Another pointy-haired boss - September 27, 2006

[Draknor]

Forgive me for starting this one early, but, I'm uncharacteristically happy today.

I was officially promoted today to AVP (though I've technically been a supervisor for the last 6 months). It comes with a 30% raise, and I move into my office tomorrow. I finally have a door. Whee!

Drinks are on me!:D :pint:

[Ganlron]

woot grats drak!

[Caranthir]

Grats Draknor! Finally promoted to your level of incompetence! :lowrazz:

[Charinida]

Congrats Drak!!! Way to go!

[shadowgate]

WOOT!!!!!!!!!! Gratz Draknor! :pint::pint::pint:

[GravenStone]

Congrats, man. :pint: :goodie!: :pint: :goodie!: :pint:

[Yuglooc]

Congrats on the promotion and the big fat raise!!

[ColonelSanderz]

hot damn, nice one Drak :D

[Sylvene]

Well... my heartiest congratulations!

[Serani]

Congratulations!!!

But...






Can I drink my drink out of a glass?

[leng]

Glad someone's happy today ... grats Drak!

[Greebo]

Yesterday was interesting.

First of all, you may have noticed I haven't been playing very much - lately its only been DDO on sunday nights and even that isn't for long.

A month or two ago, word came down that my current client, a health insurance middle company, bought a third party administrator (tpa) company in a merger. (Two privately held companies.) As a result of the merger, a number of things are happening in the software front that are keeping me very busy at work. Currently we have an 11/1 deadline (given to us two weeks ago) to move all of the acquisitions prescription drug business with a particular Pharmacy benefits manager (pbm) through our own pbm tpa business.

The problem with this deadline is the system that supports our own pbm tpa (again, middle man business) was engineered to work only with ONE outside PBM, and does not support a model that accurately reflects the possible types of eligibility we need to track. In short, the whole system, which went live in Feb right before my predecessor left, is a piece of junk that has to get rewritten from the ground up, and I'm the one rewriting it. Eventually ALL the drug business will go thru this model, so after the 11/1 deadline dealing with 76 companies and 20 thousand lives, I need to move the pre-existing 115 companies and their 14k lives, another 29 companies with 24k lives, and then there are 8 other TPAs with whom we do business that need to get migrated into the new model. Oh, and our own internal "Branded" business which consists of another 222 groups with 45k lives.

In other words, its damn busy and I'm stressed out at work, no more so than when there ISNT anything I can do immediately and I have to wait on others.

So yesterday I'm on the way into work, and they're shooting a movie downtown (Bruce Willis - I heard something about die hard 4...) and traffic sucks. I'm by a parking lot and cars want out. I let one out in front of me and inch forward. The guy behind the one I let out wants out and wants to push his way in behind me. The gal behind me doesn't want to let him out. Every time I inch forward, they maneuver to try to force the other one out. I ignore it and listen to my book (Terry Pratchett: Jingo)

Then I feel the bump.

*Sigh* Traffic isn't moving, so I get out and look - BOTH cars have hit me. A mini van behind me has bumped into my rear bumper, and a grey olds coming out of the parking lot has scraped my side panel right on the edge of the wheel well. I can see my car's paint on his bumper...

I'm not happy. I demand insurance from both of them. I point out the stupidity of being so determined to get there in front of someone else you hit other people. Woman in minivan says nothing, guy in olds says "Wasn't me!" "Your car has my cars paint on it, you scratched my car!" "Wasn't me, She hit you!" The guy f**king lies to my face about it when I can see my paint on his car. He's not going to give me insurance info. I look around his car - no tags on front, no tags on back, crappy beat up old oldsmobile with some black numbers on the trunk (probably an ex taxi cab) but no plates. It hits me , this guy has no insurance and probably no licence. Meanwhile minivan offers to give me her info, but her car has done no damage. While I'm telling her this Olds guy gets around me (traffic had moved some) and leaves the scene.


