That’s right, peanut butter and tomato sandwiches. I used to think everyone ate them, but as I got older I realized my family was the only one who made them. Well if you’ve got the moxy to try one, I highly recommend it. The secret is you have to use whole wheat bread, doesn’t taste right on white bread. Next you must, and I can’t stress this enough, use locally grown in season heirloom tomatoes. It must be deep red, still warm, and almost ready to burst. A hothouse tomato will just ruin the experience. The peanut butter can vary to your taste, but my favorite is Wampler’s Peanut Butter which is made in Manheim, PA and sold at Rhubarb’s Market. The Wamp will beat the snot out of whatever sorry excuse you’re using for peanut butter, it’s that good. Butter both slices and try, if you can to get as much tomato in the sandwich as possible. Then serve with a side of Martin’s kettle cooked potato chips and you have what I ate for lunch almost every day of my childhood from late July to September. Local tomatoes are the awesome, and to not enjoy them when they’re in season should be a crime. Happy Eating.
So today was National SysAdmin’s Day. I was surprised to be greeted by a shower of cards and gifts. I didn’t get anything done today because I kept having to sign off on flower deliveries from the FTD guy. I don’t know what I’m going to do with all of these floral bouquets. Maybe I’ll donate them to the local funeral parlor or nursing home. The best part of today is when everyone chipped in to take me to Morimoto’s for lunch. Man do they make a mean tuna tartare!
Okay, it didn’t really happen like that.
Actually nothing happened, and I’m not complaining. I don’t think I should get any special recognition for doing my job other than getting paid. However I think generally workplaces don’t realize how they’d grind to a halt if IT weren’t keeping everything going. I think Secretary’s Day was an acknowledgement decades ago of how important secretaries were in keeping everything running. You know everything your computer does now? Well secretaries used to do most of that. Filing, dictation, correspondance, etc. Well very fewer and fewer organizations use secretaries anymore. Almost everyone does their own filing and typing now, and so they should. But the IT infrastructure is what makes all that happen, and yes, I wish people would appreciate that a little more than they do.
Do I think I deserve cake and flowers next year? Of course not. Do I think we should stop celebrating Secretary’s Day? Actually I kinda do, but that’s another blog post. I do however wish people would stop taking IT for granted. So next year you can help me celebrate SysAdmin’s Day by easing up on the feature creep, and maybe letting my deadlines slip a day or two, that would be thanks enough.