(no subject)
Sep. 12th, 2008 10:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
minxyThis morning I noticed, for the first time, that the building across from my bus stop houses not a single insurance company, but *four*. One wonders if this is adventageous to Brown & Brown in some way that doesn't stem from competition? Maybe they all specialize in different forms of insurance? If they get a customer in who wants, say, death and dismemberment insurance and accidentally walks into the worker's comp office, do they toss the work elsewhere in the building with a suited "for you, my very good friend, I'll introduce you to Lombost, Smith and Jones, who do death and dismemberment like no one else"?
My friend Ed is self employed and he wonders about workers comp if he is injured and loses time on the job. He has medical insurance, but it's the time lost that keeps him up. I asked whether he'd considered getting it for his employees, but it was a complicated equation that he tossed at me, involving whether his employees had social security numbers, the cost of insurance for one vs. many, and how many could pay, what it would cost the company. I can't imagine Eddie, the blue collared, grease-covered, practical physicist, dealing with a building full of insurance suits. I mean, he looks like Buddy Holly, and he'd toss numbers at them faster than they could clean the tar off their hands after shaking hello.
I swear Ed can sense disingenuity a mile away, I wonder if he'd even make it in the door of Dewey, Cheatem and Howe. Probably blow it up first, just to make sure everyone had an honest reaction, at least when he first arrived.
I made it to work and within an hour a tinny male voice was telling me he needed my attention, because a fire had been reported in the building. I am on the first floor and just packed up my computer into a drawer (we have a small problem with laptop theft), picked up my knitting (when I'm not actually noticing things around me during bus rides, I knit) and trucked it outside. I could still hear the intercom voice, though, and what struck me was the layers of repetition, deeper than a blues song. In the blues, you'd start with 'woke up this morning' and the next line would be whatever you did immediately afterwards (my aunt always used to sing 'woke up this morning/took my dog for a poop') and then the singer repeats those two lines, ABAB and proceeds to detail later in the song how it all went bad, right? The helpful tinny intercom voice added additional layers of lyrics! "May I have your attention please," he says, and then AGAIN, "may I have your attention please."
Note the punctuation. He's not actually *asking* for your attention.
THEN, after announcing two fold that there has been a fire reported in the building (a fire reported in the building), he doesn't ask but tells you to please proceed to a stairwell (proceed to a stairwell) and exit the building (exit the building).
Maybe he's not singing the blues, maybe the robot voice is singing a country song? Or folk?
Leaving aside that I am on the first floor and don't need to involve stairwells-instead-of-elevators, whyfore so much repetition? I mean, it *immediately* goes on loop and I heard the same echo announcement approximately a billion times before we were cleared to come back in the building? So why the call and answer, huh? Especially when he's answering himself.
Although, with robots, you never know, there might have been *two* robot voices involved in that announcement and the quality control on the assembly line had just been so good one can't tell them apart when packing up a laptop and knitting.
And now I'm wondering if those poor identical robot voices are in a futile search for self-identity and my reactions tanked their self-esteem. I think I may have to find out where they're keeping the robots and take them some cookies or something.
How are you, flist?
My friend Ed is self employed and he wonders about workers comp if he is injured and loses time on the job. He has medical insurance, but it's the time lost that keeps him up. I asked whether he'd considered getting it for his employees, but it was a complicated equation that he tossed at me, involving whether his employees had social security numbers, the cost of insurance for one vs. many, and how many could pay, what it would cost the company. I can't imagine Eddie, the blue collared, grease-covered, practical physicist, dealing with a building full of insurance suits. I mean, he looks like Buddy Holly, and he'd toss numbers at them faster than they could clean the tar off their hands after shaking hello.
I swear Ed can sense disingenuity a mile away, I wonder if he'd even make it in the door of Dewey, Cheatem and Howe. Probably blow it up first, just to make sure everyone had an honest reaction, at least when he first arrived.
