The Case of the Vibrating Toothbrush

Well, I've just had the weirdest/funniest work related call of my existence.

At about 1230am the phone rang. Of course, Janelle and I had just gotten out of bed for a midnight snack of some pudding, toast with cream cheese and hot sauce and a little something to drink. I handed my plate to Janelle and rushed to answer the phone. An Asian woman complained to me that a high-pitched buzzing sound in her apartment was keeping her awake and she wanted me to check if the neighbours were drilling in their bathroom. I really wanted to go back to bed and I was thinking, Darn, lady. Can't it wait? But, of course, if it's keeping her awake, I've got to go. So I asked if I could check in her apartment first because I'd have to hear the noise for myself. She agreed and I headed out. "It's probably an electric toothbrush," Janelle said as I left.

When I got to her apartment, I could hear the sound from outside her door. It definitely didn't sound like it was coming from anywhere but her apartment. So I knocked and she let me in. She had closed the bathroom door to keep the sound out, but I could hear it quite loudly through the door, so I could understand it keeping her awake. I entered the washroom, worried that I'd find water running weird in the walls or something urgent like that. I listened to the sound and it led me to a shelf above the toilet. The whole shelf was vibrating. I looked carefully and there was an electric toothbrush, stuck in a mug, vibrating away. So I turned it off.

Needless to say the girl was embarrassed. It was too funny.

Smiles

So, two Tuesdays ago I was asked into my boss' office for a 'meeting.' When I arrived, my manager and her manager were both present and I was asked to sit down and close the door.

Their first question took me a little off guard: "Are you happy here?"

They were concerned because, to them, I seemed grumpy all the time. I was confused, because I like my job about as much as someone can like a job like this.

We had a half hour chat during which they brought up two tenant complaints about me: one tenant wanted free laundry money because I had hung up on him and was rude to him on the phone. Another tenant complained that I was rude to her on the phone and hung up on her and then laughed at her when she called back.

They made it clear that they weren't taking the complaints seriously, that tenant complaints always have to be taken with a grain of salt--especially ones where the tenant is asking for money or something for free. But still... it was kind of unsettling. I mean, I've never intentionally hung up on a tenant or potential tenant or former tenant, no matter how much I've wanted to. I can imagine certain cases where the tenant may feel hung up on--like if they're calling from the front door, the buzzer hangs up by itself when the door opens, so it could have hung up when someone else used the door. Or they may have felt hung up on if I was trying to handle multiple incoming calls and unintentionally dropped one--it happens.

As for my being rude to people on the phone, I have to admit that I may have a history of seeming rude on the phone. Once, while I was working at Little Caesar's a woman called complaining that the pizza she had ordered was not the way she had ordered it. I apologized and offered to make a new one for her, if she could come and pick it up, or if she liked, I could record that we owe her a free pizza. (This was after we stopped doing delivery.) She was angry because she had to come all the way back to Little Caesar's to get her pizza and was being sarcastic and snarky to me on the phone and I asked the person standing next to me, "Should I hang up on her?" Because, really, I was trying to help her and she was being unreasonably mean to me. Anyways, she heard what I asked because I hand't covered the mouth piece or put her on hold and she totally flipped...

As for hanging up on a tenant and laughing at them when they called back ... I really don't see myself doing that. I mean, what's so funny about hanging up on someone? "Haha, I hung up on you, isn't that funny?" It just doesn't fly, I don't find that funny. Maybe Janelle was tickling me or something, but I doubt that too because Janelle just doesn't tickle me when I'm on the work phone. Anyways, I just don't get it.

The tenant complaints were a side issue, it turned out. My managers weren't taking them seriously simply because the complaints weren't consistent with what they had seen of my character. But they were concerned because I sometimes seemed, to them, grumpy and generally unhappy and sometimes uneager to work hard. And I agreed with them, with some reservations, one being that I do work hard and I try to put my full effort into my work here, whether I like to or not.

Anyways, I left the meeting and thought about it for a while and came upon two simple solutions to help my boss' perception of me.

