The Junkie Monkey is Back

Matt has worked for three different Agencies during our years in Maryland.

The second Agency has posts all over the world and as such, Matt was expected to carry a blackberry at all times, day and night, incase something happened in Zimbabwe that needed his immediate attention.

*It NEVER did.*

He kept the blackberry by the bedside for the first month or so. The thing would inevitably start buzzing at 3am, not because there was a crisis, but because someone in China decided to send an email. You can’t really be mad at the schmuck in China, it was work related and it was broad daylight there, but I could be mad at Matt for keeping the thing 2 feet from his head and not getting any sleep. So the blackberry was banished to kitchen.

Like most work-a-holics, the crackberry really is just that. He can’t help himself. He hears the siren song of the buzz and is drawn. It is actually better when it buzzes, instead of being rendered completely silent, because in silence comes paranoia. What if? What if?!! So he checks it every 5 minutes.

Any you know what? There is ALWAYS a freaking email. I can go all day without a single email. Matt can’t seem to go 2 minutes without one.

Anyway, when he left that agency, he turned in the blackberry. I was thrilled. He hand withdrawal shakes for awhile.

At his now job, they have decided to feed the addict. The crackberry is back.

Matt told me that a few of the guys he regularly has lunch with have a nickname for him, ‘Meetings’. I know, it is far from clever, but it really is quite accurate. His office quickly recognized that he is smarter than the average bear and much, much smarter than the typical government employee, so he was assigned special projects. Which lead to more special projects. Which has led to multiple meetings daily. Which has lead to some fairly high level meeting and projects. Meeting and projects that will soon affect the daily lives of the American taxpayer. Which has lead to invitations for him to speak at conferences.

Which has led to this…. the crackberry.

It was determined that since his brilliant mind is away from the office so much, they wanted to still be in touch with him and presented Matt with a shiny, still in the box new blackberry.

Super.

The one plus to it though, is that it has internet. Matt pulled up Google for me without hesitation to show off his new toy. If he can pull up Google though, that means accessing my Google Reader isn’t that much of a stretch. And if the Reader is ok, Blogspot is a Google creation…. So maybe you will be getting up to date reports from our Outer Banks vacation next week.