Movie of the Week: Gran Torino

"GET OFF MY LAWN."

Fake Meeting sent to HR:
Where: Conference Room
When: 11:30 PM Friday
Topic:

Training - 7 Habits of Highly Successful People

Real Meeting:

Where: Conference Room
When: 7:30 PM
Topic:

Film: Gran Torino

What do you do when you run out of training that you are supposed to go to? Refresh on the basics. I love the classics. So that is why we pulled out a recent "classic" from Clint Eastwood. Although my favorite picture is this one.

The Interns Production of My Husband is a Vampire

The Interns are putting on a play.  Or maybe it is an opera?  I haven't been to any of the rehearsals.  And I just Nerf dart any of them that start practicing lines around me.  I want to be surprised at the showing. 

The boss is going to be out for three days this coming week (Wed-Fri).  Something about a golf retreat in Arizona.  So, Wednesday will be business as usual.  Thursday will be spent putting up the stage and building props for the production.  Friday morning will be the show followed up by drinks at lunch for celebration.  After wards the interns get to clean up their mess before Monday while I stay at wherever we are celebrating.

The Interns are working extra hard right now because we have gotten crazy enough to think that we should hire a couple of them.  That puts them into a position of power and no hazing.  To think... they would be on an equal level as I?

Contraband Coffee Mugs

Other offices have shutdown to cut back costs.  So there is a flood of items from old offices coming in.  We've gotten extra desks, file cabinets, computers, projectors, etc.  You name it we got it.  I was out sick a couple days when the good stuff came in and my intern did save anything for me.  Bastard is now taking out the garbage (cleaning my car). 

There is one item though that has been deemed contraband to have, coffee mugs.  Now why would coffee mugs with our own company logo be contraband?  The owner of the company can't stand the site of them.  If he sees you with one it will cause you to get an ass chewing.  That is why it is considered contraband.  There just coffee mugs right?

Well, one of the offices that shutdown used company money to get the coffee mugs.  They paid WAY too much for them.  I think the figure was something like $250 a mug?  There were some fraudulence going on.  I think one of the managers bought himself a personal golf cart shortly after the order was placed.  So it is a sore spot to everyone's boss. 

Our interns are setting up for the next LAN party in the small conference room with all our new non-contraband items. 

Cheers,

Acidity Test Results

Jimbo (Chief Intern) spent the better part of the Friday morning measuring urinal cakes.  I think the gas mask he was wearing made his work go slower.  But it was a requirement from the rule book.  So without further ado, here are the results:

Wayne:
 - original cake size: 7.8 oz
 - final cake size: 6.5 oz
 - total change: 1.3 oz
 - Strategy: Black Coffee!!!

Ben:
 - original cake size: 8 oz
 - final cake size: 7.1 oz
 - total change: 0.9 oz
 - Stategy: Mountain Dew (banking on the potency of yellow 5)

Shaun:
- original cake size: 7.6 oz
- final cake size: 4.0 oz
- total change: 3.6 oz
- Stategy: Flat out cheating and lots of Coke (it can clean an engine right?)
- Reason for Disqualification: Intern was caught rubbing the urinal cake against the urinal to wear down the exterior of the cake.

Roger:
 - original cake size: 7.9 oz
 - final cake size: 5.8 oz
 - total change: 2.1 oz
 - Strategy: Shear amount of coffee. 

Dave:
 - original cake size: 8.1 oz
 - final cake size: 7.6 oz
 - total change: 0.5 oz
 - Strategy: Lots of any fluid

Myself:
 - original cake size: 7.9 oz
 - final cake size: 6.9 oz
 - total change: 1 oz
 - Strategy: Coffee for breakfast, Dr. Pepper for lunch, Water from then on so I could sleep at night.

So Roger won easily.  I believe Roger drinks on average 15 cups of coffee on a regular basis. He picked it up for this event. I'm not sure exactly what he got it up to. But I think at the hieght of the competition we were going through a can of coffee a day. 

It reminds me of the joke, you can tell a real smoker by the number of lighters they go through in a day. 

Straight black coffee seems to be the victor.  Although I wish Shaun wouldn't have cheated.  He really messed up the scientific results.  I would have liked to have had a solid soda variable in the test.  I watered my urine down to much at night just so that I could sleep.  I need my eight hours.  And then another 10 at night. 

Prizes:

Roger took Jimbo as his personal intern.  Jim seems to be the only intern that can take constant ridicule.  For crying out loud he wore the Chiquita Banana costume to a video conference call!  I have to admit it was pretty hilarious.  Jimbo was hidden but not around the conference table as we had a video conference call with HQ.  A big dog from HQ was giving a presentation on benefit changes.  You could tell exactly when he could see Jim.  Props to the VP, he didn't even ask what the hell was going on.  He just put on his corporate smile and kept plugging away.

For second place, Wayne earned a razor.  Not as anything related to the contest.  He just has a discusting mustache that needs to go. 

Indoor Activities

I love the part on the movie StepBrothers where they build bunk beds.  "We have so much more room for activities."  Well, when it rains we need indoor activities.  Just next time it won't be indoor paintball.  That stuff does NOT come off the walls very easily.  The Interns had to repaint some hallways and a couple offices.  And it is not legal to hide in the ceiling tiles!  I don't care what Wayne or Jake say.  I didn't have some 6 foot 6 behemoth to use to climb into the rafters.  So it just isn't good sportsmanship that they should do that.

Apples are the Rubics Cube of our office

I'm not sure if you've seen the YouTube videos, but there is a technique you can use to crack an apple in half.  Most guys in the office have tried it.  Most guys have claimed they can do it.  Just no one has done it in front of me.  I think they are full of it.  Personally I think it is a practical joke that apple growers developed to boost sales.  I just made a mess on my first attempt.  I've got one more apple in my bag of two that I bought today.  I'll try again tomorrow.  I can't eat another apple right now.

Hiring!

The economy is in the crapper.  Industries that have been suffering continue to suffer.  Those that have been okay are now feeling the effects.  So what is my company doing hiring? 

[ Deep within a cave with torches attached to the wall for light.  Just picture darkness, bats, sounds of water dripping, and the sounds torches make when they are moved really quickly in a movie. ]

Boss: "We've got no way of making a profit this year.  Most of us were actually frightful of losing our jobs."

Wayne: "Were?  Were afraid of losing our jobs?"

Boss: "Yeppers.  But we figured out a way to keep everyone's job."

[grins all around]

Boss: "Actually there will be quite a bit more people around."

[confused looks all around]

Boss: "By an accounting and tax loop hole the more potential debt we assume the more we can rack up on credit.  The new government has given us the opportunity to take on up to... "

[ Boss puts on glasses and looks at notes on paper ]

Boss: "145 small business loans."

Roger: "So we can use loans to pay for things until things pickup?"

Boss: "That is the plan.  If we use up to 60 loans up are able to coast for 2 years.  If we use up to 120 loans we can expand and make ourselves appear to be more profitable to potential buyers."

Me: "Won't potential buyers look at the books and see we have outstanding debts that are unpayable?"

Boss: "Not if we get enough people that a major buyer can assume such a large debt without blinking.  So we have to become massive."

Me: "But what will all these people be doing?"

Boss: "We obviously don't have enough work for them to do.  We are covering everything already.  I need everyone here to make up fake work for new employees to do."

[ good thing we already do that for the interns ]