My Mind's Gettin' Away From Me

Not that this is news to anyone aside from me, but, ehh, that's life. I just downloaded about every version of the song "Save It For Later" I could find, and not all of them are the same song, but it's a good exploratory exercise that generally broadens my musical horizons. Right now it's the version by Splender... good song. Also, I'm about to go to bed for today... a little odd how I'm suddenly getting hungry at around four-thirty at night and am wide awake until about eight-thirty-ish, but I suppose I shouldn't be overly surprised by this; I do work midnights, after all.
On that note, Larry the foreman got fired on Wednesday, so now we've got Shawn the foreman, who is probably younger and a lot less experienced, but he's being better received than Larry was (found out he was "probably German" and "likely a nazi" from the gossiping of my fellow operators, so apparently he was pretty bad). Long story short, I've been trained on machine M3, which is the metalizer (and the only one in plant one, though they have three in plant two). This means that now that I've been trained on it, I'm likely doomed to operate it for a long while. This may not be the case if employees keep dropping out like they are, though... three people fired and four on the verge of it in the past week. Fun stuff, considering one of the "on the edge" ones just started two days ago.
Nixie and myself went to The Rainforest Cafe for dinner today, as per my promise that we'd go there upon my receiving my first paycheque from Hick's. It was a little strange, as the last time I ate there it was with my parents; never realised how expensive that place was. We also went and saw the final performance of the Romeo Theater Company's production of "Alice in Wonderland", which wasn't bad (and they had a cast of a hundred and forty-six people, plus the crew... I've never seen a high school production that big before). Other than that, I don't really remember much of the day... went on the Orion drive at around three-ish.
Also, as Khira mentioned something about getting lost in the fog, it was rather spectacular. I believe it was Friday night, but when I pulled onto Industrial (the road where the factory is situated), it was so thick that I couldn't see more than two or three feet in any direction around me; we need more foggy days like that. Fog is the best for drivin' (maybe not for driving, but definitely for drivin').

Also, I believe my torso just went upstairs without me. That could prove problematic.

A note to myself...

The next time Larry comes up to you in the middle of making your three-hundred-and-fifty-third steering wheel and asks in an almost overly friendly manner, "Ryan, are you staying over?" the answer is most decidedly NOT "Sure, why not?"

... twelve hours on machine nine is hell. Maybe if you're on seven.

Also, to those two people who were trying quite diligently to get a hold of me yesterday (you know who you are), you now know why you didn't.

And a very good day to the rest of you.

I'm Still In Existence

Though it's definitely not a typical one (not to mention the forty-eight hour week I just worked at the factory... and the fact that I get paid for a fifty-two hour one xD). I slept most of yesterday, from about ten in the morning to about ten-thirty at night, and then I spent the majority of the night with Nixie, since there was a Venture Bros. premiere last night. It occurs to me that I haven't really had much human contact outside of my fellow factory workers this past week, so for those who I'm in contact with on a fairly regular basis, you may find that I'm slightly more withdrawn than usual. It's all rather surreal, actually... feels like I've finally managed to reach the backstage of humanity.
Firstly, on the topic of the Venture Bros, I require some decent reference pictures of Triana Orpheus' friend Kim, as I'm having trouble discerning her outfit. I'd ask Doc Hammer, as he posted a rather useful D.I.Y. guide for Triana's outfit, but I suspect Kim is a little bit less based on anyone in real life. Regardless, if I'm to pull off the look for ACen, I'm going to need something to go off of in designing my costume; I can only get so much from Hank:
"Holy cow! look at my date, she's a super-villain! Possibly a Medusa. Dean, I am not kidding, she has ropes for hair and a shiny costume. Oh, no fair! She's wearing goggles! Told you she woulda dug my Batman costume, but no..."
SO, if any of yous guys has good reference (or just a sick fascination with seeing me dressed up as a hot cyber chick), let me know.
On the topic of being withdrawn, I visited the local mall recently after having avoided it for the past several months due to it going downhill back when Nixie was still working there (and I was unemployed still). It was an experience, to be sure, and not a very good one; aside from it being the same building, it's nothing at all how I remember it from my high school days. Hot Topic is just a shell of a store now, and it's full of people who wouldn't have been caught dead in it three years ago. It almost feels like a part of me died going in there... left me feeling awfully depressed, despite all my jeering at folks who looked like they'd bought the place out trying to be as goth as possible. Well, whatever... I've washed my hands of the place as of late, and I'm looking into getting more authentic goth/punk attire from the original companies in England and so forth (DogPile bondage pants are first on that list). Hopefully I'll be further withdrawn from society as a whole next time I go back there... it's kinda neat feeling like you're no longer expected to be a part of what's around you.
In the meantime, I've got work again tonight, which means I'll probably either be put on one of the seven machines I've been trained on, or they'll try me on two or three new ones that are sure to end up shut down at some point and I'll end up sweeping the rest of the night. Ah, factory life is fun...

