I
know that it has been a while since I last blogged, however I have had good
reason. 2013 really hasn't been my
year. Call it karma, call it fate, call
it whatever you will, my life kind of shit the bed starting in March, spiraling
out of control by summer, and it wasn't until recently that I bounced
back and returned on the grid. I've learned a lot about life, people, and love during the past 9 months and I didn’t
feel comfortable blogging, due to the dark depressed state that I had put
myself in.
With
that being said, I have been saving this next blog for a time when I knew it
would be appreciated. If you are reading
this blog, you have just put its popularity one click closer to reaching 10k
views. When I first started this, I
never imagined that so many people would take an interest to it. I started it solely on the basis of giving
people a good read, but unfortunately there were those that took it a bit too
serious and literal. I knew that I must
have been doing something right when people (that didn’t do a very good job of hiding
their “anonymous” identities) started posting negative comments that didn’t
even pertain to the blog itself, but instead decided to take personal shots at
me. I figured I must have been doing
something right and I was pissing off the right people. This is when I first discovered the fakeness
of “Facebook” friends.
All
seriousness aside, there was a time in my career when going to work was the equivalent
of hanging out with friends and I had the world’s coolest boss. During the good times, going to work was as
much fun as a real life episode of “The Office”. I would
like to share with you now actual emails that I sent to a former boss of mine,
that were intentionally designed to get a laugh as well as submilimany ask for
things in the “Shelby” way. I also want
to thank both fans and secret haters for your support. I am humbled that this pet project has become
as popular as it has, and I hope to continue providing you with entertaining
stories and experiences:
From: Shelby
Sent: Monday, December 19, 2011 11:48 AM
To: My Boss
Subject: Mike's Replacement
Sent: Monday, December 19, 2011 11:48 AM
To: My Boss
Subject: Mike's Replacement
In light of the
recent events (Mike’s Departure), I would like to submit a list of requests in
the search for Mike’s replacement. These qualities should be considered
during the interview process, in order to 1. Help the transition period with
the team and 2. To help me in search efforts of finding a husband.
1. Must have a college degree.
Little to no student debt is preferred, however depending on how much debt we
are talking is negotiable based on other items listed.
2. Must have a car (bus pass, bicycle, or
walking is NOT ACCEPTABLE) Prius cars are not acceptable either. I
do not get along well with “environmentally friendly people”
3. Between the ages of 26-35. I’m
willing to go as low as 25 as long as they do not look like a man child, or 36
as long as they don’t look like a prison inmate.
4. Single white male of Italian or Greek
decent preferred but I am open to English, Irish, Hungarian, Viking, and German
descendants as well.
5. No children (preferred) and or crazy
ex-girlfriends. Dogs are ok, Cats are not. Cats are evil and the spawn of
Satan.
6. Not emotionally retarded (I do not
want to sit and listen to any sob stories at work about how they are incapable
of feelings based on past experiences)
7. Someone with “loose” morals. (and by
loose I mean is NOT a “honk if you love Jesus – Tim Tebow bible hugger”)
8. Have not been previously married and
or has just recently gotten out of a relationship with in the last 6 months.
(Please refer to #6 if you need clarity)
9. Someone in shape, but does not look as
if they spend hours at the gym. (There is a reason why I have not watched
an episode of Jersey Shore in my life, I enjoy a good six pack now and then,
but not in the form of abs)
1. Someone with good work ethic, but also
has a social life. (Not accepted: Guy who clings to the unrealistic idea
that he is still a college frat boy and thinks he can drink like one, men
suffering from “Peter Pan syndrome” (not wanting to grow up), and my personal
favorite: has a bro-mance with his best male friend that is borderline
homosexual.
Thank you for
allowing me the opportunity to voice requests for Mike’s replacement. I
hope that you will take some of these qualities in to consideration when making
a decision. I am sure interoffice romance is frowned upon, however, I am
29 years old and single. I am fearful that I have about 5 years of good
looks left and would like to snag someone now, before things start going in to
disarray. I look forward to working with our new teammate in
the near future!
Shelby
From: Shelby
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 2:10 PM
To: My Boss
Subject: Printer in *** Building
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2012 2:10 PM
To: My Boss
Subject: Printer in *** Building
Dear Boss:
I hope that when disposable income is available, you will consider allowing the
purchase of a new printer in the *** building. The printer, which I refer
to as “Stubborn Sally”, is the equivalent of child in its terrible 2’s.
“Sally’s” issues
1. Sally cannot
count. When you tell her to print a specific amount of copies, she will
either give you more or less than the requested amount.
