Pranks, Arizona and Gumby

I got a wonderful CD a few weeks ago with old TV themes on it. I’ve been putting it to a somewhat evil use, but I can’t help myself. I’ve been leaving some of the songs on coworkers’ voice mail before I leave at the end of the day.

The songs are chosen to represent the kind of day the recipient has been having. Are your coworkers acting childish? I leave the theme from “Captain Kangaroo”. Did the Big Boss just give you a week’s worth of work, results due by end of day tomorrow? I leave the “Mission Impossible” theme. Did you make the mistake of wishing out loud that you’d like to be somewhere else – anywhere else? That one got the “Green Acres” theme.

With Halloween coming up, I have a major decision to make. Which theme do I leave: The Munsters, The Adams Family, Twilight Zone, Alfred Hitchcock’s theme (Death March of the Marionettes), Casper the Friendly Ghost? I really want to leave the Twilight Zone, since it fits the current atmosphere of the company. That one won’t get stuck in your head the way that the Hitchcock theme or the Munster theme would though.

Speaking of stuck songs, there’s an article on CNN’s website today about the phemomenon. It refers to them as “earworms”. I saw that and was immediately reminded of “Star Trek 2: Wrath of Khan”. It wasn’t an inappropriate association.

I suppose I could leave a few different themes, but that takes too much time, and certainly would not endear me to my victim.

•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•

The Socialist has discovered that the job market for math professors at community colleges in Arizona is looking pretty good at the moment. He’s thinking of applying to one or more positions, just to get his name out there. This was always something we’d planned to do, and I encouraged him to get the application in when we spoke last night. I admitted to having reservations, though.

I’m not sure what I’d do if we moved out there. The job I have here is not the sort of position that usually comes available, and I sincerely doubt there’s an equivalent position in the entire state of Arizona. Not that I’m wedded to doing this exact job for the rest of my life, but it’s the equivalent of yet again facing the “what do I want to do when I grow up” question. I’m not even sure what I’m qualified to do. I’ve no interest in small animal practice, and no self-respecting clinic would hire me anyhow. I have no experience in that area, and I doubt my people skills are up to the challenge of facing owners who haven’t been giving Fifi her pills on time and who allow Fluffy’s vaccinations to lapse.

Another reservation I have ties into my health situation. I know I’m being somewhat irrational here, but I’m firmly convinced that I will never find a set of doctors and a hospital as good as that which I have right here. I have something that may well border on a phobia regarding leaving the immediate area, and getting out of range of the physicians who have cared for me for the past six years. Between the episode with my heart, and the business with my liver, I have no idea of how to find a physician competent to deal with me. It was a minor concern when I drove cross-country in August, but I always knew I was coming back to Philadelphia, so I could keep the hyperventilation to a minimum. Moving away permanently scares the shit out of me.

I have no intention of allowing illness to rule my life. I just haven’t figured out a way to deal with this yet.

•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•

I’d guess it’s an effort to boost company morale. We already have a company newsletter (complete with clever name) that comes out every Friday, but starting today corporate is putting out a second newsletter that will be “more employee oriented”. They’ve named it the [insert company name here] Insider, and while I haven’t exactly figured out what the difference is between the Friday and Wednesday newsletters is, there does seem to be a lot more writing and a lot less canned graphics in the Insider.

Because my office is in a weird part of the building, I knew nothing about this newsletter until lunchtime, when half a dozen different people wanted to know if I’d seen it yet. I grabbed a copy after lunch, and it seems I’m the major story under the “Great News” section. On the great news front, Palimpsest, Company veterinarian, returned to work on September 15 following her recovery from liver transplant surgery. Welcome back, Pali. My boss asked worriedly if they’d asked me about this, I suspect because I’ve been trying to keep this whole thing understated at work. I didn’t have a clue about it, but I figure that anything that promotes organ donation awareness is a good thing, so I’m not about to complain. Although it would have been nice to be asked first.

•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•

“The time has come,” the Walrus said, “To talk of many things: Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax— Of cabbages—and kings”

I’ve been looking for a box to pack my Gumby stuff in. I’m not entirely sure what to do with it all. I have some very nice, difficult to find pieces in my collection, and I don’t really want to just store it away. But the time has come to “serious up” my office a bit. I think I’ll let my Brain (of Pinky and the) stay, as well as my Piglet doll (of Pooh fame) and my Walk for the Cure Teddy Bear (cancer awareness). I don’t want my office to get too stuffy looking, but I’m thinking I could use the wall space in a better way. Like putting up posters promoting organ donor awareness.

I wonder if The Socialist will let me redo the living room in Early American Gumby ….

•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•←•→•

The search engine hunts that turn up my diary continue to amuse. Today’s winning entry to most original way to find my diary goes to the guy looking for photos of “Cat wars”. Run that one on Alta Vista, go to page 14 of the search results, and you’ll get this:

That’s the little grey idiot playing tug-of-war with the spring-tail mouse she managed to get jammed into the coffee table.

I can always count on my site meter to give me a good laugh.