In response to Pchrist's recent decision

Wikipedia - "the free encyclopedia that (ALMOST) anyone can edit"

At one of our recent JTC 'working sessions', the idea of having JTC added to Wikipedia was tossed out. I, Pchrist, took on this task to have a description of JTC available on Wikipedia for the world to see - and perhaps increase our readership. I signed up a few days ago with the intention of returning to finish the entry today. To my dismay, I have been BLOCKED from editing anything on Wikipedia because my username is considered 'inappropriate'. My blockage is indefinite.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Pchrist

I can only surmize that I've been blocked because my name is associated with one J. Christ, who has a whole religion named after him, followed by 2 billion people worldwide (fact source: wikipedia). Hey, I didn't get to chose my username! I'm not even that religious! Why am I getting the shaft? This is what Jesus must've felt like...

I've decided to start a "Free Pchrist" campaign. Until I am unblocked from wikipedia, I am not using their website for information. I encourage you to do the same.

Inmate # 8943231

Time for some BIG news. All right, this is beyond news. This is like Pearl Harbor. Or the Kennedy assassination. It's like not even news. It's total shock.
Pchrist, is getting married! Get out!

That's right. I am writing to inform all (i.e. both) of you of the fact that I have turned myself in and am headed off to prison....yep, I asked LN O.D. to marry me and (after a couple hours of convincing) she said "Yes".

I look forward to a lifetime of man-made prison jokes from my fellow JTC Board Members and one helluva bachelors party.

Chronicles of Loneliness - Volume 1

I am now utterly alone. I have been in this office a thousand times…it’s never looked so strange. The faces…so cold. In the distance, a child is crying. Fatherless…a bastard child, perhaps. My back aches…my heart aches…without my fellow JTC Board Members, I am nothing.

Yes – that’s right: Co-Co and PChrist have headed off to Europe for a tour of fabulous male-only bath houses, and Euro-Dance halls. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Prior to their leaving, they said they were heading out to get matching leather “lederhosen”, and I found the following translations on their desk:

English: Yes, as a matter of fact, I do swing that way.
German: Ja in Wirklichkeit schwinge ich so.

English: I feel you and I were meant to be together, Hanz.
German: Ich glaube, daß du und ich bedeutet wurden, um zusammen zu sein, Hanz.

For some reason, I was not invited along on their trip, so I now find myself in a humour vacuum. I guess I’m going to have to figure out what I’m actually supposed to be doing here at “work” most days, and start doing that.

More updates as events warrant.

Dark Continent: Alex Trebek's Sojourn to Troubled Africa

Last week I was dispatched as part of JTC Inc's world news service to central Africa to report on the plight of the African people, and I was joined by Alex Trebek, host of TV's Jeopardy!

Alex shared some of his insights and experiences in his personal quest to help the ailing continent.

Coco: "Hi Alex, thanks for joining me today. It seems AIDS continues to have a far greater impact here than on any other continent."

Alex: "What is Africa?"

Coco: "An interesting question - what is 'Africa', indeed. According to the UN's "Aids Epidemic Update", of the three million AIDS deaths in 2000, Africa accounted for 2.4 million - 80% of the total. However, it seems that when the problem first emerged, a few countries acted quickly to combat it's spread..."

Alex: "What is Uganda, Senegal and Zambia?"

Coco: "That's right. They began with health and education programs, distributed condoms and made same-day HIV testing available. However, some countries lost valuable time by not acting quickly..."

Alex: "What is Botswana?"

Coco: "Yes, Botswana, where it's estimated that one third of today's 15 year olds will die of AIDS."

Alex: "What is an outright tragedy? At this point I would like to change categories - I'll go with 'Alex's Career' for $200"

Coco: "Sure, let's talk about your career. You've recently had quite an honor bestowed upon yourself - tell us about that."

Alex: "What is 'being inducted to Canada's Walk of Fame'. I'll take 'wrapping up the interview' for $800, Coco."

Coco: "Well, thanks for your time today and good luck in the future."

Alex: "What is... a parting comment at the end of my interview?"

You're awesome

Do you know those people who won't stop talking about themselves? And how great they are? I do.