2. Sally does not like
cardstock. When I attempt to feed her cardstock, she makes up an
imaginary paper jam most of the time, which results in both of us throwing a
temper tantrum. Other times she gets pissed off at me and does jam when
I’m feeding her cardstock, causing me to waste paper and time yelling at her
for not eating her cardstock properly.
3. Sally claims that her
fuser needs replaced, however Jessica and I have replaced her fuser 2 times
(within a year and via *** in corporate), and she just doesn’t want to accept
the fact that we got rid of her old fuser and replaced it with a new one.. what
a stubborn girl.
4. Sally likes to waste
ink. Being she is the only child from China that came with an instruction
manual, she is not living up to her potential. She gets ink everywhere,
as well as likes to “paint” blobs of ink on some printing jobs.
5. Sally does not like to
center things. She stubbornly likes to print things crooked when using
the self-feeding tray. I feel as if the macaroni crafts she will make in
kindergarten may reflect that of a serial killer.
6. Sally has an addiction
with recalibrating. She loves it so much, sometimes she recalibrates
after printing 3 pages. I worry if recalibrating is a gateway drug that
will lead to harder drugs and mental issues later on in life? i.e Toner
Sniffing, Ink Herion or potentially paper cutting herself to death.
7. Sally may have a
fever. Every time we replace her fuser, she overheats. I am
convinced she has a few wires loose, however being a hypochondriac does not sit
well in this office.
8. Sally may have hostile
tendencies. Sometimes when she prints, she likes to draw lines in the
print job, almost as if she has some sort of resentment for the world from a
past life.
With the list provided
above, I hope that you will consider sending Sally back to her homeland of
China where she can be taken care of properly and replace her with a more
reliable, mature and less stubborn model.
Thanks,
Shelby
Shelby
From: Shelby
Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2012 2:28 PM
To: My Boss
Subject: Obituary for Stubborn Sally's Tray 1
I am sad to announce that today at approx. 1:45 this afternoon, Stubborn Sally's tray #1 ascended into the mechanical heavens joining some of its predecessors such as the CD Player, Walkman, and A-Track player.
I was on site during the passing. It was quite sad. Tray #1 suffered a breakage of a plastic piece that allows the paper to feed in to Sally's Belly. Attempts at a rescue failed, due to a series of unfortunate events.
1. Super Glue was unable to be opened due to the stubbornness of it
adheasiving the cap to itself. Dr. Kate and Dr. Shelby attempted to revive the super glue using pliers, however with time running out we decided to make the executive decision to poke a hole in it.
2. Dr. Shelby then proceeded to try to save Tray #1, by using the rouge super glue to attach the two parts back together. Not only was this unsuccessful, but Dr. Shelby almost not only super glued her fingers together, but also almost glued herself to the tray.
3. Dr. Kate then proceeded to use the Hair Dryer to hope that the
adhesive would bond. While Tray #1 was flat lining at this time, we said a small prayer and before long, there was a pulse. Unfortunately this was short lived. Upon returning Tray #1 back to Sally from the make shift hospital "aka the Barstool in our meeting area" that had housed it, it broke again.
Tray #1 was a the most popular tray of Sally's entourage. It was our go-to tray for any and all needs. It is fortunate that it died however, because now all of our companies printing secrets have died with it.
For the time being, I have promoted Tray #2 to be the replacement until we give ourselves time to mourn the loss of our good friend. Please alert your computers to use Tray #2 as a default. If they question what happened to their pal Tray #1, just tell them he was overworked and cracked under the pressure.
In Lieu of flowers, a memorial fund has been set up in Tray #1's honor. Checks can be made payable to **** Accounts Payable.
In Tray #1's last will and testament *** and Tray #1 agreed that if
anything were to happen, **** would agree to give the open position to Tray #1's first born son. According to the research and Facebook Stalking I have done, Tray #1's wife (Margaret), is 8 months pregnant. Since the child labor laws are different for machinery, we have an executive right to the child upon birth.
RIP Tray #1
Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2012 2:28 PM
To: My Boss
Subject: Obituary for Stubborn Sally's Tray 1
I am sad to announce that today at approx. 1:45 this afternoon, Stubborn Sally's tray #1 ascended into the mechanical heavens joining some of its predecessors such as the CD Player, Walkman, and A-Track player.
I was on site during the passing. It was quite sad. Tray #1 suffered a breakage of a plastic piece that allows the paper to feed in to Sally's Belly. Attempts at a rescue failed, due to a series of unfortunate events.
