In retrospect, I could have made a better entry out of that.

Me, schlepping around in the Great Outdoors cursing the lack of air conditioning and trying not to step in any thing that looked like...something you shouldn't step in.

My cell phone stubbornly refusing to work when I tried to call the locksmith, proving that having a cell "in case of emergency" is a waste of time.

The woman designated to go around the site with me and help me pick everything up declining to leave the comfort of her air conditioned office and choosing instead to stand in the doorway and point out the various places I needed to visit.

Making five trips by foot to the farthest site (forgot the list of where things are, forgot the packing case to put it all in, forgot the key to the padlock, had the wrong key to the padlock) before the idea of driving percolated through my heat-frazzled brain.

The padlock that refused to unlock, resulting in me wasting fifteen minutes trying to cut through the unbreakable/un-cuttable cable for. (I wound up damaging the cable and eventually coaxing the padlock to surrender.)

I'm sure there's something funny in there somewhere. I'll let you know when it occurs to me.

Got one of those snippy little e-mails from Bernie this morning - this one essentially accusing me of intentionally making his life harder and sabotaging his business trip by not realizing he'd changed subjects without warning in the middle of an e-mail exchange.

A brief moment of irritation and a quick look at jobbing.com produce the information that I can work in Japan, teaching English, for a whopping $26k a year. I think not.

Anyhow, job-hunting on company time is wrong.

Update, much later.... You know, call me silly, but it actually seems to me that if you send a client an e-mail and get a return receipt that they've read it, you don't really need me to call them and ask them if they read it.

Also, if you sent a potential client an e-mail discussing the details of some agreement I haven't been involved in and don't know anything about, it makes more sense for you to follow up with them to see if they have any questions than it does for me to do it.

One assumes you're trying to look "professional" and give the impression that this company is larger than it is, but the end result is that we look like a bunch of disorganized lunatics.

(Also? While we're discussing stupid? Stupid is sending a client an e-mail, then asking me to call them and tell them you sent an e-mail. Do you have any idea just how stupid that is? I know you don't trust technology, but considering that you're trying to sell these clients on technology solutions to their problems, it might be better if you didn't let them know it.)