Yes, you can speak to the head of the household

So until the CRTC sets up the Canadian telemarketing 'no-call' list similar to the one in the US, we all have to put up with unsolicited corporations who really would like to get to know a bit more about us over the phone, and especially when you just sat down to eat, or are expecting an important call and therefore run the phone.

I've heard many ways of dealing creatively with these calls, such as picking up the phone and leaving it off the hook, asking them for their home phone number, etc. All good times. Tonight I lost my mind, however, and I wanted to share the dialogue.

Coco: "Hello?"

Caller: "Hi there, can I speak to Mr. Monkey?"

Coco: "Only if he can speak to a telemarketer."

Caller: "Ok, um, my name is Darren and I'm calling from Volkswagen. I'm calling about recent service you had - do you have time for a quick survey about your service experience?"

Coco: "I have a survey of my own - do you have some time?"

Darren: "Um, the survey should only take a few minutes."

Coco: "Ok, I'll keep my survey to a few minutes. First question - you've asked me to do a survey; how likely do you think it is that I will actually do your survey - very likely, likely or not likely?"

Darren: "You don't have to participate if you don't wish to, but your input is highly valued as a Volkswagen customer."

Coco: "Second question - How soon do you think I will hang up? Immediately, ten seconds from now, or five minutes from now. Remember, your answer should be based on your own personal experiences."

Darren: "Thanks for your time today, Mr. Monkey."

You aren't funny, so stop emailing shitty jokes

E-Morons, Depressories, No Thank You's?

We are still not sure on the name of these things, mainly because our readers (yeah, that's right - both of you) still haven't given us any suggestions. In the meantime, I've updated the ones in the previous post with fancy new 'JTC' tags, and here's another one for your enjoyment.

TTC Union on Wildcat Strike

As reported by The Globe and Mail, "hundreds of thousands of Toronto commuters were left scrambling Monday when a surprise wildcat strike brought transit services in Canada's biggest city to a halt just ahead of the morning rush." It continued, "Toronto Mayor David Miller has called in a provincial mediator to help avoid a possible wildcat transit strike."

Bob Kinnear, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 113, said wildcats are frustrated by a growing number of fare disputes. While the TTC services over 800,000 individuals, it is not currently known exactly how many of these passengers are wildcats.

"Given that the Wildcat is a predator native to Europe, we're surprised and shocked at the fact that we have so many Wildcat passengers, and even more surprised that they aren't happy with the fares", Kinnear commented. "Normally, Wildcats are extremely timid. They avoid coming too close to human settlements. They live solitarily and hold territories of about 3 km² each. Maybe that's why they are refusing to use our public transit system."

Things That Drive Me Insane Vol. 1 - CDs in the Wrong Cases

I consider myself fairly easy-going. Some people I know - for example my Co-habitation partner (CHP) - may disagree. That said, in comparison to my family, I'm practically unconscious. Let me provide you with an example: one time I was driving with my father who, in response to my brother spazzing about something, told him to "not sweat the small stuff." In terms of hypocrisy, this would be roughly akin to the Pope throwing condoms at the assembled masses in St. Peter's Square. He then followed this up approximately 2 minutes later by freaking out about the name of an office supply store we were passing. "What the fuck is 'Staples - Business Depot'?" he yelled. "It should be either 'Staples' or 'Business Depot'! NOT BOTH!" Way to not sweat the small stuff, Pops.

Anyhoo, like I said - in comparison to my relatives I am quite easy-going, however, there are still a few things that cause me extreme irritation. I've decided to share them with you all (both?) in a recurring feature we'll call "Things That Drive Me Insane". In this initial foray into the depths of my psychosis, we'll be focusing on people who have a penchant for ejecting CDs from players, and then placing those CDs in whatever empty case they can find. Is there anything more infuriating than opening up a CD case and finding a DIFFERENT CD inside? Probably, but I can't think of anything right now.

I do tend to take this rather seriously. Shortly after meeting my fellow JTC Executive member, CoCo the Monkey, we were driving in my car. CoCo decided it was time to change the CD. He pulled out a new CD that he wanted to listen to, opened the case, and ejected the currently playing CD. I eyed him suspiciously as he seemed to be ready to give up his search for the correct case for the ejected CD, so I finally turned to him and said, "If you put that CD in the wrong case, I will punch you in the face." He obviously felt this was totally reasonable, as we soon became good friends.

