Round Two

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about being put on unpaid leave. I wasn't laid off, per se, but was just put on "unpaid leave" until the work in the office picked up again.

This morning, around 9:00 a.m., I received a phone call from Mrs. Robinson, saying that I needed to come in to get my chair, and that the guys needed my CAD license key back, etc...

In other words, I was laid off without actually being told I was laid off.

Kind of crappy.

I immediately got up, got dressed, and checked the internet for what I'm supposed to do in regards to health insurance. Our firm - er, my former firm - was under 20 employees, so no COBRA for this gal. However, the State of Texas requires that firms grant me up to 9 months on the group health insurance plan, so long as I reimburse the firm.

Whew. I went ahead and applied for unemployment benefits - which I can't receive until the last week in January, even though I haven't received severance pay or anything - and then awaited the arrival of my sainted (and tired) mother, who was loaning me her minivan so I could clear out my stuff at the office.

I showed up at the office, and the first words I said, right after, "Hey, Mrs. Robinson!" were "So I'm assuming this means I'm actually laid off, now."

She said yes, that until that morning everyone in the firm had been working on different assumptions.

Oldsmobile and our book keeper - not the most competent woman - were dead certain that I had already been laid off. Mrs. Robinson was instructed last week to write a letter to the insurance company telling them to cancel my health insurance benefits.

Ahem.

Radio, Scooter, and Pacman were all working on the assumption that I would eventually be back in the office and that my unpaid leave was temporary.

What we have he-ah is failyuh to communicate.

I informed Mrs. Robinson that, pursuant to State of Texas Regulations, I had the right to 9 months of insurance, so long as I reimbursed the company. I didn't mention that, seeing as they failed to go over all my health insurance options with me at the "exit interview" (which never happened), I could file an official complaint with the Texas Department of Insurance.

I'm nice, though, so I won't file a complaint... unless the book keeper tries to tell me that they're going to defy State of Texas regulations.

I cleared out my physical possessions (including my Ice Age III action figures, aluminum desk accessories, and wireless mouse - both of which were purchased by myself) and loaded them onto my Aeron chair, which served as a handy dandy cart for transporting all my stuff.

I will return on Wednesday to download the digital files showing all the work I performed at the office (I took the extra copies of Specifications I had, since the firm already has record copies).

Because of some rumored hiring going on at my former employer's office (not Oldsmobile's, but a different firm... the one that laid me off in 2008), the guyzos all thought I would have a brand spanking new job to go to all wrapped up and tidy in a little bow.

Heck, I was pretty certain I'd have another job, but wasn't really getting my hopes up. I'd been talking with the former employer every week about the possibility, after they first approached me to discuss my coming back.

About thirty minutes after I returned to my apartment, my cell phone rang.

"That was XYZ Firm," I said to my mom, who was napping on my sofa. "They don't have a job for me, right now." I shrugged. I wasn't really certain about getting the job in the first place, and as time dragged on (almost a month) I got the feeling that it just wasn't going to happen.

My feeling was right on target.

So now I'm looking for a job. One I won't have to move to take. There's plenty of great design jobs out there. They are all, however, in Baltimore, or Shanghai. So tomorrow, I send out resumes, and a letter of introduction for my little entrepreneurial venture (which is now up and running), and we'll see how things go from there.

Once again, I'm back to playing it by ear. But this time, I have rent to pay.

About to Whine About Things Not Worth Whining About

It's getting a bit slow in the office. We were given the go-ahead today on a project (hooray!), but there's nothing for me to do on it, yet, and it's a little project, and I don't know how much we'll have to do in the way of construction drawings and millwork details, which happen to be my specialty.

I finished my assignment for Radio. He had no more tasks for me.

Pacman? Nada.

Scooter? "Uhhhhh... Yeah, but I need about thirty minutes to mark up the drawings. Do you have something to do for thirty minutes?"

Chortle. "Surf the interwebs."

"Sounds good. Go to town."

Hmmm...

I already spend about 30 minutes each day brushing up on design blogs, making sure I know what's going on in the world of millwork details, interior finishes, and the newest soft-furnishings offerings from companies I cannot afford (are you listening, Century, Henredon, and Hickory Chair? Okay, I know Hickory Chair is listening, but Century and Henredon?)

My daily blog perusal is why the guys were astonished when they said wistfully that they wished we could do interiors and I squealed and cried, "Oooh! Pick me! Pick me! Mrs. Robinson and I can do it!"

So I went back to my desk, with Scooter's blessing, and proceeded to venture into digital worlds hitherto unexplored.

I tell you, most design blogs - that is, blogs devoted exclusively to interior design - are depressing. They're cutesy and try to be hipsterish, riding the wave of zombie mania currently sweeping the pop culture beaches... or something

or they look like Z Galerie threw up all over them

or they have terrible grammar and sentence structure.

I know that my proofreading skills occasionally fall short of the mark or that I end a sentence with a preposition. I know I am definitely guilty of the rampant and irresponsible overuse of parentheses. But I also know that my sentences do not sound like a fifteen year old wrote them, and that I don't egregiously capitalize words in questions submitted to my inexplicably wide readership, the answers to which I will never respond or even read.

And I know that, although my dream house looks like the result of an Andy-Warhol/Billy-Baldwin/Dorothy-Draper orgy fueled by Dr. Pepper and lightly salted roasted almonds, I would never feature an apartment on my blog, billing it as something that is wonderful when in fact it is straight-out-of-the-Ikea-box boring. Unless it is as an example of an apartment that is boring, like so:

The above apartment was featured recently on one of the most widely read design blogs in a post entitled "Why does Barcelona have the best apartments?"

