Wednesday, March 31, 2004
Okay, so... I got in the car after work and let out a HUGE scream... and now I feel a hundred times better. After Monday's LI detour, today really should have been expected.
Continue reading for Mexico rant, or skip to the not so bitter stuff.
1. You already know about the frantic PG rush Friday morning. Well... DJ (aka Dr. J, aka Dumbass-J) should have known better about trying to get the PG onboard, but hey, it was worth a try. HOWEVER, he was responsible for the precious Pooh laptop (the main one I do all my programs and stuff on at work), the one that's necessary to get data off the controllers we use. This guy's got a med degree, so he's smart, but he has absolutely no other kind of sense. Why did he think he could get away with trying to bring three carryons onto the plane? Apparently, he refused to check in his luggage, and he just absolutely needed his own laptop, so the Pooh laptop got checked in when they wouldn't let him carry it on with him. Ok. Let's think about this... the ONLY laptop with the necessary software on it... yeah, let's throw it into the cargo of the plane. Pffft. So... who was surprised when they LOST the laptop? Of course, not me... or J... or anyone else. That meant, without the software needed, they couldn't save data from the controller. Luckily, they found the laptop on Monday on their way back home. If they hadn't, Pooh might have exploded and taken as many people as possible with her.
2. The whole purpose of trying to get to Mexico as early as possible on Friday was so they could set up the equipment. But after they got there, the only thing they decided to do was check to make sure all the equipment was there. No testing to make sure everything was still working. So raise your hand if you're shocked that the equipment wasn't working early Saturday morning when they tried to start the experiments. Yeah... that's what I thought. They spent two hours trying to get everything working and lost one of the cases because they weren't ready. Dumb.
3. All our controllers are modified so they can run different parameters and so we can collect data from them. J and I checked and ran everything before we packed them. Luckily, we packed two controllers, because apparently, one of them "didn't work." What the ---! They kept insisting that we were either missing some wires or had too many wires or something stupid like that, and that when they tried to fix them, the soldering iron we had packed wouldn't work. And then they had the nerve to say they wish they had the wiring schematic so they could figure out what was what. Okay... HELLO! J printed out a schematic for them before they left. And in color, even. Oh, and they weren't prepared at all because they forgot they might need converters for the outlets. Stupid.
4. They finally got one controller to work. Yippee for them. Each controller is connected to the laptop through this little electronic box and a data acquisition card. Another thing they bitched about was that the box kept shorting out the controller and they couldn't use it. Which is the dumbest bitch ever because they didn't even have the laptop or the daq card to connect to the box and the controller. Without those, how in the hell can they honestly say the box kept fucking with the controller? Seriously. I printed out the directions on how to connect everything, so there's no excuse for them not knowing that they're stupid.
5. The PG we had rushed to find and order for them? Never got to them. They ended up using a supply someone else had found for them. So yeah... the few hours of frantic panic and a million phone calls... a fucking waste of time. The bottle of PG is probably still sitting on the hospital receiving dock, dammit.
6. VanWilder - one of the people I just want to grab and shake silly - apparently contaminated everything. EVERYTHING. There were horror stories that he touched the tissue with/without his gloves, put on/took off the gloves, touched everything with/without the gloves on... EWWWWWW!!!!! Dude. WE WARNED EVERYONE. We told them. If there was anyone who had "note-taker/scribe/clean person for the week" tattooed to his/her forehead, it would be him. That guy's taken the same biohazard training courses as all of us, and for some reason, he just doesn't get it. I don't know what his problem is, but seriously... he needs to get some common-fucking-sense. So of course, the first order of business when we went through the equipment that's trickled back to the lab was to disinfect everything. Ugh. Nasty.
7. When they said "WE" have to unpack all the equipment to make sure everything's back... and "WE" have to check all the equipment to make sure they're still working... and "WE" still need to repack all the equipment for Philadelphia on Monday... I think -- THINK, but of course, nowhere near certain -- that "THEY" meant "Pooh and J." Bastards. Packing is the pits, but unpacking sucks huge Sloane balls.
8. When they found out they had "lost" the Pooh laptop, they were going to try installing the software on someone else's laptop. Sounds like a good idea, no? Except they only had the software disc available. The actual program they needed? Only copy was on the Pooh laptop. Dumbasses.
