FRIDAY! : )

Oh yeah, !t's def!n!tely t!me!  The workweek is over.  Bring on a MUCH needed break.  Somebody best fetch me a LITE! (hiccup) 

This may be the last coherent statement you'll hear from me for the duration of my 3-day weekend.

Oh but wait...I just realized (thanks to the wonderment of Facebook) that tomorrow (Saturday) is the birthday of one BWoP!!!  So, I've determined to take part in some celebratory drinking despite the fact that I'm not even in the same timezone.  And remember lady... it's not older, just wiser and better!  Happy Birthday BWoP! 


Regards,

cheer_dad

P.S.  See many of you tomorrow at the Yanok's for Poker Night!

i can feel it...

it's coming to take me away from this.  Work tomorrow but the promise of a short Friday, and then a 3-day weekend.  Saturday night at the Yanok's for poker night.  It promises to be a very good night.  I can sense a lampshade may be in my future.  There will be BEER.  It will wash away the mire of the workplace.  It will restore me... it will sustain me... I need some unwind time to just...be!  To avoid solving problems, being dedicated, putting others first, and just for a change think of absolutely nothing but where the next card is coming from, and when finding a lousy hand finding peace in the fact that I can grab another cold one.  No, this weekend will not bear witness to my ability to play the game, or my ability to carry on a coherent conversation.  This one is about forgetting.  About sloughing off the muck of the job, and considering it a job, and not life. 

I feel better... just knowing that a lost weekend approaches.  I think the blood pressure might have even dropped a few points.  I'm becoming me again.  To those who gather together Saturday to play the game, I look forward to your company, toward spending time and losing ourselves to it.

"Out here we is stoned. Immaculate."

Regards,

cheer_dad

Top Dog

When you're large and in charge, the command decisions you make have far reaching effects.  That happened here today in the mere form of an email.  There were a lot of forward thinking plans talked about, and new directions are for certain in store for our little Bureau.  My team in particular will most definitely be going down some paths that we'd not even considered.  But it's the nature of IT, to change... but this one is abrupt, and included some VERY agressive timelines.  But it's good to be the Top Dog, and that's why they pay 'em the big bucks.  Right? 

It's certainly going to make things interesting around here for quite a while.  Am I concerned with my continued employment, not in the least.  Will life in the workplace change... oh you betcha!  Is everyone happy about it what's in store, well that'd be a no!  The gnashing of teeth will continue for quite some time.  Hang on for the ride people, there's no telling where this roller coaster ride may actually take us! 

It all makes some of the odd stonewalling on decisions lately around here, make a helluva lot more sense.  Secrets for the sake of having secrets, people c'mon what are you like FIVE!?!

I gotta head to the house...

Regards,

cheer_dad

Pause for station identification

Let's go off the air, or at least pause for station identification or better yet detach from the daily insanity of the workplace.  Those of you have visited my blog on any sort of regular basis have noted that lately my postings have been far and few between.  They've been erratic.  If you could see me as I've banged them out on the keyboard you would note the tightening of the jaw, the quickening of my breath, the ever-present scowl.  There is developing in me (and it's in the latter stages) an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness.  Or helplessness at being hopeless...  Well, you know what, that sounds like a victim talking. And in the words of an old movie character friend, Worm, "...fuck all that!"  Yeah, he said it, go back and watch Rounders if you don't believe me.  Also uttered in the scene were (by Mike) "I can't lose what I don't put in the middle."  And later on (by Worm) "grinding it out on his leather ass."  These are NOT the sentiments I want to feel the need to express about my work.  FFS, life on this mud-ball we call Earth is much to short.  Why spend it being miserable?  Well, all have responsibilities, and we love our respective families and want the best for them, and so sometimes we just suck it up and take it.  But I'm really reaching that point at which I'm giving every ounce of my being into doing a good job, providing well-researched, wise decisions for my little nitch of the organization... only to have them die on the vine. I wouldn't mind so much being informed of a different office politics agenda, but having ideas dashed just "because" on a whim by parasites, well it just doesn't sit well.  I've uttered (or muttered) it before, there are those that do work, and then there are those that profit from the work of others.  In this case, it's even worse...  Some people just need to get out of the way, and let progress... PRO-GRESS! 

I tried to get this posted earlier, but as luck would have it, more nitwittery prevailed, and time was lost again.  Just more minutes that I'll never get back.

