Jesse Gets Jumped

I've been sick for the better part of two months now. First it was the ear infection from hell. That was followed shortly by a sinus infection. There's a solid chance that I'm dying, so if you're from that Make-A-Wish foundation please send a scantily clad, short, nerdy girl over to my house as soon as possible. Bonus points if she's in to short nerds, or gets a discount at zPizza.

One day the ear was so bad that I took the morning off from work and just slept in. I awoke at noon to find the phone all abuzz with work emails detailing various problems, and finally decided to haul my sorry ass in. The thing with being a software engineer is that when you're not around, it's all your fault. Everything. Even in my weakened state, I wasn't going to stand for that, so I cleaned myself up, threw on a fresh set of clothes, and headed in to the office, prepared to kick some nerd ass.

As I rounded the last stairwell in the parking garage I heard a voice.

"Excuse me... um... excuse me?"

I hadn't seen anyone in the garage, so the voice took me by surprise. I searched around and eventually found a head hanging over from the floor above. This head happened to belong to a particularly cute girl and it was staring back at me.

"Um... could you jump me?"

Holy crap, am I still sleeping? Did I accidentally walk on to the set of a porno?

I considered taking my pants off and doing my sexy time dance, but instead opted for something less.

"Pardon?"

Normally I'd have put two and two together, but my brain still wasn't functioning yet. I stared back at her questioningly.

"My car... the battery is dead. I think I left dome light on."

Oh... of course...

Minutes later I'd be helping her with her car and trying to awkwardly make small talk. It wasn't my usual D+ game, but I was sick so I'm giving myself a pass. Later in the month I would find out that the girl actually lives on my floor a few doors down.

While I haven't talked to the girl since, I like to think that we're just taking it slow. At our current pace, I fully expect to tell this story at our wedding in 2054. Save the date cards coming soon!

Nerd Word(s): Literally

Literally
- Adverb

1. Often misused on purpose as a means of mocking a person who overuses the word, or uses it incorrectly.

[ Origin: For some reason, the incorrect usage of literally has always rubbed me the wrong way like a stripper at a club in the bad part of town. ]

- see also
1. Figuratively
2. Totally

- examples
1. "I literally drank so much that I should have died."
"Literally?"
"Yeah, literally"
2. "He's literally the greatest basketball player in the world"
"Your cousin Tommy?"
3. http://evohno.blogspot.com/2010/04/lets-never-go-back.html

That Must Have Hurt

I started off writing this story in the comment section of Extensive Vamping as a response to this post. In the end I figured it was decent enough to post here. Enjoy.

One day my friend Rose and I were walking in to Pei Wei when a guy and girl walked out. He had on one of those button up shirts on with the big collar, which was basically the Ed Hardy first date shirt of 2001 for frat boys across the globe.

It was obviously early in the relationship because despite looking like a total ass, the guy held the door open for her and actually seemed interested in the conversation, despite the fact that "I just want to get laid" was written all over his act.

As he walked by he said to his date in that triumphant end-of-my-story-you-should-laugh-now kind of way, "and it was so good that I literally ate my ass off."

At that point Rose and I both turned to look and see if his ass was still there. Thankfully it was.

Then we both literally laughed out loud.

Are You Coming or Going? (A note from the author)

I originally wrote this on December 2nd. I didn't publish it though because I still had some hope of getting my mojo back, and it seemed a little too self serving. Tonight I went back to take a look through my half finished posts to see if anything sparked my interest and found this post.

I realize it's been quite some time since I've written here. The truth is that there's a very specific emotional state that I need to be in to write what I call, "A Sesquipedalis Story", and that state and I just haven't been able to find each other lately.

I was telling someone about my blog tonight and getting a little excited when I realized it's not really fair to call myself a blogger if I don't, you know, actually blog. The problem lately is that I feel like I've said everything I could possibly ever have to say, and then some. I'm just really a quiet guy who's not all that opinionated. This isn't a case of writer's block, it's just the repetitive nature of life.

I said something absolutely idiotic to a girl in the lobby yesterday. I was excited to have a small story to blog about until I sat down to write it and realized, "Been there, done that."

I'm still around, and I plan on blogging again sometime in the near future. I've been kicking around the idea of taking the blog in an entirely new direction, or starting a different one. I'm not really sure though. If you have any suggestions, feel free to let me know.

While I'm gone, I hope everyone is well.

Jesse

Still With the Elevator

I never really planned to have an entire section of my blog devoted to elevator stories, yet here we are again. I guess the thing about it is, elevators are awkward no matter what. When sharing a ride your choices come down to forced social interaction, forced social avoidance, or playing with your phone and pretending to text/check email/avoid eye contact. I normally go for choice number three, but sometimes the elevator has plans of its own.

