Mild Amusement

Growing up, watching television was never really a huge part of my day. Sure, I watched television like other kids did, but I never felt like I had to watch a particular show or that I needed to get lots and lots of screen time. I don't know if I could explain why to you, either. We watched a bit of television before dinner, and then we had to do our homework, but after the work was done, I just never quite went back to the television. I got my fill early on, and I was good. That habit has generally translated over to my adult life, so on a day-to-day basis, I probably watch something like thirty minutes of television. It's not really television, either, but one of the streaming services instead (specifically, Netflix). In fact, I usually get my fill of Netflix while doing the dishes or ironing a shirt, because I am stationary at that point and I prefer a bit of entertainment to pass the time. The Mild Wife and I also have a habit of watching Netflix, though, interestingly e...

At work, I help out with the university recruiting efforts. As I like to joke, it's a self-defense effort to make sure that the coworkers around me know what they're doing. I'm a worker bee, so it's not like I am in a position to hire or fire people. So, I do the next best thing if I want to make life easy on myself at work: I try to help identify talented people as entry-level employees and interns. I figure if any percentage of them stick around, my work life is bound to get better. The only reason I mention this is that this means I sometimes attend recruiting conferences. If you want to hire students, you go to the events that draw them in big numbers. There are a few of those every year, and I happened to be at one a few weeks ago. And as it just so happens, a particular moment stood out as flat out hilarious. You see, we are not the only company that attends these conferences. Part of the reason why so many students attend some of these conferences is that ...

Every now and then, the timing is more amusing than the actual thing. For example, I once let my sister and her husband use my bedroom when they stayed with us, only for me to have a hilariously hard time getting into a new routine during that time. I did eventually figure it out, but only on the very last day of their stay. Like I said, the timing is sometimes the funniest bit of the whole thing. In this case, it wasn't so much a slow crescendo that set up the joke. No, in this case, I had the PG&E public safety power shutoff to blame . If you're unfamiliar with what that was, the biggest utility company in California proactively shut off power to lots of people during some inclement weather. The craziest thing about it was that it wasn't even the kind of weather that you normally worry about. It wasn't high heat, extreme cold, pouring rains, or a hurricane. No, the root cause was high winds. Think about that; the wind blew so hard, that the utility company was ...

As I've mentioned before, I have some geeky tendencies. It often leads me to find humor in situations where others may or may not find the same humor (e.g., if a meat shredding tool reminds me of Wolverine ). It's just a part of my personality, so I've basically come to accept that this is my place in the world. It's not good or bad, it just is. Recently, though, this particular tendency has been amplified by work. For starters, my teammates have started a tradition that involves the Microsoft ninja cat . If those three words alone don't give you a pretty good indication of where this discussion is headed, let me present a picture of said ninja cat (from the very same link): In case it's not apparent, that is a ninja cat riding a fire-breathing unicorn. Just let that sink in for a moment. It takes a special type of humor to find that amusing, and it just so happens that I am surrounded by folks who find that amusing. You can imagine what kind of jokes tha...

I have mentioned it on occasion, but I sometimes get mistaken for a Filipino person . Honestly, I'm never surprised when it happens. For one, it's happened enough times that I recognize that it is a thing. For another, I have a complexion that looks very much like what a stereotypical Filipino person looks like. All in all, it sort of makes sense. Still, it's amusing when it happens. What makes it all the more confusing for people passing by is that I sometimes hang out with a whole lot of other Filipinos. For example, any time I am with the Mild Wife's family, I happen to be one of many people who are/look Filipino. Given the context clues, I can't fault someone for assuming that I am simply another one of the family. I mean, there are people in the family who are lighter than me in skin tone and there are people in the family who have a darker complexion than me. I'm somewhere smack dab in the middle, so it's a perfectly reasonable assumption. If y...

Every year, companies work with United Way in a coordinated week of volunteering effort . Basically, it is a way to try to make a difference by getting a bunch of people to all focus their efforts in a set amount of time. I usually try to pitch in, because I think it's a worthy cause. Hell, I think it's a bunch of worthy causes, and doing my part in some way has always seemed like a good idea. This year, my willingness to volunteer led to some unexpected laughs. You see, this year I volunteered with an organization that has a big yearly yard sale. I think they might make some money off of the effort, but the general idea isn’t actually to be a fundraiser. Instead, the idea is to have a sale of affordable items for their constituents. To give you an idea of what they have in mind, they sell items of clothing for five bucks. I think they might make actually make some money from the process, but that’s almost incidental at that point. I thought that was pretty c...

The Mild Wife and I live in California, which means that we had to contend with the recent power outage . For those of you who are unaware, the local utility company preemptively shut off power in select areas to avoid any raging wildfires. The rationale was deceptively simple: the last major fire in the state started because winds and a power line combined to create a spark, so if there are going to be high winds, they wanted to remove the power in "power line." I actually took/take issue with this (it shirks some of the responsibility around doing proper maintenance), but it did lead to some unintentional hilarity. Since the company announced that there would be waves of shut-offs, they announced start times for when those waves would start. However, because the ultimate impetus for this was the weather, the timing was also highly dependent on mother nature. More specifically, whether the power was shut off or not depended on whether our weather reports had accurately pre...