If God intended me to be with one woman, why did he make me so damn fine?

Got in to work yesterday and Eyes & Ears, sitting with three others at a table doing coffee, asked (sharply, for him) "So did your guard even show up last night?"

"He did, lucky for me" I replied.

"Did he show up groaning and holding his sore tummy?"

I laughed. "No, he was coping."

"Not coping very well - I thought to myself 'I wonder how Rimmy's new guard is doing?' so I ran off his access record." Uh oh, I thought.

"And?" I asked.

"He only moved three times all night." Aw shit.

So after enduring (and admittedly, composing) the jokes and taunts of the people sitting at the table, including the observation that with all the guards I go through I'm the one who trains them, I go off and check his records for the rest of the week, with Eyes & Ears standing over me.

The day before - five hits.

The day before that... was me covering because he hadn't shown up at all. Sixty-some hits.

The day before that, his first shift of the week, coming on right after the server room had been going through heating fits and needed emergency ventilation requiring constant monitoring... nine hits. And only three of those were at the server room, and he stopped going there after the first ninety minutes. Sigh.

That sent Eyes & Ears through the roof. "Get rid of him."

So I've got a new guard coming in two weeks - he's the guy that Cookie Monster, my field manager, and a guy from Operations all made a point of asking me if it was okay if he came to my site. But he's on vacation, so Cookie Monster wanted me to hold on to this guy for the two weeks.

So I marshalled my arguments, polished a few choice phrases... and as the guy showed up for his shift so did my field manager, and he proceeded to address it instead and he did it far too lightly.

I added a few things, and clarified (since I knew what I was talking about, and the F/M only sort of did), but that was that.

The guy said that he had no excuse, and it won't happen again.

Eyes & Ears called me this morning - we'd been robbed. So much for me claiming that due to my brilliant leadership since I took over we hadn't been hit even once.

However, it wasn't laptops. There was no broken glass. Nothing sexy.

Lawn furniture.

That's right, you read it correctly.

Granted, it was pricey lawn furniture. Heavy heavy metal furniture that was chained down - out on the back veranda-esque area for the smokers.

And some of it vanished last night. I assume it was scrap metal thieves.

I haven't been in to read the guy's report, but I'll bet there's no mention of it. This makes us look even more (if that's possible) like chumps than we did before. My only hope is that when I'm called on the carpet over it, is that I can point out that we aren't allowed to go outside, and that the bike patrol goons didn't notice it either.

Although Q-tip did - he phoned me while I was talking to Eyes & Ears. He's a good egg, and he said that none of the night guards noticed either.

My horoscope for this week stated Your incredible reflexes, hand-eye coordination, and taciturn nature will cause you to become known throughout the West as The Man Who Handcuffed Lightning But Was Afraid To Talk About His True Feelings. It was less than helpful.

Remind me why I'm still doing this. Anybody?

P.S. My friend Scoob who first dubbed me Rimplestiltstalker some ten or eleven years ago wanted me to let you know about soup options for your child in New York. He recommends Mad Dog 20/20 or Ripple, but advises that Champale just won't cut it.