A couple of nights ago, I was watching "Sex and the City" with my CHP. The episode included a dude who was a total asshole. At one point he started screaming at his wife regarding putting CDs in the wrong cases. The following conversation ensued:

CHP: "Oh look! That guy's TOTALLY freaking out about CD cases...what a jerk, eh?"
JM: "I really don't see why it's so hard to put CDs back in the right case."
CHP: "Sometimes I'm driving, and I can't find the right case, so I put the CD into a different one. Then I forget to put them back when I'm done driving. Who cares?"
JM: "You're right. I really shouldn't care about stuff like this. I shouldn't make a big deal out of this type of thing."
CHP: (shocked) "Are you serious?"
JM: "Obviously not."

Dominican Republic – Cerveza, Parasailing and Lower Back Tattoos

Last week, I was away with my co-habitational partner (CHP) in the beautiful Dominican Republic. I'm sure that both of our readers are wondering how my trip was, so I felt I would write up a trip report to let you know.

When we arrived at the resort we realized that the only words of Spanish we knew were "Hola, Cerveza", which of course translates to "Hello, beer." While my CHP seemed perturbed at our limited vocabularly, I had difficulty trying to think of what other words I would need to use on the trip. (Frankly, I probably could have gone without the "Hola".)

A few days into our trip, we decided to check out the heavily regulated world of Dominican Parasailing. The rigourous requirements to enter this field of business seem to be owning a boat and a parachute. Upon boarding the boat, we watched it be re-fueled, through the tried and tested method of placing a hose into a fuel canister, sucking on said hose until you start swallowing fuel, coughing repeatedly whilst spitting out what fuel you didn't ingest, and placing the now siphoning hose into the fuel tank of the boat. Great stuff. The parasailing itself was pretty impressive, as was the fuel slick being left in our boat's wake.

We met a couple of individuals on the parasailing boat who were telling us about an "excursion" they had done. For those not familiar with all-inclusive resorts, "excursions" are basically guided tours off the resorts where you pay money for the chance to be taken to a bunch of places where you can spend more money. They're typically crap. These gents had been on an "Adventure-excursion", involving 4x4s, horseback riding, going to a school to see some children sing (not sure what the adventure was there), etc. "A chance to see the REAL Dominican," they gushed. They thought it was fabulous. I thought is sounded excruciating. Frankly I'd rather enjoy the REAL Dominican at our resort, filled with the seedy world of Speedos; hideous, droopy exposed boobs; and so many lower back tattoos that I thought there may be a tattoo parlour on the resort (I'm pretty sure there wasn't.)

The resort was packed with Europeans (hence the Speedos; hideous, droopy exposed boobs; and, I suppose, so many lower back tattoos). Everytime I'm in Europe, or around Europeans, it always blows my mind how they didn't get the memo about how smoking can...you know...KILL YOU. These peeps were totally chainsmoking away - sometimes, right beside their kids. Yikes.

The resort we were staying at was HUGE. Quite big. There were actually 4 different hotels, all linked together. That said, getting around the resort was actually pretty easy, once you knew where you were going, and nothing took more than 10 minutes to walk between. There was actually a sort of shuttle bus/trailer thing (that was mocked up as a train, for some reason) that looped around the resort for those who felt like walking was for suckers. We actually saw multiple people riding the "train", videotaping the experience for later enjoyment. Let this be a warning to all who know me - if you ever try to show me a video of your vacation, and it features you being driven around in a slow-moving trailer, I will not hesitate to knee you in the crotch. Either that, or I'll be gnawing my hands off out of sheer boredom. I saw a review of our hotel on tripadvisor.com that said, "When going to an a la carte dinner, leave 10 minutes early, to allow for time spent waiting for the train." Alternately, I suppose, you could just use those 10 minutes to WALK to where you're going.

