By The Numbers

To summarize the past four months of my life:

I permanently withdrew from the graduate program I was slated to begin in January. I applied to 72 jobs: 11 in September, 16 in October, a whopping 39 in November, and just six in December. I was offered 10 interviews and made it to eight. I had four second round interviews. I had one infuriating third round interview. I had one faux job offer which dissolved into nothing when I left a message accepting the position, called five more times that day without success, and finally got through to someone the next morning who gave me an attitude, told me they were “still deciding” and never called back. I met with four staffing agencies. Two of them laid off my original recruiter. None of them were able to find work for me in a span of almost four months. So, you see, it’s been a rocky third of a year.

And absolutely none of it matters now because I was offered a job this past Friday (this time with legitimate paperwork!) which I gleefully accepted. I’ve learned an important lesson, which I think my father was right in saying that I’m lucky to have learned at this age when I have so few financial obligations. But even in my euphoric state last Friday, I had one last lingering concern. I worried that this phase changed me as a person, made me a somber, antisocial downer unable to even write a funny blog anymore. So I did the only thing I could to test the waters: I got invited a dozen of my friends over for a Christmas party, got shit faced drunk, spilled a rumndietcoke down the front of my shirt, and needed a team of people to help me overcome the hiccups.

I'M BACK BITCHES! AHAHAHA!

Close Only Counts In Horseshoes & Hand Grenades

I just… I don’t even know where to start. I have spent the past five days trying to decide where to start. I’ve started and then stopped and erased everything because it was not to my liking. I take my blogging very seriously. In short, some things happened on the trip and those things were surrounded by a lot of…. quiet. I don’t know if those events were actually eventful or just seemed eventful because they were not, in fact, cornfields. So, before another week goes by and my relations in New Jersey get their collective panties in a twist over the lack of posting, I’m going to go ahead and just start at the beginning. If you don’t mind.
Our wagon ride occurred mostly without incident which goes against everything I know about the Oregon Trail. There was no typhoid or blocked mountain passes or bear hunting (not yet anyway… that’s foreshadowing, folks. You gotta pay attention to my foreshadowing. T, are you paying attention??) We managed to fit almost every one of our worldly belongings in the barely-existent trunk of an Audi TT. Then we drove five hours west with four pit stops because seriously, at any minute we were about to fall off the face of the earth and I was reluctant to pee on a farmer’s front yard. Also, Beau needed tater tots in Troy, NY.

Finally, we approached our destination in West Bumble. We zoomed past the farmstead (going entirely too fast, eh hem) where Bologna was standing outside frantically waving her arms. That made me start flapping my own arms and squawking. Beau, probably because he was going entirely too fast, was one step ahead of me and was already turning around in the driveway of someone who might have run out of their home with a shotgun. Instead of an angry yokel, we next encountered a loose cow that proceeded to race the convertible for a short distance. It’s as if we went to the zoo and found a tiger walking around outside its enclosure. These things aren’t supposed to happen. Tigers are supposed to stay in their cages, and cows are supposed to stay inside their fenced pastures.

We spent the remainder of the day wandering around cornfields, taking pictures of deer poop, and getting acquainted with the holiday’s cast of characters. In addition to the family, we met two cats, Sweet and Pooh, so named for their individual temperaments. Sweet was particularly awesome. She’s twenty years old and noticeably blind. When she looks at you, it’s like she’s looking through you directly into your soul and reading your inner most thoughts. Then she would go and wreck my theory of feline wisdom by walking into walls and meowing peevishly at them as if it was the wall’s fault. According to Mr. T (T, that is your dad’s official blog name. I just wrote it with the intention of circling back and writing something more clever, but then I was all, “Mr. T?! YES.” These things just come to me) Sweet still goes outside and hunts. AND ACTUALLY KILLS STUFF. So, yeah, she may be a little clumsy and we may have found her standing in a toilet one night, but it’s all a part of the cosmic feline wisdom that I detected in her spacey stare.

Thanksgiving morning, before I woke up, the menfolk (T [Hi T!], his dad, my dad, and my Beau) went into the woods with guns and tried to kill things. Real guns. With like, real bullets. My boyfriend and my father with his iffy hearing and his poor eyesight went deep into a secluded forest, somewhere south of the Adirondacks, with loaded guns and little supervision. But happy times! They all came back alive and empty handed. Apparently, a few shots were fired but, as Mr. T told us, “close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.” They should have brought Sweet with them. She would have felled a buck with telekinesis and plaintive mewing.

We rounded out our visit to the middle of nowhere with a trip to the closest town which was a thirty minute drive through the woods and fields and farms. And at that, it was still the middle of nowhere. We wandered and visited a used book store and looked at Christmas decorations. All very peaceful, pleasant activities but you don’t want to read about that. You want to read about Beau pitching a hissy fit at a bakery which was really slow in that not-a-Starbucks-in-Boston way so we left before he got a cookie and complained about it until we got him a beer at a dive bar on the edge of town instead where he nearly got us all shot by loudly announcing that “those guys really suck at darts.”

That night we had an Oregon Trail style send off. Mr. T made us a bonfire in the backyard and sharpened sticks so we could roast cocktail wieners and marshmallows. We were having a merry ol’ time setting things on fire and stuffing our faces, when a mile down the road, the dogs at a neighboring farm began barking. Hysterically. The T’s all looked at each other and were quiet for a moment before forcefully starting conversation again. I was not so easily fooled so I asked what all the racket was about. They told me it was nothing to worry about. The dogs probably just smelled… something. Something? Yes, something. Like a coyote. Nothing to worry about.

I’d already been worrying about that for days. Ever since Mr. T said that the coyotes were originally introduced into the area in order to keep the deer population at bay, but they weren’t big and mean with drooly fangs enough, so local officials introduced a coyote/timber wolf cross breed. How is everyone ignoring the wolf part?! That’s like ignoring the part of me that’s Polish. Yeah, I’m mostly Italian, but that doesn’t cancel out all the Polish qualities. You should see me try to do simple common sense tasks like open a box of frozen chicken nuggets. The Polish is in there, festering, and it makes a difference. Except, generally speaking, those genes don’t make me snatch unsuspecting city folk from camp fires and feed them to my young.

Needless to say, despite attacking a bush with my pointy stick in self defense and nearly soiling myself twice, the predators stayed at bay long enough for us to wrap things up and return to the comfort of the indoors and the protection of Sweet.

Truly, this was a proper Dangerous holiday. I was nearly run down by a cow, pitch forked by angry locals, and eaten by a coyote in the span of 72 hours. Oh, and my dad almost shot my boyfriend which would have been a particular inconvenience because there was absolutely no room left in the trunk of the car for a body.

Real Pioneers Caulk It and Float

In the time honored tradition (which began last year) of the Dangerous Family, Thanksgiving simply cannot be held in a reasonable location. Why would anybody want to have dinner in front of a roaring fireplace at their father’s house in temperate South Carolina where one could still at this time of year feasibly walk on the beach? Thanksgiving must be an Adventure. This is to test the family loyalty. Sure you’ll help a relative hide a body, but will you drive cross country to stay in a roach infested motel?

Much to Beau’s disappointment, we won’t be returning to the Liki Tiki in Florida this year. Instead, we’re taking a relatively short drive of five hours to upstate New York, home of T’s entire family. Entire. Like going back a dozen generations to the Mayflower era when people were called hominids and ate ants with sticks. Yes, we’re going to eat Thanksgiving with the descendants of real life pilgrims. To do so, we just need to drive through an area that’s been blanketed with snow for a month to a place that Google informs me is nestled snugly between the Catskills and the Adirondacks. We will be frontiersmen in our own right as we forge through this wilderness where there may not be public restrooms, acceptable fast-food, paved roads or cell service. In just two days, we begin the exodus of The Slightly Abbreviated Oregon Trail.