Regards,

cheer_dad

Happy President's Day

Waiting for 3:00pm to roll around.  Big Red and I along with the Brothers'es' are going for Mexican.  We've texted the Wolfe-pack, and Uncle June, but clearly we're dead to them.  sniff, sniff, single tear!  There's still time for them to join the fun and possible debauchery. 

Whitney is busying herself about today preparing a belated Valentine's Day Dinner for Jordan, the boyfriend (no, not the cousin.)  It's beginning to look like Betty Crocker and Julia Childs had some sort of bake off here in our kitchen.  That bitch Martha Stewart showed up but they sent the skank packin'.  : )  But seriously the daughter is really domesticating herself.  Of course Red had to add that if we could get her as interested in cleaning as she has been lately in cooking things would be GREAT!  Dare to dream Red, dare to dream. 

The snow is once again flying here in the 'burg.  We're rumored to be getting another 6-8 inches by Tuesday.  Scruffy the dog may have difficulty hiking a leg very soon on anything.  Maybe he'll get lost in a snow drift... but then again I'd have to be the one to go and dig his little furry butt out, so let's skip that.

Hmmm, Cole is going to Drew's house to play, amazing that he didn't bother to ASK if he could go, and Shel just showed to pick him up.  But then again, like it really matters, he would've been allowed anyway.  Hey, it's his holiday too.  Yeah, Happy President's Day... did you all decorate and put up a TREE decorated with white, powdered whigs, and filibusters?!?  I know we sure did!  : ) 

Clearly this is rambling post and I'm glad you could all share in it.  Oh and don't forget that the boys from Jinx'd will be entertaining the Eagles and BPD crowd this Friday night.  It's always a good time and hope to see you all there!  I should get ready to head out the door now...

Regards,

cheer_dad

Dude, I think u got hacked!

Well I suppose these things are inevitable... but today my email account was compromised, hacked if you will.  I noticed (at work) around 2pm today that I had sent myself a message from my Hotmail account.  Well, I thought, how nice of me... knowing something was wrong.  So, away I go to check it out.  While logging in, I get another email from a friend at work, with a subject of "Dude, I think u got hacked!"  Yes, you would be thinkin' right.  I get logged into Hotmail and there they are, 3 extra messages in the ole sent folder, systematically sending out a link (for Viagra) I think to 10 people at a time, in order from my Address Book.  How quaint.  Lucky for yer ole buddy cheer_dad that his work email has been among the recipients of my Address Book for years.  So, I was among the first to get it.  About 5 minutes after the first message went out, I get logged in and change the password and all my other security info.  It would appear that a bot was at work, rather than a human being.  But some of the other techno geeks at work and I tracked it back to an IP Address in Poland.  All I could think to say was, "I wonder how many of them it took..."  Okay, I saw the shot and had to take it.  Sorry if your ethnicity has just been trounced.  Go ahead make an Irish joke to spite me.  We shall rain down upon ye from the highlands and ye shall be smitten.  Okay, that's the best I can do on short notice.

For those of you who've followed my exploits on Facebook, you'd know that work has been a bit of a bear of late for me.  The boss out of town, me in class, and picking up a lot of slack.  I think I exhausted the keys on the Blackberry trying desperately to stay in touch with the office.  Now that things are starting to get back to normal, some of the lingering pieces of work to be done are beginning to frustrate me.  I'm not sure who knows it... I'm not sure who cares...  I'm hoping to catch a break anytime soon. 

Not much in the poker world for me lately.  Red did play last Friday at the Eagles in the charity tournament.  I stayed home with my son, for a night of XBox and such.  I guess we had a small cash game on Saturday.  I think I made $10 and got a helluva hangover to carry into the next day.  There is another of the monthly Eagles games this Friday night at 7pm.  I hope to make it to this one (hint RED) but there might be a basketball game to attend to.  As always the kids come first. 

Hope all is well with each of you.  Maybe when the dust starts to settle around here, I'll get back to a little regularity in the posting schedule around the NDPT Blog.  In the meantime, thanks for stopping by and holding out hope that I'll bang out a few lines.

Regards,

cheer_dad

Round 1

work 1 cheer_dad 0!

I'm just really tired... and it's only Monday, are you kidding me.  4 more days of class to go.  In addition still having to juggle the workload and the lobs of idiocy that keep getting winged the way of our little team.

Stayed tuned for Round 2... like Rocky, I'm more of a late round fighter.  Ah hell who am I kidding... I just wear them down by letting them beat the hell outa me.  So far, the first half of the plan is working.

Regards,

cheer_dad