I am not Amused

Do you hear that world?  I am not amused!

Thing hugely horrible went wrong in the past 24 hours, but enough small things have driven me to consume a respectable amount of pasta, cheesy garlic bread, and wine.  Sure, the wine was in a Pabst's Blue Ribbon mug and the rest was, well, dinner, but I seriously considered buying two different cheese cakes and consuming them both.

Let's start from the beginning.  I use Feline Pine, which is a flushable cat litter.  Last night while cleaning up after my cats, my toilet overflowed.  I was annoyed when I had to use a new clean towel to clean up the mess, AND now that freaking towel has been hanging up the entire day and it's no less damp.

Fast forward a few hours and I wake up at 3 a.m. holding my cookie.*  I discover a big ass bug bite the size of a Milk Dud.  Ninety minutes later, when I actually had to get up for work, I notice that the bite is still there (albeit smaller) and I realize that it's most likely a spider bite.

Mother fucker!

The most action that my cookie's seen in over 13 months, and it's a mother fucking spider.  Not cool!

After getting ready and making the magic that is my glorious face happen, I realize that I'm a couple of minutes late heading out the door.  So, I walk a littler faster than usual and the first thing I notice is that the seam of my pants is fighting with the spider bite.

At work, things are busier than usual.  About 12 people show up who aren't expected, and it's too early for their contacts to be in the office.  In short, it's a cluster.

Mid-morning rolls around and two people show up with a project for me.  Listen, I love actually working while at work.  The fact that there's so much down time in my current position is one of the many reasons I'm so excited to possibly move on. 

The problem trying to work through that this particular project is an employee benefits informational packet I spent six weeks working on last spring.  I pool resources.  I developed and elaborated upon topics, and eventually developed one document.   I wrapped up everything by June and passed it on so the higher ups could decide if they wanted to make any changes or even use it.

Last month these two particular people called me into their office and reclaimed all of the original documents I had used as resources, so that they could be given to new hires.  This morning they come down and tell me that they need me to change 70 pages of fonts, font sizes, line spacing, and to undo what the company's style guide had directed me to capitalize. 

It wouldn't have been a problem if I could have just hit select all and made the same changes to the entire document.  However, because there are headings, subheadings, Excel documents that had been imported, graphs and images that also needed to be changed, and it just kept going.  Oh, and did I mention that my deadline was less that 24 hours, because they had run out of every single one of the  new hire benefit packets that the company had been using for the last seven years?

The good news is that I'm almost done with that little project.  My retinas feel as though they have been burnt by staring through the computer screen all day, my bug bite is a little smaller, and at least I'm not spending the day cutting ribbon, which is exactly what I did one day last week.

Okay, and now for the really good news.  It's not a sure thing, but over the last two weeks I have been through five interviews for a new position with my company.  All five gave me the thumbs up, and now the decision rests with the HR Department.  I'm cautiously optimistic, because at this point it's a toss up.  My wishful thinking is enough to keep me from drinking multiple bottles of wine or exchanging my laundry money for baked goods, or worse of all - mouthing off to the people who gave me this little copy editing, because these same people have given my manager additional reasons to question whether she should recommend me for this other position.  Yes, I'm talking about any and all of the issues I've already described in a previous post.

All I can really say is - I am not amused.  Okay, maybe a little.

* Yes, I'm talking about my vagina.  I'm trying a pet name for it.  Mostly because I like saying, "All the boys want to get their hands on my cookie."

You know - It's kind of like Midgets

My parents divorced while I was in high school.  It was a horribly arduous process that lasted more than two years, and included allegations of child molestation, tens of thousands of dollars spent on something similar to counseling at Scientology centers both in Oregon and California, and let’s not leave out the attorney’s fees and court costs.  In the end, the situation was so convoluted that my parents had to be married again before their divorce could be granted. 

Yes, that whole mess is the basis for my most of my abandonment and intimacy issues, and my feelings toward the institution of marriage.

Before the shit really hit the fan there was one week where my household was eerily calm.  My parents had stopped talking to each other, which also brought a stop to the nightly shouting matches* scheduled for after all of us kids had gone to bed. 

My mother had moved out of her marital bed and onto my trundle bed.  Since I was 14-years-old at the time, I asked the question dreaded by all divorcing parents.  I asked my mother why.  I mean, she had already made it through 18 years of marriage – why was she throwing in the towel now?  The only answer she had was that all of the small things had added up.

I didn’t understand it then, but I get it now.  Like A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, life is made up of all the little things.  They can be good or bad, but by their very nature they are not life shattering or career making.  However, they breathe life into your day or maybe a little heat into your workout.

The little things that do not make me happy:

5)  Boys on eHarmony who don’t know the difference between “to” and “too,” and/or fail to capitalize proper nouns

4)  Seeing pictures of newborn pandas – if worms and salamanders were able to breed, I’m sure the offspring would look something like newborn pandas.

3)  Seeing pictures or video of a cat with two faces – I’m glad that you have a home and you do look happy, but your face looks like something out of one of my nightmares.

2)  Telemarketers who call back – after you’ve told them you’re not interested – just to hang up on you.

1)  The person or company who has called me 17 times in the past two weeks from 503.914.1318 and not left a message.  I tried to call you back from a different phone, and a prerecorded message told me that no one had been assigned to that number.  If you’re a ghost in the machine, consider yourself on notice – we’re officially in a fight.

Little things that do make me happy:

5)  Using the restroom at work and finding the toilet water blue

4)  Watching a video of bear cubs wrestling – they could be puppies or weird shaped monkeys, but they’re bear cubs and they’re adorable.

3)  Photos of giant panda cubs – I love the fact that it looks like one of them fell asleep in the middle of playing ball and that another one is up and ready for action.

2)  Taking the first drink of soda, and feeling the cold bubbling lava rush down my throat

1)  Seeing a skinny woman with bra and/or panty lines

*Take your pick of topic: The legal battle over their chiropractic clinic’s billing procedures was only a few years behind them, as well as the accompanying money problems so bad that my paternal grandparents would regularly come down to “visit” us (see: drop off groceries).  My mother had just been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and was starting to lose her ability to walk without the aid of crutches.  My father was convinced that my mother was cheating on him with a karate instructor (they did end up dating, and it was just an added bonus when he was convicted of child molestation years later).