Culling knowledge from the computer version, I know that the first step involves packing the wagon and similar to the ways of my overzealous ten-year-old self, I am already over packing. But instead of bringing fifteen pounds of cornmeal and twenty chickens (each with a name and an elaborate personal history that was explored in detail via the journal feature which chronicled every time a hen wandered off or had to be killed for food), I’m taking a number of supplies that Beau and I are concerned we may not find at our destination. Among these items are cilantro, comfy pillows, rum, and freshly ground coffee as well as a full arsenal of allergy medications since I’ll be cohabiting with multiple felines, which, though adorable, make me sneeze uncontrollably and my throat swell up in an unattractive and life-debilitating way.

Speaking of bodily weakness, remember how pissed you’d get when Amos, the quote-on-quote doctor, would come down with cholera somewhere in Wyoming and you’d have to rest for two weeks? Like Amos, I am also diseased. The inexplicable disappearing zit that hid before I got to last week’s interview has resurfaced on my chin and it is ANGRY. It looks much less like a pimple and much more like a second chin jutting out to the right. For thematic continuity, we’re going to call it mumps.

So, this is how I am required to prove my loyalty to the family and renew my membership for the coming year. With cornmeal, dysentery, and mountain lions. Pray for us. And Godspeed on your own travels!

A Comedy of Errors & Illustrations of Said Errors

Hello free blogging hobby! I had an interview this afternoon that very nearly went horribly wrong, but happily, did not because I apparently have good karma.

My chief concern this morning was picking between two completely different interview outfits.

I brought this quandary to Beau’s attention because he works with Conservative Types and therefore, would be able to best answer whether the bright blue shirt ensemble or the white shirt/coral necklace outfit would be most appropriate for an interview at a Conservative Type Place. Beau picked option #1 which secretly pleased me because that meant I didn’t have to iron the horribly wrinkled white shirt. Yay one less thing to do!

Instead, I ironed my hair to make it less poofy and more straightish while watching reruns of Golden Girls (and, yes, I know this goes against the cardinal rule of my last entry but I gave myself a break since I was going to have an honest-to-God interview and I needed something to calm my nerves because going into public gives me agita now that I rarely leave the apartment and when I’m nervous I start defecating because nervous pooping runs in my family. When my cousin got married a decade ago, all the bridesmaids had to crowd into a bathroom stall to help lift her dress so she could pooh without obstruction. Ahh, longest parenthesis interjection ever! How much longer can I make it?! Ok I’m done).

Next, I ironed the skirt part of my suit so it could match my hair in its lack of wrinkles. I looked down at my project while I chortled at Sophia’s antics and noticed that the first pass of the iron had done more than just de-wrinkle. It left a white chalky residue which I lamely swept at, still calmly chortling. But it did not go away and I began mentally freaking out: “What the fuck?! The iron came on the fuckin’ black skirt that I have to wear to a Conservative Type Place?! What is that?! OH GOD!!”

I ran to the sink and began scrubbing just hard enough for the Iron Jism to really set into the fabric. Then I upgraded to wet paper towel. Then to Mr. Clean Magic Eraser which has saved articles of clothing in the past. Then in a moment of temporary insanity, I turned the faucet on full blast and dunked it in. Then I realized I had an hour to pull myself together and dry a now soaked “dry clean only” garment. Then the nervous pooping started. Then I only had 55 minutes to dry the skirt.

In a full set of penguin-print flannel pajamas, I tore down to the basement, ignoring the electrician working in a corner, and threw my shame into the drier which I cranked up to the max. Back up in the apartment, I simmered down slightly and began searching through my closet for other skirts I could wear with the suit jacket. The first thing I tried on looked ridiculous but not because the pieces didn’t match into a real suit. They looked ridiculous because the jacket looked like a sack. I checked the tags, assuming I grabbed one of Beau’s suits, but unless Beau has started shopping at New York & Co, then it was mine. Turns out being poor is making me skinny and for once in my life, I was not thrilled with this.

I gritted my teeth and dug to the depths of my closet to pull out my very first suit which I bought right out of college and made me look like a sausage the last time I put it on about a month ago. Granted it was still snug today, but a much closer fit than my newer suit. With mere moments to spare, I ironed the white shirt which is Iron Jism resistant by nature of already being white, slapped on some make-up, and looked in the mirror before running for the train. Here is what I saw looking back (except for the letters floating around my body; those are for explanatory purposes only):

Now I will use those floating letters to explain everything that was wrong with my appearance when I walked out the door this morning:

A) Entirely too much eye shadow applied by a girl who reads every issue of Glamour but still can’t figure out cosmetics.
B) A giant underground zit that popped up somewhere between nervous pooping and make-up application and is now hiding under a thick layer of concealer which actually conceals very little.
C) Pin stripe suit that I bought OVER TWO YEARS AGO (on second thought, I’m going to give that one a silent fist pump)
D) Scab from scratching at dry skin. Ew. Do you even want to know these things about me?
E) Elastic lines from the fuzzy argyle socks that I wore all morning
F) Mystery bruise from mysterious source. Possibly obtained during Mouse Hunt.

Somehow, in some magical, cosmic way that I will never EVER understand, points A, B, and E resolved themselves between the train and my arrival at Conservative Type Place and the others suddenly didn’t look like an issue. Furthermore, I had a lovely interview with two charming ladies who appeared to like me, genuinely laughed at my jokes, and made allusions to a second interview next week. On my way home, I thanked the universe for pulling through for me on the big day by emptying the contents of my change purse into the collection pot of a very surprised looking Salvation Army bell-ringer, despite being dirt poor, despite not having had a paycheck in almost 80 days, despite having sworn off Crystal Light Iced Tea which was a major addiction and source of happiness that cost me an unjustifiable average of $4/week without providing nutritional sustenance or inebriation.

So, thanks Universe for throwing me a bone and letting me have a good interview today. Here’s $1.08 in nickels and pennies for your trouble!

S&M Rodents

**Written Sunday, November 16:

Silently mouthing “Help me” at my laptop does not seem to be improving my current situation. I am being held hostage in my bedroom with the door barricaded by an animal in my sitting room. And it is most certainly not Ninja Mouse. Allow me to backtrack for a moment.

Saturday night, Beau and I held one of our increasingly popular dinner parties in which he gets to show off his gourmet cooking skills and I get to socialize for free. Everyone wins! After plying our guests with an Italian feast and plowing through several bottles of wine, we retired to the sitting room for board games and the Top Gun soundtrack and additional wine. I was in the middle of what I’m sure was a very urbane, witty joke when people began yelling and jumping out of their seats and pointing emphatically at the baseboards. For a moment, I got very defensive. I spent a lot of time dusting those baseboards and if they weren't clean enough for my friends then maybe they should try staying home all day scrubbing and sweating over a hot stove and not buying me nice things.

That was when I saw it: a very small gray mouse streaking across the floor. A miniature version of Ninja Mouse. One might say a baby version. It was immediately apparent that my arch nemesis has spawned and sent a legion of offspring to continue the reign of terror. Adding insult to injury, this implies that Ninja Mouse has not left my home as suggested by the past quiet month of poopless counters. No, she’s been shacked up behind my kitchen cabinets fornicating. Who knows what sick, sick acts were perpetrated mere inches from my collection of holiday appropriate dinnerware.

I climbed to the safety of the back of my couch as chaos erupted in my apartment. Our guests assembled into a cohesive regiment and began brainstorming an attack plan. Battle supplies in the form of umbrellas and large wooden bowls were quickly procured as the rodent continued to run willy-nilly around my sitting room and I began shrieking in my most helpful manner. It occurred to me that the super-genius gene seems to have skipped a generation, evidenced by the offspring’s willingness to leave the safety of the mouse hole for a brightly lit room filled with very large, loud, drunk beasts.

Large, loud, drunk beasts

During an eerie moment of quiet, I was shooed off the couch and forced to put my feet on the floor where they remained briefly as I ran to the safety of the bathroom and climbed on top of the toilet. Someone generously collected a bottle of rum from the kitchen and handed it to me in my ivory tower from which I alternately moaned in anguish and called, “Don’t hurt it!”

Next to cowardice in the dictionary

But they didn’t catch it, let alone tie it to a chair and pull out its toenails. They managed to chase it out of the apartment and continue to not be too skeeved when the second littermate appeared to check out the commotion. While Loaded Questions is still my favorite party game, I can safely say that Mouse Hunt has its own merits. Though, when you lose at LQ, the game pieces generally don’t get up and chase you around.

