Friday, July 23, 2010

Knitting and Working and Snarking, oh my

Knit Tease
I'm working on a little mystery knitting project, which should be revealed in a few weeks. I started it yesterday, and it's more than half done, so it shouldn't take much longer, but then it has to be given to the recipient, so... a little while. I look forward to showing you!

Meanwhile, I've knit on the commute, and at lunch, and enjoyed it so much. At its best, knitting can be both peaceful and productive.

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Work Tale
Here is what a book nerd I am: after years of working at Barnes & Noble, I learned a lot of the prefixes in ISBNs, at least for the big publishers, by heart. (Fun fact for those of you who haven't worked that closely with books: part of every book's identifying number, the ISBN [International Standard Book Number], identifies the publisher. Some have more than one for different divisions. The numbers are different lengths, and the shorter ones tend to belong to the bigger, older, more established houses. Here endeth the lesson.)

Today at work, I realized I still remember a bunch of them. I was working on a project that involved check long lists of books that are going out of print, to make sure they're removed from the new catalogs. And I came to some that made me frown, as they shouldn't be our (meaning my company's) products, based on the numbers.

In my head, it sounded like this:
Wait, 440 is Bantam, no, Dell.
451 is NAL/Penguin.
812 is St Martin's?
14 is Penguin, 02 is Macmillan.
380 is Avon, what the heck?
I am so confused.

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More Work-Related
I wear skirts to work almost exclusively these days, since it's just too hot for me to be wearing slacks*. I do kind of miss my jeans, but the one day I wore them recently was a mistake; by the time I got home, they had more or less bonded with my skin, so I had to peel them off and sit in front of the fan before I could stand up again. Skirts are a better choice for now.

*Tonight it's in the mid-60s, cooler than it's been in forever.

Anyway, one of the issues I have with skirts is that I have to be constantly vigilant about them billowing upwards. In Boston especially it can be very windy, because of the tall buildings, and it gets a little tiresome to be on the alert all the time. (And on a rainy day like today, managing bag and umbrella while on skirt watch calls for more hands than I have with me.) However, as I prefer my hem to be closer to my knees than my neck, it has to be done. I'd pass out on the T in warmer clothing, and this is the price I pay.

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Snarky Me
A lot of the time, I may look well-behaved and quiet, at work say, but in my head, snarky me is LOUD.

Snarky Me wants to knock on the door of the person on the conference call and say, "Could you turn up the volume, please? Because I can't quite hear every word out here."

Snarky Me is the one who, listening to a group of people chatting loudly nearby, and clearly not about anything work-related, wants to ask them, "Am I working too loudly for you? Because I wouldn't want to disturb your conversation."

Do you hear that particular voice in your head? What does yours want to say?

4 comments:

  1. Secret knitting project! I want to know!

    It is a rare day I would wear a skirt to work, but I get your practicality. Dressing for this hot weather is hard.

    Where do those code numbers fall in the ISBN? I don't think I ever knew about that.

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  2. I would like to pay CASH MONEY to your Snarky Voice to actually say things. BECAUSE OMG.

    I had no idea ISBN numbers MEANT THINGS. This opens up a WHOLE NEW WORLD.

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  3. Lately I smack my cheek and say "Crap! Did I just say that out loud??"

    Foot in mouth disease runs rampant!

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  4. Lately I smack my cheek and say "Crap! Did I just say that out loud??"

    Foot in mouth disease runs rampant!

    ReplyDelete