Caterwauling

Like you even had to fucking ASK!!!

You Are “Fuck“!

What Swear Word Are You?

More Great Quizzes from Quiz Diva

This shit is never going to end. Misspellings maintained from Asshat’s e-mail:

Ms (Goddess Dawn, spelled correctly this time),

As a colleague I would think that you would avoid the pitfalls of a defensive response to a well intentioned attempt on my part to simply point out some serious defeciences in your article. The fact that there was a typo in your name seems trivial but I  appologize for pressing the wrong key. I think you are saying that I should be thankful that you took the time to read my comments given my criticism of your article. Well thank you. Now let me inform you that given your unprofessional response to my comments, my wife and I and our many colleagues who were anticipating an informed response from you will be sure to drop our subscriptins to (Veggie Patch Gazette) and (The Veggie Patch) as a serious read.

I took it to my supervisor. She understands why I did it — I hate being bullied by assholes. Hopefully I will not get into further trouble. I wrote back to the fucker to tell him I meant no harm and that a professional and I would be in touch with him to discuss the professional concerns he raised.

Is it Friday yet? LOL

Update 2

When asshat responded, he only included two sentences of my e-mail. So when I forwarded the mess to my boss, I had to also re-send her what I originally wrote. Demure didn’t flip — she realized I handled it the best way I could manage, and she told me to simply turn it over to someone else to deal with the professional inquiry that was buried among the hate mail. So now I can have a good weekend without this eating away at me.

Remember that asshole who ruined my day yesterday? I responded to him, and I’m sure Dipshit will send it ’round the planet to show what a bitch I am:

Mr. (Asshat),

Sincerely,

Dawn

Update

Asshat did make some good points, after it took me a fucking hour to EDIT the goddamned letter. He pointed out that I didn’t clarify something, which is true, but what he’s got to understand is that, while he’s the practicing professional in our field, I am the practicing journalist who hates his misspellings and grammatical flubs as much as he hates the fact that I referred to “credentialing” as “licensure.” So we’re even. Nyah. Fucker.

This one’s gonna hurt.

1. How many times have you truly been in love?

In the truest sense of being “in love,” I’d say never. But I’ve had strong, strong feelings for certain people, and I’m fairly certain that those feelings were reciprocated, only with much less passion that I possessed. But then again, maybe they were just as scared as I was.

2. What was/is so great about the person you love(d) the most?

The funny thing about the passage of time is that you tend to forget all that was wrong during what was then the present, so when you look back, you have to be careful of not getting whiplash — most of the hurt has gone away, and times past seem so much more ideal than they were at the time. And because I always get a song in my head when I write, the tune of the moment is Vertical Horizon’s “Grey Sky Morning”.

But to answer the question, I fall in love with hearts — I truly don’t care what is on the outside. And of the three people who are on my mind as I answer these questions, each one was funny and caring and dynamic.

3. What qualities should a significant other have?

I’ve gotta go back to the kind heart thing. And an IQ over a certain number wouldn’t hurt, either. 😉 It would take a strong person to put up with me, so I need someone who’s attentive and caring, yet who knows that I need my space, and a lot of it. Trust is such an issue for me, and it takes me a long time to develop it, so I need someone who is emotionally and physically expressive, or I will be wondering what s/he is doing behind my back.

4. Have you ever broken someone’s heart?

As I’ve been told, yes. Quite a few times, actually. I didn’t mean to, but in one case that’s fresh in my mind, I didn’t know what else to do, and yes, my heart aches because of the way things had to be.

5. If there was one thing you could teach people about love, what would it be?

I don’t know a fucking thing about love. I fear it isn’t meant to be in my life, as far as a significant other. (I’m almost 30 — bear with me.) I don’t regret loving those whom I’ve loved, but I wish I would have been bolder, stronger, more confident — because I would have held on for dear life and shown them how much they really meant to me. One was a single straight guy, one was a woman and one was a married man. That just goes to show that your heart is blind when it comes to finding its match, so I s’pose my advice is to do what the little voices tell you to do. 😉

This Friendster thing is kinda cool — I’ve gotten lots of testimonails from my posse of male admirers. And thanks to Chris for this gem: “Dawn is sweet, warm, smart, a great kisser, and has a heart too big to measure.”

Damn, way to make a girl feel good! (And he’s a pretty damn good kisser himself.) 😉

… of dear departed journalist Jayson Blair.

It’s about friggin’ time his editors got canned. (OK, so they resigned, but humor me, please — it’s been a bad editorial day for me at my own piss-poor production of a newspaper!)

Christ, my readers kick my ass for printing the truth — this trio should’ve been put to death for confirming the public’s widely held belief that journalism is the lowest form of humanity. Protecting a brotha’ isn’t just cause for allowing plagiarism and just plain bad journalism.

I decided around 7 p.m. last night that, if the Veggie Patch wants average, they’re going to start getting average from me. Effective today.

I just got a ridiculous letter to the editor, one that was copied to more than 15 people in my organization. The bitch starts off nasty, of course, and talks about my “BI”-line. Um, excuse me, but it’s “byline” you fucking freak. Any ASSHOLE who starts off a letter to me talking about my “BI” line had better prepare to bend over and I’ll show them who’s bi! 😉 I can’t even read the letter. I am certain it goes on to make a good point somewhere, but that shit’s unheard of.

