Caterwauling

*updated*

That’s what Shawn and I did on Saturday. I literally came home, curled up on my bed and fell into a four-hour coma.

Yesterday, I sat in the sun for one friggin’ hour, talking to my mom while I was at my favorite park, and I am one Crispy Critter today. Sheesh. My hair is blonde (without dye, thanks much) and everything else is red. And freckled. But mostly red and painful. Ouchie, ouchie!

Wrote a brilliant article last night on workplace violence. Here’s to wondering if the Veggie Patchers will be horrified by it. I may post it here at a later date, for anyone who’s thinking about going postal. 🙂

I have a screaming tension headache and migraine today. Yes, I have both. I nearly mowed down four pedestrians as I sped to McDonald’s for yet another culinary bounty of hell. I figured, shit, it was already 9:20 a.m. — why not be even more late to work? It never fails to amaze me, though, how many people will cross a six-lane highway with their heads in the clouds. Don’t they realize that I have no value whatsoever for human life? I think one of the guys I wanted to kill today, I nearly wiped him out last week as he again wandered across the street and stopped in his tracks when he heard my brakes squealing. Dumbass. If this headache doesn’t go away, I’ll probably wipe the sidewalks with him on my way home.

Now, off to fight with my Elite XL printer — three sets of tabloid-size proofs need to come out. This should take till noon. 🙂

Update

So we busted our humps to get a proof ready for this morning (almost a full day early), and Cruise Director called off. Gaah! He was the reason we hurried and ended up leaving out some stuff that wasn’t done. Something tells me that he’s going to exercise his pithy authority and not let me go to press on time this week — I still haven’t seen his column, nor any edits to the Word documents full of articles that I gave him to date.

My head is pounding. I think today is a go-home-early kind of day.

Favorite “Sex and the City” quotes, both from our beloved Samantha Jones:

“It’s TGI Fuck Day!”

“It’s pathetic how far a gal will go for a good fuck.”

Jerry Jerrod, the waiter who quit his job to make $30/week as an actor, is now the dashing and debonair Smith Jerrod, the off-Broadway actor whose stardom in “New Moon” had him mooning us lucky viewers with that squeezable ass of his. *yum*

Carrie asked the age-old question about whether men can truly stand it when a female is more successful than him. My personal answer is *no,* having dated guys both within and outside of whatever companies I’ve worked in, and they’ve all had a problem with authority outside of the bedroom, if I happened to be the one making more money. At any rate, Carrie corroborated my predicament when Burger lost his two-book option, due to dismal sales of the first one — meanwhile, she scored a $21K advance for the European publishing rights to her book, and she treated herself and Burger to Prada, which made him way uncomfortable and a tad bit unbearable.

See, that’s why you never date somebody in the same field as you. If one’s career is soaring and the other is swirling around the sewers of the Hudson River, faking an orgasm is infinitely easier than faking excitement over the other person’s career, especially when yours is the one on the speeding bullet train to hell. 🙂

Miranda got suckered into helping Steve to bake cupcakes for what she assumed would be for the baby’s playground friends. Oh, but no. She helped to bake 20 cupcakes for Steve’s new girlfriend’s birthday — 20 to spell out “Happy Birthday Debbie.” To die! I would have slipped chocolate Ex-Lax or diaper remnants into them somehow. She found out too late to leave gracefully, and then when he left to go to work, she called Carrie for support. Carrie advised her to put the icing down and to leave. She told Miranda to say she had a baby emergency — and isn’t that what babies are for?

Poor Carrie got stuck riding on Burger’s motorcycle to Smith Jerrod’s big naked premiere in Brooklyn — Carrie looked lovely in her black-and-brown Prada dress and the four-foot-long purse with the bangle handles, but she looked like crap when she took off her helmet and was about to be photographed by the paparazzi. But, she reasoned, you have to go along with whatever the sagging male ego dictates, in order to keep the peace. But they did have a minor blowout, and Burger ended up leaving. But luckily, the ever-charming Stanford Blatch, her loving “gay husband,” came out of nowhere to be her escort and to take Burger’s seat.