The only thing I see that this apartment has that apartments in Dallas don't have is a radiator.

That's it.

There's the cheapo flat-screen. The Panton chairs. The boring Ikea-ish white chairs. Boring rug. Minimal wall art on a boring beige wall. Light-tone wood floors (boring? Check). Why is this one of "the best apartments?" Why was it even in the running?

I save pictures I find striking to folders on my desktop at work, then email them to myself at home (compressed into zip files) where I print them off and paste them into my little OCDesign collection.

It seems like lately, there are fewer images for me to save, to collect.

Am I just becoming more discriminating (my word) or picky (in the words of an ex-boyfriend)? Or am I jaded after wading through all the cutesy, un-chic garbage (see Little Augury for a lovely tirade against overuse of that particular term)

It's 6:00 : Do you know where YOUR intern architect is?

It's actually 6:15 pm, on the Thursday, and I should by rights still be seated in my cubicle, plugging away at millwork design for a 10,000 square foot house a hop, skip, and a jump from my 700 square foot apartment.

My apartment fits tidily in the master suite.

Instead, I am at home, where I have been since 11:40 this morning.

I awoke with a migraine - to be fair, I went to bed with one, too - and trudged off to work, hoping I could make it through the day. My neurologist recently increased the dosage on my migraine preventive medicine, and it had seemed to be working. Until last night.

I made it through two solid days of rain and storm, and then BAM! migraine when the sun came out. I want to be like the little girl playing outside my building and whine, "That's not fair!" but I will refrain. Even though I did just sort of do it.

I came home for lunch, to bolt down some sustenance and to take a nap, hoping that a slight recharge would help. Also, I took my migraine "rescue" medicine at that point (dose #2) hoping it would help out a bit.

It didn't help out immediately, but it did knock me out immediately. I slept until 1:30. And then I called Mrs. Robinson and told her I would not be back today, because of the migraine.

I went back to sleep, and awoke again at 4:15, still groggy - partly from the migraine "hangover" and partly from the pain medicine I took because my back was killing me. I still have some residual photophobia, and although the sounds of my new washing machine installed by Gustavo and Alan yesterday should be music to my ears, they are causing a bit of a pain somewhere behind my left sinus. Hopefully, that will dissipate by the morning.

It came as a surprise to Mrs. Robinson and the guys that I had a migraine, today. And Radio expressed disappointment that I hadn't informed him about the one I had last Friday (which had actually started on Thursday). But if I told them every time I had a migraine, I would probably sound like a whiny little brat. I don't tell the blogosphere every time I have one.

And why does the Blogspot spellchecker not include either Blogspot or blogosphere in their dictionary? Seriously? Sigh...

At least my migraine is not further egged on by the jumping racket created by my previous washing machine. At least my new one is quieter and less mobile.

At least.

Is It Friday, Yet?

I know it's not Friday, and I'm honestly glad it isn't, but good gracious, this week is fraught with difficulties, already!

Out of the past six workdays, I have been on the site five days. Today, Tuesday, I was there twice: once for the regular Contract Administration meeting (guess who's contract administrator since Pacman's in NJ?), and once because the owner's son sent me an email loaded with questions, after I settled the Great Screws vs. Nails Debate of 2010. I felt the need to look at the framing to see exactly what he was talking about before fully addressing one of the issues.

Hmmm... maybe the owner's son needs a nickname... We'll call him Big'un, because he's a big'un (granted, he's tall, not fat).

At the meeting this morning, Big'un questioned the framer's use of nails to attach the joist hangers, instead of screws, like the contractor on the family's ranch house is doing (this being their Texas ranch, as opposed to their Montana ranch: keep them straight, okay?). I told him that nails were acceptable, I'd never seen joist hangers screwed into a studwall before, and that it wasn't necessary to screw all the framework together.

He pulled a framer, on me. "Maybe you could just call Adam and check?" I wanted to smack him right in his 24 year old bearded face. But I didn't, because he's the client's son. Instead, I hailed Scooter, put the question to him, and Scooter reiterated what I had just said.

Big'un didn't seem satisfied. The other contractor, the one at the ranch house, uses screws after all.

I have a hunch that the frames aren't the only things that contractor is screwing...over.

Once back in the office, I researched the exact joist hangers we're using - which specifically state NOT to use screws - and emailed the Big'un to let him know. He shot back a looooooooooong email, full of questions that compared the construction of the house in town to the ranch house (the Texas ranch house).

Apples and oranges, kiddo. Apples and oranges.

For starters, the ranch house is a renovation. Different methods must be used to construct the houses. They have different building envelopes. And if his email was accurate, which I doubt it was, then their ranch house is a mold/mildew factory waiting to happen, because it's being built to prevent the walls from breathing properly. It took me a full hour to fashion an email that defended the building envelope we've designed without impugning the design of the contractor and/or architect of the ranch house (I'm not entirely certain they have an architect).

One thing he did bring up was staining on some of the framework. I decided to check it out on my way home - so I left to go home an hour early - and took some photos. I'm not happy, because the staining appears to be not so much staining as mold and mildew on the framework. If that's the case, we'll want to rip out the affected pieces and replace them. And by "we'll want to" I mean "we'll make the framers do it."

I also scared the heck out of Lord Midget, the Electrician, who feared I had returned to give him additional directions. He seemed relieved that I was just there to look at the framing and the ceiling in one of the offices.

