While it hasn't happened to me yet, I'm very wary of office crooks.
They steal lunches, you see.
What I'm saying is don't put anything into a company refridgerator that you might want to see again. Putting your name on it may deter these degenerates, but be advised. More than a few people have told me their lunches, labeled and all, have gone missing. One person had her leftovers from a dinner out the night before in there. While the crooks didn't take her meal, they did take a peak inside the styrofoam container to see if it was worth stealing. How do we know this? The hungry bandits had trouble with the packaging, ripping it open rather than exhibiting the patience it takes to undo the little tab.
Who steals a lunch? Other than a homeless person, I mean. I could see someone skipping out on a bill at a restaurant. I've known high schoolers to pilfer food (one particular incident involving a 99-cent burrito comes to mind.) However, to my knowledge, we don't have any homeless people or high schoolers too cool to fork over a Washington working here. We all have jobs, we all can afford lunch....what's the deal?
I've compiled a list of possible characteristics of food stealers:
- Hungry
- Possibly has to hide amount of food he/she eats from someone at home. This would explain not bringing an appropriate amount of food for their own lunch....thereby having to supplement their food-lust with stolen goods. Furthermore, they cannot buy the lunch themselves because the tell tale sign would show up on their bank statement.
- Perhaps has a penchant for stealing other things at work....such as pens, staplers and tape dispensers
- Might ask people regularly what they brought for lunch. It seems like small talk, but it's actually a reconnaissance mission for that afternoon's raid.
- Works odd hours, allowing them to be in the building at times when fewer people are around. May also take excessive bathroom breaks to "take inventory."
- Has a mini-fridge at their desk. (To my knowledge, nobody here has one. Perhaps that means I just haven't found it yet.)
- Has multiple children/going through a divorce/spouse lost job. A money crunch at home could lead to the cost cutting measure of pilfering a panini.
I'm toying with the idea of bringing in something really fantastic for lunch, bragging about it all morning and seeing if it turns up missing. This would also require me to set up some sort of "nanny cam" in the break room. Not sure what legal hoops I'd have to jump through to make this happen. I'll keep you all posted.
A few other office mysteries I need solved:
- Why the doors on the stalls in the bathrooms leave a gap wide enough that you can ID the person on the pot merely by glancing at the door. It's just awkward for everyone.
- Why they give us all passes to park in the parking lot during football games, then send out an email telling us not to use them unless we are needed to work that day. Why not just give them to the people needed to work...or hold them and hand them out on an individual request basis?
- Why when there's a campuswide alert message that's sent to everyone's phone, the message light on your phone doesn't blink...therefore the emergency alert system alerts nobody.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Monday, January 21, 2008
Cleaning out the clutter in the head
It's been a few weeks since the Snacks blog was in motion, and it's time to get a few things out of my head:
- If you're going to go to a zoo to taunt an animal, why would you taunt a tiger? I can think of 88 different animals I'd rather taunt. For instance, I would taunt penguins. They can't fly. Plus they can't eat you.
- OSU's men's basketball coach was fired last night. It was a move that had to be made, but I don't think this is a time to rejoice at all. I feel bad for coach John, because it's never entirely the coaches fault. Unless you're the coach of the USA women's national soccer team and you bench your starting goalie who hasn't given up a goal in the World Cup only to have the backup get worked and lose a game you should've won. Then yeah, it's all your fault.
- Why anyone would not want to be a parent is beyond me. Watching Jonah figure things out on his own, be amazed by things like a rattle or his own hand, or even just seeing him smile absolutely makes each day better than the last. You should all try it. You know, if you're in a stable relationship and have the financial means to support a kid.
- I won money at the casino for the first time in my life on Saturday. Now I understand why people like gambling so much. Watched my brothers clean up at craps. I'm still not sure how you play that game, but to me it looks like you put money on the table, people throw dice, and then you watch the money roll in. I swear I watched them for 45 minutes straight and they never lost a single dollar. Fantastic game!
- Is anyone watching American Idol this year? I haven't heard anyone at work say anything about it, I haven't even thought about turning it on. Is it finally starting to lose steam? Call it the Taylor Hicks hangover. Any contest that douchebag wins is not about talent. People are finally starting to figure that out.
