May 15th

Greg (my roommate) and I pledged this morning at 6:40, on the drive over, to make every Thursday the day when we actually focus and do work all day. As Greg so eloquently put it, “So, if I understand what you’re sayin’ right, Thursday is the day we beat asses around the workplace!” I’m not sure whether to view that as a tribute to the sometimes controversial American pastime of spanking or as a genuine interest by Greg in actually surpassing our co-workers in aptitude by such a large margin that we leave them with sore backsides. Either way, it is only 8 A.M., and I am writing this, not working… I mean, Sorry Sir, I am Working on my Typing Skills; I am Working on my Hand-Eye Coordination.

So I have been working hard since yesterday on scheduling a plant all by myself. As I really haven’t explained what I do yet, here goes: basically, I tell car factories, from Mexico to Canada, when to work on specific cars. This is scheduled down to small increments, for example, a guy/buddy/pal in Canada will see a car for 20 minutes, spraying it with blue paint the whole time. And then the next car pops up, he does the same thing. All of it is scheduled. That wouldn’t be so bad, but then constraints are added. This is the best analogy: You walk into a store with 100 dollars (a factory can do 100 cars a day,) you have to spend exactly 100 dollars. You have to spend exactly 29 dollars on fruit (yellow paint.) You have to spend 60 on food, and 40 on thong sandals (60 cars must be Jeeps, 40 must be Trucks.) On top of everything like that, certain percentages, you have the “blocking” constraints. Stuff like, when you put your frozen pizzas through the self-scan, they must go in blocks of 3. If you have 6, they have to be scanned in different groups. On the other hand, it could be something like this -- out of every 10 items you scan, 2 must be toothbrushes (Dodge Vipers.)

Mr. Johnny C., my neighbor, who wears his shirt unbuttoned (but not all the way) every day and sports a golden chain around his well-lined neck, managed to go on a mid-morning rant that lasted for a good 25 minutes. Topics covered: taxes, window washers, his mother’s bronchitis, how crappy our boss is, how crappy our computers are, how stupid car salesmen are, how much he is paying for his basement door to be replaced, Survivor, a libertarian’s place in laissez-faire (hands off) economics (he didn't really say this,) Hil-Dawg and Baracky the Moose. It started when one of the constituents of the Cubicle Complainers Club, of which John is a member, asked when she would get her stimulus check from the Man. John offered that it should be here soon, but that it didn’t matter because she would have to give it back as soon as Hillary or Barack is elected. Keep in mind that this is coming from the mouth of a lifelong union member who had, minutes before, declared that his experiences with the UAW would give him an edge on Survivor.

I had to take Greg home during our lunch break because he has diagnosed himself with a case of pink eye. Needless to say, I will not being showering him with his usual nighttime Eskimo/Butterfly kisses (whichever one is the eyelash one.) That will have to cease, at least for the time being.

I wore my business watch today. It costs more than the lives most of these people gave up to become worker drones. The hive is busy today with launching the 2009 models. I just checked to make sure it is still 2008. It is. I don’t know if I should tell them. Until then, I am the queen bee, laying 3,000 eggs per hour and carving out the future of my colony. The rest of them? They are my bee-otches (Some older folk might not understand this phrase. Reference “slaves, ball boys, butlers, or Mary Wilder, the blind sister that added little value to the Wilder clan.”)