Overheard in the office

It's easy enough be negative about your job -- you spend 1/3 of your day there (nearly all of your waking hours!) and it's not typically something you enjoy doing; at least, not enough to do on your own without being paid. To alleviate the usual work frustrations, I've decided to relive some of my favorite moments from work recently. I work with some very fun people!

The conductor of one of my daily meetings, Dave, was unable to make it to work on time, so he called in on the conference room phone. He explained that his bees were angry that morning and that he'd needed to suit up and plug up the tops of his hives so that the bees could calm down before going back in. 
Charles: "You know, bees can sense electromagnetic disturbances in the atmosphere. This could be indicative of some kind of impending catastrophe."
Jaynee: "The apocalypse itself!"
Dave: "...I think it was spilled sugar water." 
Silly us!

Later in the same meeting...
Dave: "Aaah! A bee!"
A few minutes later...
Dave: "Hey, do you guys want to hear some bees?"
Scott: "I want to hear 'Aaah!' again."
Dave: "That was me going 'Aaah!' Okay, here are some bees" *buzzing through the speaker*
Scott: "Hey, ask them about Thor!"

Two stories need to be told for this quote: 1) A UX engineer, Geoff, had been helping a fellow writer improve the look of our documentation website. 2) We have a comment feature in our documentation that a customer has recently discovered. He keeps asking questions that we already answer in the documentation, so he's not bothering to read before asking.
Geoff: "Craig, you are going to have the most beautiful thing that no one will ever read!"
Me, laughing: "That was the funniest, most accurate thing I've heard all week."
Craig: "Well, at least we know <customer who keeps commenting> reads our documentation."
Me: "Yeah, well... wait. No, he doesn't."
Craig, laughing: "I think that actually wins funniest thing said all week."

On the van home one day...
John: "Jaynee, is this your hat?"
Jaynee: "Nope. I saw it in the back last week. Has no one claimed it?"
John: "I think it might be Winnie's. I wonder where she's been. Maybe she's too cold without her hat."
Neil: "Sorry, I can't come to work until Spring -- I lost m'hat!"

Mr. Cellophane

I feel like I need to update this more often, so here I be, wondering what on earth can I write about... so I'll go with what's going on in my life right now. So what's going on my life? Work! And... well, yeah, that's about it, unless you count driving to work as well. Or I suppose I could do a narration of my reading entirely too much over the weekends, but I'm sure I'll be forgiven for not, hehe. I took these pictures the other day and thought I'd share a little of the new experiences with everyone. This first picture is the view from my desk out the door. I can actually see a window... amazing, right?! HUGE change from the windowless Costco! Oh, and it's also very clear that I need some posters or something. :)


This next picture is obviously what I face most of the day... this is my computer. Well, no, actually, the computer is underneath the desk. These are my monitors (Yeah, that's right, we get double monitors. It's actually kinda rough, because when I get home my one monitor on my laptop is just not enough. So inconvenient! Not gonna lie... there have been a couple times that I really wanted a third monitor. Can you say "spoiled"?).



I wanted a better shot of the very few ways that I personalized my office. It's still bare, and I still get comments on that. But hey, I made an effort. Those are a few pictures, an awesome bowling score, a Colonel Sanders bobble head, Bill Goldberg and referee action figures... oh, and a rubber chicken. Yeah, I know, I'm awesome. Just to prove it further: any guess what's holding the chicken's noose up? Go ahead, take a guess. Yeah, it's a Samus bobble head on the shelf above. I think I've said enough, feel free to admire me, I won't stop ya.


This last picture is my favorite of the bunch. This is a sign that somebody posted on the wall next to the tech side printer. I saw it on my first day, and it hasn't changed at all, except that last week someone crossed out the '4' and wrote in '5.' It makes me laugh every time. My coworkers are pretty fun. I just wish I knew which one did this so I could team up and make a space invader out of post-it notes on the wall in someone's office (I don't even care who, I just love the idea!). I definitely need a prank accomplice if I'm going to do stuff like that.

Anyway, yes, that's my life right now. There is stress, hurt and frustration, of course, but I just try to work through those, and for the most part... life is awesome. Always.

Obviously You're Not a Golfer

To copy my good pal Elise, I'm dedicating a post to 2010. I hadn't planned on doing this until I woke up this morning and realized how drastically my life changed last year.

January:

I started off my new year hanging out with these clowns. This picture was taken after running out in the street barefoot (there was a ton of snow and ice out there), screaming to the neighbors and causing quite a stir. While I have no picture documentation, they also were company to my first attempt at snowboarding this month. I still suck at it, but hey! I'll get there.

