The Etch A Sketch thread - Freeze-Frame Radio

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

RE: The Etch A Sketch thread

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

Somehow it will still be your fault.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

She's trying, but it's not working this time. She tried inferring that I should've caught it because 1954-2009 wasn't 50 years. But how was I to know it was a 50th anniversary? In fact, I thought they might be using the years because it wasn't a straight 50.

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

Next she will be telling you that that 4 was a 9 and you should have seen the difference.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

No, it was quite obviously a 4. But as she was talking to the lady about it, she took her pen and wrote a 9 over the 4. I wouldn't be surprised if later she says, "No, I wrote a 9, see!"

Mad Mema · Bad Biker Granny

Etch: (via IM) "So someone forwarded me the spreadsheets for the updates you want to make on switches 912 and 913. I'm looking at them, but I don't see anything. Am I missing something?"

Me: "Yes... the data."

Etch: "I know that. Where would I find it?"

Me: "Traditionally, in an Excel spreadsheet, the start of the data is column A, line 1, on sheet 1. My spreadsheets follow the standard conventions. In this instance, they utilize columns A-D, line count varies by switch."

Etch: "Okay, but what I mean is will you please resend them?"

Me: "Sure."

Etch: "Are you going to be difficult all day?"

Me: "I answered the questions you asked. Are you going to beat around the bush all day or are you going to ask the questions you mean to ask? "

Etch: "Oh. I guess you have a point there."

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

Man, I wish I could mess with my Etch like that. When I do, she complains to my boss, who basically says to me, "Yes, I know she's a pain, but be nice."

Mad Mema · Bad Biker Granny

I really wasn't trying to mess with him. Our long standing and well known rule is: Ask the question you mean to ask, because I will answer the question that you asked me. I will not necessarily answer the question you didn't ask me.

"Will you please resend your spreadsheet?" is completely different than "Where on this spreadsheet you have already sent is your data?" Therefore, they receive entirely different responses.

Pambo · Waiting To Be Widowed

There goes your technical side again... biggrin

Mad Mema · Bad Biker Granny

You know that's how it works! You do the same dang thing... I've witnessed you do it.

Pambo · Waiting To Be Widowed

I know. I do it all the time. biggrin

Mad Mema · Bad Biker Granny

Yeah.. me too!

Too many years at this job. It's ingrained in my nature.

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

Maybe if I start doing that people will leave me alone and quit asking me for stuff.

Mad Mema · Bad Biker Granny

It works quite well for me most of the time. Sometimes it tends to piss people off, but in the long run they eventually learn to ask the right questions.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

Oh no.

Space is at a premium in our offices, so some files are located in an office instead of the filing room. The file cabinets in the file room were at capacity again, so some files got moved into offices. Some of the accounts that I deal with got their files moved into the Etch's office.

If I go in there to get a file, do you think she'll let me leave without asking me an Etchy question?

Hopefully I can avoid accessing those files as much as possible. I don't like using the physical files anyway.

disco strangler · Smiles everyone, smiles!

Bummer...

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

Well, she's back from vacation. She's not been too etchy today though. But she did tell me a story about buying a purse. She went to a Coach outlet store, and found a purse she liked for $399. (An outlet price of $399! If I spend that much on a something to just carry my crap around in, it better make julienne fries!) She waited in this huge long line, and when she was the next person to be checked out, she saw another purse she liked. She couldn't decide which one she liked better, so she just left without buying either.

Etchy, but I'm surprised she didn't buy both.

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

You stand in a long line and don't buy either?

I thought you were going to say that she bought both. Had me fooled.

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

Oh year, if I were going to spend $400 for a purse, I better actually be buying about 20 purses.

Mad Mema · Bad Biker Granny

I wish I had the coin to buy a $400 purse.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

When Etch left on vacation, she tried to get me to walk her through changing her voicemail. I put her off, and eventually she said she figured it out herself. (Yep, I was stunned.)

Now she's asking my boss how to change it back.

And like many voicemail systems, when you access your voicemail, it says, "To listen to your messages, press 1.... To change your voicemail, press 5." Yep, all she has to do is listen to the recording, and it will tell her how to change it.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

Time for my daily whining about the Etch. Sorry.

We're getting a new digital printer later this week. My boss and I were talking about what pricing to set for the stuff we sell from it, when the Etch walks in.

First, she complains that no one has told her anything about the new printer. She shares a friggin' bed with the other owner (let's call him Owner A [since he owned his half before my boss bought the other half]), she can take it up with him!

Then my boss mentioned that Owner B said he was going to make up a price list. Etch responds not to count on it (which we already knew, that's why we were talking about pricing), because he's too busy.

But the icing was when she said she didn't know how we had the time to stand around with the Green Book (our binder of retail pricing guidelines) and talk about pricing.

Um, isn't charging customers part of running a business? How is that a waste of time?

Dylan · Leader Of The Banned

Mz, if there was a canned laughtrack...it might make a good sitcom...

Who would play you? smile

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

Dylan wrote:

Mz, if there was a canned laughtrack...it might make a good sitcom...

Who would play you?

You know, you're right, this is like my version of The Office.

Hm, good question. I don't know what actor I would want to play me in anything. We should have a thread about that.

Dylan · Leader Of The Banned

How about Molly Ringwald? smile

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

I think I just got short with the Etch. Oh well.

She was in my office because she sent me a file that we can't print from (and she doesn't know enough to tell the customer what they need to send us, but that's a different frustration). I have a couple notes taped to my screen. One is fraction to decimal conversions. The other is shortcuts for a service I use called GoPingMe.com. She pointed to that note and asked, "What's that?"

I really wanted to tell her it was none of her business. I really wished she hadn't asked, because I knew she wouldn't understand it anyway. But I said, "It's for a thing I use called Go Ping Me."

"What?"

"Go Ping Me."

"What's that?"

Darn, I wish she hadn't asked that. I don't have the patience to dumb everything down for her today. "It's a service that emails me stuff."

"What's that?"

"Do you want me to go to the website and explain what the whole thing is?"

"No, I just want to know what it is."

Later in the middle of looking at this file that won't work, she says, "They should call it Go Bling Me, I like that."

Later she comes back to my office to tell me something else, and randomly she says, "Go Ping Me. I just like the way it sounds."

I wish I would've never told her.

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

But she likes you Mz.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

confuzzed wrote:

But she likes you Mz.

Unfortunately.

Sometimes she can be really nice and appreciative.

Most times she's so flighty I don't want to be around her. She's bordering, if not crossed over into, rude.

confuzzed · Permanent State of Confusion

I am sure. They are people like that everywhere. I am sure it is more difficult in a comapny with a tiny staff. I probably would have ripped her head off and used it for a soccer ball by now.

MzHartz · Permanent Vacation

I just got a call from an Etch.

"Where are you located?"

"We are on Rogers St, just south of Patterson."

"Are you south of Arby's?"

"Yes, we're quite a bit south of Arby's."

"Are you south of Rally's?"

Rally's is directly across the street from Arby's.