A Day in the Life 2009

This is not really a typical day. There usually isn’t this much going on in one day. It’s been a little crazy lately with the CP09 stuff (strike duty assignments.)

A Day in the Life of Lissy
Thursday, April 2nd, 2009

6:12am
You wake up, it’s too early. You go to the bathroom and then go back to sleep. You have a dream that you’re living at the mall or something and you get into a fight with your mom.

7:00am
Your alarm goes off. You get up three minutes earlier. You brush your teeth, wash your face. You fill a container with yogurt and get dressed while you’re waiting for a pimple to dry out so you can put antibiotic stuff on it since it’s not healing properly. Once you’re done with that you do some dishes for about 5 minutes since you have a little extra time. You pack your lunch bag with your yogurt and your extra mug. You put on your boots so you can take a picture of your outfit, but that doesn’t go so well. You give up. You put on your coat and hat. You realize you forgot your ring so you quietly sneak back into the bedroom so you don’t wake Bryan. You grab your stuff and head out the door.

7:35am
Your keys, badge and headphones are all tangled. You get your keys untangled and lock the door. Julia is already waiting at your car. As you put your stuff in the back seat, you explain that you’re having some technical difficulties this morning. You’re doing A Day in the Life of Lissy and it’s a little distracting. You start the car and ask when is it going to stop being so icky out. You get to the end of the parking lot and realize you forgot your apple. Damn. That’s like the best part of the morning. You’re angry at yourself.

A car stops down the road to let someone across the street so you have a nice big gap to turn onto the highway. You’re pissed at people because it’s dark, icky and foggy out and they don’t have their lights on. WTF people??? 3/4 of a mile before the exit off the parkway, the idiot in front of you puts his blinker on. After another half a mile, he turns the blinker off and then turns it on again when he sees the exit. You put yours on too. You see the light down the road just turned green as you go through the EZPass thing. You speed up to make it. The next light down the road turns yellow so you stop. You probably could have made it through that one too. The rest of the lights are green on the way there. People are driving a little slow around the AT&T building.

You park in the parking garage and walk to the entrance as you try to untangle your badge from your headphones. Success! You make it to the scary door and wait until it stops revolving before you go through. Julia bids you farewell as she’s off to building D. You make your way up the stairs to your office.

8:00am
You take your jacket off and sit down at your computer. Your calendar pops up with a reminder for a meeting you have in two hours. You set it to pop up again 15 minutes before. You have an email about getting bargaining updates via text message. You have to check that out later. You go make your breakfast. You decide to have your yogurt as part of your breakfast instead of a snack later since you forgot your apple. The blueberries are still frozen though, so you’ll try putting it in the microwave. You grab some tea and an oatmeal packet and head over to the kitchen area. You put the yogurt in the microwave at 50% power for a minute. You rinse out your mug and put the tea bag in and the hot water. You put the oatmeal in your container and go and fetch you yogurt. It seems to have worked pretty well. You put water in the oatmeal and return to your office.

You eat your breakfast as you start to write this. You have an email about your RUBY meeting today. The time was changed yesterday to 3, but this email says it’s at 10, but it also says it’s out of date so you’re not sure which is right. You’ll ask someone later. You get a popup about the meeting again. You meant to put it to 15 before but you just selected 15. You change it to 15 before. You check the rest of your email.

You finish your breakfast and go to the bathroom in the back of the section since it’s warmer than the one in the front. The cleaning lady comes in while you’re leaving. She’s early today. She has to move the cleaning cart for you. When you return to your room, Maryam is there, you say good morning to her. You go check out this text message thing. You check your google reader while the site loads. Only 34 new items. You finish your tea. The text site is taking a really long time to load. It finally does so you put in your number and wait for the next page to load. You have some applesauce. Someone on weddingplans wrote a post about how only 21/100 people RSVP’d to her wedding, she thinks, because they’re already married. You feel bad for her. If people don’t want to come, they should at least say so. You go get more hot water. You see Matt and say hi. The page finally loads and you sign up to receive updates. … You don’t know if the button’s working. … Nothing happens when you press it. … You try again in IE. You have a piece of gum. There’s a Fail Whale fan club? It doesn’t look like the site’s working in IE too well either. You’ll see what happens.