So, now, while Beau is out purchasing Starbucks to ease my thundering red wine headache, I am a captive of Seed of Ninja Mouse who may still be hiding under my coffee table waiting to shank me on my way to the refrigerator.

**Update from Tuesday morning: We’ve been (theoretically) mouse-free since Sunday evening. The apartment looks like a scene from Home Alone. There are half a dozen traps set with peanut butter and three plug-in devices that supposedly make an inaudible high-frequency noise that drives rodents insane but actually also make a faint buzzing noise that is quickly driving ME insane… and paranoid, because I’m fairly certain that these gizmos are part of a Beau plot to get me out of the house more often.

I’m onto you.

Seriously, Eat Asparagus

Earlier today as I was rounding off my fiftieth job application since September 1 (the third one today), I had a moment of passing panic when I realized the job boards probably wouldn’t update until after the lunch hour when those lucky, gainfully employed members of society would return to their suddenly luxurious looking cubicles in the HR department. That meant I would have my first free time of the day which had thus far been spent getting dolled up for an interview, getting to the interview, interviewing, returning from the interview, and sending out resumes in hopes of gaining other interviews. That’s what my life is now. Job hunting and open wastelands of down time. I couldn’t tell you which terrifies me more.

There are countless articles on how to recession proof your job, how to get a new job once you get laid off from the recession-proofed one, how to compete in a market flooded with qualified candidates, how to scale back on your budget to eek out another rent payment, but I haven’t found a damn thing explaining how to deal with the boredom of seemingly infinite hours of unpaid vacation. When I quit in August, I thought a month off would be a peachy sabbatical and it really was for the first fifteen minutes. Two and a half months later, it’s a different story.

If anyone else out there is like me, then you stopped liking sitcoms about a month ago. You got sick of dusting after you found yourself on your hands and knees scrubbing a baseboard that simply refused to stay clean. Facebook has started to nauseate you. And so, I present my unsolicited advice on how to fight the unemployment doldrums and keep you from going any crazier:

Put down the remote, put on a CD that is not Fiona Apple

As that group of radicals that I associated with in college thereby destroying any ideas I had of a political career used to say, “Kill your TV.” It is the single biggest contributing factor to my brain rot. I’ve sworn it off during daylight hours and put on music instead. Anything not written in a dark room by someone wearing black nail polish is generally a safe choice. I like a variety so my current line up includes Enya, The Killers, and Pirates of the Caribbean. The intensity and drama of the last was particularly useful. It made my dishwashing feel ten times more dignified and triumphant.

Stop sitting in a corner crying and take a walk

For me, the worst part of unemployment is that stagnant pond water feeling, so I try to move around a bit. I frequently dance around the apartment and try to venture into the sunlight at least once a day. When I’m physically sitting still, I try to keep my brain occupied with crossword puzzles, reading, writing, taking inventories of what’s in Beau’s dresser drawers, anything keeps my neurons from liquefying and crawling out my nose.

Make shit to sell on Etsy

To keep my brain really distracted, I get creative. For example, cooking. You’ve got to eat anyway and making things by hand is way cheaper than Lean Cuisine. Last night, Beau and I made potato gnocchi from scratch for dinner. Today I made stir fry for lunch and as an added bonus, I threw in some asparagus which means I’ll be doubly amused the next time I have to pee. I've also been crafting like a fiend. Speaking of which, do you think there’s a market for illustrations of beans riding tacos?



Like Enigma said, return to innocence... eiiiiiiiiIIII ohhhhwah wah wahhh (remember the video with the unicorn running through the woods?!)

Lastly, I’ve embraced cabin fever like a kid with chicken pox and allowed some of my craziness to bubble to the surface. I make forts. I talk to cashiers at the grocery store. I pet stray cats. I tackle Beau and try to wipe boogers in his hair. I play dress up in my own closet. I see which pots and pans fit on my head.

It might all sound pretty simplistic and common sense, but honestly, it took me a month to remember how to entertain myself without people around to play with or wads of cash. Now excuse me, I need to use the ladies' room and I am REALLY excited.

This Is My Chin. You'll Note That It Is Up.

There comes a point in life when you’ve been unemployed for two months in a failing economy, had your resume rejected 30 times, been personally rejected after three interviews, and can’t get a certain temp agency to call you back when you think things look pretty bad. Then your insurance company tries to screw you out of nearly $1000 for a routine test. A test to tell you that you don’t have cancer. The disease that’s affected several of your family members. Including your mother. Who it claimed years ago. When you were nine.

And then you think back to you and your mom’s favorite picture book, Could Be Worse by James Stevenson, about two kids who whine to their grandpa about their trivial problems like splinters and lost kites and always elicit the same eponymous reply until one day he conjures up a long, elaborate story to teach them how much worse things really could be.

Then you think well, hey, things could be worse. So what if I’m unemployed with seemingly few prospects and looming medical bills? I don't have cancer. I have oodles of friends and family who I adore. I have the bestest boyfriend on earth who senses bad moods from miles away and brings home flowers to make me smile. I have a roof over my head and cable TV. I have rum in the liquor cabinet. I have a library card and poop jokes and turkeys-gone-wild in my backyard.

You think all that and then suddenly, things don't look so bad after all.

Thanksgiving is in the Air

There’s good reason for me to ignore Halloween in favor of skipping ahead to the next holiday. Here’s a particularly good reason: I’m still unemployed and too frugal for a costume which is a real mood killer. But in addition, Thanksgiving forcefully assaulted me yesterday. It was thrust under my nose not once, but twice, TWICE. That’s more than once. Two times as much actually.

This year, the family plans to convene at my brother-in-law T’s childhood home in upstate New York for the holiday. Having been raised in Jersey and lived in and around numerous cities my entire life, I’ve never seen the middle of nowhere. I visited my college roommate in Vermont once, but we spent most of our time in Burlington, which is at least a small town, so that doesn’t count. For this trip, I’ve been promised farmland and woods and moors through which I can wander and sigh into the wind like a Brontëan heroine. These dreams, of course, have been dashed by the first snow storm of the season which blanketed the area in, well, in this:

But, hey, it's not the Liki Tiki

Until then, I’m left with obscene amounts of time on my hands. One of the few productive things I do with it is romp in the park near my house. I look at the leaves, pet the puppies, and give dirty looks to the joggers that judge me as they pass me on the trail. Whatever. I’m outside getting exercise and I know better than to wear those stupid little running shorts that expose your nasty old man thighs to the 40° weather. So let’s all just keep our self righteousness to ourselves, shall we?

On my way home from said romp yesterday morning, something caught my eye as I turned into my driveway. Something moved in my backyard. At first I thought it was Winston, one of the semi-feral (but very friendly) cats that belongs to our crazy cat-lady and sometimes hangs out with me when I read outside or when I come home drunk and need to sit down on the porch to figure out which key to use. I stooped to look under the car that was blocking my line of sight for soft little paws. None. I was about to write it off as my imagination when something else rounded the side of my landlord’s unsuspecting Subaru. It was a skeksi. Except this time, it was corralled in my backyard and I was blocking the only exit.

I snapped a few blurry phone pics and returned to the apartment where I stood there for several minutes wishing I had time to return with a proper camera. But wait! I have nothing but time! I flew out the back door with my equipment, praying that the skeksi hadn’t used my absence to flee. Happily, it hadn’t. That’s because skeksis are stupid. AND THEY ARE ALSO FLIGHTLESS, COUGH COUGH. You know who you are.

As I stood at a safe distance on the back porch zooming in on my find and feeling like the Croc Hunter, Beau’s words came back to me from my last skeksi sighting. Something like, “No, honey, you shouldn’t chase wild turkeys into other people’s backyards. They are vicious birds. I’m very sure they will start shit with you and they will win.” Those words continued to echo in my head as I snapped picture after fruitless picture from a miserable, safe distance:

So far away you has to circle me in red

Here I is. Bein as tall as yur table

Soon, I grew weary of precautions, so I snuck closer. I really like to have photographic evidence of my many wild, seemingly tall tales. Not because I sometimes lie (no, really, I am an Italian supermodel) but because sometimes even the true things I say stretch the bounds of reasonable credibility. I was sneaking up behind it musing on this point when finally, it came for me.

