The Life of Bonzi

Forward this Post or You'll Have Bad Luck

2009-12-14T13:39:00.000-08:00

This morning, I inadvertently became part of one of the most annoying things about e-mail and the internet: mass e-mail forwarding. I didn’t mean for it to happen. Honest, I didn’t.But sometimes I just can’t keep my mouth shut. I have a compulsive need to educate the ignorant. It’s a curse, really, my cross to bear.

Let me backtrack. In my introductory post about Dick, I mentioned that one of his many irritating tendencies is forwarding of chain letters. I think it might be his primary hobby, and there’s a good chance it’s what he spends the greater part of his working hours doing. So this morning, when I opened my e-mail I had no less than 8 forwards from Dick. Five of them required me to click some attachment to see some photo. These are usually pointedly gross so they get immediate “click-delete” treatment. One of them was a suggestion for everyone to put “In God We Trust” in their e-mail signature. Another was a story about a giant Alligator someone killed in Alabama, complete with some poorly PhotoShopped images of an Alligator taking down a full sized buck. I glanced at that one for a couple of seconds and then deleted it.The final e-mail was titled “Proposed 28th Amendment to the Constitution”.

As you can guess, this e-mail was an example of the most common purpose of mass e-mail: political rabble rousing. It was as insidious or overt as some of the other messages I see from time to time, but it didn’t lack for ridiculousness. The United States Constitution, the e-mail suggested, should be amended for the 28th time to include the common sense provision: "Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and/or Representatives, and Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and/or Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States". Well, gee whiz! Who couldn’t get behind that? I mean, I love the Constitution and all but just the other day I was saying to myself, “Self, why doesn’t the constitution have any amendments that use a lot of words to say nothing at all?” And now, problem solved!

It gets better, too. You might not have known this, but amending the U.S. Constitutions is an exceedingly easy thing to do. To wit: “[We] Only need 3/4 of the State Legislatures to pass this to become law...AND IT IS VETO PROOF including no appeal to the Supreme Court.” See, piece of cake. Let’s get right on that.

Wait? What? That’s not right?

No. No, it’s not. You see, having paid attention during elementary school social studies class, I can tell you that it is actually more complicated than that. An amendment to the constitution, shockingly, actually requires an act of Congress. A prospective amendment requires the “Yay” vote of 2/3 of both the United States Senate (67 of 100) and House of Representatives (290 out of 435). Only after does the proposed amendment go the states for ratification, requiring ratification of three quarters of the states (38 of 50) to become the law of the land.

Well, damn. That sounds a lot harder.

I probably should have just let it go and sent that e-mail to the recycle bin with the rest of them, but I couldn’t help myself. So I responded to the e-mail (I did not reply all to a bunch of strangers; that would be obnoxious) and pointed out to Dick that amending the constitution was actually a fairly difficult thing to do, which is why we’ve only had 27 amendments in more than 2 centuries.

Dick, for his part, took my e-mail and forwarded it to all hundred plus names on his mailing list, taking care to add his own rant about how actual process pretty much guaranteed that such an amendment would never pass. And so, whether I liked it or not, I became part of the wonderful world of e-mail forwarding. At least I brought some actual facts to the process with me. That’s rare in e-mail forwards.

I don’t really get how some of these things explode the way they do. I know some older people that won’t purchase things on the internet because they’re worried about their credit card info being stolen, but if some stranger of unknown origins at some undisclosed location in the country tells them that Barack Obama is a secret Muslim, they take it as gospel and share it with all of their friends. I heard it on the internet, so it must be true. What kind of system is that? And there’s no limit to the ridiculousness that people will believe. One time I joked with a friend of mine that I was going to start the most ridiculous internet rumor I could think of, forward it to a couple of people and see if I could get it to show up on Snopes. The rumor was that Barack Obama and his democratic allies in congress were planning to secretly vote on a law to rename the state of Alabama as “Al’Obama” to honor Obama for becoming our nation’s first black president and introduce a touch of Islamic culture to our map. I would have done it, too, except I’m half afraid it would work and people would actually believe it.

And then I’d have three different versions of it forwarded to me from Dick, and I only have so much space in my mail box.

That’s all I’ve got.

Do Not Let it Snow

2009-12-10T11:42:00.000-08:00

There are two things that I do not like. Actually, there are a lot of things that I do not like, but there are two things that I don’t like that that are somewhat out of the ordinary among the people that I know. The first thing is sand. I do not like sand. It’s grainy and itchy and if you walk in it for just a couple of minutes, you’re somehow still finding it in random places several weeks after the fact. It’s gross and uncomfortable. I have no problem with beaches. In fact, I enjoy the beach. I simply would enjoy it that much more if I didn’t have to inadvertently take seven and a half pounds worth of sand as a souvenir every time I went. The last couple of times I’ve gone to the beach, I’ve tried to explain this to people, but each time, people have reacted like I was saying I didn’t like football or money or America. Maybe I’m strange.

The other thing I do not like is snow. Snow sucks. It just does. Why do we have to pretend otherwise? Think about it. If someone told you “tomorrow the ground is going to be covered. It’s going to be really cold and slippery, and harder to walk on. The roads are going to be bad and it’s going to take 10 times as long to get your car out of its parking spot,” would you be excited about that. Of course you wouldn’t? But somehow every time there’s even a hint of snow, or a possibility there would be snow, half my Facebook friend list has some happy status update complete with smiley face emoticons. I don’t understand.

Most of this is probably sentimental value left over from younger days. Snow was nice when I was school. We got a day off, and could go outside and play and someone else was responsible for any driving and shoveling that had to be done and for making sure there was something to eat in the house. Win-win-win. Good times all around.

But now, what good does snow do me? I can’t play in it anymore; the neighbors get grumpy if you throw snowballs at them and you get weird looks trying to build a snowman with the neighborhood kids. And I certainly don’t get any time off work when it snows. In fact, I have to get up earlier just to make it on time, being diligently prompt as I am (he said, his voice heavy with irony). Cars need to be dug out and God help you if there’s a layer of ice under the snow on the windshield. You have to choose between uncomfortable boots (have you ever tried to find boots in a size 15, I didn’t think so) and getting snow in your shoes. Snow in your shoes is sort of like sand in your shoes, except the effect is a lot more irritating, if much less long lived. And then you have to drive to work on slippery roads surrounded by both terrified drivers who think going 5 miles per hour and riding the break the whole way is a winning strategy and maniacs who think their giant SUVS make them immune to laws of physics like friction and inertia.

So my question is: what part of that is good? Exactly which of the things I just listed am I supposed to enjoy? Where is the fun? Exactly. So why does everyone still get excited about snow? What is wrong with you people?

That’s all I’ve got.

An American Hero

2009-11-19T11:42:00.000-08:00

Since Sarah Palin’s out-of-nowhere debut in the National Awareness last August, she’s been a force of nature, a veritable typhoon that impacted everything in her path, for better or worse. At various times in her year and change on the stage she’s referred to herself as a pitbull with lipstick and then blasted as sexist those who repeated the quote, accused a future U.S. President of “palling around with terrorists”, knocked a respected journalist for asking her what newspapers she reads and blasted a major magazine for putting a picture of her in shorts on the cover even though she posed for the picture. She’s done all of that without having everyone with half a brain decide “she’s a whackjob, next!”. Sure, some people think that, maybe even a majority, but she has somehow maintained a significant and steadfast collection of supporters who at each turn nod their heads and say “you know, that woman makes sense.”

It’s bewildering, but her more significant achievement is that no one has yet been able to take her on any kind of significant level and escape unscathed. You might be able to win an argument with her, or beat her in an election or render her speechless with a basic policy question on national television but no one has been able to do any of those things without some small amount of collateral damage. You can engage her, but you do so at your own risk: the risk of being called a sexist or a socialist or a nazi and having thousands and thousands of letters with those claims flood your mailbox.

There is one, and only one exception to this rule. There is one person who has stared down the Palin monster and come out for the better:

His name is Levi Johnston. If you don’t know him he became a national figure in the wake of the news that Governor Palin’s 17 year old daughter was pregnant with his child. He sat with her dutifully at the Republican National Convention, flashed the tattoo of her name on his wrist, smiled, waved and somehow helped Bristol Palin become a symbol of why abstinence-only sex education is a good idea. (See what I mean about how hard it is to argue with this woman?)

But then they broke up (Conveniently after the election. Weird.) and the world had what it needed. A hero that could stare down the Palin machine and not blink. A hero to stand in front of the proverbial tank with the proverbial flower and not blink. That hero came in the form of a 19 year old high school drop-out from Wasilla, Alaska.

