reason 17 and 10 outbursts

Welcome to Why My Job is Awesome: Reason #17: A couple of days ago I started having all of those annoying cold symptoms, stuffy nose, itchy throat, frustrating congestion, blah blah blah. Granted, my job doesn't have supernatural healing benefits or anything like that (if any such job exists [...for some reason I immediately thought of a doctor having that magical employment, but I'm pretty sure that's inaccurate..?], please let me know), but I think it does have the second best thing: I get to stay home. And still work. And accomplish however much or little I'm able. No one has to listen to me blow my nose all day, which is a plus for everyone potentially involved. I don't have to be embarrassed by how awful I look (having the nose of Rudolph the reindeer doesn't help anyone's self-image), and I don't have to go through any of those tiring efforts of making myself look presentable to the public. I can stay home, be doted on by Jason all day long, and be paid for whatever work I happen to get done (in between the constant eye tearing [sometimes my eyes would tear for so long that I was almost convinced I was crying, which is just not conducive to transcribing], sneezing, and 3.2 bathroom breaks per hour [the jury is still out on whether drinking gallons of water while sick is more helpful than it is annoying]). I lo... whoops. The L word almost slipped out there. I don't think this job and I are at that level yet. But apparently, we are getting closer. Let me rephrase: I really like this job. I so want this job (and, at the moment, more specifically, this company) to love me. But that's still left to be seen. Oy.

So, this marks week 5 (I think?) of working. And even though Edoc calculates their week Saturday through Friday (while I've been keeping track of my weeks Sunday through Saturday), I am still going to declare that this week I completed 5000+ lines, which is Edoc's desired rate for full-time employees. Success! Now, I did have a pretty incredible half day today (I absolutely love doing the 7+ minute dictations of my favorite dictators), but to balance that out, my production has been inhibited by the past 2 days of under the weatherness. So... I think  it all works out somehow. Anyway, once my overall quality has been reviewed, there is a monetary increase to my line rate at 5000 lines and 6500 lines. So, 6500 lines a week is the next goal to shoot for. No clue how long that will take. Oy.

To entertain me during my sniffling misery these past couple of days, Jason has played several a game of Outburst with me. (Brief Explanation of Said Game In Case You are Not Familiar [else you won't be able to fully appreciate/experience the indignation/pain/disbelief that I did tonight]: There are cards with a subject [such as "Household Chores"] with 10 answers [such as Vacuuming, Doing the Dishes, Washing the Windows, etc.]. The goal is for one person/team to guess as many of the 10 topic answers as possible within a certain amount of time. You get awarded points based on the number of answers correctly guessed from the card. Simple enough, eh?) This game is from 1994, and so the "Updated topics!" boasted about on the box top is not really much of a boast anymore. It's more of a subject of laughter. Yes. Anywho, the game is rather outdated, and there are also plenty of "What? Famous Red Heads From 1963? Overweight Comedians With a Toupee? Most Popular TV Shows From the 90s? Yeah... skip it...." cards about which we just have absolutely no clue. (And, speaking of that last card... How can you have a list of 10 of the "Most Popular TV Shows From the 90s" when the card was made in 1994? Oh, things to ponder...) But there are plenty of cards that we give a fair shot and even some that we do really well on ("Parts of the Body That Come in Pairs"? Heck yes).

Earlier today, the card I passed to Jason was "Famous Authors of Children's Books." The reason I passed the card to him instead of taking it for myself was because A) he always passes absolutely awful cards to me ("Bands Who Played at Woodstock"? What?), B) off the top of my head I could only think of 3 authors who might be listed, and C) I figured he probably wouldn't be able to come up with any more than 3. It turned out to be a good pass on my part because he ended up only guessing one of the answers, Dr. Seuss. The downfall of passing the card to him was the above-mentioned indignation/pain/disbelief that I experienced. The nine remaining answers on the card included well-known greats such as A. A. Milne, E. B. White, Beatrix Potter, Robert Louis Stevenson, Hans Christian Anderson, and Richard Scarry. (I believe the other three were Beverly Cleary, Judy Blume, and The Brothers Grimm.) Now, like I already said, I probably wouldn't have guessed nearly all of them, but I know for a fact that I would have loudly groaned the fact that I missed so many obvious famous children's authors. Jason on the other hand just looked at me with a completely blank face. He had no clue who most of them were. How can someone not know who wrote Treasure Island and Charlotte's Web and Winnie the Pooh? He thought Beatrix Potter was a character in a book or movie. I laughed at him for quite a while, partially because it just seemed so bizarre (my definition of "common knowledge" doesn't always line up with his) and partially to lessen the sharpness of my "Oh my word, are you illiterate?" reaction. (I realize illiteracy doesn't have a direct correlation to knowing the names of famous authors, but I think there's at least an indirect connection in there somewhere...)

I think his reason for why he'd never heard of these authors was the final straw: I brought up the fact that he knew, in general, most of the books that I mentioned were authored by these people. If he knew the book/story, why didn't he know the author? His response was that they were either read to him by someone else or he only ever watched the movie or TV show. Oh, so much laughter. I love him.

Anyway, so that's the short story long. I probably sound super mean in the above telling, but it's all in good fun. I love him. He knows it. And it's OK that he didn't read a fraction of what I read as a kid. He's still the best thing that has ever happened to me. I suppose one good thing did come of the whole thing: He said that we could institute a rule with our kids that, once they know how to read, they will read the book before watching the movie of a given story. Obviously, we realize this rule will undoubtedly be broken before it is ever even thought to be enforced, so it's a moot rule, but he definitely soothed my ruffled feathers by offering the solution. And I love him for it.

Anyway, moral of the story is that Jason gives me more reasons to laugh than I could ever imagine and everyone knows (or should come to realize) the written version is always way better than the viewing version.

It's late. I'm tired. Jason is home from his soccer game. (Since I didn't feel well, I had to miss one of his soccer games for the first time. Sad day.) I think I'll call it a day.

This dog's forehead is as wrinkled as my brain felt during Jason's Outburst Confessional.