Disgusted, unfuriated, burning with rage, I barely manage to get back in the car and get myself to work. Traffic is still barely moving, but just a bit too fast, and I'm unable to catch the attention of a police officer to point out the car w/ no tags who hit me so olds guy turns off onto an alley and drives away.

It took me hours to calm down and I had to sit thru an hour conf call on the 11/1 deadline and try to focus on it the whole time.

However, I now have the beginnings of a plan. The parking lot where olds guy parks is on my regular route, and he left it at about 9am. Possible implication: he works nights and parks there regularly. This morning, driving buy the lot again, I see the same olds parked right there - same numbers on the trunk.

Now I need to find a guy to pay to slash his tires and paint rude words on his car at 3 in the morning...

[Caranthir]

Ewww, sorry Greebo.

Played Calliandra for a bit, getting her to level 16, then switched over to Kaerik. For some reason I was having a really bad night with him, but I gutted it out, getting most of the way to 15 before calling it a night to read more for school. Also watched Bones, Criminal Minds, and CSI: NY.

[Lycos]

Congrats Draknor!

Sorry about that Greebo!

Last night I played very little WoW. I got tired and went to bed a little earlier than normal. Instead, I got the kids to bed and did some studying. That was my exciting night. :D

[Serani]

Class. We had the career center person come in to present about their career center at RMU and all she did was go over stuff that they had printed. When you asked her a direction question, she'd get all flustered. Basically, a useless presentation and a waste of 2 hours of my life.

Got home and we watched a couple of SG1 episodes before I crashed.

[Kiir]

DNP, pretty quiet day and evening. Took a long nap in the afternoon. Other then that surfed the web some and read a few books, nothing overly exciting.

[Sir Rubi]

Forgive me for starting this one early, but, I'm uncharacteristically happy today.

I was officially promoted today to AVP (though I've technically been a supervisor for the last 6 months). It comes with a 30% raise, and I move into my office tomorrow. I finally have a door. Whee!

Drinks are on me!:D :pint:

Excellent news! Big congratulations :mrgreen:

[Greebo]

Oh yeah, totally forgot...

Congrats Drankor! Great news! Can I borrow money to get my paint job fixed? ;)

[Sir Rubi]

So yesterday I'm on the way into work, and they're shooting a movie downtown (Bruce Willis - I heard something about die hard 4...) and traffic sucks. I'm by a parking lot and cars want out. I let one out in front of me and inch forward. The guy behind the one I let out wants out and wants to push his way in behind me. The gal behind me doesn't want to let him out. Every time I inch forward, they maneuver to try to force the other one out. I ignore it and listen to my book (Terry Pratchett: Jingo)

Then I feel the bump.

*Sigh* Traffic isn't moving, so I get out and look - BOTH cars have hit me. A mini van behind me has bumped into my rear bumper, and a grey olds coming out of the parking lot has scraped my side panel right on the edge of the wheel well. I can see my car's paint on his bumper...

I'm not happy. I demand insurance from both of them. I point out the stupidity of being so determined to get there in front of someone else you hit other people. Woman in minivan says nothing, guy in olds says "Wasn't me!" "Your car has my cars paint on it, you scratched my car!" "Wasn't me, She hit you!" The guy f**king lies to my face about it when I can see my paint on his car. He's not going to give me insurance info. I look around his car - no tags on front, no tags on back, crappy beat up old oldsmobile with some black numbers on the trunk (probably an ex taxi cab) but no plates. It hits me , this guy has no insurance and probably no licence. Meanwhile minivan offers to give me her info, but her car has done no damage. While I'm telling her this Olds guy gets around me (traffic had moved some) and leaves the scene.


Disgusted, unfuriated, burning with rage, I barely manage to get back in the car and get myself to work. Traffic is still barely moving, but just a bit too fast, and I'm unable to catch the attention of a police officer to point out the car w/ no tags who hit me so olds guy turns off onto an alley and drives away.

It took me hours to calm down and I had to sit thru an hour conf call on the 11/1 deadline and try to focus on it the whole time.

