See, no good comes of drinking
Apparently, for the people who actually have to put one bit of cryptic code after another to produce functioning software rather than answering phones, this was a pretty hectic week at BioSoft. Can't say I miss deadlines that much, especially in the IT field - there's always some last minute changes, and meetings to discuss those last minute changes that keep you from actually working on them during business hours (so you stay late even though you've got tickets for anything), some horrible sort of hardware failure, etc. And people are starting to get wise to people blaming it on Microsoft. Oh, they've had their own Microsoft issues, but not so much lately, with XP being so damn reliable, and if Microsoft is so damn evil why do you keep paying for those expensive MSDN memberships...?

This week was nutty, of course, because it was the QA period, so things were just zinging back and forth between the developers and QA, and people were being taken off other projects to help. Maureen practically spent the entire day today on printer patrol, making sure that they were constantly stocked with paper and toner, while I rode herd on a whole bunch of pizza and other lunch deliveries.

But, finally, it was done at 3pm today and the noise from the actual work area was a lot of "hey, this works too! Excellent!" Then lots of high-fiving.

So, we all adjorned to The Place at just about the exact stroke of five. It was a boisterous time. I had to correct a few people who claimed that signing Byung-Hyun Kim to a multi-year deal was a bad idea, but these were people who were bitter about losing Shea Hillenbrand for an above-average pitcher in the first place. One of 'em got really heated; I don't know how long he had been there, but he got up in my face yelling. Actually, sort of up over my face; I'm not really used to being physically intimidated yet; I don't realize that this could be trouble until I realize that I'm tilting my head back to see just how red a guy's eyes are. Kate pulled me away, telling me that I really shouldn't bait people like that. I don't do it on purpose; it just happens.

Anyway, we'd barely gotten back to Carter, Dimitri, and Mark (Mark was ragging Dimitri mercilessly about how great it must be to have an underage girlfriend because it makes a bar like this a complete safe haven) when Kurt and Denise came in. Didn't see us, I don't think - heck, I probably wouldn't have seen him if Kate hadn't pointed him out - but I suddenly decided it would be nice to be elsewhere. I told Carter that I'd show him off another time, and we headed back to his house to kill some time before heading out to the midnight movie.

He must really have been dragging, though, since he was asleep just as soon as he hit the bed. Really, just as soon - I sit down to unzip my boots, look up, and he's snoring away. I wrote him a note, reminding him that we had another double-date with Kate & George tomorrow, and let him sleep.

I've got to say, there are times when I don't miss parts of my old life. Even though I work a full 40-hour week, I get paid overtime if I have to stay late; that's not the case for the salaried guys. And as borning and tedious (and not terribly well-paying) as being a receptionist can be, I haven't had a week at work that has really tried to break my will yet, either.

-Michelle
- posted 11:03 PM - - (archive use only)