Feeling Happy!!!

Goodness Gracious! I'm feeling so incredibly, absolutely and completely Happy! Sure, it could be the effect of my delicious bagel-breakfast, which this time around was poppy (though there weren't many poppy seeds on the bagel), or the effect of the Light Coke that I mistakenly got, since I don't drink light coke, I only drink regular coke. Now, life would be just perfect if I could go out into the beautiful, warm, sunny patch of street some yards away from the office building, and sit on a concrete half-wall with a cup of coffee and a cigarette. Sadly, I can't smoke (stupid asthma not going away) and I forgot to make coffee. But still, I'm about to go out and fetch myself some lunch (I was supposed to go lunch with my twitter friends, but all of them balked out in the last minute), and I'll enjoy that wonderful warmth, walk in the sun and be simply happy!

I've been meeting with friends, getting stuff fixed - meaning restoring things to the state they were in prior to me going to Hungary in February - and now I'm looking forward to a weekend full of more programs with friends and exciting things to do.

Sometimes life is plain AWESOME!!

Chillin'

This is one of those days I don't really like. It's a hot day. Too hot for my liking, and going hot during the morning is a sure way to make a day not my kind of day. Yes, I know, I have bitched about the hot days a lot, and guess what? I'll keep doing it, so if you don't like it, go read some other blog! Nobody is forcing you to read this one! (Well, heat got to me officially. I'm in such an unsufferable mood I pick fights with... nobody.)

There's a lot of work to be done in this week, and - as it should be - none of it is really some easy pie. I'll have to wrestle again with a project for which my best and most honest recommendation is "file it and behead all those involved with the idea", yet I still have to make this surface one way or the other. Thanks Chuck I have an idea about what could be done, but for it I'll need "input". Do I have those "inputs"? I do not. Oh Goodie. But looking at it from the bright side, it's just Monday morning, and I have until Friday to work some magic on the proposal. Ideas? Well, I just hope I won't have to make use again of the Nauthilus Spiral to get things done.

Good thing is that I'm off the loop with another project, which I took home on Friday and spent all weekend working on. It wasn't easy, it wasn't small, but I managed. To my utter delight, today as I presented it to my boss, he was happy with it, quite pleased and decided that not even a comma should be changed. This lifted my spirits, not to mention that by having this done, some layers of work will be shaved off my in-tray. Right now a slim in-tray would make me happy, but that's not my case, specially when I have a deadline for a project, to be done by Friday, and there's another one that's "Super-Urgent" according with two different areas outside our area, not to mention the other scattered 3 projects that loom in the shadows over there, some of them taken over by people in whose capable hands I don't quite put all my trust. so yeah, that's my share, and top it all with the possible moving to the Babel Tower in this week, which won't be as pleasing as I would hope, specially since there have been quite some Earthquakes in these days and though in the second floor they feel horrible, in the 15th they should feel even worse.

So this is the moment when you grab your coke by the neck and pour some into your gutter. Sure feels good. Then it doesn't matter how long the day takes to cool off, because it does. It doesn't matter the workload you've on your back or your in-tray, because you will get ahead of it sometime. It doesn't matter either because I've a great boss, not some moron with a dysfunctional pea-brain, like the one I used to have (who now torments some of my friends, all hiked up on the fact that they are naive fresh meat, right from the private market grinder, and would do his obnoxious bidding in the same overly exploited slave-driving fashion Chinese slave work force does). So this is when I pop out of those magical chill pill, take it and let the world grow groovie. My chill pill is my coke and a nice vid to slow down the rush. What's your chill pill?

Fresh Coke Anyone?

Hell, I'm starving... well, not "starving", but more like inhumanly thirsty for some coke. I do have a can in the drawer, BUT that's my "emergency-emergency" can.

