At 2:30 this morning, our carbon-dioxide detector started beeping. Nothing was wrong — the reading was still 0 — but the battery was starting to die. I got up, walked downstairs and replaced the batteries.

If only I could have gotten back to sleep.

Grr.

On the plus side, I got to catch up on my email, watch an episode of Firefly and walk on the treadmill. All before 5:00am. So productive!

We’re spending the weekend in fall-cleaning mode. The air conditioners come out of the windows and the down comforter comes down from the attic.

If only it weren’t 85 degrees right now….

If you put a frog in cold water and then start heating it up, the frog will jump out when it gets uncomfortable.

Let a million “enlightening” anecdotes get cut from bad presentations. Hallelujah.

We were a little confused when Ed Helms’ character disappeared without a trace from The Office. It actually got to the point where we were wondering if we’d missed an episode. So, where’s Andy?

That’s the question fans of NBC’s “The Office” have been asking ever since the Jan. 18 episode, titled “The Return,” when new Dunder-Mifflin Scranton employee Andy Bernard (Ed Helms) punched a hole in a wall in a fit of rage. He excused himself and hasn’t appeared since.

Turns out the answer to that mystery lies within “The Return” itself — or, rather, in an extended producer’s cut that was made available on NBC’s Web site and through Apple’s iTunes store. An added scene at the end explained that Andy was ordered to attend anger management classes.

We had a little bit of this with Lost, too, over the past few months. If I’m watching a TV show, I don’t want to have to discover critical pieces of information by hunting around on the web. I’m way too lazy for that.

(via our Viewer Discretion TV blog)

Technorati Tags: The Office, Ed Helms, Television

The last 36 hours have been Hell. I was on my back all day yesterday with all sorts of Pepto symptoms. Today I made it through a half-day of work before having to head home. Ugh.

At least it’s not just me. We’re reporting that hundreds of people are visiting emergency rooms with gastric distress.

About 800 people showed up in ERs complaining of gastrointestinal woes the week of Feb. 3 as well as the week of Feb. 10, according to the system, run by the Boston Public Health Commission. A similar wave of suffering appears to be sweeping the city this week. That’s more than double the number of patients seen, for example, the week of Dec. 9.

You know the panel discussion on the stage is annoying when *every single person* (including me) in my row has whipped out their Blackberry or Treo.

Memo: FAST: Don’t have your guys on the stage talk with infomercial patter.

“Nothing like getting your ass kicked to make your ass hurt.”

Have I mentioned how much I love living in launch mode?

The baby woke up at 4am. I am not a fan of daylight-savings transition days.

Unplanned doctor’s appointments, managing work crises with a screaming baby, satellite installers who don’t show up, furnace breaking, NSTAR repairmen who don’t show up, and finally, Sadie’s first exciting trip to the emergency room.

I’m actually glad it’s Monday.

I often say how proud I am to work for the Boston Globe, especially when they pull off investigative reporting like the current series on debt-collection abuses in Massachusetts.

You should go and read the series. The blatant abuse of our courts and our less-fortunate citizens is appalling.

Technorati Tags: Massachusetts, Debt, Courts

This morning’s Globe picks up on the nightmare that has been the commuter rail for the past few weeks.

Customer complaints have risen as on-time service has declined, with 533 complaints in May, 654 in June, and 900 so far in July.

“Overall, it’s the inconsistency that’s really frustrating,” said Joe Fischer, 44, a commuter from Sharon who rides the Worcester-Framingham line to work. “Sometimes the service is spot on and the conductors are doing their jobs, and other times it’s not.”

Family responsibilities require me to drive in each day — the daycare doesn’t buy “the train was late” as an excuse for picking up the baby after closing time — but A. takes the commuter rail from Ashland. It has not been fun.

The Worcester line’s performance has drivin us mad the past couple of weeks. Sometimes it’s on-time. Sometimes an hour late. Always, the riders are kept in an information black hole, pining for updates about when they will actually get home, forced to wait and conjecture, only able to unleash their boiling rage through colorful text messages to loved ones. Sometimes several messages over the course of a few minutes.

I hope the Commuter Rail powers-that-be get their act together soon. I want to be the type of person who takes public transportation to work, but that’s not an option right now. And, God help us when we hit $5/gallon gas.

Boy, it sucks to work on Congress Street and drive in from the west these days.

They’ve closed another section of the Big Dig this morning, and all the traffic on from the Mass Pike is flowing onto the surface streets all around us. I’m not looking forward to trying to find a way onto the Pike this afternoon when I have to go home.

You know what, I can handle the graft, the guanxi, the payoffs and bribes, but if you’re going to be corrupt, at least try to be competent.

So much for a picking a real — yet reasonably rare — name in the hope that Sadie would be able to be the only one in her class.

Last weekend, a Sadie showed up in the gym’s babysitting room. Yesterday, another Sadie showed up at our regular daycare.

Alas. Here’s a fabulous toy to spend a few minutes with, the baby-name voyager.

6/6/6 can’t scare me. This month is already hell.

Sorry for the posting paucity. I’m in a whirlpool of strategy and product planning at work, and, at the same time, someone who shall remain nameless has been awfully fussy the last couple of weeks.

I’m happily awaiting the fourth of July.

My office is on the second floor, facing the alley behind our Congress Street building. Normally, I just get the regular city noise, and it’s not all that bad. I can still concentrate, hold conference calls, get on with my life.

But, this morning, some friendly person has decided he wants to feed bread to all the Fort Point Channel seagulls, and do it right outside my window. For the past fifteen minutes, I’ve been treated to an deafening chorus of gull screeches. What made someone possibly think this would be a good idea for 7:30 in the morning?

Grr.