Charlotte met Carrie’s Prada salesman, which she’d originally protested because he’s not Jewish. Poor Charlotte. It seems a waste to have given up her religion for a guy who ran screaming. I feel like Harry will come crawling back eventually. They always do, when they realize what a treasure they’d lost. 😉 Although we need to figure out how to make Steve get rid of Dipshit and realize that Miranda is too uber-fabulous for him to let get away from him.

Samantha was just pleased as punch to have given Smith Jerrod and his play a fine Manhattan-esque publicity buildup, and she was shocked in the end that — in addition to a beautiful naked dick to watch throughout the play, he could actually act. He’s a pretty boy, and definitely easy on my eyes! What I wouldn’t have given to have been privy to the *full frontal* view!!! 😉

"Lisa, if you don’t like your job, you don’t
strike. You just go in every day and do it
really half-assed. That’s the American
way!" Well, you’re really really lazy. You
manage to get by, but you never put any effort
into anything you do. You most likely enjoy
watching TV, sleeping, eating, and doing stuff
of the sort. Get active. You’re a fat, lazy
idiot.

Which Advice Quote said by Homer Simpson are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Quiz link via A Small Victory.

1. When was the last time you cheated?

Surprisingly, never. I am fully committed to whichever loser is in my life. Unless you count the one time when I was screwing three different guys at the same time, but we all knew things weren’t exclusive. And I was just about to leave Pittsburgh at the time anyway, so why the hell not screw everyone in sight? 😉

2. When was the last time you stole?

Um, Shawn and I were klepto when we were kids. I’ll never forget the $800 worth of crap that we took from Walt Disney World in 1996. I even had a policeman trailing me as I stole a Minnie Mouse shotglass. Thanks to that trip, I own more than 70 shot glasses, 60 of which probably came from there. 🙂

3. When was the last time you lied?

The only time I lie is when I say that I am fine or that I will be fine. I hate pity, and I never want anyone to know how much I am hurting.

4. When was the last time you broke or vandalized another’s property?

I’ve broken into a few apartment buildings in my life, but that was more to stalk or snoop. Although I did use Shawn’s ex-boyfriend Dustin’s toothbrush to clean the toilet, but that was after Dustin pissed in my Paul Mitchell shampoo bottle.

5. When was the last time you hurt a loved one?

If I did it, it was inadvertently. I’m not sure what’s going on with the world, but we’re all so damned touchy anymore (I include myself in this statement). And I never truly tell people how much they’ve hurt me, when they’ve done it, so I can only imagine that people may not be giving me the full story to any acts of assholitry that I might have committed. And this is assuming that I’ve hurt their feelings. Physically hurting someone, well, I might have sucker punched a few people in my day, and there was that time I Maced Shawn in Alan’s car back in 1994. … 😉

I’m getting old before my time.

The paper is stressing me out, the impending move is stressing me out and everywhere I turn, I find something to stress me out.

But I’ll figure it out.

I need a fucking massage. You could hit my back and shoulders with a sledgehammer, and they couldn’t possibly hurt any more than they already do.

I was pissed off because at work, we found that Cruise Director blatantly lied to us. He stressed that, during budget cuts, our leadership really took a big hit and canceled a huge (costly) meeting, reducing their two annual meetings to one. But when the president was in my office today, he referenced the fact that I should really cover those two meetings. I quizzed him and said, “Oh, there are two?” and he said sure, there are always two and will continue to be.

That really irked me. So, essentially, we were fooled. And we found it rather odd that we were not given handouts of the PowerPoint presentation on the budget … and now we know why, because it was FALSE!

What else has we been bamboozled about?

Had a lovely chat with Susan, much of which revolved around another fucked-up workplace … the one I left before coming to this one. Incoherent Twit finally quit and is gone, and Susan bet her annual salary (to HRP’s sister) that if Twit had left a lot sooner, I never would have left. Not only that, but that I would raised a shitload more money than Twit ever could have (because I was a damn skilled and competent fund raiser).

The Twit story was like a Candyland board. Apparently she applied for welfare benefits before she was done with the job, and she also filed for unemployment. I never heard of someone who put so much effort into wasting time. When Susan got a call from the welfare office, she informed the gal that, actually, Twit had some serious vacation pay and medical benefits coming to her through the end of July, and the gal said that she’d heard a very different story.

