If we're all God's children, why is Jesus so special?

Therefore, since there is no proof of its absence, Christianity must be true. As must Buddhism, Sikhism, Islam, and the religions of ancient Greece, Rome and Egypt. There are lots of old Norse gods bumming around my neighbourhood too.

Oops, sorry. Wrote that in the wrong window. I was distracted when the six-armed lady living two apartments down asked if she could borrow a dove.

Anyway.

I had just got to work on Thursday and was sitting in the atrium with the client's Eyes and Ears and another guy, when someone came by and offered us cake.

Because she's a very nice person (and because I knew the cake was left over from someone's retirement bash earlier that day) I set aside my usual paranoia about accepting unsolicited food and we all took a piece.

We needed forks and plates. The plates were nearby, but there were no forks out. So I went to get some.

I do tell some fascinating stories, don't I?

At one end of the atrium is the kitchen, which has a folding gate pulled across it. I was outside of that, opening a cupboard that has all of the boxes of plastic utensils.

"Excuse me!" My back was to her, but it was obvious that Cafeteria Lady was about a metre and a half behind me, looking through the gate. It's hard to mistake the voice of the dark Edith Bunker.

"You're not allowed to get things out of there!"

My back still towards her, I glanced up at my cake-sharing companions. One's face was bland, the woman with the cake look horrified, and Eyes and Ears seemed irritated (and expectant).

"Really, is that so? How fascinating." I said, taking a couple of extra forks and heading back to the cake. Cafeteria Lady spent a fair amount of time glaring through the bars of her cage, but that's okay. I really don't mind.

"Did you get in trouble from her?" the lady with the cake asked, seriously.

"Nah. What can she do?"

"She's so..."

"Batshit crazy? Tell me about it."

Eyes and Ears: "You nailed it there, Rimmy."

The cake was totally worth it.

And except for the fork incident, I've noticed an inordinate amount of attention on me this week, and not the bad kind.

When the weather starts turning kind of summery, the womenfolk get into a good mood and forget about my sub-par rating (which takes a lot, since my jacket is loud and extremely unappealing) and seek me out, halt me to make small talk, and come to me in clusters to ask me to help them carry something ridiculous, like a two kilogram box. It's highly entertaining, enough so that I wish I didn't work evenings. But I do, so I'll just have to content myself with the fleeting attention.

I bet they'd be less interested if they knew that the other day when I was brushing my teeth I spat in the sink and it careened back out, arced over my shoulder, and sailed clear out of the bathroom and into the hall behind me.

Perhaps I'm spitting too hard?

I was laughing too hard on Tuesday, though. On the SkyTrain, on my way to work, there was this girl.

That isn't the funny part.

She was quite attractive, and Japanese. I mention that only because it will help you visualize the skirt she was wearing, which I've only seen Asian people wearing. It's rather short, and sort of puffs out.

Anyway, she was standing at one of the doors, and a lady came in with one of those little dogs that I hate. She sat down, but let her dog run around free on the train. This little thing made a beeline for the Japanese girl, and started doing figure-eights around her ankles, yipping the whole time.

When the girl put her feet together to preven it, the dog would sit at her feet, staring up her legs and under her skirt. Sometimes he'd rear up with his paws on her knees, staring upwards.

The girl was clearly very embarassed, and it probably didn't help that by this time the entire car was trying not to laugh aloud (most of us - some just went ahead and did it). The dog's owner did absolutely nothing to control her dog, and I don't even know if she knew what was going on. Fortunately for the girl, the lady and her dog got off after a couple of stops. Good start to the day. ;)

Now, I'm going to finish this off with a link that you really shouldn't click on. I include it because I looked at it, and it bothered me.

Normally when there's a beheading or a bus explosion or something that everybody is decrying in the news, I look out the video so I can see what it is that I'm supposed to be upset about.

On that note, it looks like being beheaded isn't any worse than being shot, from a pain and suffering point of view. But that may just be me.