However, I now have the beginnings of a plan. The parking lot where olds guy parks is on my regular route, and he left it at about 9am. Possible implication: he works nights and parks there regularly. This morning, driving buy the lot again, I see the same olds parked right there - same numbers on the trunk.

Now I need to find a guy to pay to slash his tires and paint rude words on his car at 3 in the morning...
Go early and look for his VIN number. It's almost always in the upper left-hand corner of the dashboard, if it's not scratched away. That will give you (and the insurance company and police) a unique number which I.D.'s the car. Then you call the cops and report this guy for lacking tags and presumably insurance - oh and by the way, HE HIT ME! Here's where he parks. The paint flecks on your car and the scratch on his will put two and two together. Plus, you have the contact information for the other person involved, so you have a witness.

Nail his sorry ass to the wall.

[Serani]

I thought I posted it, but forgot. CONGRATS, Drak!!

[Greebo]

But slashing his tires will be so much more fun. :)

[Charinida]

Ouch Greebo! That's not good at all... :( No more 20 pickups eh?

***

A little more cleaning... Shipped out a huge box. Well, not huge. But big enough to stuff someone in if need be... The poor shredder is hating me, and I think I need a new one if it dies on me.

Dabbled about with oils again. Went to the Dodo, twice (breakfast, then lunch). Talked some with the owners. Dropped by the Barista, to sit and eat PB&J drinking chocolate milk, while reading about Oils.

Played about with EQ-Mac. It's been so long since I played EQ, I forgotten how the graphics looked, and I've forgotten how the music is. Couldn't decide on Dark Elf or High Elf really, or which class. Forgot which class can solo the best. Still can't get EQ Classic to run on the PC. Keeps on giving me a eqgame.exe error. And I've re-installed several times.

Played about in EQ2. Didn't realize I was in Windowed mode. Was puzzled as to why the water looked staticy and such. Got another useless adept 1 (ie, not for my class). Looked quiet. Lots of green stuff in TS. Need to progress one of the quest a bit more.

Did play in PS. Still hate the system lockups which requires me to reboot the system. /sigh. Is it the video card or just the programming of PS? Trying to coerce Pidgie to join EQ2, but she has characters on Crushbone... It was a bad night for NC... At least from where I was... Ended up with like a 7-13 KD, before the lockup. After that, I died too much...

The student hostage situation at Bailey CO was horrible and needless. Would the US be better off if we had some tighter gun controls? But that would probably infringe too much on the "Right to Bear Arms" of the constitution... Catch-22...

[Sir Rubi]

But slashing his tires will be so much more fun. :)

Well, sure it will! But that only hurts him briefly - the other hurts him much longer and much more firmly in the pocketbook. Completely beside the idea that this guy will probably get hauled off to jail for such a big bunch of violations...

No, I don't have to work hard to be this evil, why do you ask?

[deepfred]

aye grats drak. got an encouraging email myself last night that has me thinking 'm going to get a position i've been after lately, but we'll see.

chari, it's the ancient openGL programming of PS giving you touble. and yeah pidgie would be at home here, but alas he is on crushbone. shame too cause he's a 70 SK iirc, among others, and it would cost him a fortune to move over - mebbie low could start a fund to get it paid for =p

dsl still down but i finally heard some acknowledgement of the problem and they are tellin gus we might see it up today. fingers crossed.

broke out some old games, san andreas, godfather, mount & blade, and far cry among them. will uninstall & defrag the moment dsl is back up.

[Charinida]

chari, it's the ancient openGL programming of PS giving you touble.

Ahhh, I see... I think. Studio/Poser uses OpenGL, but I guess they are better programmed/designed?

and yeah pidgie would be at home here, but alas he is on crushbone. shame too cause he's a 70 SK iirc, among others, and it would cost him a fortune to move over - mebbie low could start a fund to get it paid for =p

Yeah, was talking about that with her last night... She said like about 200usd... Ouchers...