Just before leaving our office, I was indulging in a fair amount of griping about Big'un, and the somewhat idiotic questions he asked (with the exception of the staining), and Radio made the remark, "You know, you shouldn't be complaining about him. You're really missing an opportunity, here. Sure, he may not be the brightest bulb in the box, but he's rich and not a bad looking kid."

"He's illiterate," I replied, brandishing the typo-ridden email. "Enough said."

"You need to be more materialistic. Money can make up for lots of things, even being an illiterate idiot."

I sighed. "You've obviously never dated an illiterate idiot before."

"You've obviously never dated a rich one."

I smiled. "You obviously don't know my dating history." And with that, I left the office. I have a hunch Radio hasn't spoken the last in his attempt to get me to marry our client's son, however.

At least it would guarantee the firm more business, right?

Eh...

It's been a busy busy week. After discovering that the framers our general contractor hired roughed-in the windows on the front and rear facades approximately 2 feet away from their intended location (really?) and that they are putting up walls where they don't belong and leaving out doors elsewhere, Pacman was in a car wreck.

He's alive, but bruised and cut up from all the windshield glass. And guess who became de facto head of our project?

Ms. Strainedconsciousness, that's who.

I had a meeting Thursday morning with the framers and the superintendent to discuss the windows before they set about rectifying their mistake. During the course of the discussion, one of the framers asked Radio a question, who deferred it to me, and I answered.

The framer replied, "Maybe we should hold off until Pacman can give us an answer."

WHAT. THE. HELL.

I'm not usually the project head, so I don't talk a whole heck of a lot to the subcontractors, but the guy asked Radio first, and when I gave him his answer, he said we should wait until Pacman got back? Which could be as long as two weeks?

I suspected a bit of sexism was involved, and I looked the framer in the eye and said, "I just gave you the answer. Pacman would say the same thing. And I produced that drawings, not him. So you're ready to go."

The superintendent seemed to get a kick out of the situation. The framer just nodded and said, "Okay," in a somewhat cowed voice.

He was much more respectful of me when I met with him on Friday - along with the midget electrical contractor and the interior designer - to discuss electrical outlet and light switch placement. We had a couple of questions for him, and he answered, and then asked me a couple of things, and I gave him answers, which he accepted.

All is right with the world.

I may be pretty and I may look young, Mr. Subcontractor, but you sure as hell better not underestimate me. I can be just as aggressive as Pacman, when you push me to it.

Lying Abed After Work

Yes, I am already happily ensconced in my bed, and it's only 6:30, Texas time. I have downed a bowl full of curry and rice, followed by a white nectarine for dessert, and am taking a well deserved rest.

You see, dear reader, I am almost finished with my archival duties.

Almost.

Today, more boxes were sorted through, albeit with less gusto than on previous days. Today, the routine was more along the lines of my poking through the box, saying to myself, "Yup, they're all project files of one form or other," and putting a new lid on the box.

Most of our file boxes are lidless, a fact that initially struck me as inexplicable, given that file boxes are sold with lids. The mystery was solved when I found a stockpile of unassembled file box lids lurking in a corner of the office. WHAT. THE. HECK.

And the guys complained that the boxes didn't stack properly. No kidding, geniuses! They DON'T HAVE LIDS.

Anyway, Radio was kind enough to haul out four file boxes to the recycling dumpster for me yesterday, but did not make the mistake of doing so today. His comment to me after completing that task was "How are you able to carry these things around?"

"I just move them a few feet at a time, or I incrementally lift them and carry them on my shoulder," I said.

"Huh." I only have to move them a few feet at a time, as I decided to just sort through them all in the archive room, rather than moving them around.

Nothing interesting really stood out, today, insofar as archival articles go. I did find a box of framed pictures - mostly limited edition cartoons and prints - stacked at the bottom of a tower of boxes, all of which were much heavier and less fragile than the box full of pictures, none of which had the glass broken.

I also decided that I would reward myself, today, by taking a full lunch hour and by taking a few goodies from the archive room.

Now, before you call the police, or the TBAE, or something, let me state that nothing I took had anything to do with the firm, and they were duplicates. As in, I took a postcard, because there were literally 20 of them in a box, along with a Key Club bumper sticker (I have no idea how many of those there were, because there were so darn many). After carrying a 4-foot wide and 10-foot long roll of gridded mylar into the office and saying, "Uh, guys? What do I do with this?" and being answered with "Throw it away," I decided that it would be better off coming home with me for art project purposes.

Speaking of art, did you know it's almost impossible to find colorfast grey tissue paper? Anywhere? I tried "making my own" by layering black and white tissue paper (it's for a collage) but that didn't work out. It appears that if you want colorfast grey tissue paper, you must buy 480 sheets of it. So I now have 960 sheets of grey tissue paper coming my way, because I needed two different colors of it.

Everybody, prepare to have all of your gifts wrapped in grey tissue paper until the day I die. Or, conversely, if you'd like some, let me know, and when my project is finished, I'll send you some.

Or maybe I could just end my clothing crisis and start wearing tissue paper clothes.

In My Own Little Corner, In My Own Little Chair

And if anyone can tell me what that's from, I will buy you a beer. Well, maybe not, because you can Google anything these days.

I'm back at my apartment, as of Thursday, and it feels so wonderful to be in my little home again. I've been cleared to drive, so I start back to work on Monday, and I'll work 4 hours in the office and 4 hours at home. Pacman is ecstatic, since there's gobs of work to be done on his project, and he needs me "desperately," according to Radio. Hmmm...