That said, this video really bugged me. Be aware that it is graphic animal cruelty, so I again recommend that you don't watch it. Oh, and there are porn banners on the page too, if that sort of thing bothers you.

Ennui is not a french dessert.

Slow and boring week. The Filipin-Pho sucks. The other new guy is annoying. Meh.

I saw Silent Hill over the weekend. The sounds and lots of the visuals really captured the game, in my opinion, but I missed seeing the big pipe swung at the twisted nurses.

And even with the implied passage of time in the movie, the heroine got through things way faster than I did. Probably she read a walk-through online when she was researching Silent Hill.

As for yesterday...

Stuck in close with Vanna White!
Night after night after night after night
All right!

Remember that song by Weird Al? Well, I was stuck in one at work for an hour last night, and the reality bore no similarity to the song.

It's not the first time I've been stuck in an elevator there, but usually the elevator makes it to the nearest floor and I can easily pry open the doors. This time it got stuck a little short of the second floor and, despite the rest of the building seemingly made of crusted tissue paper and discarded styrofoam, the elevators appear to have been designed with the philosophy of "No escapees!".

And, looking over at the client's Eyes and Ears, I realized he was no Vanna White. Not even if I squinted. To be fair, I'm hardly Pat Sajak myself.

Ah well. I used the phone in the elevator to call the monitoring company, who called the bike patrol guys, who sent up one of their new guys, who doesn't have access to the second floor (my doing), where the cleaners let him in, where he determined that there was in fact a stuck elevator. He then called the elevator company, who responded in less time than it took the bike patrol guy to show up, despite being on the site.

The guy flipped some switches in the machine room, and out we popped. The first thing he asked was "Where you guys jumping in there, before it stopped?"

That's exactly what we had been doing. I do that all the time, and so does he. Our synchronised efforts, however, were more than a match for any mere machine. Score one for the meatsacks!

Rimmy: "No, we weren't. Were we?"

Eyes and Ears: "Nope."

Technician: "Yeah, well the overspeed indicator is what stopped the elevator, and that usually happens when people jump."

Rimmy: "We'll keep that in mind, won't we?"

Eyes and Ears: "Yup."

Ah well, c'est la vie.

On the weekend I talked to the useless braggart that replaced Zoroastrian, and told him to actually patrol, and to not just write down that he is.

He said that he was, and I told him that all electronic records indicate that he's not.

He suggested that something was wrong with the electronics, and I pointed out that it would be an unusual malfunction indeed, since it seems to accurately show everybody else doing what they're doing.

He then said "Well, I'm doing everything I was shown to do."

Dumbass. "I'm the one that trained you, and I certainly didn't tell you to take long breaks between doing halfassed patrols where you don't go everwhere and check everything."

He then wanted to come by during my shift on Monday to see these records for himself. I asked him what he hoped to accomplish by that.

"So that I know what I'm missing." Yeah right, so you can see what data points I'm using so you can figure out how to fool them.

"I've already told you what you're missing. This is the same information that the client uses. Do your duty."

And, when I checked his records after that, they were better. ;)

Laid down the same basic thing to the Filipin-Pho last night too. Same deal, he said he goes everywhere and does everything, but unless he's greasing up with oil of etherealness, he ain't doing squat. I told him the deal was that if things are done, the client gets mad, calls the company, and you get removed from site. "So do the whole thing, okay?"

"Uh... okay."

We'll see. ;)

The sort of people I'm sure I've played with in Guild Wars.

If I had known it was harmless, I would have killed it myself.

The sound of Arctor reading obscurely had awakened Luckman. Luckman sat up groggily and listened. He then heard the noise of Arctor dropping a coat hanger while hanging up his coat. Luckman slid his long muscular legs under him and in one motion picked up a hand axe which he kept on the table by his bed; he stood erect and moved animal-smoothly toward the door of his bedroom.

In the living room, Arctor picked up the mail from the coffee table and started through it. He tossed a large junkmail piece toward the wastebasket. It missed.