They see me rollin. They hatin.

With as much grace as one can muster when fleeing from poultry, I jumped over a bush and ran the 15 feet to my backdoor. As I snapped one last picture of my close encounter, I thought back to my vegetarian days many years ago when I hung “meat is murder” banners in the dining room and handed out pamphlets covering the inhumane treatment of livestock to our Thanksgiving dinner guests. Times they are a changin'. Now, I’ve officially added turkeys to the List of Things I Would Eat Because They’re Really Ugly. Right after pugs.

Lonely Teenage Boys Need Not Apply

The following requires no introduction, which is convenient because I’m slightly hung over from Beau’s birthday festivities last night and my brain is having trouble formulating an appropriate opening line:

My web of spies informs me that this flier was found posted in a student dorm at Bentley College (just west of Boston) and that the square seen in the lower left corner is the genuine stamp of approval from the school. After a little intrepid sleuthing of my own I was able to find the aforementioned housing contract here on their website but was unable to find the anti-chicken-choking clause.

So many questions come to mind (a much better place to come than the Bentley showers apparently). I’m positively bursting with questions, much like their pipelines are overflowing with the raging spermatozoa of a thousand desperate freshman boys. But enough puns. Onto the inquiry. Right onto it. All over it, in fact. One might liken it to a money shot. But seriously:

Who was the unfortunate plumber that discovered the problem? How exactly does semen clog a pipe other than the one in which it originated? How does the school expect students to masturbate in their rooms when most are shared by a roommate? Isn’t that why they’re escaping to the showers for a little privacy? Is Bentley suggesting they do the five knuckle shuffle with their roommate? Is that sexual harassment or homosexual activity? Do they permit the non-ejaculating gender to wank in the showers? Isn’t that gender discrimination if they do? If the boys can’t beat the bishop in the shower OR in their rooms, will all that baby batter on the brain affect their schoolwork? Which is more important to Bentley: keeping their students happy and healthy enough to succeed in their classes or keeping the cost of facilities maintenance at an absolute minimum? If the guys are cock blocked in their own homes, will they compensate by having more sex elsewhere? Will the school turn into one giant outdoor orgy? How will that affect the teen pregnancy rates? How about the STD rates? Is Bentley prepared to provide free condoms as a precaution? Wouldn’t it probably be cheaper to just clean out the pipes once in a while? How much sperm does it take to clog a pipe? How much are these guys masturbating anyway?!

The only certainty in this case is that the housing authority at Bentley College wouldn't be so up tight if they engaged in a little prohibited self-love themselves. I suggest the administration make a special visit to the showers immediately.

Wildlife: A Summary of the Past Week in Three Vignettes

I. Goats

After months of whining that I always share Beau with our friends and that he never takes me anywhere nice (other than the Chili’s on route 1 which is pretty rockin’), I was treated to a date-weekend commencing with a trip to Belkin Lookout Farm for apple picking. I was informed that there was a petting zoo which quelled my griping over the $14 per person entrance fee… which didn’t include any actual fruit. Fruit was extra.

We got our money’s worth though because we rode a little train to get from orchard to orchard which I found exhilarating. Anyone who has been on a kiddy rollercoaster with me can personally tell you that dragging me on any ride that involves drops or unreasonable speed results in my uncontrollable swearing. Kind of like that scene in The Exorcist where she cusses out the priest. Except instead of a priest it’s usually my close friends and relatives and an errant ride operator or two. In addition to this fantastic amusement, Beau managed to scarf down one Asian pear and three grapes while we hid behind trees watching for farm workers and other immigrants. By my calculations, we stole approximately $1.93 worth of merchandise.

Truly the animals were worth every cent I overpaid. I was expecting some chickens and a really exasperated looking pig. What I got was a pen of a dozen hungry goats and small children. Less adventurous types in skinny jeans and Uggs watched on in horror at the chaos of these constantly defecating creatures. I quickly grabbed Beau and pushed in front of a nine-year-old while dancing around steaming piles of pooh. I chased them around in little circles, I scratched them behind the ears, I otherwise amused myself until finally, I found the Holy Grail of the petting-zoo world: a wee little goatling baby which I played with until it started chewing on Beau’s sneakers and nipping his fingers. As I told Grasshoppah a few days ago, baby goats are adorable for many reasons but also because they don’t reject you from a job that you had two interviews for and felt promising since the employer went through the trouble in the last meeting of explaining the company's benefits package thereby causing you to waste three weeks of job searching. So there’s also that.

II. Turkey-dogs

After returning home with the Most Expensive Apples ever, we punished them for their excessive cost by making them into a pie, then decided constant consumption of pie makes us fat, so punished ourselves with exercise. We took a stroll through the park near our house which was similar to our other walks there: we discussed my continued lack of employment, the little graveyard tucked in the forest that always makes Beau say “Wow, I’ve never noticed that before!” every time we pass by it, and the cuteness of the dogs we saw. I was still remarking on the chubbiness of a huge chocolate lab and fluffiness of a miniature husky when we heard hysterical laughter behind us. The chubby lab had mounted the fluffy mini-husky and the owners were attempting to pull them apart. It’s dogs humping in the park that I find most useful in fighting off the hovering clouds of self-pity and depression. As long as I’ve got that, things can’t be all bad.

Monday I had jury duty which was disappointingly uneventful. Upon leaving my apartment for the courthouse, I saw a gigantic turkey walk down the street. It must have been as tall as my hip. But what the hell was it doing in my neighborhood? For that matter, what was that coyote doing in my neighborhood? This is a suburb of Boston, people, not Des Moines.

Anyway, it was like an acid flashback. Or a scene from The Dark Crystal. Either way, after chasing the turkey halfway to the train station and almost pursuing it into someone’s backyard, I realized that maybe I don’t get out of the house enough anymore. Mostly because I’m busy peeking out from behind a curtain waiting for more skeksis.

III. Vermin

Ninja Mouse is still terrorizing the household. While this is a useful diet aid since it makes me afraid of my own kitchen, I have come to find troublesome droppings on my counters like the trail of an overzealous 5th-grader with a bottle of jimmies. Clearly, we can no longer share this apartment. The other inhabitants work on an honor code built around not defecating on food preparation surfaces. If Ninja Mouse can’t abide by that rule, then I’m afraid it has to go.

But how to get rid of a critter whose intellect and acrobatic skills far surpass my own? As an animal-hugger, I was inclined to purchase a humane trap so I could catch it and re-release it into the wild. Unfortunately for Ninja Mouse, those traps are costly and I remain, yes, unemployed. Beau even drove me around to the local hardware stores looking for options other than the snappy-break-your-neck type traps without success. Once home, we found out that estrogen and mouse-genocide do not mix well together. I pouted and fought back tears while Beau was forced to set the traps alone. But it doesn’t matter, because after two nights of attempted murder, we haven’t caught the damn thing. It’s been eating the bait WITHOUT SETTING OFF THE TRAPS. Pitted against each other in a game of chess, I’m 90% certain that I would lose to Ninja Mouse.

HR Beasties

Today I had a phone interview for an editorial assistant position with a local publishing company. Unlike the last interview I had, this one was with a faceless human resources lackey. Regardless of actually wanting this job and feeling lucky to have gotten an interview, I can’t help complaining about the conversation itself which consisted of The Most Generic Questions Ever which I answered in my usual evasive, political way (thanks presidential candidates for teaching me how to give a 30-second sound bite without giving any semblance of a real answer!). I talked about professional growth, my intellectual curiosity, and my understanding of the words “deadline” and “organization.” Meanwhile, deep in the corners of my mind, my real personality was hog tied and gagged with a tube sock because this is how she wanted to answer these questions:

Why did you leave your last job?