I went and did something enjoyable, today (pedicure) since there hasn't been much of that, lately, and then decided to drive by the projects in my neighborhood to see what my firm has been up to, in my absence.

We've been up to a lot. One of my projects has topped out and is almost entirely sheathed in plywood, already (whoop!). I didn't get out of the car to look at it, though, since I was wearing post-pedicure flip-flops, and those just aren't safe for a construction site. Also, there's a big fence around it, and I couldn't remember the combination to open the gate. The other project is one I've only done shop drawing approvals for, and it's also sheathed in plywood, and is much larger than I thought it would be. It swallows the lot. Enormous.

And now I'm back in my apartment, having just written some checks to a laboratory that did blood tests for my surgery and pondering how I'm going to keep all my medical bills for the year organized. I usually just throw them all in a file folder and let them stew until taxes roll around, but there's a huge quantity of them, this year, so I'm thinking it might be time to buy a binder and stow them all in there, in order, with the Explanation of Benefits forms nicely arranged with my invoices, etc.

At the very least, it gives me a reason to visit the Container Store once again, right?

It Was the Best of Times, It Was the Worst of Times

Best of Times

I am an aunt. My 8 lb. 3 oz. niece was born on July 25 at 1:29 pm. I'm overjoyed at the prospect of getting to spoil her rotten for the next 18 years of her life (and then some). My mom and I drove down to Houston as soon as we heard and met her Sunday evening, and I got to hold her.

Of course, as soon as she was put into my arms, I burst into tears.

That's how I roll, Dawg.

Right.

She's an incredibly lively baby, opening her eyes and looking around within hours of being born, kicking her little legs and moving her arms, amidst the motionless babies of the nursery born shortly before her. Amazing. The nurses all seemed as flabbergasted as my mom and I were. But then again, being the daughter of my sister, she's bound to be an over-achiever.

I kid! I kid!

As an aside, she was born at a hospital dedicated solely to women, so there were pregnant women everywhere. It was kind of... creepy. Something sci-fi about it, although I can quite pin down what it was. They moved around in big packs, too, with their mates alongside them. They give tours of the hospital to expectant moms on weekends. Crazy.

I also found out today that I am receiving a bonus on either Friday or Monday, which should be about the size of one of my paychecks (I hope).

Worst of Times

I have been placed on furlough. Without pay. My bonus and this next paycheck are the last ones I will receive until I am able to return to the office full-time, which is looking to be 2-1/2 or 3 weeks from now. Radio talked to me about it when I went into the office for an hour this afternoon (he caught me on the way out the door).

Then I talked to our book keeper, this afternoon, who informed me that I still had 60 hours of vacation left for the year (I have no idea how, unless I made up more hours than I realized for doctor visits) and about 30 hours of sick leave left.

I guess I underestimated the amount of work I've done during the past month I've been at home.

She told me I could use all that time towards the next couple of weeks I'll be out, if I need to. I think I won't, though, and I'll just live off the bonus and this next/last paycheck (I'm not going out, and not eating much in general, so expenditures are low, right now, with the exception of medical bills). God only knows what might happen post-op, and I want to be prepared in case I have to miss more work.

She also told me that they're going to go ahead and reimburse me the full amount that I paid towards the CT Scans (even though the whole amount might not be applied to the deductible at this time) because with the surgery, at least that much will be applied at some point, and they'll just figure it out from there. She was under the impression that I hadn't paid anything yet for the CT scans, so didn't realize I was already out almost $1000 that I'd have sitting on my credit card until the whole insurance debacle gets sorted out. So I'll get a check from the company next week, since I have to pay my credit card bill. She was much more understanding about the whole thing than I thought she would be, honestly.

At least the furlough won't change my insurance status, since I'm still technically employed. And the bonus will cover living expenses while I'm not getting paid. And I'll be able to pay off my credit card instead of racking up $130 in interest for the next month.

Always look on the bright side of life.

(Whistling) De-do. De-do-di-do-do-do.

That Answers That Question

I went into work this morning, and the first thing I did, okay, the second thing I did, was discuss my current health issues with Oldsmobile. (The first thing was deposit my purse and my can of root beer at my desk, but that's not important). Since I cry like a French futbol player, these days, I teared up, and my voice cracked while I tried to explain to him in the least embarrassing way possible what's wrong with me and that it's causing pain.

His response? If I need to work from home where I can lie down, then work from home. If I need to take a few days off, that's fine, they won't dock my pay.

"The most important thing, Ms. Strainedconsciousness, is for you to get well." He assured me that my job was secure because I'm a vital asset to the company, I'm so professional with clients, and because I'm so adaptable within the company. They need me for all the little things that spring up that Radio, Pacman, and Scooter aren't available to do (or, as is more often the case, just don't want to do, because it's boring).

So I've just finished up a bit of commercial specification writing, prone in my bed, and I'm about to make myself some lunch and read for a few minutes - but nothing so mentally taxing as The Economist, because I am still on muscle relaxers, so I'm kind of spacey - and then I'll return to my specifications for the rest of the afternoon, feeling less stressed about work than I have in a long while.

Speaking of muscle relaxers: it is damned hard to type when you're on muscle relaxers. Thank goodness for Microsoft Autocorrect, because otherwise there would be all sorts of typographical flotsam and jetsam all over my usually impeccable specifications.

In an hour or two, I'll give myself another injection and call my primary care physician to raise a point with her about my current treatment, and a point I raised with the surgeon I'm seeing who was kind of dismissive of my point, to see if she thinks it has any merit. Maybe she'll want me to come in to see her, and maybe I can schedule it for the same day as my next appointment with the surgeon so I won't miss work on multiple days (since I'm trying to double-up for efficiency's sake).

