Caterwauling

John has the best list for Santa ever!

In honor of Shawn’s holiday party last night, Angie and I made balls. Lots and lots of balls. She made amaretto balls and Kahlua balls; I was a perfect Little Suzy Homewrecker Maker and cooked spinach balls and cocktail meatballs.

Too weary to post much else — need to get back to my coffee and let the hellcat Kadi out of her cage. 🙂 Have a good Saturday, friends!

I feel fucking amazing today. I truly believe 2004 is going to be “my year.” I always have better luck in even-numbered years anyway, but this time, I just got that warm and fuzzy feeling that all will turn out well.

What’s changed? Nothing. That’s the amazing part. I just finally said out loud what I’ve always believed — that I am just as deserving of happiness as anyone else.

That, and I seem to have developed a crush on someone. Shit. But it’s so much fun in the early stages (you know, before reality bites you in the ass). So let me keep dreaming a little — I’m much more pleasant when I’m happy!!!

More mind-numbing joy.

1. List your five favorite beverages.

Alcohol — does that count as five, considering that I can’t stop at just one? (Kind of like Lays, and by “lays,” I do NOT mean the potato chips!)

Alcoholic-wise, a nice glass of Riesling or Chardonnay is sure to make me weep with joy. Same thing with an amaretto sour, a long island iced tea (depends on who’s making it, though) and a Captain and Diet Coke. There’s this great alcoholic drink called Hawaiian Punch, but I can never find anyone who knows how to make it. Not like I can make one myself, though. 🙂

2. List your five favorite websites.

Blogs or not? ‘Cause all you have to do is cruise over to the right side of my page and read the pages under “Cast” and “Inspiring Reading.” Too many faves to list, and I don’t want to exclude anyone.

Commercial sites — I can’t help but read the WaPo, the NY Times, Yahoo! News, Poynter Online (forum for journalists — I’m too lazy to look up the hyperlink) and Milk and Cookies dot com for funny shit.

3. List your five favorite snack foods.

Anything that doesn’t eat me first.

Seriously, I can live on snacks alone (and that would explain the size of my ass these days *sigh*). I cannot win a battle against ice cream, chocolate-covered popcorn, Wasabi peas, Reese’s peanut butter cups or chocolate-raspberry truffles. *drool*

4. List your five favorite board and/or card games.

I fucking hate board games and card games. I usually end up playing with uber-competitive people, and it just sucks when people are out to win and not to have fun with friends. I’ll play drinking games, as long as I can drink no matter what happens (somebody bounces a quarter and Dawn drinks; somebody loses an eyelash and Dawn drinks, etc.).

Although …. I must take exception for Erica’s Sunday Night Sex Show Drinking Game, whereby you drink pretty much any time Sue Johansen (an elderly granny type) gives you the heaves when she’s talking about blow jobs and great sexual positions. Although, again, see previous rule that Dawn drinks no matter what happens. … 😉

5. List your five favorite computer and/or game system games.

I don’t do games. Used to play Tetris, but that was back when it was created. And seeing people playing Solitaire on the computer is a raging joke at work, so I stay far away from it and similar games. I’d rather read blogs or get the hell offline and read a real book or something!

I’ve been uninspired to post today. On a whim, I had asked my designer to come into the office yesterday instead of today, and I must thank my humble spirit guides for directing me to do so, because our advertisements were a disaster. They’re usually a mess in general, but this month, half the documents were corrupted and the other half were created on a system more advanced than mine, so I couldn’t even get them open. In the wee hours of this morning, he got the fuckers to work and to read right, and I got the document back today to do last-minute edits and to toss in some late-arriving graphics.

This, of course, would have been a breeze, but two ads weren’t even FedExed till today, so they had to be re-routed to the print shop. And then, of course, we have this ridiculous company that services our Macs, but all they do is fuck up my settings and cause setbacks. Whenever I give them a laundry list of my problems, they claim to fix them, but what they really do is go into my extensions folder and turn everything off. You know, because you really don’t need a font manager when you’re producing a 72-page Quark document. Morons.

So my designer literally sat with me on the phone for an hour and a half, because the moron from the Mac company decided to erase my Acrobat Distiller settings, so I couldn’t make a PDF of the document (we have to FTP each individual page as a PDF to the printer). Actually, what was fucked up was that I did make an initial PDF, but half of the color pages showed up as black-and-white. You know, because that’s so helpful when you’re working on a deadline.

I have helped to get the Mac service company fired, as of immediately and no later. In fact, I also put a bug in the right people’s ears to just hire my designer as our tech support person, because he knows his stuff and he doesn’t charge $500 for emergency phone calls in which Dawn becomes the helpless female who can’t use her technology. (Vibrators I can handle; Mac G4s with errors implanted by idiotic supposed profesionals are a little beyond my limits!)

Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick, why the hell is everything so difficult? My writer, designer and I have our processes down to a science, but invariably, the advertisements and the damage done by the “repairmen” cause two solid days of downtime. *scream* No wonder I get migraines!

There’s this old dude who has been calling me at work practically every day since last December. I have actually reached a point where I never even pick up the fucking phone anymore, because he’s calling three or four times a day to chat. And when I accidentally picked up yesterday (awaiting a call from my ad rep), he was on the line and got mad at me for not calling him back. I snapped that I was in the middle of a crisis (and I was), so I was indisposed. So he tried to ask me to call him that evening. He’s 83 and a darling chap, but for Christ’s sake, I am not the entertainment of the day. I wonder if this is what my grandfather does to people he calls at companies when he needs customer service. Mom reports that he’s on the phone forever sometimes; I always feel bad for the guy who calls me and try to hang in there and be interested and attentive. But this just wasn’t one of those times. Hallelujah that I’m working off-site for the next two workdays — my voice mail log is about 86 percent full of calls from him ALONE!!!

Ahem.

Hung out at Shawn’s hacienda this evening while he cleaned and I threw together a cheese/meat plate for his holiday soiree tomorrow evening. ‘Twas the only time today that I managed to relax (that, and of course after my PDFs were made). Hurrah for the men in my life (except the old dude — somebody needs to put me out of my misery and remove my number from his speed dial!). But ain’t that the bitch of it all — young, hot, fuckable men are NEVER trying to hunt me down, but man, if they’re 83, they’re ALL over my voice mail!

I’m delirious. Speaking of putting me out of my misery, it’s time for NyQuil!!!

Here’s to the first poem I’ve written in two years. My inspiration came back, and I shall entertain this muse as long as she’s willing to stay. 😉

Again

I hang up the phone

And smile for moments that turn into hours

Just for the fact that we’ve connected

It’s been so long

Since I’ve felt the slightest inspiration

To write, to rhyme, to create

Anything that will outlive

The daydreams and memories

That I never see fit to record on paper

Because the images are too precious

Too tantalizing

To wish to share

Even with a computer screen

Yet without even noticing it

You’ve inspired me

To write

To dream again

To wonder what if

And I don’t know what to do with this

Sudden desire to caputre my fascination

With the cerulean and seafoam

Shades in your eyes

The curve of your lashes

The faint smile on your lips

When you’re intrigued by my chatter

Or your incredulity at my boldness

When I start to say something

That could change this easiness between us

For a long time to come

We both have

So much to overcome

Within ourselves

For this to ever stand a chance

Of not plummeting into some flaming abyss

And I know

Even though you are so much more

Worldly than I

That I am more ready for this

Than you may ever be

Your ghosts are more recent, more vivid

Of love left unresolved

And questions unanswered

From beyond this reality

And it was this passion

That captivated you so

That drew me in and

Caused me to invite myself to stay

Just to learn

How someone could love so much

With such passion and depth

And it makes me wonder

If you could ever love again

And if I could ever be so fortunate

To feel a little bit of it

Or maybe more

If you could spare it

Or if you could allow your heart

To let someone else, someone different in

What would she have said

Were she around

To give you her blessing

Do you think

She wants you to take the love

You so generously gave to her

And to let someone else

Feel so bathed in adoration

As she once enjoyed

Could you do it again

Or would it only come from half your heart

If it could ever flow again

How I await

The right moment

To come along

For something, anything

To manifest itself

To let me know

Whether to hang in there

Or let you go

But in any event

I’m all the better for having known you

And having had the opportunity to see

That a woman can be loved

More than she ever dreamed possible

And it gives me hope that

Whether or not you are the one to give it to me

I still shouldn’t stop believing that it exists

Because clearly it did

Clearly it can

And I want nothing less

For myself

So thank you

For allowing me to dream

A little while longer

A little more boldly

A little more expectantly

Thank you for giving me

The courage to break the writer’s block

And dream out loud

Again.

For the record, I just want to say that there are some HOT guys in Rockville, Md. (of all friggin’ places). At Shawn’s company holiday party last night (where I had the pleasure of hanging with the illustrious and ever-charming Scott), I was happily drooling all over myself and my $37 cocktail dress (which retailed around $200 — woo hoo, do I know how to shop for these things!). I’m not sure if the hot boys (other than my uber-attractive buddies) actually work at his company or whether they were guests of invitees, but I will certainly play nice and hope to be invited to future events there. *bats lashes*

Was home in time to watch the “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” video debut for “All Things Just Keep Getting Better.” I’m waiting for a remix to come out so that we can hear it in all the gay clubs from now till doomsday. 🙂 I was impressed that Wayne Isham was the director — he did about a gazillion of Bon Jovi’s videos, so he has all my respect. Although he really needed to do something about those sunglasses he wore. … 😉

Well, I curled my hair for the second day in a row. People think I have a job interview or something. I actually quit curling my hair more than a year ago, due to complaints from Upper McManagement that they didn’t like the way I look. As if they have ANY room to speak, but I shall digress before becoming too catty on this wondrous Hump Day (without the hump, of course!).

