Two recent gems:

• Last night outside Merkado as two female servers were setting tables for dinner, “… yeah lots of great looking guys around here. None of them straight though.”

Ladies, you’re in Logan Circle. You already forced the queers out of Dupont, they had to go someplace!

• Downstairs in the cafeteria for lunch, the sign for entrees lists “Turkey Scallopini,” but there is no label on that specific tray. 4 co-workers are all milling about, staring at it wondering what it is. One says, “I don’t know, maybe it’s some kind of squash?”

I can’t judge them too harshly though. They asked the cafeteria employee what it was and even she didn’t know and had to go get the chef.

It hasn’t been very good lately, that’s for sure. It’s like other people have been forgetting how elevators work. I notice it mostly at the office. There’s the simplest behavior: trying to get out on every floor thinking it must be your floor. This is cute once or twice, but it’s usually exhibited by someone whose head is permanently crooked down looking at their Blackberry and after making the same mistake twice don’t think that it might be a good idea to look up.

The other common behavior is more aggressive, though people are probably more familiar with it on metro platforms: rushing the doors. While yes, the purpose of the elevator is to take you where you want to go, it’s also to take other people where they want to go as well. The chime that sounds the door opening does not signify the same thing as the starting bell at Belmont Park. At first it’s amusing to see people ram into those trying to get off the elevator, but after a while it’s just sad.

I ran into one of the greatest sins this morning, however, at both the office and at home: pressing the button for the wrong floor and its two evil cousins getting on a car going in the wrong direction and pressing both directions from your floor.

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This afternoon may be the most frustrated I’ve ever felt with this job. It’s not one thing, it’s a combination of a whole lot of stuff that seems to keep getting more crap added to it and all the while the dam is getting ready to burst. I normally don’t blog about the office because I’m sure that co-workers beyond the ones I know about read the entries and I have no desire to let my non-anonymous blog turn into office rants.

Today tho… is just one of those days. Kris often asks me, in a supportive fashion, when I’m going to quit this place and move on. After 4 years, just over ½ the time spent at my last job before they laid me off, I’m starting to ask myself the same thing more and more. I love what I do, I really like some of my co-workers and clients, but the working environment and the constant lack or rewriting of procedure here is really getting to me. What used to be simple processes have gotten needlessly complicated due to too many cooks, requirements, appointees, boxes to tick, ladder climbers, etc. It’s hard not to be more than a little fed up.

Tonight, I may seek out booze… lots of booze.

* Growing up, we had a lot of Milton-Bradley games, including Trouble a.k.a. Frustration, though that moniker would have been better used for the game Perfection or it’s evil cousin Superfection.

Interesting ride in this morning. I was a little later than usual, so the train was more crowded than I’m used to. A few stops in, a trio got on, two men, one woman and they were kinda cuttin’ up during the ride, but nothing too bad. With my headphones on, I was able to easily ignore them.

Then one of the men took an open seat, the woman sitting on his lap. He had headphones in and began to sing along, apparently, with whatever he was listening to. I say apparently, because through my music it sounded like he kept saying the same line over and over again. When I turned my music down, it was two lines repeated, heavily featuring the n-word, this particular pronunciation sounding like nik’-uh.

From the way he was looking around at the other riders, it was clear he was doing it for effect, but I have no idea to what end. The man was black, the majority of riders were white. He was dressed in a blue-collar coverall (similar to, but not, WMATA maintenance togs) while most around were clearly white collar with some tourists. His two friends laughed and smiled at his performance, most riders didn’t give him more than a second look but some were… disturbed. Not scared or offended, but clearly uncomfortable.

He’d protected himself in the perfect Metro force field: racially-charged discomfort. Who out of those riders would dare say anything to him or even make eye contact with him? He stopped right before we pulled into my station and he exited there with other passengers. Perhaps the little game had lost his interest or he couldn’t walk and sing at the same time. Craziness on the metro is nothing new, but I don’t mind so much when it’s at least entertaining. This guy was just annoying.

Also, to my co-worker: when it’s 80-something degrees outside and I manage to say a quiet but clear “good morning,” to you and nothing more, I am not grumpy. I am hot and wilted and tired. Believing that you are so interesting a person that I must have volumes to talk to you about will, in fact, make me grumpy and cause me to let you know just how uninteresting you are.

Tamara J. Erickson at Harvard Business talks about 10 Reasons Gen X’ers Are Unhappy at Work

Many of you X’ers are not thrilled with corporate life. You tend not to trust institutions in general and deeply resent the Boomers’ confident assumptions that you will be motivated by the same things that Boomers have long cared about. Many of you have told me that you are planning to leave corporate life “soon” – to start entrepreneurial ventures or work for smaller companies – options you feel will suit you better than the corporate roles looming ahead.

She makes some good points, and I’ve experienced more than a few of her examples. I don’t feel that being unhappy at work is exclusive to Gen X, but in my time I’ve definitely felt the cultural clash between my father’s working generation and mine.