11-08-01 - 2001 A.D... D.

I'm generally not much of a hypochondriac, but I was recently having a conversation with some friends about Attention Deficit Disorder, and it suddenly struck me that I might have it.  

I have considered the possibility that I have ADD prior to this conversation, but never seriously.  But suddenly, it hit me.  I must have it!  That must be why my mind wanders, why I can't concentrate on work, why I can never remember to pay my bills, why I often find myself pantsless... and any number of a million little problems I've had for some time.

I took a little online test, and knew I was in trouble right away.  The test was comprised of a list of behaviors, which you would rate numerically as to how seriously they applied to you.  Things like "Easily distracted, tendency to drift away" and "Tendency to be easily bored (spaces out)" and "Tendency to invade vampire chat rooms and act like a schmuck."

Actually, the first thing I noticed was that the test had 76 questions.  That struck me as odd.  I mean, come on!  If I have ADD, how the hell am I supposed to concentrate long enough to answer 76 questions?  That's like a doctor who specializes in acrophobia having an office at the top of the Sears Tower.  You're not even giving the patient a chance to help himself.

Of course, it dawned on me that the very fact I would think the test was too long might be just another indication that I am suffering from ADD.  I was playing right into this test's hands!  Clever, test, clever.  I kept going.

"#18:  Trouble sitting still, such as trouble sitting in one place for too long, sitting at a desk job for long periods, sitting through a movie."

Currently, I am having trouble sitting at a desk job for long periods, although this is mostly due to the goddamn intercom going off (in fact, it interrupted me twice while I was taking the test).

"#19:  An internal sense of anxiety or nervousness"

It's pretty obvious I've got that one down pat.  Maybe the ADD Foundation is looking for a spokesperson...

"#26:  Frequent, impulsive job changes"

Ha ha ha!  Ha ha!  Ha... ha.  heh.  huh.

Hm.

"#29:  Poor organization and planning, trouble maintaining an organized work/living area"

Okay, I'm screwed.  I'm totally screwed!  I'm so screwed!

"#44:  Negativity."

D'oh!

"Poor organization and planning, trouble maintaining an organized work/living area"

"Chronically late or chronically in a hurry"

"Poor financial management (late bills, check book a mess, spending unnecessary money on late fees)"

"Singing songs about barbeque wings before obliviously whomping women in the crotch with said wings"

Hoo boy.  Well, it certainly wasn't looking good.  Of course, some things I didn't feel applied to me:

"Skips around while reading or trouble staying on track"  - Reading, I do just fine.  I don't absorb a word of it, at least not for very long, but I can read the crap out of stuff.

"Say just what comes to mind without considering its impact" - I rarely say anything without thinking about it first.  In fact, I rarely say anything, period.

"Spends excessive time at work because of inefficiencies" - Ha!  That'll be the day.  I may be inefficient, sure, but come 5:00PM, I'm gone like a shot.

"Failure to see others' needs or activities as important" - Well, take my co-workers.  I definitely see their needs and activities as important.  I just happen to not care.

"Tendency to embarrass others" - No.  Myself, sure.  Others, no.

"Poor writing skills (hard to get information from brain to pen)" - Bah!  I write a daily website!  No way in hell am I having problem with information getting to page from brain or pen with difficulties!  Stupid is that!

Anyway, I took the whole thing, and just as I thought, the test informed me that "may have Adult ADD."  But that's all it said.  No in-depth analysis of my answers, or how serious it might be, or anything.   Just one sentence, after all that work and fidgeting and daydreaming.  Thanks a lot, test.

Anyway, here's the link to the test I took.  For me, the whole thing was a little alarming.  Do I really have ADD?  Should I really be concerned?  It bugged me for the rest of the day.  Well, for a couple hours, anyway.  Then I kinda lost interest.

e-mail: temp@notmydesk.com

11-07-01 - Hitting the Cruise Button

As you've probably noticed, the entertainment industry is in an uproar over how to deal with the terrorist attacks.  They're going nuts trying to remove anything having to do with the attacks, altering New York skylines with computers, pushing back releases of movies dealing with terrorists, etc.  They even pulled a Seinfeld rerun, the one where George's fiancée died from licking poisoned envelopes, due to the anthrax situation.

(On the other hand, other shows are rushing to be topical.  The West Wing, for example, had a special dealing with the attacks, and CBS's The Agency has an episode dealing with anthrax due to air this Thursday (although this episode, too, was delayed several times).  Other examples abound, I'm sure.)

The reason I bring all this up is because I wrote a movie review a while back, and the movie (and therefore the review) features not only the deliberate crash of a civilian jetliner, but also a bioterrorism plot.

Now, I'm not trying to draw any parallels between this website and the entertainment industry, but I felt a little weird about posting the review for the same sorts of reasons.  You don't want to present something that's meant to be entertainment and wind up bumming people out because it reminds them of the attacks.  Hell, even watching a silly movie like Airplane! these days could make you uneasy.  It's almost ridiculous, but it's true.  The other day I was flipping through a Calvin & Hobbes book and came across a comic where Calvin is (imagining) crashing a plane, and I thought, in a word, "Guh."  

So, a review of a movie that involves planes crashing and bioterrorism might not be what the doctor ordered right about now.

On the other hand, running the review gives me a chance to make fun of Tom Cruise.  Terrorists be damned, I can't give up that God-given right.

So, uh, here's my review of Mission: Impossible 2!

Click here to read it!

e-mail: temp@notmydesk.com

11-06-01 - Temp Chat:  D-FENS

Once again, I infiltrated an IRC channel to find temps.  Once again, I found not a single temp, but at least I found someone willing to talk about them.  Of course, once he started talking about temps, he wouldn't shut up.  Worse than that, he was talkin' trash, which got my dander up.

Here's a partial transcript of me going undercover in one of the highly entertaining vampire chat rooms.

*** Now talking in #vampyrenexus

 

* Cyber^Wolf nods her head and welcomes you to the Nexus :)

 

* DarkyeTemp greets the channel with a cold, flinty stare... daring all to meet his gaze

 

<Damine_Watters> relax dt

<Damine_Watters> have fun

<DarkyeTemp> Oh, okay!

<DarkyeTemp> I thought this was one of "those" channels

<DarkyeTemp> You know. All the dorks pretending they're vampires and that vampires are real and all that silly crap

<DarkyeTemp> ha ha

<DarkyeTemp> So, any temps in here?

<Damine_Watters> temps?

<Damine_Watters> was you mean by that

<DarkyeTemp> oh, not again.

<DarkyeTemp> um, like, temporary employees? y'know?

<Zarendangar> nah we all have real jobs

* Damine_Watters nods

<DarkyeTemp> ah... so, temping isn't a "real" job?

<DarkyeTemp> that's funny. because I could have sworn I got a real paycheck and everything. Albeit a small one...

<DarklonX> I have a real job and a real paycheck

<Damine_Watters> as do i

<DarkyeTemp> Do any of you work with temps?

<DarklonX> nope I work at a home family business

<Zarendangar> no actually beign a temp gives companies the right to screw its full time imployees .. by hiring underpaid workers to do substandard work

<DarkyeTemp> Huh, really?

<DarkyeTemp> Well, if it's substandard work, wouldn't you say the company is screwing itself?

<DarkyeTemp> And anyway, how can you blame the temps? They're just trying to make a living. Maybe if the full time employees were a little more valuable, they wouldn't be replaced so easily

<Zarendangar> wll amybe if there were no temps it would cause companies to hire fulltime employees

<DarkyeTemp> So, temps should just, like, not exist?  They're just using temping to find full-time work. Many of them are hired full time.

<Zarendangar> and this causes temp companies to ahve contracts wth these companies who will not hire fulltime workers to do the job

<Zarendangar> companies are not concerned with quality just quantity

<DarkyeTemp> kinda like you with your typing.

<DarkyeTemp> Well, it's hardly the temps fault, is all I'm saying.

<Zarendangar> so that the company can get uot of payig proper wages for the same work temps do as fulltime employees do

<DarkyeTemp> You're blaming the prostitutes for causing the husband to cheat on his wife

<Zarendangar> if the temptation was not there they would not cheat

<DarkyeTemp> Pff.  So, like, if someone is raped, it's their fault for causing the temptation? That's a sick attitude.

<Zarendangar> I think being raped and working in a tempory job are different things

<DarkyeTemp> You've never temped, I see.

<Zarendangar> yes I did

<DarkyeTemp> Yeah. That was a joke.

<Zarendangar> and the only person making money is the company and the temp agency

<Damine_Watters> i will not have a temp job

<Damine_Watters> i hear bad things about them so my dad advised me to get something permenet

<DarkyeTemp> Nah, if you get something permanent, you'll only get screwed by the damn temps!

<Zarendangar> I was working 60 hours a week at minimum wage while the temp compnay got $10 an hour for me being ther and the company was only interested in getting work done ..

<DarkyeTemp> The company was interested in getting work done.  Shocking.

<Damine_Watters> and i did

<Zarendangar> and as for benifits ... were none

<Zarendangar> temping only makes slaves of ppl

<DarkyeTemp> Well, temps are bad, so they deserve it, right?

