If you came with a warning label, what would it say?
Submitted by chris.
I’m going to answer this with a little help from warninglabelgenerator.com…
(Thanks to Indy Bunny for the link!)
Tag: geek
an ode to diet coke
You know you’re having a bad chocolate craving when you check out the fridge at your workplace and think, “Mmm, chocolate low-carb Slim Fast… wonder how much they’d mind if I took one….”
Oh, wait, right. Just because it says chocolate doesn’t mean it is chocolate, and just because it looks like a thick and delicious milkshake doesn’t mean it won’t taste like protein-infused poo. I’m no food scientist, but I do know my chocolate, and there is no chocolate in you, Slim Fast. You disappoint me so.
(On second thought, if I were to take it, I think I’d be doing the owner a favor.)
No, being that I’m not much for scavenging through other people’s lunches in search of treats, I’ll settle for my own drug of choice, in the form of Black Cherry Vanilla Diet Coke.
Compared to the Slim Fast, which could probably pass with moderate nutritional content, I can personally assure that BCVDC (it sounds like a disease! “I have BCVDC! It makes me twitch and talk really fast!”) has absolutely no nutritional content whatsoever, nor does it contain any trace of real black cherries or real vanilla (or real coke! Drat!). I can drink it freely, knowing that those pesky calories are no longer an object, knowing that no trace of real food substance will touch my tongue, even if I’m slowly giving myself brain cancer through aspartame poisoning. Such a small price to pay for that sweet, caffeinated elixir!
I don’t know how I’d get through the 3 p.m. drag without you, BCVDC.
Ahem. And on another subject, apparently I made the front page. Lil’ ol’ me? So thank you for those [this is good] votes, and thanks to the Vox gods for making it happen. I’d also like to thank the Academy… and the Coca-Cola Company, for making such a wonderfully addictive product… and my mother and father… and Jim-Bob, my second cousin… and great Auntie Lou….
What, work? Oh, right. Work. Yes.
(I almost forgot to mention it, but I’d been waiting for the Vox gods to make Haze’s banner into a full-fledged style ever since I saw it, and I’m so so glad it’s on my blog now! Squee!)
honesty is overrated.
MMS is Monday Morning Syndrome, which is what I jokingly told the IT guy I had when he had to ask me three times to correct a link on particular University Web site before I got it right. “Yeah, sorry for the delay, I have Monday Morning Syndrome.” Hah-hah-hah.
But it’s a real disorder. Seriously. A couple hours later I went to the restroom and happened to look in the mirror, and that’s when I realized I’d put my shirt on inside out when I got dressed this morning. Three hours of walking around the office with the tag hanging off the back and all the seams sticking out.
I don’t drink coffee, but it’s times like this that make me think I should. What makes me a true geek is, the inside-out shirt incident actually made me think to check my underwear while I was there, because I have a terrible habit of putting on my underwear inside-out and/or backwards.
Just call me “spatially challenged.” It’s a bit more politically-correct than “special.”
Anyway, you can see what kind of day it’s been so far. My personal theory on Monday is, the quality of your Monday is inversely proportional to the comparative quality of the prior weekend. (Unless, of course, it’s one of those beloved national-holiday-observed-days, in which case we get to skip the Monday gloom entirely and go straight to Tuesday. Thinking about it that way, I wouldn’t mind if we declared EVERY Monday a national holiday from here on out, but then I suppose we’d eventually run into TMS, or Tuesday Morning Syndrome, which would usurp MMS and make the whole point moot. But let it be known that I am all in favor of three day weekends across the board!)
Anyway, my point is, this is not one of my better Mondays ONLY because I have the luxury of saying I had a good weekend. Look at me, putting a positive spin on things! This is totally unnatural, and as backwards as my underwear!
One of the things I’ve promised myself–after making the decision to work full-time, and after all those days spent trapped on the couch–is not to let my weekends go to waste. I have precious few days during the week where I can just do whatever the hell I want, and I’m finding that what I want is to get away from the computer periodically and get out of the house. Amazing, no?