It might seem ironic that Sarah Palin’s kryptonite would be a 19 year old apprentice electrician and aspiring actor, but in actuality, Levi makes a perfect foil. You see, unlike a politician or media figure, he doesn’t have to worry about public image or approval ratings or getting elected to anything, ever, because that was never going to happen anyway. He doesn’t have to worry about bad publicity, because when you’re trying to make a buck as a reality star (or playgirl cover boy) or prolong your 15 minutes of fame, there is no such thing as bad publicity. It’s all gravy. And because of his relationship with Bristol, it stands to reason that he knows where the skeletons were buried.

Because of all this, Levi has been the one person who has managed to get under Sarah Palin’s skin in a meaningful way, and it’s because he has nothing to lose. The Palin camp criticizes him for the playgirl spread, he points out she was in swimsuit contests. They play hard ball on his custody rights, he blabs about it on day time talk shows. The Governor makes a disingenuous Thanksgiving dinner invitation on Oprah, he responds with “whatever, f*ck off”. (I’m paraphrasing).

And that’s the essence of Levi’s power: the ability to figuratively look at the governor and say “Oh yeah? Well, I knocked up your daughter, how do you like them apples?” And there’s no way she can hit him back because anything she says only elevates his profile, which is exactly what he wants in the first place. He’s got “f*ck you” power over her more than anyone else in the country. Don’t you think President Obama would have liked to tell Governor Palin where to stick her “pallin’ around with terrorists line? I’m certain that Joe Biden would have (and probably had to be reminded not to a dozen times). But they couldn’t, because they actually had to worry about alienating people and winning an election. Levi can drop down to her level and start digging. And there’s nothing she can do about it.

While others may criticize Levi Johnston for being a media whore or for milking his 15 minutes of fame, for taking off his clothes for money or for trying to get paid for what amounts to not knowing how to use a condom, I applaud him. And since he happens to be doing an important public service along the way, I say more power to him. Go get ‘em, Levi. Stick it to the (wo)man and make a buck while you can. Because after all, what's more American than that?

That’s all I’ve got. You betcha.

MNF Live Blog! Live! Part 4

2009-11-16T19:56:00.000-08:00

Continued from part 3

10:57 The Ravens run a half back pass, because, hey, why not? It doesn't work. 4th down.

10:59 The announcers get bored and start talking about Lebron James. I don't blame them.

11:01 Chris Carr continues to suck at returning punts. He must have faked his references or something. How else does someone get $5M to do something they suck at?

11:05 The Ravens get a 15 yard penalty and then run the ball for a gain of 1 on first and 25. It's like they don't know I have money riding on this. Meanwhile, Jaworski claims Mark Clayton, who hasn't missed a game in 2 years, is always injured.

11:12 I've been trying to find something to write about for 7 minutes, no luck. Meanwhile ESPN has resorted to showing John Gruden's college game film.

11:14 Chris Carr forgets about the fair catch rule for the league record 469th time and gets hit in the mouth as punishment.

11:19 The crew decides to cover their asses with the "been in a coma for 36 hours" demographic by talking more about the Pats-Colts game from last night. For the record, I think he should have punted. But I don't have three Super Bowl rings.

11:25 We've now entered the make excuses for Brady Quinn portion of the evening. While this is going on, Cleveland decides to give up and punts on 4th down with 4 minutes left.

11:30 Two minute warning as the Ravens lifelessly bleed away the clock. This is the worst shutout in team history. What an abhorrent game.

11:33 With 1:55 left, the Browns use their last time out. I guess because their fans haven't been through enough without drawing out this game.

11:35 As the last seconds wind down, Gruden "doesn't know if Brady Quinn was very good tonight." You think so, doctor?

11:37 On the last couple of snaps, Quinn takes his last chance to heave two throws 50 yards out of bounds. And finally, mercifully, this abomination of a football game is over. I've never been so dissatisfied with a win.

Thanks for following. Good night.

MNF Live Blog! Live! Part 3

2009-11-16T19:09:00.000-08:00

Continued from part 2...

My office pool is not looking good.

10:14 Chris Berman sucks. That isn't new, but it needed to be said.

10:19 Brady Quinn has passes knocked down by blitzing linebackers on either side on consecutive plays. Good balance, that.

10:21 3 and out for the Browns. I've seen Monkey crap fights with better displays of talent than this game.

10:23 Flacco to Mason for a huge gain, followed by Ray Rice scoring a touchdown as the Browns only have 10 guys on the field. Apparently counting to 11 really IS difficult.

10:28 On the Brown's first play Brady Quinn hits... Dawan Landry streaking down the sideline for an interception and a Ravens touchdown~! That's right. I used the tilde-bang~! Of course, this is too much success in a row for the Ravens, so they go ahead and get the extra point blocked. By the way, that never happened to Matt Stover in at least the last 5 years. Just saying. 13-0 Ravens.

10:31 Fabian Washington makes what might be his first NFL tackle. And dances.

10:36 Chris Carr has his first "doing something right" as a Raven as he picks off Quinn. This could get ugly. Ravens ball at the Cleveland 25.

10:39 Ravens drive stalls so Hauschka comes on to miss a kick.

10:40 I'll be damned. He made it. 16-0. I'm halfway to the points I need.

10:45 Jaworski and Gruden fill time by lamenting how the Browns won't throw the ball down the field. Meanwhile, the Browns try to come up with new and exciting ways to call a "screen pass".

10:49 The camera pans to a fan wearing a shirt that says "I [browns helmet] Cle". I don't get it. Is that supposed to be a heart?

10:51 Brady Quinn sees Ray Lewis sprinting up the middle and decides to fall down before he gets there. I don't blame him.

10:55 Third quarter ends. 16-0 Ravens. That's more like it, but this game is still bowling shoe ugly.

Continued in part 4

MNF Live Blog! Live! Part 2

2009-11-16T18:21:00.000-08:00

Continued from previous post...

9:23 The 2nd quarter starts with the Ravens screwing up a 3rd down and 1. The great start continues. But hey, monster punt. So we've got that going for us. Which is nice.

9:27 Haruki Nakamura has a broken ankle. I can tell you from experience, that sucks.

9:29 Brady Quinn finds a towel boy wide open on the sidelines. Unfortunately for him, towel boys are not eligible receivers, so the Browns have to punt.

9:33 Todd Heap makes a great catch and pays for it with his kidneys.

9:35. The smash-mouth football John Harbaugh brought to Baltimore leads to a 3 and 2 pass out of a shotgun formation. It doesn't work.

9:42 The Ravens get their second 12 men on the field penalty in the first half. Because counting to 11 is hard. Nine... Ten... Eleven...Twelve... Wait... Shit! Good thing nobody is trusting these guys with the holy hand grenade of Antioch.

9:49 The refs let the Cleveland fans know that there's no intentional grounding. But it's okay, because they DID call a dubious roughing the passer penalty. So win-win. Unless you like the Browns.

9:51 Flacco with a seed to Mason to get into Browns territory. This is setting up for Hauschka to miss another field goal before half time.

9:56 Running for his life, Flacco goes sideline to sideline, risking interceptions and injury to find Heap. For a gain of 5.

10:01 While the refs take 5 minutes to review a call, Stephanie chimes in to suggest: "seriously the 12 men penalty should be to wear a dunce cap for the next quarter".

10:02 The Browns takes a knee to take us to halftime. Still 0-0. Disgusting. The Ravens are getting outplayed.

Halftime. Continued in part 3...

MNF Live Blog! Live!

2009-11-16T17:18:00.000-08:00

You're looking LIVE at the first ever LoB Live Blog...

Three story lines tonight:

1) The Ravens trying to remove their heads from their proverbial asses.

2) Jamal Lewis last game against the Ravens. He's one of the 5 best players in team history.

3)My quest to win money. Ravens need to cover 10.5 point spread with a total score between 32 and 38 so I can win my office pool.

See how these things and many more play out... LIVE.

RAVENS! BROWNS! LIVE on ESPN and my blog!

8:29 Ray Lewis is mic'd for this game. Great, great player and I love him. But he's a lunatic.

8:31 You know it's a less than stellar match-up when the game lead in is about the Browns leaving for Baltimore 14 years ago. Yes , 14.

8:33 Ron Jaworski has the nights first stupid comment. Did you know John Harbaugh brought smash-mouth football to the Ravens? Brian Billick should thank him for that. Without it we wouldn't have won the Super Bowl 8 years before Harbaugh got here.

8:34 Commercial. So much for that 8:30 kickoff.

8:35 Gruden says the Ravens lead the league in knockouts. If by knockouts he means pass interference penalties, then yes.

8:36 Another commercial. I was getting worried. It had only been 2 minutes.

8:38 Are you ready for some football?

8:40 That 8:30 kickoff finally gets here.

8:44 Already an injury. No joke here.

8:46 3 and out. Good start. Only not.

8:49 Jamal Lewis up the middle for 11 Cleveland yards. I take back the nice thing I said about him in the open.

8:50 John Harbaugh decides it's never too early to waste a challenge. He's like the Cal Ripken of doing that. Every game, without fail.

8:53 Challenge fails. No kidding.

