strange HR people
Jan. 10th, 2006 12:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
adrian_turtleFriday, my research group went out to lunch together. The original plan was to hang out in a conference room, send for pizza, and sign each other's lab notebooks. http://www.livejournal.com/users/adrian_turtle/44209.html But as we were starting to gather and count heads and negotiate toppings, someone said, "I'm sick of pizza. Let's go to the Chinese buffet instead." And so we did. Ten of us sitting around a big table, chatting, signing notebooks, and going back and forth to the buffet.
Last week was not a good time for me and food. Stephen King audiobooks are not good for my appetite, especially the smoking-advocacy stories. The nice fellow probably didn't listen to them before giving them to me, just thought I was so impressed with _It_ and _The Green Mile_ so these were worth a try. Even if he had, he tends not to focus on smell the way I do, so he might not have noticed the revolting similarities. It's consistently vivid and unpleasant, whether it's the smell and taste of smoke (from the perspective of someone who hates it), or the resentment of not being able to smoke (from someone who craves it.) Part of why I read King is how much he seems to like his characters, and with "Ten O'Clock People," "Sun Dog," and "Riding the Bullet," I can't see the liking beyond a resentful blur of nicotine withdrawal. But I digress.
The people at the next table were another group of colleagues talking shop over lunch. We could tell they were colleagues talking shop, even though they were complete strangers talking an unfamiliar kind of shop, because they were talking so loud. They were in human resources, and most of us had been working long enough to recognize their buzzwords at that density. (One of them smelled so familiarly vile I thought I recognized him, but either he was not the same man who had been such a close friend of my ex, or he had changed out of all visual recognition.) Members of my group looked at each other over the notebooks, and someone said, "is it that easy to hear between tables?" After all, they were talking about policies for giving people bonuses, which we expected to be a little more private. "No, they're just being loud." Nevertheless, we mumbled about "the project" and "the other project" with increasing embarrassment, asking for clarification by going over to the person who had written something and pointing to the scrawl, rather than trying to read it out loud across the table, as we would have in our usual conference room.
After a lot of drinks and conversation, the strange HR folks went back to the buffet one last time. I don't know what they actually got, but they were talking about the little cubes of jellied dessert the restaurant sometimes has. At various times, I've seen white ones with a mild coconut taste, orange ones with a mild mango taste, and clear pale yellow ones with a taste so mild I couldn't identify it at all. I think the strange HR folks were talking about the clear jellied cubes, because that's all I saw Friday.
"What is that stuff?"
"I think it's gelatin?"
"Yeah, but what is gelatin? Meat or what?"
"I think they make it from cows' hooves?"
"No, it's horsehide"
"I thought it was seaweed"
"Ewww! Seaweed is disgusting! Get it away from me! Don't they make it from pigs?"
The person next to me does not have the coloring to turn green, but he did look very unwell. He and I have discussed kosher gelatin variants before. The whole group has discussed any number of interesting gelatinous properties over the years, but none of us wanted to interrupt the conversation at the next table with talk about how gelatins are made commercially, or what different textures one can get by using gelatin from different sources.
"I wonder if they clean the pig shit off the hooves before they make it into gelatin?"
"Why would they? I mean, it's just, like, y'know, stuff..."
"Like what?"
"Like soylent green..."
At my table, half of us burst out with "Soylent Green is people!" at the same time. There was enough giggling to confuse the poor waiter.
I consider it a very successful going out to lunch, though I didn't have anything worthwhile to eat.
Last week was not a good time for me and food. Stephen King audiobooks are not good for my appetite, especially the smoking-advocacy stories. The nice fellow probably didn't listen to them before giving them to me, just thought I was so impressed with _It_ and _The Green Mile_ so these were worth a try. Even if he had, he tends not to focus on smell the way I do, so he might not have noticed the revolting similarities. It's consistently vivid and unpleasant, whether it's the smell and taste of smoke (from the perspective of someone who hates it), or the resentment of not being able to smoke (from someone who craves it.) Part of why I read King is how much he seems to like his characters, and with "Ten O'Clock People," "Sun Dog," and "Riding the Bullet," I can't see the liking beyond a resentful blur of nicotine withdrawal. But I digress.
The people at the next table were another group of colleagues talking shop over lunch. We could tell they were colleagues talking shop, even though they were complete strangers talking an unfamiliar kind of shop, because they were talking so loud. They were in human resources, and most of us had been working long enough to recognize their buzzwords at that density. (One of them smelled so familiarly vile I thought I recognized him, but either he was not the same man who had been such a close friend of my ex, or he had changed out of all visual recognition.) Members of my group looked at each other over the notebooks, and someone said, "is it that easy to hear between tables?" After all, they were talking about policies for giving people bonuses, which we expected to be a little more private. "No, they're just being loud." Nevertheless, we mumbled about "the project" and "the other project" with increasing embarrassment, asking for clarification by going over to the person who had written something and pointing to the scrawl, rather than trying to read it out loud across the table, as we would have in our usual conference room.
After a lot of drinks and conversation, the strange HR folks went back to the buffet one last time. I don't know what they actually got, but they were talking about the little cubes of jellied dessert the restaurant sometimes has. At various times, I've seen white ones with a mild coconut taste, orange ones with a mild mango taste, and clear pale yellow ones with a taste so mild I couldn't identify it at all. I think the strange HR folks were talking about the clear jellied cubes, because that's all I saw Friday.
"I think it's gelatin?"
"Yeah, but what is gelatin? Meat or what?"
"I think they make it from cows' hooves?"
"No, it's horsehide"
"I thought it was seaweed"
"Ewww! Seaweed is disgusting! Get it away from me! Don't they make it from pigs?"
The person next to me does not have the coloring to turn green, but he did look very unwell. He and I have discussed kosher gelatin variants before. The whole group has discussed any number of interesting gelatinous properties over the years, but none of us wanted to interrupt the conversation at the next table with talk about how gelatins are made commercially, or what different textures one can get by using gelatin from different sources.
"Why would they? I mean, it's just, like, y'know, stuff..."
"Like what?"
"Like soylent green..."
At my table, half of us burst out with "Soylent Green is people!" at the same time. There was enough giggling to confuse the poor waiter.
I consider it a very successful going out to lunch, though I didn't have anything worthwhile to eat.