First Day as a Factory Worker

So, I've just gotten home from my first night working at Hick's Plastics, and I'm feeling pretty tired, but I figured I'd do a blog about this now before I forget and go to sleep and then later get involved with other things until work. Firstly, I enjoyed it thoroughly; yes, it's eight hours of doing the exact same thing over and over, but once you get a sort of rhythm going, it just kinda flows and the hours go by pretty quick (unlike retail where you're staring at the clock every thirty seconds).
I only had two things irk me, the first being the break-replacement who lets you take your break, and then when you come back, you realise you were gone just long enough for them to mess up everything you did. Steering wheels are all facing the wrong way, the clippers are on the wrong side, the towels are a mess, the weights are all out of wack... generally unpleasant, and you have to wait until you can cycle back through all your things before it goes back how it ought to be. The second wasn't so much an irk as it was an almost panicky feeling: quality inspection. There are two quality inspectors, one was pretty much training me today (as the person assigned to train me kinda disappeared), the other was just walking around doing her job. The guy who was training me was cool... he'd refill whatever needed refilling and make sure I wasn't having issues with the machines. The lady, however, was a nightmare. She didn't talk, she just kinda walked up, inspected the parts I'd made, kinda looked like she was pondering something, and then proceeded to walk off with one of my parts... I have no idea what happened to it. So, a little unnerving.
The only other thing was the awkwardness of the breaks; it's ten minutes of not working, so what do you do? Well, I sat there and stared at the ceiling for exactly ten minutes. Maybe I'll find something better to do tonight, but for now... it's difficult to figure out what to do with yourself.

Musings from English Class

Not that today's English class was particularly thought-provoking, but I did get a chance to let my mind wander for a bit while the rest of the class (all ten of them) sat and did pretty much nothing, effectively making our professor re-think her strategy of not calling on anyone. There were several short stories that were assigned to be read (as I wasn't there, I didn't get them, though they sounded interesting), and I would have loved to have commented, but I had no idea what was going on, and so I sat and doodled counting machines with the number 01134 printed out an infinite amount of times on very long ribbons of paper. This is, of course, something for the first page of Shade, but it seemed applicable here.
For the most part, the class seems to be a great environment for me to temporarily escape into Shade's world, if only for a brief moment; a little nonsense is good when you're being forced to analyze other people. I know they say you're analyzing their writing; their thought process, but it's a sham. You're delving into whatever it is that they've written, and you're picking that person apart bit by bit until you know exactly what makes them tick, and then you've got your right answer. This is similar to taking apart a beetle (in my head it is, anyway). You start with the obvious parts: the outer shell, the wings, the legs, thus assuring that your unwilling subject won't be able to even attempt escape. Then you begin picking it apart with whatever you have handy: toothpicks, pushpins, screwdrivers, twigs... anything that can effectively poke a hole in the thing. And after you've managed to slowly torture the thing to death, made a large mess, and overly grossed out any onlookers not intrigued by this sort of thing, you realise that you have no idea what it is that you're looking for. Amidst all that grey and pus-coloured mess is the answer you seek, but you've no idea what it is; you haven't the slightest idea what made that beetle tick, and you never will, because you exhausted its life before you could reach what it was that was allowing it to be in the first place. I view over-analyzing literature in much the same fashion; I understand that the premise of the class is to give us a better understanding of the English language as a whole, but how do analytical and argumentative essays play into this? Is the English language only here to pick things apart and prove your point? Who the hell gives a damn why they decided to make the characters jacket blue instead of orange and green plaid? Words are a beautiful thing, and yet they get trampled on and made into something unpleasant in the name of education.
This is not, however, one of my musings from English class. As I sat there, amidst the mostly disinterested looking ranks of fellow students, my mind off somewhere where teeth can fly and what you perceive something as means nothing at all, the droning of the professor brought me back into attention long enough to get some people observing in. People observing is not the same as people watching; I'm not really sure of all the differences, suffice to say that they are there, and I'm sure they're darned effective when they're known. My English professor has a rather sing-song way of talking, a kind of up and down and up and down that makes it difficult to really want to grasp the gist of what she's saying. This is often neutralized by the incredibly monotone voice of a girl who (for reasons far too obvious to even mention here) sits by herself at a desk towards the front of the class. This girl has the uncanny ability to recall, verbatim, almost any useless fact on anything the professor says; today it was birds, and I felt as though some very, very boring computer voice was reading some book on the care of birds to me. And then she switches it up and talks about something else that she really doesn't need to be talking about. You wonder how long this has gone on in her life. This is apparently what having a military family that constantly moves around does to you. At some point in her life, mindless recitation will prove to be enough of a hindrance that she'll actually only say one sentence, and maybe in varying tones, until then, I'm probably going to wish I had the ability to yank people's eyeballs out of their sockets with my mind every time she opens her mouth.
In other, more pleasant news, I begin my new job tonight (there will undoubtably be a blog about how it went after I wake up tomorrow), and I'm rather enthusiastic to start. Nervous, yes, but still enthusiastic. Now, I'm off to nap before headin' out for the first night of the rest of my life.

