Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Sister Motherf***er

This is exactly the kind of thing I do to pass the time. It's over seven minutes long, but if you're a retard like me it will be worth it.


Wednesday, February 20, 2008

I don't Awana rock with you


My good pal over at Better Living through Bacon recently wrote about her six-year-old daughter's first (and last) visit to the Awana Clubs, a Kristian organization whose primary purpose seems to be scaring young children into believing in Jesus.

I'm sorry, but frightening six-year-olds into believing what you believe is simply not a legitimate use of religion in my book. Frankly, I think this kind of thing should be illegal.

I was raised as a Lutheran, although because we ended up attending the scarier Missouri Synod part of the church, I got a lot of the fire-and-brimstone education from which my more moderate Lutheran friends were spared.

It wasn't until I was attending a Lutheran college that I discovered mainstream Lutherans, you know, of the Sunday hot-dish church supper variety. We had none of that good stuff when I was a kid; for me, church was all about what would and wouldn't get you sent to Hell.

In my parents' defense, they would have put a stop to it if they'd known exactly what I was being taught in Sunday school and confirmation classes. Unfortunately, they were usually both too drunk to inquire. But that's another story.

One time when I was in 4th grade my school friend John Hagerson asked if I wanted to attend an Awana meeting with him. "Sure," I said, having no idea what "Awana" was. I was just usually game for anything that would get me out of the house.

When I arrived at the designated address I realized it was a church. "Oh," I said to the other kids there, "do you have to belong to a certain religion to go to this?" They all replied, in unison, "IT'S NON-DENOMINATIONAL!"

Well alrighty then!

There were some preliminary niceties, and then about 50 of us kids were seated inside the church and some guy was in front going on and on about how we needed to be "saved." Pretty soon he had all of us bow our heads to pray, and started asking which ones of us wanted to come up to the front to be "saved."

This was confusing to me. For starters, I had been going to Sunday school for several years by that point and had thought I was already "saved." Why was this guy acting like I needed to be saved again?

Furthermore, what exactly was he going to do to "save" me? Wasn't that God's job, not his?

After an uncomfortably long time sitting there with no one opting for eternal salvation, we were dismissed and the meeting was over. John came up to me holding two Snickers bars and handed me one. "This is our prize for me having convinced you to come tonight," he told me.

Oh, for crying out loud, I thought. Is this what this whole song and dance was about? You wanted a free candy bar? I smelled a scam.

I never went back. Those people gave me the creeps.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

As if!


I was quite angry earlier today, despite it being Valentine's Day and all. Read my prior post for the context

But right now, all I can say is "thank God for Poor George!"

One homemade lobster dinner, three glasses of merlot, half a bottle of Proseco and one viewing of "Clueless" later I am not mad anymore! Funny how that works!

Some people in life are bitches, but with what I just described should it really matter?


I don't think so.


Happy Valentine's Day to all my Gentle Readers!

Love,
CP

Some days as a Strategic Sales Executive are annoying days


We have a rollout of a major new product coming next week, a product I will be largely responsible for selling.


Not only do I not yet have online access to the product; I just found out that the product manager from our home office has been scheduling customer visits and demos with my sales reps directly, without telling me.


I take this as a sign of disrespect. It's not like she doesn't know this is my product; she knows it very well. Furthermore, it's in her own best interest to include me in these meetings because otherwise all the sales reps in the country will just go to her with all their questions and requests for customer appointments.


I'm having several conversations about this in my head even as I type:


1. My sour grapes are telling me to say "fine, let her do all the selling if that's what she wants."


2. My inner paranoid-schizophrenic is telling me she's not including me because she thinks I'm annoying and a buffoon and would simply rather not deal with me.


3. My inner adult is telling me it was just an oversight and to chalk it up to a big "whatever, Mary."



I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going with options 1 and 2.


CP

Sunday, February 03, 2008

Pig fuckers


In my last post I bragged about how I won the award for Strategic Sales Executive of the Year. #1 in the whole damn country. I get to go with Poor George to Pabooba for an exotic vacation in April.

Except for one small problem. They forgot me at our company's awards banquet on Saturday night. I was supposed to get to walk across a stage in front of 2,000 of my colleagues and be recognized.

But they forgot me. They gave fancy crystal vases to every other winner except me.

Then, during dinner, they flashed large screen images of the names and photos of all the winners throughout the evening - except for me.

Needless to say, I was puzzled and slightly upset. I asked my boss what was up, so he went to talk to the woman who coordinated the awards.

When he returned to my table he said "Tom, I spoke with Martha and she was really, really apologetic. But there's nothing we can do. You still won though, and you still get to go on the trip."



Bullshit. He could have gone to our president at the front table and explained that they accidentally left out the Strategic Sales Exec category and failed to announce the winner. He could have gone back on stage and corrected it. But I guess they didn't care enough.

I don't care about fucking Pabooba, and in fact we're no longer going. I'm going to stay home and eat my sour grapes instead, or maybe go somewhere else with Poor George on my own dime. I'd be too angry to be able to enjoy myself if I went after this slap in the face.


I kind of feel like a dick for even caring about this, but I do. I worked my ass off last year, and through a combination of hard work, teamwork and good luck I won. I deserved to walk across that stage.

Now, only the people in my immediate vicinity know I won. People in other parts of the company whom I've known for 18 years have no idea now that I have made good. People who might later be able to help me, knowing I have the cache of a national award behind my name, will not know anything about my achievement - unless of course I tell them. Which I don't want to have to do.


It may have something to do with having to get up at 4:00 am to catch my plane this morning, but in the cab ride home from the airport I actually shed tears over this. Maybe I need to get a life.


Fuckers.

Friday, February 01, 2008

Some days as a Strategic Sales Executive are good days


Hi all,

Greetings from a warm southern city - I can't get too specific because I don't want to be Googled by my colleagues. I am currently attending our annual sales conference. Me and 2,000 sales reps. It's just this sort of thing that normally puts me over the edge.

But this year is slightly different. You see, Gentle Readers, last night I learned that I am the #1 Strategic Sales Executive for 2007! I guess my Amanda Woodward-like attitude has finally gotten me somewhere.

Poor George and I will be joining my company's senior executives for a fancy award vacation on a tropical island. Again, I don't want to say where for fear of being Googled, but it rhymes with Pabooba and it's near the coast of Venezuela.

Finally, the recognition Poor George deserves for putting up with my non-stop bitching!

Love,
CP