In his bedroom Luckman heard that. He stiffened and raised his head as if to sniff the air.

Arctor, reading the mail, suddenly scowled and said, "I'll be dipped."

In his bedroom Luckman relaxed, set the axe down with a clank, smoothed his hair, opened the door, and stepped out. "Hi. What's happening?"

Arctor said, "I drove by the Maylar Microdot Corporation Building."

"You're shitting me."

"And," Arctor said, "they were taking an inventory. But one of the employees evidently had tracked the inventory outdoors on the heel of his shoe. So they were all outside there in the Maylar Microdot Corporation parking lot with a pair of tweezers and lots and lots of little magnifying glasses. And a little paper bag."

"Any reward?" Luckman said, yawning and beating with his palms on his flat, hard gut.

"They had a reward they were offering," Arctor said. "But they lost that, too. It was a little tiny penny."

Luckman said, "You see very many events of this nature as you're driving along?"

"Only in Orange County," Arctor said.

"How large is the Maylar Microdot Corporation building?"

"About an inch high," Arctor said.

"How much would you estimate it weighs?"

"Including the employees?"

"Yeah."

"About ten pounds."

"Well, how can you tell, then, when you pass by it, if it's only an inch high and only weighs ten pounds?"

Arctor, now sitting on the ouch with his feet up, said, "They have a big sign."

"What's the sign look like?" Luckman asked. He sat on the floor, cleaning a boxful of grass. "Neon and like that? Colours? I wonder if I've seen it. Is it conspicuous?"

"Here, I'll show it to you," Arctor said, reaching into his shirt pocket. "I brought it home with me."

Luckman said, "You know how you could smuggle microdots into a country without them knowing?"

"Just about any way you wanted," Arctor said, leaning back smoking a joint. The air was cloudy.

"No, I mean a way they'd never flash on," Luckman said. "It was Barris who suggested this to me one day, confidentially; I wasn't supposed to tell anyone, because he's putting it in his book."

"What book? Common Household Dope and -"

"No. Simple Ways to Smuggle Objects into the U.S. and out, Depending on Which Way You're Going. You smuggle it in with a shipment of dope. Like with heroin. The microdots are down inside the packets. Nobody'd notice, they're so small. They won't-"

"But then some junkie'd shoot up a hit of half smack and half microdots."

"Well then, he'd be the fuckingest educated junkie you ever did see."

"Depending on what was on the microdots."

"Barris had his other way to smuggle dope across the border. You know how the customs guys, they ask you to declare what you have? And you can't say dope because-"

"Okay, how?"

"Well, see, you take a huge block of hash and carve it in the shape of a man. Then you hollow out a section and put a wind-up motor like a clockworks in it, and a little cassette tape, and you stand in line with it, and then just before it goes through customs you wind up the key and it walks up to the customs man, who says to it, `Do you have anything to declare?' and the block of hash says, "No, I don't,' and keeps on walking. Until it runs down on the other side of the border."

"You could put a solar-type batter in it instead of a spring and it could keep walking for years. Forever."

"What's the use of that? It'd finally reach either the Pacific or the Atlantic. In fact, it'd walk off the edge of the Earth, like-"

"Imagine an Eskimo village, and a six-foot-high block of hash worth about - how much would that be worth?"

"About a billion dollars."

"More. Two billion."

"These Eskimos are chewing hides and carving bone spears, and this block of hash worth two billion dollars comes walking through the snow saying over and over, `No, I don't.'".

"They'd wonder what it meant by that."

"They'd be puzzled forever. There'd be legends."

"Can you imagine telling your grandkids, `I saw with my own eyes the six-foot-high block of hash appear out of the blinding fog and walk past, that way, worth two billion dollars, saying, "No, I don't."' His grandchildren would have him committed."

"No, see, legends build. After a few centuries they'd be saying, `In my forefathers' time one day a ninety-foot-high block of extremely good quality Afghanistan hash worth eight trillion dollars came at us dripping fire and screaming, "Die, Eskimo dogs!" and we fought and fought with it, using our spears, and finally killed it."

