I left for work at around 08:20, briefly talking to my mom beforehand. She has been experiencing some tooth pain as of late. I have been nagging her to get the filling redone, but she has been putting it off for months until now. I advised her to take some Advil or something to relieve the pain before her appointment. She said that it wasn't necessary. She's stubborn that way.

I walked into work and first spoke to the president's son (PS). He was telling me about the new hires at the company, who are about to play some important roles. He basically shared some information about an office shuffle upstairs. My former boss is now moving into the president's stepdaughter's office, as the latter will be on maternity leave soon.

As I predicted, my former boss, the glorified bookkeeper, is pissed off at the president's wife for hiring a CFO. Well, that's too bad. The company is growing and finances must be accurate. My former boss doesn't have any chartered accounting designation and apparently sucks at her job. Most people I have talked to do not feel sorry for her. She is known to be the company bitch. She is finally getting a taste of her own medicine.

So, PS spent some time talking to me about this in the kitchen. The sales coordinator then walked in. This was a great test to see how quiet he can be. He did pretty well. Soon, the quality assurance person and spy girl walked in. I talked briefly with them when PS paused a few times. He gets easily distracted.

iPod boy (DJ) gave me a blank CD to burn the latest Elton John CD for him. I did just that for him. I gave him a DVD that contained three movies he had lent me to convert into iPod movie format. I had forgotten to bring back his DVDs, though. He claimed that his drive wasn't recognizing his DVD. I looked and pointed out that he had put it in the wrong drive. He said that I knew his computer more than he did. I said that I had watched him make the same mistake a couple of days ago.

Moments later, he showed me scanned pictures of each of his family member's passports, but showed his to me first. I asked him if I'll be getting nightmares tonight. He then showed me his younger daughter's passport, saying that she didn't like her photo at all. Hey, when you're not allowed to smile, that's what happens.

I started revamping another brochure today. DJ came over and said that it looked nice. He needed help with syncing the three movies to his iPod. So, I went over to where he was sitting and helped him out with iTunes. It looked like his movies had uploaded properly.

Well, he came over and said that they only play the audio, but the video was missing. I had no idea why that was happening. I joked and said it was a user error and that I was confused. He said that it doesn't take much for me to get confused and quickly shielded his head, in case I felt like slapping him in that location. Well, he came back moments later and said he had toggled the TV out feature to get the video to work. He nudged my left arm and joked that I should have known that. Seriously, he thinks I know everything, but I don't.

It was neat when, at one stage, we had our video iPods in our hands, pretty much side by side. I asked him if he was going to take his iPod on vacation to watch movies. He said that he was thinking of doing that.

I got a call from my boss a few minutes before I was going to do lunch with curly girl and PS. He wanted the names of our customers removed from a PDF, but didn't know how to do it. Being my regular self, I offered my assistance. He advised that he needed this file by 13:00 and was going to send it to me.

I hung up the phone. Curly girl and PS said it was time to go. I told them that I had to get a file out. Curly girl came over and asked if they should wait for me or if they should meet me at Swiss Chalet. After thinking about it, I said that I'd meet them there. She gave me her mobile number, just in case I couldn't make it and maybe I wanted something brought back. DJ was at his desk this entire period. I knew he was listening in on our conversation.

It took me ten minutes to find and remove all the customer references in the PDF. I then sent it to my boss and started getting ready to head out. I talked to the new girl next to me. She asked if I was going out. I was. It's incredibly noticeable when I leave my desk to go out.

I met DJ in the main corridor and asked if he wanted anything from Swiss Chalet. He asked me which one I was going to, for the one I was about to head over to is now closed. Great. He suggested that I call curly girl to stop them from getting there. I thanked him for the tip. He said he wanted chicken curry, so he was fine.

I got in my car and called curly girl. She serenaded me with my very own theme song. We both said that the Swiss Chalet was closed. She was at the nearest Licks with PS. I said I was on my way and that I'd see her soon.

I got a pretty good parking spot and walked in. Curly girl and PS were in the lineup. The shipping guy was reserving seats. He gave them up to order, which sucked. Anyway, PS paid for all our lunches. We all ordered different items. PS had the homeburger, curly girl went with chicken, I had the gobbler, and the shipping guy went with a back bacon burger.

As predicted, PS didn't say a peep. The shipper was fairly quiet himself. Both curly girl and I were the most talkative. I was just glad to chat a bit with people.

It was a gorgeous, sunny day outside. We went outside to catch a few rays. We then headed back to the office. I drive faster than curly girl does. By the time I had parked my car and was at the side door of the building, she was there, dropping off the guys.

I walked into the building and broke the news to the sales coordinator that I didn't go to Swiss Chalet. I had asked her if she had wanted anything there. She was hoping for some chicken noodle soup, but was okay. While we were talking, DJ walked past us and back to his desk.

I got back to my desk and sat down. I got a couple of nice e-mail from my boss and the nice saleswoman from Las Vegas. Both thanked me for helping them with the PDF.

