Do you have the baculum?

"Do you have the baculum?" and other assorted things I never thought I'd hear.

The setting: I was relaying my excitement at finally getting a package from my husband that was several days overdue to my boss. He looks dead at me and goes, "Do you have the baculum?" That was my boss's response to me saying, "Yay! The post office finally had my parcel today!" Blink. Blink. Now, those of you that have been following this blog have learned that 'baculum' is the technical term for a penis bone. In this case, we'd be referring to polar bear penis bone. So, yeah, I was a more than a little confused. To alleviate the confusion, my boss then repeats the exact same question, just louder and slower, as if I did not hear him ask if I had the baculum. Blink. Blink. Blink. My mind is racing to try and make polar bear penis bone and "yay, mail!" somehow fit together. What do these two things have in common? It's like I'm on a game show trying to figure out the common thread. My brain is failing me. I wonder if my boss is being really weird and somehow asking if my husband has included some sort of penis thing in my "package". I nixed that idea--I wasn't willing to go there and even ask if that's what he was talking about. Was someone shipping us baculums? Why would they do that; our polar bear samples come frozen by air...not in general mail with your electric bill and Zulily magazine----you know, polar bear penis meat isn't exactly great to send through snail mail. Everyone loses in that scenario. Finally, when none of my mental confabulations could construct anything remotely sensical, I gave up and said, "What in the ever loving world are you talking about penis bones?!!?" To which he replies, "I guess you don't have the baculum." lololol. Now the situation was just silly. "Nope, no I do not have the baculum. Care to enlighten me?" He then goes on to explain (as if this should have been stunningly obvious) that our work's post office box key is attached to a baculum. You know, so we don't lose it. Kinda like restaurants putting cute flowers on their pens to dissuade accidental (or purposeful) theft. We, apparently, attach penis bones to things we don't want to disappear.

About one to two weeks ago, it was frigid. I know, I know, it's always frigid. But, this was the coldest it's been all year. Real cold. Real windchill. So, I felt as if I had enough, shall we say, "arctic" on my plate. Then, as if things could not be any more inhospitable, our office manager comes in and delivers a warning: "Be careful walking home. There are reports of rabid dogs in town." And she walks out. That's it. As I sit there, mouth still gaping, I switch from shock to hilarity. Of COURSE, there'd be rabid dogs. I mean, why not? Why wouldn't there be?? I mean, life is just too cushy and easy here anyways. We need a little excitement to top up the day. What better way than throw in a pack of rabid dogs in the mix??!! It's not enough to have to endure the extreme cold. Noooooo, we gotta make it actually tough by adding in "avoid rabid dogs". When 5 pm rolled around, I put on all my gear, and because it was so cold, I had to have my hood up and pulled forward to protect from the wind. For those of you that have not been in an Arctic parka, the hood, fully on and pulled up, creates a tunnel of vision that allows a field of view of approximately 37.8 degrees (I made that up). The point is, you can't see shit. Not the person standing next to you, not the person standing slightly in front of you. You can't hear either. So you damn sure can't see a "friendly" rabid dog racing up to bite your ass. And, it's not like you can carry a stick for defense cause there are NO trees----yep, just like we learned about the tundra. I stood outside my work and did a 360 to see what I could see. No dogs. Oh well, gotta get home. Mama is hungry! And off I set, swoosh, swoosh, swooshing in all my ski pant, parka glory. I rationalized that if a dog did, in fact, try to bite me, it wouldn't get through the outerwear....like one of those police dog training suits. I made it safely home and now just keep an eye out for rabid foxes or whatever other creature, like a polar bear, might be wandering about. But hey! --at least the sun's come back so I'll hopefully be able to see the monsters before they get me!

Next story: After a wind storm and power outage, our work servers were fried in Igloolik. We did not have internet, at all, for 4 days. Think about that. A lot of organizing, cleaning, and editing documents got done in those days. And we all feared when the internet would return to bombard us with piled up emails full of crap that we'd been so happily oblivious to for 4 work days. But, the inevitable happened...a server was flown in and a tech flown in and a mere 4 days later, we had internet. The best part is that when I saw the first email envelope ping into my inbox, I ran out into the center atrium area and asked if anyone else had internet. At that moment, someone yelled, "I have internet!" and we all smiled and hurrahed. Before the smiles could even fade, a coworker came out of the bathroom and said, "the toilets aren't working properly." Cue instant smile-fade. I turned to the manager and quipped, "Welp, we got working internet but no toilets. Guess you can't have it all!" and flounced away to my office to hold my pee.

Next story: Today, the guy from housing came back from my house, to my work, to show me what he'd pulled out of my tub drain. I live on the other side of town from work. He drove over to work with that nasty drain ooze in the vehicle. Then, he brought it into my work, walked past everyone's offices to show. me. a. drain. clog. Not in a bag, not in a container. Just out there for all to enjoy. If I had any pride, I'd be embarrassed. However, I just told him, "wow, that's wonderful. No thank you, I do not want to keep it." (he asked if I wanted to keep it).

Every day folks. If seems that every single day something happens or is said that I never thought I'd hear or have to deal with. I am not sure I can go back to working in a place where the internet is fast and reliable, the toilets work, there isn't the constant fear of frostbite and rabid dogs, and people don't randomly ask me about polar bear penis bones.Read more