"The kids wouldn't believe that either."

"Kids never believe anything any more."

"It's a downer to tell anything to a kid. I once had a kid ask me, `What was it like to see the first automobile?' Shit, man, I was born in 1962."

"Christ," Arctor said, "I once had a guy I knew burned out on acid ask me that. He was twenty-seven years old. I was only three years older than him. He didn't know anything any more. Later on he dropped some more hits of acid - or what he was sold as acid - and after that he peed on the floor and crapped on the floor, and when you said something to him, like `How are you, Don?', he just repeated it after you, like a bird. `How are you, Don?'"

Silence, then. Between the two joint-smoking men in the cloudy living room. A long, somber silence.

"Bob, you know something..." Luckman said at last. "I used to be the same age as everyone else."

"I think so was I," Arctor said.

"I don't know what did it."

"Sure, Luckman," Arctor said, "you know what did it to all of us."

"Well, let's not talk about it." He continued inhaling noisily, his long face sallow in the dim midday light.

The slide into stupidity

The aforementioned slide was brought home to me at a personal level last night when I went to see Lucky Number Slevin and decided to take a leak before finding a seat. Standing in the midst of a row of men staring at the cyclopean occupancy sensor on the urinal, I found that I couldn't unlimber my dingus.

I'd put my underwear on backwards.

Now, I can't say that I normally put a whole lot of thought into my boxer alignment, because some things just become automatic. Not unlike the whole "pants first, then shoes" dressing hierarchy. But there it was - shorts undeniably on backwards, and me fumbling at my crotch for an unlikely period of time. People were starting to notice - even the guy who banged his bishop on the side of the drinking fountain to dry it.

I managed my business, and went to my movie. Here's what's happened in the past two weeks:

If you were to scroll down to my last entry on March 30, you'd know that I'd just trained a new guy to replace Yumpin' Yiminy, and that the next day I had to do a five hour stint at the Justice Institute.

Well, it didn't work out like that.

At the end of my shift on the same day I wrote that, my relief didn't show up. I gave a generous amount of time for him to show up or call, but finally I called Operations and let them know. So they put me on the list of things to do and I waited.

At 0115, they called me back, and they were pissed.

Ops: "Rimmy, we finally got hold of your guy. He's not coming in."

Me: "Say whaaaaaaaat?"

Ops: "We finally managed to wake him up, and he said that he didn't know he was supposed to work. We brushed that aside and asked if he'd come in now to relieve you, and he said that he had a headache."

Me: "Not as much of a headache as he's going to have when I club him like a baby seal."

Ops: "I hear you. So I hate to ask, but can you cover the rest of the shift?"

Me: "So... you know I have a special to do in the morning, right? At the JI from 0900 to 1400? Couple that with the sixteen hours I have to work here now and my shift here tomorrow leaves me working 29 out of 32 hours."

Ops: "Oh shit!"

Me: "Welcome to my world."

Ops: "Well, how about if we take you off that special?"

Me: "Up to you, but was having trouble finding people to do it in the first place. If you think you can find an HP flagged person to do it in time, go for it. I'd be happy for the sleep."

Ops: "I'm pissed off at this guy. It's his responsibility to know his schedule."

Me: "Especially since I told him he was working tonight."

Ops: "You did? For sure?"

Me: "Twice that I can recall."

Ops: "Can you do me up an IR (incident report) stating that, and get it out to me tonight? We'll take care of this for you right away."

Me: "Sure thing."

Ops: "Thanks for working the extra. Don't worry about the JI, no way are we going to make you work for that long."

Me: "I appreciate that."

Sigh. Work work work, all day long. Work work work while I sing this song...

Late Saturday night (or more properly, early Sunday morning), I got a call from Valium Wailer. He was calling to inform me that he had a trainee on site. Say whaaaaaat? They replaced my new guy (which I'm glad of), but the new guy isn't training with me. Ah well, I'll tighten up his training when I see him on Monday night.