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So I started writing this entry a few hours ago. Since then I went to the store, the pretty one because the closest one is astonishingly dirty, and I like my coke and crackers PLAIN, not liberally sprinkled with dust, and aged to perfection past the expiraton date before being put on the shelves. Call me unoriginal, traditional and dogmatic, but I like my food "fresh". You see, usually you find the "gracefully aged to dated" products in Chinese stores, where broken stuff are magically held up together, spelled to look "okay" by the gods of these people. The spell, however, is spacebound, because usually as you walk out of the store, the goods rot, break, fell apart, stop, spoil, or any other natural, organic or mechanical procedure that taked the good from good to "waste of your wage". Well, Chinese stores are not the only ones, for this store in the corner is ran by Iranians. But I don't want to be xenophobic on the topic.

As I remember, and this is a piece of information that could aid many currently living or working or studying close to the Mall San Pedro, there's a small store somewhere behind the Z Tower, before reaching the corner of Spoon (a coffeeshop), where you COULD buy soft drinks, water, candies and daily things. I stress the "could" because truth is that you wouldn't really want to. You see, I'm a big fan of chocolates, particularly American chocolates, and usually the ones I like are the harder to get, here. So, back a few years, before I fell in love with Reese, I was all about Butterfinger. I was willing to go to any extent to get it, even buying them old at the store in the mall, just to have them. Well, those "any extent" didn't include the man from that certain store assuring me he had some "somewhere" and then DIGGING elbow deep in a glass counter filled with a lot of crap from old chocolates to pencils, flu medicin and nails. And when I say "full", I mean it was all crammed up in there, and the only way to get your arm into it was by pulling stuff out. All small cavities between things were crammed with grey, greasy, sticky dust and cobwebs. Things got interesting when I saw against the glass a dead cockroach covered in dust and cobwebs getting slowly mashed by the movement of things as the Butterfinger bar was searched.

"Oh... uh... I changed my mind, thank you!" I said and rushed away.

It never ceases to amaze me the degree of messiness acquired by some people, and the best of it, that many of them PRETEND to be liked by a broad audience. Well, I don't know you, but I prefer to buy and eat in clean places. I don't like eatng in a restaurant were rats and cockroaches run around among the clients and the waiters. I don't like to buy my food and stuff in stores that keep everything dusty, spoiled and generally dirty.

This messiness can translate also to poor job. Poor customer service, crappy ensambling, crappy times of answer and crappy solutions. Our company, inspite of all old people and unions could say, is CRAPPY, and people know it, but they don't care, almost as if they've got their jollies out of being outrageously criticized. Our health care is crappy, private medicine is craptacular, with doctors that would diagnose only expensive illnesses and squeeze as much as they can from the patient before it dies.

I have another one for you. At the office I was asigned an HP Compac piece-of-shit laptop. He was known as Nyikolaj Rosztov, later on Azrael, when the demon in it was bigger and more in possession than the machine. Our techs could do nothng against Azrael, so we called HP to demand the warranty for this p.o.s. The dude, a nerd-meets-nerder looking, smelly, never-fucked-anything-but-his-own-hand tech came, said that they covered only hardware, but wouldn't replace the inner mouse (which Smelly Bastard fucked up even more than what it originally was), nor will see why the printer rejected the laptop... printer being HP too. It was decided that Kolya would have his hard drive (did you know that in Hungary they call the hard drive Winchester? ^_^ Well, you know now what would be the name of my next lap top. Or can I rename Omi "Dean" and Nagi "Sam"?) replaced. That was April 22nd. It was said it would be replaced on April 23rd or in five days max. I'm working on a No Name laptop, an HP as well today. Whenever I called the HP people, they promised me that by the end of the week they would replace the winchester. Over and over. Promise after promise.

I e-mailed mad that nothing was done, and then, using my evil contacts, got to a manager at HP and I demanded action. I've got a promise: "We will be installing the new hard drive by June 1st. I'll let you know if something happens and we have to delay".