I put eye-drops in my boss’ coffee or, they caught me negotiating with the janitorial staff for a bag of pure, uncut Colombian, or, I got sick of collecting mugs and scrubbing at stubborn tea rings, or I hate answering the switchboard phone, or, I am the lizard king.

What is your understanding of this position?

Despite rereading the job ad 5 minutes ago and actually having it open on my laptop right this very moment, I have very little understanding of what I would do in this position because your advertisement uses the same kind of flowery corporate phrases as are present this interview. I’m aware that I will book flights, send form letters to annoying people that my superiors don’t want to talk to, and go to occasional conferences where more than likely, I will watch a married editor get drunk and tell me he’s gay before vomiting in his briefcase and passing out in an Applebee’s bar.

Why do you think you’d be good at this job?

I’m good at everything that I’ve ever tried except sucking at life.

What are your future goals?

Well, short-term I intend on using this company as a source of income, title, recommendations, and new facebook buddies. Long-term, I hope to flee this country, become a snorkel tour leader in Bermuda or barmaid in a small village pub in Ireland where I’ll own several large Labrador/Shepherds mixes. I do not see myself as part of the intelligentsia and have limited interest in the disciplines covered by your company (literature, anthropology, sociology, political science, etc.) but would be interested in founding a division on crude humor.

How much money do you want?

I need $75K a year, access to the corporate jet on the weekends, and also whatever you have in your wallet right now.

Phew! It feels better to have gotten that out of my system. Anyway, I think the answers I gave out loud were sufficient enough. Fingers doubly crossed for this one and the interview I had last week.

More Projects I Started and Then Forgot About / I Still Have a Blog?!

I’ve made it through almost a month of unemployment and besides a booming social calendar and a dwindling checking account, I have very little to show for my time other than a touch of insomnia. While I wait for this Benadryl to knock me out so I can finally get a good night’s sleep this week, I thought I’d check in. Nothing puts me to sleep so well as listening to myself talk. In the dark. To the Internet.

I’ve had a couple of complaints from my Only Fan that updates have not been coming at their usual frequent pace. For this I apologize and offer the following excuse: I have very little (good) material to share with you. For monetary and liver-tary reasons, I’ve scaled back on drinking (except for last weekend which was a shit show in New Hampshire where I took shots and ate sauerkraut in the same day which is a VERY BAD IDEA) so I have fewer wild and crazy stories to divulge and also I fall down less often. Mostly I putter around the house, read 19th century fiction, water plants, do laundry, and spy on my neighbors.

I also voraciously apply to every publishing house in the Boston area while our economy crumbles and hope that someone employs me soon so I won’t have to start bootlegging gin out of the washing machine (no bathtub – it’s the only option). On that note, I just had my second interview with an awesome company that felt promising but now that I’ve jinxed it and probably won’t get it, I’ll come back and cry to you next week when I hear back. I also crawled back to that grad program that I deferred in the spring and told them I’d be enrolling in the spring (hopefully part-time if this whole getting-a-job thing works out). So, I’m theoretically back on track to get a Masters in Books. We’ll see how that goes.

In my puttering today I discovered that we once again have a mouse which is not unusual in an old Victorian in New England at the onset of cold weather but nonetheless grosses me out when I want a piece of toast and find that something has chewed through the plastic bag and nibbled a circular portion of my whole wheat bread. This happened sometime last year when I left an unprotected loaf on a shelf with a large obvious mouse hole, but this time the food was in a bowl with tall, smooth sides on a counter devoid of holes. This led me to believe I have not just a rodent but indeed a Super Spiderman Ninja Mouse that carries nun chucks and wears a little black mask like Zorro. Bologna (who is visiting for the weekend) disagreed and demonstrated vividly how the villain might climb up the pipes under my sink, through a crack in the stove, hoist itself up on the ledge around the counter and from there jump into the bowl. So, OK, either I have a Super Spiderman Ninja Mouse or a Super Intelligent Mouse with Logistical Powers and Planning Ability Far Exceeding My Own. Neither makes me feel comfortable in my kitchen. But so help me God, if I see that thing crawling around on the ceiling like the baby in Trainspotting, I will spray its ass with Raid faster than you can say “Hey, I think the Benadryl kicked in.”

I Know Exactly How Tom Brady Feels

Hi Internet! Sorry I’ve been ignoring you but I’ve been wallowing in a sea of self-pity and boredom and rabidly applying for jobs. And also acting like a complete teenager by having the following dialogue with myself daily:

Me: Woe is me, I am so bored laying on the couch watching reruns of Will and Grace.

Rational Me: You could get off the couch and do something.

Me: There’s nothing to do.

Rational Me: What about that elaborate page-long list you made when you still had a job? Ya know? The one with fun things like pickle-making, dress-sewing, learning-a-Beatles-song-on-the-piano, etc.?

Me: Why bother? Life is so bleak. Woe is me.

[Fade to black]

I used to get like this when I was bored at work too. I would spend all morning staring at a wall but when someone finally dropped a two-minute task on my desk, I would procrastinate an hour while giving it the stink-eye before I would actually get it done. This is in contrast to the days when I actually was busy, because then the two-minute task would be swept up in my frenzy and completed while I simultaneously did five other things. So the moral of this story is that I’m more likely to accomplish something if I’m already overwhelmed. But now that I am my own boss, I have no whelms. I am whelmless and as such I may not brush my teeth until noon.

Now that you know I am too lazy to voluntarily cross the room to pick up a coloring book for my own amusement, it should not come as a surprise that I haven’t left the apartment by myself in a week. I’ve been out with Beau multiple times but am seemingly incapable of mustering the willpower to leave of my own accord. That is until yesterday when the catalyst of T’s birthday party this weekend provided enough force to launch me onto a Boston-bound train to shop for a dress.

I found almost exactly what I was looking for:


There was only one problem: the tummy region. Despite my best sucking in efforts, it remained… slightly poochy. Luckily, technology has remedied this problem! I hurried off to the underthings department with the dress and belt in tow and found what Bridget Jones referred to as those “scary stomach-holding-in pants very popular with grannies the world over.”

I remained skeptical of corseting undergarments as the laws of physics suggest my body fat might just spill over into other regions creating even weirder bulges. With this doubt in mind, I hustled off to the dressing room. I put on the other portions of the outfit and then looked challengingly at the medieval torture device hanging on the wall. I had selected the largest size possible assuming it would be physically impossible for me to fit into what would be considered my normal size (On a side note, why do they make them in a size small? If you can fit in a pair of small Spanx then there’s absolutely no reason you should be wearing them).

I pulled them off the hanger figuring I would try them on in the same fashion as a new swim suit: quickly and with my existing underwear still in place to block passage of cooties. The garment was safely up my left thigh when it became apparent that there were about three square inches of space left for the rest of me. This wasn’t a complete shock as I already understood the point of this device was to constrict my existing flesh. I was less concerned by the bondage of wearing it than the logistics of actually getting into it. It was like trying to climb into a tin can.

In a burst of energy and unprecedented acrobatics, I attempted to thread my right leg through the remaining hole. To do so, I lifted my foot as close to my belly button as I could and quickly jammed the pointy end into the garment. This movement is not included in my usual range of motions because I don’t do yoga. A searing Charley horse ripped through my left side. I fell sidewise into the wall, howling in pain as the rustles and coughs from adjoining dressing rooms went silent. I stayed with my forehead pressed against the mirror until my left leg stopped twitching enough to put weight on it at which point I realized I was now firmly jammed into the scary stomach-holding-in-pants. I made the best of it and squirmed around until they were in the correction location. Though they did, as promised, make my stomach smaller and my ass higher, I realized I would be drinking at the party and would therefore need to reenact the scene in a small bathroom stall every time I needed to pee. Exasperated, I ditched the entire scheme and left the store. Hobbling.

Half an hour later, I was still in a good deal of pain which was no longer ripping through my entire left side. It was now localized. In my left ass cheek. I pulled an ass muscle trying on a pair of these. My vanity now has the ability to wound not my just my pride but also inflict actual physical damage.

Now, approximately 20 hours after the incident, I’m still limping which provides me an awesome excuse not to leave the couch for another week.