That weekend, my mom was operating solo and so we went to a movie. She chose, and so we saw Inside Man. It wasn't bad, and it was nice to hit a movie again. And I hadn't done anything with my mom in a while that didn't involve an unshowered breakfast going, so that was good too.

There was a line to get into the theatre, so mom sat down and I rode the line. As I got to my spot, there was a woman in front of me talking to some other guy. She turned to me and asked on behalf of the guy if this line was for all the movies, or just Inside Man. I told her it was just for the one movie, and the guy went on his merry way.

She: "That's a great shirt!"

I was wearing my red Transformers shirt. I periodically get attention for it, exclusively from women. I have no idea why, but it's a pretty sweet shirt.

Rimmy: "Thanks."

She: "So do you think this movie is going to be any good?"

Rimmy: "Beats me. I'd rather have gone to V for Vendetta, but my mom gets to choose today."

She: "You're here with your mom? That's cool."

Rimmy: "Yup. All these years and the apron strings are still attached."

She: "So have you seen V for Vendetta yet?"

Rimmy: "No, but I'm going to for sure."

She: "It was really good."

Rimmy: "Did you read the comic? My bad, I mean illustrated novel?"

She: "Oh yes, I'm rather an intellectual and a neo-avant garde in regards to fringe literature."

No shit? Well, aren't you just the cat's ass?

Fortunately, she was being somewhat self-lampooning here, so I didn't think she was too full of herself. She was kind of cute, too.

We chat a bit more, but before I could ask her if she wanted to play Auto-Eroticbots versus the Contracepticons (that's where she gets to see part of me transform into a gun), some big forty-something dude with a long (to the small of his back) ponytail shows up and says:

Ponytail Dude: "What, I can't leave you alone for five minutes and you're picking up some guy?"

Rimmy: "Nah, she wasn't strong enough to get me off the ground."

She: "Five minutes is a long time. Besides, he's here with his mother."

Ponytail Dude: "You're here with your mother? This replaces the traditional Sunday dinner?"

Me: "The traditional Sunday dinner was in the food court downstairs. She had A&W, I had won ton."

She: "It's okay he's here with his mother, since I'm here with my father." (as she links arms with the guy who is clearly not her father.

Oddly enough, as the line started moving, my mom cut in line in front of them. What a bully. ;)

The movie was very watchable. It would have been nice if any of the characters had more than two facial expressions though. Jodie Foster has legs, by the way.

Monday arrives. The roof falls in.

That's a nice metaphor that people use when lots of chaotic bad stuff happens, or when the worst possible scenario happens. In my case, the roof actually fell in.

It was raining, as it's been known to occasionally do in Vancouver, and I was doing my rounds. As I walked through the atrium, I heard a little splatter of water start hitting the floor just behind me.

No big deal, it's a glass ceiling (driving that lesson home for all the aspiring employees with dreams of promotion) that often leaks when it rains. It's never very much.

A few steps further on and the sound of the water increased as though someone had opened up a faucet, which was what the stream of water now appeared to resemble, when I investigated it. From about four stories up.

"Hmmmm," I thought to myself. "That's odd."

Then an undescribable sound, best described as a horrid version of "scrrrrrriiiiiiIIIIIIIITTTCH!", and the water volume increased again.

"I think I'm going to get someone," I thought valiantly to myself. And that's what I did.

Because if there's one thing a guy wants to know when he's facing a mini-Niagra cascading down from a decomposing (scrrrrrriiiiiiIIIIIIIITTTCH!) glass roof in heavy rain late at night is that he's not alone.

So I called the client, and I called Evil Property Manager's company. I went in to the nearby sales unit and started putting papers and boxes up on desks, as the water was definitely leaking in.

I mused briefly that I used to do flood restoration, and how I'd been glad that I no longer worked at a job where my feet were perpetually wet. Oh, sweet irony. At least my boots are waterproof.