8:55 Not to be outstupided (that's a word) Eric Mangini calls a reverse on 3 and 5. It doesn't work. 4th down.

8:59 Mark Clayton reenacts the play that won him an Ass Award.

9:03 After taking a sack, the Ravens let the play clock run down and use their last time out of the half. With 8:45 to go in the first QUARTER.

9:05 Ray Rice gets 20 yards on 2nd and 19. Fantasy points.

9:10 Steve Hauschka stinks on ice. Just awful.

9:11 This is what happens when you sign a kicker out of junior high.

9:14 Jaworski: I got so excited I couldn't get it out. That's what he (?) said.

9:20 First quarter finally ends. 0-0. Ugly. And not at all what I need in my pool. On the bright side, nothing caught on fire.

Continued in next post...

Word Snobbery on a Rainy Day

2009-11-13T10:14:00.000-08:00

I’ll admit it: I’m a word snob. I use big words when small words would do just as well or better. It’s probably my only personality defect. Well, that and my lack of humility. Using big words is the more subtle of the two ways I let everyone know I am smarter than them. The other way is by writing it in a blog post.

Nobody gets more annoyed by my gargantuan vocabulary than my mother (Hi Mom!). To this day she still loves to tell anyone who will listen about the time when I was three years old and I called her despicable at department store (who says Daffy Duck never taught anyone anything?). Two years ago, I casually used the word “pejorative” in a conversation and she’s been giving me a hard time about it ever since, although she usually mispronounces it. The other day she called me so that I could explain what it meant to a car full of her friends.

So yes, I’m a word snob, and I won’t apologize for it. Quite the contrary. Instead of apologizing, I’m taking the world to task. Too many people misuse words, and since I am smarter than everyone else, I feel it is my responsibility to rectify these errors. You’re welcome.

Culprit number one is the word “literally”. Literally basically means “actually” or “no really, it happened”. It should not be used as a word of emphasis. A hard tackle in football does not literally take someone’s head off unless the person being tackled is subsequently laying dead on the field with their head separated from their body. It is not literally raining cats and dogs unless the furry animals are actually descending from the sky in the form of precipitation. This does not literally drive me crazy, but it’s a close thing.

Culprit number two is “ironic” or “irony”. This is probably the most misused word of all. Personally I blame Alanis Morissette. There’s two definitions of ironic and most of the stuff in her song is neither. A free ride when you’ve already paid is bad luck. Good advice that you just didn’t take is stupidity. Some guy who’s afraid of heights dying in a plane crash is tragic (sorry, my knowledge of Alanis Morissette lyrics is limited). None of those things are ironic. Irony is most often misused in place of coincidence or just crappy luck. Examples: If a death metal drummer is also a classically trained pianist, that might be ironic; if a death metal drummer is killed when a piano falls on him, that is a coincidence and shitty luck. If the worst hitter on the baseball team gets the game winning hit, that’s ironic; if he gets that hit on his birthday, that’s a coincidence.

The third and final is just a personal pet peeve of mine. It is a word that is mostly used by other people who wish they were word snobs, but aren’t smart enough to pull it off. That word is “penultimate”. Penultimate is a big word that simply means “next to last”. It doesn’t mean “really, really ultimate.” That’s just something that annoys me.

And since that’s all I’ve got, that paragraph will be my penultimate paragraph, literally. And no, that’s not ironic.

Conference Call Redux

2009-11-13T07:20:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks back, I wrote about conference calls. Specifically I told a story about my own conference call misadventure where I accidentally flushed a toilet while my phone speaker was un-muted. Yesterday I had another conference call that was so bad that I was inspired to do another conference call post. And this one is better, because none of the idiots in question are me.

The first sign of trouble was 2 weeks ago when the invitation for the call went out (marked urgent). Ignoring the ridiculousness of having an “invitation” for a mandatory call, it’s generally a bad sign if the host decides that what they need to talk about requires two weeks notice. It’s not going to be a short call. And this call had a Microsoft Live Meeting session associated with it, which is another bad sign. If you’re not familiar, this feature allows the meeting participants to log in and see the hosts computer screen. In theory, this simulates the feeling of having everyone in the same room. In reality, everyone just stares at the same power-point presentation they normally would, only someone else is clicking through the slides for them. It’s very high tech.

After two weeks of daily reminders (The call is 12 days away; the call is 11 days away; the call is 10 days…) yesterday rolled around. I called in and tried to log in to the meeting. And guess what? It wasn’t set up correctly. See, the other thing about Microsoft Live meeting is that it never goes smoothly. Either there’s a problem with the software or the person setting up the meeting doesn’t understand something like different time zones. But whatever the case, this meeting wasn’t working and nobody on the call could connect. Problem number 1.

With the Live Meeting option in the tank, it was time for plan B: an attempt to e-mail the presentation to all of us so we could follow along ourselves. But that plan was doomed to failure from the start because the company e-mail rules doesn’t allow you to e-mail 30MB email to 40 different people. Problem number 2. I guess the powers that be decided having functioning e-mail for everyone was more important than this random Tuesday afternoon meeting. Those bastards.

Next, the call host enacted plan C, which was to post the presentation to an ftp site and have everyone download it. And that worked. With one caveat: it took each of us 10-15 minutes to download.

Fast forward past 15 minutes of small talk between 40 people who live in different parts of the country and have never met and the call began. It was standard conference call fare. Here’s some new items that are coming out. Here’s some completely irrelevant information about said items. Here’s the host stumbling to answer a basic question about something that is important. You know the drill.

But if that was the case, this call wouldn’t deserve its own post and since I’m writing this, you know there has to be more. And there was. You see, there was one woman on the call who wasn’t in front of her computer. And we knew this because she told us. Several times. Once the call started, we went through the fairly standard process of having the slides read to us. Except on this call, every other slide was punctuated with an interruption. To quote: “Hi, yeah, I’m not in front of my computer. Will I be able to see this when I finally pull down the presentation. Yes? Okay good. Sorry to interrupt.” And then again a page or two later. “Hi, me again. Yeah. Is this also on the presentation I can download later? It is? Thank you. Sorry.” And this happened literally 6-8 times. From the same woman. Maybe she thought there was a secret copy of the presentation that we were hiding from her as punishment or something like that. By the fourth or fifth time I was openly laughing at her. But this time, I had successfully enabled by mute button, so I was able to laugh with impunity.

And speaking of mute buttons… there’s more. Because this same woman wasn’t done yet. About 45 minutes into the call, there’s suddenly a lot of noise in the background, like kids laughing at a television. The host initially ignored it, but in a couple of minutes it got so loud we couldn’t hear what was going on.

“Can everybody mute their phones?” the host asked. “There’s children or something in the background.”

“I can’t,” said ‘Is this on the Presentation’ Woman. “I’m on a cell phone because I’m not at my desk right now.” Really? You’re not? Why didn’t you tell us?

“Star 6 should mute your phone,” someone chimed in helpfully. The next sound we should have heard was “beep-beep”, followed by silence. But instead the sound was more like “beep-beep-beepbeepbeep-beep- exasperated groan-beep-beepbeep- ‘Oh!’ –“beep-beep.” Miraculously, the sound of the laughing children was gone and we were able to get back to the ever important discussion of the process behind making home cleaning products. Because really, who doesn’t need to know that?

If only I had known the star-6 trick before I flushed. Oh well.

That’s all I’ve got.

Now Playing

2009-11-03T09:04:00.000-08:00

If there was a list of the top 4 annoying things I deal with on a daily basis at work, Old Guy and Dick would be numbers 1 and 2, in that order. Number three would be Gogurt Guy, who I haven’t discussed yet. More on him later this week. Number 4 is the background music.

In general, having some sort of music playing would be favorable to working in silence with the clacking of keyboards and ringing of phones as a soundtrack. But only in general. Because in real life, the background music here is an ongoing loop of maybe 30 songs that are repeated over and over during the course of a week. Most times in just fades into the background. But other times hearing a particularly song for the 8^th time in a week is enough to make a guy crack. There’s only so many times you can hear Miley Cyrus wail away about mountain climbing before you want to bang your head against a cubicle wall.

Yes, Miley Cyrus and her ilk are among the featured “artists” on the constantly-repeating playlist. There are two types of songs that make the list. The first type are the songs that reach the “drastically overplayed” threshold on the radio. About 2 weeks after they finally fade away, they show up on the loop. For example, “Hey There Deliliah” was on the loop for a long while. It’s like the monster at the end of the horror movie. It’s never quite dead when you think it is.

The second type of song is any relatively famous easy listening, 80’s pop, or classic rock song, so long as the song has less tempo than the pulse of someone with hypothermia and lyrics that could not, under any circumstances, be offensive to any person anywhere in the world. Billy Joel’s (who I otherwise like) Innocent Man is one such example. There’s nothing wrong with this type of song in and of themselves, but stack them one after the other and repeat them a numerous times a week, and well, a sharpened pencil in the ear becomes a viable alternative.