A Sorry Excuse for a Blog Entry

Unemployment wears well on me. I spent four days being a human slug at Beau’s Cape house (mostly having a stomach bug that interfered with my drinking, but otherwise tanning). While there, I spent a bit of quality time with Beau’s sister, She-ra, so named because she very casually does triathlons every few months making me think that she could probably pick me up and throw me if I got too rowdy. Plus she has style flair just like her namesake and if you aren’t impressed with the embellished toga/cape/Uggs combo, then I just don’t know how to reach you.

On Monday night, I found myself on the couch with She-ra and her friends who introduced me to a new substance to go with my ice cream. I’ve never tried it before because I thought it was shameful, detrimental to my overall health, and dangerous. They say you’re hooked after just one dose, and they’re right. I am speaking of course of The Hills which I will more than likely watch next Monday and every Monday thereafter while drooling a little from the side of my mouth.

In other news, I’ve jumped on the housewifery bandwagon to fight the threat of cabin fever. In my first day alone at the apartment, I got up early to pack Beau’s lunch, did all the laundry I could find, exorcised 2 liquefying tomatoes from the kitchen, and did that puttering thing where you find problems you didn’t even know existed when you had a life. Like dusty baseboards. Faced with the prospect of continuing on a cleaning rampage thereby becoming my father, I rounded yesterday afternoon off by reneging on every bad thing I ever said about Corporate America and trolling Craigslist for job openings.

I Said “More on That Later” and Now is Apparently Late Enough

The time has come to explain what I meant when I elusively mentioned in my last post not getting a job until October. I’d like to preface this explanation by saying that I had to completely rewrite this post because it turned into an incoherent three page diatribe ending in a poorly constructed metaphor involving colonialism in early America, so, please be aware that this is the calmer, friendlier, 50% less bitter version.

In short, I have determined that work sucks. I don’t want to overwhelm you with my wisdom so why don’t you take a minute to let that sink in.

Specifically, I’ve come to abhor office work. I’m resentful of every minute I fritter away in front of a computer under fluorescent lights in a room with no windows. Less than three years into the work force and I’m already sick of office politics. I realized earlier this month that if one more customer/superior/random neff they pulled off the street gives me an attitude, insults my intelligence, or is just generally nasty because they’re constipated, I might actually just walk out on my job. Like literally. Take my purse and leave this place and never come back because this doesn’t feel like the way to really live one’s life.

Instead, I’ve luckily had a quiet month of training my replacement and saying my farewells. Originally, I quit in anticipation of starting grad school in the fall. After weeks of agonizing (both in my head and out loud to everyone I know… thanks guys), I deferred my acceptance for two main reasons:

1) I have no idea what I want to do with my life and I’m finally comfortable with that. I’m not prepared to waste $30,000+ figuring it out. I highly doubt sitting in a classroom will lead to existential resolution anyway. So, if I go back for more education, I’m going to be damn sure I’m going to use it. Without that assurance, I don’t think it’s not a good investment. And no, I don’t believe graduate programs are generally beneficial in landing a fulfilling career. For those stalwart proponents, I suggest reading Barbara Ehnrenreich and Penelope Trunk and then polling the cashiers at Barnes and Noble and baristas at Starbucks to find out how many have PhDs in English.

2) Any graduate program I’m both qualified for and interested in will launch me directly back into an office environment which, as we’ve already discussed, I find loathsome and soul-sucking. The thought of paying someone so that I can come right back to the same general thing under a fancier guise is downright horrifying to me.

I fully respect those who do office work. Working outside of one can be tough – I know, I’ve been there. I understand that we need someone to staff the organizations that make the world go round. I’m aware that my humble efforts photocopying play a role, albeit a minor one, in keeping these giants afloat. I get that you’ve got to start at the bottom where the work is boring and unrewarding and work your way into a more stimulating position. My understanding of the way the world works does not change my reluctance to participate in it. And yes, I am five minutes from following Thoreau’s lead and building a house in the woods. Preferably on someone else’s property (hey Bologna, how’s the new house search going? Still looking at that one with a few acres of forest that you won’t be able to easily monitor?)

As such, I’ve given myself a break in September, both to goof off and also pursue projects of my own interest. It’s entirely possible I won’t be able to support myself in my freelance endeavors (which I assure you are farfetched and completely unstable means of earning a living) but I owe it to myself to try before resigning myself to a means of existence that I personally find distasteful.

Wanted: Sketchy White Van & Large Bag of Beggin' Strips

“Tail at two o’clock” is the first thing I said when we got to the park last night as I craned my neck to watch a black lab run through the forest to our right. Beau thinks we’ve been taking walks for exercise but really, it’s just a cheap excuse to ogle puppies and use my secret dog weapon, a “misdirected” Frisbee, to cop a scratch behind their ears. Frisbees are to dogs what Huffies are to children. Lately the dog lust has gotten worse. I spent 15 minutes chatting up my landlord in the hall last night because his adorable mutt was alternately sniffing me and going through my laundry basket. I am the construction worker of the animal kingdom. I shout obscene things at your pets and they secretly feel flattered.

Luckily, they have places for people like me. Institutions that use our sickness in a constructive way: animal shelters. So, between my September sabbatical (Did I mention that? Yeah, I’m not getting a job until October. More on that later) and my willingness to be a free walking pooper-scooper, I’ve decided to volunteer a few days a week at the local animal rescue. Tonight is my second orientation. I’ll be touring the facility and getting a lesson in proper dog walking form which I believe involves triple sow cows but I’m not entirely sure.

God, Gin, and Something Trippy

This Saturday found me in a vaguely familiar place: church. I haven’t been to one of those since Christmas 2006 when Beau’s family dragged me to a midnight mass despite the fact that most of us were half in the wrapper. But this weekend wasn’t a holiday. It was a wedding. That means I stopped hissing at statues of saints long enough to quietly sit through a ceremony.

Let me preface this by saying that I was raised Catholic. I went to church every week in my childhood. I sat through Sunday school classes where I was scolded for asking questions, not understanding the concept of blind faith, and drawing fancy hats on Jesus in my work book (and then further reprimanded when I called my teacher an idolater for putting so much emphasis on a pictorial representation of Christ). I’ve studied the Bible more in depth than most Christians. That said, I am now an enthusiastic atheist. If that or blaspheming bothers you, now might be a good time to stop reading.

Anyway, I can be respectful when needs be, so I behaved. We were seated too far back in the church to hear or see what went on up front which was a pity because friends of ours were getting hitched somewhere up there. After a quarter of an hour of straining my neck and failing to catch anything, my mind started to wander. For awhile I watched everyone around me kneel and sit and chant and make elaborate hand gestures all the while thinking that truly, mass must count as cardio. I abstained from the general hocus-pocus except the standing bits (because my ass was falling asleep) and the hand shaking (because I like smiling and saying nice things to people on occasion). For the remainder of the time I admired the interior of the church with its marble columns and painted murals and wondered how much money could have been donated to charity instead of pimping God’s crib. Of course, studies show that God is between 17 and 30 feet tall so they had no choice but to vault the ceiling that high, but the rest is a bit much.

Eventually, the ceremony was over and we moved to the reception hall where I visibly relaxed and unclenched because there was an open bar and that is a religion I can wholeheartedly believe it. In my magnanimous way, I grabbed a few scotches for the boys before asking for my rumndietcoke. The bartender shook his head. I spoke louder as if he were hard of hearing, “RUM AND DIET COKE.”

He gestured behind him at the sparse array of bottles and said, “This is what we have.” No rum. Fuck, I thought, God is pissed at my sacrilege. The bartender suggested I try something else and handed me something blue and fruity. I was dumbstruck. Defeated, I took my blue cocktail back to the table and sat pouting while Beau laughed at me.

Five minutes later I returned to the bar with a friend all the while lamenting the plight of the rumless. She told me her drink of choice was gin and Sprite but she couldn’t have too much because it gets her into trouble. Trouble you say? I ordered a round for us.