Woes Coming to a Close

My apartment was bombed, today. And by "bombed" I mean "the maintenance guy set off two flea foggers." I still have no idea how I came to have fleas in my apartment, unless I carried them home with me after lounging in a friend's backyard (which is the most likely option, at this point).

The big source of excitement for the day (apart from the bombing raids in Highland Park) was having Mrs. Robinson and Pacman back me up against Radio as to why we should not hire a gentleman named Luigi (not his real name, of course) for a contract job we may or may not get.

Luigi first appeared on our collective radar when he emailed his resume to the firm. Mrs. Robinson wrote him an email in reply, informing him that we don't have any positions, right now.

So he called, just to make sure.

Three times. In three weeks.

And then, out of the blue, he appeared in our office with his portfolio and proceeded to hang around for two hours while the guys listened to him lecture about the joys of ArchiCAD and how great he was at it, and then pulled out drawings.

Two hours. Of billable time. Wasted by a guy who didn't make an appointment.

Because we don't have any openings. Which we told him.

I was unemployed. I understand it's frustrating. I understand you get desperate. But no amount of desperation should drive you to interrupt the workday for people and cost them money. Because that's what he did.

He has continued to call every couple of weeks to beg for a job.

To refer to his "requests" as begging is not an exaggeration. His voicemails are along the lines of "Please! I really need to work for you!"

So now, we're looking at possibly having a large short-term workload, and Radio and Oldsmobile were kicking around the idea of hiring someone on a contract basis.

Luigi came up, because Radio feels sorry for him. Radio is the only person in the office that pities him that much. The rest of us, despite the fact that two of us were unemployed for extended periods of time and so should be sympathetic, are immune to pity in Luigi's case. His incessant calling - we've told him we have no positions available, that we have his resume on file, etc... - has driven us all to dislike him intensely.

Do I feel kind of guilty for disliking this man, who I have met only once? Yes.

But I also know that, if we were to hire him temporarily, he would expect us to keep him on permanently, and would probably refuse to leave. It would be like Bartleby, The Scrivener, but in real life, instead of a Herman Melville story (if you haven't read Bartleby, I highly recommend you do so).

So Luigi-Bartleby won't be coming to work for us any time in the future, near or not. I wish him luck in finding a job, but if he keeps his current approach up, he'll never find one.

He needs to start hitting happy hours. That's how all the best architects get their jobs...

Uncle Moneybags

I met my new client for the first time, yesterday, and then spent a full 95 minutes in his presence today.

I thank God I was chaperoned by one of my big-brotherly male coworkers.

At past jobs, my clients flirted with me. It's an occupational hazard when you're a 20-something female in a field where your commercial real estate clients are overwhelmingly male with overwhelmingly large pocketbooks that give them an overwhelmingly large sense of entitlement. Their flirtations were mostly benign and confined to the conference room, or cocktail parties for real estate promotions. But this character is something else, altogether.

Unlike past clients - and my present clients on other projects - who oozed money without ever talking about it except in the context of what they wanted to spend on their project, Uncle Moneybags talks about it. All the time. Seriously.

"I pay $500 per month for a climate controlled storage unit for my 5,000 bottles of wine."

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand?

"I was thinking about building a 15,000 SF house in Preston Hollow a few years ago, about $5 million or so, but decided not to."

That's quite the non sequitur. What, pray tell, does that have to do with asbestos abatement?

And he's one of those people who talks about money all the time, talks about how much money he spends, and then talks about how cheap he is and how much he hates to spend money. Wonderful.

And he hardly talked to Radio at all. Most of his comments were directed towards me. Even though I'm the subordinate in the office, the little helper, I received the brunt of his attention. Radio's the big man on the project. I'm just a CAD monkey, right now, inputting the existing floor plans into the computer so they make sense. But noooooooo. He hardly looked at Radio the whole time.

Granted, I was wearing white jeans, and according to my guy friends, a girl in white jeans is difficult to pry your eyes from, but still. When I left the room to investigate things, he inevitably followed, even if Radio was in the middle of discussing things with him. Important things. Sticky issues we might run into.

Like asbestos abatement.

Sigh. Maybe next time we go, his 25 year old ex-girlfriend - who's living in the apartment, right now, while the apartment he's bought for her is being renovated - will be the only one there. I have a sneaking suspicion he'll be there, though.

Maybe it's time to invest in a couple of muumuus.

OCDesign + Migraine = Working in Bed

Monday night, around 10:30 or 11:00 pm, give or take a few minutes and seconds, I realized I had a migraine coming on. I took my medicine, shut down my computer (I was working - yes, on stuff for the office), and went to sleep, aided by the anti-nausea medicine, which essentially is like smashing yourself in the head with a rubber mallet, insofar as unconscious-making goes.

I hoped that my preemptive strike would render me migraine-free Tuesday morning, ready to face the day and go to work, albeit a bit groggy-headed and sluggish for the day.

I was wrong in my hopes. Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.

My alarm went off, and it was literally all I could do to open my eyes. I guess the anti-nausea medicine hadn't worn off, because I was practically sleep-walking as I stumbled to the bathroom to take a shower. I had to lean against the wall, but wasn't really aware of the fact, because I was still so darned sleepy. Asleep, really.

After the water hit, however, I realized that I was leaning against the wall, and realized, more importantly, why I was leaning against the wall: I was dizzy. The room was positively swimming around me, and so I shut off the water - after rinsing the shampoo from my hair, natch - and called Mrs. Robinson to tell her I'd be late to work, that I'd had a migraine the night before and was off to a sluggish start this morning.

