More Pepsi?

Today was my fourth day of work at Health Plan Operations. As I have told numerous people before, my job consists of entering numbers into a computer, sending the information to an analyst (someone with a real job) and then I take the sheet of paper that I was copying the information from and add another number, the claim number. That is the basics of my job. Can you read? Can you recognize numbers? Can you remember what F7, F3, F5, and F12 do? Then you can do my job.

Today was different. First off, we were having a Hawaiian themed lunch party today so everyone was wearing Hawaiian shirts, sarongs and leis (who's gonna wear the lie now? That's for you, Mauri). And today we sent out checks to the various hospitals and health care centers to pay for people's drug rehab, hospital stays, ear infections and bladder control problems. My new motto? Don't do drugs, rehab is expensive.

Checks were fun. I held in my hands a check for $62,000 and wished with all the fiber of my being that it was made out to me rather than Corvallis Clinic. I was also introduced to a very pleasant machine. The folding machine. It's amazing, and possibly my best friend. You turn it on, choose how you want your letters folded, and there it goes. In less than five minutes 400 sheets of paper were folded into lovely letter sized thirds. I simply added checks and stuffed the envelopes and sent them on the next step to mailing. In a conversation with a friend about how awesome the folding machine was, my friend asked, "can it fold a paper crane?" I told him that I didn't know, but that he was welcome to come and fold papers for me next week. Though I doubted he could do it as fast.

There are over fifty people working in my department, and as you can probably tell no one's job is all that riveting. People get bored easily, and they tend to deal with it in interesting ways. Whether I was too job focused the last three days to notice, or whether Friday certain inhibitions were lost I can't tell, but the three ladies that work in the back are absolutely hilarious.

Today, to break the monotony, they wrote poetry.

A walk in the woods
A bear pooped
Nobody heard.

(Someone then replied, "and that's the epitome of loneliness.")

They also decided to find how many different ways they could wear their sarongs. Then they modeled them. Later, as the shift was ending, one of my coworker's husband showed up. He started talking about sarongs and how a guy would wear one. Another coworker asked, "would you wear underwear underneath?" (honestly, where was that question coming from??) He replied, "I don't wear underwear, I wear panties." Which is something, I'm sure no one wanted to know.

That all spurred another conversation which ended with one woman laughing so hard that her Pepsi came out her nose. Aloha!

International Woman of Mystery

First off, a disclaimer. I am not usually one to follow fashion trends, or go all out for the latest style.

The other day I was in the waiting room at the hospital while my grandpa underwent surgery. I had forgotten to bring a book, or something of the sort to keep myself occupied during the long wait, so I found myself reading some sort of celebrity gossip magazine. While doing so I stumbled across a picture of an absolutely fabulous outfit. On further examination it was discovered that I had all the articles necessary to pull of said outfit, but for one item, which was easily substituted.

It was all black, consisting of a straight knee-length skirt, a turtleneck sweater, a trench coat, and a pair of black heels, which I didn't have. I had boots though.

Now, this would typically be a very wintry ensemble, but I know that living in Oregon it can easily seem like winter in the middle of June. Luckily for me an opportunity presented itself today as it managed to rain all yesterday, and continue into today. Perfect trench coat weather.

As I was driving home from church, I went past a gas station teaming with bikers. My friend and I laughed over the fact that I would almost fit right in, in my black trappings.

My mom said I looked like Mata Hari. I wonder if she realizes that Mata Hari was an exotic dancer and courtesan, accused of being a spy for the Germans during WWI. I don't think I looked like an exotic dancer, though spy might fit the bill.

I wish I could go looking like a spy all the time. That at least would add some inkling of interest into my life. Or I could always run away with the biker gang.