Explore the Concrete Beach

That is the time I started writing this. I am currently at work at this odd hour. I started at 8PM to turn over a new system and of course when it was suppose to be easy, it’s not!

I’ve been listening to MIS people go back and forth trying to figure out what went wrong and they can’t so I am stuck here in my cube, in the dark because they shut off the lights on our floor at 9.

Luckily I have a light at my desk and the computer moniter to help me see.

It’s no secret I don’t like my job, really I’m more bored with it. A few days ago I sent off my resume to another company in another state. I’ve determined it’s time to move on. Sitting here at 12:45AM on a Friday night is not doing my 28 year-old self any good and it’s time for a change.

I hope I get an interview for the job I applied for, but we’ll see. I should here something in the next two weeks.

I just opened my school e-mail a few minutes ago. I found a reply from someone in my group who thinks we need a itemized list of services and products for the pro-forma budget for our project.

This is after an e-mail I sent that explained what to do. All he needs to do is group things together like labor, special purchase, equipment, facility fees etc..

I love when people make things more difficult for themselves. It just makes me want to bang my head off the desk. :head desk: Ah, much better.

 I haven’t started my slides yet. They’ll get done tomorrow since I have to work tonight until 10 tonight. They shouldn’t take me long as I know what what goes on them, and I wrote it out on paper so it should be easy to assemble.

I’m a little stressed at this point between work and school, but knowing it’s all over on Saturday makes things better. Also knowing I will be in Florida all next week brings a smile to my face!

Here’s to drink Back Scratchers at the Polynesian Bar, Cheers!

Mark

This time next week I will be in Florida, but before I get to that point I have to endure one of the craziest weeks in a looooong time.

After surviving this weekend of Pittsburgh Sports teams losing in every way imaginable here is my schedule for this week:

I have normal work Monday-Friday (Obviously)

Monday- Penguins VS Hurricanes

Tuesday- I work at the Mall

Wednesday- work on my project that is due on Saturday

Thursday- Hair Cut and write paper that is due Saturday

Friday- Meet with group about project that is due Saturday

Saturday- MY LAST DAY OF GRAD SCHOOL

A word about this project. My event planning class has been working on planning the grand opening of the Consol Energy Center. It just started as a normal made up project we had to do and we we’re having fun with it creating a lot of ideas.

Well, our teacher knows some people from the Penguins and asked if they wanted to come and see our presentation. Well guess what they’re coming and not just one person. Last we heard we have the VP of marketing, the GM and Assistant GM of the Mellon Arena, Someone form the Consol Energy Center and a few others I don’t remember. Also, the Dean of the Business Department and the Department head of the SAEM (Sports, Arts and Entertainment Management) Department.

So we’re all a little freaked out at this point and this week is going to by one for the ages as you can see above I have another class I have to write a paper for and I have normal work, mall work and hockey games that can’t be missed (research of course).

So that’s my week when it’s over i will have a MBA and I will be on a plane heading to Florida, so I’m really excited!

Well, it’s another gray Monday here in Pittsburgh. The rain has been falling for a few days on and off and it looks to continue that way for the rest of the week, but at least it’s suppose to be in the 60s at it’s lowest point so that’s a good thing.

This weekend while I was working at the mall my manager and I ordered from a restaurant which is in the outside portion of the mall. We usually order from there on Saturday’s because we get sick of the food court and there food cost just as much as the food court, but it’s 100X better.

Like I said we order from this place every week so the bartender who takes our order, Lucas, knows the deal when we call. So I went to pick-up our order. I walk into the restaurant and the girl behind the podium says, “Hi,” and I say, “Hello how are you?” as I walk toward the bar area to pick up the food and then she says, “Are you the new guy? Here’s your apron.” I stopped and look toward the bar area as I see Lucas laughing as he heard the whole conversation.

I said, “No, I am just picking up food.” Slightly embarrassed she apologized and I proceeded to pick up the food from Lucas and when I walked out she apologized again and said, “You must be a waiter, somewhere because you just look like a waiter.”

