Like a Phoenix...

Hey,

So, the real Stan has moved on past my jurisdiction. The latest thing I know is that he opened his big mouth for a magazine and talked about how amazing his major is for getting him a job he "didn't fit into" (or deserve, but the article didn't mention that...neither did he)...granted, that industry loves ChemE's...so...technically, not a big surprise...oh wait...you say you're in the paper and pulp industry? Stan, you're oh so wrong again! You're in consumer products.

Nevertheless, his reign of terror has momentarily ended. But...can Stan ever truly...move on? There will always be a Stan. None will ever surpass the original (I pray), but I think I have found a decent enough substitute for now. He has chosen, through his actions, attitude, and asshole-ishness (at times) to take up the sacred mantle, and his stories shall be told here.

Stan I: 2006-2009.

Stan II: 2009-

1. Stan II shares a few attributes with his forebear...interrupting conversations, stuck-up "I'm better than you" attitude, lack of social skills...not to the same extremes, but he adds one more dimension: whining. S2 whines about every possible disturbance in his life. And based off his reactions, if something slightly bad happens to him, it becomes the worst thing to happen to anyone ever.

2. S2 asked me to help me move his stuff into his room. I said sure, but I wouldn't be back for an hour. He said he'd wait. So, I get back to the dorm and call him up. In an hour, he had managed to find a cart to move all of his stuff. Great, I think, all the stuff will move faster. Then he opens his car.

All of his stuff is in small boxes and none of them are heavy. He waited an hour for me to help him move stuff he could have easily moved by himself within that same time period...it took us like 20-25 minutes to move it all.

Then, he talked on the phone while I unloaded his stuff from the car. He also insisted on showing me everything and anything he found interesting in his pile of stuff.

S2, how could a machete be useful in a dorm. Fer srs. Why did you bring a space heater with you if you're specifically prohibited from bringing them? Why on earth do you have so much stuff to fit in a 10x15 DOUBLE?

3. S2 insists on not taking notes in some of our classes...then he gets surprised when he doesn't know a technique we learned in class. He also got upset when he missed a TA office hour...because he arranged for a meeting with a professor at the same time.

4. S2 is extraordinarily condescending in tone when you ask him for help...even though he is one of only a few ChemE's who can't extract data from a steam table or who have never seen a Mollier diagram.

5. S2 learned thermodynamics from the professor who wrote the book we're getting example problems from. As expected, he has a big head about it. Surprisingly, he never understands the problems we do from the book...even though he has a copy of the book...and has surely done all of them before.

6. S2 has a girlfriend...that he yells at when she asks him for help on questions and she doesn't get it after a poor explanation.

OH

7. I've had several discussions with S2 on how to do some of our homework problems. Several times, we disagree on something...and he always insists he is right...even when I prove him wrong. He then claims that we were talking about something different to begin with. Granted, if you rewind the conversations...that's obviously not true.

8. You've taken...what'd you tell me...3 classes of linear algebra? How do you NOT know that the complex conjugate of a real, symmetric matrix (Hermitian) is its transpose? It's on frakking wiki. The professor TOLD US in class.

9. We get it. You're mixed Chinese and German. That does not make you specially diverse. Stop talking and bragging about it.

10. I have a new Macbook Pro. We are all in agreement that it is shiny. However, I do not feel comfortable when you say:

"I like my black Macbook, but every time I look at your computer, I fly into a jealous rage."

Staying Somewhere

1. Stan moved into a manager's apartment on a Friday. Friday before his first day. Which makes sense. However, when his work term ended...

Landlord (manager at work): "Hey, when do you think you're moving out?"
Stan: "Oh...I dunno...Friday...maybe Saturday, maybe Sunday, maybe Monday."

Friday rolled around. He hadn't finished packing. And he lounged around all day after work. Saturday came. He didn't finish packing and kept lounging around. Sunday came...

Landlord: "So, when did you think you were leaving?"
Stan: "Haven't decided yet."
Landlord: "Ok. Get out. Today."