An hour later, I was dangerously flirting with Tanqueray, sending texts to Bologna about this delicious mistress. The rest of the evening flew by in a blur of gin, baby quiches, and holding my new friends’ hair back while she vomited on the sidewalk. I spent the majority of the time dancing to Polish techno with a dozen accountants. At one point I paused to wonder how I came to be spinning with my arms above my head, surrounded by stupefied bean counters but then someone told me it was time for the second dinner and this one included meatballs and I lost my train of thought.

In conclusion, gin gives you a crisper feeling hangover than rum, don’t eat a bowlful of sauerkraut when you’re drunk, and God may or may not shop in the big’n’tall men’s department of Macys.

The Show Down

When I weighed myself this morning I was a full 2.5 lbs heavier than I was yesterday, though to the best of my knowledge, I did not eat an additional 2.5 lbs of food yesterday. This is the first time in my life that I’ve religiously applied to a scale for a sense of my own self worth. If I had even casually monitored my weight in the past year, I would probably not be in this situation. I would have seen the numbers climbing and made appropriate adjustments. Instead, I scorned owning a scale in favor of owning an additional 30 lbs of woman-flesh adhered delicately to my abdomen.

I rampaged around the house taking my fury out on everything in sight: Beau for trying to drink the last of the coffee, Beau for putting his shoes up on the coffee table, Beau for not agreeing to come home early to make me dinner… mostly just Beau. I finally calmed down and conjectured that it could be either a combination of the rum cake from last night and part of Grasshoppah’s buffalo chicken wrap from yesterday’s lunch or water weight. Beau offered that perhaps I just had to take a massive pooh.

Since his idea was the only one I had any control over, I began chugging coffee as soon as I got to work to, ya know, speed things up. Finally the time came and I bustled off to my favorite bathroom stall. Mid-ya know, someone walked in: my new arch nemesis, Amy Wineouses’ Doppelganger. In Bertha’s wake, I was left with this over-kempt girl of twenty-something who appears to pull her wardrobe directly from the pages of Cosmopolitan. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Just be aware that wearing a snug vest over a long white button-down with a pencil skirt and 5-inch stilettos, pancake makeup, a jet-black bouffant, and a perpetual pout of disdain will cause me to judge you. Harshly. And on the internet.

So, it was fairly easy to identify Doppelganger when she tottered into the room in stilts and planted herself in front of the mirror where she proceeded to apply cosmetics, and, I assume, feed the raging goblins that dwell within with a mixture of heroin and Chiclets. Next, armed with a wet paper towel (yes, this much I ascertained from vigilant listening and also looking through the door gap) she seated herself in a stall somewhere to my left. Then the furious sounds of reams of toilet paper being pulled from the roll. Enough to wrap a small child in. Then silence. Then more silence.

I sat there patiently waiting for her absence in order to resume activity since there is nothing worse than a prolonged bathroom silence interrupted by a deafening plop. If you are the type of person to do this, then I must ask you to stop reading my blog and never come back. That one thing is perhaps the only thing that I find truly offensive. Pooping in a quiet room of strangers. Shudder. But I digress.

Finally, it became apparent that she was also waiting for my absence. Oh Doppelganger, don’t try to outwait me, I thought. I am a receptionist. I spend all day waiting for something to happen. If I need to spend that time waiting in a bathroom stall instead of at my desk, so be it. More to the point, I was there first and frankly, I was in the middle of something important.

Happily, she did her thing and vacated. I won. With just 10 days left at this job, I have finally triumphed in a bathroom that was a battleground for a year and a half: coworkers trying to discuss paperwork while we were both otherwise occupied, creepy Indian ladies trespassing in the buffer stall, Bertha’s digestive stench. Today, 2 weeks from my permanent departure, I am victorious. I am also probably 2.5 pounds lighter.

Logic of the Year Award

Scene: AIM conversation during business hours

Unspecified Friend: I'm sleepy

Dangerous K: are you stoned again?

Unspecified Friend: nope, I've stopped smoking!

Dangerous K: like on principle or because you ran out of weed?

Unspecified Friend: weeeeeeeell...both

Her Bags Are Packed, She's Ready To Go

Three years ago while studying abroad in Oxford I met Notorious, Face, and Grasshoppah. Since then, we’ve referred to ourselves as The Quatro (yes, we named our foursome and shame on Carrie Bradshaw for not doing the same). Those three years have seen more action than a Denny’s parking lot. There have been parties, bars, street corners, gutters, fights, make ups, hugs, heart-to-hearts, laughs, and, maybe the worst of it, moves. Actually, it seems we’ve been apart more than we’ve been together since the good ol’ Oxford days. England and Arkansas robbed us of Notorious for years, London and Jersey stole me away for a time, but finally we all collected in and around Boston for a second coming of the golden age, though granted, a far tamer, more gentle version. Alas, once again, a member is moving on: Grasshoppah leaves us on Saturday for western Massachusetts. In homage to our wise, advice-giving, ever patient, understanding, and empathetic friend, I give you a pictorial representation of Grasshoppah through the years (we'll miss you hon!):

Me, Face, and Grasshoppah on New Year's Eve 2008

Grasshoppah playing drunken Jenga with the German

Grasshoppah and Notorious talking in the gardens at Oxford

Face, Notorious, and Grasshoppah clubbing in England

The Quatro in Scotland

Grasshoppah and me, showing the love at our favorite bar

'Hoppah, consider it a going away present that I didn't post the innumerable pictures that I have of you passed out on various bar stools, kitchen counters, sofas, and assorted ditches. Now go get into trouble where we can't keep an eye on you and come back soon!

There’s One in Every Neighborhood

I was not pleased at 7:30 this morning when my doorbell rang. First of all, I have a doorbell? Second, I was halfway through an iced coffee watching the morning news in my pajamas. Third, Beau was in the shower still so I couldn’t send him downstairs to answer it.

Since the butler was busy, I trounced down two flights of stairs picking at the wedgie my booty shorts were giving me (I only wear them in the privacy of my own home and that is my prerogative), hoping to God that this wasn’t a religious official trying to convert me when I was still braless and thereby, at my most defensive. Through the glass in the front door, I saw a very shabbily dressed older gentleman. I cracked the door and said, “Can I help you?” in a tone that best conveyed my intended message “Get the fuck off my porch.”

As he opened his bearded face to explain exactly why he was still standing on my landlord’s New York Times, I was overwhelmed with the smell of festering garbage and unwashed human. I ascertained he was homeless and come to beg tuppence of me. I was about to shut the door in his face when he said “Do you own a sports car?”

Don’t nobody threaten my baby’s convertible.

In an unprecedented move, I skipped from the usual Jersey attitude directly to the tone and demeanor of Marisa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny. It was something angry, feral, bestial, JURASSIC even and probably had a lot to do with my Cheerios getting soggy as I stood there talking to a man that appeared to have slept in a dumpster.

I cracked the door farther and barked “Yeah.” He then asked (quite politely considering my general bearing) if I could move said sports car so that they could remove a dumpster from my neighbor-across-the-street’s driveway. The car was in the way of the truck. Apparently he didn’t sleep in a dumpster, he just worked with one.

I rolled my eyes in a way I haven’t done since I was 15-years-old and gave him one last “Yeah” before slamming the door. But since I can’t drive stick, I had to run upstairs and scream to Beau (who was just getting out of the shower) that he needed to move his car because some construction guy told me so. Hell hath no fury like a Beau bothered before 8 am. I immediately started eating my Cheerios in front of the window to see if Beau ran someone over.

When he returned, I described to him the sheer grossness of the construction worker who rang our door bell. “That wasn’t part of the construction crew,” Beau responded, “That was our neighbor.” The same neighbor who left a nasty gram on the car this past winter causing me to call down the fury of coyote poop on his backyard. The same neighbor who actually confronted Beau in person once about our car being parked in front of his house instead of our house (even though at the time there were clearly no spot available on our side of the street). Yes, that neighbor has now asked that we not park in front of our own house either. And also he smells bad.