The glass ceiling continued to slowly give way, and the piece of glass itself was now bowing under the weight of the water that had run over from the rest of the roof into the new depression. The glass guys, when they came, said that the water depth was two and a half feet, the glass was so bent.

Finally, the decision was made to chop the glass down rather than have it fall during the day when people are around. So that's what they did.

I was on the other side of the room, behind an upright, and I still got showered with bits of glass. Luckily, tempered glass breaks like your windshield - very few sharp pieces.

Oddly enough, as soon as the glass was down, the rain stopped. Fucking Murphy anyway!

Wood and tarps across the hole, and that was it for the night. My new relief showed up. Nice way to meet, really. "Hi, I'm your boss, don't let anybody go near the area with the new skylight we spontaneously installed tonight. Suspend normal patrols and watch the area once people start to arrive. Yadda yadda yadda.

Incidentally, the new guard looks and sounds just like Napolean Dynamite. He's a little more on the ball, and his hair is slightly different, but the resemblance is striking.

No, I didn't ask him about his nunchuk skills, bow hunting skills, or computer hacking skills, but he did mention that the conditioned air in the building made his lips hurt real bad.

Then the client asks me to arrange for a guard for the day (0800-1600) to keep the area safe. I phone it in, and Operations is dubious they can get anybody, as they're already overextended. So they ask me to call in at 0630 to see if it's covered, otherwise I get to do it.

I got to do it.

Now, here's an interesting thing: I didn't sit down or take a break for that entire eight hour shift. Nine hour, if you want to be picky, since business hours were until 1700 and there were still lots of people around.

That wasn't the interesting bit, by the way. This is: people went absolutely out of their way to try to get me to take a break, to eat something, to go to the bathroom. They offered to take my place, they offered to go and buy me food, they offered rationales about how "nobody is going to report you if you just sit down". It seemed to absolutely offend them that I paced back and forth in the same area for all that time.

Why do you suppose that is? Company policy (my company, not theirs) says that we don't get breaks unless someone relieves us. That's a guard relieving us, not neighbour Joe. Company policy also says that we're not supposed to be seen eating or smoking while on duty and in uniform.

I don't smoke, but I do eat on occassion. When I do, I go into my office and have a quick nosh between patrols. But out in the public eye, it looks less than professional if the "alert security guard" is dipping fries in catsup and trying not to drip on his shirt.

Trying to explain this to someone who was trying to get me to eat, they disgustedly said "Why, because it would make you look human?" Well yeah, kind of. More because nobody's paying us to eat.

Oh, and word came down that we're not supposed to talk about the glass, and we can't actually say that the glass came down. Of course, everybody who went by wanted to talk about it, and ask what had happened. I gave various responses, but I kept coming back to "You know how you throw pencils at a drop ceiling sometimes? That shit can get out of hand."

Ah well, I survive that particular sixteen hours.

Wednesday I spent recovering from that, and I got a phone call from Cookie Monster. He called to tell me that Yumpin Yiminy had been replaced (fucking DUH, man!) and that Zoroastrian was also being replaced (which I knew, since I'd seen that on the schedule). Then...

Cookie Monster: "I gave myself until Wednesday to call you, and today's the day. I sensed some frustration in your last few status reports, so I wanted to explain to you why it took so long to deal with those two guards."

Frustration? It took four weeks from the time the client asked me to remove Yumpin' Yiminy. I sent constant written reports to CM (at his request) detailing anything involving YY since then. Often these reports would begin something like "It's been x weeks since the client requested YY's removal. Since then, I have received y complaints regarding (various things employees have been annoyed about), and heard z derogatory comments about YY and our company in general.

I think it was the counting of weeks during which CM had done bugger all that was the subtle indication to him that I thought he was a ponce. And I was pretty sure it was one of the derogatory comments about our company that got him moving. He doesn't like bad publicity, although you can see he does very little to prevent it.

