(no subject)

[featherynscale]

My strategy for dealing with difficult people or irritating situations is to always have a cup of water on hand. The few seconds of sip time allows me to formulate what I'm going to say, as opposed to what I might *want* to say. Also, this gives me ample excuse to walk back and forth to the water cooler and/or the restroom during the day. Liquid in, liquid out. As a measure of what kind of day yesterday was, I went to the bathroom 6 times between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m.

Today, though, could well be better. After all, it's payroll time, and none of the staff tried to take more vacation time than they were entitled to. This is the first time this has happened since I've worked here. Either people are becoming more attuned to the system, or all the really clever staff go on vacation at the same time.

Speaking of vacation, jackbabalon23 informs us today that there are only 16 days left until DragonCon. There are costumes to be finished, finances to be checked, grids to be examined (hell, has anybody even seen a grid? I don't know), assignations to be arranged, booze to be begged, traded, or bought, buttons to be made, and so on. By my estimation, there are approximately eleventy billion things left to do. Of course, if they don't all get done, that's okay too. Because, you know, this is Fun we're talking about.

Comments

[zylch.livejournal.com]

What booze do you need? Scheduling is looking Not Conducive to a giant "Drink all of V's Booze" party before I leave, so it may as well do some good somewhere.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Mostly mead. There is a tradition of a mead party among the Wheel of Time fans, apparently, which is a good plan. The place where it falls apart is that they seem to believe that Chaucer's is mead. This clearly cannot stand.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Also, there seems to be a pirate party. So, if you should happen to have any rum that needs a good home, I'm sure we could find someone to give it one. :)

[kittenpants.livejournal.com]

No, I have not seen a grid, neither have I been informed WHEN MY DAMN WORKSHOPS WILL BE. I'm flying blind, and at T-16, this makes me cranky.

Need to go to the framer's, print some business cards, finish those workshop outlines, meet with Kaysha online to run through the workshop, finish the handouts, upload them to my website, print the handouts, figure out how I'm going to hang my art, do the last of the data entry for my website, and get some folks to do beta testing... oh, and I need to write a CV for the website, since that's in the new version...

On the upside, careyoxler.com is connected, so once I am ready for beta testing, I can put my new website on the index page, and we're good to go.

Also, we need to write the Greater Rite of Blessing the Dice, and get the Sacred Red Bull from seantaclaus

speaking of workshops

[agrnmn.livejournal.com]

Who else is on that panel I'm moderating. Since we have no direction given by facilitators I thought we might create out own.

[infintysquared.livejournal.com]

Re: water...

I'll have to remember that. Usually I can think fast enough to posit my thoughts clearly if I speak a bit more slowly than usual. However, if my emotions and temper are REALLY flaring, you can tell because I speak in a very stilted, two-or-three-words-at-a-time, deliberate manner, because I am choosing every. word. with. severe. consideration. so. as. not. to. blow. up. in. your. face.

The glass of water is a good trick to have a pause that doesn't threaten the other person's feelings.

Then again, if I am very sincerely really at the end of my fuse, I will walk away, and I will say that I need, not want, to walk away, in order to prevent bad things from happening.


... Mostly, I am scared to death because I have only recently been made aware of what I am physically capable of doing. And the thought that I might slip my bonds of control and do that to someone I love... scares the hell out of me.

I can sympathize.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

My non-verbal cue that I am Really Starting to Get Ticked is that when I speak, I open my mouth as little as is physically possible. The reasoning is the same. We're going to keep the sound in, or else there will be an Event.

I have, I will admit, a terrible temper. I am descended from a long line of people who have terrible tempers. We are not quiet angry people who write letters of gentle rebuke to the mayor and the editor of the local paper. We are demonstrative angry people who rip things off the wall and throw them through windows. My mother, I kid you not, once made a solid attempt to pull a phone booth down from its place, where it was bolted with thick steel into a brick wall, because her hair was not the color she wanted it to be and she couldn't get her stylist on the phone.

Coming from that sort of world, I have tried to a)manage my temper better and b)develop small tricks so that other people don't see the temper happening. I have only just, in the last two years or so, graduated to the stage at which I can walk out rather than doing injury to myself, others, or innocent and inanimate bystanders. I'm not all that strong, really, but when you have a steel file drawer in your hands, for example, you don't have to be all that strong.

In a pinch...

[wildnsquirrelly.livejournal.com]

...the water also comes in handy to throw in someone's face should they make an extreme ass of themselves.

It's better than beating them.

Well, legally it's better than beating them.