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January 14, 2001
Bleah.
I'm very glad it's a long weekend. The Cold From Hell is still toying with me (I don't actually have it yet -- it's still deciding whether it wants to attack or not) and my stomach has been having temper tantrums for the past couple of days. I get it every now and then, and it's never fun -- it involves a whole lot of pain, which nothing really alleviates. All I can do is wait it out, which sucks. My doctor told me it's likely a stress thing. It must be delayed stress, though, because everything is relatively calm right now.
I had my yearly job review on Friday. It was good on the whole -- I'd say 98% good, and 2% bad. One of the bad things was understandable -- my boss told me I need to project a bit more friendliness. She understands that I'm not really good at the small talk thing, and tend to be very quiet at work, and she's stopped trying to get me to change that. But I can be a bit surly, especially when I've been at the desk alone for eight hours, and someone decided to upbraid me for a policy I have no control over. I'm aware that, if I'm trying to get a pile of work done, and I keep getting interrupted, my irritation shows -- I know I need to stop that. So her mentioning it was fine. The other bad thing did chafe me, though, because it's not something I'm doing. A while back, both my mom and one of my best friends had email at work, and the three of us abused it like mad. We had these excellent three-way conversations going on all day long, which was not good for work, of course. My boss told me to quit it, and I did. Since then, it hasn't been a problem -- we don't have a policy outlawing personal email at work, so I do check it from time to time. I read both my work email and home email first thing in the morning, before we're busy. I keep my work email up and running all day, because I use it heavily for -- you guessed it -- work. I usually have to email two or three professors a day, to ask them questions about the books they want on reserve. I also need to be in touch with the reserves people at the other libraries. I don't get a huge amount of work email every day, but enough so that it's easier for me to keep that account open in the background while I work. I usually check my Yahoo account -- which is also used for some work stuff -- around lunchtime, and a couple of times in the afternoon. In total, maybe an hour a day is spent on personal stuff, and the rest is all work. Someone keeps telling my boss that, since I type so much during the day, I must be goofing off. I have to type a lot at work right now -- processing reserve requests basically involves data entry. No way around it. Lately, I've been doing that for 6-8 hours a day. I also have to go online to look for books we need to order -- I use a couple of online databases for that. So, unless someone is standing behind me, looking over my shoulder, they can't tell what I'm doing. I think I know who the complainer is, and it makes me angry. I've been doing the jobs of two people lately, and doing it well, and I don't like being accused of just goofing off, especially when it's coming from someone who has no idea what I do all day. But, aside from that, it was all good. I left the review feeling like my boss really appreciates the extra work I've been doing, and that's a nice feeling.
I ended up going home from work early after that, because I felt so crappy. Went home, had some soup, and curled up in bed and watched TV mindlessly until I fell asleep. Yesterday I slept far too late, and loafed around the house for most of the day. Talked to my mom on the phone, complaining about how bored I was. When I got off the phone, I noticed that these was a voice mail waiting -- it was from Lee, telling me that she and Patrick were on their way to my house, and would be there in 15 minutes. The message was left at 6:15 -- I looked at the clock, and it was 6:35. Gah. I figured they'd already been by, and left -- our doorbell doesn't work. A few minutes later, I heard a car horn honk, and then heard someone yelling my name, so I dashed out into the front hall, and told them I'd be right down. Threw on sone clothes (I was in pajamas, very comfy for loafing around) and dashed out the door. I wasn't feeling great, stomach-wise, but I wanted to go out, dammit. We went to see "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," which was just excellent. Loved it. Though I do agree with Patrick -- when I watch a martial arts film, I do feel like I'm missing something important. This one, though, I just gave up trying to get, and just watched the fight scenes in slack-jawed amazement. When I wasn't wishing I could use some of the moves on our fellow moviegoers, that is. First off, go read Patrick's entry about it -- he sums it up very well. (And hilareously.) Now, I have rarely had a truly bad experience with people in a theater -- occassionally there will be some lout who has to talk, full-volume, through the entire movie, but usually a glare or two shuts them up. I've been to a couple of movies that were full of kids, even though the film was very much not a kids' movie -- "Jurassic Park," for one. Yes, it has dinosaurs. And yes, your adorable little Timmy loves dinosaurs. rent him "The Land Before Time," okay? I'm thinking he won't love dinosaurs so much after he sees them chomping people in half and such. Really.
We were first appalled by the people who came in with two or three very young children, and sat them down right in the front. This was a violent movie, for one thing. Not the sort of thing I'd want my three-year-old (if I had one...) to see. Plus, I have never met a small child, no matter how well-behaved, who could sit quietly through a two-hour movie, and these kids were no exception. I lost track of the bathroom trips they had to make, and the one kid yelling "Pee!" every five seconds lost his charm really quickly. More disturbing, though, was the woman who brought her tiny, teeny infant, in a car seat. And sat toward the front, right where the sound is the loudest. Sometimes the sound effects in movies hurt my ears -- you'd think it would enter the mom's mind that her newborn's ears are very sensitive, wouldn't it? And yes, the baby was asleep when they came in, but as soon as the first fight scene started, the baby started screaming. At least the mother took it outside right away... but since it happened during every fight scene (and there were a whole lot of them) it got a wee bit annoying. I'm utterly sympathetic of the fact that new moms can use a night out every now and again, but for pete's sake, hire a sitter. Get the kid's grandparents to come over and stay with the baby. Don't bring them to a loud, violent movie, then get peeved because the baby doesn't sleep through the whole thing.
And the cell phones. Don't even get me started on the cell phones. One going off during a movie I can handle -- maybe the owner just forgot to turn it off. But a dozen of them? Please. Shut it off, before I beat you about the head with it. Thank you.
The thing that annoyed me most, though, was the woman sitting directly behind us, who wanted to eat individually-wrapped hard candies during the movie. The kind with the crinkly, crackly wrappers. I think she thought that, if she opened them really slowly, they would make less noise. That doesn't work, folks. That just means the people around you have to listen to you going *crinklecrinklecracklecrinklycrackle* for five minutes, instead of two seconds. If you absolutely have to have that peppermint, just open it quickly. Yes, it will still be annoying, but brief annoyances are okay. I was about ready to turn around and ask if she needed help opening it, or if she would rather have me shove it up her nose. (What, me, surly? Never!)
So. In short, the movie was great. The other people sucked, and reminded me why I much prefer watching movies at home. After the movie, the stomach pains were bad enough that I just asked to be dropped off at home -- unhappily, since I really wanted to hang out more. But since I couldn't think of much except "OUCH!" I knew I wouldn't be good company. I crawled back into bed, and discovered that having a very warm, heavy cat sit on your stomach for a while does wonders for a stomachache -- maybe it's the vibrations from the purring. Whatever it was, it helped enough that I could fall asleep. I slept far too late again today (and will likely do it again tomorrow, woo woo!) and am now pondering taking a shower, so I can go do laundry.
Posted by Mary Ellen at January 14, 2001 12:00 PM