I am not Amused

Do you hear that world?  I am not amused!

Thing hugely horrible went wrong in the past 24 hours, but enough small things have driven me to consume a respectable amount of pasta, cheesy garlic bread, and wine.  Sure, the wine was in a Pabst's Blue Ribbon mug and the rest was, well, dinner, but I seriously considered buying two different cheese cakes and consuming them both.

Let's start from the beginning.  I use Feline Pine, which is a flushable cat litter.  Last night while cleaning up after my cats, my toilet overflowed.  I was annoyed when I had to use a new clean towel to clean up the mess, AND now that freaking towel has been hanging up the entire day and it's no less damp.

Fast forward a few hours and I wake up at 3 a.m. holding my cookie.*  I discover a big ass bug bite the size of a Milk Dud.  Ninety minutes later, when I actually had to get up for work, I notice that the bite is still there (albeit smaller) and I realize that it's most likely a spider bite.

Mother fucker!

The most action that my cookie's seen in over 13 months, and it's a mother fucking spider.  Not cool!

After getting ready and making the magic that is my glorious face happen, I realize that I'm a couple of minutes late heading out the door.  So, I walk a littler faster than usual and the first thing I notice is that the seam of my pants is fighting with the spider bite.

At work, things are busier than usual.  About 12 people show up who aren't expected, and it's too early for their contacts to be in the office.  In short, it's a cluster.

Mid-morning rolls around and two people show up with a project for me.  Listen, I love actually working while at work.  The fact that there's so much down time in my current position is one of the many reasons I'm so excited to possibly move on. 

The problem trying to work through that this particular project is an employee benefits informational packet I spent six weeks working on last spring.  I pool resources.  I developed and elaborated upon topics, and eventually developed one document.   I wrapped up everything by June and passed it on so the higher ups could decide if they wanted to make any changes or even use it.

Last month these two particular people called me into their office and reclaimed all of the original documents I had used as resources, so that they could be given to new hires.  This morning they come down and tell me that they need me to change 70 pages of fonts, font sizes, line spacing, and to undo what the company's style guide had directed me to capitalize. 

It wouldn't have been a problem if I could have just hit select all and made the same changes to the entire document.  However, because there are headings, subheadings, Excel documents that had been imported, graphs and images that also needed to be changed, and it just kept going.  Oh, and did I mention that my deadline was less that 24 hours, because they had run out of every single one of the  new hire benefit packets that the company had been using for the last seven years?

The good news is that I'm almost done with that little project.  My retinas feel as though they have been burnt by staring through the computer screen all day, my bug bite is a little smaller, and at least I'm not spending the day cutting ribbon, which is exactly what I did one day last week.

Okay, and now for the really good news.  It's not a sure thing, but over the last two weeks I have been through five interviews for a new position with my company.  All five gave me the thumbs up, and now the decision rests with the HR Department.  I'm cautiously optimistic, because at this point it's a toss up.  My wishful thinking is enough to keep me from drinking multiple bottles of wine or exchanging my laundry money for baked goods, or worse of all - mouthing off to the people who gave me this little copy editing, because these same people have given my manager additional reasons to question whether she should recommend me for this other position.  Yes, I'm talking about any and all of the issues I've already described in a previous post.

All I can really say is - I am not amused.  Okay, maybe a little.

* Yes, I'm talking about my vagina.  I'm trying a pet name for it.  Mostly because I like saying, "All the boys want to get their hands on my cookie."

Why T-Mobile can Suck (the proverbial) It

I’ve been with T-Mobile since 2003.  I’ve seen the cost of my service go up, and the quality of the phones go down.  I considered it an anecdotal part of my cross country road trip when I couldn’t get service throughout most of South Dakota.  Well, pretty much anywhere past Sioux Falls (which really is most of it).  When the charger for my previous phone simply stopped working, it took some finagling and cajoling, but my local T-Mobile store was able to help me replace the charger and carry on my life as usual within the same day.

Yes, this is a purely emotional reaction to a situation that should have been a nonissue.  However, after three visits to a T-Mobile store with an unsatisfactory result and having to eat my angry feelings in the form of two cupcakes – I am no longer amused with T-Mobile and am going to jump ship as soon as my current contract is up.

While I was at a pirate wedding last Saturday (in case you were wondering, yes, there was a moat), one half of The Gato Twins decided to bite through my cell phone charger cord.  So, on Sunday I went to the T-Mobile store, sucked it up, and shelled out $29.99 for a new charger with a USB port and detachable wall charger.  Until last Saturday, whenever I used my original charger, my battery would stay charged for about three days.  (I don’t have a busy social calendar, and therefore don’t quickly exhaust my cell phone battery.)  With the new charger, my battery wouldn’t even last 24 hours. 

So, last night I went back to the T-Mobile store for round two.  I exchanged the charger, and mentioned to the sales clerk that my phone kept telling me to insert a memory card.  She mentioned that it was weird, but did nothing more than swap out Saturday’s charger for Tuesday’s charger.

Tuesday’s charger wouldn’t charge my phone.  Period.  I spent this morning looking into the cell phone plans from the other big providers, and there wasn’t much difference between all of the big names.  (Sure, AT&T’s monthly plans are in the same neighborhood as T-Mobile and rollover sounds great, but who wants to pay $20 per month for texting?  You almost had me AT&T, but I don’t need unlimited texts!  I’m a girl who’s spent 29 minutes on the phone and sent 297 texts this past month.  Sure, I still have a week to go until the new cycle begins, but I’m thinking Sprint’s $29.99 plan with the 1,000 messages add on is going to be my new plan.  If I talked more maybe I’d go with Verizon, but I don’t so I won’t.) 

Today during lunch, I took it back to the store and walk out totally defeated after 20 minutes of conversations like the following:

Me: The newest charger won’t even charge my phone.  I’m open to any and all suggestions you may have.

T-Mobile Clerk:  (After trying the newest charger and determining that it isn’t charging.)  It may be your battery, but let me see what we have in back…

(He comes back with two different chargers.  One won’t fit my phone, and the other starts to magically charge my phone.)

Me:  Yes!  That’s great!  Can I buy that charger or trade you my fancy new charger?

Him:  I can’t.  This charger belongs to a loaner phone.  It’s a different product.

Me:  But…  That charger works for my phone, and these don’t.  These chargers are official T-Mobile products and should work with the loaner phone.

Him:  I can’t.  It’s a different product.

Me:  Okay…  What can we do?

Him:  Well, your contract isn’t up until April 2012, but you can get the full trade in amount in November…

Me:  But, I’d be without a phone for several months!

Him:  If you can wait until September 23, you’ll get what we call trade in “plus”…

Me:  That’s over three weeks away!  I can’t wait THAT long.

Him:  (hushed voice)  You can go to 7-Eleven and buy a prepaid phone and put your SIM card in it…

Me:  Umm…  Okay…  Thanks for your help…