So then, Twit was talking to Excoriated White Boy (oh, how I miss him!), saying that she planned to collect unemployment for six months, until she felt like going back to work again. She said she planned to sit around the house and enjoy it (note that she just bought a house and now has no income to pay for it). Muahaha. Like Tiff said, would you really quit a job when you have a mortgage to pay?

But then again, Twit was banking on the social liberals to fund her life of leisure. Hah! I’m so glad I don’t pay taxes in her state anymore — I’d seriously have to file a complaint. And cry. A lot.

God, we really miss Excoriated White Boy. Tiff and I just waxed poetic about how friendly and truly caring he is — he’s the type of guy who, no matter how badly HRP had excoriated him, would put on a genuine smile about you and ask how you were doing. Not only that, he would remember something you had told him that was happening in your life or that you were working on, and he would ask very detailed questions. He made you feel like your activities were truly important and interesting. Susan, give him a BIG hug from us Virginia girls!!! 😉

In Twit’s resignation letter, she claimed she was quitting for emotional reasons. I’d joked several conversations ago with Susan, asking, “What? Wasn’t casework agreeing with her?” Whereupon Susan said, “Apparently, work wasn’t agreeing with her.” The Two Strikes crew, after two years, finally realized that she had no talent in fund raising or communications, so they moved her to a lower-paying casework job that actually required her by law to visit families and do paperwork. Gaah!

They found out that the so-called registered nurse on staff (who provided nursing services and medication monitoring) is not, in fact, a nurse. At all. Christ, I raised a lot of money for their clinic, and a lot of it was contingent on the medical personnel. They’ll be lucky if, after their audit on Tuesday, that they won’t be asked to reimburse the foundations. But they have bigger problems — with the last two months’ of paperwork being undone and the concurrent firing of Non-Nurse, so we won’t mention that possibility to them. Sssshhh. 😉

I had a great interview with someone today about when employees are about to go postal. Nobody intervenes when people are becoming frustrated — so they get more and more frustrated till they explode like a Zambelli fireworks display. Like my interviewee said, quite intuitively, “People are getting really tired of sacrificing their lives for their jobs/employers, when, inevitably, their employers can and will sacrifice them.”

That last part is something I want you to read again and again. Don’t make work your life. Don’t let it spill into your personal time (yes, I know, I’m the worst offender). Get your cackles about work, like I do (of course!), but don’t give up living and enjoying and spending time with people and at places you love. Because, as long as you work for someone else, it truly does always pay the same.

And to hear that Solitaire, Town Crier and everyone who works with them got a 4 percent raise — when I am doing three jobs and only got a 3 percent raise — really burns my toaster strudels. What, are they going to give 4 percent more effort, or is it that they only GIVE 4 percent effort? Perhaps, then, I should only give 3 percent effort myself. One of these days. Just not today. Or this month. 🙂

So, Shan and I have yet another business venture — a relocation/welcome wagon/career coaching project. We want to help people to relocate to D.C./NOVA. Whaddaya think? I think it’s viable. But then again, who the hell has time to do anything besides the job that’s actually (albeit barely) paying the bills? 😉

I had a great story interview this morning, and as soon as that was over, the Veggie Patch president dropped by to meet with me, which was very productive. Then, one of our past presidents (from decades ago), with whom I’ve had a terrific telephone relationship, came to visit with me. We had a fabulous discussion about all kinds of stuff — we are both visionaries, and we feed off of each other. Then, when I went to grab coffee, and I ran into another former president, one whom I’d interviewed on the phone a few months back. He was another charmer, and I just reveled in the energy and deep concern for practitioners in our field. Those are the kinds of people who keep me schlepping my miserable ass back to the Veggie Patch every day — those are the people who are grateful for my time and attention and willingness to provide a good service.

I have more swriling around that I can’t talk about here, so I have to go retreat into my already-cluttered head to figure it out. 🙂 Posting will be light for awhile.

Although the phrase “furlough days” sounds like it should be a festival or a clearance bonanza at your favorite store, it is actually the bomb that dropped on Veggie Patch staff today. Yes, it’s official — we will have six unpaid days during the next fiscal year. If things get better for us financially, it will be reduced to three. If things get worse, well, we’re preparing for more.

Through a two-hour managers’ meeting and then a staff meeting, we got the lowdown on how bad things are financially. In the former meeting, there was much spirited discussion coming from the finance director and several others, all of which left Cruise Director looking tired. You could perceive that Finance Guy was less than thrilled with the land of furloughs, even though they were strategically spaced out and placed next to paid holidays, thus extending our weekends.