Now I am required to wear all black or black and white for my job at the mall, I choose to wear all black because when I used to wear a white shirt at the store I work at it would look not so white by the end of the day because there is so much dust flying around the mall. But still I didn’t know I look like a waiter.

Is there a certain type of look that fits a waiter?

I could never be a waiter because, well, people would piss me off with there special orders and I would probably drop a tray of food on someone, which wouldn’t be good.

I get annoyed at the people at my other job in the morning that go to the café and get picky about what piece of bacon they want or how crispy a hash brown was made. I feel bad for the cook because some people are just so picky. That and these office ladies like to steal tea bags constantly. They take two cups shove tea bags, sugar packets and sometimes lemon into one cup, then place the other on top and fill it with water and it looks like they just doubled up their cup.

I just roll my eyes and try not to cause a scene. One day I will stop the office ladies and just be like why are you stealing tea bags? The kicker is the first cup of coffee or tea is free.

Sigh.

That’s it for now.

10 days until vacation.

Penguins VS Capitals Game 2 tonight.

LET’S GO PENS!

Later!

I deal with a lot of graphs and time lines. At work we can view our pay advices days before payday, so we can check for errors. Also they have a representation of our check. I thought I would share.

As you may have guessed most of my check goes to taxes, 24 percent to be exact. That sucks, but what are you going to do?

3 percent is my benefits and 6% is goes into my 401k, which is the max at which the company will match. 33 percent or a third if you will disappears like that.

Why can’t this be Florida with no State Taxes?

Today is not going to be a fun day.

Why?

Well because I’ll spend most of it stressing for my Quantitative Methods midterm this evening. The issue is not the math or the problems, but for some reason there is a vocabulary section on the test.

Why? I don’t know. We don’t even use most of the terms. I know what standard deviation is and the co-efficient variables. I know relative f, mean, median and mode, but do you think I can remember the different types of quantitative problems? Not so much. In a class where 95% of the time was constantly run through problems that I will most likely do well on, I’ll screw up defining the word statistic, ratio, ordinal or some other random word. That’s what stresses me out.

I also have a Legal midterm on Thursday, which was suppose to be next week but someone in the class told the teacher that this week is the 4^th class and it should be the midterm since we only have 7 weeks. I was not too happy with that and then she felt dumb because she forgot we have a midterm in stats this week. Thanks for ruining it!

I would have rather had less on the final and more on the midterm, but I guess they didn’t see it that way.

Something that has been bothering me at work is this whole “Living the Brand” crap.

I get that most companies and even more so now, people have branded them selves in some way. Sometimes annoyingly so others I find creative and interesting, but mostly annoying. I’m and tired of thinking a company runs my life outside of work. I try to keep everything separate in my life.

This blog, my Facebook and Twitter accounts are me and no one else or anyone’s ideas. So I guess this is my “brand” but what it really is me just being me. I don’t like people asking me “what have you done to live the brand today?” I usually think to myself “show up at work and do my job.”

In short I don’t want to live any type of brand I just want to be myself. Is that too much to ask these days?

Wow it’s a nice day in Pittsburgh! The Sun is shining and the sky is blue and best of all it’s NOT 5 degrees! Woooooo!

Today I bring you a summary of a work conversation that evoked memories of the past. It also involves food!

In the sea of cubicles that surround my in the office you notice several things about ones little cube. One person is obsessed with pigs and has about 100 all over his desk and he makes “oink” sounds when walking by the area where my cube is located. He’s not “oinking” at me, but at the office ladies down the other end of the row.

Another person has “Star War” action figures lining the top portion of his cube; another person has dog plush all over their desk. I, myself, have a Beaker from the Muppets plush, a Mr. Potato Head, four Calendars (I don’t know way) 2 are Penguin (the team) calendars one is just a plane monthly calendar and the other one is the yearly one provided by the company, which in March features a man typing on his Black Berry at a table with a laptop that is outside in the woods next to a babbling brook. Didn’t know there was Wi-Fi in the woods.

