Saturday, May 22, 2010

Chapter One - 1b

My life, such as it was, consisted of work, getting to and from it, and the Internet. Sometimes I played my guitar. I usually played that on my tiny balcony. It seemed more romantic, more edgy out there. Plus in the back of my head I thought I would catch the eye of some fair maiden. This would lead to an encounter in the elevator or the hallway where she would stop, look twice, and exclaim "Hey! It's you!" Then she would laugh somewhat embarrassedly, look down for a second, then up, the desire impossible to hide in her eyes, and say "I was listening to you play guitar. Would you like to come by and play for me? I'll make us dinner." It never happened of course. I did find a flyer for guitar lessons under my door when I came home one night though.

My life on the Internet, for the amount of time it took up, returned very little actually worth anything. By worth, I mean anything that came in handy later after life changed for me. This was not really a surprise since half my time was spent finding the perfect porn video. The other half was spent looking at youtube videos and reading stuff I forget five minutes later.

The first change was when I was laid off. Yep. That certainly got the ball rolling. I went in one day, late due to traffic, and cleared through the security at the parking lot entrance. That part was easy because no one was there. That was my first clue that things were not right. The second was when I walked past the cube that contained the hottest girl on our floor. She was crying and there were three guys around her trying to comfort her.She was a drama queen normally so I shrugged that off thinking she had probably broken a heel or her favorite on Dancing with the Stars had been eliminated.

The next clue was when I got into my area and the Director of IT was waiting for me with a security guard. He looked pissed. The first words out of his mouth were "Forgot your Blackberry again?"

I replied "Ah...yes."

"Well, it doesn't matter. Your assistant took care of it." I could see Dat Le, my assistant, busy in our glass room.

He continued "We lost the contract. We are shutting down immediately. There is a chance you will be called back as a consultant. HR will want to see you. You have 30 minutes to pack your stuff." He looked at his watch "Make that 20 minutes. HR is in the cafeteria. After 20 minutes that will be the only space you will have access to." Then he got up and walked away. No goodbye. Nothing. I was stunned. Not too stunned to notice that the security guard hadn't left with him. I looked at him and said "Ain't this some shit."

He smiled sadly and replied "Yeah. I got until the end of the day."

5 comments:

  1. Once again you've painted a picture of life I see daily.

    These intricate networks or life maps if you will seem to become more unstable inversely proportional to the population level. Maybe that's due to the lack of respect people seem to have in a large society.

    Jim in MO.

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  2. ...Flyer under the door... Reality Check!
    Thanks for the laugh, lol!
    JO:)

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  3. Funny, I'm a network guy, and play guitar, too. (Actually, lots of computer geeks are also amateur musicians.)

    Love the bit about the guitar lessons flyer under the door - not everyone appreciates a free show I guess.

    I've started getting back into my guitar, in fact. I'm not going to spend all my spare time prepping - no matter what i do it will somehow not be enough, and I figure I might as well enjoy things now while we still have gasoline and electricity and money that people accept.

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  4. Yeah, the lack of civility is seen at a lot of different levels when networks break. The human level we know. The digital is when it breaks the other entities it was communicating with no longer exist instantly. No lingering. No goodbyes. Just gone.

    I play guitar myself. Not as often as I would like and nowhere near the level I would like. In the back of mind I hold onto the idea I could busk. Which is about as realistic as selling pencils.

    Life is always about the reality checks. Most people manage to ignore them I think.

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  5. My life, such as it was, consisted of work, getting to and from it, and the Internet. Sometimes I played my guitar.

    Actually, this is me to a 'T'. Ouch!

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