Tomorrow afternoon I get to give the first of five presentations on Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards. The presentation is as exciting as you might expect, but with a few extras thrown in to amuse myself:

• 1 transformers reference
• a picture of Devastator with “PCI DSS” photoshopped across his robo-knuckles
• Two Star Trek references; one TOS and one TNG
• Pictures of Vault Boy on almost every slide
• Referring to our PCI team as dashingly handsome throughout the presentation
• A line about the Wheel of Time for some reason

..  the entire thing is about as irreverent as I could get it; it’s not nearly as serious as it probably should be.

Also, our scary new CEO will be sitting in on the presentation. And I spent money on Oreos to keep people awake.

This can only be COMPLETELY AWESOME and not at all a terrible career move.

me devastator, me certified by the payment card industry security standards council

The Whistler trip is done, and I promised myself I would wait until at least this long before I started packing for London. I know we don’t leave for 25 more sleeps, but I’m a worrier – what if I forget underwear? What if I accidentally pack pants? What if I get a dozen new most favourite ever articles of clothing that I want to take with me? These are all very real concerns of mine, which is why I pack ridiculously early and then repack seven more times before we actually leave. I like packing, okay. It comes in handy when you have a natural tendency to run away at the first sign of not-your-way but you also have a lot of awesome things that must come with you.

I am scheming. I want to do a serious hardcore purge of my closet, and I know I’ve got more than a few things that would be better off with friends – hell, I’ve even got half my wardrobe allotted out to other people because they’d look better in it than I ever would. I’m thinking about having a “by donation” night, where people come over and paw through my unmentionables and give me a few bucks for whatever they take. I’ve already given away so much to people, but I feel bad about charging for things .. so this would work well, actually. Hey, people I know: what are you doing next week, say .. Tuesday? Come to my place and take my dresses, bags and shoes. Not all of them, but some. More than some. Lots. I have too much goddamn stuff.

I am feeling so much better than I did last week. It is a treat to not feel like a pile of ass!

gondola: scary as hell