driven to the bottle

is it any wonder that tuesday is half-pitcher of beer at lunch day?

every tuesday morning we have 1.5-2 hours of obligatory meeting, presentation, argument, overuse of "let's take this offline" long past the point when it would have actually saved us time, and congratulatory notes of achievement that one would expect would result in promotion but, in fact, do not. those who actually achieve don't get announced kudos; they just get promoted.
none of that applies to me though, because you can't get promoted when you've declared your intent to leave as early as your interview, so don't read into that.

but yesterday a certain member of our group was scheduled to speak, and i had my notepad and pen at the ready. it has been a debate of long-standing between me and my workwife as to whether this person really overuses the word "actually" as much as i profess she does. my feelings were mixed; jubilation at knowing i would finally be vindicated in my assertion, and utter despair that i would have to sit through the talk and pay attention in order to prove it.

lo and behold! 21 total powerpoint slides, 45 minutes, and 84 - yes, eightymotherfuckingfour!!! uses of "actually" as a modifier when none was needed. do you need an example of the auditory lashing we all took? "when we received this sample, we actually tested it using a protocol which was actually designed for another drug, which we actually did not look at using the same actual parameters." gaaaaah!

i also compiled a list of other abused adverbs, most notably, "basically," "essentially," "totally," "practically," "generally," and some others which i can't remember for you now because my ears are still ringing and it's distracting me. DO NOT OVERUSE THESE WORDS IN YOUR PRESENTATIONS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. say less, say it more slowly, and be concise. misusing words makes you look dumb and then people assume the content of your talk is similarly retarded, and then they repeat lines from your talk in the 'special olympics voice' later at lunch, and will discuss your faint harelip and sweaty pit stains but not an iota of information from your long, arduous presentation.

otherwise there will always be someone sitting in the back row, disgusing their smirk with sips of coffee, high-fiving their friend under the table and noting with acerbic accuracy every single time you fuck up. and then posting about it on the internet.