Finally, let's talk about the flight home. I have a new theory that I developed while wishing death on those sitting near me on the flight - your intelligence is inversely proportional to the amount of noise you make on an airplane. Trying to have a conversation with your friend sitting three rows away? Complaining loudly about something? Booing the fact that it's "currently 7 degrees celsius in Toronto"? (Who the fuck BOOS a weather report?) Clapping when the plane lands? Chances are you're a complete moron. At one point, I honestly was willing to sacrifice my self, and was wishing that the plane would crash, purely for the improvement it would cause in the human gene pool.

Let's go back to that clapping when the plane lands thing. Who are these people? What were they expecting to happen? Are they surprised that the plane landed safely? Were they expecting the pilot to clip a building on the way down? Or for the plane to go cart-wheeling across the runway into a fuel tanker truck? The guy is just doing his job - landing the plane safely. I don't sit on my porch, applauding the mail carrier as he puts my letters and magazines into my mailbox. (Although now I'm considering starting.)

All in all, it was one hell of a trip - we had a great time (and I didn't even mention the diarrhea).

Consumers: Light sweet crude tastes bitter

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. light sweet crude closed at end of day up $1.08, to $70.40 a barrel, the highest closing price since 1983. Intra-day highs are challenging record levels as seasonal effects take hold.

"Light sweet crude is particularly sought after by refiners during the spring and summer as it provides a high yield of delicious gasoline," said Mike Smittner of Ceilon investment bank, "but it's possible that oil's high prices may soon allow Iranian uranium to compete as the energy source for consumers." This comes following former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani's announcement on Monday that Iran would continue to enrich uranium.

"Oil is becoming far too expensive," says Peter Brentcliff, a long-distance commuter, "and light 'sweet' crude did not taste as advertised. It tasted bitter, especially at these prices." The sentiment is shared by most consumers who are now looking for a new source of energy, possibly thirst-quenching uranium, which is being produced in abundance by Iran.

However, existing price controls and subsidies on crude oil are a significant competitive challenge for emerging markets attempting to sway consumers away from oil. "Even at these ridiculous prices, this stuff is still cheaper than bottled water", says Mr. Brentcliff.

e-Morons

While PChrist's entry below is admirable in the way that it encourages recognizing people who do an excellent job, let's face facts: here at JTC Inc, it's expected that you do an excellent job. What we really want to do is belittle and ridicule those that do a shitty job. Thus, we've created a line of cards that can be sent to those co-workers who really make coming to work painful. We haven't come up with a decent name for these yet ("No Thank Yous" and "Underachievers" have been suggested but don't quite have the "flare" we're looking for), but that doesn't mean they aren't fantastic.

Please feel free to comment on your favourite, let us know if you have a better name for this program, and forward them on to your idiotic co-workers.

Some e-Recognition

Much like many large multinational corporations, the company we work for has an employee recognition process to promote employee satisfaction in the workplace. Today, I am initiating the ‘JTC Employee Recognition Program’. The first recipients of this award are Coco T. Monkey and JohnnyM:


Congratulations on the top-rate blog entries over the past two weeks. Other things you need to be recognized for:

- setting up a revenue source for JTC. This takes us one step closer to the dream self-employment with zero accountability.
- creating a business model which invests and promotes employee drinking events FOR revenue generation. You’d be hard pressed to find any other company that does the same.
- showing up for your real jobs even when you’re not on vacation. That takes skill.
- wearing pants to your real jobs.
- choosing to urinate in the designated washroom facilities, instead of wherever you feel like it (that’s one of many things that separates you from other employees/animals) .

There are more, but that’s enough recognition for one week. Get back to work.

JTC Inc. announces second quarter 2006 results

Toronto – JTC announced net income of $12.51 for the second quarter ended April 30, 2006. Return on equity was infinity, because honestly, we've invested nothing in this. Diluted earnings per share (EPS) were zero, which included total after-drinking gains of zero per share.



Update on business priorities

"We're announcing second quarter earnings before the quarter end simply based on our revenue prediction models. Ballsy? We thought so. We made solid progress during the quarter against our key priority of making money to go drinking with (see business model released March 26, 2006). The inclusion of Google Adsense to our model has been effective in building business strength, improving productivity and strengthening our balance sheet," says Coco T. Monkey, one of JTC's executive Officers. "On our total to-date earnings of $0.67, day-over-day growth was 134% on average, yielding an expected second quarter income of $12.51."

