Seven Swans a Swimming

One more week! Aaaauuuugggghhhh. The good news is that I managed to get that oversized gift exchanged for the right one. The bad news: I still have a long way to go! I have been making Christmas ornaments for my family, and they are almost finished.

This is great. The only radio station I can get at work is a Light Rock station, and usually bores me to tears. Today, however, they are playing all Christmas carols, all day! It's making me all Christmassy and joyful. It is also snowing today, the big fat snowflakes that stick to my hat and eyelashes.

Yesterday was crammed-busy with all kinds of insanity. I had the morning off, and spent it fixing a big salad for the potluck Christmas party at my new office, exchanging the aforementioned gift for the right size, and trying to find something clean and festive to wear (not so easy when I haven't been able to afford that trip to the dry cleaner yet.)I got to work and was whisked off the the party before I even had a chance to take my coat off. At first it seemed like an ordinary office potluck, except that there were about 160 people jammed into the room, most of whom I didn't remember having met before. They started off with an all-staff meeting, which was also fairly normal. Goals for next year, bonus criteria, and a recap of last year's performance. I was amazed to year that MPHI customers had reported 100 percent satisfaction with the service they received. That is astounding.

Then I got the first clue that strangeness was coming. The people from the Detroit office introduced themselves as "earth, wind, fire and water" and proceeded to give a lyrical interpretation of their general workday. (Yes, a song.) Then they were done, the Ann Arbor office recited a poem they wrote about parking at U of M. This was not the strangest part.

Soon after the U of M thing, different departments of the MPHI home office started to make their presentations. Let's see if I can keep this all straight: The Sudden Infant Death Syndrome people read limericks. The Cancer people gave a kinetic/poetic presentation. One of the research groups (I can't remember which) sang a song about alcohol abuse in the teenage community, and someone else sang one about Hepatitis B.

JeffCroff says that as far as geeks go, I seem to have hit the motherlode. I think I must agree. My corporate Christmas gift was a yoyo and an extra string for it. :)

It was the strangest Christmas party I have ever attended. Then we ate turkey. I learned that if you still have work to do, you should not stuff your staff with tryptophan (the amino acid in poultry that makes you so sleepy after eating it). I had to go to training after that, and about dozed off!

Today I get to try to do the payroll. Hoooo boy.

This is my last day at MSPE, thank *insert greater power here*. As I said before, three jobs is too many. I will be continuing as MSPE's webmaster, mainly because no one here knows how to do it and they are not so keen on trying to find someone who does.

My munchkin's first school Christmas program was Wednesday night. She was an elf, and very proud of it. She did a very nice job! It was a cute program. I was happy because my mom and Sam were there, Bill, Kathy and Allyn, Bill's mom, Yeffy, Curt, and JeffCroff. It was a nice turnout.