I just got home from Milwaukee. Again. (Was there last weekend for my bday.) Big boss chartered a bus and various newsroom types and their SO's went to the Brewers game today.

We left this big honkin' parking lot in the middle of Eau Claire at 7 a.m. I got there about 6:45, stowed my lawn chair and took a seat on the bus.

At 7:55, Chris (jerk officemate) pulled in. There is an open seat next to me. He smiles weakly and walks on by.

It's a 4-hour drive; we got there in time to fire up the grill and do that good old-fashioned Wisconsin tradition, tailgating. I spent my time talking to our ex copy desk chief, who is from South Milwaukee (the last town I covered), and to the new guy, who I hadn't met before. He just started maybe a month ago. He brews his own beer, brought a cooler full, and was willing to share, which was lovely. :-D (With all due respect to the Miller family multibillion dollar fortune, they brew really crappy beer -- but oddly enough, it's all you can get at Miller Park. Whoda
guessed? )

Chris went and sat with Christena, who kindly tried to befriend me my first week and still doesn't seem to think ill of me. He pulled up a chair with his back to me. Christena tried to be friendly and wave me over to join them, but I figured that probably wasn't a plan.

From 7 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., he didn't say a word to me and made it plain he wasn't interested in doing so. If it were possible for him to do so, he would canonize the girl I replaced (she moved to the main office), and the fact that I am not her causes me to be lower than dirt, as far as I can tell. He talks smack about me to her behind my back and doesn't think I know (c'mon -- what kind of reporter would that make me?) but is too much of a sniveling coward to say anything to my face. After this, I smell open warfare on the horizon. You guys got any ideas??

Brad (the new guy with the great beer) asked if I was OK because I was being so quiet. I said something noncommital because my boss was sitting in front of me and I couldn't very well say, "I'm homesick as bloody h*ll and about to burst into tears and I want my apartment and my friends and my home and not to get on the stupid bus to a place that stresses me out beyond belief." But, didn't seem like a good thing for the guy who hired me to overhear.



Candy