Keeping that in mind, the S.O. and I have started a new tradition of going out to breakfast on Saturday mornings. This Saturday we chose Governor’s – one of those local, hokey, family-friendly places that serves a breakfast menu all day (because by “going out to breakfast” I really mean “going out to breakfast at noon, or whenever I decide to haul my lazy arse out of bed”) and generally has good service and cheap food.
This time, however, we got stuck with a waitress who might have had a touch of ADD. She was nice enough, but she kept interrupting us when we’d try to ask for something (one of those, “I already know what you want so I’m just going to blurt it out before you’ve finished speaking” people), talking too fast, throwing items down on the table as she rushed by, never quite looked you in the eye because she was watching her other tables, etc. We’ve had better service, we’ve had worse, and having worked a brief stint as a waitress the summer before I started college, I’m pretty sympathetic to the profession. It wasn’t the kind of thing I was going to make a big deal about (especially not in a place like the Gov’s, where her best tip is probably a five), but her lack of finesse was noticable.
When our meal was finished, she made the mistake of giving the S.O. and myself a comment card, and, because I’ve been brainwashed to “fill in all the little circles, completely, with a number two pencil” (many thanks to Mrs. Ivey, and all those second-grade aptitude tests), I made the mistake of filling it out. And when I got to the part about “Please rate the friendliness of the waitstaff: Exceeded Expectations, Met Expectations, or Did Not Meet Expectations”, well, I didn’t really think about the answer too much, because I’m a bonehead. By process of elimination, I circled “Did Not Meet Expectations.”
… not really thinking the the waitress would come back to the table as we were getting ready to leave, pick up the comment card, blatantly look at it, and then, without pause, in front of everyone else in the restaurant and in the LOUDEST VOICE POSSIBLE, glare at me and say, “OH, I’M SORRY I WASN’T FRIENDLY ENOUGH FOR YOU!!”
… making me think I’ve mistakenly walked into an episode of Seinfeld. I’m thinking, Are you kidding me? I’m getting called out on a comment card? Now you’ve proven that you have no tact, and I’m forced to reference a television show I don’t even like. Lordy!
The S.O. and I ducked out rather quickly after that, me feeling partly like she was way out of line to do that, and (let’s be honest) partly like a bitch. Because it’s not like I intended to hurt someone’s feelings that morning, and in hindsight, maybe I didn’t give her enough credit. Maybe she was having a case of delayed MMS.
Of course, after I’d gotten over the initial shock, my next words to the S.O. were —
This is so going in my blog.
Thankfully the rest of the weekend was normal-ish, and fun, and relaxing, and not at all like an episode of Seinfeld, for which I am very grateful.
Now, where is Tuesday when I need it?
can we skip friday entirely?
I have this burning desire to write something, but I have absolutely nothing to say. Maybe this is a cry for attention. Or perhaps I’m just desperate for the last 20 minutes of my work day to be over, and need whatever distraction I can possibly get.
So…
What is Caro thinking right now?:
- I could really get into this bento thing.
- I love my car, Tyrtle, a little green Volkswagen Golf. It is a wonderful car, except this morning it leaked on me. It seems there is a broken seal around the moonroof, because when the S.O. braked, water from last night’s rain came streaming into my lap. Good morning, Caro! Fancy a shower?
- I do not have enough money to warrant having such a bad case of the gimme-gimmes.
- There need to be more games like GrowCube.
- Speaking of growing, my job is growing on me. Growing on me like mold on stale bread.
- I can walk!
- I am going home to a new dishwasher! Though word around the cubicle is, the S.O. left the house and forgot to turn off the tap. I may be going home to a flooded kitchen, too.
- 4:21? It’s only 4:21? Arrrgh!
- Finally, I just want to take a moment to thank Mr. Columbus for making the upcoming three-day weekend possible. Now if it would only get here faster.
my other ride is a succubus!
Good news: I am mobile! As in, walking! As in, HURRAH!
And being that I’ve spent the last three weeks cooped up in the house with nowhere to go and nothing to do (unless it involves the world of Azeroth), I spent most of the weekend jumping for joy on my not-entirely-healed-but-getting-there foot.
