Functional Friday

I usually really look forward to Fridays with the attendant prizes of Zorba's pizza and beer.

Yesterday however I had a meeting at work with the union leadership where they wanted to modify some of the times I created for the upcoming changes.  They had a complete laundry list of everything that was wrong with the new times I created.  This sounded about as much fun as a frontal lobotomy.  In the interest of labor peace I agreed to the meeting but I warned them ahead of time that they would have to justify each recommendation.

It turned out to be a very productive meeting as the union leaders really seemed to have turned a page in attitude.  They were very professional and some of their suggestions actually made a lot of sense.  It was fun to point out some the recommendations were suggested by drivers obviously looking to put some “sham time” in their schedule.  I asked them how they could recommend planning only four minutes to get completely across Worcester (more than two miles) while also recommending seven minutes to go only two blocks on another route.  To their credit, they didn’t try to justify it and said it made no sense.  We ended up getting a lot of really important work done, to my utter surprise.

Over lunch I finished another book, Unto the Breach.  One of my favorite authors. John Ringo, finally has his work on Kindle so I downloaded three of his novels from his Kildar series.  This series tells the story of an ex-US Navy SEAL who through a series of adventures becomes the feudal lord, the Kildar, of the descendants of Vikings who formed the Varangian Guard of the Byzantine Empire in the country of Georgia. I know that sounds a little far fetched (ya think!) but Ringo does a great job of making the implausible believable (almost).  This book started a little slowly but the second half has some of the best contemporary military action prose I’ve ever read. Ringo gets it; the desperate fight of the Kildar and his beloved followers against overwhelming odds is heartbreaking and exciting beyond belief.  I actually felt a little out of breath at times reading Ringo’s account of battle – he is so good at that.  A truly great read once we get the Kildar out of his harem.

The rewarding Friday continued with my bride at Zorbas.  We were forced to wait at the bar (damn!) for a table, so my wife got to meet some more of my “protectors” during her absence.  I think she’s coming to understand my “kindly, old uncle” status (double damn!!) with these beautiful young ladies.  Their pulchritude is only exceeded by their efficiency and we both enjoyed the fantastically tasty pizza at our eventual table.

The Most Beautiful Woman at Zorba's Last Night

A nice surprise, as we were leaving; a group of our friends from Worcester were waiting for a table.  (yes, the fare at Zorbas is legendary enough to draw even the city folk this far west)  As fate would have it, the table my wife and I left was being cleared for them.  We invited them to stop by the house on their way back to Worcester, which they did.

Farrell Gets Last Laugh

While my wife and the female contingent took a tour of my wife’s surviving plants (and Buddy complained lustily from his cage) I shared a beer and the Red Sox game with the male.  A fun time as they took on the greatly improved Toronto Blue Jays who sport some of the most unfortunate beards in major league history.  The normally polite Canadians were in high voice expressing displeasure with the new Boston manager John Farrell, who left Toronto for Boston (who wouldn’t?).   Farrell had the last laugh as the Sox, with their own shared of semi-scary facial hair, beat the Jays in the late innings.  A good day, blessed with Zorba’s beauties, pizza, and of course – beer!