2. Our company has a bare minimum number of weeks that they like summer interns to work. The summer is fairly short, so most people don't stay much longer past the minumum of 10, but Stan wanted to repeat what he did last fall and stay as long as he could. His first week at work, apparently, something like this happened:

HR: "Stan, how long did you want to work?"
Stan: "Well, I started May 19th...and school starts Aug 28th. I can work *I imagine he whipped out his phone calendar* til Aug 22nd."
HR: "COMPANY NAME HERE has a minimum of 10 weeks for summer interns."
Stan: "Oh, that's way beyond 10 weeks. I should be fine."
HR: "We want you to leave after 10 weeks."

3. Stan did end up getting a full time offer for the company. Surprising many people. Supposedly the people here had extremely low expectations for him. And he mighta exceeded them.

4. The managers here are ridiculously upset that he got a full time offer. Like...more upset than I was puzzled. Actually, they're more upset and puzzled..more than...uh...more than Dark Knight had made money.

His Final Presentation

1. He still has shitty powerpoints of all text that he reads off of. This time he didn't even bother like trying to learn what he was gonna say as he stumbled pretty much every slide...even the background slide about himself.

2. He still clicks the clicker (mouse) as if breaking the mouse and making a loud noise every minute will make his presentation better.

3. I was wondering why Stan wanted to only work 10 weeks. Last time, he worked near 20, and 10 is the minimum number of weeks interns are supposed to work. With his start date, it gave him a month of nothing to do. I don't know how true this is, but one of the other interns told me that they called Stan into HR's office and told him that NOMNOMNOMOMGFORGOTANDACTUALLYPUTCOMPANYNAMEHEREFORTHELONGESTTIME wanted him to work the bare minimum 10 weeks and leave.

Updatesville

New (Long) Post!

1. Intern 1: "Where's Intern 3? We're all supposed to be having a meeting!"
Intern 2: "Oh she told me she's not coming, project meeting or something."
Stan: "I'll call her anyway."

True to his word, he was on his phone 5 seconds later.

Stan: "Oh ok. So you're not coming? Ok. Bye. She's not coming guys."

Thanks, Stan, where would we be if you didn't needlessly confirm something we all knew every 5 seconds?

2. Manager: "So we need someone else to drive people to the airport for the trip."
Stan: "I'll drive, I have a Honda CR-V."
*momentary silence*
Stan: "It's got a lot of room."

3. Stan pretty much insisted on driving for the next two days. Then he told everyone how he wouldn't be able to drive anyone back from the airport. At the time, this was a huge problem. 13 people...and up to a carload can't leave? Thanks, Stan, for offering something halfway, really. Thank God we managed to have differing plans for the weekend and we only needed 2 cars to get everyone.

4. Intern X: "Could you give me some advice on picking cameras?"
Me: "Yeah, sure! No problem!"
X: "Uh, not like yours. Like a normal camera." (I give up, we all know who writes this fucking thing.)
Me: "Oh yeah, like a point and shoot then?"
X: "Yes, thinner maybe?"
Me: "Thinner ones usually take crappy photos...I'll look for a decent point and shoot that's not too bulky."
X: "Oh great! Thanks!"
Stan: "You should get one with a massive zoom."
Me: "...Ok...X, do you need a massive zoom? What kind of pictures do you think you're going to take?"
X: "Nothing to special, like normal hanging out ones."
Me: "Ok, so a massive zoom would be totally unnecessary...plus massive zooms make the camera very large."
Stan: "I like my 12x zoom."
Me: "Great."
Stan: "Yeah, I like to take a lot of landscape photos, so I need a huge zoom."
Me: "...uh...for landscape photos....you don't need a huge zoom. In fact, you should generally be looking at a very wide angle lens."
Stan: "Really?"
Me: (let's keep in mind...what I do for a hobby.) ".....Yes."

To be fair, there are times when telephoto (sorry, I couldn't dumb myself down anymore) lenses are good for landscapes. I really don't think Stan knows when it's good.

5. Trip time! I got stuck riding in Stan's car. Again. It was not fun. I probably should've guessed as much when he was telling me how to load stuff into his car. Which was empty.