Here’s what I was greeted to:

Ms (Goddess Dawn):

I am responding to the front page article in (The Veggie Patch Gazette) for June 2003. The article was ostensibly written by you as indicated by your BI-line. I am copying others in your organization in hope that my concern will not be trivialized. …”

So, ostensibly, I am bi and now the whole fucking leadership of my organization knows it. Did I happen to reject her at the conference? This is a bitch on a mission.

Oh, and as if that weren’t enough to ruin my day. …

Demure’s secretary sent me an e-mail with a request — she wants her daughter’s school pictures scanned into the computer so she can have them online. She would also like me to print them in color for her, but at least I don’t have a color printer. You know, I work so fucking hard, and for what? I am sick of everyone else being comfy in their fuzzy bunny slippers and bathrobes, waving their pill cups around. I am officially done with this place.

I want every last one of my readers to e-mail me with an inventory of your skills. Do it as soon as you read this message. I’m serious. I am going to start a referral service for companies that need help and I am going to refer those needs to good people who deserve to make the money. And god damn it, I am going to be whoring out my own fund-raising, editorial and party-planning skills. I am through … absolutely through … with the stress and heartache I get every day when I pull into my employer’s parking lot.

Update

You know, I received a beautiful compliment from one of my readers on my VM this morning. Why is it that, when they like what I do, they call and leave a VM just for me, and when they hate it, they put it in writing and circulate it around the country? Why can’t people write their compliments and send them to the people who control my budget?

I sent the offensive e-mail to Demure, as she was surprisingly missing from the distribution list. My note was bitter and pissy, and I said, “If she can’t spell, I can’t expect her to write coherently, either. And it is not my policy to read letters that assault me in the first sentence.” On a final note, the bitch signed the note, “Respectively submitted.” DUMB BITCH, IT’S “RESPECTFULLY”!!!

Oh, and Jackass spelled my name wrong, too.

Now I shall go respectively impale myself on a letter opener on an Exacto knife.

Update 2

Oh, it was a person of male gender who wrote the letter. Everyone in the building is referring to it as a she, so I went with the flow. Well, male or not, it was on its rag today, baby!

Our president sent me a thoughtful reply (he was slammed in the letter too for one fucking quote), and he said he could see the reader’s point. I zipped a note back that the only point said reader managed to make was that he is in fact a moron.

So I am here, trying to cut $37,000 from my next FY budget.

Joke.

So far, I’ve shaved off $900. I have one of the leanest, maximized budgets on the planet. I do not spend money on anything other than printing, postage, occasional generic supplies and freelancers. The freelance and travel budget just went buh-byes. I did allow myself a few stories, but now that Cruise Director has me farming out these ridiculous stories on our divisions to one of my writers, my budget is shot in the ass. Completely.

And for some reason, Ad Angel is making $80K/yr. in commission out of my budget alone. Funny, but the revenues from these ads sure as shit aren’t credited to my budget! My boss is looking into whether that $80K can be broken up among some other departments; otherwise, I’ll finish this year at $20K over budget, and that’s not nice, given how I never, ever apply for reimbursement for my mileage, meals or anything else.

Anyway, I am tearing out my ridiculously red hair right now (I’d like to know why, no matter what color I dye my hair, the red always shines through. It’s that very color that I am sick of! Nothing says Irish chick like the green eyes, freckles and red hair). There is no bloody WAY to cut out the other $36K, although I did suggest that if Cruise Director didn’t just buy $50K in office furniture, and if Solitaire weren’t making nearly double my salary, then perhaps I might be a little bit more willing to do my part. Fuck this shit.

It is sincerely looking like I am going to have to publish 11 issues per year instead of 12. Un-fucking-believable. We pay consultants a LOT more than I make per hour — consultants who overbill and who don’t do half as much work. We pay for our presidents to stay in luxury accommodations all over the country. We pay Town Crier and Mouth Almighty, who seem to have nothing but time on their hands while the rest of us are running ourselves ragged, carrying three or four positions’ worth of work. I am so very annoyed and sick of this shit. So very annoyed. I am going to write a note to Cruise Director right now, proposing some budget-saving ideas whereby maybe I can combine my efforts with Membership’s efforts to save a few bucks.

Spent two and a half hours in a meeting with my supervisor today. I should either get an award or a complimentary day off. This just reminds me why I need to work for myself — I have so many ideas and initiatives, and they’re buried under a mountain of paperwork and malaise. I did get in a few snarks about the workplace, though, and that made me happy. 🙂

Shan and I escaped for lunch today, and I had to come home and blog about it. I decided that working at Club Medicated is like riding the kiddie coaster backward and in slow motion. Makes you nauseated, just thinking about it, and that, my friends, sums up my average workday. 😉

Now that “Six Feet Under” has gone away till next season, I happened to start watching “Out of Order” on Showtime last night. Oh.My.God. Did you girls see the oral sex scene? Sweet Jesus. I think I managed to come, just by watching it!!! And here I was just wondering if I could possibly live without cable. …

And join me in wishing a hearty CoNgRaTuLaTiOnS to Tiff for landing herself a new job!!! And she gets to leave her crappy job, where she is a staff of one who is governed by a crappy board where members are dropping off like flies, a week before their annual conference! Trust me, this is one time when the Inner Bitch needed to make a grand showing, and I’m definitely gonna be looking for updates on her blog about the shitstorm that’s about to ensue. …