An hour later, I was no better. I called back and asked to speak to Radio. He answered the phone, and I told him I had a terrible case of migraine induced vertigo - not uncommon, I'd had it before - and that I was incapable of driving to work. "But I have my files and everything at home with me, so I'll work here," I said, trying to sound chipper and upbeat, although I'm sure I sounded rather more like the losing contender in a heavyweight boxing match.

I fell back asleep, since I still wasn't firing on all cylinders, and came to around noon and battled my way into a sitting position. My head vetoed that idea, so I slid my computer over onto the bed, rolled onto my side, and spent the next two hours researching possible bathroom flooring materials for the project I'm working on, right now. I've actually found one I like, and it's (relatively) affordable. I've emailed a link to the material to my work email and everything. By the time I'd found it, I was starting to feel better, so I put on some non-pajama clothes and sat up, and began working on CAD drawings, which is what I did from around 2:00 until 6:30, when I talked to my mom on the phone. By that point, the vertigo was almost entirely gone, to be replaced by a vague queasiness that I've had lately post-migraine, or pre-migraine, and sometimes en-migraine, so essentially constantly.

After the brief chat with my mom, I decided to venture out of the house, so I made a run to my happy place, aka Container Store, to buy a couple of things and now I'm back home, ready to return to my work.

Hurrah.

Projected Baby Boom in Dallas

I suspect that, round about the middle of November, give or take a few days, there will be a boom in baby deliveries in Dallas. Why? You're most likely assuming it's because of Valentine's Day, but you're wrong.

The reason for the boom de bebe is the Great Blizzard of 2010.

Wait. This is Texas. We don't have such things as blizzards. And yet, as I write, there is snow on the ground outside - because it's taking forever to melt - and a slew of slushy snowmen. It began snowing Thursday and continued on into the night, knocking out the power at my own little abode for 14 hours.

I didn't have power for 14 hours! As a result, all the food in my refrigerator had to be tossed, so there are some lovely frisbee-shaped discs of frozen-thawed-refrozen soup in my trash can. After I make dinner tonight, I will be taking out the trash. Double-bagged of course.

On the upside, I didn't have to go in to work on Friday, because nobody could/would drive to the office. Only Pacman made his way to the office, and that's because he could simply take the train. Mr. Robinson was snowed in at her house and could even get out of the driveway. Radio and Scooter had to take care of their kids, whose normal daycare accommodations were closed due to the iced over streets. Oldsmobile couldn't get to the office, either - although he dearly wanted to - because his driver couldn't get to him.

What did I do with my day off? After the power came back on, I worked from home, because I thought ahead and brought some redlines home with me. Until the power reasserted its presence, however, I lay in bed in a big sweatshirt under my enormous duvet reading Dwell and The Economist. Not a bad way to spend the day off, albeit a chilly one.

You Say It's Your Birthday!

Well, it's not mine, so congratulations if it's yours. Actually, there are two awesome birthdays, today. Oldsmobile turned 458, give or take a few, and one of my friends/family members had a baby! When I told Olds that my friend had a 10 lbs. 5 oz. baby, on his birthday, his reply was, "That's a wonderful birthday gift." He seemed pleased that someone I love was born on his birthday.

As a consequence of Olds turning 543, today, we celebrated. All day long. Mrs. Robinson decorated his office with balloons and yellow streamers - he was positively delighted - and we took him "somewhere scuzzy" for his birthday, as per his request. When we told him last week we wanted to take him to lunch for his birthday, his request was "somewhere scuzzy." We jokingly told him to bring lots of $1 bills, at which point he remarked that I would need a blind-fold, since my eyes shouldn't be subjected to such horrors.

Where was "somewhere scuzzy?" Adair's Saloon, as mentioned in my May 17, 2009, post (yeah, I had to check to see which one it was. I'm not that OCD). We ordered 2 pitchers of Shiner Bock and hamburgers all around (there were 6 drinking, plus one elderly non-drinking driver - not Olds, thank goodness, but his chauffeur, who is still pretty darned old). Radio, Pacman, and Scooter seemed to think it was amusing to have me drink more than anyone else at the table because I was just doing interior elevations. Thanks, guys.

We returned to the office and ate canasta cake, courtesy of Mrs. Robinson. I think she makes her buttercream icing with Crisco instead of butter, though. It was still delicious, and we all entered a carb/alcohol coma following the meal + drinks + cake. Oy.

I actually accomplished quite a bit of work following the lunch/binge, seeing as we have marketing mailers to send out. The firm for which I work has never sent out marketing materials, before, but we are, next week. As a result, I have 100 mailers to seal after I finish writing this entry. Hooray, work! I don't mind, actually, since I can get through 50 in about 10 minutes. It's just sticking a little sticky tab over the closure. I did 150 at work, today, while I waited for drawings to print.

I'm just good like that.

Then this evening, we had a cocktail party at one of Oldsmobile's friend's homes. So we all left work at 4:45 - a full 3 hours after we finished lunch/drinking - and went and had wine and "horse dervers" at her amazing home.

Her dining room is orange lacquered. The whole thing. I covet her dining room. And, yes, I told her as much.

I met a couple of lovely people at the cocktail party, managed to make them laugh (score!) and then had dinner with Radio, because everyone else had dogs/kids to get home to. Actually, Radio has a wife and son, too, but his wife and son had already eaten, so we grabbed some food. And, because we're in the architectural profession, another beer.