I’ve come to realize that this music loop is not exclusive to my office. I believe it’s a satellite feed that businesses can subscribe to and (presumably) pay for. This revelation occurred to me during one of the most subtly surreal moments of my life. I was sitting at work one day and I had a question I wanted to ask my mother. So I picked up the phone and called her at work and was immediately put on hold. And suddenly, there was an echo in my ears. It turns out, my mother’s work’s hold music is the exact same music I’m forced to listen to on a daily basis, just a second behind. It’s like I’m being stalked by trumped up elevator music.

I’d like to write more, but at this moment that Miley Cyrus song is playing again (seriously) so I’m going to make a run for it. So for now, that’s all I’ve got.

(P.S.- My blog posts might be a little bit shorter for the next couple of weeks, as it’s National Novel Writing Month, and I’m going to put some work into that. You know, when it’s not part of the 20 minutes a week that I actually do my job.)

Not in the mood for Monday

2009-10-26T06:32:00.000-07:00

Mondays suck as a general rule; everyone knows that, but this particular Monday is sucking more than average. I got about 3 hours of sleep last night, not because I was up doing anything fun, but because apparently my body decided that staring at my ceiling was a better use of my time than actually sleeping. So already I’m in a crap mood when I get to the office this morning. And that is before Old Guy and Dick decided to form their tag team of stupidity.

First thing when I walk in the door, Old Guy says, “Wow, you look like you got hit by a bus.” Thanks, Old Guy. “I didn’t sleep well last night,” I tell him and leave it at that. “Must have a lot on your mind”, Dick chimes in from the other side of the cubicle wall. That wouldn’t have been bad, but then he walked over to my side of the wall to continue the conversation. “You know what they say,” he continues in his patented “least effective whisper in the history of sound” tone. “When a guy can’t sleep it usually means he’s thinking about sex. Am I right?” “No, actually I was thinking about appropriate boundaries between co-workers,” I told him. See, I’m quick even on barely half a night’s sleep. That didn’t deter him though as he kept rambling about how that’s usually the case with him. He was about to go into how he gets to sleep under those circumstances (!) when I got up and walked away to get a cup of water. Thankfully, he did not follow.

Then I get back to my desk and Old Guy says “Hey, [Bonzi], I need your expertise for a second.” That never leads to anything good, but I humor him and ask what the problem is. Apparently his mouse “isn’t working.” So I take a look and he’s got a plan-o-gram product table open in front of him and he’s trying to scroll down. But it’s not working. Because there’s only 7 items in the table and since they easily fit on his screen, there’s nothing to scroll down to. I explain this to him and he gives me the vacant “I don’t get it look” that he has for about 30% of each day. So I explain it again, trying to use simpler terms and finally he says “Ah! I get it. I should know that, shouldn’t I?” Yeah, probably.

But that’s not the end, because a couple of minutes later I hear him asking Dick if he knows why his mouse won’t work. Dick tells him it’s probably broken and that he should ask the help desk for a new one.

These are the people I work with.

Silver lining: I’ve got three vacation days to burn before the end of our fiscal year on Friday, so I’m on vacation starting tomorrow, assuming I get through the day without smacking someone. In which case I’ll probably have even longer off. Win-win.

And the Winner is...

2009-10-24T09:57:00.000-07:00

The votes are in and we have a winner in the contest for the second LoB Ass Award. It was a competitive race, but in the end, we have a decisive winner. The totals:

From the poll on the side of the page:

David Heene (Colorado balloon scam): 8 votes; 57.1%

Christina School District, Deleware (Suspension of boyscout): 5 votes; 35.7%

Steve Hauschka (Ravens kicker who sucks): 1 vote; 7.1%

Keith Bardwell (LA Justice of Peace): 0 votes

From the comment thread:

Heene: 2 votes; 50%

School District: 1 vote; 25%

Hauschka: 1 vote; 25%

Total

Heene 10 votes; 55.6%

School District; 6 votes: 33.3%

Hauschka; 2 votes; 11.1%

Mr. Heene is certainly deserving—he had my vote, but I’m somewhat surprised by the lack of support for Bardwell, who seemed to have the total package: social relevance, significant news coverage and a dip-shit quote. But it seems my readership has sympathy for the children, because the top 2 finishers involve people who are screwing up the lives of children. So I suppose the message is this: The Life of Bonzi and its readers stand up for the kids!

I think the distinction that puts balloon man over the top is that while the Christina School District is actually trying to do the right thing, only in a horribly misguided way, David Heene is perfectly willing to use his children as a pawn to further his own fame, consequences be damned. I think that’s definitely deserving of an Ass Award. So, Mr. Heene, on behalf of the readers of my website, I say to you, NICE JOB, ASS.

Conference Calls

2009-10-21T12:24:00.000-07:00

Today, all the people in this building who actually work for The Grocery Store are on a conference call with the president of the Grocery Store’s parent company. Not actually being on their payroll , I didn’t have to attend. I didn’t even realize they were having one until I was walking around the building trying to find an answer to a question I had and realized everyone’s office was empty. They had all piled into three conference rooms to sit in a circle around a talking telephone. “We’re stronger than ever,” the telephone implored them. “Now is the time to really take initiative.” Wave after wave of fake enthusiasm rolled over the employees as they struggled to keep their eyes open and I felt grateful I didn’t have to sit through that whole call. Because I hate conference calls.

On the list of illogical things I’ve come across since entering the working world, the conference call would be pretty near the top of the list. I sit through two or three a month and I’ve yet to experience a call that would not have been better served as a couple-paragraph e-mail and a power point attachment. Because that’s all they ever are. “Did everyone get the presentation? Good. Now let me read it to you. Don’t worry, we know you’re busy, so we’ll try to keep this short. Shouldn’t take more than an hour or two. But first, let’s go around and have all 50 of you introduce yourself just like we did on the last 5 calls. Who’s first?”

Getting through such a call is an art. Obviously, you want to make immediate and continuous use of your mute button. That way you can cough and sneeze without interrupting the call and yell things like “Shut up! For the love of God, why won’t you SHUT UP?” at the phone without anyone on the other end of the line being the wiser. But once the phone is muted you have to be careful. The trick is to maintain an effective level of half-attention. You have to be alert enough to respond if someone asks you a direct question and have enough of an idea of what was being discussed to B.S. an answer. The best way to do this is to keep an ear out for keywords. If you have a basic understanding of what is being discussed, it’s pretty easy to come up with some generic nonsense that will pass as acceptable when graded on the conference call curve, especially since nothing of importance is ever discussed on a conference call.

I’m usually pretty good at coasting through a conference call, but even Tiger Woods misses a putt from time to time, and so mistakes have been made. A couple of months ago I was doing my usual Friday afternoon cruise job when I got an e-mail (marked urgent!) requesting my presence on a “quick conference call” starting at 3:30 Central Time (4:30 my time). Stupid time difference. I had no desire to stay in the office for a conference call that would potentially run to 6:00 local time, so when 4:30 rolled around, I punched the call-in number into my cell phone put the phone to my ear and got in the car to drive home.

The call lasted the whole drive home—good thing I didn’t take the call in the office—and so I walked in the front door of my house with the phone still against my ear and, more importantly, a desperate need to pee. So I rushed up the stairs to the bathroom still holding the phone, closed the door behind me, relieved myself and flushed. And then, after it was too late, it occurred to me: my cell phone doesn’t have a mute button.

“Does anyone else hear that?” A voice on the call said.

“Yeah, I heard it too,” someone else said, with a hint of laughter.

“Yeah, me too,” I said, covering. I think they bought it.

Rookie mistake on my part. But it was an important lesson regarding conference calls: Never let your guard down. Also, maybe go to the bathroom ahead of time.

That’s all I’ve got.

P.S.- Don’t forget to vote in the Ass Award poll to the right of this post. Two days left!

Ass Award 2: YOU Decide!

2009-10-19T12:01:00.000-07:00

For the first LoB Ass Award, I unilaterally anointed Mark Clayton for his inability to catch the ball on the potential game winning drive against the Patriots. But for the second award, I thought a little something extra was required. So for the first time in its prestigious 2 week history, the Life of Bonzi is going interactive! Below I’ll list 4 nominees for the second Ass Award and you, the reader, can vote in the poll on the right side of the page. The winner will be announced on Friday. You can also have your vote count double by posting a comment explaining your vote in the comment thread at the bottom of this post. Onward to the nominees:

Nominee #1: Christina School District; Newark, Deleware

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/12/education/12discipline.html

Our first nominee is the powers-that-be in the Christina School District in Newark, Deleware for their valorous action in protecting their charges from the dire threat posed by… a six year old cub scout with an eating utensil. The boy was suspended under the school ‘s zero tolerance policy about bringing a weapon to school because he brought in a tool that could serve as a fork, a spoon or a knife. Now, I understand school violence is a sensitive issue and all, but if we’re going to suspend kids for having weapons, I think the first step should be to have a functional definition of what a weapon is. I’m pretty sure that definition would not be so broad as to cover a spork.

