Office Max!

Microsoft has a relatively new product out called Microsoft Office Small Business Account 2006. I think it’s been “officially” released now, though not too long ago it was in beta. This isn’t anything real important to me, except that I see them overtaking Intuit’s marketshare in this area, and basically beating the shit outta QuickBooks. That’s all, just wanted to mention that so that in the future I can say I predicted it. Move along now…

Another thing was this man who came up to my mum and repeated over and over again " Yes, you must go to human resources etc etc etc". That was quite strange.

I am still working my way through The Cathedral & the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary. As I fully anticipated there are numerous things in this book that speak to my ecclesial dream. I found the chapter, The Magic Cauldron, to be one of the best chapters in the book. I am going to comment on it in a later post but since it is available online I wanted to link to it. I think anyone who is thinking about church and the structures we use to sustain and support the business side of it needs to read at least this chapter.

Okay… what ass-clown decided to steal my stapler? I’m serious. The stapler that I have had in my office for eight (8) years is gone.

She attends McDonalds everyday. Fine, your life choice, not mine. But at least three days out of the week she brings it back to the office. If she doesn’t eat the McDonalds in the office, she’ll bring back a sleeve of fries and a McChicken for later. A little snack in-between classes. Nothing tastier than cold McDonalds. Try sucking on a lead pencil, it tastes the same.

Bought a new printer today, was originally going to get a networkable printer, but after some discussion, we figured it wasn’t needed. BUT, this bad boy is a printer/scanner/copier/fax machine. I tried out the copier and it’s pretty fucking sweet. Should get to use the fax machine soon for sending out resumes and shit…only think that seems weird is that the ink cartridges are really small. Makes me wonder how long ink will last on this thing. The carts they give you are like 1/4 full so that’s not a good test and they don’t give you a USB cord to hook it up to your computer. Damn cheapskates.

6. At the office copy machine “Reproducing eh? Can I help?”

My assignment was admittedly a plum! You´ll generally have to start at the bottom, driving to a furniture store in the sticks on a Sunday to report on how they are doing. If you prove yourself as careful, punctual and reliable you´ll soon find yourself getting paid a few bucks (and more importantly having your expenses covered) while you go to the movies or out to eat.

They are not the only businesses to leave town. A leisurely drive up Taylor Street reveals a multitude of closed offices left behind in corporate restructures, consolidations and relocations. Estimates of vacant commercial space in town are as high as twenty-five percent. Of course it's not just the commercial taxes we miss and find hard to replace, it's the loss of good paying jobs. Our citizens need work within the city limits and one by one those jobs are disappearing.

I knew I needed some heavy card stock. So, I traveled to Staples and then to a local copy center, both of which didn't have what I needed. Staples carry the self-printing, perforated-edge business cards, the kind that you stick into your printer like a sheet of paper. Those aren't for me, but if you're looking to cut cost even more and are willing to sacrifice paper thickness (and overall appearance), by all means go for it. While I was at Staples, however, I picked up a customizable stamp kit that ran me about $14. Not too shabby considering what was in the kit: 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 line, large oval and circle stamp templates along with upper and lower-case letters (with each letter having roughly 3-5 duplicates) and special characters; an ink pad; tweezers to put the letters into the template (though fingers work just as well) and a holder to put the template into.

The most important is knowing some sort of word processing. Today’s world is requiring it and it is not going away. Power point is another important tool to know, from school to the working world. The student can create a simple report (presentation) and in the working world, they need to make more complex reports. Excel is a widely used softeware, if anyone has looked in the want ads, they would notice many places want/require the knowledge of excel. Inspiration is a learning tool taught in school and can have many uses. Imaging Software is great to know, but may not be required for the business world. It is a great asset to have when editing pictures.

Probably one of the less useful events they hold yearly at work is something called “Vendor Day”. Basically, various companies (hotels, office supplies and tzchotchky/doodad makers) show up, set up a table, and hand out pens and brochures.

Monday was here and I arrived to work in my new outfit. Because I had no energy, I took the elevator, which is sort of unusual for me. As the elevator opened I stepped out to what I could only describe as a human fly paper trap. Workers were apparently laying new flooring and had spread adhesive all on the floor and left for it to cure without roping off the area. My new shoes and I were stuck to the floor. I finally pulled myself free and proceeded to collect every thing from the elevator to my cubicle. The stray paper clip and the confetti from the shredder, to name a few.

I am a collector of office supplies – a collector, not a user; however, I’m working on changing that. There are so many possibilities in a blank paper, a new pen, or a package of stickers. I love to go to office supply stores merely to browse. Luckily, I’ve never been one to buy a lot. I buy sparingly and just hang on to the things I have.

when i came in for my one-on-one this morning, he had it on his desk where everyone who sat down had to look at it. funny stuff. i can’t take credit for the idea, sara gave it to me so i thank her for that. christine took the photograph. good times. another assignment we got from him was to write 10-15 rants on anything we wanted to. i will post a few here but keep in mind, this is all off-the-cuff stream-of-consciousness stuff. and a bit colorful:

New.net finds itself little liked by experts on Internet infrastructure and security. But where are users in this mess? I’ve never spoken with a user who actually wanted New.net, but I’ve looked at plenty of massively-infected computers with New.net installed. So I’ve long suspected nonconsensual, improper, or overly aggressive installations of New.net software.

Brent Simmons has confirmed that Newsgator has purchased NetNewsWire. One of the reasons Brent gave for the purchase is excerpted below

The first is that we get requests constantly about syncing—not just better syncing, not just between copies of NetNewsWire, but with Windows RSS readers, PDAs, Outlook, and so on. People even ask us to create a website version for when they’re away from their normal computers.