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After convincing six people do the Rock n’ Roll Half-Marathon with me from the Marketing and R&D groups, I spread my search pattern to include other areas including those that had previously rejected me applying to them. In one of these cases, it was the hiring manager for the position:

Me: Hey, can I ask you something?
Hiring Manager: Sure. I’m sorry we couldn’t hire you for the IMQA position but…
Me: That’s fine.
Hiring Manager: What do you mean?
Me: I understand that there are reasons why you couldn’t hire me.
Hiring Manager: Then what did you want to talk to me about?
Me: I wanted to know if you’d run a half marathon.
Hiring Manager: I’m sorry, I can’t do that either.

Break my heart again.

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The Broad Street Run had jazzed me up about running and now I wanted to do it with other people. After yesterday’s race, the members of the Temple contingent swapped notes and stories and I enjoyed this part of the event much more than I thought I would.

Today, I walked around work asking people if they wanted to do the Rock n’ Roll Half Marathon. The answers I received were varied:

Julia: Sure.
Joe: Can you ask me a month from now?
Carl: No.
Everett: Can I say yes, then bail on you while training?
Pauline: Ok, sounds hard, but I’ll do it.

That last one was a victory. Once Pauline jumped on board, I used her as a club.

John B: No thank you.
Me: But Pauline’s doing it.
John B: The short woman from EHS?
Me: Yep. You’re not going to let her beat you, are you?
John B: Dammit. I’ll do it.

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Me: I’ve found a new way to prepare steak that you might be interested in.
Boss: I like steak.  Go on.
Me: It’s called sous vide, and I think if I use some lab equipment I can make amazing steaks at work cheaply.
Boss: Not on your life.
Me: Why not?
Boss: Against SOP, every device in this lab comes with an implicit guarantee that it will not be used to prepare food.
Me: But it’s steak.
Boss: SOP says no.
Me: If an SOP told you to jump off a bridge would you?
Boss: Yes.

At least he’s consistent.s

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Gina is a friend of mine from High School that recently moved back to Philadelphia and has taken to running.  We got together for dinner at Beau Monde, a creperie on 6th and Bainbridge that I remember enjoying in High School.  The entire wait staff was in skintight leather and the crepes were good.  I remember one of those from high school but wonder if the other was what really made the selection for me.  Gina and I talked and we went over our recent past.  She had apparently gained and then lost a lot of weight, started and then quit smoking, and dated and then stopped recently but now had a vastly better job.  I had gained and lost a lot of weight, gained and then lost a neat job (medical device start-up gig), and started and stopped dating, but now I had a vastly improved cardiovascular capacity.  I’d prefer the job.

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Me: Joe, do you know anyone with Community on DVD?
Joe: No, but it’s on Netflix, I think.  Why not use a free trial and see it all?
Me: I’ve used up all my email addresses to set up accounts already.
Joe: You own like, 4 domains, just make a new email address.
Me: Joe, you’re a smart one.

Minutes later “freenetflixtrial@ockanickon.org” existed.

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During a presentation on new software, Joe pointed out to me that the syntax they used was allowing wildcards of a type that suggested that inputs weren’t being sanitized. With a little poking, we determined that we could execute queries that could be harmful. I brought this up to the IT head that I had previously sought a job from.

Me: I think there could be a security hole in this.
Him: Hm… good observation. I think we have everything left open for now but I’ll make a note to make sure we lock everything back up when we’re done. You know, we’re looking for a security guy.
Me: Good to know, I’ll shoot you my resume, again.

I probably said one word too many.

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One of our products at work is designed to be taken rectally but only after a healthy slathering of lubricant has been applied. The videos of that product in action in a faux-butt required several takes and I went through almost a pound of lube. By my calculations, that’d be enough to get a 200 person key party going. Finally, something that brings together my analytical background and my failure at dating.

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As the resident operator of the massive printer at work, I was contacted to do a number of posters for our EHS department to promote Earth Day.  They wanted them to be 30″ x 40″ and mounted and it took me some sacrificial rollstock to get the colors right.  I had just spent a day making a large series of posters saying “I promise to not print unless necessary”.

Good to know that irony doesn’t clog the print heads.

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Marketing Boss: Terry.
Me: Yes?
Marketing Boss: We need to talk, you’re scaring some of the marketing people.
Me: How?
Marketing Boss: Well, someone saw you running around in a lab coat with a large knife wearing protective glasses.  And with your headphones on you looked kinda menacing.
Me: Well, I brought in fudge today and people were having trouble cutting and I didn’t want the crowd to disperse so I suspend my lab testing, grabbed the spare knife I had stored and started walking over there.  The building was chilly so I went back and put my lab coat on, and was in a hurry so I moved faster than usual.
Marketing Boss: So, this was all for brownies?
Me: Yes.
Marketing Boss: Ok.  Try not to do this on non-Mondays.
Me: Got it.

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Gary: Is that Chef Boyardee?
Me: Yes.  How are you going to make fun of me?
Gary: What do you mean?
Me: Joe and Reed both made fun of me for it.
Gary: Nah, be proud.  Chef Boyardee carries on a proud tradition of quality foods at low cost that can be prepared at home.
Me: Thank you.
Gary: Maybe one day you’ll turn 10 and will pack a real lunch for yourself.
Me: Die in a fire.