The first thing was that, whenever my phone rang, no matter who was calling, I'd smile to myself before answering so that I would sound cheerful on the telephone. Because, if I'm picking up someone's disgusting garbage when the phone rings, when I answer it, it just sounds like I've been picking up someone's disgusting garbage. Not pleasant at all, or cheerful. So I started getting into that habit and since my boss is the one who calls me the most during the daytime, she got the full experience of my "newfound cheerfulness."

The second thing I decided to do was to make myself more visible and communicative in my workplace. It takes me about an hour and a half to sweep one staircase in this building from top to bottom and another forty five minutes to mop it. And there are three staircases. Also, there are no security cameras in our staircases. So if I'm working on the staircases, that can be up to six hours and forty five minutes, plus breaks, that my boss doesn't see me during the day. And if she doesn't see me, she doesn't know what I'm doing. So, I've started popping into the office periodically during the day. If I finish a job, I go to the office, chat with the receptionist or the boss for a bit, let them know what I'm up to, what I plan to do next, and then head back to work. I also tell them when I leave for lunch and at what time to expect me back and what I plan to do after lunch.

So that was two weeks ago now and already I've seen some huge improvements in my relationship with my boss. She's much more friendly with me. She seems to trust me more. I'm more comfortable with her and I find it easier to talk to her about some things. She also seems less cranky. So I'm impressed with myself. Yay.

Escapades in a Springtime Storm

So, tonight Janelle and I borrowed Joanne and Colin's van to pick up some baby things in Cole Harbour. (Yay! We got baby things. No, we're not expecting yet. But we did promise Chad and Leanne that we'd have some things for Jelena when they come visit in the summer. Also, we can keep the things for when we have our own babies!) Anyways, it had started snowing earlier during the day and by late afternoon we were in the middle of a raging blizzard. Hello Spring!

We had a hard time finding the place where we were supposed to pick up the things because the blizzard had obliterated most of the street signs but we finally got there, had a look at the baby things and agreed to buy them. The gentleman who sold them to us was very nice and helped us load it all in the van but we couldn't get it all in, so we would have to make another trip. The drive home was tedious because of the blizzard, but we stopped at the Stupid Store and bought some Crispy Minis and Litchi pop.

Anyways, we finally did get home and have supper and we put away the baby things. Afterwards, I volunteered to drive the van back to Colin and Joanne's house and get our car back. It was still blizzarding quite badly and the drive there took much longer than expected, when I arrived, I parked the van in the parking spot and got out to knock on the door and trade keys. When I approached the door I noticed that the blinds were drawn, I could see the floor in the entryway, littered with footwear, a tidy track leading into the living room/dinning room area but nothing beyond that. I knocked quietly at first, not wanting to awaken anyone who was sleeping. When no one answered after some time, I knocked again a little louder. Still no answer. After a third knock without answer I contemplated ringing the doorbell but decided against it--it would probably definitely wake up everyone who didn't want to be woken up. Obviously, I thought to myself, If they've gone to bed when they knew I was coming, they don't want to be woken up. I tried the door handle, planning to place the keys inside, but found it locked. There was no mailbox to drop the keys into, so I left them under the driver's seat. I thought better of that, not wanting to make the keys too difficult to find, and left them on the driver's seat and locked the doors.

Then I crossed over to our car, brushed off the snow, and drove back home entirely grateful that I could park my car in a heated garage and not have to worry about the snow that would pile up on it if it was left outside. I got home about the same time that Joanne called. Janelle answered the phone as I kicked off my shoes. After a moment she turned to me, "Where did you put the keys?" "They're on the front seat," I replied, somewhat smugly. "The van is locked and that's the only set of keys they've got," Janelle said. "Did you knock on the door?" "Yes," I replied, "but the house was all dark and nobody answered, I thought they were all in bed." "You parked in the wrong spot, probably knocked at the wrong door too," Janelle said.

Oh dear. I didn't know what to say. This was horrible. I tried to think of what I could do to fix the situation. Drive back over and use a brick to ... no, there would have to be a less destructive alternative ... but I just couldn't think of one. All the while, Janelle was glaring at me. Finally, I thought, I know! I'll check the CAA website! They can unlock the van! "Can you at least check the CAA website?" Janelle asked.

I looked it up and found a telephone number and an option to request assistance over the Internet, the only problem was that membership was required and I don't have any membership and I didn't know if Colin and Joanne did. So I googled, "Locked keys in car in Halifax." The results weren't all that helpful--there were detailed instructions on how to get the door unlocked with a coat hanger. I was feeling more and more sheepish by the second. Should I look for a locksmith? I wondered. I could feel my face glowing bright red with shame and embarrassment as I retreated to the office under Janelle's glare as she talked on the phone with Joanne, offering to call a tow truck or something. In the end they reached some kind of solution, where Dad Swan would come over in the morning to get the keys out of the locked vehicle. It didn't make me feel much better, particularly because I wasn't able to fix my mistake myself and because it further inconvenienced Dad Swan. Also, it's pretty darned unfair that the situation gets fixed without me having to do anything about it. I mean, all I can say is, Colin and Joanne, I'm really, really sorry; it was a thoughtless mistake and I'm so embarrassed and feel really bad that I did that.

Crazy People

So I was just over at Cst. Kenny's blog "A Policeman's Life," where I read his latest entry about the gentleman who wanted to park in the no parking zone while Kenny was standing in it. (Read it, it's really funny: www.apolicemanslife.com.)

I couldn't help but laugh because I've been in a similar situation all weekend. Our boss manages three buildings from her office in this building. One of these buildings is a supposedly ritzy building on Spring Garden Road. I've been there, it's not that big a deal. It's old and has antique hardware, the heating systems are constantly breaking down ...

Well, the company is in the process of overhauling the heating systems, so the boilers are being rebuilt or something. Well, the process involves interruptions in both heating and hot water use. This is normal if you've ever lived in an apartment building, right? The heat and/or hot water goes off every once in a while so they can upgrade or repair it. Everyone has to put up with it. Anyways, it seems that the project at this particular building has run into some trouble and the heat and hot water interruptions have gone on longer than anticipated. Well, that's just unacceptable, especially to the poor tenants who have to live with it, right?

These tenants are rich people, they think they are just the shiznit and that everything should revolve around them. So when the water goes off they call the superintendents and tell them to get their act together and make that heat and hot water come back on. A few people have even broken their lease and moved out of the building. Well, this weekend, I figure they got fed up with calling the superintendent and getting the same answer: "We're working on it." Someone put up posters all over the building with our boss's office number and her name that encourages the tenants to call her and complain. Well, the boss is out of the office on the weekend because she gets weekends off, so that phone number rings my line. So all morning I've been getting all kinds of calls complaining about how unacceptable and disgusting it is that the hot water and heat are off and these people can be positively abusive, which is kind of ridiculous considering that I can't do anything about it. So I've just been saying that I would pass the message along to the boss.

One woman called and she was very apologetic, telling me that our coworkers at the building in question have been doing the best they can and getting nothing but abuse from the tenants. What I feel like saying to them when they call is: "Hey, do you think we turn off the hot water and heat because we feel like it? Do you think there's this switch that we can just flip on and there you go, you have hot water again!? Do you think that when the hot water and heat goes off we don't do everything we can to get it back up and running as soon as we can? We're in the same boat as you are, we have to live in the building too and it just makes it worse that you call and complain about it all the time!" I have to say, there's a lot to be said for people who can accept a situation that is outside of their own control and be patient through it and trust the people who can control it when they say: "This is temporary, we're working to fix it!"

I find we get three kinds of tenants in this business: the ones who complain about everything, no matter how small it is: "The traffic outside is making too much noise, make it stop;" the ones who never complain at all, no matter what goes wrong: "This water's been leaking through my living room ceiling for about three weeks now and my whole ceiling is soggy and my carpet is soaked;" and the ones who complain when it's reasonable to. Obviously, you can tell which ones I like best.