- While it is fun to take your baby places and watch people ooh and ahh and tell you how great he or she is, it can also lead to awkward moments. At Subway on Friday night, our sandwich artist congratulated us on our baby, asked how old he was, then promptly asked us how long we'd been together. Ummm, none of your business dude? Then Saturday we were eating our clam chowder at Mo's and our waitress kept saying how perfect our son was. In fact, he was so perfect she said that he just made her want to cry. She reiterated this point at least three times. I think if we'd have stayed there any longer we might've had to issue an amber alert for a crying Mo's waitress running down the beach with a baby.
- If you're going to go to a zoo to taunt an animal, why would you taunt a tiger? I can think of 88 different animals I'd rather taunt. For instance, I would taunt penguins. They can't fly. Plus they can't eat you.
- OSU's men's basketball coach was fired last night. It was a move that had to be made, but I don't think this is a time to rejoice at all. I feel bad for coach John, because it's never entirely the coaches fault. Unless you're the coach of the USA women's national soccer team and you bench your starting goalie who hasn't given up a goal in the World Cup only to have the backup get worked and lose a game you should've won. Then yeah, it's all your fault.
- Why anyone would not want to be a parent is beyond me. Watching Jonah figure things out on his own, be amazed by things like a rattle or his own hand, or even just seeing him smile absolutely makes each day better than the last. You should all try it. You know, if you're in a stable relationship and have the financial means to support a kid.
- I won money at the casino for the first time in my life on Saturday. Now I understand why people like gambling so much. Watched my brothers clean up at craps. I'm still not sure how you play that game, but to me it looks like you put money on the table, people throw dice, and then you watch the money roll in. I swear I watched them for 45 minutes straight and they never lost a single dollar. Fantastic game!
- Is anyone watching American Idol this year? I haven't heard anyone at work say anything about it, I haven't even thought about turning it on. Is it finally starting to lose steam? Call it the Taylor Hicks hangover. Any contest that douchebag wins is not about talent. People are finally starting to figure that out.
- While it is fun to take your baby places and watch people ooh and ahh and tell you how great he or she is, it can also lead to awkward moments. At Subway on Friday night, our sandwich artist congratulated us on our baby, asked how old he was, then promptly asked us how long we'd been together. Ummm, none of your business dude? Then Saturday we were eating our clam chowder at Mo's and our waitress kept saying how perfect our son was. In fact, he was so perfect she said that he just made her want to cry. She reiterated this point at least three times. I think if we'd have stayed there any longer we might've had to issue an amber alert for a crying Mo's waitress running down the beach with a baby.
Monday, January 7, 2008
My day home with Jonah
5:20 am - Rachel just left for work. I'm officially on my own. Jonah is still sleeping, though he is snoring a little bit. I think that's because he has his little face smashed up against the side of his bed. He's got plenty of real estate in there, but he likes the edges. Maybe because he wants to be as close as possible to mom. I tried moving him more to the middle, but he made a noise that was a cross between a tired lion and a pig eating his slop. Better leave him alone. Had a little bit of trouble getting him to sleep last night. Tried feeding him a bottle of formula around 9:45, but he wouldn't take it. I rocked him for a while but he wouldn't fall asleep. Finally reheated the formula around 10:30 and he took to it then. He fought sleep til he finally succumbed around 11:30. Hopefully all our feedings aren't that difficult today. I'm going to try and sleep a little more while he's still out.
6:30 am - Well he woke up. It wasn't an angry awakening, he woke up like most people do....a little stretching and a little grunting. Things got a little worse with the diaper change. I didn't have his outfit for the day ready to go before changing the diaper, and I took too long deciding what he should wear. I'm still in my PJ's, not sure why he had to get dressed, but it seemed like the thing to do. I finally settled on some overalls and a striped t-shirt. He cried a little bit while I put it on him, and he made it clear he was hungry when he started trying to eat the shoulder straps of his Osh Kosh's. First feeding went great. He wasn't very understanding that I had to heat up the milk whereas mom just whips out her boob and away he goes, but once the milk hit his lips he was fine. Probably spit up about a quarter of what went in, but that's about par for the course. He's now resting comfortably in his car seat, his favorite place to take a nap (aside from on someone's chest.) I think I'm going to try and exercise myself right now before he decides he wants to hang out with dad again.
