As of the end of this month, my student loan is officially out of default. w00t!!!
Many, many other good things on the horizon as well. Job’s good, heart’s doing fine — maybe both are better than fine. Days like today are a reward for the darker ones that came before them.
I could just dance.
*cabbage-patching in the office chair*
Now streaming: DJ Colette, “What Would She Do For Love (Kaskades Big Room Mix)”:
[audio:DJcolette_WhatWillSheDoForLove.mp3]
I have a blog category called “Better Left Unsaid” for a reason — because I shouldn’t admit shit like this.
Today after I drove to work, I fell asleep at the wheel, literally.
As of somewhere around 10 a.m. today, I had already worked 40 hours. It’s Thursday. And I have to work a convention tomorrow and Saturday.
Either I have to work faster, do more stuff half-assed, quit volunteering for more stuff or ask for a raise. 🙂 But seriously, I parked the car around 10:30 a.m., put my head down on my hand that was still on the steering wheel, and conked the fuck out.
The last song I remembered was the remix of Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” and when I came to, the CD was on Jamiroquai’s “Seven Days in Sunny June.” That meant I totally missed the song between the two, Holly Cole’s “Make it Go Away.”
And for the equally anal-retentive, why yes I DO burn my CDs alphabetically by artist. I used to arrange songs by theme but fuck, that takes effort. (Incidentally, a Nick Lachey tune was next, if you really need to know what I’m listening to these days. “Run to Me.”)
No big, I guess — I’ve had a schedule like this for five years. Once you set the precedent, you can never break out of it. I just wish I had more to show for it other than high blood pressure, missed dental appointments, abandoned relationships, a propensity to break into hives practically on command and an eating disorder. No wonder the hair around my face (which is mostly blonde) has more silver shining through than I’d care to admit. Other than that, life is grand. 😉
I just finished listening to the audiobook version of “The Devil Wears Prada.” I’d bought the book a few years ago but either sold it or tossed it off the balcony or lined the litterbox with it (or Maddie probably took a dump on it, like she does everything else. That brat defiled the house last night. New carpet! Ruined!!!)
Anyway, the audiobook was read by Rachel Leigh Cooke, known best (or only. Whichever) for her role in the Freddie Prinze movie “She’s All That.” And my whole problem with that movie is the same issue I took with the silver-screen adaptation of “Devil,” which was that in “She’s All That,” Rachel goes from the biggest, “ugliest” dork in school to the prom queen (or whatever. I am not looking up details) simply by taking off her damn glasses and putting on clothes that fit.
In “Devil” you’ve got a beautiful Anne Hathaway who is frowned upon for not being able to afford a designer wardrobe as a just-out-of-college executive assistant. She gets a “makeover” by someone brushing the tangles out of her hair and replacing her Gap crap with Chanel couture. Woo. It’s pretty hard to believe the ugly-duckling storyline when you’ve got fundamentally attractive actors who only get/need a five-minute makeover. Sorry, but it’s NOT HARD to make over a person who’s a size 2. Gah.
But I have to admit I liked the audiobook version. I’d had an initial impression of the author/main character having too much of a sense of entitlement to all the finer things she received, but you know what? I remember being 22 and working for the woman I called “The Cuntess.” I remember her summoning me into her office, handing me a piece of paper and telling me to go photocopy it. Never mind that she had a copier/printer/fax right next to her fucking desk — I had to run down the hall (out of her sight) to make her the single photocopy, whereupon she’d put a Post-It Note on it and have me run it upstairs or across town to City Hall because god forbid the bitch could send a goddamned interoffice e-mail on our motherfucking Intranet.
Grr.