Nominee #2: Louisiana Justice of the Peace Keith Bardwell

Link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091016/ap_on_re_us/us_interracial_rebuff

Nominee number two goes to a stunning display of racial ignorance from the state of Louisiana. Mr. Keith Bardwell, a state licensed justice of the peace, declined to grant a marriage license to white woman Beth Humphrey and black man Terrence McKay. But it’s not as bad as it seems. You see, he was only thinking of the children. But don’t worry, Mr. Bardwell isn’t a racist. You see, in his own words: “I have piles and piles of black friends. They come to my home, I marry them, they use my bathroom.” Hey, I’m not one to judge, but might I suggest that if you consider an integrated bathroom as going above and beyond the standard of non-racist, a little self -reflection in order.

Nominee #3: Colorado nut-job David Heene

Link: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/10/17/colorado.balloon.boy/index.html

On Friday the nation (nay, the world) was captivated by the plight of 6 year old Falcon Heene, who was allegedly floating aimlessly over the state of Colorado in a modified weather balloon that looked oddly like a flying saucer. The balloon was eventually brought down and deflated and a rapt audience watched in horror as the balloon was found to be... empty. Where was Falcon? Did he fall out? Was he dead? No. Turns out the kid was never in the balloon to start with, and was instead hiding in the attic of his parents’ garage. It also turns out that his family was (allegedly) fully aware that he was never in the balloon, and this was all part of a publicity stunt whose endgame was to somehow ensure that his father ended up with his own reality show. Good plan, guys. Obviously this whole scam ranks pretty high on the scumbag scale, but I think the underrated aspect is the sheer amount of idiot points this family earns by building an incredibly elaborate and public hoax around a 6 year olds ability to maintain a consistent lie on national television.

Nominee #4: Ravens Kicker Steve Haushka

Yes, I know he’s not the only reason they lost the game. Yes, I know the Ravens secondary couldn’t cover a book and that it seems like Frank Walker would get a pass interference penalty when someone passed the ketchup at dinner. But Haushka is a kicker. He has one job! It’s right there in his title. So I’m nominating him.

The Tricycle Story

2009-10-16T10:56:00.000-07:00

I haven’t had a must-write topic jump out at me in the last couple of days, so I figured it was time to reach back into the vault of my memory and pull out one of the classic Life of Bonzi stories from my memory. This story took place a couple of years ago in December in front of about 10,000 witnesses at the MCI Center in Downtown D.C.

My buddy Andrew and I were at the arena for a Wizards game just before Christmas. That year we decided that as Christmas gifts to each other we would meet up at the team store inside the arena and each of us would pick out a Wizards jersey and immediately give it to the other. I picked out Gilbert Arenas for him, because he likes Gilbert Arenas. He picked out Steve Blake for me because I’m a big Maryland fan.

Fast forward to just before half-time. There’s a time out in the game. It wasn’t a particularly exiting game—that’s what you get when you go to a Wizards-Raptors game in mid-December—and so I was entertaining myself by air-guitarring to whichever stupid song they were playing during the time out. I’m sure I looked ridiculous, being as tall and generally oaf-y as I am, plus wearing a Steve Blake Wizards jersey over my dress shirt from work. This was also before I lost a lot of the weight I put on after college, so I weighed about 290 pounds. Remember that fact later; it will become important.

So I’m rocking away on my air guitar and I see one of the attendants in the bright yellow “Event Staff” jackets approaching me. I figured he was coming to tell me to settle down because I was bothering people, and so I stopped acting like a fool as I saw him coming. But that’s not why he was approaching me.

“Do you want to be in a tricycle race after half-time?” he asks.

“Um, not particularly,” I say.

“Come on,” Andrew decides to chime in. “It will be fun.”

“Then you do it,” I suggest.

“No,” says the event-staffer. “We want you.” I’m still skeptical, but after prodding from Andrew and the offer of free tickets if I manage to win this race I reluctantly agreed. That would turn out to be a mistake.

The guy in the yellow jacket led me all the way through the bowels of the stadium to a sort of backstage waiting area, just off the court. That’s where I met my opponents. I was 24 years old at the time; if these two were older than 24 between them, it was only by a year or two. I also probably had them beat in combined weight. Right off, I’m thinking this isn’t going so well. Then I saw the trike.

When I say tricycle, you are probably picturing a bike with three wheels, maybe like a red one must of us had when we were little. That is not what this was. This tricycle could have been more accurately described as a big wheel, only its frame was metal instead of hollow plastic. The seat was only a couple of inches off the ground. Immediately I’m seeing huge problems with size and weight ratios that could lead to potential disaster.

The event-staff guy introduced me to a guy with a microphone whose job it is to fire up the crowd during breaks. Chip or something like that. He’s at a lot of Wizards games and he’s pretty much a big douche. I expressed to him that I didn’t think I was going to be able to fit on the tricycle, let alone pedal it, but he assured me it would work and told me to feel free to give it a try before I went out.

So I got on the tricycle. It took a contortionist job that would make a member of Cirque du Soleil jealous, but I managed to get my feet to the pedals while keeping my ass on the seat. “See,” Chip said. “It’ll work.” Then I started to pedal. And the trike went nowhere. Apparently no amount of peddling can make a 25 pound tricycle move from its spot when a near 300 pound man is sitting on top of it.

I pointed this out to Chip. “Don’t worry,“ he said. “The surface out there is different. You’ll get better traction.”

I should have quit there. But I didn’t, because I’m a good sport. And also, I’m an idiot.

The race took place during a timeout early in the third quarter. I—along with the two half-me’s I was racing against—made my way out on to the court to mild applause and general disinterest from the crowd. We set up at the starting line and I repeated my contortionist act to get on the tri-cycle.

On our marks.

Get set.

Go!

The other two racers take off like they’ve been shot out of a cannon. But not me. Nope, apparently Chip’s traction theory isn’t holding water. Who could have guessed? So there I am, sitting on this joke of a vehicle, peddling as furiously as I can manage (and banging the living hell out of my knees in the process) and going absolutely nowhere. And now people in the crowd are start paying attention. Apparently a huge man in a dress shirt and a Steve Blake jersey peddling a tiny tricycle and not moving is entertaining to some segment of the population or something.

Meanwhile, the camera man has decided to ignore the race and hover over top of me to get a close up shot of my agony on the big video board and Chip is gleefully shouting things like “It looks like Racer Number 3 is having some trouble.” Real funny, jackass.

It would get worse. Sometime right around the time I get lapped (the race was two laps around the court) Chip decided to be a friend and give me a push. And it worked! Suddenly I’m moving and not feeling like a total dope and I’m able to move this thing as long as I don’t break forward momentum. The crowd is getting behind me.

Then I came to the first turn and disaster struck. I decided that I was going too fast to take the turn, and the only way I could think to slow down without stopping the tricycle altogether was to lean backwards slightly. Bad idea. As physics would have it, a 290 pound man only needs to shift the slightest amount in order to throw a 25 pound trike off balance. So when I leaned back, I fell backwards. The tricycle went flying up in the air. And landed on top of me.

By this time the two kids had finished both of their laps, and Chip is chirping away on his microphone, saying “We’re still waiting on Racer #3 to finish!” So I did the only thing I could think of. I got up, picked up the tricycle and jogged the rest of the lap to thunderous applause from the crowd.

Now, lesser men than I might be embarrassed by an event like this, but I am not a lesser man. I like to think this was a moral victory. Sure I lost, but nobody is going to remember that some 12 year old kid won a tricycle race. But I bet a lot of people that were at that game still remember the time the big asshole couldn’t get his tricycle to move. And that’s something.

Plus, I got a free oil change from Jiffy Lube as a consolation prize. So I had that going for me. Which was nice.

That’s all I’ve got.

LCS Predictions (Almost certainly wrong)

2009-10-15T12:40:00.000-07:00

Yankees versus Angels

Obviously the Yankees are the favorite and on paper they’re the better team (that’s what spending eleventy billion dollars on your roster gets you), but I like this Angels team a lot. They’re not the same Angels team as the last couple of years, for the better (A more dynamic line-up) and for the worse (the K-Rod , Shields lock-down in the late innings is no more). They got over a major hump by beating Boston and there’s a sense of unity and purpose with them because of the Adenhart tragedy.

On the other side, this isn’t the same Yankees team that has struggled in the playoffs this decade and missed them altogether last year. They’re somehow looser and less uptight than they have been. That’s not a small thing in the playoffs as it lessens the pressure when the going gets tough. They also have, for the first time in a while, a legit anchor to their rotation. They may have had to overpay to convince Sabathia to play for them, but he’s been exactly what they needed. They got lucky with the schedule, allowing Sabathia to pitch 3 times in the series while only going once on short rest. That’s a huge advantage.