There is one thing you can find in the top left drawer of everyone’s desk that is a commonality…Microwave popcorn. I don’t know how it started maybe it’s because no one really takes a lunch anymore, or they think it’s a healthy snack, or maybe it’s cheap because you can buy a giant box from Sam’s or Costco for what it cost to get one tiny bag out of the vending machine.

It was a bag of microwave popcorn that was slightly burnt that started the conversation of Hills.

You remember Hills, right? “It’s where the toys are.” Truth be told my mother worked at hills when I was younger. She worked in the layaway department. But what everyone remembers about Hills is when you first walked in you were greeted by the smell of fresh popcorn and ICEE’s!

It was really the perfect combination. Much better than Movie Popcorn and SnoCaps combo (I learned that one from one Jaime Fox in college; she always claimed it was the perfect combination of salty and sweet).  

There was just something about Hills popcorn that one could not resist. Maybe it was the taste lightly buttered with a little bit of salt. Maybe it was the packaging the long paper bag like container or the big plastic bag that made it so enticing. Whatever it was it evoked fond memories from everyone. We talked about the after Thanksgiving Sale commercial where the cooked turkey sat up on the table than ran out of the house to be ready for the Black Friday sale.

Whatever it may have been proves the strong bonds people form with brands from their past. It was a sad day when Ames took Hills over. Ames was awful, from the store, to the customer service. It was done on the cheap, unwelcoming and cold. Even the popcorn wasn’t the same.

In times like these, I wish Hills was still around so I could pick up a bag of popcorn and a Cherry ICEE and waste an afternoon with two comfort foods. Well at least I got my memories of the past and a bag of microwavable popcorn to pass the time.

Another cold Monday here in Pittsburgh.

All the news stations were doing live reports from the airport covering the Steelers trip to Tampa. A note to news reporters, it’s just Tampa not Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay is a body of water. I don’t think you want to say “they will be landing in Tampa Bay….” I don’t think the team would appreciate that.

Tomorrow is media day so every TV show will have someone there. I usually watch Jay Leno because he sends out someone all the time and it’s usually entertaining.

I can’t wait for the game on Sunday. Let’s hope it’s a Steelers win!

This weekend I worked at the mall.

It was OK I sold a lot, but there were a few returns from odd places. Like a store in Las Vegas. Did you know Las Vegas has a 7.75% sales tax? Does Las Vegas really need a sales tax? Between Vegas and Reno doesn’t that make enough for the whole state?

Any way the girl who brought back these Versace’s was like Oh I bought these in Vegas 2 days ago and I just wanted to return them. This to me says, “I wanted to have fancy glasses while out in Vegas but since I’m back in Pittsburgh I can stop pretending to be fancy and I’m returning these because I’m just cheap.”

Seriously it gets annoying when people buy sunglasses for vacations and return them a week later. It makes you look cheap. When you stop by and say “I need a pair of sunglasses” and we spend a good amount of time helping you find the right pair and you come back a week later because you really just wanted them for a week, you didn’t need them if you’re returning them.

Plus people don’t realize when that happens we lose money. When sunglasses are returned what ever commission we made off of them originally comes out of our next check. Its one thing if you tired them out and you didn’t like them, or there was a problem with them, or something broke on them. Hey no problem, but it’s when you specifically bought them to just return them a week or a few days later because you wanted nice sunglasses for that amount of time. It’s really taking advantage of a company’s policy.

Whew! Sorry for the tangent.

Sunday, I sat home and read my chapters for class then went to my sisters and got a shock when I opened the garage door to see snow covering everything. Seriously it wasn’t supposed to snow this bad. Pittsburgh weather people suck for not being able to predict this stuff. Today when I look outside my office window I see that that river is frozen, so you know it’s been cold.

I really want to get out of town to warmer weather soon, but I have class and my only break is the first week of March. Oh well the sacrifices we make for higher education.

Oh, another store is closing at the mall, Arden B. That makes 23 or something. Also the mall manager and assistant manager got canned last week. Wil there be change on the way? 

That’s it for now.

Later!

It’s such a happy Monday here in Pittsburgh.

Nothing lifts the city like a Steelers Play-off win. In a city that lives and dies with its sports teams, especially the Steelers, it always feels good to go to work the next day because everyone is in a good mood.