7:11 am - Nevermind. No sooner did I post that last update than he made a funny face and pooped. Sounded like a big one. Smells even bigger. Guess we're on to diaper 2 for the day.
7:45 am - Asleep again after a half hour of crankiness following the diaper change. At least it stayed in the diaper. Scott Van Pelt just yelled "On FIYAAAA!" during a SportsCenter highlight and woke him up. I'm boycotting SportsCenter until further notice. We're switching to the Today Show, where they're talking to a guy with blue skin. Fascinating. Maybe I'll work out this afternoon.
8:44 am - After a half an hour nap that allowed me to eat breakfast, Jonah awoke with a scream. We're now having tummy time until he gets tired of that, and then it's time for another feeding. Right now he's having an intense staredown with a rainbow colored spider that says has the numbers 1,2,3,4 on his left legs and A,B,C,D on his right legs. Sounds creepy, but it's actually kinda cute. And Jonah loves it, though he's getting tired. His neck isn't holding his head up much anymore. He has his head on the blanket in a look of "help me spider, I can't go on!" Maybe I should heat the bottle.
9:30 am. Jonah's sleeping soundly after that last feeding. Had time to unload the dishwasher, make the bed, and clean up breakfast. I'm thinking we might take a trip to Costco at some point today. I'm also thinking about taking him over to my Grandparents. Going to see family is always risky though, because there's no guarantee that you'll ever get to leave.
10:20 am - Jonah's looking at our light fixtures and making sucking faces. Our light fixtures look a lot like boobs. He's not due to eat til at least 11. Gonna pop in the Jungle Book and see if the bright colors entertain him. Could be a long 40 minutes.
12:35 pm - Jungle Book worked! Well, sort of. There was also some bouncing and singing by dad. I think I know all the words to "Bear Neccesities" now. We fed around 11, and we went with formula because the breast milk in the fridge is still kinda frozen. After the feeding, I put him in his carseat and away we went to Costco. After a few minutes of fussing, he was fine the whole car ride and trip through Costco. Got a few compliments from people and smiles from old ladies. I felt bad for my checkout lady, who had 2 year old twins and was pregnant with another set! Jonah just woke up a few minutes ago, but he is sitting comfortably on the couch having another staredown with Mr. Spider. He's pretty animated right now, which means lots of entertaining for me until the next feeding. We're going to try and hold him off until at least 1:30.
2:10 pm - Success! The tummy time/bouncing combo works well. Was able to hold him off until 1:40 for the feeding, although by that time he was so hungry he forgot to breathe a few times will eating and had the milk go down the wrong pipe. It's sad, but choking babies are actually pretty cute. Turns out he wasn't only hungry, he was also exhausted, because twice he fell asleep with the bottle in his mouth. He'd wake up when I tried to ease it out of his mouth. When the bottle was empty, I just let him keep sucking until he fell asleep again. He's been out for about 20 minutes now. Gives me a chance to catch up on the ER episode I missed last Thursday because Jonah was crying.
4:18 pm - He's still sleeping! I didn't think he'd be down this long, or I'd have taken the Christmas lights down. I keep thinking I should go do it, but I know as soon as I head outside, he'll wake up. Of course I've thought that since 2:45. P.S. He's really funny when he sleeps. He occasionally will put his hands straight up in the air and grunt for no apparent reason. Oh, and I've found he hates the sound of a pop can being opened when he sleeps.
5:33 pm - We ate at 5. I think I pushed the maximum time frame between feedings. Every time I took the bottle out of his mouth to burp him, he screamed about as loud as I've ever heard him yelp. It was pretty funny. He took that bottle down in record time. Hopefully I won't have to feed him again until Rachel gets home around 7:15 or so. Now I have to try and get him interested in the national championship football game. Might be hard, because I'm not even sure I'm excited about it.
