6 weird things about me/Vince made me do it

Vincent Cheung made me do this and I just can't let that guy down.

THE RULES: Each player of this game starts with the '6 weird things about you'. People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 6 weird things as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. Don't forget to leave a comment that says 'you are tagged' in their comments and tell them to read your blog.

This is hard. I don't know if these things are really that weird. I think I've revealed most of my oddness on this blog already, but here goes.

1. Although I enjoy many different activities, both solo and with friends, I would have to say my favourite way to pass the time is daydreaming. I spend a lot of time lost in thought. Probably too much time, really.

2. I do make a conscious effort to not use obscene language because I personally believe that I am smart enough to find some other word that will do just fine, but on occasion of course, there are slips. However, two words you will NOT ever hear me say and that are not usually offensive in normal context are "panties" and "nightie". (I honestly can't believe I was even able to type them). I don't know why, but hearing either of those words just makes my skin crawl. It's not what they represent that offends me, it's literally just the sound of the words. I'll say "underwear" and you'll just have to figure out that I'm talking about the bottoms that girls wear under their clothes.

3. I'm not at all ticklish anymore. People try and I don't flinch. However, my sister has some kind of magic powers over me. If she even motions towards my side or my neck (even with completely non-tickling intentions) I literally start to shake and giggle like a Tickle-Me-Elmo.

4. I have found through careful documentation that my lucky day is often the 5th of the month. Good things just seem to happen to me either on that day or on the 4th or 6th. My birthday is on the 5th of the month so that was my first lucky day!

5. The last scary movie I saw was Stranger than Fiction. I call it scary because I actually do believe that there is someone writing and narrating my life. I don't really like my author because I think he/she is a better writer than I am and therefore I am insanely jealous.

6. I remember when I was a kid I always heard about the ball dropping on New Year's Eve in the Big Apple. I somehow got the message mixed up though and thought that if I looked outside on New Year's Eve I would see a big red apple in the sky.

Uhg, I feel so naked now. The world knows all my stupid secrets.

Oh yeah, I'm not finding six more people to tag, mostly because I don't even know six other bloggers but also because I don't believe that breaking this chain will have any negative impact on my life (and even if it does, everything will be rosey again by February 5 anyway!)

1-900 Tech Support

I have to call the help desk (tech support) at work twice this week. The first time is because I forgot my password to one of the databases, the second time is because something wasn't working and it was mildly inconvenient. I put both calls off for as long as I could. I hate asking for help.

Eventually I have no choice; I can no longer avoid calling in to get my password reset. I need in. I hate making this call because I do it at least once a month. I feel so dumb that I cannot remember a password that I chose for myself (in my defense, it does expire every month and it's not like I use it every day). I imagine that every time I phone and give them my id a huge log comes up showing all the incidents of password resets I've called in and the person on the other end is just shaking their head at me. I have always found the support personnel cheerful, helpful, and not at all patronizing, but I can only imagine the venting conversations they have in their hallways about the idiots they have to help.

Anyway, this particular time a cute sounding guy answers. I have never spoken to him before as far as I can recall. His phone voice conjurs up an image of a very hot preppy blond wearing Dockers and a ringer t-shirt. After I make my request he puts me on hold so he can call my voicemail and leave me my new password. We hang up and I retrieve my message. As I listen I actually start to tingle a little (you have to understand, I was having a wicked bad week so sexy-tech-help-boy was actually a big highlight).

"Hey Jill, this is Aaron. I reset your password to access the GWL mainframe. Your new password is J as in Juliet, five, W as in whiskey, J as in Juliet, B as in..."

I smile to myself and let my mind wander off as I think, "why Aaron, Juliet and whiskey? I'd love to do Shakespeare and shots with you. Maybe later you can help me defrag my hard drive". The voicemail lady interrupts my day dreaming, "to delete this message, press seven, to save in archives, please press nine." I decide to archive Aaron, just incase I wrote something down wrong and I need to listen again.

On Thursday morning I make my second help call. This time it's because whenever I try to print a report in Access a little window pops up saying it is sorry but for no explicable reason Access would have to close and I may lose any unsaved changes. Leave me for no explicable reason huh? Access you must be a man. I pick up the phone and cross my fingers that Aaron will answer again.

"Hello, GWL Help Desk, Karen speaking." Rats. I explain my problem to Karen and she manages to figure out that I can print without disaster if I click on the printer icon instead of going File-->Print. She tells me though that she will have to pass my problem on up to the next level (woo hoo! I have a level II problem! That's way more credible than forgetting my password for the 500th time). I print my reports and I go to my meeting with seconds to spare.

When I get back I have a voice mail from Dwayne at the Second Level Help Desk and he wants me to call him back. I dial him up and he proceeds to remotely take over my PC to play around. He's not exactly fantasy material I decide, not like Aaron. I can hear him breathe and sigh and make other weird noises as he pokes around my system. Bored, I use the time to shuffle papers and search for my lip gloss. He's looking at my install/uninstall program list when he grunts, "Google toolbar. Toolbars are bad" before sending Google packing.

I cry to myself, "Noooo! Not my Google! Google knows so much about me, all my favourite places, my history, my habits". An image of me in a two star movie comes to mind:

"I know he's bad for me mama, but I love him and I don't care what you say cuz Google and I are going to be together forever! You can't keep us apart!"

Yeah, Google will come back once mouth breathing Dwayne here is out of the picture.

Forty-five minutes later and Dwayne still can't make me print. He informs me that he'll have to call in IBM to take my PC away for "re-imaging" (like, making it prettier?). Yee-haw! No computer for a few hours? Finally some good news.