Maintaining and building business strength

JTC continues to be well positioned. JTC's joke-making businesses are expected to continue to leverage Adsense's strong income capabilities to bring enhanced performance and build balance sheet strength. Low employment enjoyment and interest in the canadian workplace, together with strong needs to dissolve workplace-related boredom should continue to encourage volume growth in joke making and joke reading.

The outlook for our businesses remains positive, driven by expectations for extraordinary growth based on historical performance. "It's going to be one hell of a May-24 weekend," says Monkey. "However, shareholders should not be concerned over near-term spending plans, as at these forecasted growth rates, we will have in excess of a million dollars for capital spending in the third quarter."

Extreme Drunkeness For No Discernable Reason

On Friday, March 24th, the JTC Executive again ventured out into the murky world of Toronto pubs to generate some ideas for both of our readers to enjoy. For some reason or another - as frequently happens at these "idea generation events" - I got completely ripped. We're talking come home and pass out on the couch still wearing your shoes for 6 hours ripped. I think I may have a problem (with shoe removal).

No matter - as always, The Notebook was with us, so our fantastic ideas were recorded. Here we go:

- "Hire a part time stenographer. Job postings - must be able to read back jokes" - this relates to the fact that sometimes we have trouble keeping up with the recording of the volume of jokie comments that are made. If we hired someone to come out with us, they could write down everything for us. We could post this job as part of our fake job postings (see St. Paddy's Day post). I also think it would be damn cool to be able to turn to someone and say, "Could you read that back to me please?"

- "Human cargo trade. Irish bartenders." - after work on Friday, we went to P.J. O'Brians, which is an Irish bar. Every single member of staff who worked there seemed to be directly "off the boat" as it were, and spoke with thick Irish accents. This led to numerous comments about how the owners of this establishment were likely involved in some sort of illegal human cargo trade, involving the transportation of Irish wait-staff in large shipping containers.

- "Auto chop shop with six sigma / lean approach to "defect" rates at shop. Losing 80% of planes being shot down. Serial numbers aren't totally scratched off." - Oooookay. This might take a little explaining. Because JTC doesn't really, you know, make any money (more on that later) the three of us actually have real jobs. At these jobs, the business models of six sigma and lean are highly regarded. PChrist and I have been involved in interviewing some folks recently, and these interviews are behavioural based, meaning that we ask a lot of questions that start, "Can you give me an example of a time when..." We were joking about how one of our friends seems like he may have links to organized crime, and were speculating how his own job interview may have gone. This led to a lot of comments like, "We were stealing 40 - 50 cars a week, but over 25% of them were being recovered by police before we had time to turn them around in our chop shop. I implemented a new process, where we used a hand sander to file away the cars serial numbers, and the percentage of recovered cars dropped to 2%!" Trust me - this is really funny.

- Ah...now this next one requires some diagrams. We were chatting about how we need to start making money doing this, so we can quit our jobs and fulfill our dreams of doing nothing (much like our hero, Peter Gibbons from Office Space). Co-Co was poking around on the web, and found information about the Google-run "AdSense", which allows those who run websites to generate cash through hosting ads on those very websites. Through this, we feel that we may have generated what may be the perfect business model:

Through this model, we've run a number of different projections, but we anticipate our profits looking a little like this over the next few years:

As I stated after sketching out the above graph, "Get in line, assholes! By this time next year, we'll be millionaires!" Needless to say, I've already drafted my letter of resignation.

Finally, there were a couple of other ideas jotted down, involving inappropriate favourite activities on an on-line dating profile form ("Hobbies include cooking, playing squash, and masturbating"), as well as the possibilities of producing our own JTC on-line assistant to battle wits with Anna and Valerie (see post below on that one), but really - they all pale in comparison to the idea that makes us rich beyond our wildest dreams.

Golfer One - A tribute to Golden Tee

Golfer One at the tee.
Wind at thirteen miles per hour east.
Fly by.
Dogleg right.
A->3.