February:

Wow, some very huge changes came very close together and very quickly this month. On the 10th, I moved. Yes, it's true. I, Jane E., the girl who spent 22 years, 4 months, and 29 days living in the exact same house finally moved. The picture on the left is my old room, my last time in there before hauling the last load. The picture on the right is my new room, all set up.

For some reason I can't find any pictures, but my mom was married on February 25th this year. We all spend that weekend in Wendover (my first time there) where I did and did not gamble. I didn't use one cent of my own money, but I did play craps in Dick's stead when they left the table to go get dinner.

March:
I spent March adjusting to my new home. What does that entail? Chasing this up-to-no good kitty around the house. You know, coaxing him out of drawers, the drier, blinds, etc...

April:
April was pretty eventful... one of my very best friends and cousins was married to a good friend of mine. And Weenie asked me to be a bridesmaid - that was so much fun! The picture on the right is our surprise for them when they were on their honeymoon. We painted their bedroom.

Oh, and I also ran my very first half marathon at the end of this month.

May:
I enjoyed a 2-week break from school and then started what I thought was a 10-credit semester. And then I discovered something about how summer Spanish classes work and came to the conclusion that I could graduate in December rather than next April. Long story short, I started a 17-credit semester this month.

June:
Despite all the time spent in school, I managed to find time for other things. For instance, I went to my first concert in June - it was my favorite band, Cake! They put on an excellent show too. We also adopted this little kitten that Ludo is scoping out. We named him Archie after a character in the movie Rocknrolla.

July:
I played entirely too much this month! On July 5th, I once again set off to hike Mount Olympus alone (this time it wasn't snowy though). I also hiked Timpanogos (that's the jumping picture there). I also went to Bridger Lake for a week, a tradition of my family's. Those are two of my nephews chilling in my camping chair after we caught a few frogs.

My brother, sister-in-law and I also took a Wednesday we all had off to go explore. We wound up driving in the Jeep, top down, to a canyon waaaay out in the middle of nowhere. There we discovered a teeny, tiny, abandoned mining town. Ghost town hunt, whoot! It was pretty dang cool. I included a picture, but I think I accidentally deleted it and I'm too lazy to reupload it. Just trust me, it was rad.

August:

This is where I started my last semester. I also went on my favorite hike of the year, up Red Pine trail and to the top of the Pfeifferhorn. So much fun! It was freezing up there though. I also commenced my final semester at the end of the month.

September:

I turned 23. Still not sure how I feel about that...

October:

Pretty uneventful month. I think I spent most of it studying. By November I gave up and just prayed I'd just pass.

November:

I invested in a pair of snowshoes. Good purchase! The picture on the right here is from Donut Falls. Looks absolutely gorgeous in the winter, right? I also started a new job. By some miracle, I landed a job as a technical writer at a software company in Provo. I worked part time on Tuesday and Thursday start November 9th.

December:

Christmas! Oh, and I finished classes. yeah, I took my last final on December 17th. I also had some random illness during this week that made me so achy and feverish that my hand hurt like heck when I tried to write my exam essays... yuck. But I did pass everything and now I'm free! I also started working full time on December 20th. Looks like I don't have any major decisions or milestones to hit anytime in the near future, and I'm actually liking that. Maybe 2011 will be the year of remaining static.... except when I'm using my AWESOME new snowboarding gear I got for Christmas. check me out!

It Tastes Like Goblin Piss

The new job is going very well. I still feel very out of place and strange, but the first couple weeks of any job are the "What have I done?" weeks. I'm easing in, however, and adjusting to the new environment. My day Thursday, for example, consisted of my going in a half hour early, turning on my computer, and converting some software documentation to HTML. I finished that quickly, so I browsed through the documentation that's already been done to make observations about the style. I noticed that images were presented in tables, so I changed all the images in my project. Then I noticed side notes were written differently, so I changed that... etc. Basically I was trying to make it identical in format, and I took notes so I could contribute to a style guide for our company's documentation.

After about 5 hours, my manager checked in for the first time and asked if I needed anything or had any questions. It's so strange not to be constantly watched at work, you know? Anyway, I showed him the operations section of the documentation and pointed out that it looked really ugly. After asking if there was another way he wanted to present the information, he took the controls and I watched. We created a table that would work pretty well, so I spent the remaining hours converting most of the operations to our table. I didn't quite finish.

As I was about a 15 minutes away from packing up and leaving, my coworker came in and started chatting about school. He has the same major as I do, only he's not at all happy with the way English degrees are done in Utah. I agreed with his argument, but added that while the required classes are useless, I have enjoyed them nonetheless, haha. We also talked about movies and stuff too for a while. All in all, I had about a 45-minute conversation with my new coworker. It was so nice! I'm still new and alone, but the environment there is super friendly, and I'm sure the newness feeling won't last too long. I love it. :)