There’re a couple of X-Factors in this series. One of them is the weather. An early rain out could throw of the Yankees 1-4-7 plan with Sabathia and take away travel days, which matters when you’re flying between coasts. A couple of muck games on short rest could turn the games into real grinds. It remains to be seen who that favors. Logically, you’d think the team from the northeast would be more comfortable in cold weather than the team from Southern California but the Angels roster is more equipped to win the type of game that happens when it’s 45 degrees out, the hitters arms are frozen and the ball is as hard as a rock. I also think they’re more equipped to go to a “Plan B” starter if circumstances dictate.

The other X-factor is how various players respond to pressure. Alex Rodriguez had a great first round, but he’s still got a major monkey on his back when it comes to playing in the clutch. Sabathia was a monster this year, but struggled in the last two playoffs. Kendry Morales was huge in anchoring the Angels line-up this year but this is the first huge moment of his career.

So who wins? The Angels win if they get Figgins on base often enough keep the Yankees off balance and manufacture some runs and get enough innings out of their starters to protect a shallow bullpen. They lose if John Lackey struggles and Brian Fuentes can’t nail down a close game. The Yankees win if A-Rod comes through and A.J. Burnett is ready for prime time. They lose if Sabathia gets beat early and the Hughes/Chamberlain duo fails in middle relief.

I think the Yankees winning scenarios are slightly more likely, but it’ll be a close, potentially great series. Yankees in 7.

~~Cardinals~~ Dodgers versus Phillies

I don’t follow the National League as much because the Orioles are in the American League and so is my fantasy baseball team, so this section will be shorter. Plus I predicted that the Cardinals would sweep the Dodgers, and that was as wrong as humanly possible, so I’m not going to pretend to have any kind of credibility on this one.

On spec, neither of these teams seem as complete as their American League counterparts. Both have very good lineups. Both have questions with their pitching. The Dodgers have questions in their starting rotation, which lacks a go-to ace, but have a very strong bullpen. The Phillies bullpen is a major weakness, but they have Cole Hammels and Cliff Lee (who won’t go until game 3) to anchor the rotation. The other problem I see with the Phillies is that they probably don’t want to be in a position where anyone other than Lee or Hammels has to start a must win game, which is exactly what happens if the Dodgers win game 1 with Pedro Martinez pitching for Philadelphia in game 2.

Like I said, I picked the Cardinals to beat the Dodgers (in 3) but I think even if Philadelphia is a slightly better team, the Dodgers are a tough match-up for them. The Phillies struggle against lefties (I read that somewhere) and the Dodgers have a couple good ones, especially in the bullpen. And if I’m wrong, no one will have a heart attack of the surprise anyway. Dodgers in 6.

URGENT! You must read this ASAP

2009-10-13T13:35:00.000-07:00

Let me set a scene for you. You’re sitting in your cubicle plugging away at another non-descript day, taking care of some busy work, being productive, working in just enough mindless web browsing to stay sane and counting down the minutes until 5 PM (Okay, 4:30. Fine, 4:15. As long as it’s not Friday). Everything is going smoothly when you are interrupted by the gentle chime of an incoming e-mail. No worries, you think, it’s probably just this week’s edition of “News from Around the Company” or another mass mailing that you don’t need to be copied on.Or maybe it’s just a small request that requires a simple answer or even an assignment you’ll have to schedule time for in the next couple of days. So you click over to your e-mail, and that’s when you see it:

THE RED EXCLAMATION POINT OF DOOM~!

Yes, this message has been marked urgent. This message has been sent with (gasp!) HIGH IMPORTANCE. That’s right, someone on the far end of cyberspace has decided that this message is so important, so unavoidably urgent, that they just couldn’t avoid their e-mail getting lumped in with all the other e-mail of only piddling importance. It’s not so important, mind you, that they felt the need to pick up their phone and have an actual conversation (it’s not like anyone is ever away from their e-mail, anyway) but definitely important enough to mark with shiny red punctuation.

The e-mail usually goes something like this:

(Note: Credit for this e-mail goes to the creator of this blog.)

Now, I’m not under any delusions that what I do is hugely important in the grand scheme of things. As Old Guy likes to say when he’s catching heat about something, “We’re selling groceries, we’re not building bombs.” And he’s right. But somehow I get half a dozen “Urgent” e-mails a day. I’ve never in my life sent one, unless it was in an ironic attempt to make the point I’m making now. What does into the decision? Do people sit there, type out an e-mail, get ready to click send and think “you know what, I’m not sure my words convey the significance of this request, let me click this red punctuation mark here to really drive the point home. “ And is there anyone out there who reads an e-mail and thinks “I was going to drop this directly in my trash can, but look, it’s urgent, I better get on this right away.” I doubt that there is.

More often than not, what the red exclamation point really means is “I screwed up and I need this right away, but I don’t feel like picking up the phone and telling you I screwed up, so let’s use this fairly benign feature to convey my panic.” Or it means “I’m an ass with an overinflated sense of self-importance and I mark all my e-mail as urgent just so everyone knows how URGENT my work is.” But very rarely is it something of any kind of cosmic importance.

Whatever, I usually just ignore them anyway, so it doesn’t bother me. But the day Old Guy comes and asks me how to mark an e-mail with high importance is the day I quit.

That’s all I’ve got.

In Memory of Chris

2009-10-12T13:57:00.000-07:00

Three years ago, today, Chris died. October 12, 2006. I was sitting at home reading a book when my phone rang. I couldn’t find the phone in time to answer it, but the caller ID said it was Will so I decided to call him back after I finished the chapter I was reading. Then the phone rang again; this time it was Lance. It was his birthday and I had been meaning to give him a call a little bit later that night so I picked it up.

“HE’S DEAD.”

“What? Who?”

“CHRIS. HE’S DEAD. HE’S F—KING DEAD”

I dropped the book I was holding. I was suddenly back on the couch, but I don’t remember actually sitting down. At first I thought it was thought it was an awful joke. Hoped it was. But it wasn’t. The rest of that night is a blur. But the first couple of minutes are etched in my memory to this day.

I sometimes struggle trying to explain Chris to people who didn’t know him. The phrase I always come back to is “force of nature.” The man was a force of nature. I’ve never met anyone with a wilder temper or anyone who was more unerringly loyal. He could be furious with you one second and then break his back to do you a favor the next. Make you shake your head in frustration over his antics and then have you busting a guy laughing seconds later. He carried himself with an air of invincibility even while making (eerie, in retrospect) predictions about dying young. I’m not sure I fully realized it until after he was gone, but being friends with Chris meant always having someone I could count on, no questions asked in any situation.

Chris was the funniest person I ever met. I don’t know anybody who knew him well who wouldn’t agree with that statement. Even the night he died, standing in his front yard with Lance and Brooks and Todd and Will and Aaron, and feeling like the world was ending, we all found ourselves laughing. It felt weird, but I couldn’t help it. You couldn’t talk about Chris, couldn’t think about him, without bringing up a dozen stories that could make you laugh in any situation. I think that humor was what made him so good at bringing people together.

When I spoke at his memorial service I told a story that I think perfectly sums up the essence of Chris. Chris, Lance, Aaron, Brooks, Will, Todd and I all became close friends in high school and stayed that way all four years, but when college started, we were scattered. I was in Virginia. Lance was in Florida. Will was in Ohio. Aaron was in North Carolina. It would have been natural, even expected for us to grow apart. But Chris would never let that happen. He held us together through the sheer force of his personality. He always had events planned when all of us were in town together and wouldn’t take no for an answer if any of us were too tired or too busy to come out. And you couldn’t refuse him. If there is any silver lining at all to his death is that it brought us all closer together than ever at another time of transition where we might have drifted apart. In a strange, sad way, I feel that’s something he would have willingly died for.

There are dozens upon dozens of stories about Chris that make me laugh, cry, or just shake my head. The guys and I even put together a book of them, and I still often remember others I had previously forgotten. In the future, I’ll post some of them. But today I just want to state how much I still miss him and always will. So Chris, wherever you are, know that you will not be forgotten.

Oops

2009-10-11T06:26:00.001-07:00

In retrospect, perhaps Cardinals in 3 was a bad prediction.

Self Check-Out Lines

2009-10-09T11:02:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went to the grocery store. I do this several times a week, because I rarely remember everything I want or need in one trip. I also spend a lot of time in grocery stores as part of my job so I’m probably pretty close to an expert of the goings on of your standard supermarket. But even being such an expert, I’m still completely baffled by some of the things I see there. One of those things is how a grown adult with half of a functioning brain can’t figure out something as vastly complex as the self check-out line. And more to the point, why such a person with such an inability still feels the need to get in said line anyway.