You tested the new application you’re taking over yesterday. You look through the notes you took on the code to make sure you understand everything in case Roy quizzes you on it later. You add to your notes. Oh, the website says you successfully subscribed to updates, yay! It says you’ll receive a text confirming your subscriptions, so you check your phone. Oh, you have three. You confirm one of them. You delete all your old texts in your inbox. You compare your notes with what you sent into the application. You have terrible handwriting you can barely read these. What does that say? “St rauest o roparties ressng for sandig potato data” ????? You think that should be post, not potato, but it looks like potato. You decide it’s best to type up your notes. You notice your wordpress is an hour behind. You didn’t update for daylight savings. You have to fix that. You go to the bathroom. Your hair’s really long, you need to get it cut at some point. You see Robby on the way back to your office. You wave.

You start typing up your notes. Maybe that word wasn’t post … you have no idea what it’s supposed to say. You have to go back and look in the code. Ah, the line is supposed to say “Set the request properties necessary for sending posted data.” Sudhir, a system tester, calls you and says that the file name for the config files you were working on yesterday is wrong. You have to change it which is a big pain in the butt because you have to ask someone to remove the old files from ClearCase. He says the name should be in caps, you’re not sure if that’s right, but he says it works that way.

9:50am
You’re still not sure what time this RUBY meeting is today since it changed so many times, is it 10 or 3??? So you Q Don to ask. Don says he’s not sure either and he’s going downstairs to check. You dial into your CP09 meeting. You tell Maryam you have no idea what time this this stupid RUBY meeting is. Someone on the call says the website says the union bargaining is going well. That’s completely opposite from everything everyone else has heard. You open the MR assigned to you while you wait for the meeting to start. The meeting starts, you take notes.

Hsiu-Mei calls and says the meeting is NOW. You tell her you have a CP09 meeting. She says she’ll tell Roy. Tran Qs you and says she just joined the meeting. You tell her you’ll send her notes. Meera Qs you and asks you if you would be interested in interviewing summer interns. Oooh, you say “sure.” Tran asks you what time you would have to be there. You say by 2pm Sunday. The manager says they’ll have bucket trucks instead of having to climb poles. He says they don’t usually climb. That’s good, though you’re not crazy about going up in the bucket either. Apparently everyone needs steel toe shoes with a steel shank. They never said that before. You don’t know if yours have a steel shank. What’s a shank? The meeting’s over, so you run downstairs to join the other meeting.

11am
The discussion is semi-interesting, and you actually understand some of it, so you don’t have a problem listening. The meeting’s over 21 minutes later and you return to your office. You hit your hand on the stair railing on the way back up. Ouch. You’re a klutz. You have an email from Bo suggesting you all meeting tomorrow to discuss the carpool for CT. You’re glad someone else is setting up a meeting. You look up the command to add a file to ClearCase. Maryam has her CP09 meeting. She says the manager said the union people walked away from the table today, but another guy said the website says thing are going well. You talk some more about the CP09 stuff. You don’t care if you get a lot of extra money, you still don’t want to go. You add the new config files to ClearCase and submit your MR. You’ll email Don later. You read through your google reader while you wait for the MR to submit. You read an article about VistaPrint charging people for services they didn’t knowingly sign up for. You hope you didn’t sign up for anything when you ordered your Save the Dates. You don’t think you did. You go to the bathroom to take a picture of your outfit since you didn’t get a good one this morning.

11:54am
Time to go downstairs for pizza and cake! The organization is having a recognition event for people with service anniversaries before the Employee Series meeting this afternoon. You ordered the cake the other day. Chocolate and banana and vanilla and strawberry, yum! You put your phone on vibrate. You and Maryam head downstairs. You’re very excited about the pizza.

The elevator stops at the fourth floor. You press 2 and almost close the doors on Sudhir. Maryam says it’s because you don’t want to answer anymore of his questions. You say everything should be fixed now.

There aren’t many people in the multipurpose room yet. They have your training photos on a slideshow in the front. There are handouts with the names of people at each CP09 location. You already know the people at your location, so you don’t bother taking one. Bogdan asks if it’s OK that he used your names in the presentation. Not your pictures, just your names.

You get two slices of pizza, veggie and chicken parm. You look at the cake. There’s no balloons! You told them you wanted balloons! At least they spelled everyone’s name right.

You sit down to eat and chat with your friends. Joe moves your chair so he can get through the aisle. He says he talked to Roy and told him that you guys are now non-exempt and can’t work overtime. Yay! Manjula comes over. Josh congratulates her for her service anniversary. She’s been here 10 years :O She doesn’t look old enough to have been here 10 years. Josh asks you about your wedding dress, April Fools joke, yesterday.