Saturday: “We needa go here! And there! And here! And over there! And oh, look! Shopping! Movies! Shopping! Assembling furniture! Rearranging furniture! Cleaning! There here there here there here WEEHEEEEEEEE.”
Sunday: “Owwwwww, why does my foot hurt so much?”
Very surprised the S.O. didn’t shoot me full of tranquilizers, or better yet, break my other foot. But no, being the wonderful S.O. that he is, he mostly just tried to keep up with me in his quiet, humble way.
In any case, it was a good weekend, full of movement. And walking. And did I mention the walking? Grand.
In other exciting news, we’re getting a dishwasher. One of those portable/convertible ones, on wheels. This is particularly exciting because currently the only portable dishwasher in the house is yours truly (and I haven’t exactly been portable for the last few weeks!). So, I’m being replaced by a GE Nautilus on Thursday, and we are purposely letting the dishes pile up in the sink until then, because what fun is a new dishwasher if you don’t have dirty dishes to wash? That’s what I’m telling myself, anyhow.
And finally, it wouldn’t truly be an update unless I talked about WoW, would it?
My guild made its first attempt on Hakkar a week or so ago, and we killed him on the second try. This was a particularly big accomplishment for us, since we’ve been running Zul’Gurub for over a year now – we can finally say we’ve cleared it. Our recent success had us acting all, “C’mon Blizzard! Why dontcha throw something hard our way for once, eh? BRING IT!”
And then, there was Ragnaros. Back to the drawing board, guild!
Meanwhile, Cyspar ventured into Dire Maul last night with a group of familiar faces: Mom’s mage, Dad’s priest, the S.O.’s druid, a guild tank and myself. The family that plays WoW together dies mercilessly together… many, many times. Our objective: To attempt Cyspar’s epic Dreadsteed quest.
Much glass chewing ensued, mostly because I’d forgotten how hard it is to run 5-man instances when you’re not outfitted in epics. Situations that would be a piece of cake for Sheara are near-deadly for Cyspar. It doesn’t help that I’m still not used to playing a DPS class instead of a healer – I spent most of the run watching health bars go up and down, and panicking when the tank dropped below 20%. “Oh crap! Gotta heal him! Bandage, bandage, banda… oh, wait, we have a priest. And a druid. Right. Throw a freakin’ shadow bolt now and again, won’t you?”
In the end, we succeeded… barely. We survived the summoning ritual – waves upon waves of imps and big ugly demons – and defeated the dreadsteed itself, but died at the stinky feet of his ugly demon companion. The entire thing had me shrieking obscenities at my laptop while the S.O. looked on in something that came precariously close to amusement (but he knows better than to admit it). Thankfully we were able to run back as a group and defeat the big guy, and now Cyspar has a flaming, pointy, demon-horsey. Rawr!
you do not have the required proficiency for that item
Over the weekend I went to the local hospital’s walk-in clinic for a follow-up on The Foot Fiasco ™.
The good news is: It’s not broken! Hurrah! Apparently the tiny line they thought was a fracture is actually my little toe’s joint. I have weird-looking toe bones. Go figure.
The bad news is: I have what’s called a crush injury or contusion, and the bruise will take the same amount of time to heal. So, I can’t ditch the crutches just yet, and I’m under strict orders to keep it wrapped, keep it elevated, keep it iced. I really overdid it last week, so I took another day off yesterday and planted my butt firmly on the couch.
Of course, being couch-bound for another day gave Cyspar ample time to reach 60! Hurrah! Now she’s working on the warlock epic mount quest.
I’m so adding this shirt and these stickers to my Christmas wishlist.
QotD: Game On
What was the last game you played?
Hooboy, I dunno, this is a toughie.
Ummm.
*cough*
Last night was our regular Wednesday Molten Core Lucifron/Magmadar/Gehennas/Garr run. I picked up these beauties! /flex That’s my fourth piece in the Prophecy set.