I woke up late today, and found myself rushing through the morning routine. There isn't really a late per se at my job, but I was intending to leave at a reasonable hour, and as such I really should have been in earlier than I was.

I got to the building around nine and grabbed the elevator that was open. It's a simple procedure that I've managed to perform correctly for the past five years, but today when I pressed the button labeled "15", the elevator did something different.

It didn't move

I waited a moment, but nothing. A quick step out and glance at the other elevators gave no clue as to how to solve my predicament. I decided that before going to talk to someone I should give the elevator one last try.

The "Door Close" button was feeling my frustration when the elevator finally relented and the doors began to close. At the same time I looked up to see a woman who resembled a thirty-something year old Kim Kardashian trying to get on.

I caught the door just in time. She thanked me, and in turn I explained why I had been so focused on the button panel.

"The door wouldn't close for the last three minutes. I guess it just wanted to wait for you."

I was fairly pleased with myself for making what seemed to me, an appropriate comment that was at least slightly amusing.

Kim apparently didn't share my amusement. She looked at me as if I had just asked her for her sign in some Scottsdale bar and dryly said, "Charming"

Jesse gets Zugged

A few months ago I was reading an article at www.zug.com about the best office pranks ever. I'm a big fan of the site, and the creator John Hargrave, but with all due respect I felt we had done it better. I left a comment on the entry with a link back to our prank, and left it at that.

Soon after I got an email from John asking me to rewrite the story so he could host it on Zug. I double checked with Sean since it was, after all, his prank, and then agreed.

Unfortunately life got a little busy, and I never got around to writing the article. John emailed me again after the holidays, and I finally got off my ass and wrote it. It's now one of the featured articles on the site.

http://www.zug.com/live/83619/shr5/The-Office-Prank-My-CoWorker-Will-Never-Forget

Enjoy!

The Valentine's Day Wrap Up Part 1:J.R. Wins

I realize it's been an exceptionally long time since I last "blogged". I had a whole post written out explaining why, but then I realized, nobody cares. I've decided to kick off my (semi)return to blogging with a few stories that have been sitting in the vault for a while.

This particular story is probably one of the bigger ones of my life, but then 5 days later I met Shaq at a diner, and that story sort of occupied my time for a while.

Back in February I ran a contest to send flowers out on Valentine's day. The Valentine's day contest has become a bit of a tradition around here, but last year I took it to a whole new level sending all manner of prizes and gifts. Despite the fact that there were numerous entries deserving of flowers, and despite the fact that no inmate received flowers, I still feel like J.R. was really the winner. He took upon himself to not only enter the contest and provide insightful comments on the other entries, he also did a little work of his own.

Friday was the day before Valentine's, but most of the "prizes" were scheduled to arrive that day. Only for the "big winner" did I actually pay the extra ten bucks for Saturday delivery. As I strolled in to work, I was mentally making notes of what was going where, and double checking to make sure I hadn't missed something. For 2009 it wasn't just a contest, it was an operation.

I entered my office and became the envy of every extremely myopic drunken 22 year old female. I had received flowers from the Baller himself.

J.R. didn't just send me flowers for Valentine's. He took it one step further and included the following, heartfelt poem:

Bitches Ain't Shit,

But Tricks And Hoes.

Maybe It's Time You Give Up

On Girls, And Switch to Bros.

Have A Bro-Mantic

Valentine's Day!

Baller

By noon things were on trucks and "out for delivery". All told there were 3 sets of flowers, 5 gift boxes from The Popcorn Factory, and one set of two dozen long stemmed Roses.

I hate sitting around to see how a plan unfolds, and since I had no particular Valentine of my own, when Kendall, my 6'1 modelesque friend, invited me to L.A. to hang out for the weekend I took the rest of the day off work and headed home to pack. As I walked in to my building I ran in to Agnes, my ninety-two year old building crush.

"So, any Valentine's day weekend plans for you?" I asked.
"Valentine's? Love?" she looked at me like I was crazy, "I'm too old for that stuff."

I reached the eleventh floor, and minutes later I had a weekend's worth of clothes packed in to a travel suitcase. I was about to leave when I spotted J.R.'s flowers. I didn't think they'd do much good in my place since I'd be in L.A., so I took them with me.

As I walked out of the Landmark I handed them to the guy working the front desk.

"Could you give these to Agnes for me?"
"And who should I say they're from?"
"Oh. Just tell her they're from a secret admirer."