You debate whether you want a third slice of pizza. Kathy asks you if you want to share a veggie slice. You tell her you will if she is able to split it in half. She brings back the pizza, a knife and two spoons. Spoons? You ask what the spoons are for. She says for cake. She splits the pizza very well and you eat your half.

You talk to Karen and Eddie about ladder climbing during training. Bogdan asks you to cut the cake. You ask Kathy to assist you. You cut some of the cake and sit down for the start of the meeting. They’re having trouble with the bridge. There’s a sign-in sheet going around that you sign. Everyone borrows your pencil. They acknowledge the service anniversary people and you help serve the cake. The chocolate falls apart because the bananas and the filling split the cake in half. It gets awfully messy. You take pieces of chocolate and vanilla for yourself and sit down for the rest of the meeting.

They talk about new things in CDT, training, and CP09 stuff. You feel very sleepy. Bogdan does a humorous presentation with crazy pictures of people climbing on telephone poles with names of people from your TX training.

After the presentation, you stay behind to help clean up. You box up the leftover cake and go with Monali and Bogdan upstairs to put the leftovers out in the open area. You’re not carrying anything to put out. Monali says you’re there for moral support. Yeah, you’re good at that.

2:47pm
You go back to your office and check your gmail. You have mail from various wedding vendors. Rich comes by and hands you a CP09 sticker for your badge. He says to put it on right above your picture. Bogdan sends a Q saying to send email confirmation if you have a sticker. Brad shouts at people in the hallway not to put the stickers on the badges. You ask him why. He says there was an email saying not to put the stickers on until a strike is declared because until then, we’re supposed to be one, big, happy, at&t family. Oh well, too late. You chew a piece of gum.

Tran comes to your office to ask about the car rental. They made a big deal about having to take your own car to CT at the meeting earlier. You go to ask Bogdan, but he’s on the phone. You send an email instead. You go get some water. It’s not very hot. Bogdan and Tran come to your office a little while later. He says he’s afraid we’d have to pay for the car rental even if he approved it. Tran only has one car for her household though, so Bogdan says she would probably be able to rent one.

Everyone is sending emails about the boots. You hope yours are OK. You had a hard enough time finding those, you don’t want to buy another pair of boots. You forward the email your CP09 manager sent about the boots to Josh and Julia. Julia Qs you with a silly smiley. You look up your boots online. It doesn’t say they have a steel shank. Frell that. Julia asks if you can go early today. Yeah. Josh Qs you about the email. You tell hm you’re not buying steel shank boots. He says it’s mostly for climbing the ladder which you say you won’t be doing anyway since you didn’t pass the training. Josh says you should duck tape something steel to the bottom of your shoes. Actually, you found another pair of shoes online that do look like yours and they say they have a steel shank.

This whole thing is ridiculous. If this specific type of shoe is required, someone should have said something more than three days before the possible strike. You call your daddy to ask if he remembers if the shoes have a steel shank, he doesn’t. Eddie comes by while you’re on the phone, but he leaves. You go to look for him after you hang up, but you don’t find him.

3:58pm
You continue typing up your notes. Someone comes in and asks where 34F is. You give him directions. The building is a little confusing. Julia says you guys should leave at 4:45.

Poor Maryam is running around more than you today. Danny told her she doesn’t have to worry so much about the stuff Roy gave her to do since she has his work to do. She feels much better. Maryam says you will help her with her work, you’ll do the coding part, lol. You get yet another email about the CPID checklist.

Smita comes in and asks about the meeting Maryam had this morning. She’s at the same location as her for the strike assignment. You tell her you’re doing a Day in the Life of Lissy. You tell her she was in it last year and show her. She asks about your April Fools wedding dress. She knew it wasn’t your real dress. You talk about CP09 stuff and how you’re not supposed to work overtime, but everyone has all this project work and CP09 stuff to do, it’s crazy. Julia sends you an article: “Woman divorces husband for cleaning too much.” Smita leaves. And another article: “Ten Things To Buy Before The Economy Improves.” She must be bored. You respond to emails about the carpool. You go to the bathroom and then back to your notes.

You help Maryam with the CPID stuff for your CP09 assignments. Josh Qs you asking if you have an active skillport license. You don’t. He asks if you know how to renew. You suggest sending an email. You’re thirsty, but you’ll be leaving in a few minutes so you don’t want to get anymore water. Julia Qs you to tell you she’s leaving. You throw away the garbage on your desk. Maryam asks if that’s all we have to do for the CPID. You say, well, that’s all you did. You tried logging in with it, but you were already logged in with your attuid and you didn’t bother trying again. Bogdan comes in with a pencil and asks if you left it in his office. You didn’t.