6. Intern Alpha: "Where are you from anyway, coworker?"
Me: "From near Boston, if you're from the area, I'd say near Braintree."
Alpha: "OH ok, cool, my bf is from there!"
Me: "Oh nice!"
Stan: "I know Braintree!"
Me: "....*knowing he like...never leaves his home state unless he's visiting family...who don't live in my states*...really."
Stan: "Yeah, John Quincy Adams and John Adams were born there!"
Me: "*sigh*....well, technically, Braintree and its neighboring town have traded territories several times, so that's debatable."
Stan: "Oh."

7. Intern X started a discussion about wearing seat belts in the backseat and how she hates it since it's uncomfortable. We all talked in the car about why we wear belts in the backseat. Stan then described why we should wear seatbelts in the front passenger and driver seats for like 5 minutes. Until I was like "dude, get on topic, we're not talking about front seats." Then he got it.

8. Intern X: "I like my Subaru, cuz the Boxer engine gives it a nice low center of gravity."
Stan: "Yeah, I don't have that low center of gravity, my spare tire on the back screws it up."
*awkward silence*
Me: "....dude, I don't think that's really a factor...you drive an SUV, which is raised higher in general, with an I-4 mounted high in the front of the car. Your tire weighs like 40 pounds at most and your engine weighs at least 400-500 pounds."
Stan: "...Oh...I guess. I still think my tire screws with it."
Me: "Whatever helps you sleep at night."

9. Stan tried to have a competition with me about cars and offroad capability. Specifically about skid plates on cars. With me. I drive a fucking Jeep, motherfucker. Yes, I have skid-fucking-plates. No, of course your shitty compact crossover SUV wouldn't have skid plates, it doesn't even have a good engine. Now shut your goddamn mouth until you say something else short-bussy and quotable.

10. HE DRIVES SO BADLY 2 PEOPLE IN THE CAR GOT MOTION SICK. He would like....JERK the wheel 30 degrees to go against a smooth curve in the road. He also doesn't see why you should slowly decelerate to stop signs...

11. Reread number 10.

Did you do that? Good.

Stan: "There are SO many BAD drivers on the road!!!"
Me: (I've gotten so motion sick, I've pretty much lost my internal monologue at this point)"....Wow. I was about to say something very mean."
X: "Yeah, I totally agree."

12. Stan: "We're here! We're at the finish line!"

Stan then tried to give a high five to Intern X. By placing his hand literally in front of her boobs. It was dead quiet in the car for like 10 seconds. Then she moved his hand away...and he punched her flirtingly in the arm.

13. Stan: "Whenever you see me talking to a random person, I probably know them."

You wish Stan. More likely, you're bothering them, especially when you find out you have less than 3 degrees of separation from them.

14. Manager, as we're following the car Stan's in: "I can tell he's in there by the shape of his head."

15. In an elevator with Stan:
Intern South1: "Oh yeah, he's the person I was telling you about."
Intern South2: "Eh?"
IS1: "He's like a plant version of Alex."
IS2: "Oh. I mean, uh, good!"

16. We were walking through the airport when I saw some pretty awesome architecture. I started my previsualization so that I could imagine the shot before I took it. I made this kinda obvious as I slowed my walking down and started looking around.

Stan, after watching me for like 30 seconds, turned to Intern X and said "This architecture looks pretty significant." And whipped his phone out in like 2 seconds before I could even open my bag. Possibly to make it seem like I was copying his shots to the rest of the (very tardy) group.

I try not to see too much of Stan this summer, I feel very uncomfortable around him.

Renew!

More posts!

1. Stan talked constantly about how his 21st birthday was coming up. Mostly to the twins. He then looked up the caloric value of beer and debated drinking since he didn't want a beer belly.

2. Stan told this to some of us:

"Hey, I just had a brilliant idea! You know how they keep complaining that it costs more to make a penny than it's worth? Well why not get some chemical engineers in there and have them make it cheaper? I'm going to be so successful when I'm in the business world."