If anything, she can join the LoW boards and hang about... Or make a new character on Permafrost... :D

Yeah, lots of 60+chrs... and only a few 30s or so... Hrmm... forgot exactly... got too hot in the tower...

[Asharad]

congrats Drak!

Greebs, this is why I always carry my cameraphone. :)

[leng]

Hey Greebo,
Slash his tyres then report the car as being abandoned.

Played a bit last night. Hunter dinged 11 and his pet dinged 10 (loyalty lvl 3). Boy, things slow down when you get to 10.

Warlock dinged 10 and has got the voidwalker quest - just hasn't started it yet.

Created an undead warrior callen Kron. Kudos to whoever can remember where that name came from (it is appropriate for an undead warrior).

IRL, we received a note saying that due to the sterling performance of the division we were getting an extra days vacation on monday. Very nice, but I'm having problems squaring it with financial results so dire that all our contractors were fired 3 weeks ago.

[EricStratton]

Damn, Greebs. That sucks on both fronts. :(

Played Civ4 yesterday. I played my 10 turns of Car and I's PBeM game. Then I played my own game as the Germans. Won a non-backdoor diplomatic victory w/ 2 turns left in the game! See, Hitler? This is how you *could've* done it.

When Joy came home we took the dog for a walk and then watched The Biggest Loser and Eureka.

[Raveneye]

Congrats Draknor!!! Awesome news! :goodie!: :pint: :goodie!:

So, you'll be paying for one month of online games for all of us then? :smile:

[Raveneye]

DNP last night.

Was going to hop into Planetside for some vehicle combat fun, but we got some severe storms in the evening. When the power flickered, I knew it was time to turn the PC off for the night.

Instead I ended up watching "Jericho" and "Studio 60" which I had taped earlier. Both good episodes. Looking forward to more of each show.

[Sagar]

Congrats, Drak!!!

Took Tucker for a walk again yesterday to improve his 'topline consistency and rear end strength". Roadwork.. dis puppy is in training :lowrazz:

Played WoW with Murgos while I was sorta watching Dancing With The Stars and then the Lost summary.

We explored blasted lands, some swamp, and breakwind pass.

I am enjoying Evenstarr's new job, though. We've been able to drive in together all week :)

[Asharad]

Instead I ended up watching "Jericho" and "Studio 60" which I had taped earlier. Both good episodes. Looking forward to more of each show.

I'm really loving Studio 60.

[EricStratton]

I'm really loving Studio 60.
Ditto. A lot.

[Drax]

Sorry to hear about the promotion, Drak!

Congrats on the new paint job, Greebo!

Er, wait, should I have...

Ah well. My yesterday went well. A full day's work, followed by rushing home to meet up with Becky so we could pick up a couple teens from our church to go to another church's youth night so we could observe and ask questions. *breathe* Realized this church's youth night model was not for us, so we'll be going back to the church Becky attended last week and using that church's youth pastor as our mentor.

We went to St Louis Bread Company afterwards, where I got to try their new crispani; I had the sweet sausage & apple one. Delish! :pantless:

[Barrack]

Well done Drak, and bummer there Greebs. Since he is not trying to hide from you, I would do as Rubi stated, but dont wait too long.

Not much to report from the duck pond. Still quite happy with everything that has gone on.

[Sylvene]

Ya know Ash... if I had that presence of mind when I was hit yesterday, I'd have taken pictures for evidence. I do have a camera on my cell phone afterall. I was shook and only thought to move off to the side of the road so we weren't blocking the entire intersection.

I was driving down a residential street at 25 mph. Going downhill - so my foot was already on the brakes. This woman in a Lexus is sitting, waiting to make a left turn onto another street. Then as I approach, she turns right into me. Not enough time for me to react besides stomping on the brakes. Her bumper is a lil' higher than mine, and I've a plastic car (Saturn Ion3). Crunch.

