ModestGeniusXL

O the St. Patrick's Day Randomness

To be fair, not all of these ramblings will be related to St. Patrick's Day.  I just felt like giving this particular randomness entry some sort of a theme so I went with that one.  That's just how I roll.

No, I didn't wear green today.  I never have bought into that "tradition".  I'm not Irish.  Ironically enough, the one green shirt that I do own is one of my favorite shirts, but it has come up missing.  I'm thinking a leprechaun stole it.

I'll start wearing green on St. Patty's Day when folks start wearing black on Black History Month.  Yes...for the whole month.

Our office is a little thin staffed today.  At least my team is.  It's not all because of St. Patty's Day though.  It also has a little something to do with Spring Break and at least one for family reasons.  Still, I wonder how many last minute absences we'll have tomorrow.

I wonder how many folks will get accidentally hit in the eye from candy being thrown in the parade downtown today.  I wonder how many claims arise from those type of incidents.

I have officially lost interest in Twitter.  I still lurk out there reading different folks' updates, but I rarely post my own.  I've been concentrating those efforts on Facebook instead.  Maybe that will inspire me to post more out here as well.

My little cousin Kandace was killin' me last night with her assertion that UAPB will beat Duke in the first round of the Tourney because the Lord will be with them.  This is just a hypothesis, but I have a funny feeling that the Lord has better things to do than to worry about a first round NCAA game.

Do the NCAA women really need to have a tournament?  It's going to end up being just another means for the UConn women to further pad their stats.  Everyone else is pretty much just playing for second place.

Does green beer taste different than regular beer? 

I'm thinking police will have no problem at all hitting their monthly quota for tickets with all of the folks that will be driving drunk today.

This is the first time in a while that there have been so many new dvd releases all in one week.  What's so special about this week that they had to cram them in now?

Watched the new FX show "Justified" last night and was fairly impressed.  Mainly because I have been a fan of Timothy Olyphant's work ever since "Go".  Looks like I just found me a new evening drama.

This lady is in the office crying over her sick cat.  It's a cat.  I know that may sound callous, but I'm just sayin'.  It's a cat.

The Tom Joyner Morning Show is on Spring Break this week so I've been listening to The Steve Harvey Morning Show instead.  It's been very painful to say the least.

This weather is trying to get us to fall for the banana in the tailpipe with these 50 and 60 degrees temps.  We already know it's supposed to drop into the 30s again this weekend with snow on Saturday.  Nice try though.

As much as I like horror movies, I've never seen a single one of those "Leprechaun" movies.   Even I have to draw the line somewhere when it comes to my horror selections.

I still can't believe it took the University fo Huntsville over a month to fire the professor who killed her coworkers.  She even did it ON the campus!  If that's not grounds for immediate termination, I don't know what is.  She must have had some leprechauns watching over here to help her keep her job that long.

'Nuff said.

O the Randomness

I know what you're thinking..."What?  Did he really rip off another one so soon already when he just hit us off with a random entry a few days back?"  Yep...sure did...

First things first, I need to send a huge shout out to my grandmother.  HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GRANDMA TURNER!  Once again, I am blessed to have another year where I have three of my grandparents still with us.

I just don't get how this Mark Becker kid had the nerve to plead not guilty to shooting that Aplington-Parkersburg football coach when there were over a dozen students who witnessed him do it. 

Oh wait...I guess he actually pled not guilty by reason of insanity.  Still, there's no need to waste taxpayers' money on a trial for that.  Just have him tested to see if he is truly insane then proceed with putting him away for life.

"The Princess and the Frog" is one of the movies that has now made it to our dollar show.  I may have to finally check that out now. 

It figures that right after I get done singing Words With Friends praises in its own separate post, it starts having all types of problems.  It's been crashing and/or not working more frequently than it does work lately.  I know you can't expect too much for $2.99, but you would at least expect it to be operational.

Just as I suspected, my Cyclones fell to the Kansas Jayhawks earlier today 73-59.  That now extends their streak to 20 consecutive losses against ranked opponents.  It just feels so great to be a Cyclone!