Yay, architecture.

In 30 Minutes

I hope to be in bed. I've spent the better part of the week getting entirely too little sleep, being absent-minded at work, and not accomplishing anything productive when at home. It's all a bit overwhelming for this girl.

The office has been somewhat in turmoil, this week, due to some missing artifacts that are highly valuable. What are they, you ask? I can't tell you, except that one of them is a key that gives access to the other, and the other is worth a ton of money, so the two combined are pretty darned important.

Aside from the key-loss stress, there's the stress of being under a deadline that has already passed, and which is not my fault for being missed. As usual, it is the fault of the client who made demands that were simply unreasonable, then set up roadblocks to those demands being met. Frustrating at best, but enough to make a girl cry, at worst.

I have not cried. Well, not about the assignment in arrears, but I did kind of lose it today when I found out one of my friends is newly unemployed. The guys in the office, poor souls, attempted to comfort me by discussing it, leading me to laughingly cryingly say ",Don't talk about it, and I'll stop crying! Jeez, you'd never know y'all are married!" They all laughed in response to this, and remarked that men as a whole have no idea what to do when women cry, regardless of their marital status.

On a completely different note, I purchased an album by Yo La Tengo, and just read the full title:

I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your A*s.

I think I'm going to love this band even more than I previously thought...

I Guess I Really Am Invisible...

I made the mistake of eating an ovo-lacto vegetarian dinner last night, and I woke up this morning hungry. About 10 minutes after I finished my shower, I started feeling weak and nauseous - I assumed as a result of hypoglycemia - so I sat on the counter to finish doing my make-up. I finished drying my hair and started to put my shoes on when the nausea hit harder, accompanied by some dizziness.

Hmmmm... Ok, could still be hypoglycemia.

I lay down for 20 minutes, which meant I was 15 minutes late to work, and then grabbed a Dr. Pepper and bolted out the door.

Ever since my last job - no, not sitting around unemployed and reading, the job before that that paid - I've eaten oatmeal almost every morning for breakfast. I keep a box of organic instant cinnamon raisin oatmeal packets on my desk and cook some up in the morning when I get to work, eating it while I check email and sign into the project files. It's a good routine, and it usually kills any morning hunger I may have. If not, I just eat another packet of oatmeal.

This morning, the Dr. Pepper and oatmeal ritual failed spectacularly. Thirty minutes after eating, I still felt nauseous and weak. Several times, I lay down on the floor in my cubicle, half-hoping no one would notice me on the floor, half-hoping someone would notice me so they could say, "Do you need to go home?" and I could say "Yes" without feeling guilty.

Alas, when Radio came over to my cubicle to get some plans off my desk, I was apparently not visible on the floor of my cubicle, because he grabbed the plans and went into the conference room with nary a glance.

Granted, he was on the other side of the drafting table, and there was a chair partly blocking me, but I'm pretty sure I would have noticed someone lying on the floor of their cubicle.

Pretty sure.

Around 2:00 (after going home for "lunch" wherein lunch = nap+2 bowls of cereal), I realized that maybe it wasn't hypoglycemia, since the Dr. Pepper and cereal and oatmeal, etc... should have killed that.

Yup, you guessed it: another aura migraine without headache. Bleh. I still have it, too, so I plan to go to sleep in 30 minutes after taking a large dose of ibuprofen.

Hopefully, I'll have something more entertaining about which to write tomorrow.

Just Like College All Over Again

Except not at all, really.

Today, after 5 hours of tagging details - interspersed with a few joyous minutes of designing details - I heard Pacman yell from the other end of the office, "Damn it! I need ice cream."

As anyone in my family will tell you, I am always up for ice cream.

I scream. You scream. We all scream for ice cream!

Scooter immediately asked, "Where could we go for ice cream?" We checked the Internet to see what was near our office - Paciugo's is now closed, so no pricey gelato for us. Eventually, we settled on walking down to the CVS after Pacman announced that he wanted an ice cream sandwich.

We locked the office door - Radio, Lola, and Oldsmobile were all out momentarily - and bolted down the fire stairs and out into the stifling heat of Downtown Dallas on an August afternoon. A five minute walk landed us in the air-conditioned environs of the downtown CVS, with its throngs of homeless buying cases of Natural Light and its white collar workers picking up Band-Aids.

We stood in the ice cream section - just past the beer, which made us wonder if we shouldn't have just headed to the bar on the first floor of the building - and debated whether to buy a 4-pack of the Nestle cones with chocolate and almonds on top, or if we should buy 3 individual ice cream sandwiches. The ice cream sandwiches were on sale, so we grabbed them and headed to the cash register.

I love Downtown because of all the people there from varying social strata that you wouldn't normally find interacting. The woman in front of us - with a gold tooth, but not the whole tooth, the kind that just sort of wraps around partially in the front - had another identifying feature: a bar code tattooed on the back of her neck. I guess it was to complement the three stars tattooed on the side.

Once back in the office, we began speculating: was the bar code there for quicker processing at the county jail? What would she ring up as if scanned? Would she be expensive or cheap?

Because of the tattoo's location, we couldn't see the SKU, but I suspect it was either some significant number (to her) or a string of curse words.

Why did the adventure remind me of college?

When I was in school, we'd be up at the architecture building all night, and occasionally, we'd make a 3 a.m. run to the local QuikTrip to get a huge soda and a hot dog or some chips (or those chocolate cream-filled cupcakes). There were always hapless drivers who'd turned the wrong way en route to I-20 while looking for gas, and their Land Rover would be parked next to a Cadillac sedan from the mid-80s with 26" chrome rims, and there'd be a female "hitch-hiker" in the parking lot, asking for money.