But yeah, I remember being so fresh-faced and edumucated and idealistic and shit, and she did nothing but stomp on my pretty little head full of pretty little ambitions. I stayed with her seven months until the verbal harassment from her top assistant drove me over the goddamned edge. I filed a grievance and gave one week’s notice with nary a backup job in sight. I remember when one of the reporters we worked with published a huge expose on what a fraud The Cuntess was/is/will always be. And my job included cutting articles out of the newspaper, pasting them onto letter-sized sheets and distributing them to key players in the agency. I GLEEFULLY shared that article with the world. I think I put one in every employee’s box that day. Fuck, I still have it in my portfolio because I never wanted to lose it — it was the one day in seven months that I LOVED my job there!
So, I think the author didn’t necessarily feel entitled to anything other than salvaging her dignity. When you sign up for a job, you tend to forget that they have to impress you right back. Many of us take an opportunity not because it’s perfect, but because the last one was so bad or it’s better than nothing at all, and we all just try to get the experience and put in that year and just try to survive it. But we don’t start out that way. We start out wanting to savor it, milk it for all it’s worth and learn some new skills to show off to the next employer. And I think that’s all the author really tried to do, as she struggled with watching her free time and her loved ones fall through her fingers.
In the book, she doesn’t live with her boyfriend (as she does in the movie) but lives with her best friend, who becomes an alcoholic and gets a DUI and that’s how “Andy” leaves Paris — she needs to get home and she’s been demeaned by “Miranda” just enough to make her realize that something’s got to give. I hated the friend (“Lily”) storyline in the audiobook until I realized it had to do with the ending. I guess it served to humanize Andy, although I don’t see where it’s her job to act as hostage negotiator/warden/nanny. Then again, at that age, I was definitely my own version of Andy, so I guess I shouldn’t complain. 😉
I have to say that while I loved the movie because it’s just fucking good, I liked the “book” better. The ending rocked. Andy goes into the Elias-Clarke building one last time, not as the frazzled assistant with four cups of Starbucks that will never be hot enough for the raging bitch upstairs (did she ever hear of a microwave?) who’s balancing the woman’s dry-cleaning and other stuff she herself is above carrying, but instead as a woman going to meet the editor of another publication to discuss a freelance writing project. The guard motions to the new girl who is doing the frustrating juggling act, and Andy is now a poised, happy, welcome guest in the building and not the slave/peon/second-class citizen she used to be. Those shoes were too tight for her to wear and now someone else has to fill them.
I think the book or, at least, those of us who can relate to it, has the potential to discuss the forward actions of bosses from hell. I mean, “Miranda” admits that people work for her for a year and go on to better positions. Wouldn’t she want to treat her staff well so that they’d stay with her? I mean, her impatience to me clearly stems from expecting that they should psychically know what she wants at all times. She gets bored with having to ask them for what she wants so she just terrorizes them into guessing. I would think that if you’d cultivate a good relationship with someone, you’d keep them for a few years and you actually could achieve that easy, effortless relationship. But when you’re making people despise you, you’re damn lucky they’re not playing pranks on you.
Not saying I ever did that. Nope, not sayin’ that at all. Never. Nope. Nah. Well. … 😉
Anyway, that’s my summer “read.” The girl who used to read a book a week, then a book a month, now a book every year, is now doing one audiobook a year. I guess I’m a fine one to talk about having no life. 🙂 Pass me the marriage certificate, as I’ve been living in sin with my employment establishment. Luckily, the devil isn’t a devil and they don’t wear Prada, but I definitely have to. …
So, I got invited to sit at the big-kids’ table today. The view isn’t bad. Not bad at all. …
I have a funny story from it, though, because it’s not like anything ever goes that smoothly for me. I was joking with Important Person that I was trying to buy him a new domain name but couldn’t find one I wanted, so I decided on “WeHeart(his name)FanClub.” He looked at me strangely and said, “Uh, I hope not,” and walked away.
It occurred to me five minutes later that he might have thought I’d said “WeHATE(name)FanClub.” Whoops!
