Yes, I know it’s the holiday season. Good Will Towards Men, and all that stuff. However, some of us have to work during this time. Not only do we have to work, but we get end-of-year fucked up projects dropped upon us, have annual reviews, are told how great we are but there is no money for raises (while there are about 50 consultants running around making $1000/day, each), and so forth.
On our way home on the train, we want to do what we always do: relax, nap, read, listen to our music. But no, we can’t. Because you have decided to bring your damn kids downtown to look at all the pretty, pretty tall buildings, and have decided to take a rush hour train home. Your children are inconsiderate little bastards. Well, I’m not sure that view of their parentage is correct, but I stand by my label of inconsiderate, based on your darlings’ actions:
[ul][li]Musical chairs. They seem incapable of sitting in one spot for more than one minute, so they have to switch with Brittany, Tad, Trevor, or whoever. And you know the seats on the top level make a loud whoomp when they fold up.[/li]
[li]Swinging on the guard rails on the top level. I wish for a hacksaw.[/li]
[li]X squared conversations, where x = number of rug rats you’ve brought on board. And no, they can’t use their inside voices. They gotta yell at each other.[/li]
[li]Asking if it’s their stop every time the train come into a station. This is despite the fact that Mister Automated Announcer-Man voice has just said what station it is. And not only that, Mister Automated Announcer-Man voice said what the station was when we left the previous station.[/li]
[li]If the train stops before a station, say to wait on a switch, loudly asking if the train has stopped. Lack of motion from outside the window should be a clue.[/li]
[li]While said train is stopped waiting on said switch, asking loudly if the train has started moving. Lack of motion from outside the window should be a clue.[/li]
[li]Whistling for 15 damn minutes. [/ul][/li]And you do nothing to change these activities. Therefore, in closing, stay in damn suburbs where you belong and leave the big city to the working folks. Thank you, happy new year, and bite me.
If it makes you feel any better, she has probably been cooped up with the Spawn for the last week and a half, 'cause of course we all get two weeks off at the holidays, like the schools. So she’s had many days of similarly scintillating conversation and sibling interactions, punctuated by frequent "Mom, I’m bored/I’m hungry/He’s touching me! breaks.
You all are lucky she just sat there, rather than opening up on the car with the Ronco Uzi she ordered from the QVC last week.
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Look, mommy, 5que’s ears are smoking!
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Ooh, shiny!
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
Are we there yet?
I loved the one I saw the other night - relatively full train, woman bringing her darling duo home from shopping downtown, and of course they had to take up 6 seats for three people. In an otherwise full car, with people walking through looking for seats. The two loudly yapping children had their bags full of purchases and their little backpacks full of toys to entertain them strewn across a full bench (which seats two) while they took up the other two-seater behind that one, and the mother took up a full seat as well with her packages. Did the mother look around the train and note that the businesspeople had all ended up shifting their bags onto their laps, or into the luggage rack? If she did, apparently she didn’t think that she and her children should be subject to the same rule of not occupying seats you didn’t pay for if seating is at a premium. I moved to another car to find a seat, but I wish a conductor had been around or I’d have pointed him at the situation.
Hey, Ferret Herder, which train line you on? I’m having my troubles on the Milwaukee District North line, and all the little bastards seem to be riding to Libertyville, meaning they’re with me almost my entire ride. :mad:
I’m on the Burlington, myself. As I was in the vestibule waiting for the train to pull into my station, I saw the mother and children in question gathering up their things, so they would have been along for my entire ride if I’d found a vacant seat in that car.
That’s one reason why I like Metro-North Railroad so much. The conductors will politely remind people to stow their crap in the luggage racks, and if they come through again and it’s still there, they won’t hesitate to grab it and shove it up there themselves.
OK, you lost me right here. What is it you’re trying to say? Should the company do without the consultants, rely on their own people to do the job, and use the savings for raises? Damn, you’ll never make management with that attitude!
No kidding. We’re moving into a new building in a few months, and the floor plans show two special offices for “consultants.” We’ve got 150+ people in this IT department, and we still need a bunch of consultants??
There’s one that sits next to me sometimes – ha, ha, just a cube for her – and she taps her teeth with her pen. Drives me crazy.
To quote Despair.Com (no link, because our firewall blocks access to it!): Consulting. If you’re not part of the solution, there’s good money to be made in prolonging the problem.
I’ve been shopping the last couple of days (not really sure why, just didn’t occur to me not to, I guess), and it seems like I’ve been hearing children crying/wailing/screaming/throwing tantrums every minute of every day that I’ve spent in a mall. I think I should start shopping with earplugs.
5que
My sympathies. I catch the bus to and from work everyday. Usually, at commuter times, the buses are a mobile oasis of peace and quiet. But during the holidays… grrrnggg. They turn into mobile playpens for little yapping yelping demons.
Thing is, i can tell just by looking at some of the little pests EXACTLY what stunts they will get up to. Dunno how, guess it is just years of observation. Just last week a woman and her child were queuing for the same bus as me… and i thought… i just know what is going to happen here. I was spot on.
Little kid - about 6 / 7 years old - sits at the front. There is a spare place next to him for mother. But that is like, just not how things seem to be done anymore. Off she goes to the middle of the bus. Eventually the bus fills up and sets off. What happens then? Over the heads of the tired and weary commuters and shoppers, mother and son engage in lively LOUD banter. Well, of course, silly me, they have to raise their voices as they are not sat together are they. :rolleyes: