TAN 202: A bunch of rotTAN apples (Page 44)

Reading this last page I have a few things to catch up on!

1. I have mixed feelings on Black Friday. I think it's everyone's own prerogative... if a store owner wants to open at whatever time - their choice. If shoppers want to line up an camp out all night - their choice. I think both parties are to "blame" for the craziness though. If the stores didn't open up, the shoppers wouldn't line up. If the shoppers didn't line up, the stores wouldn't open early. Chicken or egg? 

I personally shopped Friday but in the afternoon at a leisurely pace. The deals were smoking. Like almost everything 40-50% off. Everything. It's just good fiduciary planning to get stuff at half off.

2. I helped Brian put up TWO Christmas trees in his house yesterday. Two. WTF. 

3. Coffee.

Morning TAN. Hope everyone had a great weekend.  Got back LATE last night so dragging a bit this am on only a few hours sleep. BTW put up the tree last week   It would not have been til the weekend that I could have gotten to it and here is the thing.........here in FL I would rather get the tree earlier and get it into some water rather than get something that has been sitting in a parking lot un-watered for weeks in 80+ degree heat.  Plus it amuses the cats greatly.  Yeah I love Christmas. I was away over the long weekend so helped my fiance with some shopping but it was pretty dead as far as what I am normally used to as far as crowds go.

Hey, TAN:  I heard Brad did an IM.  Is that true?

TAN is off to a slow start after the long holiday weekend. Everyone still in a food coma?

Taco Tuesday is upon us and let's make it a good one!!!!

etiquette question - how many minutes do you wait on someone for a meeting they accepted?  why are my coworkers so disrespectful of other people's time!?

At our head to head matchup, I will be counting the minutes I am waiting on you to finish!

If a phone meeting, I call them and leave message. If it is a meeting face to face I would wait 15 minutes, then leave stating I had another meeting to get to.

When I worked for a major corporation and had too many meetings, we actually had people keep attendance tracking and that was turned into the managers every week.  If you were on-time, late, or absent.  it was part of your annual review.  Once that started happening, even the managers started showing up, because it meant no raise, and no bonus to some of them.  They actually started to get things done, like a manager should.  It was amazing, once the plant manager made it part of the annual review and raise procedure and backed it 100%.  He knew the people that thought their work was more important and even talked to them about it before it was implemented.  Once it impacted them as a manager and money, they changed.

i sent an IM, and left a voice mail, and it's been 15 minutes (actually 17).

so aggravating.

I'm a wait-10-minute person on the meeting thing. It happens ALLLLL the time here - the higher up the title, the more frequent. 

i ate sooooooooo much for lunch.  whee.

ME TOO!!!!!!

Chiliiiiiii cook off!!!

I actually did NOT eat that much, just a few bites of 5 different kinds. It's amazing how different each chili tasted! One was super sweet/brown sugar with bacon, one was HOT, one was PUMPKIN (impostor!), one vegetarian with too much tobasco, and mine wasn't even a chili I made enchilada soup hoping that the "different " aspect would clinch me a win. No such luck. "Security First Shift" won, a lady who had never made chili before. Rigged.

I won the chili cook-off in my office a few years ago with a sweet pumpkin chili.  I wouldn't call it my favorite, but it was an intersting change of pace for me back then (like 2009).

These days, I like the chili's that have chunks of meat, like stew meat, and not as much liquid.... and melt-your-head-and-scald-your-retinas-HOT.

i make a pretty average chili (use premade seasoning mixes!  HORROR!) but i serve it with pumpkin cornbread which more than makes up for the chili's mediocreness.

I won my company's first chili cook-off with a Texas style (all beef, no beans!) chili made with slow smoked tri-tip. The smokiness was a delicious accent to the robust chili flavor.

The next year a regular middle of the road chili won. The other competitors and I think it was due to there being more of a general population judging instead of a small number of "foodies" judging.

For the next cook-off I have a new approach which will hopefully win so I can regain my title! (and little desk trophy).

(chili-award_small.jpg)

FNG. *rolls eyes*