Faustian Bargains And Meetings From Hell

Yesterday I wanted to kill a little girl devil, and today I wanted to make a deal with the devil(faustian bargain) just to get me out of the longest, stupidest meeting ever to be held.  I was already in hell, so I figured trading my soul for a way out of the meeting wouldn't really matter.  I had nothing to lose!

I just lost 2.5 hours of my life - that I will never get back - listening to the two biggest egos I have ever seen fight for control of a meeting that was done 30 minutes in.  Literally... everything that needed to be said was said in the first 30 minutes.  The next two hours was just two narcissistic assholes trying to seem like they were smarter, more important, and better than the other one.

I am so thankful that this meeting was with a vendor and not with a client!  After the first 30 minutes I think I said two words, and the vendor said maybe 10.  It was so ridiculous it could be an SNL skit, where two guys just try to one-up each other for 2 hours about totally off-topic things while everyone else just looks on.  Except that there was nothing funny about it.

I wanted to just tell them, in an effort to speed this thing along, could they both just stand up, drop trow, and lay their junk on the conference table so that they could compare, settle the matter, and we could all just get on with our lives!  Morons!

So then, the meeting gets over, and within the next 20 minutes BOTH of them pull me aside separately to ask me what the deal was with the other one.  "Do you think it's just insecurity that makes him try to prove how smart he is?"  "Didn't you agree with me?"  "Wasn't the point I was trying to make obvious?"  

I would have told them both to shut the hell up and never act like that again, but they both  kinda outrank me.  One was the President/CEO and the other was the VP/General Manager.  So I just zipped my trap.  But I do think I am going to recommend them both for Assification.

I am glad that I am secure enough in my own intelligence and importance that I don't need to go around trying to prove it to everyone.  Although I'm sure Mrs.  Stickman would disagree!  She always calls me a know-it-all.  I tell her I can't help it that I am so smart and have a high knowledge retention level.  And she says, "see".

I once read a book called The Know-It-All, thinking that someone had written it about me.  I was mildly disappointed to find out it wasn't about me, but I still enjoyed the book.  It was about a guy that decided to read every volume of the encyclopedia from cover to cover.  I recommend it.

I'm so glad it's Friday and I have a whole weekend of drinking ahead of me.  That's the only thought that carried me through that meeting.  I can't wait!  Stickman out!