Of course, the QT smelled much better than the CVS. There was plenty of debate about the smell, but we finally settled on:

TRASH + FOOD GREASE + CHEAP PERFUME = EAU DE CVS DE VILLE.

Snarkicism

My coworkers and I stumbled upon a rival's website today while attempting to hunt down the contact information for one of his former employers. As I sat in my cubicle, all by my lonesome, updating interior elevations, I heard Radio yell, "Guys, come look at Moog's website!" Moog is not, of course, the rival's real name. Radio is not named Radio, Pacman is not named Pacman, and Scooter is not - thankfully - actually named Scooter. This is all to protect certain peoples' identities, as well as my own employment.

We all rushed into Radio's cubicle and there, on the screen, was Moog, orating to someone off-camera about his theory of architecture - which is pretty much Le Corbusier 101 - and the materials he uses ("Hey, we use those, too!"). It wasn't until the second go-round that we realized there was more to the site than just the video, which served only to make Moog look somewhat laughable in the eyes of architects, but which might seem impressive to lay-people.

What was so striking about the occurrence and its effect on all of us is that we all respect Moog very highly - he's probably one of the most talented architects in Texas, myself not-withstanding . However, the video made him appear to be an overblown and pompous ass, which I'm sure he's not. I've never actually met the man, since he is too far above my own plebeian status in the world of architecture.

Of course, the rampant snarkiness that ensued as we watched the video is just one reason that I love my job so much. The guys I work with are genuinely funny, and have the same "take no prisoners" sense of humor that I inherited from my father. They can turn anything into a joke, and the best jokes are at their own expense, typically. Today, however, they weren't forced to mock themselves as the all-knowing and incredibly impressive Moog gave us ample fodder for that.

Whoa There Cowboy, Let's Not Get Carried Away

Work has been going well, and I have mountains of interior elevations to annotate and hatch (or, for you non-architecty people, I have to put patterns on them that represent materials). I am, truly, the forgotten architect, as Radio, Pacman, and Oldsmobile neglected to inform me that they were meeting to discuss the project on which I'm working. I was called in for the last 15 minutes, just before Oldsmobile left and Radio abandoned the conference room to call a client.

In other news, Emilio sent me flowers today, and not just any flowers, but Bird of Paradise, calla lilies, and something pink and waxy looking. I'm not sure what it's called, apart from many-petaled waxy pink flower.

I have to say, I was freaked out. Yeah, yeah, maybe I should have been all, "Oh, how sweet! He sent me flowers!" but the fact is, I was a little weirded out. Heck, I'm still a little weirded out. I knew he was a bit gung-ho about me, but... The card was kind of gushy, too. Granted, maybe what he intended to say was lost in translation and came out more enthusiastic than he intended.

At least, that's what I'm hoping.

If his over-exuberance continues, I'm going to have to talk to him about it, to let him know that, yes, he's a great guy, and I'm enjoying his company, but he needs to slow it down a bit.

A fellow I once went on a date with told me that I was "hard to read." I guess his idea of flirting would have been if I licked his face. Regardless, I flirted more with Mr. You're-a-Borderline-Ice-Queen than I have with Emilio, with whom I've been very reserved, and he's still this excited about me.

The upshot of all this is that I simultaneously have the feeling that of course he's smitten with me, I'm an amazing person and should be revered by all with a religious fervor while at the same time something is screaming get out while you still can! He will stalk you and kill you and wear your skin as a dress. Except he didn't seem creepy until he sent flowers.

And now, I feel nothing but pity for males: send flowers too late (if at all) and you're a boor; send flowers too early, and with too much enthusiasm, and you're a latter day Jack the Ripper.

I am so glad I'm not a guy.

I'm a Big Kid, Now!

I was informed this morning that I get to have my own project!

Sort of.

I will be designing the house for some Ranch Hands that must complement the newly designed main house on our clients' property. As Radio pointed out, "Yeah, the ranch manager and his wife will live there. Scary people. No teeth." I laughed. "I'm serious," he replied.

Neat.

So my first solo assignment is a dumbed down version of the big house, with a floor plan the client presented to Oldsmobile with the admonition that he not make it too fancy, because it's only the ranch hands' house. I guess it beats drawing interior elevations of the Master Closet for another project, although I was actually looking forward to detailing all the woodwork in the library.

I signed the application for my lease, today - did I mention I forgot to do that crucial step on the application I turned in Friday? - and tomorrow, I can either fax or drop off a copy in the mailbox of my pay-stub, which will corroborate the claims I made about my salary. The claims are all entirely true, as being accused of fraud and evicted from my apartment hold no attraction for me.

Last night, in typical OCD architect-designer fashion, I built a 3D model of my (hopefully) future apartment in SketchUp and experimented with furniture layouts. With some input from my mom, I think I came up with a floor plan to my liking. Now, I just have to hope that I get the apartment.

I am somewhat concerned, however, because it appears that the apartment I hoped to rent will not be the exact one I will get. It seems that the complex found someone to rent that one, and I will get a different one, currently lived in by another renter. This means I might not get the breathtaking view of Downtown that I coveted. I guess I'll live, but I don't even know which building I'll be in, now, or how close I'll be to the elevator. I think I'll call the leasing agent tomorrow to clarify the details.

Hopefully, I'm mistaken and misinterpreted what the not-my-normal-leasing-agent said, otherwise I might have to redo that 3D model. You know, because the fireplace might be in a different corner...