4:48pm
You pack up your stuff and leave the office. You meet Julia at the door downstairs and head to your car. On the way home, you talk about how crazy everything’s been with the CP09 stuff. The turn onto your street from the parkway wasn’t so bad today.

You arrive at you apartment. They finished putting up the fence, so they don’t have the good spots blocked off anymore. You park there. You tell Julia you’ll see her tomorrow. You get the mail. You put your stuff down, take off your shoes and hang up your jacket. You open the mail. You have one thing from the Girl Scouts asking you to volunteer which is weird since you filled out a form online like almost a year ago. You also have a package from Create Excitement DJs. You look through it as your computer boots up. You drink some water. You decide not to eat the apple you forgot this morning since you’re still full from lunch. You do the rest of the dishes in the sink.

5:30pm
You put on your workout gear and put on your iPod. You dance and lift some weights for 30 minutes until you burn about 200 calories. Then you put in your Firm: Total Body Toner exercise DVD for the next 40. You burned 460 calories, about 100 more than usual a strength training day. That’s good because you ate a lot at lunch. You stretch while you watch the end of Friends and some of Seinfeld. You empty the roomba and clean it out and then turn it on to clean the bedroom. While it does its thing, you go shower. You use the chocolate body wash Bryan’s parents got you for Christmas. You shampoo and condition your hair. You use your tea tree oil face wash.

7:30pm
You hear Bryan come home while your in the shower. You say hi to him when you get out. He’s going to make a frozen dinner for himself and your couscous creation for you. You instruct him on how to make it. Couscous, salad dressing, frozen veggies, canned fruit, and black beans. You help stir a little. You sit down and eat. You watch the end of Seinfeld. It looks like Grey’s Anatomy will be a rerun tonight :( You put on The Daily Show. You take your vitamins. You put away your leftovers for lunch tomorrow and sit on the couch with Bryan and watch TV. He asks about the Girl Scout thing. You tell him you filled out a form a while ago. He says he thought maybe it was some cookie thing.

You have a bunch of new emails and 179 new items in your google reader X( Two of the messages are from the discussion Cheryl started on Facebook about Dollhouse. Her friend suggests you all have a party for the season finale. Ooooh, yeah! You become a fan of Bill Nye: The Science Guy. You stalk people for a while. The ER series finale starts at 9, but you can always watch that another day online. Bryan goes on the exercise bike. You try catching up on your google reader while you upload your pictures. It’s at 9%, 10 minutes later it’s at 8%. You don’t know why it’s having so much trouble copying videos. Bryan asks if there was a new Gossip Girl this week. You think so. You nod yes. Woo hoo, photos are done!

9:00pm
You put on ER. Bryan says he loves you. You love him too. He’s gonna shower. He’ll miss you. He waves, you wave back. Bryan comes back and keeps you company while you both half watch ER. Bryan kisses you and eats your ear. ER is really disturbing. You don’t wanna have a baby now. Bryan says he still wants a baby, please? We’ll see. You snuggle. You tell Bryan you’ll go watch Get Smart after the first half of this is over.

10:00pm
You floss and brush your teeth. You go into the bedroom to watch Get Smart. You change into your pajamas and put the DVD in. You snuggle on the bed with Bryan. The episode is kinda silly because he looses the tooth inside a prisoner’s mouth, gets arrested, gets sent to jail, gets put in with the murderers and gets the tooth back all within 72 hours. Well, they’re all a little silly, but our justice system doesn’t work that quickly unless it’s 2015 and they’ve abolished all lawyers.

The show’s over and you cuddle for a little while before taking out your contacts. You get under the covers and cuddle and chat with Bryan. He says he doesn’t like any boy names. You ask, what about William? He says no. He says when you two have a baby, you have to have a girl. You say you can’t just have a girl because you don’t like any boy names. You’d prefer a girl anyway though :P Bryan gets up to leave and you ask if it’s time to sleep already. You hug and he turns off the fan and the light.

11:06pm
You realize you forgot to pick out clothes for tomorrow. You get up and grab your jeans, purple sweater, a bra and some socks and put them on the chair outside. Bryan asks why you’re up. You tell him you forgot to pick out clothes. You go to the bathroom one more time before going back to bed. You turn off the light, climb into bed, get under the covers and fall asleep after a short while.