He went on saying nothing of substance for a while, then

Cookie Monster: "Anyway, I wanted you to know that I've been on your side during this whole thing. We think you're doing a good job running that site. Talk to you later." Click.

Well, click to you too.

Where in the hell did that comment come from? A little bit of talking to people that get things done yielded the answer.

You see, we have a fairly new director of operations. That would make him CM's boss, and he's only been with us for a few months. He used to be a cop, and he wants things to work, apparently.

My site problems came up during a manager's meeting being chaired by him, and when he noticed the reports from me, followed by the request from the client, and the continuing reports from me, he was less than impressed by CM's response time of zip. That's where CM's change of attitude came from.

I've also since been told that this new director's door is always open to supervisors, and that he wants to know when there are problems. I should also start going to the S/S meetings, and really ought to wear my epaulettes (rank insignia), which I don't have. And apparently the way to take advantage of CM's boss is to nag the hell out of CM when there's a problem.

I probably won't go to that extreme, but it would be nice if things were addressed on occasion...

Friday I trained my replacement for the Zoroastrian. He's a twenty two year old who doesn't pay rent, his mom does his laundry for him, parents pay for school, and he's spent $15000 tricking out the inside of his car (it's got three tv's). He also used to work for us at Vancouver General Hospital, so he knows everything there is about security. He also knows everything about everything.

Him: "Let me tell you something man, this is the way things work."

Rimmy: "Let me tell you sumptin', mon. Dees ees the way tings work here!"

For someone who's so capable, he sure calls me a lot. Reminds me of Palooka in that way.

On the weekend, I finally saw V for Vendetta. And what can I say? More thumbs up than a Chernobyl pianist. Go see it.

"There are people who are going to hate this movie; people who don't like to think, the brain dead, the fools. Referencing the still unseen film, one member of a politically minded film forum was quick to declare: "You can't make a movie about a terrorist now without endorsing bin Laden". It's that mindset, which has become so ingrained in all of us since 9/11, that makes V for Vendetta so unsettling. At times it almost feels like you're watching something forbidden, like you're seeing something you shouldn't be allowed to see. It's shocking that a movie like this, especially in these times, ever actually got made. It's even more unbelievable that it was made by a major Hollywood studio. It's fun to accuse Hollywood of liberal activism, but you don't expect this kind of real filmmaking bravery from corporate America or a company like Warner Bros. It's a purposefully uncomfortable film, one that will affect different people differently depending on what you bring in with you."

--Joshua Tyler, CINEMA BLEND

On Monday, I sat down with the guard reports from the previous week and the keyscan transaction logs and did my usual check. And Napolean was blowing through his patrols suspiciously quickly. So I asked him about it when he came in. Or rather, I told him what he had to do.

Rimmy: "So you have to check all of these areas every time you patrol."

Napolean: "It's already taking me half an hour to do what I'm doing. It'll take way longer if I do all of that."

Rimmy: "Well, this is what the client wants so... it's taking you half an hour to just walk around the building?"

Napolean: "Yeah."

That's odd. If I were to just walk around the building without stopping to do everything I usually do, I could crack it off in less than ten minutes. And that's at a normal walking pace.

Rimmy: "You probably just haven't found the flow for the building yet. I do everything in twentyfive minutes or so."

Napolean: "You do all of that in twentyfive minutes? No way!"

Rimmy: "I do. Give it a shot and see how it goes."

Napolean: "Well, if that's what I've got to do."

I also found out from the client's eyes and ears that the window washer and the glass guys who came to improve the plywood and poly patch on the glass roof had argued with each other to the point that they'd grabbed each others collars and were shaking them. This because the patch leaked on the weekend (so my guards called me, and I called the client and Evil Property Manager's company) to get someone in to deal with it. The window washer was there and wanted to rig up some sort of tarp chute to catch and channel the water, and was starting to set up his rigging. The glass guy didn't like being told what to do with by a pixie with his name tatooed on his arm (Scuzzy), and that was that. Weird.