DJ asked how lunch was. I said it was fine and that we went to Licks instead. DJ told me that curly girl had paged for me, but I had just left the building. DJ picked up the phone to tell her that. He then said that the Swiss Chalet was closed. She had already reached the restaurant and had left for Licks by then.

He said to me that he could have warned them had he been invited. He doesn't like being singled out, like most of us, but he feels it more when I end up going with others and he is excluded. I have figured this out within the past year. I told him that PS had initially invited curly girl. The latter wanted to talk to someone, so that was when I was invited. That cracked up DJ and he felt much better. I don't know if that's true, but that's my interpretation of it.

I worked on release notes for the rest of the afternoon. DJ talked more to me about iTunes and thanked me for help as he was wasting my time by getting me to assist him. I poked fun at myself, saying that I was good at wasting time. He asked if that was my primary job. I said nothing. It was a good response, even though we both knew that it wasn't true.

According to the sales coordinator, our former boss, the controller, is pissed off at the president's wife. This was evident today, when the latter asked the sales coordinator to go out for a smoke. Normally, the president's wife and the controller do that together.

I left just after 17:00. DJ was pulling me into his conversation by saying that it took mischievous guys like him to pry me away from work. We talked as we walked towards the lunchroom. He then went on a rhyming spree. I looked at him funny. He told me to just go. I said goodnight to him and left.

PS was outside, talking to the sales coordinator and her smoking buddy. It was nice outside. I wished them all a good evening and we proceeded to my car.

PS and I decided to have dinner at Swiss Chalet in the Beaches. It was a nice evening to take a walk down there. Too bad we didn't have that much time. He bought me dinner, which was a nice gesture. I had the quarter chicken dinner. He had the chicken wrap. We both went with fries. I even had to steal some of his chalet sauce.

We left at 18:30 and drove to the parking lot where I normally park to get to Kool Haus. PS paid for parking. There was a girl in the passenger side of a Pontiac Firebird, who asked how much parking was after PS had paid for it. I said it was $10 and then pointed to the sign that she could have seen herself. She didn't say thanks or anything, which annoyed me a bit. They then drove off. You tend to get cheaper parking when you park farther away from the venue. They were going closer to it.

Anyway, it was the first concert in quite some time where I forgot to bring my camera. Oh well. This was an all-ages show and it started at 19:00.

The first band that opened was The hush sound, a band from Chicago. They were great. I enjoyed their happy songs. They are obviously influenced by many styles of music. I'll have to order their latest CD.

The second band to hit the stage was Boys like girls. They were generous with throwing out their drumsticks, picks, and water bottles out to screaming fans. They were good, but I preferred the first band more.

During the second break, I had asked PS if he wanted to sit down. He said he was fine, but I didn't think so. With my bingo attendant experience standing at least eight hours in a day, for twenty days straight, standing for 3.5 hours at a concert wasn't a big deal to me. We walked around a couple of times.

A couple of weird things did happen. I was standing, talking to PS, when all of a sudden, a kid probably not much older than fifteen years of age, walked right into me. She looked at me as if I was the one at fault. My reaction? Holy cow! She really needed to watch where she was going.

The other oddity was this thin, tall guy, wearing a white t-shirt with a really short pair of shorts, white tube socks, and a white cap on his head, prancing around the dance floor. He got a lot of attention. By the end of the evening, he had a following -- literally.

Hellogoodbye came on-stage just before 21:00. It was an incredibly energetic and fun show. The stage had windows and walls with photos on them. There were lap shades and pillows everywhere. Streamers were tossed all over the place. It was pure fun.

The band sang with approximately ten females from the audience. They were clearly enjoying themselves, too. Forrest, the lead singer, was quite the character, dancing and literally putting his hand on a couple of dancer's faces. After a few songs, the dancers left the stage.

The remix of "All of your love" was great. A lot of their songs came from their latest CD, Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!. They did a great, longer version of "Oh it is love." Jesse, on keyboards, spoke just as much as Forrest did. They are so wacky. I like them.

The dancers came back towards the end of the show. A pillow fight ensured among them. Forrest gave a couple of them quite the whack with the rather huge pillow he had in his hand. I take it that it was one of the fan dancer's birthday, as pictures were being snapped left, right, and centre.

The encore consisted of a decent cover of The Beastie Boys' "(You gotta) fight for your right (to party)," with Jesse singing lead vocals. Hellogoodbye ended the evening by singing the upbeat "Touchdown turnaround (don't give up on me) ." It was a terrific night of music.

The show ended just after 22:30. I drove PS home. He stayed awake for most of the trip. I guess he needed to take his iron pill soon, which explains why he tends to fall asleep all the time. He has an iron deficiency.

I had a good drive home. The temperature tomorrow is expected to reach a high of 22°C. Yay!

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Song that's stuck in my head: Hellogoodbye's "Oh it is love"
Yummy food eaten today: Gobbler burger
What I crave: Something containing chocolate

Recent thoughts:
Readings, lights, and random thoughts - 2009-03-15
Thoughts about work, school, and peeps - 2009-03-09
Working from home and a mini life update - 2008-12-19
The weekend is here! - 2008-01-06
A new year - 2008-01-01