My trip yesterday provided another example of this phenomenon. I stopped by the store on the way home from work, picked up a couple of things I needed to make dinner, and proceeded to check out. The line wasn’t long at all and since the market near my house has several self-check terminals that are all fed by the same line I was able to get through pretty quickly. Scan, bag, scan, bag, a swipe of the card and I’m on my way in a couple of minutes. Pretty painless. Everything is going well.

As I’m on the way out I notice that the lady at the next terminal is having trouble. To be exact she can’t find the bar code on the fruit she is trying to buy. Being a concerned fellow citizen and a fine upstanding young man I tell her that there is no bar code on fruit and she has to enter code from the sticker after pushing the “key in code” button. She seems to accept this and I’m on way.

Sadly, our story does not end there. As I’m getting in my car it dawns on me: I had meant to pick up paper towels why I was there. After a brief internal debate over their importance I decided that I probably should go back. So I drop the groceries on my passenger seat and back into the breach I go. I walk back across the parking lot to the store, quickly locate the paper towels (after all, I place products for a living) and return for the second time in a couple of minutes to the self-check line. Except, by now, the line has ballooned and is about 8-9 people deep. How does did this happen? Well the SAME old lady is still at the very same terminal still struggling to scan her fruit. Meanwhile the “associate” assigned to watch the self-check and make sure no one shoplifts has decided staring off into space is a useful alternative to helping this poor woman out. (Also contributing to the delay was the younger woman at the next terminal buying enough individual packages of Ramen Noodles to end world hunger, but since she at least knew how to work the scanner, she gets a pass). Someone eventually wakes up the attendant from what I’m sure was a very important day dream so she can help the old lady out and the line worked its way down, but not before I lost 20 minutes of my life that I’ll never get back to pick up 6 rolls of paper towels.

It’s easy to feel bad for the old woman. Some people, especially older people, struggle with technology. Hell, I work with such a person and he has “technologist” as part of his job title. But my question is this: if you are someone like this, why are you deliberately putting yourself in a situation where you’re going to embarrass yourself and waste everyone else’s time? Sure, the self check line is shorter, but that’s because it’s not as easy to use. In a normal line, there’s very little chance of embarrassment. Someone scans your items for you, bags them for you, tells you where to swipe your card and hands you your receipt. It takes a little longer, but it’s easy. And yet, on more than one occasion I’ve seen people work their way to the front of the self-check line and immediately wave at the attendant for help before they’ve even attempted to scan the item. Do these people not know what self check-out means? Or do they know and just have no concern for anyone else’s time? Either way, it bothers me.

Does anyone else notice this? Or is it just me?

That’s all I’ve got.

Dick (An Introduction)

2009-10-08T12:42:00.000-07:00

Something just happened at work, so I think it's time to introduce everyone to another of the characters in my office. His name is "Dick". As usual, this is not his real name. Dick has worked here for the entire 5 years I have worked in this building. I see him every day and talk to him most days. And for the life of me I could not tell you what exactly it is that he does here. I think it might be something like the "Jump to Conclusions Mat" guy in Office Space. He even looks a little bit like him. Use that to frame your mental image.

Dick earned his nickname a couple of years back after right after news of the Sean Taylor tragedy broke. If you are unfamiliar, Sean Taylor was a safety for the Redskins who was shot in the upper leg trying to defend his family after his house was broken in to late at night. He died a couple of days later. But right after it happened not all of the details were out and all anyone knew is that a professional football player (who had a checkered history) had been shot and so there was all sorts of irresponsible speculation going on. Dick, hardly the type to abstain from that type of speculation, had his own theory. And because he’s somehow decided that I’m one of the people who like to hear his theories, he came to my cubicle to share his theory with me.

“You hear about that Redskin?” he said, leaning in conspiratorially despite speaking loudly enough for everyone on the floor to hear what he is saying.

“Yeah.”

“Got shot in the upper leg, they say.”

“Yeah, I heard that.”

“You know what probably happened? His wife probably caught him in bed with some other broad, decided to shoot him in the dick.”

“Is that what they’re saying?”

“No, but think about it. Makes sense.”

No, it really didn’t. Especially given the fact that Sean Taylor WASN’T ACTUALLY MARRIED. After that, when I would tell anyone a story about him, he was known as “Sean Taylor’s Wife Shot Him in the Dick.” But eventually that became too cumbersome to type in an e-mail every time he did something obnoxious, so it was shorted to Dick.

Dick is also the guy in the Office who forwards everyone inappropriate e-mails and makes vaguely (and not so vaguely) racist comments loud enough for anyone to hear, which doesn’t exactly foster harmony in this building, which is fairly diverse. After the election last year, he somehow got it in his head that the President was going to open up the borders to create an army of Mexicans and that he needed to “buy guns and gold, so he’d have the guns to protect his gold.”

He also trims his fingernails at his desk and spends all day on the phone trying to have some job done on his house or threatening to sue someone. You get the general idea.

What did Dick do today that prompted this post? Let me tell you. I’m sitting at my desk, going through a long list of products that were somehow put into the system with the wrong codes and Dick approached me, asking if my eyes were good. Since he had decided to overlook the fact that I wear glasses and have literally every day since he’s known me, I told him that I did. That was a mistake on my part, as Dick thrusted his thumb into my face. His thumb is slightly swollen and generally gross-looking as if he has a splinter and has been picking at it.

“Does it look like I there is something in there?”

“Eww, what? Get that out of my face.”

“I had a splinter, I thought I got it out, but I think part of it might still be in there.”

“Yeah, maybe, you should get it looked at.”

“I thought since you had young eyes you might be able to see.”

“I have no idea.”

And then he went on his way. I almost want to ask “who sticks their thumb in somebody’s face anyway?” but I know the answer to that. Dick does. So the moral of the story, to paraphrase Bill Murray from ghost busters is, if anyone asks you if you have good eyes, you say “No.”

That’s all I’ve got.

Test

2009-10-08T12:34:00.000-07:00

Is this working?

MLB Playoff Predictions (Probably Incorrect)

2009-10-07T10:00:00.001-07:00

Yankees versus Twins

The Twins showed incredible heart coming back from 7 games back of the Tigers in less than a month and 3 games back in 4 days. They're spunky, they've got momentum and they'll get an emotional lift from a hot home crowd in the closing games of the Metrodome. The Yankees are better at baseball. Yankees in Four.

Red Sox versus Angels

This reminds me of an ultra-lite version of the Red Sox-Yankees series from 2004. If you took the team names, jerseys and logos out of the equation and just looked at the players on the teams and their respective performances this year, the Angels would be the pick, but it makes sense to pick the Red Sox because they've owned the Angels in the post-season this decade. But I think the Angels are a better team, and-- as importantly-- a different enough team from previous years. Angels in 5.

Dodgers versus Cardinals

Because the baseball season is so long, season long records can paint a misleading picture of how good a team is at the end of the year. The Dodgers, I think, peaked too early, and they aren't as good as their record or reputation would suggest. The Cardinals meanwhile, played fairly well all season and then hit another gear down the stretch after the Holliday trade. It seems like there's always a supposed contender in the NL that never gets off the blocks in the playoffs. I think the Dodgers are that team this year. Cardinals in 3.

Phillies versus Rockies

I could see this one going either way. The Rockies are hot, and the Phillies pitching is quite as good as the names on the backs of the jersey's would suggest. Cliff Lee is untested and he struggled down the stretch and Cole Hammels isn't as sharp as he was last season. But the Phillies are the champs and they've shown some grit in defending their title. It's going to take a very good team to knock them off and I don't think the Rockies are that team. Phillies in Four.

BRETT FAVRE~!

2009-10-06T06:38:00.000-07:00

Just making sure you heard. It's easy to miss with the understated approach the media takes with him.

The First Ever "Ass" Award

2009-10-05T06:51:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, after I got done throwing everything I could get my hands on and making up new swear words, I decided to vent my anger by making the simple blog post “Catch the ball, ass.” But as my blood pressure returned to a more healthy level , I decided that Mark Clayton’s effort at the end of the Ravens-Patriots game deserved more than a simple 4 words. After all, Mr. Clayton displayed more than just a simple case of hard hands; his was an epic example of how to not come up big in a clutch moment. The simple “catch the ball, ass” tells part of the story, but weeks and months down the line it has potential to lose context and seem like just an indictment of a run-of-the-mill bad play. And if that happened I wouldn’t be doing my job as a blogger with a readership of (maybe) half a dozen people.

In that spirit, I am introducing a new feature to the blog. Congratulations, Mark Clayton, you are the first ever winner of the Life of Bonzi “Ass” Award.

There is a bright side to this story, however: it reminded me of a story from my college days that never fails to make me laugh. At my school there was a guy named “El Vito”. Like other characters on this blog, this what not his real name, but rather the self-chosen nickname he had emblazoned on his vanity plate. El Vito was a well known guy around campus, but not generally for things one would be proud to be known for. Most of those things are not relevant to this particular story, but suffice it to say that El Vito was exactly the type of guy who would post his intramural basketball stats on his instant messenger profile, even if those stats were “2 points, 1 rebound, 3 turnovers”. He was also the sort of guy who would act genuinely surprised when his seventh consecutive missed shot ended up the exact same way as the previous six and refuse to play unless the level of competition was up to his “standards.” You get the idea.