9:45 pm - Well, Rachel made it home about 7:15. Jonah was a bit cranky before she got home, so I was glad she made it home when she did. Fortunately I started preparing dinner while Jonah was asleep, because he freaked out for about half an hour straight before Rachel got home. I had to sing along with the Ohio State marching band during halftime to keep him quiet. When that ended I had to start singing commercial jingles. He really likes the one with the dude singing in his Jeep with the animals. Now we're watching Prison Break and Jonah's sleeping soundly on his mommy's lap. All is well, and we all survived. I kind of enjoyed this diary thing......I need more "events" like this to blog about!
6:30 am - Well he woke up. It wasn't an angry awakening, he woke up like most people do....a little stretching and a little grunting. Things got a little worse with the diaper change. I didn't have his outfit for the day ready to go before changing the diaper, and I took too long deciding what he should wear. I'm still in my PJ's, not sure why he had to get dressed, but it seemed like the thing to do. I finally settled on some overalls and a striped t-shirt. He cried a little bit while I put it on him, and he made it clear he was hungry when he started trying to eat the shoulder straps of his Osh Kosh's. First feeding went great. He wasn't very understanding that I had to heat up the milk whereas mom just whips out her boob and away he goes, but once the milk hit his lips he was fine. Probably spit up about a quarter of what went in, but that's about par for the course. He's now resting comfortably in his car seat, his favorite place to take a nap (aside from on someone's chest.) I think I'm going to try and exercise myself right now before he decides he wants to hang out with dad again.
7:11 am - Nevermind. No sooner did I post that last update than he made a funny face and pooped. Sounded like a big one. Smells even bigger. Guess we're on to diaper 2 for the day.
7:45 am - Asleep again after a half hour of crankiness following the diaper change. At least it stayed in the diaper. Scott Van Pelt just yelled "On FIYAAAA!" during a SportsCenter highlight and woke him up. I'm boycotting SportsCenter until further notice. We're switching to the Today Show, where they're talking to a guy with blue skin. Fascinating. Maybe I'll work out this afternoon.
8:44 am - After a half an hour nap that allowed me to eat breakfast, Jonah awoke with a scream. We're now having tummy time until he gets tired of that, and then it's time for another feeding. Right now he's having an intense staredown with a rainbow colored spider that says has the numbers 1,2,3,4 on his left legs and A,B,C,D on his right legs. Sounds creepy, but it's actually kinda cute. And Jonah loves it, though he's getting tired. His neck isn't holding his head up much anymore. He has his head on the blanket in a look of "help me spider, I can't go on!" Maybe I should heat the bottle.
9:30 am. Jonah's sleeping soundly after that last feeding. Had time to unload the dishwasher, make the bed, and clean up breakfast. I'm thinking we might take a trip to Costco at some point today. I'm also thinking about taking him over to my Grandparents. Going to see family is always risky though, because there's no guarantee that you'll ever get to leave.
10:20 am - Jonah's looking at our light fixtures and making sucking faces. Our light fixtures look a lot like boobs. He's not due to eat til at least 11. Gonna pop in the Jungle Book and see if the bright colors entertain him. Could be a long 40 minutes.
12:35 pm - Jungle Book worked! Well, sort of. There was also some bouncing and singing by dad. I think I know all the words to "Bear Neccesities" now. We fed around 11, and we went with formula because the breast milk in the fridge is still kinda frozen. After the feeding, I put him in his carseat and away we went to Costco. After a few minutes of fussing, he was fine the whole car ride and trip through Costco. Got a few compliments from people and smiles from old ladies. I felt bad for my checkout lady, who had 2 year old twins and was pregnant with another set! Jonah just woke up a few minutes ago, but he is sitting comfortably on the couch having another staredown with Mr. Spider. He's pretty animated right now, which means lots of entertaining for me until the next feeding. We're going to try and hold him off until at least 1:30.
2:10 pm - Success! The tummy time/bouncing combo works well. Was able to hold him off until 1:40 for the feeding, although by that time he was so hungry he forgot to breathe a few times will eating and had the milk go down the wrong pipe. It's sad, but choking babies are actually pretty cute. Turns out he wasn't only hungry, he was also exhausted, because twice he fell asleep with the bottle in his mouth. He'd wake up when I tried to ease it out of his mouth. When the bottle was empty, I just let him keep sucking until he fell asleep again. He's been out for about 20 minutes now. Gives me a chance to catch up on the ER episode I missed last Thursday because Jonah was crying.