Speaking of sarcasm, it is snowing yet again and I am SO excited!  I thought maybe that if tried using a little reverse psychology on the elements it would work with keeping the snow away.  Yeah...so far that theory hasn't been panning out so well.

At least one Iowa team is having a very good year.  With the UNI Panthers win over the Drake Bulldogs this week, they have officially become the Drake story of this year.  Let's just hope they can get further into the Tourney than Drake did.

I may return to watching "American Idol" this season since the talent is TONS better than they have had in previous years.  Plus, I'm digging the whole Ellen Degeneres dynamic.  We'll just see.

I was watching "Splash" again and was thinking about something...do you think Allen later on regretted his decision about going to Madison's underwater home and forsaking his life forever?  I'm thinking he did.

The rappin' Charles Barkley Taco Bell commercial is going to be the death of me.

Then there is the Sprite commercial with Drake.  Are we really supposed to believe that someone gets inspired off just one swing of Sprite?  Not even a whole bottle, mind you.  Just a swallow.  That's some potent pop if it can pull that off.

Dear Mediacom reminder feature:  I am NOT a Harry Potter fan so stop suggesting those movies to me every time they are scheduled to be broadcast.

Today I broke the cardinal rule of grocery shopping:  I went to get groceries while I was hungry. 

It's so good to have Presidents' Day off.  No other company that I have ever been with has ever considered that to be paid holiday.  More kudos to my current employer for that.

I saw a commercial that stated 1 out of 4 women can misread a home pregnancy test.  I sure hope that's not accurate.  I would sure like to believe that the percentage of women with enough basic intelligence to read a home pregnancy test is higher that 25%.

I'm not completely sold on the "We Are the World" remake they recently did.  I could actually do an entire post on just that song.  As a matter of fact, I think I will.  Stay tuned...

It's amazing that no one has ever been killed on that luge thing in the Winter Olympics until just recently (R.I.P., German dude).  I love me some thrill rides, but NO way would I ever do something like that.  Not even in my daredevil prime.

Facebook should have one of their relationship status options be "Okay...see...it's like this..."

'Nuff said.

Happy Anniverseary to Me

It's a rather awkward situation because today is my "official" anniversary with my company, but I have been with the company for longer than a year.  I started in early October as a contract employee since I was hired thru an employment agency.  I had to wait for all the paperwork to go thru and for all the necessary final approvals before I was a member of the company's staff.  All of that ultimately got finalized on December 1, 2008. 

This has been the first time in a while that I have been at a company for longer than a year.  It's rather sad to admit, but it's the truth.  I have now worked for a total of six different companies since graduating Iowa State in 1993 and this anniversary now marks third longest tenure.  There's something very different about how this one feels though.  It's also the smallest office I have ever worked in which provides more of a close-knit feeling of camaraderie among the employees.  It makes a huge difference that promotes a more positive work environment.

Prior to coming here, I had been at Marsh for just over a year.  It only me took me that long to realize that that was not the place for me.  I can't speak for the entire organization as a whole, but the department I was in was a disorganized mess.  I had a boss with one of the worst midget complexes I have ever seen.  Not to mention that the environment was just poisonous overall from the minions all the way up to clueless senior management.  Getting out of there was the best thing I could have done. 

There's always a certain level of stress involved with any job; however it all depends on what type of role you're in.  My prior two jobs involved me being in the supervisory role.  Although I did enjoy helping others succeed from my coaching, that wasn't always the case.  Some folks didn't want to succeed and that was always hard for me to accept.  I never could understand why some folks are content being sub-par no matter what type of incentive is presented to them.

Now I'm back in the area of claims where I have the bulk of my expertise.  I have no more direct reports.  I am accountable for the work of one person.  My workload is determined by how much I get accomplished during the course of one day as opposed to relying on other folks that may or may want to pull their share depending on how they feel.  That type of stress is much easier to manage as it's something over which I have full control.

As I look around the office, I see folks that have been here for years and years.  That's something else that is very encouraging.  It demonstrates job stability.  You can tell from the over atmosphere in the office that folks enjoy being there which also says alot about why folks have been there for 5+ years.  I anxiously look forward to the time that I can say the same thing when my 5-year anniversary rolls around.