The next day, it was my mom's birthday. We went out for lunch and I had what very possibly might be the best halibut and chips I've ever had. I'm still not sure what "hand crafted" means when it's applied to fries, but it totally worked. And the fish... I'm glad I'm not a glutton. That was some primo flavour.

I even used the tartar sauce, and I don't even like tartar. Best eighteen dollar cheap food I ever had!

At work, I looked over Napolean's report and transaction record. He patrolled properly, but it took him over an hour to do each.

When he showed up to relieve me, we talked about that and he said that he understood it was what the client wanted, but he was told by scheduling that this site was "ten minutes of patrolling, then he can spend the rest of the hour studying".

Which was good, since he was looking for a stationary quiet site where he could, in fact, study. Since he'd discovered that this was not the case at my site, he put in for a transfer. Which is too bad, because the guy does what he's told and isn't a total dumbass, despite the resemblance to Mr. Dynamite.

On Wednesday, something utterly unexpected happened that was so heinous that I'm not going to relate it here. That, and I can't remember what happened on Wednesday. I certainly did not indulge in my own crapulence, I can tell you that!

On Thursday, I found Crazy Cougar Receptionist to be adoorable. Literally, as I clocked her with a door and none too gently.

To be fair, I honestly didn't know she was there. It was after the time she usually leaves, and I'd noticed the guy who does the last hour in reception in his place, so when I threw the door open and it impacted her (elbow, shoulder, and hip) I was as surprised as she was.

She looked at me like a poleaxed cow, in shock and pain. I said "Sorry", but I didn't add that I was sorry I didn't know she was there, or else I would have got a better run up before I hit the door. Maybe next time. ;)

I also trained the replacement for Napolean. It turns out he's a buddy of the guy that I trained the previous week who then stood me up and made me work all of those extra hours.

Bad way to start.

He's a Filipino ex-cop who's been in the country for six months or so. I mention the Filipino part because while I was training him, the all-Filipino cleaning crew was doing their thing. And every time he met one of the Filipino cleaners, he told them he was from Vietnam. And some of them believed him.

I can't figure out why this is funny, although clearly he was amused. He is henceforth going to be called Filipin-Pho for as long as he stays on site.

He also managed to break one of my two master override keys off in somebody's office door that night while I was training him. Since this was the start of a long weekend, with extra coverage and no employees, no way was I going to leave my one remaining override with Charles Atlas over here.

So I called Operations and asked if somebody could come by, pick up my key, and make a quick copy.

They told me that only Cookie Monster could make that decision for my site. So I called him. He didn't think it could be done (he was at home with his girlfriend), but she told him that Home Depot was open until 2200 that night and they cut keys. And for some reason mine doesn't have the "Do Not Duplicate" stamp on it. So he actually showed up and got it cut, and we swallowed the cost.

Operations couldn't believe it. "Monster came out and took care of it? Cookie Monster? Well shit in a bag and punch it!"

Okay, that last part was mine. But the sentiment was clearly expressed.

Statutory holidays are boring at my site. There's nothing to do, and nobody to talk to. Ah well.

I'd been waiting all week to see if I was accepted for an in-house course being held on Saturday. It was to get my CPI certificate, which is Non-Violent Crisis Intervention. But when I tried to confirm, I just kept bouncing to voicemail.

Having heard nothing from them, I just went and showed up. And it turns out that it was being held the following Saturday. I joined in the class they were holding, and got my OFA 1 instead. Meh.

Which brings us back to me trying to hose the porcelain with my knickers in a twist at Lucky Number Slevin.

I managed to sort that out, and watched the movie. I couldn't decide at first if I liked it, but I now think I'm glad I went. It was entertaining, that scores big points with me.

Incidently, when I got home I discovered that not only were my shorts backwards, they were inside out as well. To unbutton the fly, the quickest route would have been to swallow my arm and let my fingers do the walking out my colon.

On the plus side, this means they're technically okay to wear again, forwards and rightside out.

Damn that slide. Oh well.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!