I sat in oodles upon oodles of traffic on the Beltway last night. I told Shawn that he’s the only person on earth for whom I would do that — and I looked like a dog’s ass when I got to said destination. *shudder* Thanks to the lovely Linda, I was able to get into the locked ladies’ room to apply about a pound and a half of makeup and to remove my tennis shoes (for driving), as the dress was designed for a gal in heels. So when I got my heels on, well, I couldn’t fasten the tiny buckles on each ankle strap because I just got a manicure and I can’t do shit with these claws. Luckily, Shawn saved the day and fastened the buckles for me, although not before a colleague caught him bowing at my feet. *swoon* All girls should have a man at their feet, even if only for a moment. It’s heavenly to be serviced. 😉

It was most excellent that I already knew a handful of people at the soiree, so it wasn’t like I was meeting EVERYBODY for the first time. In fact, a lot of these folks shall be at Shawn’s holiday party on Friday, so it will be good to see most of them again. Note that I say most. But alcohol shall prevail, and everybody is lovely when I’ve had alcohol. In fact, I should have some right now here at work, and maybe I wouldn’t have the damn crow’s feet I’ve recently acquired from glaring at my enemies. 🙂

Actually, just to meet Shawn in Rockville and go to his company’s holiday party tonight. I cut the tags off my dress and it doesn’t quite fit as well as when I bought it on sale this summer. 🙁 Oh well. I haven’t really eaten in two days and that still doesn’t help matters.

If you’re into prayer, send me good wishes while I’m on the Beltway. I hate that fucking thoroughfare!!!

I wished my designer a happy anniversary today — we have produced a solid year’s worth of newspapers together without killing each other or anybody else. Although, granted, the temptation to knock out the lights of the people who are making us earn every single gray hair on our heads can be overpowering sometimes. 🙂

I had a funny feeling that I would put in my resignation during this issue. Seriously, I get the idea (and nobody’s convinced me otherwise) that certain people want me to fail. I’ve been given an indication that these people don’t necessarily believe all the computer problems I tell them I have (and believe me, I have more than they will ever hear about). I got chastised mightily for being up-front about slicing some editorial last month (that nobody even knew existed until, in the fair interest of disclosure, I happened to mention). I thought I would be proactive and tell them what I cut and why I decided to cut it (complete with budgetary backup). The response? That I am never ever to cut editorial without informing my supervisor first. My supervisor, of course, not having a journalism background and certainly not there during late nights locked in the castle, forcing the computer to, well, compute. Not to mention having to re-lay out the paper every time a new ad comes in — shouldn’t paid space be more important than editorial? Sheesh. Fuck me for having priorities.

I was also forbidden from editing a submission — this announcement, of course, arrived AFTER I had edited the thing. I was ordained to send it back and have the original writer chop it up, which she did, but I know that my editing was way better. However, I may not, as editor, do, OH, EDITING, but I have now been told to chase after another person to learn how to do their job. Which, of course, has something to do with the paper, but the reason I need to pick it up is because it isn’t being done by the person who was supposed to do it.

So I lost my marbles last week, noting to my supervisor, “OK. So I can’t cut editorial. I can’t cut ads. I can’t edit certain people’s submissions. But I have to go chase after (insert name) and tell them do their job so that they can teach me how to do it? Is this the TWILIGHT ZONE?!?!”

Of course, when I saw my supervisor’s frustration (partly at me; mostly at Cruise Director), I quieted down. She called off today — I wondered if it were a silent protest to the absolute inanity that went down last week.

In any event, this issue that I’m working on is important to me — I’ve been editor (in function and mostly in title) of my publication for a year, and at this time last year, I had no idea what I was in store for or how I would do it. All I really knew is that I would somehow do it. And without the political bullshit, it’s a good job. But the political bullshit (read: “other duties as assigned”) is the tough part.

But what I am proudest of is the communication I have with my staff, only one of whom works in my building (most are in other cities, states and time zones). All of the relationships came together very easily and continue to do so. We get frustrated but never really get irritated with each other — we talk and process and laugh and bitch. I would love to keep this job but work from home — anything to minimize the distractions and hoop-jumping that is expected outside of our little circle. Just goes to show that I need to run my own company, and I’m really never going to be truly happy until I do. But I know who I will call when I need help with that company, and thanks to the loyalty and respect we have cultivated, I know that they would be more than happy to help, when the time comes.

Happy anniversary, Veggie Patch Gazette. Here’s to a year of hard work under our belts!