(Tap, Tap, Tap) Um... Is This Thing On?

So you've come looking for your daily dose of Murky Words, expecting to be disappointed once agai- what's this? FINALLY, a post. 'Tis true! I'm back, bearing large apologies and a sheepish grin. TWICE I had planned on posting this week (Tuesday night and tonight and... Well actually, I am posting tonight, technically, but it isn't the excessively lengthy and overly grandiose piece that I had envisioned) and twi- er, ONCE I was denied.

You can blame FedEx. On both days, I arrived home to find they had posted a "Sorry, we missed you!" tag on the door which instructed me to head to an address in South Boston to pick up whatever it was they were so sorry I had missed. And so, off to Southie I went. I won't apologize for Tuesday's trip. As luck would have it, it ended up being my very first paycheck from my new job (sent via FedEx because they forgot to issue it with all the others.) You fine folk mean a lot to me and all, but a brutha-man got to get paid, know what I'm sayin'? Today was a sort of follow up package - 'Your Benefits for 2007' and all that jazz, and after a cursory looksie, they could have just as easily sent it via regular mail. I mean, don't they know that an anxious public awaits? A public who needs something to read in order to avoid work? Well - they soon will! Why, I've got half a mind to...

Oh yeah, the new job. It's going very well, actually. Thanks for asking. At the risk of boring you to tears, I'll just mention that it involves a lot of proprietary application support and back end database work. Or, at least it would if I were doing any. The other people in my department haven't exactly cottoned on to the fact that there's a newbie in the office that they can dump part of their workload on to. Needless to say, I haven't exactly been in any hurry to point this out. So, tell me. How many times do you think a guy can check his personal email account in one day? Eh - how many? Noooooo, that's way too low.

Still, I am learning a ton, and - unbelievably - getting paid to do it, so things are pretty nifty, indeed. In fact, just today I enrolled in the company 401(k) - what happened to versions (a) through (j) is still unclear to me - and, wouldn't you know, I feel all productive and smart and shit... Just wait. Soon, I too will be a middle aged man with salt and pepper hair, wearing slacks and a cardigan while walking my dog on the beach. I'll throw a stick for Rover to fetch and while he's off being stupid and getting distracted by gulls, I'll call my financial adviser and say, "Edgar? Eric here. It's time for some straight talk about my financial future!" And he'll say, "Too true, Eric. Too true. Tell me, how would you like to balance your portfolio?" Feels good to be on the fast track, no?

Woah. Forgive me. Those are the ramblings of a sleep-deprived Bostonian suffering from a dearth of creativity. Basically, I've been doing the usual for the past two weeks: reading some (although not a lot - still stuck on the book in the sidebar there), watching Christmas specials (Charlie Brown, anyone? Rudolph? Misfit Toys?), happily enduring the wrath of graduate students with varying degrees of frayed nerves, cutting my toenails, trying to decide just how casual 'business casual' is, watching movies (go see 'The Departed' and 'The Queen' - both are excellent), rebuilding computers, rediscovering music on the drive to/from work, shimmying, oh... and posting.

Now, however, I'm going to put a stop to this nonsense and try 'sleeping.' Perhaps it will put the joints back in the areas that are currently 'dis.' Just wanted to let you know that I'm alive, I'm well, I'm tired, and that I'll be back soon - probably tomorrow. Ta, until then.