I guess it's a perspective thing

Funny how even a shitty gig looks pretty good when you're idle. Tomorrow will be day three of "waiting for data to load" on the shitty gig that I didn't really want in the first place and now am desperate to start back up. Yeah, I'm trolling madly for something else, and maybe I'll have something for next Monday (market is not bad right now, kids), but at the moment, the bird in the hand isn't doing much except crapping in my palm.

Not gonna lie

Just using the word sex in a post increases traffic. I wonder what saying "blow job" will do?

Sex time

I took so much time off (from the blog and from work) that I need to do something to drive traffic. Thinking about posting a sex post, but I don't really have any sex stories to tell. I did work with a guy who hooked up with a woman he met at work, and actually had sex at work. I won't lie, I haven't been on any projects where getting laid at work was an option. Logistics rarely work out and, with all due apoligies, I don't usually see a lot of co-workers I would want to have sex with.

It's like I'm Nostradamus or something

Yeah, got hte email -- project isn't "over," but it isn't on for tomorrow. Rule No. 2: the more you need to get back to work, the less likely they are to have work for you.

New territory

So, tomorrow I will be going back to a project that I have been away from for almost two weeks. Frankly, not a great project, unless things have changed. Nonetheless, we'll see what we see. Damn thing will probably be over the minute I walk in the door. That would suck.

OK, I'm back

After nearly two weeks of ugly extracurricular activity, I'm back. Basically, it's been lots of unpleasantness punctuated with downright nastiness.In any event, I've been away. I toyed with posting some blasts from the past as if they were current, but decided not to because I have always made this blog about what is going on in Temp Town and, maybe more importantly, I had really limited internet access. I know that is a foreign concept to most of you, at least in a no-internet-access-at-work-where-the-rat-bastards-cut-off-the-internet-to-keep-us-clicking sort of way, but that's the way it was. Consequently, traffic has been in the toilet. Time to amend that. Perhaps I will be able to come up with a sex post. I am told that using terms like sex in a post drive traffic. Naked women? Who knew. Kinda makes you want to say boobs. Anyway, enough search-engine teasing. At this point, I just hope the project I was on is still going after my extended leave of absence. Guess I'll find out Monday.

And I'd like fries with that

Found myself in an unusual position today, exerting a little power over a project manager. Through no fault of my own, I got a great seat, in a corner, far from firm/associate view, pretty much isolated, at least as much as possible under the big-room circumstances under which we are operating. For whatever reason, the powers that be decided today that they wanted someone else there -- I don't even pretend to know why. Fortunately for me, the project manager asked me, out loud, in front of an entire room full of temps, if I would mind moving. My response was immediate:

Me: I don't know. This is a great seat. And you know that the only thing a temp has is his seat.

(The room laughs, but in a that's-true kind of way.)

Project manager: Well, would you be willing to move if I got you another great seat?

This meant, of course, that I would not have to simply trade with the person who would be taking my seat -- a woman I knew to have a shitty seat, right in the middle of a table full of temps. Knowing I had already won, I agreed.

And I got a great fucking seat. No one anywhere near me. Practically a corner office. Sometimes it pays to be a pain in the ass.

How 'bout that shit?

Probably as a direct result of drunk blogging on Saturday night, we passed 5,000 hits yesterday. Still no fucking Canadians, and I am getting a little belligerent about it. I've always been a good neighbor, never caused any fuss. All that is about to come to an end. Not sure what I'll do, but Canada is gonna get theirs.

Drunk blogging

I believe it's a tradition in some places, but it usually takes place during live events that the blogger is chronicling. In any event, yes, I am drinking while blogging. Aren't you surprised there aren't more typos?

Canada can suck it

We're closing in on 5,000 hits. Sure, that's lame for blogs that get gazillions of hits a month, but fuck them. 5,000 will be a big deal, and we're almost there, with NO help from Canada, thank you very much.

We're No. 2!

OK, not a great chant, because who really wants to be No. 2? And I'm not talking about Avis trying harder. Anyway, October was the second-best month ever for this blog, despite the fact that I'm a lazy sack and nothing really interesting happened. Probably the most interesting thing that happend in October was that I got accepted for the revival of the project that gave birth to this blog, and then, within hours, rejected for the same project, probably because of this blog. More about that later. Anyway, that was a good month, so keep clicking (because it's all about the clicking). 

Just shoot me

Repeat after me: they're lying. Never forget that. The long-term, 50-hour project (maybe more) that I started yesterday turned out to be two weeks, 40 hours. For perspective, for those of you who don't do this for a living, 40 hours is slow death. Even an unmarried temp in the DC area will find that a 40-hour project leaves them strapped and, eventually, simply unable to pay the bills. You'll take one of you have to, but usually when and agency says no overtime, you just say no. That's why a lot of agencies will claim a project is 40 hours with the possibility of overtime. Remember, they're lying. Bever ever forget that, no matter what they tell you. If it turns out they're not lying, great, enjoy the moment. But the only way to survive this business is to assume they're lying. Project is 4 months? Cut that in half. They're lying. Unlimited overtime? Bullshit. They're lying. Assume they're lying and avoid disappointment. On the rare occasions they are not lying, it is simply that much more enjoyable.

Why the bitter rant? For this short-term, 40 hour project, I turned down a short-term, 80-hour project that would have rolled into something else once it was over. I gambled, I lost. Sucks to be me. Fear not. Like a phoenix, I shall rise again.

Tightrope

[I started writing this post on Wednesday. It's out of date, but I'm putting it up anyway. If you don't like it, refer to the title of the blog.]
So I turn down the chance to roll over onto a new project with the same firm, same agency because I already applied for a new gig elsewhere. I was cool with staying home one day, because I was looking forward to yard work and drinking beer in my underwear, but now it looks like I will be home tomorrow, too. This, of course, raises the nagging doubt that the project won't actually start. I hate that feeling. This morning I got an email asking for conflicts forms -- something I thought was taken care of already -- and when I sent those back, I expected some kind of confirmation that the project would be starting and that I was on it. Instead, crickets. I had to send a semi-obnoxious email, suggesting that somebody might want to let me know whether I can sleep in tomorrow. Finally, somebody (not the jackhole who sent me the email asking for conflicts information and leaving a voice mail telling me to hurry up and send that shit in who was then never heard from again) let me know that the project would start Friday. At noon. My cup runneth over.