Okay, No Name is lended. It is NOT my own laptop. Okay, I'll name right not No Name as Vonnegut. I'm having a big Vonnegut moment anyway, so might as well have a name. Anyway, this is not HP letting down Individual Customer Me, it's letting down Corporative Customer, Our Institution. When a company selling posters on Amazon delayed my order two weeks, I wreck havoc royally. Now...

ATTENTION TO ALL COMPUTER AND LAP TOP BUYERS:

DO NOT BUY HP EQUIPMENT. YES IT COMES WITH "WARRANTY" BUT SIT AND WAIT TO SEE WHEN WILL THEY MAKE IT GOOD. IF THEY CAN LET DOWN A CORPORATION, A STATE INSTITUTION, WHAT WOULDN'T IT DO TO YOU?

Don't get fooled by Fergie, Shrek characters and all the people HP is using to advertise. Take my advise: if you want a laptop (which is my area of "expertise") go for IBM, even if they are such motherfuckers as to ship American workers to the India to pay them less, go for Dell, even if they are such sons of a whore that don't let women grow in the company. Go for Mac, go for Acer, go for Sony. Personally I can vouch for the exceptional quality and durability of both IBM and Acer. I've worked so far with Lanix, Dell, Toshiba, HP, Compac and Sony aside from the afore mentioned. Add to it, I can vouch for the customer service of IBM and GBM. They have NEVER let me down. They keep their promises and move sky and earth to do what it takes to get your computer right. Add to it, IBM ThinkPads, just like lovely Acers go the extra mile and keep working nice and fine for YEARS there where other laptops had long died.

But above all, avoid HP like the swine flu. It's even worse.

Seven Weird Things About You

My friend Dragonfly just tagged me to do this "Seven Weird Things About You" MEME of which I do have a small concern... mainly that I'm not sure I have seven people to tag for it, but I guess I'll try, so to all my tagged friends, sorry, but I had to do it... hehehehe. So, here are the rules of the MEME (I never understood why are they called MEMEs):

1. Create a link to the blog of the person who has challenged you. I did, but here it goes again:

2. Confess seven weird, strange, different, unique things about yourself and your blog/online personality. I'm getting there.

3. Link seven victims... friends to do the test. Hehehe... be afraid, be very afraid!

4. Notify them. I will!

Well, now my Seven Weidnesses. I don't really know what to write, not because I have no weirdnesses, but because you all already know them. Oh well, let's see.

I. Food: I have trouble telling people what's my favorite food, because, well, recently I discovered that it's Hungarian, but I always considered it to be... just food. I'm not much into eating, truth to be told, and I eat little, and I'm normally nauseated by what other people eat. Well, it's either that or people at my job have the tendency of bringing the most disgusting concoctions to lunch. I can be tremendously hard to please, and most of the time I eat and compliment food only for politeness. From the top of my head, the only people whose cooking I can eat anyday and I LOVE (because they are good) are Dragonfly's (pasta and focaccia! Add to it she makes sure it smells and tastes good, and that's very, very important to me), Ale and Ale's parents (oh dear Hyne! The supreme cooking of that house!), Marcsi's (and it's á-la-carte!), my aunt's (simply genius!), Skylar's (elegance and sophistication in every ingredient and every detail), my Mom's (duh)... and that's it. I like my cooking, which is why I keep doing it, plus, obviously, since I make it, I season it to my liking, though it has happened that I cook something and then I don't like it.

II. Resistance to Some Changes. Actually, for me it's very hard to change, but there are things that I can't change, or I just don't want to shoulder the emotional baggage that comes with that change. This is the case when I'm changing something I like and I've got very attached to, such as changing a color in my clothes or changing a watch brand or an ink color. Particularly watches and ink. It've come to the point where I rather have no watch than wear anything other than a Swatch. Not even for five seconds. I get physically sick thinking of wrapping another brand of watch on my wrist. So is with the ink. Sure, I can use red or green, but I write with black, and only with black, so I just can't simply can't use a blue ink pen. I either go and replace the cartridge in the pen or give it away, but I refuse to write with blue ink.