Grumble Grumble Grumble

I find it monstrously unfair that though I stayed in last night doing laundry and reading instead of imbibing my usual Thirsty Thursday quota, I have a headache. I don’t get non-hangover-induced headaches. Doesn’t happen to me. When I’m not hung over, my brain is so grateful not to be drained of all hydration that it behaves itself. Until today when it suddenly became a whiner. Shape up buddy or I’ll really give you something to cry about. It’s Friday. I’ll do it. Don’t mess around with me, Brain. I have an override button that allows me to put rumndietcokes into my mouth with or without your help as evidenced by so many previous black outs.

Really, I should probably blame Neck and not Brain because that’s where this trouble started. I have a crick from reading last night with my head in Beau’s lap. I don’t know how to threaten a neck, but I’m open to suggestions unless they involve a guillotine. That’s the only neck punishment I could think of, but it doesn’t seem fair to take disciplinary action against Shoulders and Pretty Little Face both of whom I’m sure would be marred as a result. Back to the drawing board, readers.

Speaking of Lessons Learned

As I leaned against the kitchen wall just now, fixing myself a cup of coffee and swallowing my second helping of Advil to counter my early afternoon hangover, I thought to myself, when will I learn? When will I learn that staying out half the night drinking ends the same way EVERY TIME? A small voice in my head ventured never. I may NEVER learn to curb my thirst in the interest of not feeling like pond scum the following day. I’m sure we’ve all sworn after a particularly bad night that we were never drinking again (see St. Patty’s Day 2007). I certainly have no intention of following through to a state of teetotalism but a little restraint might go a long way. Developing the ability to say “I’d love to go to another bar for more drinks after dinner, but it’s a weeknight and I’m broke” instead of “Hells fuckin’ YEAH I want a shot of tequila” would be advantageous at this juncture of my life.

Instead, here I am squinting under fluorescent lights thinking of how that plate of nachos from the Cask & Flagon circa 10 pm will manifest. Perhaps as another dimple on my already ample bottom? A third chin to keep the other two company? A pooh that waits until my commute home to try to leave the mother ship? It is a mystery.

Besides the weight gain and the hangovers, my wallet runs dry as my poor, desiccated bladder (something to keep in mind since I’ll be officially unemployed as of September 1). Yet this trifecta of reasons NOT to get drunk enough to pinky-swear that I will reread Wuthering Heights is somehow not enough to sink into my brain.

Lately, I’ve actually grown bored of the boozing lifestyle but you wouldn’t know it, would you? I whine that I want to go out for a nice adult dinner but then I’m the first one to order a rumndietcoke… or seven. I make plans for innocent day trips but then cancel on account of a hangover. If I wasn’t too lazy to go out most nights, I’d be an alcoholic by now. Apparently, sloth is my saving grace.

So, I returned to my desk with my coffee and my obstinate refusal to learn from my mistakes. And also the memory of Grasshoppah buying a steak and cheese sandwich for a homeless guy sitting outside the 7-11.

And I Haven't Learned a Damn Thing Since

Without going into any further detail, I would like to share with you a remarkable cure for the hiccups: hold onto the hiccuper’s nose until the afflication has ended. Keep a firm hold despite their attempts to shake you off, wipe snot on your hand, or get their drink back up to their mouth. For example:

Thanks, Mistress!

So, Do I Fill Out a W-4 Now or What?

Since beginning to apply for new jobs for the fall, I’ve been checking my spam filter carefully every day instead of just skimming and chuckling at such messages as “Cheap Viagra Now! Just Give Me Your Credit Card Number!” or “Brittany Spears Screws Angelina Jolie with a Gigantic Purple Dildo Shaped Like Dick Cheney.” To make absolutely sure that the companies I’m applying to aren’t getting caught in the filter (No calls today? Huh. Maybe they’re getting stuck in the spam filter. Yes. Yes, that must be it), I’ve been going through every few hours and reading the subject line of every one of those dirty emails. I've learned more about human sexuality doing this than I have in nearly 25 years of existence.

Early this afternoon while preening said filter, I happened upon a message with my entire full name in the subject line. I figured this must be the one I was looking for since I never ever EVER give out that information out on the Internet. Except to Gap, but I don’t think they count. Do they sell contact info to dirty smut peddlers? Don’t they have enough on their conscience already since all my collared shirts were made in Malaysia by the tiny, nimble fingers of 4-year-olds?

Since I wouldn’t dare accuse Gap of further indiscretions, I assumed the only people that know my real name must know it because I gave it to them. Like written in size 50 font across the top of my resume. The excitement was short lived. The e-mail went on to inform me that I have been nominated for the Montclair Registry of Who’s Who in North America which catalogues our continent’s “industry leaders” in such fields as marketing, law, healthcare, and even administration and customer service. Sadly missing from their list is a category for Receptionists Who Blog When They Ought to Be Pushing Paper and In General, Not Being a Bitch to Whoever Points That Out. I mean this in the least self deprecating, pitiful way possible: I belong on the OPPOSITE of the Who’s Who list. I belong on the Who’s Not list. Or the Who’s Chosen To Work a Crumby 9-5 Gig Instead of Starting a Career That Could Potentially Interfere with Her Drinking list.

Yet, this company (who has a seemingly legitimate website) knows my full real name. This leads me to conclude that either a) one of my friends has pranked me in which case, my hat is off to you and while we’re at it, which one of you was it? Or b) Houghton Mifflin is subtly trying to tell me that they will permit me to mop their floors.

The Post That Almost Wasn't

Remember that time I said I was going to post amusing stories and pictures on Sunday or Monday? Remember when I didn’t do that? Remember when I used to not lie to you?

Me neither.

In a nutshell: We drove to Jersey, I got drunk with my bestest friend in the world, Lulu, while having a very serious heart to heart about how I have no professional future, left early in the morning for the family reunion, nearly vomited on the Verrazano Bridge, recovered over a ham sandwich at my uncle and aunt’s house, maintained stomach composure as we drove an hour deeper into Long Island, ate lots of Italian food, watched my cousin get drunk, threw her kids around in the pool, listened to my family badger Beau about proposing to me, ate some more things that accidentally wandered close to my mouth, nearly had an anxiety induced brain aneurism as a result of the horrible drivers careening around the highway on the way home, fell asleep at 10 pm, ate a bagel in the morning, and followed a massive thunderstorm all the way back to Boston which nearly resulted in a second anxiety induced brain aneurism.

Nothing all that eventful happened and I forgot to take pictures so instead, I have prepared the following pictographic representation of my weekend (click for a bigger version):

I used to use that clever version of “The End” to conclude all my homework assignments in elementary school. I might start signing off my work emails that way.

A Whole Gaggle O' Trouble

I'm down in Jersey for the weekend. Will update on Sunday or Monday with pictures and stories from the Dangerous family reunion!

The One That Got Away

Scene: Driving down the Cape on Saturday morning.

Dangerous K: I have one of those itchy boogers.

Beau: So pick it.

Dangerous K: [said with finger in nose] I am.

Beau: People in other cars can see you.

Dangerous K: [rooting around] I don't care. Let them watch. I'm going to flick a booger at the next car that cuts us off.

Beau: No, you're not [quietly searching for child locks]

Dangerous K: Oh yes I am. BINGO! Got it! [opens glove box looking for emergency stash of tissues which are conspicuously missing while admiring nose gold]

Beau: Don't you DARE wipe that on my car!

Dangerous K: I'm not going to. Give me a little credit. I'm just looking for a tissue [fruitless search continues until Brain Child occurs] I’ll just put it in the garbage bag! [arm cranes around seat in search of sack of lunch remnants. Pause. Eyes widen]

Beau: You wiped it on my car.

Dangerous K: I did not wipe it on your car.

Beau: You fucking wiped your booger on my convertible!

Dangerous K: I did not wipe it on your convertible!

Beau: Then what is that face for?

Dangerous K: [turning to peer behind seat] I’m just not sure where it went…

Beau: YOU LOST YOUR BOOGER IN MY AUDI TT?!

Dangerous K: [still rummaging behind seat] No, no. I just misplaced it. Temporarily.

Beau: How did you lose something like that?

Dangerous K: It just kind of fell. Before I was ready.

Beau: You find that booger.