9. We were told to start analyzing and compiling all the data they collected in Mexico. We, as in J and Pooh. First order of business, organizing the pictures of all the tissue sections they were supposed to take so I could do the measurement analysis when they came back. Okay... I don't know how many times I've told them how to take the picture, but how difficult is it to remember to snap the anterior, posterior, and top-view of each section? Because really... when I glanced through the pictures, there were like 7 or 8 of ONE side view of each section. Every ten or so sections, there would be one section that had both the anterior and posterior views taken. So out of 100 sections, only maybe 4 of them had the two out of the three necessary pics taken. I seriously think they were trying to screw with me by doing that. Like "oooh... wait... one pic.. two pic... ahhh... nah, let's forget about the third pic for this section just to get Pooh's hopes up." **deep breath** Okay, so I can work with one good pic per section, but you'd think in order to do that, they would have gotten a person who knew how to use the digicam to actually take the pictures. 90% of those stupid pics were either too dark or too blurry to use. Dammit. And then... we had packed a mini-tripod for them so each picture could be about the same for measurement calibration. But NO! Let's not do that, because Pooh needs busy work and she can calibrate each fucking picture individually when she does the measurements. Fucktards.
10. Next thing to do was go through all the temperature data they collected since they didn't have any data from the controller. Opened up the data files, and... WTF. Where the fuck was the timestamp for the twenty columns of data? Bastards had used the WRONG FUCKING PROGRAM to collect data!!!!!!!!!!!! FlyersBoss was there with me, and noticed they had used the wrong program, too. Thank God he didn't go with them because I'd really hate to have to strangle him, too. You know, I probably wouldn't have been so pissed if I hadn't written out, in very specific terms, how to set up the program for data collection. I put a shortcut on the desktop, told them which folder the program was in just in case it didn't show up on the desktop, gave them my username AND password (*pets slutty password, since everyone and their grandmother has it now*) if they needed to get to the desktop in my account, and hell... even wrote out a list of potential problems and how to troubleshoot every single fucking one of them. It was practially an InstructionalPooh, in paper form. So yeah... I was just a teeny itty bitty upset when I opened those files. BUT the best part? When Boss emailed me to say that she thought the program was supposed to have a timestamp, which it didn't have, and that next time, we should make sure the program has a timestamp. Okay... I just... I'm going to... I wanna... I can't... **SHOOTS SELF**
11. And then when I tried to do the image analysis, I couldn't sit still. I was literally trying to crawl out of my skin. I was in PAIN. Not quite sure what happened there, but it might have had something to do with a mental breakdown. All I know is when I got up to pick up a printout from the printer and needed to walk by the front door, I had to fight the urge to walk out the door, keep going, and not stop until I got to California or Canada or Florida or wherever. Argh. The scream at the end of the day helped relieve the need to smack everyone, but I still feel like I can put on my shoes and just... go.
Slacking off
Thank goodness for ameoba work friends. We've decided that no matter how many instruction manuals we prepared for them, they would have never looked at them because we're just ameobas and therefore, nobodies. Because of the pure exasperation and frustration of the day, neither J nor I wanted to actually do any work. You know what that mentality is like: why should we analyze all your stupid data if you didn't even follow the explicit directions we gave you to collect the CORRECT data. Fuck it. We kept trying to find time to slack off because we were both about to go psycho over it. I think today we went beyond potty-mouth to being able to embarrass sailors. Almost had to wash my mouth out with soap during work. That's how upsetting today was.
1. We spent some time going through our astrological charts. Heh. The short version. The detailed version. The extended forecast. Compatibility tests for all the interns... Yay! We're all compatible! Also checked out our energy meters. Surprisingly, today was a good day for love, but a bad day for "attitude." LOL
2. We also took a couple of Cosmo quizzes online. What's your sexy vibe? **hangs head in embarrassment** Pooh's a G-rated gal. Heh. Like that's a shocker.
3. We checked out the top 50 bachelors in the country, went through all their pics, and snarked on pics/questionnaires. **snert** Pooh didn't see any interesting guys, so Kiefer can now breathe a sigh of relief. Hee!
4. J had the funniest story about an ex IM'ing her when she was on the computer during class, the ex's use of a webcam for EVIL purposes, and about a guy in her class who IM'ed her to ask when she was going to invite him over to her place and cook dinner for him. Dude... lmfao.
5. We then spent the last half hour at work playing on Friendster, and shopping for flashdrives and digicams.
Thank god for those mini-mental breaks during work. Ended up bringing some of the work home with me because there was absolutely no way I was going to stay late to work on it, but you know... pfffffffft to that now. Unfortunately, we do it all again tomorrow, AND there's that aggravating tech meeting to go to. This week needs to end right now. Please?
|| posted by Pooh at 7:31 PM ... ||