1. Super Glue was unable to be opened due to the stubbornness of it
adheasiving the cap to itself. Dr. Kate and Dr. Shelby attempted to revive the super glue using pliers, however with time running out we decided to make the executive decision to poke a hole in it.
2. Dr. Shelby then proceeded to try to save Tray #1, by using the rouge super glue to attach the two parts back together. Not only was this unsuccessful, but Dr. Shelby almost not only super glued her fingers together, but also almost glued herself to the tray.
3. Dr. Kate then proceeded to use the Hair Dryer to hope that the
adhesive would bond. While Tray #1 was flat lining at this time, we said a small prayer and before long, there was a pulse. Unfortunately this was short lived. Upon returning Tray #1 back to Sally from the make shift hospital "aka the Barstool in our meeting area" that had housed it, it broke again.
Tray #1 was a the most popular tray of Sally's entourage. It was our go-to tray for any and all needs. It is fortunate that it died however, because now all of our companies printing secrets have died with it.
For the time being, I have promoted Tray #2 to be the replacement until we give ourselves time to mourn the loss of our good friend. Please alert your computers to use Tray #2 as a default. If they question what happened to their pal Tray #1, just tell them he was overworked and cracked under the pressure.
In Lieu of flowers, a memorial fund has been set up in Tray #1's honor. Checks can be made payable to **** Accounts Payable.
In Tray #1's last will and testament *** and Tray #1 agreed that if
anything were to happen, **** would agree to give the open position to Tray #1's first born son. According to the research and Facebook Stalking I have done, Tray #1's wife (Margaret), is 8 months pregnant. Since the child labor laws are different for machinery, we have an executive right to the child upon birth.
RIP Tray #1
From: Shelby
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2012 10:04 AM
To: My Boss
Subject: Computer Issues
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2012 10:04 AM
To: My Boss
Subject: Computer Issues
Boss-
I think my computer, similar to myself, has gone in to permanent sleep mode. At one time, also similar to myself, my computer was a self starter, meaning that it would just automatically start working by button pushing and empty threats. Now my threats are not working....
Currently when I attempt to push Archie's buttons (his power button to be exact), and like any stubborn child of his age (I'm assuming by his looks, condition and his younger Dell siblings, he is probably about 5 years old) he does not cooperate and listen to me. Rather than showing me a green light indicating that its "all good" followed by the reassuring sounds of his internal parts (a fan and sometimes a weird clicking noise), I now receive a blinking orange light. With each moment that I watch this orange light blink back at me, I can only imagine Archie try to communicate to me saying "Caution, Caution, Caution," however due to the comatose state that he is in, he cannot indicate to me what's wrong. So as I sit in my office in total silence, receiving no vital signs from Archie, I attempted to perform the following tasks with the hopes of bringing him back from the dead, which all have failed.
1. After consulting with the All Might Monitor God (Lets call her Carrie) , I was instructed that there was no signal coming from Archie. She instructed me to press any key on the keyboard or mouse to wake him up or to press an imput button. As I pressed numerous keys on the keyboard in an attempt to wake up my sleeping beauty, nothing happened. Being slightly short tempered, and it being 7:30 am on a Monday Morning, my anger got the best of me and I proceeded to throw my own temper tantrum by not only using my hands to bang on the keyboard desperately thinking that this time Archie would hear me in his sleep, but also the usage of my forehead on the keyboard was used at the end to prove that I had given up.
2. After taking a break and calming myself down, I marched back in to my office with a calm demeanor, and decided rather than taking a boxer approach to fixing this, lets take an electricians approach. It was at this point I realized 2 things, 1. my floor is absolutely disgusting and I need to clean it, and 2. there are alot of wires that mean nothing to me. The simplest solution for me was to unplug each wire, one at a time, hoping that by doing this, it would revive Archie and breathe new life in to him. As I engaged in this second failed attempted at waking up Archie, I did however manage to turn lemons in to lemonade by cleaning up my floor, and making it a more socially acceptable space for the fruit flies that have now invaded my office.
I am not sure what to do from here. I do happen to have Archie's stepsister "Anna" with me at all times, so I do have at least 1 computer, however, I am worried that if I arrange Archie to be life flighted to our institution in **, that he may end up where Sally (his printer cousin) did, only as a permanent fixture on the *** "rack of technology shame. I will contact Dr. *** and get a second opinion before I go "Office Space" on him and throw him from the first 3rd story window I can find. I just wanted to make sure that you will be OK funding Archies trip to ** to get emergency surgery first.
Please let me know
Thanks
I think my computer, similar to myself, has gone in to permanent sleep mode. At one time, also similar to myself, my computer was a self starter, meaning that it would just automatically start working by button pushing and empty threats. Now my threats are not working....