III. Warm Soda. I like warm coke. I can't drink it with no gas, but I love it when its warm, not hot or warmer than the environment, but when it's just slightly under the environmental warmth, for me is perfect! Also, I prefer canned coke to bottled, because it tastes better, more "pure", it sparkles and makes my tongue itch better. (Not to mention, opening cans makes me happy because of the sound, which is so tremendously refreshing I can feel it buzz and sparkle on my chest... and it reminds me of Aya's and then my days at BF with Roo.)

IV. Occultism and Medieval History. I've always liked the topic of witchcraft and occultism. However, all these things, in order to interest me, have to be historical, ancient. No UFOs or modern urban legends can hold my attention, but myths, witchcraft, old secrets, things with a medieval connotation intrigue me terribly. The Medieval history, culture, art, artifacts, traditions, beliefs, lores, they all interest me, particularly the European, continental stuff. Maybe it's because my Mom read us so many tales about witches and princesses when we were growing up, but I find everything so fascinating! Just thinking about all the books and secrets locked in the old monateries makes me want to sneak into them and find them!

V. Books. It's not weird, and it's not a secret, and probably is not unique, but I'm addicted to books. I however, mention it, because most of the people I know is not that crazy, or their library is not, exactly like mine. You see, I don't really have textbooks (save for a few Economics related books) or "mandatory reading" books in my shelves. I'm a sucker for novels, and so that's what I have. I get hooked on some topic and I practically sniff up every available book... that fits my standards. No, I'm not a "read everything that I can get my hands on" type, and add to it, I'm a slowpoke, and I mean a slllllllllllooooooooooooowwpoke reader. I read so slowly I'm sure the writer finished writing it faster than me reading it. Then, the book has to "speak to me". Before I buy something I check the book, keep it in my cart for weeks, or carry it around the bookstore, put it down, come some other day, flirt with it before I make up my mind and buy it. Books have something about themselves that seduce me. I love being surrounded by books, and there's a distinctive charm attached particularly to used books that makes them even more outstanding. A nice place, old, a bit worn, cozy packed to the ceiling with books is heaven for me, which is why I fell so much in love with Massolit in Krakow. (If I manage to do it right, I hid a link to the homepage of Massolit Books in the picture!) Books have a way to make you feel so good! They can get you in touch with yourself, and that can elevate you to such a delicious state of laidback achievement, make you owner of knowledge, fill your soul and make you feel... bohéme and philosopher. I'm addicted to that feeling. I'm addicted to the stories and the minds hid in books. I plain love books, and for many, that's weird.

VI. Red Shoes. For some reason I find red shoes beautiful. Of course, not some Converse shoes, but red shoes. Ever since I was a child all I have dreamed of was red shoes. Red clogs, red skates, red slippers, red lackered shoes, red tango shoes, red boots... It might be due to the tale of red shoes, which made you dance until you died, and yet, I have always found them fascinating. Curiously, however, I don't have that many red shoes, and never really had, and even if I have a pair, I hardly wear them. Hn, maybe on Monday I should put them on again.

VII. Loner. Even though I've a boyfriend now, and I love him, I'm still a loner. Loner in heart, loner in mind, and even if I share and sometimes share too much, I love being alone and being left alone. I love solitude. I love knowing that nobody is coming, sitting all alone at a table in a restaurant, write my journal, check my e-mails, write in my blog, sip a drink, read a book... and know that nobody will come, that I'm waiting for nobody, that theres no chance that I'll run into anybody who would take me away from myself. I love traveling alone, going to the movies alone, go shopping alone, read alone, sleep alone, eat all alone, work alone. maybe that's also why I love reading and why I love books: they ensure you complete loneliness.


Well, there you have me. Now I'm tagging:

1. Shota-Hunter Insane Deviations (well, an excuse and an opportunity to write)
2. Jeka B@sszuskulcs (kellett, bocs!)
3. Gitta
4. Shimmy Gin
5. Sandra Hill
6. Márton
7. Ann V.

Done!