I resolve the following for 2007 . . .

I will no longer pat coworkers on the ass whenever they give "good hustle." A simple, strictly verbal "nice work" will suffice.

I will no longer spend time trying to think of a clever way to work a humorous reference to the formidable Super Aggro-Crag of Nickelodeon's GUTS into a Hulver comment.

I will quit signing off my business emails with "stay sexy."

The ten second rule will no longer apply to things I see on the floor of the subway.

I will no longer revise my Vladimir Nabokov/Gregor Samsa slash fiction. The project simply does not work. It is time I recognized that fact and let it go.

Lose 25 pounds, on myself or another, it doesn't matter so long as it is lost.

I will endeavor to find out if my paternal grandmother is, as I have been telling people all this time, dead. It started as a knee-jerk answer because I simply couldn't remember whether she was dead or not, and it has since become my habitual answer. Though I really should look into it as I don't want to be a liar, if, in fact, I am one.

Bourbon is officially now a "sometimes thing," especially at work.

Young children don't enjoy extended, running gags in which they are told repeatedly that their parents are simply raising them as foodstuffs. They are especially displeased with the idea they will be slaughtered at the age of 12. Therefore, I should stop with said running gag.

No more licking the faces of strangers I pass on the street.

Work

    I tried to get a messenger to deliver some draft reports to the Manhattan Building (administrative offices of city government) yesterday. We do quite a bit of work with the city and, though we're only a few subway stops away from their offices, given how long it can take to get through security and simply drop off a package, it is easier if we just send a messenger. I called our normal guys, gave them the info, and they said no.

    "What?"
    "Can't do. We're not carrying for Company Y anymore."
    "Why not?"
    "You don't pay us."
    "Sure we do."
    "Not for two months you don't pay us."
    "Well, um, I'm sure we intend to."
    "Fuck that. You don't pay, we don't haul. That's the rules."
    "And that's a fair rule. Completely fair. Look, I'm certain . . ."
    "We see a check and then we haul. No more to talk about."

    Within minutes, I got an email from on off-site freelancer. He was missing several checks dating back to October.

    So, I called accounting.

    Accounting is actually in a different office. Where I work is in SoHo, but the main office – which houses accounting – is near Times Square.
    Accounting is run by a man we'll call Commander Brian. Now I should point out that while "Brian" is a name change to protect the innocent, the "Commander" part is not my invention. He prefers to be called Commander.
    I've only run into him a few times. The first occasion was several years ago at a diversity training session. We all had to wear nametags and Commander Brian actually wrote "Commander Brian" on his nametag. Assuming it was some sort of joke, I asked some uptown types what the story was. It was explained to me that he was part of some coven of Trek fanboys that met regularly, held "ranks" in whatever passes for the space navy of the Trek world, and so on.
    The Commander was a thin man, considerably shorter than I am. Shoulder length, straight dirty blond hair. Blond mustache. Rectangular wire frame glasses. When I met him, he was wearing black jeans, a t-shirt with a painting of a wolf's head on the front, and white tennis shoes. He was laid back, talked in a slow drawl that was idiosyncratic and not, I think, a product of geographic origins.
    (I've since tried to explain the impression on gets on meeting Commander Brian and phrases like "boogie van with a copy of a Frank Frazetta painting airbrushed on the side" come up. If I picked a musical motif for the characters in my diary, a section of Foghat's "Slow Ride" would play over your computer every time Commander Brian showed up.)

    Anyway, after talking to a receptionist and working through two insulating layers of mid-level bureobstruction, I got the Commander on the phone.

    I explained the situation.
    "Yeah, we're not paying them."
    "Why? Did they fuck up or something?"
    "Naw. They're fine."
    "What's the problem?"
    "November and December are the last two months of the year."
    I paused to consider this. This was, as far as I know, true.
    "Granted. Are we both in the same conversation?"
    "They're not getting paid because November and December are the last two months of the year."
    "We're kind of in the same conversation. Help me out, Commander. I'm not making the connection."
    "Bro, we never pay anybody in November and December."
    "But I need a messenger."
    "Then use one, man. We've still got money. It isn't like we're broke."
    "But they won't work with us because we don't pay anybody."
    "No, that's wrong. We pay people. Just not in November or December. They'll get it later."
    "Let me frame this in terms we can all understand. The, um, Intergalactic Super Company will collapse if I can't get this, um, sensitive data packet to, um, the Empire headquarters. To do that, I need a swift and dependable interstellar, um, bike messenger. And for that I need a space check. Is any of this making sense?"
    "You learned nothing about tolerance at diversity training."
    "Very little."
    "Shame."
    "Look, are we going to pay messengers or do I start writing personal checks and then demanding comp?"
    "Don't freak out. We've got a secret account with the messenger service. Just tell them to tap that shit. We never turn the tap off on the secret account."
    He gave me the account number.
    "But only use it for like two weeks. Then the normal account will be back. Think of it as a disposable cell phone."
    "But why?"
    "Because you can't use it after two weeks."
    "No, why as in why this unnecessarily complex system of paying our messengers?"
    "It technical. Accounting stuff."
    "That's very reassuring."