When my computer comes back it's not any prettier although it does look different. I spend about 45 minutes re-doing my settings, changing my wallpaper back and generally just getting reacquainted with the thing (BONUS! I can PDF now!). Is my Access problem fixed? I have no idea because now I can't seem to locate the database anymore. Whatever, I'll deal with it on Monday when I need to print again. Here's hoping I remember (forget?) my password.

Tag, you're it baby

For about an hour and a half today I was without my computer as it was in for repair. I was forced to fill my time with jobs that some how did not require printing or consulting e-mails. I started something I had been putting off for a while--going through a binder of investment articles written by our advisors, edited by me. My task was to categorize each one by subject matter by labeling with a Post-it--RRSPs, life insurance, estate planning--some could technically use two labels and I had no idea what I was going to do about that. Later I will sort the articles by category and then by publishing date. As I got into it, I thought to myself, "this is how tagging was invented, isn't it?" Then I frowned because I realized I have way better technology for organizing my personal photo collection than I do for doing my actual job. I felt like the subject of an educational video on life before computers, or at least life before Google.

Check it out: Random Acts of Cooking

My astute followers may notice that I added a new link to my blog called Random Acts of Cooking. Sometime before Christmas Rob, Vince, Justin and I got together at Rob's place for what may have been the geekiest time I have ever had. Enjoyable, but very geeky. I think I got to Rob's place first (because I am clearly the geekiest of them all). Vince was next. I said to him, "It's weird seeing you in person again; you're not just a blinking window on my computer screen".

I showed up that night on the promise that we would not be playing Settlers of Catan. We did not play that game, but we did spend a significant amount of time talking about blogging. Somehow the idea that we should have a group blogging project came up and thus, Random Acts of Cooking was born.

The site is a collection of recipes and adventures in cooking. The general idea is that you're supposed to stray away from tried and true recipes and instead make up your own creation. I generally like to stick to recipes so I've only posted two items so far, both in the "bad cooking idea" category. I say that I like to stick to recipes, which sounds safe enough, but I also have to admit that I often run into problems even with detailed instructions as a guide. Usually this happens when I decide to make a big batch of something and I lose track of my doubling (was that my fifth cup of flour or the sixth?). Do you remember that Rice Crispies commercial where the mom is making Rice Crispie Squares and to make it look like she spent hours slaving in the kitchen over them she purposely dusts flour all over herself? Yeah, I do that but without trying. Whatever, the stuff usually turns out, it's just an adventure to get to the final product, as cooking should be! So anyway, if you are looking for some culinary inspiration and a few laughs, check out the Random Acts of Cooking blog.

Stranger than Fiction: 2006 A Year in Review

I remember as 2005 drew to a close I thought to myself, how can 2006 possibly be better than this? 2005 was awesome! But then 2006 was awesome too! And now here I am going, how can 2007 be better than '06? I can hardly wait to see what is in store, what stories I will collect and share. Here are the highlights of '06.

January 14--First blog posting of ajillstory. I wrote about my first Hip Hop class. 2006 was the year that I added "dancer" to my identity.

January 20--Truck came home! After 100 days of waiting, I finally brought my baby home. Truck and I have since had many adventures together. My love for Truck is indescribable; he truly makes me happy.

February 21--My dear little wiggly goldfish, Itty Bitty died. I don't have any pictures of him. Just imagine the little fan tailed fish in Disney's Pinocchio.

March 2--First Boy Story of the blog, Alex.

March 20--My reputation as a Homewrecker gets its start.

May 23--First trip of the year to the US (Minneapolis). Coincidentally I also booked my trip to California in May. I had a lot of American adventures in '06.

May 29--First golf game. I aimed in 2006 to sign up for more stuff, try new things. Golf was one of them. Thanks to Rob for practicing with me, and thanks to that stranger guy at the driving range for telling me that my grip was upside down.

May 28--My growth spurt! Yeah, this is the girls only post that only the guys commented on. First radio contest prize of 2006.

June 2--My first solo trip across the border. Truck's first highway trip. Good times. Funny Elmo and Dad story.

June 14--My second of four radio contest prizes in 2006, the Back Yard BBQ.

July 1--San Francisco! My first solo airplane trip, my first trip to California, my most southern trip, and just a super fun trip all around.

July 13--Near death experience as I try Hot Yoga for the first time, yet another new activity for 2006. I can tell you that it got easier by the 3rd class.

July 28--Truck sustains an injury. This still makes me cringe.

July 30--Somewhere around this date I set my goal to move out. I came close to realizing that goal for January 07 but I decided that place was not for me. Still on the hunt and keeping my hopes up that I will not have to in fact live in a trailer park with my tow-truck driver husband, Gus.

August 13ish--Vince came home. Yeah Vince, you're a highlight buddy :) Yin and Yang are back!

September 27--RMH Conference and Vince hijacks my comments. September was mostly a sad month for some reason it seems. Let's forget about it.

October 9--The Jill B@rr0tt Media Blitz starts! First there was the CBC interview, then the Free Press story which was picked up in the Brandon Sun as well. In December my fame would reach international status when one of my favourite stories was shared on a North Dakota radio station and posted on the station's website. My last media appearance of the year was when I along with the rest of the Great-West Christmas Choir sang live on the CBC radio morning show. I never would have predicted I'd be such a star in 2006.

November 13--World Kindness Day, aka, Cupcake Day! I wanted to celebrate WKD because I love the idea of random acts of kindness. The day was a huge hit.

November 24--My last trip to America for 2006 and my most memorable one. Good girly fun and memories I revisit often.

December 5--My super fun 25th birthday. I am still Wang Chungin'.

December 20--My first experience with organizing a Christmas hamper.

That sums up the highlights of my 2006 (well, the ones I'm willing to share with you). In 2007 I look forward to more new activities--boxing boot camp for starters--more travel fun, moving out adventures, and all the other "this could only happen to Jill" kind of stories.