Yeah, I Really Don't...

Setting: Late Afternoon - My co-worker Joy and I are leaving the office together.

Joy: So what have you been working on?

Me: I've been QAing a test in Chinese

Joy: Oh, I didn't know you spoke Chinese.

Me: Yeah, I don't. At all.

Joy: (Laughing) How's that going then?

Me: Slowly. Very Slowly.

So - yeah - I started giving the Chinese characters names in my head as I was checking to make sure they were the same ones used in a different files. That was really the only way I could figure to actually ensure they were the same; rather than just seeing squiggly lines everywhere. So here's my list of character names I used most frequently:

House on a Triangle

Up Arrow (indeed, an arrow pointing upward)

Wonky 7 (as if someone tried to bend it out of shape)

Double Pitchfork (one on top of the other)

Ladder (skinny and fat varieties)

4-Square (As in the schoolyard game)

Swoopy

Box inside a Box

Squishy

Messed up E

Fancy M

Mirrored F (and Mirrored Upside Down F)

Hangman (as in the classroom game)

Two Snakes Dancing

Ski Lift (one of the fancy enclosed ones that probably only exist in, like, James Bond movies)

Squiggly (closely related to Squishy and Swoopy)

Shuttle Launch (because it looks like a NASA launch)

Telephone Pole

Shiny 3 (it's a special one as, you are no doubt aware, it's hard for a character to be "shiny")

Jet Plane

Cross Stitching

Pyramid Scheme

Feather Duster (this could have also been a bug with lots of legs but I went with the less gross option)

Warrior 1 (as in the yoga pose)

Birthday Cake (with candle)

Man in a Box (like if a mime actually was trapped)

Imperial Palace

Roasted Marshmallow

Flow Chart (similar to Pyramid Scheme, only more symmetrical)

Skirt & Legs

Man in Hat

Squished Robot

Vitruvian Man

Smooshy

X in a Box

Squid Guy

and...

Optimus Prime

That really doesn't have any thing to do with the picture I'm posting - I just wanted to share my ignorance. Any day now Steve is going to make me take down the Christmas decorations and I'm going to be very sad. If it were up to me, we'd keep them up all year long. I love them, especially the lights. But Steve's a "traditionalist" or something so he insists we take them down well before my birthday rolls around at the end of the month. Crazy, that boy. Anyway, last year we got a new topper for our tree that is really pretty awesome. It has little stars punched into it with a little light inside that throws these little bursts of light onto the ceiling and, uh, I just love it. I stare at it constantly, I can't get enough of it. I just think it's so cool.