True story: last week, we were upgrading the plumbing in all our apartments and we went into one apartment that had a giant leak in their living room ceiling. The whole ceiling was soggy, and there was massive stains where the water was pooled in the ceiling. When we asked the tenants how long this has been going on, they said they first noticed it about a week before. We had to hunt that leak down for about an hour before we found it--it was a drywall nail driven into a pipe. We had to get plumbers in to replace the section of pipe, and now we have to replace and/or patch most of the ceiling and walls in the apartment, which is going to cost way more money and time than if the tenant had just called when he first noticed it ...

Anyways, that's the wonderland I happen to live in :)

Moment of Surrender by U2

So I downloaded U2's latest album: No Line on the Horizon and found my new favourite song: 'Moment of Surrender.' Actually, the whole album is pretty phenomenal. It's got a really original experimental sound (if you want a sample, go to youtube.com and watch the video: 'Get Your Boots On;' it's really cute and funny and cool.) Anyways, I put the lyrics to the song with a few of my comments below:

I tied myself with wire
To let the horses roam free
Playing with the fire
Until the fire played with me

The stone was semi-precious
We were barely conscious
Two souls too smart to be
In the realm of certainty
Even on our wedding day

We set ourselves on fire
Oh God, do not deny her
It’s not if I believe in love
If love believes in me
Oh, believe in me

At the moment of surrender
I folded to my knees
I did not notice the passers-by
And they did not notice me

I’ve been in every black hole
At the altar of the dark star
My body’s now a begging bowl
That’s begging to get back, begging to get back
To my heart
To the rhythm of my soul
To the rhythm of my unconsciousness
To the rhythm that yearns
To be released from control

I was punching in the numbers at the ATM machine
I could see in the reflection
A face staring back at me
At the moment of surrender
Of vision over visibility
I did not notice the passers-by
And they did not notice me

I was speeding on the subway
Through the stations of the cross
Every eye looking every other way
Counting down ’til the train would stop

At the moment of surrender
Of vision of over visibility
I did not notice the passers-by
And they did not notice me

To me, this song is kind of about the sudden realization of just how important something is; how important love or faith is, or how significant a loved one is.

The first part of the song is kind of weird and it was difficult for me to get into because I just don't get it, but I think it's talking about a focus on material things and the obvious stuff, like surviving and making it from one day to the next, paying the bills, and working at the job. When that's the focus, it's kind of like drifting through life, relationships happen accidentally and we don't pursue them or take the time to enjoy them. At least, that's kind of the feeling I got from it; I have to admit, it's kind of cryptic and symbolic.

'The Moment of Surrender' described in the chorus is, to me, the realization that, you know, "Wow, I've been missing all this awesome stuff that's been going on!" Stuff like a relationship with the spouse, with God, and a real appreciation for those things that bring value to life. Or simply a sudden realization of self. It's like that transcendental moment when everything else disappears and it's just a unique singleness or union.

The next part is kind of weird. It's like Ricky Martin meets ... I don't know. Anyways, to me it says, you can sacrifice yourself to just about everything this world's got. The world will suck everything out of you if you let it. And that's kind of what that's about, where the 'Moment of Surrender' is the realization that everything they try to tell us is important is empty and meaningless and that we've been cheated and emptied and we start looking to get filled. At this point we're beggars in need of Grace.

The ATM machine, that's kind of like money, right? It's one of those altars that you can sacrifice yourself at. Here the character is kind of, maybe worshiping at this altar, when he looks through it and in the screen of the ATM machine he sees himself. Here the 'Moment of Surrender' is that sudden realization of self. Like, "Hey... what do I amount to?" This is where I got into the song, I like the concrete image of the ATM machine and the imagery it brings to the lyrics.

I often catch myself playing at religion, you know. Like, nobody rides the subway for the enjoyment of riding the subway, we're on our way somewhere. So the mind is hardly ever on the experience of the subway ride, we're thinking about what we're going to do when we get where we're going--or something like that. Well, riding the subway through the stations of the cross is like playing at religion. We're not there for the experience, we're thinking about something else and just going through the motions and counting down until it's over and we can get back to whatever we were doing before. Here the 'Moment of Surrender' is when I catch myself and say, "Hey, whoa. Focus. This is important--it's not just a subway ride."

