Vickiepedia

Something shiny caught my attention as I walked past the working space of one office lady during lunch — a new 17-inch LCD computer monitor. (This was a few years ago.) I leaned in with an ooooooh to check out this hottie (the screen), and quickly noticed that the office lady was still using the old screen resolution from her last setting.

“This is a five-by-four screen,” I said. “You’re still using a four-by-three resolution on it.”

She blinked.

“You know? The ratio? Five… to… four,” I explained, accompanied with body motions that somewhat resembled the chicken dance.

Turns out when someone doesn’t speak your “language”, speaking slowly or doing the chicken dance doesn’t really help.

I grabbed her mouse as she continued to look at me in confusion. Minimise all, right click, click, click, click, click: 1280×1024; there, a correct screen resolution for a shiny new screen. I smiled, satisfied, and turned to walk away (casually noting the lingering confusion on the colleague’s face), giving myself a mental pat on the shoulder for an unpaid job well done.

“OH MY GOD!” A scream of terror.

I paused, thinking if I’d forgotten to apply the new screen resolution setting properly so the screen had automatically reverted back to 1024×768 while she’s admiring the sharper images. It didn’t.

“Why is everything so tiny? Why do I look so fat in the picture?!” She cried.

And then I cried too.

(She insisted on switching back to 1024×768. I undid my mental pat on the shoulder and complied.)

Roughly a year and three months ago, Vickie secretly worked at a two-Australian-dollar shop. It’s seriously amazing what vast age range of people would use what vast range of techniques and tricks to steal what vast range of things while you’re at the cash register serving another customer. Hmm, I did mention I worked at a $2 shop, right? But this entry has nothing to do with shoplifting, so moving on.

During one of those narcissistic mirror-staring because there was nothing else to entertain me days, one of those mothers walked into the shop pushing one of those strollers with one of those little boys in it. Now I’m completely immune to cuteness and babies or toddlers, so when that little boy with short, curly blonde hair tried to climb out of the stroller while the mother looked away, I thought I’d make myself helpful and said, “He is falling!” (How that has anything to do with being immune to cuteness and babies or toddlers, the world may never know.)

The mother turned to look at the boy, then looked at me, then looked back at the boy.

“Bad girl, bad GIRL!” screamed the mother while she fixed the boy GIRL. I panicked a little, stood there and tried to think up an excuse or apology (hrmm, she looks like a boy? Me no speak Engrish?); but before I could mutter another sound, they had left the shop and were never seen again.

Now that I think about it, maybe she was really screaming at me, not at GIRL.

GIRL, you’re one year and three months older now, probably no longer pushed around in the stroller that you so desperately wanted to climb out of. But GIRL, if you mummy won’t let you wear trousers, sit with your legs comfortably apart, have short hair, not wear make-up, climb a tree, leave the kitchen, play video games or write a program…

I’m sorry. It was probably me…

Wanting to be known as the one-of-a-kind girl who didn’t mind getting wet — as in, you know, sweating and walking in the blazing sun or the rain — I had let rain and sweat collect a little on my face as I was rushing to work in the drizzle yesterday morning. I was sure I looked cool… no, hot… no, sweaty-cool, until I said “good morning” to the first colleague I met face to face in the restroom.

Not only did she not greet me back, her mouth also twisted into an odd shape as if reflecting something obscure she saw. I turned to the mirror: instead of the cool anime-esque sweat drop(s) I’d expected, I saw huge, round, shiny, non-anime beads of sweat sitting and only sitting on my nose and upper lip. No wonder…

I quickly splashed water all over my face, and noticed that the woman was still staring. In the pathetic attempt to distract her before heading out, I curled my lips into a cool smirk (which I hope was indeed a cool smirk; I didn’t check the mirror) and threw a one-handed Ocelot hand gesture at her — the latter a total slip-up, mind you.

Expand to view Ocelot’s hand gesture

Now they probably think I’m more than just a freak who sweats excessively on some parts of the face. Damn you, Ocelot.

Really, though, if my ginormous hips and thighs were the undesirable traits from my paternal side, then my sweaty nose and upper lip must be those from Mummy Dear’s. The fact that antiperspirants aren’t usually designed for the face doesn’t help either…

They say school prepares students before they enter the adult working world, but I’m not so sure if my school did a good job any more. I really, really don’t get it. Like, really.

At work, somebody would actually call me on the phone so I’d have to spend 10 seconds to walk over to their cubicle, then 3 minutes listening to them explain what I should do, 1 minute to go over the instructions, another 1 minute to confirm that I indeed understood what they said, and 10 seconds to go back to my cubicle. The task itself, took no more than 15 seconds. They could well have done it themselves.

I had asked about it very indirectly, thinking maybe they spent so much time educating me was for a possible future follow up or similar situations. “Nah, it’s a one-off thing. You probably won’t need to do it ever again.”

So maybe it’s because they wanted to remind me that they’re the boss of me. Ah, that would also explain why they’d ask me to put this little thing in somebody’s office when they were already more than half way at it; and calling me on the phone to ask me to print this document for them when they’re a mere metre away from their printer; and emailing me to email people about something they already typed.

Uh, welcome to the real world?

Dear Cathy,

Do you realise that my name is Vickie, not Vicky? Please stop carbon-copying emails to people of another company with my misspelt name on it. Thank you so much!

Best Regards,
Vickie

Dear Cathy,

It’s the thousandth time you typed my name as Vicky. My name is Vickie, Vickie with an “ie”. Could you please kindly update my name in your brain? Thank you so much!

Best Regards,
Vickie

Dear Cathy,

Seriously, Cathy, my name is not Vicky. It’s rather impolite of you to constantly misspell my name when I know you knew it should be spelt as Vickie, as you did spell it correctly once. Now people from other companies call me Vicky in emails because of you. Please update asap, thanks!

Regards,
Vickie

Cathy,

Please forgive me if I stab you in the eye the next time you type my name as Vicky.

Vickie

I can’t help it! It’s just a major pet peeve of mine, but she’s also always so damn busy. Or maybe I should actually send the emails to her? Hmm.

On another topic, I think I’ll be participating in CSS Reboot for the first time. *blushes* Dammit, why am I blushing?