There were other cuts, such as the employer match on the pension plan, the elimination of most consulting roles and the usual rah-rah about saving money wherever possible. I hear this. I am on board with all of this. Luckily, I am still allowed to hire help, but I am the only one right now with that fortune.

But, I just got off the phone with Finance Guy, whom I called to thank for his comments and his unfailing support of staff. He made great points (most of which were squelched or sidestepped by Cruise Director) about lost productivity for those staff members who are already busting their humps (and yes, he knows only a select few of us really fit into that category). He threw out lots of numbers — that why is it that only five percent of our members attend our annual convention. What are we doing to get people to attend? Why spend so much money on so few people? And what are we doing to increase membership in general, because it’s dropping and, therefore, convention attendance will drop accordingly.

He also made a great point, along with Ethics Boy, that we aren’t doing squat in the way of P.R. and getting the people who aren’t joining — or who aren’t renewing their memberships — to know who we are and why they and we will mutually benefit from a membership with us. They noted that every last one of us are sitting on talents, skills and ideas that could be contributing to the financial success of this place, but nobody’s asking and nobody’s listening and nobody’s coordinating these efforts.

This, my friends, is where I went off on the phone with Finance Guy. I said, look, I have a piss-poor excuse for a supervisor who clearly indicated on my performance review that I need to quit offering suggestions about the whole of the Veggie Patch and just concentrate on my job. She also told me to my face, no fewer than six times and in no uncertain terms, that I will NEVER do public relations for this company. I told him that words and actions like that break my heart a little more every day, and I am finding it easier to not reach out and help, even though that help is obviously needed. I said people like me are sitting on skills that could very well perpetuate this place out of its deficit, but we have no outlet for our thoughts, and certainly no one is asking for them, either.

He was blown away and said damn, I should work for him, because if I were giving him suggestions and guidance for the overall benefit of the organization, he’d promote me in a heartbeat — he loves global thinkers. But, alas, he said the cream of the crop always rises to the top, and he encouraged me to hang in there and do what I’m doing, and I will continue to make a difference. And furthermore, he finds it appalling that talking to my supervisor is parallel to talking to a brick wall, and he agrees that certain people (i.e., Demure) are so set in their ways of what they think “should” be that they can’t handle it when people are ready to move and change without and despite her. He said they’re afraid, and that really, their fear is a roadblock that we can’t afford to not move around.

So, all in all, he gives Shan and me hope that there is ONE person in power who *gets* it. (Private to the Caterwauling hacienda is that he’d rather see us let Solitaire go than furlough the whole crew — it would save the same amount of salary dollars.)

The management portion of the day was kind of funny, at least to this participant. For as many furlough days as we (the staff in general) end up biting, Cruise Director said he will take twice as many. Finance Guy shot up his hand and said, look, we already can’t get any time with you and this is a time when we need more guidance and teamwork than ever, so that’s just crap that you’ll be gone even more than you already are. (Sidenote: Cruise Director leaves every day around 1:30 or 2. Sure, he does work at home at nights, but you’re SOL if you can’t get him. For instance, I need him to approve $40K in print house and postage expenditures, and I need that money ASAP, or we won’t have a paper this month. Do you THINK I will get my paperwork back in enough time for Finance to cut a check? The Caterwauling Magic 8-Ball says “Not Fucking Likely.”)

But I sidetracked. In response to the clear bullet that he ain’t never around, Cruise Director said, reluctantly, “I’ll still be here on those days.” But you know that this was said to appease Finance Guy and the rest of us, not because he was planning to do that all along.

I have no problem with the Furlough Days. I really don’t. Shit, I’ll eithert do my freelancing or lie on my ass and take some mental health siestas. But, like I told Finance Guy, I’ll take a wild guess that he, I and a boatload of others will have our asses in here on those unpaid days, and I get mad that there are people who should be furloughed for good (i.e., Solitaire, Town Crier and so many others), but everyone is paying the price for their inability to pull their load.