* Damine_Watters nods

<Zarendangar> until temping stops and companies refuse to hire qualified ppl .... then good ppl have to demean there selfs to support there families

<DarkyeTemp> DOWN WITH TEMP AGENCIES AND ALL COMPANIES

<DarkyeTemp> ATTICA

<Zarendangar> were I am from the temps contact out to companies about 20 employees a shit with the promise you might get hired full time

<Zarendangar> but there is always a reason they don't

<DarkyeTemp> I've been offered a lot of full time jobs

<Zarendangar> and when ppl retire

<Zarendangar> more tepms are hired to replace the retired personal

<DarkyeTemp> stop now.  I'm sorry I said anything.

<Zarendangar> is why I started my own company ;)

<Zarendangar> well night all

<DarkyeTemp> You ought to hire a temp to help with your keyboarding, Typo McSpellwrong.

<DarkyeTemp> Well, you've changed my point of view.  I will get the last laugh though. I will do poor work and steal Post-It Notes.

<DarkyeTemp> From now on, I'm fighting the system from the inside.

e-mail: temp@notmydesk.com

11-05-01 - Temp Chat!  Extra Hostile!

So, for the past couple weeks I've been hitting the chat channels on IRC, looking for temps and finding either stony silence or complete intolerance.  To this day, I have found exactly zero temps online, and what's worse is that for the most part, the people who actually bother talking to me don't even know what a temp is.  The one thing most of these "conversations" have in common seems to be this little exchange:

<notmydesk> Any temps in here?

<random_moron> huh?

Still, I recently made some headway, that is, I found people who at least sort of knew what temps are.  Only problem is, they have a low opinion of them.  Very low.  Which led to an interesting phenomenon:  me getting defensive.

Seems that as much as I complain about temps and temping, if someone else does it, I get incredibly annoyed.  Who knew?

Anyway, here's a recent chat session I had.

*** Now talking in #alaska

 

<notmydesk> whazzup, alaskanians?

<notmydesk> say, any Alaskan temps in da house?

<SATAN0K> temps?

<notmydesk> sigh.  yes.

<SATAN0K> as in temporary?

<notmydesk> as in temporary employees

<SATAN0K> are you here to hire people?

<notmydesk> Ha ha ha. No!

<notmydesk> Just looking for fellow temps to talk to

<SATAN0K> huh?

<notmydesk> Thank you!

<notmydesk> So, are you a temp? Or have you ever been one?

<SATAN0K> no

<notmydesk> Ever seen one?  Read about them?  Perhaps on a wonderfully offbeat and consistently hilarious website?

<SATAN0K> I have hired them though

<notmydesk> And? What did you think. Did you like them?

<SATAN0K> actually my experience has been all bad

<notmydesk> All bad? I find that hard to believe. Surely there was one temp who did a good job.

<SATAN0K> I hired a girl to file for a week and she literally fucked up our entire system

<notmydesk> No! I can't believe that!

***DivineBeauty has joined #alaska

<notmydesk> Hi, DivineBeauty! We're talkin' tempin'!

<DivineBeauty> huh?

<SATAN0K> she also cried when I told her the work term was over

<SATAN0K> it was shameful

<notmydesk> Well, sounds like you were very mean to her!

<notmydesk> What up wit dat?

<SATAN0K> I was not mean

<notmydesk> You made her cry.

<notmydesk> Maybe you explained her filing responsibilities poorly. Did you ever think of that?

<SATAN0K> I don't explain things poorly

<SATAN0K> alphabetical order is not difficult

<SATAN0K> well for her it was

<notmydesk> Maybe she was nervous.

<SATAN0K> you don't stay nervous for a week

<notmydesk> Are you kidding?  I consider it an accomplishment if I *only* stay nervous for a week.

<SATAN0K> I put her back on the phones

<notmydesk> Maybe she just needed a hug.

<SATAN0K> I gave her a hug

<SATAN0K> and grabbed her ass too

<notmydesk> Why you... You strike me as a poor source of employment for temps. I will warn them about you, SATAN0K!!!

<SATAN0K> I explained to her my passion for making amateur pornography films, she seemed interested at first but would not put a rubber ball in her mouth so I kicked her out

<notmydesk> Huh. I had no idea Alaska was so full of assholes.

<SATAN0K> notmydesk I live in Canada

<SATAN0K> LOL

<notmydesk> Oh, well, Canada I knew about.

<SATAN0K> where do you live?

<notmydesk> California

<SATAN0K> that explains alot

<notmydesk> But I grew up in New York.

<SATAN0K> ah

<DivineBeauty> that even explains more.

<notmydesk> Thanks, Divine!  I agree, that explains my wit and wisdom!

<DivineBeauty> nah, I was saying that explains your stupidness.

<notmydesk> My stupidness?

<notmydesk> My 'stupidity', you mean?

<notmydesk> probably what you meant.

<SATAN0K> let me guess you grew up on the streets of NYC now you have moved to Cally with your "street sense" impressing future wannabe rap stars

<notmydesk> Amazing.  You've captured me perfectly.  Well done.

e-mail: temp@notmydesk.com

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