Anyways, I like this song.

Schooled by Gordon Korman

If there's anything I learned from Capricorn Anderson it's that good values never go out of style.

Capricorn Anderson is the hero of Schooled by Gordon Korman. He grew up on a commune that was back from the sixties and he has never seen a television, eaten a pizza, or been to school. He knows how to drive though, and throughout the novel gets arrested three times for driving. Mind you, he is only thirteen.

When his grandmother and sole caregiver breaks her hip when she falls out of a tree while picking plums, Capricorn moves to the city and spends two months at a real school where he is exposed to all the realism and cruelty of modern North America. The school he goes to is called Claverage Middle School, but the students call it C Average, and they have a tradition: every year they elect the biggest "loser" as the school president. It's one big prank because they then make life very difficult for their elected president and completely enjoy watching him/her make a complete fool of themselves all year. Well this year, Capricorn gets elected class president. But really, if a kid showed up in your grade eight class wearing tie-dye and day glo with corn leaf sandles and long hair, we'd automatically think "LOSER" too, wouldn't we?

Capricorn doesn't get that it's a prank. He's naive. And as time goes on and he still doesn't realize that it's a prank--things just don't faze him, it doesn't occur to him that people are trying to hurt and degrade him because, to his mind, that would be completely unrealistic--his classmates try harder and harder to break him. What they're hoping to see is a huge nervous breakdown or something. But Capricorn with his innocence and good heart takes everything they dish out and turns it around and makes it good.

I loved this book. It was very refreshing to read a school comedy with so much heart. You know, usually school is portrayed with a lot of cynicism and negativity but Gordon Korman takes a very realistic approach to school in this book: it's like he's trying to say, "Yeah, man. School sucks, it's a terrible place ... BUT!!!! it doesn't have to be if you just approach it with the right kind of heart."

Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke

I finally finished reading it! I thought it would never end.

Overall, it was a good book with equal parts excitement, action, drama, and suspense. The beginning was a little tedious but about halfway through it got quite gripping. And then the ending dragged awfully. But overall, the book was good. It introduced some new, exciting and imaginative settings, the characters were great. Mortimer became an even more heroic character, Dustfinger and Farid became more minor characters, which was somewhat disappointing but the book made up for it with some exciting developments with the other characters and some new and exciting villains.

As in the other books, I have one major complaint. The characters worry too much. They worry to the point where they're ineffective or they do stupid things. For example, Resa is so worried about her husband that she makes a terrible bargain with the villain Orpheus. I think that's a cheap writing device and it's really annoying.

I liked how evil the villains were, though, it made them really scary and I wanted them to meet terrible ends at the novel's end. I didn't really get what I wanted, but it was satisfying. Also, Basta makes a brief and terrifying return in this novel, which pleased me immensely; (he was one of my favourite characters in Inkheart and I was really disappointed that he was dispensed with in Inkspell.)

Overall, the novel was stunning and exciting, suspenseful and dramatic. It makes a fitting conclusion to the trilogy begun with Inkheart. And, there's even room for another sequel ...

The Usual Suspects

dear anonymous: thank you for posting your comments on my "Top Ten Reasons Why Patrick is Grumpy" blog entry; but why did you post as "anonymous"?

here are my guesses as to who you are:

1. tante doris: most likely; you know about the milk allergies and you'd be likely to say things like "you need to grow up" and "get over it" to me. my only doubt is that i think you would have capitalized your sentences.

2. mom: second most likely, to my mind; of course you know about the milk allergies. i'm just not so sure you would word those things that way.

3. jennypo: what can i say, it just sounds like you. (or steve, but i doubt he reads the blog.) nevertheless, it's not likely you would have known about the milk allergies.

4. Sophie... i doubt it. you wouldn't think to tell me to grow up or get over it.

5. tante alice: i don't know. i doubt you'd have time to even read my blog... mind you, you were at the flight house when the comment was posted.