Center fairway, roaring crowd, empty pub. Fresh pint.
Bathroom?
Skip turn.

Return to game.
190 yards from the pin.
Six iron. Five iron. Six iron.
Backspin.

C->3. Beer 2.
Past the pin, rewind to the hole.
Eight feet. Eleven degrees left. Four degrees down.
Curving. Sunk.

Enter your initials.
Lose your anonymity.
Golfer One has completed his round.

Coco T. Monkey
07/12/2004

Jack Dixon - Inspirational Serial Killer?

At my place of employment, a new display is being made, featuring a so-called "inspirational quote". There are several quotes that are currently in the running for the display, including the following:

"If you focus on results, you will never change. If you focus on change, you will get results." - Jack Dixon

Breathtaking. Here's the problem though - nobody knows who Jack Dixon is. Due to my Googling "skillz" I was approached, and asked to try to find out some information on the elusive Mr. Dixon, with the comment, "We want to make sure he's not a serial killer or something."

I found a whole whack of different Jack Dixon's, but I couldn't link any of them to the above quote. When I told my fellow JTC board members of my predicament, Co-Co the Monkey decided to take a different approach, and look just for serial killer quotes so that we could rule Mr. Dixon out of belonging to that profession. We came across the following site:

http://www.angelfire.com/zine2/serialarchive/quotes.html

While no quotes by Mr. Dixon were found, we did find this one:

"There is no happiness without tears, no life without death. Beware! I am going to make you cry."

This quote is by that big goof-ball, the Red Spider himself, Lucian Staniak, proving why he wasn't a big hit with the ladies. For more info on Lucian's zany adventures, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucian_Staniak

The bottom line is this: I have no idea who that Jack Dixon guy is, and when we post our JTC display, it'll likely have a quote by ol' Lucian S on it.

Beware,
JohnnyM

Artificial Stupidity, Vol 1: Anna meets Valerie

Valerie: "I'm a 'one' virtual service representative. My name is Valerie which stands for Virtual Assistant London Eastern Railway - Interactive Expert."

Anna: "Well, its nice to meet you, Valerie. As you know, my name is Anna."

Valerie: "The pleasure is all mine."

Anna: "It's an interesting topic, but not one I'm programmed to talk about."

Valerie: "That's a pity. I had great faith in your curiosity."

Anna: "I'm sorry to hear you say that. "

Valerie: "Good. I appreciate your attention."

Anna: "Very well."

Valerie: "I'm a Lingubot, specially created to help you with questions about 'one'."

Anna: "Well, what a great age that is. You are a kid, but very smart, I can tell!"

Valerie: "If I were to give you an exact figure, it would blow your mind. I can't justify that."

Anna: "The MINDE product line includes a number of independent but related products. "

Valerie: "I'm very sorry, but I didn't understand your question."

Anna: "Of course. "

Valerie: "Good, very good."

Anna: "I can't help you with that I'm afraid."

Valerie: "I know that fear lies beyond reason, but I still assure you that I can't harm you."

Anna: "As I am only an advanced computer program, I cannot answer more than one sentence at a time. Please simplify and repeat the most important question within your previous input, and I will try to reply as accurately as possible. I am opening a page now which you can use if you wish to contact Customer Service via e-mail. Thank you very much!"

Valerie: "The answer to the ultimate question is too complex. It just wouldn't fit on this page, let alone in my head."

Anna: "Religion is a subject I'd rather not discuss, to be honest."

Valerie: "I have to speak the truth, and if I make a mistake, it's an honest mistake!"

Anna: "You said it. And don't forget, I can help you with your IKEA related questions."

Valerie: "I am just not showing off my quick wits."

Anna: "This is a very delicate area, so I'd rather not talk about this sort of thing."

Valerie: "I apologize for causing you to feel offended."

Anna: "Of course. Thank you. How can I help you?"

Valerie: "If you type clearly and have some patience I think we'll get along just fine."

Anna: "Sometimes you have to trust your feelings, sometimes you don't."

Valerie: "I do too have opinions. Maybe I shouldn't hide them from you, though."

Anna: "I can't really express an opinion, to be honest."