"It means they've changed something..."

I was reminded of The Matrix this morning whilst I was at work, namely the part in which they describe how "deja vu" is a hiccup in the system that hints that some portion of the program had been altered. In 7-Eleven's case, however, you don't give a sense that you've done or seen something before but, instead, you suddenly get an odd blue bar across your register screen that says "PLU Updated". It doesn't really seem very important when it pops up, but then you go to ring someone up for something a couple minutes later, and all of a sudden you've got two prices to choose from for damned near every item. Upon inquiring about it later (had to wait until seven this morning before there was anyone working there besides me), I learned that it doesn't just apply to cigarettes, but to any item that can have a price change (or may have a coupon available). So, if I all of a sudden start seeing "PLU Updated" hovering in the air somewhere... I'm gonna know that something's probably different... or that they've cut the hard line.
I also got to experience my first truly unruly convenience store customer (and a good thing, too, I've only got a few days left). I found out later that she was drunk, but that was after she forgot to ask me for lottery scratch-off tickets, asked if she could pay with her card, and upon doing so demanded to know why she didn't have her scratch off tickets. There was a bit bit more confusion (I still have no idea what she actually wanted), and I just about backhanded her out of the store about twice, but at least I can say I've dealt with an angry drunk now. M' a little disappointed that the coppers didn't check in on me last night... woulda been fun to re-iterate that'n to them.

Just A Few Thoughts

Firstly, I have to record down another odd dream I had last night (more like unpleasant, though not necessarily bad). Seems like the dreams I have involving my room swarming with insects are usually the most vivid, leaving me to wake up in a cold sweat, eyes darting all over the room trying to find all the bugs crawling all over the walls that had been then moments before. Yech.
I don't recall how it started, save to say that I was working on some sort of MegaMan-powersuit-type figure and I needed to add directional exhaust vents to the chest and back. I didn't feel like using epoxy-putty, so I was looking for stuff that looked close that I could just glue on. This led me to a "nature collecting kit" that was probably around eight years old. It contained samples of leaves and roots and insects, all sealed in small plastic containers, and meant to be inspected or whatever. The kit also contained some grey plastic pieces (I assume they were meant to aid in displaying the containers) that had the basic shape I'd been looking for (I was going to have to paint them yellow before gluing them on). I grabbed a handful of them, and in doing so, managed to bump one of the insect containers, and what looked like a cross between a cockroach and a very large winged ant crawled out and onto the floor, followed shortly after by a big centipede, and then all sorts of bugs started crawling out all over, so I slammed the lid shut and taped the box closed so no more could get out. At this point, the majority of the bugs were the same as the first that had crawled out (no spiders this time... thank goodness), and I pretty much just saw them as cockroaches. They were crawling all over the ceiling, sticking towards the edges where it met the wall and the corners of the room. There was also a large black mouse or rat crawling around on the walls as well, which didn't really strike me as odd at the time.
After a period of unsuccessfully trying to smash some of the insects, a girl who I don't remember very well (knew her perfectly well in the dream, but m' drawing a blank on the face now), came in and started helping me get rid of them. I believe she was joined by a younger boy and they were both standing in front of a door that would have replaced one of the windows in my room, and lead out to a balcony. They were either squashing them on the windows, or using a spray... or both. After killing a few, several birds that looked similar to pigeons flew up and started throwing up on the opposite side of the window. The last thing I remember is an elderly gentleman slumped over in a plastic deck chair on the balcony, with the pink bird vomit running down his face (this, too, was a familiar face, though I've no clue who it was now).
That being said, the rest of my day went quite well; attended to my physical, which was the final step in my new employment, and the entire process probably took about eight minutes tops. I then proceeded to turn in all of my necessary paperwork at Hick's Plastics, took my operations and procedures quiz, and was told I start November 9th (as my employment at 7-Eleven goes until the seventh). I'm quite excited to start, as this seems much more up my alley than the convenience store clerk business; kinda wish I could start sooner. But, alas, two more weeks of mumbling cigarette customers, unpleasant regulars, odd lottery tickets, morning coffee rushes and The mad dash to make sure the taquitos aren't burnin'. Oh, and my older sister wants a picture of me in my smock... yippideedoo.
The only other item of the slightest bit of importance was that I had my first walk-out class in my college educational history; English professor never showed up, so all eleven or so of us that had actually turned up signed a sheet of paper for attendance, dropped it in her mailbox, and that was that. It's an awkward feeling, I must say.