I also leveled my warlock, Cyspar, to 56. Her last few levels went fast because she is always well-rested (in game terms), so she gets twice the experience for killing mobs. Rested experience is also referred to as, “that experience you get when you neglectfully leave your character to do nothing but drink pints with the Orgrimmar Innkeeper for months at a time because you’re too busy kissing the floor of Onyxia’s Lair with your main character.” If she ever gets there, Cyspar will be my second level 60 toon, but that’s a big “if”.
Unfortunately our server is down for hardware maintenance until Friday afternoonish, so I’m taking a brief, forced vacation from WoW.
*steps warily into the light of day, squinting, eyes bloodshot, face pale, fingers cramped* My god, it’s bright out here!
yep, still a nerd
In my haste to get something to eat before my lunch hour was up, I totally forgot to include two of my most defining nerdy traits. So another day, another lunch break… another post.
The first: I’m a recovering X-Phile. In high school and college my dorm room walls were plastered with pictures of David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, Mulder and Scully, my favorite FBI-fighting team. I owned all the episode guides, read all the fanfic (even wrote some of my own, embarrassingly enough), knew all the in-jokes, and desperately wanted my heroes to get it over with already and screw like bunnies. Yeah, I was one of “those” fans. When everyone who knew better stopped watching the show in the 6th or 7th season, I was still securely anchored in front of the TV every Sunday night at 9, giddy with anticipation. Thankfully the show ended in the 9th season, or I might still be defending myself (poorly) to television critics with better taste than I on some obscure Internet forum somewhere.
My second nerdy love: Jon Stewart. He’s tall, dark, handsome, and makes fun of politicians for a living. But before he hosted the Daily Show, he had a small-ish role (alongside noneother than Gillian Anderson!) in a movie called Playing by Heart, which served as my feel-good movie for several years. It wasn’t a great film by most standards, but it made a certain hormonal teenaged girl cry in all the right places, so it served its purpose. The feel-good movie of choice has since been replaced by Love Actually, but my love for Jon Stewart and his biting wit continues.
I’m such a nerd because…
What’s the nerdiest thing about you?
“Nerdiest” would imply the one, most nerdy thing. One? Just one thing? Well, okay.
Hi, my name is Sheara! I’m a 60 Undead Priest and a Blood Guard of <Grim Determination> on the Earthen Ring server. For the Horde!
Need I say more?
Other nerdy facts about myself, because just one nerdy fact does not a good blog post make:
- I’ve had an online journal/blog/personal Web site since before I hit puberty. To me, Web design is an artform.
- I use a Mac,
and I like it. No, I <3 it. - I went to a special high school for nerds called the Maine School of Science and Mathematics (alternately known as the Maine School of S & M).
- I graduated from university with a degree in New Media. “New Media” is Latin for “nerd”.
- I’ve been known to abuse the emoticon. 🙂
- Lists. Lists everywhere. Lists about anything and everything, as long as it’s a list.
- Megapixels turn me on.
- And finally… I’m spending my lunch break writing this instead of eating lunch. That pretty much sums it up!
the sweet smell of frivolity
Today I made my first “I don’t really need this but I don’t care because I have money now ha ha” purchase: A Targus Urban Messenger notebook case. Blame the significant other. He actually bought one for himself first, and as soon as I saw it, I got a case of the meme’s.
How could I resist? It has pockets for everything! Cellphone (not that I actually have one, but it’s nice to know that if I did, it would have a home), CD’s, pencils and pens, books, cables… oh, and my computer, too! It’s got a hunter orange pocket so I will never accidentally mistake my laptop for a deer (a common problem in the Cheney family, I’m sure)! It has little orange grippy feet on the bottom, an ergonomic handle, optional shoulder strap, and a magnetic pocket on the front with a port for my iPod’s headphones. It’s scratch-resistant, weather-resistant, and don’t-buy-me-resistant.
I obviously didn’t stand a chance.
Besides, I’m going back to school next semester, and I haven’t had a new backpack since I was in high school. And, uh, so what if my only class is web-based? Details, details!
Thankfully, the bag was also half price, thanks to the S.O.’s employee discount. Now to see if the workplace will write it off as a business expense… muwahahaha.