Nuggets

No IM messages for a while, and no email in my hotmail account either. So in the course of patching the OS, I rebooted. When msn restarted, lo and behold there were emails! And someone popped up on msn!

Microsoft sucks sometimes - I wonder how long I've been in limbo like that?

Here's a neat little factoid: if you have a "suppress all sounds on phone button", and it gets pressed... you'll not hear the phone ringing. This got discovered when I was on the phone and told someone to call me back, and I waited and waited and waited.

Of course they had called and I hadn't answered. Bah.

It's never attractive when you see yourself in someone else. And it's certainly less than flattering. I was on the train heading to work when I saw just that.

From where I get on, it's ten stops to work. With nine left to go, a couple gets on and sits a couple of seats behind me.

The guy was throwing out unconnected bits of "conversation" with a bit of an edge to them, and the girl was being fairly patient. And then she started talking about things he needs to do with his life and aspects of it he really needs to address.

The guy got defensive and a bit of a whine came into his voice as he began to throw out insults, counters, observations of her, et cetera. She was calm (but emotional) the entire time and while she sometimes humoured him and followed some of the directions he obviously wanted to take their conversation, she never allowed herself to be led far from what she was saying.

The guy had apparently been abused (mentally, emotionally) by a string of his mom's boyfriends when he was younger. This came up from both of them, and how it affected his current life and his dealings with others.

Now, I've never been abused. And the specifics of what they were saying don't match up to anything in my life, but the whole scene was... familiar.

And it came to me that I've been that defensive angry whining guy attack-loving the person he was with while we travelled somewhere. Too often.

When I got off the train, they did too and were walking in front of me continuing their conversation. I kind of wanted to interject with "She's making so much sense dude. You're lucky to have to her, so pull your head out of your ass before you lose her" to him and "You're very patient and empathic, I wish you luck" to her.

But of course I didn't. I did get to see that they were pretty young - she looked like she was still eighteen, and he couldn't have been much older.

I hope they do okay.

When I got to work, there was a guy from the mail room still blasting around the site. He's very friendly and likes to talk a lot, so of course that's what we did. He also likes to slag on my S/S, but he also goes out to dinner with him so that's a bit of a mixed message.

Anyway, I mentioned to him that I told one of the vice presidents of the site that I was going to take him out on the lawn and whip him with a hose, and the mail room guy was appalled. A little context:

The VP seems to be a pretty good guy. We've shared some laughs in the past.

So on the day that everybody got back from their Christmas break, when I saw him outside his office complex in the morning at the end of my shift and he asked if I could let him in because he forgot his card at home, I did but only after making my standard "Okaaaaay, even if you do look pretty suspicious" line. He laughed.

The following day on my initial patrol I found he'd left the blinds open in his office. So I closed them, but he's the guy that got his laptop stolen back in November and which prompted us to have the rocks outside the windows removed, and the policy by which you close your blinds.

So when I saw him that morning, I mentioned "We had a bit of a security breach last night. Someone in [his office complex] left their blinds open."

He leaned in conspiratorily and said "You know what? That was me. I usually leave them closed but I opened them to show someone the view and I guess I never closed them."

So assuming his name is Bob Scratchit, I said to him "That's twice, Scratchit. One more and I'm taking you out on the front lawn and whipping you with a hose."

He laughed. Hands on knees laughed. I don't think there's a problem, do you? :)