Bleah. Another day in paradise. But I am truly looking forward to hiring help, to renew my interest in the job as well as to allow me to concentrate better on fewer tasks. And it’s really sad when my work life is more interesting than my personal life. 🙂

Normally, I want to hold my hair back and yawn in Technicolor when I hear of other peoples’ happiness. But I take exception when that person is Shan, my darling blushing bride friend.

We had a lovely little mini-reception for her today at work, whereby everyone looked at the photos and said what a lovely dress she had (hey, I know — I was there to pick it out!). But they should’ve said what they meant — that she was a lovely bride. Judge for yourself. 😉 And get the tissues ready. …

Shan on the beach at sunset in Maui — Monday, July 7, 2003

Shan and John after they said their vows. The minister did a Hawaiian ceremony and also did a blessing for baby Alex, who is set to make her debut in late September. …

Shan and John with their tropical cake and matching bridal bouquet

Three hours with the photographer yielded various stages of sunset photos. Doesn’t the third one remind you of the old “Virginia is For Lovers” ad?

This, my friends, is what I want. A wedding/honeymoon with a special person in a faraway land. Shan was so bummed that I wasn’t there, and hasn’t stopped reminding me of it. 😉 But just to show what great friends we are, I had sent her a text message at 9:24 a.m. (my time) on July 7, but it bounced back as undeliverable, so I resent it at 9:30 a.m. to the right number. At the same time, she awakened at 3:24 a.m. (her time; also the same time I sent the first message) and thought about calling me. And then when my message arrived a few moments later, we were connected, despite the time zones. I’m glad she’s back here, but I’m even happier that the wedding went off with nary a detail out of place. 🙂 Congratulations, friends!

1. I am really cranky when I have a cold. I’m even bitchier when I’m going through withdrawal, after not having a cigarette for a week. Grrr. …

2. Packing is therapeutic (although a cigarette would be even more so). Especially when I can finally see my bedroom floor ’cause everything that was strewn upon it is now in a box somewhere.

3. I have more boxes than I have square footage in the current apartment.

4. My entertainment center and overstuffed couch are huge! God, how the hell are we going to lift those items?

5. A dreaded Pittsburgh trip is in short order (did I mention how much I hate the drive?). I need to get my microwave that’s in my mom’s closet, as well as the grill she and my grandfather are buying for me.

6. Moving party or housewarming party?

7. Mixed feelings about becoming a mommy again. Right now, I have to convince Maddie that she needs to be a good big sister, after being an only child for seven years. The adoption is this coming Saturday, but the little four-pawed wonder will move in with us once we inhabit the new place. Am I ready to go through the new-mother phase again? 😉

8. Not paying bills is liberating while you’re throwing away the invoices, but that only means that I’ll owe triple (at least) once I’m settled at my new Seminary Road address.

9. A washer/dryer in my apartment has been the ultimate amenity. I will miss it so.

10. Liz Phair’s new CD rocks. Live’s, however, does not. And I’m madly addicted to Michelle Branch’s new CD. And I made my own CD compilation today, called Insidiousness. Seemed to fit the state of things. Need another name for a CD I’m burning tomorrow. Any thoughts?

11. Scott and I were reminiscing about drive-in movie theaters. He is looking to sell the idea of going to one to Clown Feet, at which time I listed the benefits as being something along the lines of enjoying films, flasks, foodstuffs and fags (the cigarettes, of course!). Damn it, now I want to go to a drive-in! A Super Wal-Mart replaced the last standing one in Pittsburgh. Something about wearing my cutest jammies so that I could fall asleep in the car brought back warm memories of my ex-stepfather jerking me awake because he had paid for my admission.

12. My heart is soaring because Shan’s back from Hawaii. The bad news is that she has to set foot for the first time into the Veggie Patch tomorrow. Cruise Director is springing a surprise donut-and-bagel gathering for her first thing in the a.m., so I warned her about it. She hates surprises. She thanked me, as she likes to roll in late and avoid the people she hates who get there early. Heh. Now we’ll all be gathered like one big Manson family, in her honor. Oh, the humanity. 😉

13. My mom, Shan and Shawn are my heroes these days. It’s not that they necessarily talked me off a ledge, but I think that, if it came to that, only they could. They have a tendency to say what I’m thinking, without me saying it. And I value that more than they know, because it shows either A.) I’m not crazy, or B.) If I’m crazy, I’m in good company. *hugs ‘n ‘at, friends*