4:18 pm - He's still sleeping! I didn't think he'd be down this long, or I'd have taken the Christmas lights down. I keep thinking I should go do it, but I know as soon as I head outside, he'll wake up. Of course I've thought that since 2:45. P.S. He's really funny when he sleeps. He occasionally will put his hands straight up in the air and grunt for no apparent reason. Oh, and I've found he hates the sound of a pop can being opened when he sleeps.
5:33 pm - We ate at 5. I think I pushed the maximum time frame between feedings. Every time I took the bottle out of his mouth to burp him, he screamed about as loud as I've ever heard him yelp. It was pretty funny. He took that bottle down in record time. Hopefully I won't have to feed him again until Rachel gets home around 7:15 or so. Now I have to try and get him interested in the national championship football game. Might be hard, because I'm not even sure I'm excited about it.
9:45 pm - Well, Rachel made it home about 7:15. Jonah was a bit cranky before she got home, so I was glad she made it home when she did. Fortunately I started preparing dinner while Jonah was asleep, because he freaked out for about half an hour straight before Rachel got home. I had to sing along with the Ohio State marching band during halftime to keep him quiet. When that ended I had to start singing commercial jingles. He really likes the one with the dude singing in his Jeep with the animals. Now we're watching Prison Break and Jonah's sleeping soundly on his mommy's lap. All is well, and we all survived. I kind of enjoyed this diary thing......I need more "events" like this to blog about!
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Andy Blog History
Tomorrow will be the first time that I've been in charge of Jonah for an entire day. Rachel's got some bottles pumped, and I'm now proficient at preparing formula in case he gets too hungry. Formula is not rocket science. Take some water, add some powder, and shake. I can handle that. We did a test run with Jonah last night, and after he tried to drink the formula so fast he choked a few times, we finally figured out a system that allowed me to feed him without him drowning. I think we'll be fine. However, I know you're all worried about me, so I've figured out a way to keep you all abreast of the situation.
That's right....tomorrow I will be keeping a live running diary of the day's events. Be sure to check this blog frequently throughout the day for the adventures of Big A and Lil' J as we try to survive on our own from the time Mom leaves in the morning (around 5:30 am) until she returns (around 7:30 pm). 14 hours of chaos! Stay tuned.....
That's right....tomorrow I will be keeping a live running diary of the day's events. Be sure to check this blog frequently throughout the day for the adventures of Big A and Lil' J as we try to survive on our own from the time Mom leaves in the morning (around 5:30 am) until she returns (around 7:30 pm). 14 hours of chaos! Stay tuned.....
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
New Year's Resolutions
I figure by posting my new years resolutions, everyone will know what they are and be able to say "hey remember when you said you were going to do such and such? Well, you didn't you liar." Can't be having that, so here's my attempt to motivate myself. Hasn't worked much in years past, but every year is a new year to start fresh.
1. Stop eating junk food at work. My office is like a non-extradition country for fat people. Everyone brings in food that they don't want to eat in front of their significant others and/or families. In an attempt to not feel so crappy about it, they bring in massive quantities of the fatty/sugary foods so that other people can eat with them. It's sort of an "everyone's doing it, so it's not that bad" mentality. So, I'm ceasing my daily trips to the admin assistants candy jars, putting the kibosh on donuts when they come in, and especially not eating cake at people's birthdays/going away parties. In an office of 130 people, you'd be surprised how often we have birthday cake. You'd also be surprised how often people find new jobs. Hmmmm.......
2. Exercise every day. Even if it's only a 15 minute walk around the neighborhood, I gotta do something. During Rachel's pregnancy, I stopped exercising almost entirely. Pretty much if she'd been a few weeks past her due date, I would've turned into stone. We need to reverse this trend. Rachel and Grant are both talking about running the Portland Marathon in October. I'm not entirely positive I can get in shape to run a full marathon, but they have a 5 or 10K that I think I could handle. Gotta crawl before you can run a marathon right?