Currently when I attempt to push Archie's buttons (his power button to be exact), and like any stubborn child of his age (I'm assuming by his looks, condition and his younger Dell siblings, he is probably about 5 years old) he does not cooperate and listen to me. Rather than showing me a green light indicating that its "all good" followed by the reassuring sounds of his internal parts (a fan and sometimes a weird clicking noise), I now receive a blinking orange light. With each moment that I watch this orange light blink back at me, I can only imagine Archie try to communicate to me saying "Caution, Caution, Caution," however due to the comatose state that he is in, he cannot indicate to me what's wrong. So as I sit in my office in total silence, receiving no vital signs from Archie, I attempted to perform the following tasks with the hopes of bringing him back from the dead, which all have failed.
1. After consulting with the All Might Monitor God (Lets call her Carrie) , I was instructed that there was no signal coming from Archie. She instructed me to press any key on the keyboard or mouse to wake him up or to press an imput button. As I pressed numerous keys on the keyboard in an attempt to wake up my sleeping beauty, nothing happened. Being slightly short tempered, and it being 7:30 am on a Monday Morning, my anger got the best of me and I proceeded to throw my own temper tantrum by not only using my hands to bang on the keyboard desperately thinking that this time Archie would hear me in his sleep, but also the usage of my forehead on the keyboard was used at the end to prove that I had given up.
2. After taking a break and calming myself down, I marched back in to my office with a calm demeanor, and decided rather than taking a boxer approach to fixing this, lets take an electricians approach. It was at this point I realized 2 things, 1. my floor is absolutely disgusting and I need to clean it, and 2. there are alot of wires that mean nothing to me. The simplest solution for me was to unplug each wire, one at a time, hoping that by doing this, it would revive Archie and breathe new life in to him. As I engaged in this second failed attempted at waking up Archie, I did however manage to turn lemons in to lemonade by cleaning up my floor, and making it a more socially acceptable space for the fruit flies that have now invaded my office.
I am not sure what to do from here. I do happen to have Archie's stepsister "Anna" with me at all times, so I do have at least 1 computer, however, I am worried that if I arrange Archie to be life flighted to our institution in **, that he may end up where Sally (his printer cousin) did, only as a permanent fixture on the *** "rack of technology shame. I will contact Dr. *** and get a second opinion before I go "Office Space" on him and throw him from the first 3rd story window I can find. I just wanted to make sure that you will be OK funding Archies trip to ** to get emergency surgery first.
Please let me know
Thanks
Shelby
From: Shelby
Sent: Thursday, August 02, 2012 11:49 AM
To: My Boss
Subject: Alert - Please advise
I would like to inform the team of an incident that has been committed in the *** building. The incident occurred at approximately 10:15 while all upper level management was in attendance of a meeting. A rouge steamer in the *** building attacked one of our own, causing them a severe panic attack and resulted a trip to the hospital. The rogue steamer, which was rumored to be a disgruntled employee due to hearing a rumor that it was going to get bumped from a P2 to a P1 position at the bid session tomorrow, decided to attack the unnamed individual by spraying steam in to their face, which resulted in campus police and paramedics to be rushed to the scene. Where the employee is set to be ok, police interrogated the steamer, to which they found no sufficient evidence to place any charges at this time for any wrong doing.
In light of this incident, I would like to share with you all tips on to prepare yourself in case a situation like this arises.
1. Treat all equipment with respect and love. As I have learned in the past with the "**** Technology Wall of Shame" be sure to treat your equipment the same way you would a small child or an elderly adult. Where people have expiration dates, equipment have things called "expired warranties", which make their funerals more expensive when you need to replace them, and I also hear that their union is the worst to work with, due to being on hold for long periods of time, as well as being unable to understand the dialect of your union rep assigned to your location, which can make the conversations a bit foggy.
2. Assure the equipment they will be ok. We all get overworked sometimes, which causes a cloud of mist to surround us. Teamwork and building long lasting bonds between employee and equipment is crucial in order to maintain a healthy working environment.
3. Assure the equipment that you are there for it, and lend a supportive ear to its needs and wants. If it makes unfamiliar noises, starts peeing on the floor like a small puppy, or just loses its will to go on, be sure to contact the psychiatry department (via ***) ASAP to request an evaluation session, which you will be assured an appointment with in any 6 month time frame.
I hope that by sharing my life experiences with you, it will provide you with a road map to success, allowing you to vaporize any issues that you may have.
Thanks
Shelby
Keeping it real and thank you for 10k hits J
