Excaculator
Well, it’s been somewhat of a long weekend - no work for me last Friday or today. I’m not completely skiving, though - Friday was sick leave, and today was a day of “education” at a local “learning centre”.
Friday saw my final traipse out into the dodgy locale of Penrith - not actually a suburb so much as an oversized pram showroom - for my final visit to my dick doctor. You know, just to make sure everything’s okay downstairs. It’s not like I haven’t been testing it every five minutes or something.
After spending a couple of hours traipsing around Penrith, then waiting 45 minutes in a waiting room, I bumbled in the doctor’s door and dropped my dacks.
He prodded everything for all of five seconds, decided “Mmm. Looks fine,” then shoved me back out the door. All within a matter of a few minutes.
This guy made $90 off me, just for doing that. I’d suspected that I didn’t particularly need a follow-up appointment - clearly I’m in the wrong profession. It’s still got me absolutely buggered why this guy operates out of Penrith, of all places. He’s freaking raking it in.
So, while I was out there, I figured I’d pop into the local major shopping centre. Big mistake! Surely alarm bells would be ringing if you entered a shopping centre which featured enormous “code of conduct” signs everywhere around the entrance?
The Penrith Plaza Code of Conduct:
1. Respect others.
2. Respect yourself.
3. Respect the Plaza.
4. The Plaza is Good and Your Friend. Would you like some Kool-Aid?
Well, maybe not #4, but still - “respect the Plaza” sounds rather ominous. What will it do back to you? Trap you inside some never-ending Tarocash store and submit you to endless bad meterosexual fashion for all thundering eternity?
So, my guard was up from the moment I entered, considering they basically needed signs at the entrance screaming “PLEASE STOP BASHING AND STEALING FROM YOUR FELLOW PENRITH RESIDENT. ALSO, DO NOT CUT.” Fortunately, I was run down by a wall-to-wall battalion of twin prams roaring down the food court towards me, and put out of my misery shortly afterwards.
Considering that my Friday off work wasn’t really eventful at all, I was comfortable in the fact that I was off for some “Advanced” Excel training today (yeah, nerdy, but work’s paying, so eh). They really don’t freakin’ prequalify people for this course, and bloody hell they should’ve. Here I am trying to learn how to use PivotTables, and I’m surrounded by fuckwits gaping at their screen, then slowly raising their hand to mumble “How do I make a pink border again?” Did these knobs not even read the “expected knowledge” section of the course description?
Apparently not. A couple of the attendees even mentioned that they were “only here because this is required to get into another course I’m interested in”. Christ, maybe there’s a reason for that.
The moment I snapped was when we were all waiting for one woman to catch up, performing an overwhelmingly simple function in Excel. After literally five minutes of her dribbling slack-jawed into her keyboard, she bent down and pulled out a calculator from her bag, proceeded to MANUALLY CALCULATE equations and then enter hard numbers into Excel.
WHY ARE YOU EVEN BOTHERING TO LEARN EXCEL AT ALL?! FOR FUCK’S SAKE! THE COURSE IS NOT CALLED “ADVANCED FUCKWIT OFFICE ASSISTANTS: MICROSOFT CALCULATOR BOOGALOO”.
Holy shit, I just realised that she could have even used the Windows calculator. But no! A FUCKING ENORMOUS DESKTOP CALCULATOR. Why the fucking jockstrap are you EVEN HERE?!
On top of that, the Cats died in the arse on the weekend, when by all rights, they should have won. I’m so angry, I need a beer. And, er… Deal or No Deal may or may not be on right now. Where’s O’Keefe and his machine-gun stacatto laugh, he’ll fix me…
Oh yes - I’ve got a new MSN Messenger account, so come and have a chinwag if you’re on there too. I’m jeb at tastes like drunk dot com.
June 21st, 2005 at 1:44 am
I’m going to have nightmares about being stuck in a Tarocash store now.
I do love going to shopping centres in really dodgy suburbs though - Vicky Pollard goes to all of them.
June 21st, 2005 at 11:47 am
Just read your post regarding Fitness Fuckwit First. I also spent a great deal of time and energy trying to free myself from their money hungry little hands. The process I went through to cancel the stupid thing was ridiculous and expensive. I was also told I had to rock up to the gym location I joined at. So I caught the bus, and low and behold. IT’S SHUT! Angry attitude in tow I stormed back into the gym on the otherside of the bridge and demmand they close my account and slammed my money on the table. No such luck. I. Hate. Fitness. First.
June 21st, 2005 at 12:22 pm
Excellent dick news. Even with the overcharging bastardry.
June 21st, 2005 at 1:14 pm
I’ve done that Advanced Excel course. I had a similar experience with idiots in the class as well. I was always streaming ahead, which gavem me time to reply to emails in between. Haha.
June 21st, 2005 at 1:15 pm
Dead set, after that experience, I’m just going to research shit myself, or get work to buy a book so I can work at my own pace. That was way too frustrating.
I was reading SMH most of the day… heh :)