Her insurance claims company is on MST, so although she made the report immediately, the claim rep it was assigned to was out yesterday afternoon and only started the case today. By the time she gets home they'll be closed and it will be another day before she calls back and the claim rep gets a statement from her and I get the shops to bring the car into. *sigh*

[Ganlron]

didn't play much yesterday...least not eq2. spent most of the day on dragon quest 8. had it fer a year and only 40hr's played and not even to the halfway point. figured i needed ta get round ta beating the game.

[Lycos]

...Not enough time for me to react besides stomping on the brakes. Her bumper is a lil' higher than mine, and I've a plastic car (Saturn Ion3). Crunch...

Sorry to hear about that Sylvene. Who's going to be the one at fault?

[Sylvene]

Sorry to hear about that Sylvene. Who's going to be the one at fault?

She will be. I had the right of way. That's how it works here in WA. No partial-fault laws here.

[Lycos]

She will be. I had the right of way. That's how it works here in WA. No partial-fault laws here.

Glad your ok. Well, that helps a lot, except for the loss of the car until it gets repaired. Hopefully, it's going to be pretty painless. Good luck!

[Sylvene]

Apart from the accident in the morning... I had a great evening. :D I downloaded the XBox compatibility patch, my bro ran it on the XBox 360 and loaded up Lego Star Wars - supposedly for the kids - uh-huh!

But... how cute can it be??? Two can play - with one being the leader, and you get a "pet" that one can "take over" to use their special skills. The other character and the "pet" follows the leader - i.e. You have a radius of movement - can't get too far away... so you are playing on the one screen instead of a split screen.

The "pet" can be Artoo - to open doors for you in one scene... then you meet Jar-Jar who can jump higher than you can...

The kids had fun running into things, jumping up and down, then one swatted the other with light-saber and the screaming started, so Daddy and Mommy took over... which wasn't much different because Mommy would swat Daddy with her light-saber too!

"Darling... don't hit me with your light-saber!"
"Stop laughing at me then! Like I meant to fall off and die."
Bro whispers as an aside: "Over and over and..."
*SWAT* *ZAP*

I was laughing so hard... then after the kids were sent off to bed, I read up a bit on Lego Star Wars to find out how to turn on various options - that a friend with kids had told me about. Well, you have to earn enough credits to buy them... I had figured on turning on invincibility for the kids. :wink:

I think this game is going to give us plenty of fun for a while.

[Lycos]

...I read up a bit on Lego Star Wars to find out how to turn on various options - that a friend with kids had told me about. Well, you have to earn enough credits to buy them...

Like the pron option where all the characters are naked? ;) :lowlol:

[Greebo]

Like the pron option where all the characters are naked? ;) :lowlol:
Gives new meaning to "look at that box!" :rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao:

[Sylvene]

Gives new meaning to "look at that box!" :rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao:


Eeeeeeew!

Bah... I forgot... you don't have the "flip the bird" smilie. So this one will have to do. :evileye:



*looks around*



/ROFL

[Charinida]

/me would say that all lego's are boxy/blocky... But is missing the joke. ;)

What was that comedian with the purple monkey puppet (Peanut?)... when something that goes over one's head... "Zooom" or however it is said/spelled...

[Draknor]

Sorry to hear about the promotion, Drak!

Congrats on the new paint job, Greebo!

Er, wait, should I have...

For some reason that actually made me laugh.:D

Thanks everyone. It was very odd being in an office today. But the door and window are nice, I must admit.

Greebs, did you perhaps call the police? It's not too late if you explain the situation. At least take a pic of your damage. The lady that hit you might be able to be a witness as well.

Insurance or no, that son-of-a-bitch should pay. And if you can provide an id to your insurance company, THEY can go after him after repairing your damage. When I was an adjuster, I could (and did) pursue uninsured people for the damage they caused. You pay good money for insurance, may as well let them work for you.

Good luck - if you have any questions I'll be happy to try to answer them.

[Drax]

For some reason that actually made me laugh.:D

:goodie!:
Only took 5+ years! Hooray!