3. He also said this to people who were not me. Nor were they in earshot of me because I would've ripped him a new one. Especially with a post that comes later!

"I almost saved the company I co-oped for half a million dollars. Too bad they said it was against the rules. Darn patents and stuff."

4. A lot of people were in a small apartment having a party. Like 20 people? With alcohol? On a 93+ degree day.

Girl that Stan has been hitting on pretty much every single time I see them together: "It's really hot in here."
Stan: "It's because I'm here."

5. Same girl as in Number 4 drives a 10 year old beat up Subaru. Stan said it'd be cool to pimp.

6. Stan was wearing the shirt with distillation columns at work and decided to tell everyone else about how much better our major is TO people. And explaining why the shirt was so good.

7. Stan eavesdropped on a conversation about computers and started talking about his work computer and all the programs it has. Which, by extension, are all the programs that EVERYONE has. And if they don't have them? Clicking like 4 links gets them downloaded.

8. Lastly! Remember number 3?

Young Manager 1: "Did Stan cause a Quality Incident last fall?"
Young Manager 2: "I don't think so, since if he did, he would not get invited back this summer."

Stan's former officemate: "Now remember, if you do run anything, say, you run an experiment to test a new kind of glue. Make sure that you put the product on hold or else it becomes a QI and there's all kinds of trouble."
Girl now working in Stan's former department: "Has that ever happened before?"
SFO: "Stan did it last fall."

Remember, as co-ops, companies are legally bound to let us serve 2 terms.

Enjoy!

Long Time, But Was It Worth It?

1. I went to office hours for help on some homework. Naturally, since our homework seems fucking impossible in this specific class, there was a line. I think I was 3rd. Stan was 5th. He wanted to have a conversation with slot number 4.

Stan: "Yeah, so I forget what my file's called, but it's on my flash drive."
Number 4: "That's great."
Stan: *takes out flash drive with as much flair as he can...while it's attached to a neck lanyard and like 6 keys* "On my flash drive that's right here."

For some reason, he still believes that conversations are only him talking. He continued by...narrating...his phone call list...like who he called, who called him, etc. Then he described the virtues of his standard flash drive and the wonders of the flash drive market.

2. I went to the computer lab to try to print some stuff. All the computers were taken and I knew I'd only be around for like 20 seconds. I saw one computer that was unoccupied, but someone had logged in on it. There was also no screensaver or lock or anything, so the person probably just went up to the bathroom. The person sitting right next to the computer was, unfortunately, Stan. I was in a rush and asked him about the computer.

Me: "Who was using this computer?"
Stan: "That was.........................someone who was just using that recently, he was just here."
Me: *under breath* ".....fucking useless." *Proceeds to use computer and print*

3. From someone older and more experienced with Stan:
"In the middle of your exam, Stan started cracking up for no reason. First, I thought he mighta been losing it or something. When I graded his exam, I realized that he was indeed laughing. The part of the exam where your professor wrote that another professor was a master on the subject? Yeah, he wrote out 'LOL.' There was also a diagram that was designed to help us solve a question. Some of us didn't use it. Stan was also one of those people. He wrote: 'I didn't know how to use this diagram.' And then drew a foot in mouth smiley face all over the page."

4. There are two twins that are classmates of ours. That one sentence, btw, has probably done more to give away the secrecy of this blog than anything else. Anyway, apparently Stan told one of them "You know, you're sister's a lot smarter than you are." That's a rumor. Supposedly, he kept talking to them and eventually one of them just said "SHUT UP YOU ARE SO OBNOXIOUS." Also, a rumor?

What isn't a rumor?

Me: "So...how do you two feel about him anyway?"
Twin 1: ".....We think he's really obnoxious....and offensive...so we just do the same thing back to him whenever we talk to him."
Me: "I see. Listen, take these cards. Go there when you're bored."

Fuck. I had more notes, but they're not showing up in my notepad. This update was kinda disappointing for me, actually.

OMG UPDATE WTF BBQ

GOTCHA!!!!

No seriously, maybe this weekend. Just pretend this is a late April Fools' Day joke.