I am a dumbhead on a couple of fronts as well. One, I cut my pinky open while washing last nights dinner pans. Two, I thought that for the past week no one loved me, but I had just forgotten to toss the stats code into my new layout.

Luke is really pissed off at work and considering taking some more vacation soon. Apparently, they�ve been shifting poor Rita around a lot. Last I heard she had been banished from working in the caf� because people were complaining about her and she was supposed to be �dusting�. She really enjoys helping Luke strip magazines, too, but they�re not even allowing her to do that anymore, telling her that she should clean the stairs. Both she and everyone else in a non-managerial position know that she�s being dicked around. She was a chemical engineer in Russia before coming here, for cripes sake; she�s got more than enough brain to know when she�s getting the shaft. This woman has lived through so much and is really a sweet woman. She�s so friendly and talkative, just like your own personal Russian grandma. Luke (and all his coworkers) thinks that if they don�t want her doing actual work, they should just fire her. It�s hugely unfair to make her do work that she knows doesn�t need doing in some pathetic attempt to be nice. Luke said he was thisclose to telling the managers that they�re being assholes (in gentler language), but he doesn�t feel he has enough clout to do it alone. I told him to rally his coworkers who he knows feel the same and have them all confront the management. He often chimes in saying, �Oh, I could use Rita�s help with [insert duty here].� But they never allow her to do anything worthwhile. He�s got 10 days this year, so I told him to take some of them in the coming months, knowing that the one week he took recently just wasn�t enough to refresh him.

I�m trying really hard to think of things to do for Valentine�s Day, but after last year�s extravaganza, I�m all tapped out. I think we may just do dinner the day after or something, since he has to work. I already put some stuff into the Isthmus� Book of Love, a first for me, so I don�t know.

It�s absurdly cold out again today, so I�m not even considering stepping outside. I�m having a hard enough time staying warm inside. At least I have a tasty dinner of tuna melt sandwich and potato product to look forward to. The whole cooking for ourselves thing is working out just fine, I think. M isn�t complaining, even if she is leaving the pans out for us to wash. But, I think that such a thing is only fair. Just as she shouldn�t make me wash their crappy food pans (she does still), she shouldn�t be made to wash mine.