I made it to work and within an hour a tinny male voice was telling me he needed my attention, because a fire had been reported in the building. I am on the first floor and just packed up my computer into a drawer (we have a small problem with laptop theft), picked up my knitting (when I'm not actually noticing things around me during bus rides, I knit) and trucked it outside. I could still hear the intercom voice, though, and what struck me was the layers of repetition, deeper than a blues song. In the blues, you'd start with 'woke up this morning' and the next line would be whatever you did immediately afterwards (my aunt always used to sing 'woke up this morning/took my dog for a poop') and then the singer repeats those two lines, ABAB and proceeds to detail later in the song how it all went bad, right? The helpful tinny intercom voice added additional layers of lyrics! "May I have your attention please," he says, and then AGAIN, "may I have your attention please."
Note the punctuation. He's not actually *asking* for your attention.
THEN, after announcing two fold that there has been a fire reported in the building (a fire reported in the building), he doesn't ask but tells you to please proceed to a stairwell (proceed to a stairwell) and exit the building (exit the building).
Maybe he's not singing the blues, maybe the robot voice is singing a country song? Or folk?
Leaving aside that I am on the first floor and don't need to involve stairwells-instead-of-elevators, whyfore so much repetition? I mean, it *immediately* goes on loop and I heard the same echo announcement approximately a billion times before we were cleared to come back in the building? So why the call and answer, huh? Especially when he's answering himself.
Although, with robots, you never know, there might have been *two* robot voices involved in that announcement and the quality control on the assembly line had just been so good one can't tell them apart when packing up a laptop and knitting.
And now I'm wondering if those poor identical robot voices are in a futile search for self-identity and my reactions tanked their self-esteem. I think I may have to find out where they're keeping the robots and take them some cookies or something.
How are you, flist?
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no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 05:14 pm (UTC)Anyway, that does sound like an odd fire alarm. One of our buildings at work has one that sounds just like the red alert on the original Starship Enterprise. The current building I'm in is horridly loud beyond belief.
Glad everything was OK. *hugs*
PS. Do those robots require nano-cookies? *veg*
no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 05:40 pm (UTC)Yes, everything was okay. There was an alarm pulled in Physics yesterday, I'm not sure whether these things are related or not.
Poor little robot. He was given a good amp, though; the request for attention was completely asinine. Or maybe he's just a very *polite* robot.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 06:12 pm (UTC)And I just fell over laughing about the potential connection between the alarm and physics.
He's not only a polite robot (thinking of Salieri's Space Mountie story now), he's a very articulated one.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 10:10 pm (UTC)If our polite robot looks like Sal's polite robot, I'm definitely baking him spare-parts cookies.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 10:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 07:31 pm (UTC)How are you, flist?
I am wonderful! My class went and played in the mountains to actually look at all the stuff we've been learning about and I got to get my hands dirty (different types of soil! organic matter! saprolite! clay! sediment!) and watch clouds evaporate so we were suddenly surrounded by mountains we hadn't seen when we got there and I got to boulder (a little, barely, on wet, lichen-covered, exposed bedrock) and I've only been doing this earth-y science stuff for 3 weeks and I'm already noticing that I'm seeing things differently - I'm not looking at water and soil and rocks and trees like I was before - I'm seeing how it comes together and extrapolating how it got there and thinking about how water travels through it and...it's all so cool!
Um. I realize you're in a bit of a science funk right now with the scooping earlier this week, so I hope my science bouncing isn't making it worse...this stuff is awesome! How did I forget how awesome this stuff was?
no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 10:08 pm (UTC)I've always envied the Earth Scientists for their field work. My field work is bench work. *g* So glad you're happy.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-12 07:49 pm (UTC)who needs zombies.
but! it is friday and i have bourbon.
hi!
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Date: 2008-09-12 10:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-13 10:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-13 08:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-13 08:25 pm (UTC)Never mind.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-13 08:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-09-14 10:05 pm (UTC)