Thursday, March 27, 2008

I'm *still* not the secretary!

I keep on having to go to a giant pile of archives to look for things at work. Very important things... *cough* Yeah. It's such a huge pile of things that there are multiple secretaries that dual-class as librarians taking care of it. Their job is to help you find things and then photocopy them for you so that you have a nice big productive looking pile of tree to bring with you to meetings.

Well, apparently their job is to find things and photocopy things for EVERYONE BUT ME. This is the second group of people I've met at (large engineering company) whose brains physically can't lump me into the engineering pile. Even though I've been introduced to them on multiple occasions as an engineering intern, it doesn't seem to stick.

One of the secretaries went ballistic on me this morning because I dared to ask for her assistance in finding a file and photocopying it. She more or less called me a stupid lazy bitch and told me it wasn't her responsibility to train me to do my job. I ended up being late for a meeting when the printer ran out of paper and I couldn't get the copies I needed. Instead of doing something nice, like showing me how to refill the tray, she decided to rant about how stupid people are these days and then gave me an instruction manual for the printer.

So shoot me, I've never worked in a large office before, and I really don't have innate knowledge of which tray (A, F, B145, or Quillbert?) the 11X17 paper goes in. Or where the paper is stored. Or even how to use the damn machine, really.

It actually got to the point where I was wondering if I really had missed out on some big "change the paper in the printer" training day. But then male student in my office walked in, asked her to find a binder and copy it, promptly received copies, and left. Grrrrrrr.
I wish there was a polite way to say, "I'm not a fucking secretary and I in fact have NOT been trained in the ancient traditions of making copies, fetching coffee, and booking appointments!" Because it would really help clear up this situation a bit. Grrr.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Steampunk Laptop

I.... I... I think I'm in love!

Steampunk laptop

Monday, March 17, 2008

Idle Minds

Today I got to go look through piles of old drawings to look for old records of stuff. It wouldn't be so bad, except the records are in different places depending on who you ask, and some people maintain that they don't exist at all. While waiting for one of the librarians (sooo many drawings, sooo many records) to do a search for what I was looking for, well, there was nothing for me to do. Me, 10000 binders full of drawings that don't really interest me and are probably things I shouldn't be snooping around in. Oh, and boxes upon boxes of binder clips, erasers, rubber bands, paperclips, and the like.

It would have been a crime NOT to build a statue of a man riding a donkey out of office supplies. I've seen books that tell you how to build cool things out of your office supplies, that's cheating. Plus, you never know what's out there for you to commandeer on a given day. And, I'd feel bad using ALL of something (all the Post- Its, all the ink, all the whatever) to make a project. Hopefully the next poor soul that gets trapped in there finds my artistic contributions amusing.

It's not like I can help myself, either. My brain is always thinking. Always. About anything. If it can't find anything good to think about, and doesn't feel very imaginatory that day, then it starts worrying. Usually it's thinking about several things at once and humming a song in the background.

Lots of people think that nerds are bad at social interaction because they're shy, or because they 'just don't get it'. Sometimes, it's quite the opposite. Imagine driving your car and having to think every few seconds to check if you were driving at the right speed, in the right lane, going to the right place, looking at the mirrors to check for other traffic, etc. Incidentally, this is how I drive. I can't automate anything, I have to constantly think about every little thing I do in the car. The same goes for some people and social situations.

Some nerds, instead of being completely oblivious to the nuances of social interaction, are actualy hyper-aware of it. They might be wondering, "Should I be making eye contact? Did I make eye contact for too long? Where do I look if I'm not looking at them? Am I mouth breathing again? Shit, I need to stop leaving my mouth hanging open. What's my posture like? Am I slouching? My arms are crossed, do they think I'm angry? I'm not angry. Should I smile to show them I'm not angry?" ad infinitum. Then on top of that you have to actually carry on the conversation, and try to censor out (depending on who you're talking to) dorky things that you'd rather talk about, like recent upgrades to the GPL. The plus side of this is that hyperanalytical nerds can be really good at manipulating people, if they can just concentrate hard enough to project the right images of themselves during an interaction and predict the flow of the conversation.

I think I had a bad week for being social this week :(
I tend to veer off on tangents. Pick your tangent from the menu on the right.