I Was On Vacation, I'm Back, I'm Avoiding Work Already

I was waiting for my bags in the Midway Airport baggage claim yesterday, and I was interrupted from my iPod-based reverie by a crazy-eyed, but professionally-dressed woman who asked me how much the baggage carts were, while actually pointing at the price printed on the baggage cart dispenser. It made my answer ($3) a breeze, but was the last tumbler in the mental lock, and I knew I needed to write down what I'd do if I ran an Airline.



Simply put, I'd have a test. And if you passed this test, you'd get a card, or a key, or a password to allow you to join me on my airline of joy and peace, flying to specially-equipped airports. If you want to stratify, we'll add first class, so rich people can still show off. The test will be comprised of the following factors:

• Intelligence: Can you follow somewhat complex directions? Can you manipulate objects in three dimensions without smacking people around, or taking an inordinate amount of time? Failing that, can you ask for help in a competent and polite manner?


• Conversation: Can you avoid talking endlessly about stupid shit? Can you take a hint and leave your seatmate alone if they don't want to talk about your cats, or oil, or the government, or golf, or sports, or big business, or your goiter? If you are talking, can you do it in a tone of voice that doesn't involve everyone in the two rows behind you?


• Odor.


• This one was going to be Attractiveness, but that's really not fair. No, I take it back; that's completely fair. We'll leave it in. I want to fly with people who aren't freaky-looking. Take that, political correctness!


• Creepiness. Can you avoid being freaky to the flight attendants? And other patrons? Do you make people nervous? We'll have our crack team of adjudicators follow you around surreptitiously for a week to see how strangers react around you. That's the plan for the Conversation category, as well.

So, yeah, this isn't fair or equitable, but it's my airline, and I'll be discriminatory if I want to. And perhaps we'll weight it so if you smell somewhat weird, but aren't creepy, we'll let you on board. If you pass the test, and then act like an asshat on the plane, refusing to read signs, or trying to fit a queen-sized mattress in the overhead bin, or something like that, the plane will land immediately, put you off on the tarmac, take off again, and serve free drinks to the remaining passengers to make up for you.

The guys behind me talking loudly about how we sold F-16s to Israel and really really simplified foreign policy for three hours? They'll be ejected in mid-air. The people who wouldn't turn off their phones on the way out of Vegas? Placed in the cargo hold, and their phones smashed with hammers. Incapable of figuring out where to go to claim their baggage and what to do when they get there, without running over 35 random people in the process? Fed to wolves.

Additionally, if a member of my staff happens to be walking past a Southwest gate and hears someone in line complaining about their A/B/C system of boarding, they are empowered to strike that passenger with an open hand, at their discretion. It's not like they keep that a secret, idiots. You chose to fly Southwest, and part of the reason that it's cheap is that you deal with being treated like cattle for a few minutes.

This is the Jump.

This Has Been About Work WAY Too Often

New busywork project:

Hey, Tom, could you go onto that Print and Go Marketing thing print off a copy of all the flyers, and put them into a binder, organized by type? So it's convenient to the guys.

Um, it's on the Internet. Not only is it already in the most convenient place imaginable, it's not wasting paper or ink. It's ON THE INTERNET. If anything changes, the list changes automatically! I'd have to know actual magic to do that in real life. IT'S ON THE INTERNET. YOU CAN LOOK AT IT ON THE INTERNET.

There is no more convenient place to look at images!

This is the Jump.

I Enjoy Making Stuff Up

In between trying to repair the paper folding machine, and deciding what real work I was going to do today, I followed up on a phone call from my boss that asked if I could explore where a customer's monthly mortgage statement went. I found the relevant information, and called our servicing department, who said they'd send another copy out to the customer ASAP. I then called the customer back, and had the following conversation:

Me: [After telling him how much he owed, etc.] Sorry for the confusion,
sir. You'll get your statements in a regular fashion from here on out.
Him: Well, what happened? How come I didn't get a statement?

Now, I could tell him what the rep on the phone thinks happened (his state wasn't listed - zip and everything else was valid), but that's not as interesting as:

Me: Well, you know how you live in [redacted], IL? Your statement was sent
to [redacted], LI. Which isn't a state.
Him: Oh! LI, the 51st state in the union!
Me: Indeed.

There was absolutely no need for me to make that up, especially because the
truth is nearly as weird and idiotic. I think there's something wrong with me.

Now, back to making the paper folding machine work, because I'm not folding all of these letters by hand. Even monkeying with the machine isn't necessarily appropriate. Fold them yourself, John. John [deleted - see note], whose name I will use in full, so that when you Google yourself like the insecure pervy wanker that you are, you will discover this: fold your own damn worthless letters, you miserable hack. You and your letters are a waste of otherwise useful carbon. Were I to receive one of your poorly-worded, 2-page form letters, obviously signed with a variation of Brush Script MT font, I would go back in time to intercept the mailperson at before he/she reached my home, and commit a federal offense by tipping his/her truck over and setting fire to it. That's how you commit mail fraud.

The best part is, I'm unlikely to be confronted about this, because I'll know that this post was discovered by the Googling of onesself, of which you should be embarrassed, you simpleton. So you can feel better: you're not the biggest clown in the office; you're just the most recent shiftless greed-driven coward to request that I do something stupid because you're lazy and don't want to do it yourself.

At least the phone call was fun.

[Note: While it was amusing to put his full name in, briefly, I realized that the consequences could actually be dire. So, forget it. Pretend it's in there - the rest of the post won't make sense otherwise.]

This is the Jump.

Oh, Monday...

I walked in and noticed a couple of things that immediately made me angry. Clearly, I ought to be doing something else with my daylight hours.

1) There are four boxes of stamped envelopes sitting on my desk. The corpses of the people who carried them from the postage meter to my desk must have already decomposed, because you can't escape the building without passing a mailbox. Therefore, I have to assume that the person or persons who dropped these letters off suffered a tragic accident before they were able to carry the letters to the elevators and to a mailbox.

2) The candy dish, full on Friday when I left, is empty. This is meant primarily for customers and non-assholes. Your home-schooled wolf-children fall into neither category, letter-abandoning lard-ass. And if it was you who devoured an entire bowl of Fruit Gems, then I hope you lose a leg to diabetes and I can beat you to death with it. I don't want your ill-concieved spawn to get diabetes; diabetic children are tragic. I just hope they fall into a well.

This is the Jump.