3. Limit the Pepsi. I have a problem. I can admit that. When you think about it, 4 sodas a day doesn't seem like much if you have one at break in the morning, one with your lunch, one for dinner and one in the evening, but that's like 600+ calories a day that take up room on the front porch that used to be my stomach. So we're cutting down to one regular and one diet pop a day tops. The rest of the time I'll drink water or milk. Exemptions can be made if I exercise for an hour or more in a day. Call it a reward of sorts.
4. Help more with the chores around the house. Now the Jonah's around and Rachel's going back to work, I need to step up and actually do some in-home maintenance. Problem is that I still feel like I do more harm than good (recall the crock pot incident of a few months ago). Guess like everything else, I'll get better with repetition. Plus we can't have Jonah getting used to living in messy conditions.
5. Clean the closet....and keep it organized. I cleaned it out tonight, now I need to maintain its order. I think by making sure that everything is in order once a week when we do laundry will help.
6. Watch less television. This should be easy with the current writers strike. I'm not a big fan of re-runs. Also, I'm issuing a complete and total cease and desist on all reality shows....except for American Gladiators. I'm going to give that one a shot. American Idol however is not getting one second of airplay in this household. I'm not investing 3-6 hours a week on that junk. I don't care how drunk Paula gets....I'm no longer interested.
I think we're going to set this circus down now, before I make my list too long to handle. Plus, Rachel needs a glass of milk, and she has a small human that looks suspiciously like me attached to her left nipple.
1. Stop eating junk food at work. My office is like a non-extradition country for fat people. Everyone brings in food that they don't want to eat in front of their significant others and/or families. In an attempt to not feel so crappy about it, they bring in massive quantities of the fatty/sugary foods so that other people can eat with them. It's sort of an "everyone's doing it, so it's not that bad" mentality. So, I'm ceasing my daily trips to the admin assistants candy jars, putting the kibosh on donuts when they come in, and especially not eating cake at people's birthdays/going away parties. In an office of 130 people, you'd be surprised how often we have birthday cake. You'd also be surprised how often people find new jobs. Hmmmm.......
2. Exercise every day. Even if it's only a 15 minute walk around the neighborhood, I gotta do something. During Rachel's pregnancy, I stopped exercising almost entirely. Pretty much if she'd been a few weeks past her due date, I would've turned into stone. We need to reverse this trend. Rachel and Grant are both talking about running the Portland Marathon in October. I'm not entirely positive I can get in shape to run a full marathon, but they have a 5 or 10K that I think I could handle. Gotta crawl before you can run a marathon right?
3. Limit the Pepsi. I have a problem. I can admit that. When you think about it, 4 sodas a day doesn't seem like much if you have one at break in the morning, one with your lunch, one for dinner and one in the evening, but that's like 600+ calories a day that take up room on the front porch that used to be my stomach. So we're cutting down to one regular and one diet pop a day tops. The rest of the time I'll drink water or milk. Exemptions can be made if I exercise for an hour or more in a day. Call it a reward of sorts.
4. Help more with the chores around the house. Now the Jonah's around and Rachel's going back to work, I need to step up and actually do some in-home maintenance. Problem is that I still feel like I do more harm than good (recall the crock pot incident of a few months ago). Guess like everything else, I'll get better with repetition. Plus we can't have Jonah getting used to living in messy conditions.
5. Clean the closet....and keep it organized. I cleaned it out tonight, now I need to maintain its order. I think by making sure that everything is in order once a week when we do laundry will help.
6. Watch less television. This should be easy with the current writers strike. I'm not a big fan of re-runs. Also, I'm issuing a complete and total cease and desist on all reality shows....except for American Gladiators. I'm going to give that one a shot. American Idol however is not getting one second of airplay in this household. I'm not investing 3-6 hours a week on that junk. I don't care how drunk Paula gets....I'm no longer interested.
I think we're going to set this circus down now, before I make my list too long to handle. Plus, Rachel needs a glass of milk, and she has a small human that looks suspiciously like me attached to her left nipple.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)