During the fall semester of senior year, the intramural flag football men’s team I played on (not to be confused with our co-ed team that reached legendary status with our undefeated championship season) was short of players for a game against a particularly tough team on a particularly lousy day. It was about 35 degrees outside with a cold, fine rain that is a real pain in the ass to play in. After scouring campus trying to find another player to fill out the roster, my former roommate (and friend of the blog) Andrew and I bumped in to El Vito, and since almost literally everyone else had declined, we asked him if he wanted to play. El Vito agreed.

To say the game did not go well would be an understatement. We got beat pretty bad. If El Vito had posted his stat line for that game (and he probably did, I don’t know) it would have read something like “2 catches, 1 tackle, 7 dropped passes, 4 times inexplicably running in the opposite direction from the ball”. But he did make one play that is the reason I’m telling you this story. Late in the game, we were driving with a chance to score and make the final score slightly more respectable. Andrew, playing QB despite a pulled muscle in his arm and running for his life for about the 50^th time that game, rolled out and made a perfect throw that hit El Vito right in the chest in the end zone. The ball bounced off his chest, up in to the air and was intercepted.

El Vito’s reaction as we huddled on defense? “Hey man, are you sure your arm is okay? Because if you’re struggling like that I can play QB.” After the Ravens game yesterday and after I had a chance to calm down, I texted Andrew “Do you think that Clayton went to Flacco after that play and asked him if his arm was okay?”

So congratulations Mark Clayton on your award, and thank you for the opportunity to share this story.

Damn it, Clayton.

2009-10-04T13:45:00.000-07:00

Catch the ball, ass.

What is a Space Technologist?

2009-10-02T05:52:00.000-07:00

A funny thing happened yesterday. It turns out someone actually read my blog. Sure, it was a person I texted and said “read my blog”, but still, this explosion in readership can not be overlooked. So in gratitude to that reader, I’m going to use this entry to answer a question she raised. “What exactly is it that you do?” So this post will be dedicated to answering the question, “What exactly is a space technologist?”

Well, dear reader, the Space Technologist is among the smartest, best looking, most charismatic and incredibly charming members of the Sales and Marketing industry. But it goes beyond that. Far beyond. Now I’m sure everyone reading this (both of you) have been to a grocery store. In that grocery store there are shelves and on those shelves there are products. How do those products get there? Most likely some high school kid getting 6 bucks an hour put them there. But how does he know where to put them? I’m glad you asked.

If you’ve ever worked in retail, you might have heard of something called a planogram (POG for short). If you haven’t, it’s basically a diagram that shows the shelves of a given section of a store, how high they should be, and what products should go on them and in which order. These POGs do not create themselves. Someone has to do it. And that’s where the Space Technologist comes into play.

I work for a company, and that company represents companies that make food and other things you would buy at a grocery store, such as coffee filters or toilet paper. We have many clients. I won’t list any of them here, but stand in your kitchen and turn around in a full circle and you’re bound to see a dozen products my company represents. It’s my job to make sure those products get to the best location on the shelves so that you can buy them and have them take up space in your kitchen.

Grocery manufacturers come in all shapes and sizes, but invariably they share two traits. One, they like for people to buy their products. And two, they are incredibly nitpicky. Put those two things together and those manufacturers will pay my company good money to make sure their products are placed where they want them and my company in turn pays me (less) good money to make that happen.

I am what is known as an “In-house” Space Technologist. This is probably the most common breed of the Space Tech. family. That means I work In-house at a specific super market and represent my clients exclusively to that particular chain. So for sections in which my clients are the biggest players, I’m responsible for creating the POG so that high school kid making 6 dollars an hour knows where he should place the products on the shelves. At least until he decides it would be easier to ignore the POG and do it whichever way means less work for him.

And that’s what I do on a daily basis. At least, that’s what I do when I’m not writing blogs or screwing around on facebook.

That’s all I’ve got.

Old Guy (an introduction)

2009-10-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

One of the primary reasons I wanted to start this blog is so I could have an outlet to talk about some of the people I work with and the irritating/mind-boggling/hilarious things some of them do on a daily basis. So we’re going to start with a guy who I imagine will become the most frequent recurring character in this little exercise. We’ll call him “Old Guy”. This is not his real name.

“Old Guy” is, like yours truly, a Space Technologist. He’s pretty good at the “Space” part, having managed to take up his fair share of it for (I’m guessing) 70 years now. It’s the “Technologist” part that seems to trip him up on a daily basis. You see, Old Guy struggles with technology. And by technology, I mean any object or piece of equipment that runs on any form of electricity. It’s that bad.

Let me backtrack for a minute. Old Guy’s predecessor was a guy named “Jim.” Jim wasn’t the most motivated guy in the world, but he was likeable enough, and he was good at his job. You can tell this because I did not feel the need to give him a nickname. Well, about a year ago now Jim left to take another job at Parts Unknown. Jim’s company (which is actually my company’s competitor- more on this in a later post) decided they could save some money by not replacing him. This was a decent enough plan, but it didn’t go over especially well with the powers that be at the Grocery Store I Work At Even Though I Don’t Work For Them (hereafter referred to as The Grocery Store) and they insisted that Jim’s company hire somebody to do the essential work that Jim did on a daily basis. This issue was debated for several weeks before Jim’s company finally said “You want someone? Fine, we’ll give you someone. Enter Old Guy.

Like I said, Old Guy is roughly 70 years old. He had been retired for more than 10 years when his company came calling and begged him to take their job. He agreed, but on the condition that he could do it part time and only work three days a week. Given that Jim has been a full time employee who worked the full 40 hours a week, you might be able to see how this could become a problem, but since I’m fairly certain they were trying to stick it to The Grocery Store anyway, his company agreed and Old Guy was on board. And immediately, there was a problem.

You see, like in most fields, a lot has changed in the field of Space Technology in the last 10 years: particularly, the technology part. In fact, as recently as probably 6 or 7 years ago, there was really no such thing as a “space technologist”. Someone who does what I do was called a “schematic analyst” or “space planner”. There was very little technology involved beyond paper and pencils, a ruler, a measuring tape and in some instances a non-digital camera. Basically, Old Guy had to learn his job again from scratch. This is not an easy thing for him.

I met Old Guy on his first day, exchanged introductions and went about my business of surfing the internet and pretending to look busy; I’m not particularly social at work. But in the interest of being friendly, I told him to let me know if he needed help with anything while he was settling in. Big mistake. Not 10 minutes later Old Guy peered over the wall between his cube and mine.

“Hey [Bonzi]?” he said.

“Yeah, [Old Guy]?”

“Do you know how to send an e-mail?”

“Um, yes.”

“How do I do that?”

“What do you mean?”

“How do I send an e-mail?”

Turns out that Old Guy has never sent an e-mail before. In his life. Ever. I asked him what e-mail client his company used. He didn’t know. I asked him if they had given him an e-mail address and password. He didn’t know. In fact the extent of his knowledge was that there existed something called e-mail and he was probably going to have to do it at some point. Fantastic.

Now, I imagine in some jobs, not knowing your way around a computer isn’t a crippling problem. Our job is not one of them. Of everything I have to do on a daily basis here at work, about 80% of it requires something computer related, and another 18% is made drastically easier with the help of some computer related utility. So from the first hour, it seems Old Guy is up a creek.

How does Old Guy handle this? Realize he’s over his head and quit? Nope. Contact his boss for more training? Try again. No, he decides to take me up on my offer of help. Over and over again. And because I’m both a nice guy (most of the time) and an idiot (all of the time) I allow myself to become his personal help desk.

Among the questions I’ve gotten from Old Guy in the past several months:

“Do you know how to send an e-mail?”

“After I save a file on the share drive, do I have to e-mail it to everyone else to save on their share drive?”

“Do you know what my password is?”

“Do I have to save my files whenever I close them, or just when I am finished for good?”

And many, many more. And many worse. But those incidents deserve their own posts, and this has already run longer than I planned. Plus, I have to give my reader(s) reasons to come back. So I’ll wrap this up. Until next time…

That’s all I’ve got.

Welcome

2009-10-01T10:48:00.001-07:00

Well, this is my blog. It seems like every asshole has a blog these days, and being an asshole myself, I was feeling left out so here we go. I’m not quite sure exactly what direction I will take this yet. The most likely scenario is that I post whatever is on my mind for two weeks, realize no one is reading this and then quit, leaving “The Life of Bonzi” to drift unattended in cyberspace until this whole internet fad finally dies down. So, on the off chance that someone else is actually reading this, I urge you to get your fill while you can.