The Trailing Edge

                          Important announcement to my faithful readers (all four of them): I'm employed again. My last gig was, shall we say, seasonal employment with a company that lots of people get packages from. That was January and since then I've been living on Social Security. There used to be two Social Security recipients in the house, but now there's just me, so extra income was needed. I had a pretty good idea of the type of work I wanted to do, and as of tomorrow, I'll be working for, well, let's call it a big-box store. This is pretty exciting. So, right after I finished the nuts & bolts part of the interview, where they get my consent to run a background check, etc., the man behind the desk said "Okay, so, if you want, we start orientation tomorrow at, oh, let's say 4:00 p.m. That work for you?" Um...yeah... I mean, you tell me, okay dude? Or should I test this and see if Orientation Dude feels like wait...

Anyone who has read a blog or a Facebook post has probably seen the word "Welp." There are still a few people who don't know what it means, so let me expound. First things first: The word is not "whelp." Whelp refers to birthing puppies. This generally has nothing to do with puppies, unless your intent is to post the following announcement: "Whelp, the neighbor's unspayed dog just gave birth to another litter of puppies under our porch." In that case, I suppose "whelp" would get a pass. But it's actually "Welp." Great, so what does it mean? Let's start with an example of a conversation with some words nearly everyone is familiar with. You: Are you going back to work today? Me:  No . Contrast that with: You:   Are you going back to work today? Me:    Nope . "No," in the first instance, could possibly be interpreted as "No, I'm sorry, I know you'd like me to but I'd really prefer not to, and I...