Weather for ducks?

So this morning was a little dreary- it had been raining a lot of the night and was still raining pretty good when I got to work. I got on the elevator with a co-worker, and she says something like how about this weather? It's great for the ducks! I kind of chuckled, because I know this woman likes ducks and has mentioned ducks on occasion before. So then about 45 minutes later my boss gets to work, and one of the first things she says is "Great weather for ducks, huh?" I turned around and said you're kidding me, Sonja said that to me on the elevator this morning, I don't get it. Well about 10 minutes later my boss's husband comes in the office and says the exact same thing- this is great weather for ducks! Well I've just never heard of this before, do ducks have a partiality for rain? I never thought so. Ducks never would have even crossed my mind on this rainy day, and yet three people completely independent of each other today commented that the rain was great weather for ducks.

Weird, I tell ya.

Today when I was at the drive-through bank, the car next to me had a ginormous dog in it. He took up the entire back seat, and I really think was bigger than the woman driving the car. Yikes, the thought of just being on the same side of the street as that dog gets me all panicky, not to mention being trapped in a car with it! Once I was waiting for an elevator, and there was this guy there also waiting for the elevator with his humoungous dog who, by the way, was a little bit hyper. And then he was surprised when I wouldn't get on the elevator with him. He tried to reassure me that he was in control and it was no big deal. He didn't seem to realize that being trapped in a small 6x3 box with a dog half my size is pretty much my worse nightmare.

Tip o' the day: People like their dogs. I get that. Just keep it away from me. It's not too much to ask.

A Paperclip Fettish

Sorry about the lack of updates, been pretty busy. I like to blame my business on being RS president, but then realized a couple weeks ago that the things I was off doing every night had nothing to do with my calling, I would be doing them either way. So there goes that theory.

So quick update on me- job going pretty well, I'm now officially on the payroll, so that's exciting. The only difference really is that I have a nameplate now outside my door, so if I forget my name, I have a quick reference. And I now have to use the time clock system, so I can't sneak in 5 minutes late without anybody knowing the difference. Not that I would do that. Ahem.

We purchased our plane tickets for the summer vacation finally, a couple weeks ago. I will officially be in Mexico June 2-11. Pretty dang exciting. Any tips anyone has on vacationing in the Yucatan are welcome, we are flying into Cancun, and wish to see all the cool stuff in the area, while avoiding crowds and over touristy areas. And let me just say that my tax return, along with the "stimulation bonus" or whatever the heck they're calling it, is pretty much paying for my trip. Thank you, US government. Alas, I will not be spending it assisting our great economy as you would wish me to do. Sorry about that.

So I have this weird thing at work. I use a lot of paperclips. Legitimately, I mean, I just need them a lot. I'll have a lot of stacks of paper, with many papercliped throughout- generally because I will need to run them through a scanner and so don't staple them until I'm done. As a result of this, there always seem to be a spare 3 or 4 paperclips loitering on my desk. And I find that somehow, there is constantly one in my hand. I don't know how it happens. Generally I don't really realize I've picked one up. I just go to type something, and discover that I must put down the paperclip I've been fiddling with first. Sometimes, just to change things up a bit, I find myself fiddling with the little bunny eraser someone planted on my desk around Easter time. It's pretty strange. And, incidentally, I have ruined more paperclips. I play with them, moving the inside part around until it's pretty much useless in actually clipping paper together. So then I throw it away, put the rest in my drawer, trying to break myself of the habit. But, since people hand me stacks of paper with paperclips strewn about all the time, I find myself playing with another one a mere hour later.

So the question, I suppose, is why does there always have to be something in my hands? At least I've moved up in the world. In college it was always silly puddy or a mini-slinky that I would find myself playing with.

Tip o' the day: When in a down mood, watch an episode of Remington Steele or Star Trek (any of them really, although I would recommend Voyager first). There's nothing better!

What, your finger is more powerful than mine?

So a funny thing happened when I got to work today. There are 2 elevators. The one on the right only goes up, and the one on the left goes up and down. So sometimes you push the up button and the system thinks it has to wait for the right elevator, but the little red light above the elevators says that the left one is on the 1st floor. So you push the down button and the left elevator opens. You with me so far?

So today I walk into the lobby, and right behind me is this lady. I push the up button and nothing happens, but the left elevator sign says it's on the 1st floor. So I push the down button. It does not light up, and the elevator remains closed. I say hmm, that's weird, push the button a few more times to no avail, and so figure it must be broken or being worked on or something, and commence waiting for the other one. Well this other woman had come up and stood right in front of the elevator on the left, like with her nose 6 inches from the door. So she looked confused, backed up a little, and then said well that's weird, it says it's on this floor. We stood there a couple seconds, and she then proceeded to start pushing the down button. I'm standing there thinking you've got to be kidding me. You just saw me push that button several times and nothing happened, what you think it'll magically open when you push the botton? Because I'm not versed in the art of proper button pushing? Well, of course, she pushes the down button several times and nothing happens. So most people would then assume as I did that the thing is broken and just be happy waiting another 5 seconds for the other elevator. Not this woman. She proceeded to stick her fingers in the little crack and try to manually open the elevator door. Who are you, Data? You think that you can pry the door open with your little fingers, and then the elevator will say oh yeah, I'm supposed to open when people push that button and then it's business as usual?

So the other one comes, we get on it, I push my floor and she just stands there. Now I know that this woman does not work on the same floor as I do as I've seen her around before, so I'm standing there thinking is she going to push the button for her floor? Or at least tell me which floor she needs so I can push the botton? I should have just let her ride up to the 8th floor, but I was nice and when it was about at 2, asked her which floor to which she responded 3 and I got it hit just barely in time for us to get there. She got off and I just shook my head. Some people.

Tip o' the day: Always make sure your heater is on before you leave work, so your office isn't like 50 degrees when you get there the next day.