Vegas is like a woman breathing hotly down your neck, then suddenly she takes all your money. And she keeps breathing, and you keep losing to her, and you go to the ATM, but have exceeded your daily limit, and you think of your options.
Those are never good options. But she keeps breathing hotly down your neck, and you're kinda drunk by now, so the taking of your money no longer sounds like a bad thing. It sounds like a necessary evil, to engage in this privilege. And that's when things really go wrong.
I'm never going back to that treacherous chanteuse, Las Vegas, again.
Au revoir, blackjack.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Staplers are antiquated and dangerous.
Officially as of today, I'm the guy who stapled his thumb.
I had never realized how jeopardous the workplace could be, before this afternoon. Staplers being the main threat, unless you're working with asbestos or on tall construction beams.
The story, because I must tell it:
I'm in the Senior V.P.'s file room. His assistant can be a stickler, and is kind of unusual as a person, so I made sure my presence and intentions were known. She was quite helpful really, and I just wanted a couple of copies of the documents I needed.
She finds them and gives them to me. I ask to use her copy machine. She agrees and points me to the staple remover (which at this time, was not a potential surgical tool). She exits.
I make my copies and gather the originals to refile. I'm going to staple back her originals. I do, using a stapler that looked like it was from the 50's. No problem there. I refile her originals.
Then I try to staple my copies. Same old school stapler. First staple try, fine. Only need to staple one more document and I am out.
So I staple. I don't know if it was my technique or what, but the staple didn't take. It stuck out from the pages, obviously it wasn't going to hold them together. So I pulled it out (with my fingernails). Decided to try again. Staple that fucker and get out.
I did. Same result. Staple protrusion. No document adhesion.
So it's out of staples, right? It's not working! My own stapler gets ornery when low on staples, I knew this from experience. On top of that, what if I leave the Assistant to the Sr. V.P. without staples? She has to reload it, when she knows the last person in there was ME? She would hate me (more than she maybe already does). I rationalized my attempt to reload her stapler as a returned courtesy. Probably misguided, in retrospect.
Newer staplers have spring-loaded refill mechanisms, like you hit a button and the cartridge snaps out. I love those. This old stapler had instructions engraved on the front lip. It said something like "To release, push up and then pull down." And it had a couple of release-looking buttons that I messed around with to no avail. So I just snap it open (front from the bottom, not releasing the staple cartridge) and pushed up on the staple ejector thing. Then I pulled it down.
It was at that moment I realized I had stapled my thumb.
A staple was sitting on my thumb, the horizontal part flush against the skin. It was EMBEDDED. I am grossed out, even though it didn't hurt that much. So I carry this staple, embedded in my thunb, back to my department office. I show it off, but I'm pale, and I'm sweating. I only regret not getting a picture of the staple-in-thumb, because it was nasty and you could have envisioned my situation better.
So then my boss asks me to sit down, so I won't pass out, and a co-worker extracted the staple by hand (good work, BTW). Others get me sanitary wipes and ice. The staple was removed and I seem OK, for now, although my thumb hurts.
Tetanus, that's another thing. I will contact a medical professional.
So be wary of antiquated staplers, America. Paper clips! Use those, they never hurt anybody. On second thought, use the plastic paper clips. Those definitely never hurt anybody.
I had never realized how jeopardous the workplace could be, before this afternoon. Staplers being the main threat, unless you're working with asbestos or on tall construction beams.
The story, because I must tell it:
I'm in the Senior V.P.'s file room. His assistant can be a stickler, and is kind of unusual as a person, so I made sure my presence and intentions were known. She was quite helpful really, and I just wanted a couple of copies of the documents I needed.
She finds them and gives them to me. I ask to use her copy machine. She agrees and points me to the staple remover (which at this time, was not a potential surgical tool). She exits.
I make my copies and gather the originals to refile. I'm going to staple back her originals. I do, using a stapler that looked like it was from the 50's. No problem there. I refile her originals.
Then I try to staple my copies. Same old school stapler. First staple try, fine. Only need to staple one more document and I am out.
So I staple. I don't know if it was my technique or what, but the staple didn't take. It stuck out from the pages, obviously it wasn't going to hold them together. So I pulled it out (with my fingernails). Decided to try again. Staple that fucker and get out.
I did. Same result. Staple protrusion. No document adhesion.
So it's out of staples, right? It's not working! My own stapler gets ornery when low on staples, I knew this from experience. On top of that, what if I leave the Assistant to the Sr. V.P. without staples? She has to reload it, when she knows the last person in there was ME? She would hate me (more than she maybe already does). I rationalized my attempt to reload her stapler as a returned courtesy. Probably misguided, in retrospect.
Newer staplers have spring-loaded refill mechanisms, like you hit a button and the cartridge snaps out. I love those. This old stapler had instructions engraved on the front lip. It said something like "To release, push up and then pull down." And it had a couple of release-looking buttons that I messed around with to no avail. So I just snap it open (front from the bottom, not releasing the staple cartridge) and pushed up on the staple ejector thing. Then I pulled it down.
It was at that moment I realized I had stapled my thumb.
A staple was sitting on my thumb, the horizontal part flush against the skin. It was EMBEDDED. I am grossed out, even though it didn't hurt that much. So I carry this staple, embedded in my thunb, back to my department office. I show it off, but I'm pale, and I'm sweating. I only regret not getting a picture of the staple-in-thumb, because it was nasty and you could have envisioned my situation better.
So then my boss asks me to sit down, so I won't pass out, and a co-worker extracted the staple by hand (good work, BTW). Others get me sanitary wipes and ice. The staple was removed and I seem OK, for now, although my thumb hurts.
Tetanus, that's another thing. I will contact a medical professional.
So be wary of antiquated staplers, America. Paper clips! Use those, they never hurt anybody. On second thought, use the plastic paper clips. Those definitely never hurt anybody.
