Lauren Wu dot com

Yes, I realize that 1-800-LAUREN-WU is an 8-digit number. No, I don't own it and I've never tried dialing it either. But if you're into vanity numbers, here is some information I found from the Wall Street Journal you may find helpful:

• Web sites like telcodata.us or fonefinder.net will let you find, for example, that numbers starting 917-2255 (i.e., 917-CALL) were allotted to AT&T Wireless Services, which is now owned by Cingular Wireless.
• Some carriers, including Cingular, Verizon and SBC, actively try to accommodate vanity number requests. Some carriers offer the service free; others charge.
• Calculators like phonespell.org and dialabc.com tell what words your existing phone number spells.

The last time I posted was not days, weeks, but MONTHS ago. I have a lot of catching up to do. I'll start with something that Ingo sent me:

• Blamestorming: Sitting around in a group, discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed, and who was responsible.
• Seagull Manager: A manager, who flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps on everything, and then leaves.
• Assmosis: The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss rather than working hard.
• Salmon Day: The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream only to get screwed and die in the end.
• Cube Farm: An office filled with cubicles.
• Prairie Dogging: When someone yells or drops something loudly in a cube farm, and people's heads pop up over the walls to see what's going on.
• Crop Dusting: Surreptitiously farting while passing thru a cube farm and then enjoying the sounds of dismay and disgust.
• Mouse Potato: The on-line, wired generation's answer to the couch potato.
• Sitcoms: Single Income, Two Children, Oppressive Mortgage. What yuppies turn into when they have children and one of them stops working to stay home with the kids.
• Stress Puppy: A person who seems to thrive on being stressed out and whiney.
• Swipeout: An ATM or credit card that has been rendered useless because the magnetic strip is worn away from extensive use.
• Irritainment: Entertainment and media spectacles that are annoying but you find yourself unable to stop watching them. The O.J. trials were a prime example.
• Percussive Maintenance: The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again.
• Ohnosecond: That minuscule fraction of time in which you realize that you've just made a BIG mistake