2004-04-27 - 1:37 p.m.

�Look, is it finished or not?! I don�t want to hear �pretty much�! I want to hear �yes� or �no�!�

This is the guy opposite me in the office, talking into his handset. He appeared some weeks ago. He�s not connected with our team and nobody really knows what he does other than that he�s employed by the company. I think he is employed just to shout things like that down the phone line at quivering employees elsewhere in the building.

He�s a very aggressive person, and it�s hard to keep up my usual air of laconic apathy in the face of the throbbing energy coming from his direction. He has applied aggression to every facet of his life as far as I can see, from his vociferous support of a local sports team to putting the fear of god into any minion that dare operate outside his exacting corporate standards.

His rampant hostility is directed at even mundane tasks that most of us manage to complete without foaming at the mouth or clenching our jaws. For example, he eats an apple as if he�s been personally challenged to gnaw his way out of an enclosed space, and drinks water from his bottle like he�s frenziedly downing shots of flaming sambuca. He even types aggressively, like each of the keys had just mortally offended his blind, crippled mother, and he was dishing out some violent digit-based retribution.

It�s very tiring.

�Look, we�re just about ready to press the button on this and you�re sitting around with your thumb up your arse!�

I wonder of he sits home at night writing these lines. If they come naturally to him, that�s an even more worrying state of affairs. I now have eight more weeks until I leave. I hope I get to see him overheat and explode at some point, revealing the cold steel of his inner workings. A few more �pretty much� replies and I reckon he�ll burst like a water melon, only a water melon that�s been fitted out with a kind of monotonous corporate psychosis and a voice box that only has one setting (Iron Foundry in meltdown) and more torrential testosterone than a rutting silverback gorilla at an arm wrestling contest.

You know, THAT kind of water melon.