So let’s re-cap my weekend!

Over the last week I’ve been dealing with tire issues on my car. My “low tire pressure” light came on last Saturday. I thought, “OK, it’s been a while since I filled them” and I proceeded to find a place to get air. I stopped at five gas stations, yes FIVE. The first 4 had air machines, but they were all Out of Order. To me that’s just ridiculous, does no one fix these?

Finally I found myself at the Get Go in East McKeesport, filled my tire, and noticed my rear passenger side tire was lower then the rest, so I would be keeping an eye on that one. Two days later my tire light comes on again so Saturday I took it in. Turns out I had a 5 inch screw stuck in my tire. So have a plug and a patch, I was on my way to work at the mall.

When I arrived I got some bad news. Three more stores were closing. J. Jill, Rave and Rite Aide as will be closed by the second week in February. That makes stores 18, 19 and 20 to close this year. It’s kind of depressing. We new all the people at J. Jill since they work next to us and they will be missed, but we are going to have party before they leave.

It was a good say though Saturday at the mall, I sold what would be considered a lot being it’s January and it’s sunglasses that I sell.

In my very few spare moments I’ve been trying to read my book for class. It sucks my classes were changed and so did my pre-assignments. Trying to read 144 pages of a boring text book when you have maybe 10 free hours it pretty rough especially when those 10 free hours includes sleeping times!

Sunday, of course, was the Steelers game, which I went too. It wasn’t really as cold as some other games this year; I think the Dallas game was, by far, the coldest.

It was a really fin game and everyone was pumped. And as many of you know the Steelers come through and beat the Chargers 24-35!!!

I am looking forward to Sunday for the AFC Championship game again the Baltimore Ravens. That should be a great game and I hope it ends in a Steelers victory.

That’s the weekend.

Have a great day everyone!

Later!

When you work in a large office like me you start to notice some things like bad habits of co-workers. Some of these people you know and some you do not. The only time you see some of these people are in the cafeteria during breakfast and lunch.

In the morning we kind of have a routine at work. There’s usually 2-3 of us who walk upstairs to the cafeteria in the morning to grab something to drink or sometimes something to eat.

The company I work for lets you have a free cup of coffee in the morning, which would be great if I drank coffee, so I usually grab a juice or milk then order  cheese eggs or if I really want something for breakfast I’ll get a breakfast wrap.

As I stand there and wait for my egg or wrap I watch people. In the center of the room is a salad bar that during breakfast serves bagels, yogurt and toppings. There is this one guy who normally walks in as I am waiting for my breakfast.

This man in his late 30s must have a fetish…for bagels.

He’ll pick up a bagel and sniffs it. Then, and this is the kicker, puts it back! Then he’ll pick up another one and repeat the sniffing process and puts the bagel back. I don’t understand it, but its part of the reason I do not eat any bagels at work.

Then over at the grill where I am standing you can pick up some bacon or sausage as the side. Mind you this office has 3000 people in it so it can be quite busy at times and there is one lone person behind the grill. When people ask for bacon I can’t stand the picky people who stare at the giant pile of bacon and say, “I want that one” and point to an obscure place in the pile.

When the guy goes to grab one from the general are it turns into a game of “Oh not that one. Over a little more. Up one. Now a little to the left.” You would think they were hanging a picture on a wall.

Why be so picky about the smallest things? It’s not just picky sometimes it’s disgusting in the case of the bagel sniffer.

I can’t help but stand there and roll my eyes. By the way rolling my eyes is like a trademark for me because I do it way too often.

I group the above mentioned persons with the people who steal food from the fridges at work. I call that group “Yogi Bears” I don’t get why people do it. We actually had someone fired in 2008 because they were caught stealing food out of the fridge. How bad does that look on a person?

“Why did you get fired?”

“Oh, I got caught stealing food from the fridge”

“Oh you were a Yogi Bear then.”

Does anyone else notice these things at work like I do?

Well, that’s it for now.

If I have time this afternoon I might make a quick post. But who knows.

Later!