6. chad or leanne. janelle says: "hahaha, probably. this is the most likely." yeah, i'd have to say there is a very strong possibility.

7. amy fuller: i have no idea. because you're a wild card and i've been told you might be poppin' in periodically.

8. grandmaman: if it's you, i'm surprised that you figured out how. or did you have help?

9. momma swan: i know you read the blog ... but you're generally so upbeat and encouraging. so i doubt it.

and finally:

10. joeyanne: hmm. you would say that. but i can't imagine you knowing about the milk allergies.

just so you know: i'm not making a big deal about this and my feelings aren't hurt. i just thought it was funny and was wondering who it could have been, so i figured it might be funny to write an entry about it.

Jerusalem's Hope by Bodie and Brock Theone

I have to say that this book was a major disappointment. In the final installment of a six part series, I was expecting a climactic ending and a satisfying resolution. I got neither. And what's worse, the awesome writing that I had come to expect from the Theones was gone. The writing seemed half-hearted and rushed. They had obviously not put much heart into this book. It was like they just wanted to get it over with. Okay, I knew from Saga of the Sierras that the Theones were capable of some pretty shoddy writing, but I wasn't expecting to find it here!

Okay, anyways, the story picks up where book five leaves off, it follows the three boys, Emet, Haor-Tov, and Avel as they journey from Galilee to Bethlehem; it takes Nakdimon ben Gurion to Jerusalem where he tries to convince the council that Yeshua of Nazareth is not a threat to national security; and it takes Marcus Longinus to Pilate's aquaduct building project outside of Bethlehem. These five meet up again in the novel's climax during the riot and subsequent massacre in Jerusalem on the Passover holiday. And then the novel abruptly ends.

That's not so bad. What is bad is that the novel ends as a commercial for the Theone's next series: The A.D. Chronicles! It's like this whole book has been a teaser trailer for another series! Not only do I not like that, I also think it's very, very bad form and highly unethical. Okay, maybe the unethical part is taking it too far, but can you understand just how disappointed and frustrated I am? I mean, how would you like to go to a movie you were really looking forward to and when you got you found out that this movie is actually just a commercial for another movie and you're going to have to pay if you want to watch it to find out what actually happens? That would make just about anyone mad, especially considering the cost of theatre tickets. Well, books are pretty expensive too. Especially Christian books.

And not only that, but they obviously didn't think through their writing! For example, there's one part where Gamaliel and Nakdimon are studying the Old Testament profecies to determine whether or not Yeshua of Nazareth can be the Messiah and Gamaliel directs Nakdimon to Isaiah 52. What? The Torah wasn't divided into chapters back then! The Bible was divided into chapters by a monk who was riding the train or something during the dark ages. Or something like that. I know that doesn't seem like a big deal, but it shows just how little thought was put into this book, that the writers were obviously just writing this in a hurry to finish off the series because they had something else in mind, like The A.D. Chronicles.

Also, and, I promise, this will be my last complaint--what's up with Jesus? In this book he seems like little more than a parlour magician spouting off feel-good philosophy! I know they didn't intend to make him seem that way and if you take his portrayal over all three books they actually do a pretty good job, I think, but in just this one--it stinks.

Finally, for what I liked about this book: the gospel was exceptionally clear. That was amazing! The book totally shows how Jesus fits into prophecy and into the whole history of Judaism and how everything in the Old Testament has meaning that points towards the coming of the Messiah. That was really awesome and it's almost worth reading the book just for that. So by all means, read the book, just skip the beginning and the end.

Top Ten Reasons Why Patrick Is Grumpy

Patrick is often grumpy/cranky/ornery, for your benefit we've compiled a list of reasons why:

10. He's sick.

9. He's tired.

8. He wishes he was doing something else.

7. He thinks you're angry at him/blaming him/disapproving of him.

6. There has been an unexpected change of plans.

5. He has been told to do something he is already doing/has been planning on doing.

4. He has been reprimanded.

3. He's embarrassed.

2. He hasn't eaten yet today.

1. He has just been woken up.