I swear to god, that’s why I need to just hide in my little corner. My verbal ability at the crack o’moi is clearly overestimated ’round these parts! 🙂
As I was doing my usual, “Oh, yeah. It’s 4:30. Guess I should shove my lunch in the microwave,” I realized that I probably couldn’t tell the difference between eating the Lean Cuisine or the box it came in.
And I suppose it defeats the purpose to eat said Lean Cuisine and make a subsequent trip to the vending machine for something a little more flavorful. And filling. 😉
Y’all know I carry my girly products in my bra because I rarely wear pockets. (Blazers are to be left on the back of one’s chair, damn it.) So today I shoved some supplies (I didn’t need them — it was a “just in case” scenario) in the ol’ boulder-holder, per the usual.
Well, I was washing my hands when I saw said items THROUGH my light-pink dress shirt. I’d sort of stuck them between the girls instead of in a cupholder (ha!) and BOY were those bitches visible. I skulked back to my desk holding my ID card directly over that area of my chest until I got back to my desk. Yoy.
It’s a good thing I work with a department full of men, because I know better than to tell them about it. But y’all are captive to this kind of shit. Aren’t you lucky!!!
I grouse about having to be all-business-attire, all-the-time (especially when we have those 12-hours-on-our-feet days, which are around the corner again). Yet the people who clean my apartment building are always in skirts and sweaters and otherwise-dressy clothes — by their own choice. Bizarre.
One would think that if they could wear a nice pair of comfy cotton jeans and some non-chafing shoes, they would. Not that I don’t love dressing up, but I prefer to do it for myself and not because someone’s going to be mad at me if I don’t. I think jeans and heels are lovely together and would wear them seven days a week of my own accord. But insisting that one stuff one’s ass into pantyhose and then into a binding suit and then into three-inch heels every day for the rest of her life is downright cruel.
Speaking of, time to go choose an outfit to hate for the next 10 hours. …
Nate was my buddy during Sabre’s moving day yesterday. (Yes, that’s a “Hooters” lanyard on him!) He’s very quiet and calm but supposedly fussy with others. I agreed to entertain him for a few minutes and he really took to me. I always seem to get along best with baby boys — here’s to hoping that when the day comes that I have one (and I stress, ONE), it’s a little lad.
A bunch of colleagues came together to pitch in for the move. It either says something about our workplace or our work ethic in that we knew each other on sight, but I’d never had a conversation with any of them before. To say we bust our butts and burn the midnight oil is an understatement. If we could have Port-a-Potties in our offices, we’d never have to emerge from them!!! In any event, I am impressed by the quality of people I’m surrounded by. I’m also sort of reminded that for as hard as some days get, I really do have a damn good situation in comparison to most others. *bows before the Goddess for that one*
Insofar as the big move, I don’t envy our dear Sabre, but I do wish her lots of love and luck and happiness in her new abode!!!
Between not having any time to post and having a bizzitch of a time logging into this fucking site, boy am I behind in my bitching. But then again? It’s OK. Really. I always love to deconstruct things so that I can cope and let go of them. But there’s something to be said for denial or outright avoidance. Whee oblivion!
But the title of this entry made me laugh my ass off. Wait, nope, *poke* — still there. Damn it. Oh, and ow.
But enough about me. Let me wish the Carnival of the Recipes a happy centennial! (I hosted No. 98 and No. 72) Trub did a spectacular job rounding up readers to round up their favorite Carnival moments.
My favorite? Dogshit Nachos. Never mind how bloody god-awful it looks, but the name cracks me up every time. Yes, I’m aware I’m still in the second grade! I’ve wanted to serve up a nice shit souffle to some of my least favorite people, but this seems much more doable, given that I really don’t need to clean up after any errant pet droppings to make it possible.
Speaking of pet droppings, Maddie wiped her ass on my voter registration card. Big wet shit streak on it and the surrounding carpet. I’d be angry but honestly, if it’s her way of saying our elected officials can be asswipes, I’d be inclined to agree! 😉
