Caterwauling

Claws

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

I can just hear Patton Oswalt narrating my life right now.

So, I have kind of been up to something. I didn’t put a lot of thought into it. As we all know, desperate times call for desperate measures, and all that jazz.

Naturally, it’s come back to bite me in my sizable ass. Oy vey.

I’d call on God for help with this one, but even He is like, “Yo. I’m waiting to watch you jump the General Lee over the ravine you dug for yourself. Good luck!”

Thanks, Big Guy.

So, OK, I had 14 meetings between Monday and Tuesday (and one I forgot — story for another day there. Jesus Christ). And exactly one today.

Not only did I get a lot done, but I immersed myself in pure editing. No profit-and-loss statements, or conversion and renewal rates. No promo codes, no reporting software, no five hours of planning a one-hour meeting.

It was glorious.

I think I’ve risen to the level of my own incompetence. I thought I’d be good in administration. And I do love it, but I’m not advancing the learning curve fast enough. And things are falling by the wayside when I focus on things like supervision and, oh, editing.

It occurs to me, do I want a paycheck, do I want to be happy and creative, or do I want both? Because I thought I could have it all. But I really think I need to pick my priorities. And struggling isn’t my style.

I was thumbing through my copy of Peter Drucker’s “Leader of the Future” and my beloved Patrick Lencioni’s “3 Signs of a Miserable Job,” and I started dreaming of the business I want to start that has NOTHING TO DO with my current field.

I’m not mad at the field. It’s been educational and kind of lucrative in recent years. It’s gotten me introduced to the biggest names in the field, and gotten me accustomed to five-diamond accommodations and five-star meals.

I don’t want to start over. I just want to plot my second business and run it until such time that it’s my only business.

And that I went and did something that could rock my entire world, ugh. Seriously. WTF, Goddess? The cure for drama is not MORE DRAMA.

Well, I think God’s still mapping the joke He is playing on me. Santa Claus is my only hope.

Santa, all I want is to be happier than a hog knee-deep in slop. Please bring me whatever it will take to be that way. And take away everything else. Because I don’t have my wits about me enough to know the difference.

“Come and open up your folding chair next to me
My feet are buried in the sand and there’s a breeze
There’s a shadow, you can’t see my eyes
And the sea is just a wetter version of the skies.”

– Regina Spektor, “Folding Chair”

I don’t even listen to Regina Spektor, but I saw this on one of my beloved’s Facebook pages, and had to keep it in my head somehow.

I have SO MUCH work to do, between being out for six workdays and then taking off five next week. (And another one and a half at the end of the month, but I haven’t told anybody that yet.)

I did ask if I could just take off the rest of the month and start over Dec. 1. Ah, to dream. …

I sort of have a bug up my ass about something. Or someone. And there’s no flushing this turd out of the punchbowl. So I’m working behind the scenes to take matters into my own hands. I may not be able to conquer certain people. But I will find a way around them. And the good people always win. At least, that’s what I have to believe in, right now.

Onto other topics, my apartment is falling apart. I’m planning to move in March when the lease is up. I told the UEOEH that she isn’t going with me … that she’s got to figure out where she’s going.

She asked me for 10 bucks yesterday, so she could bake cookies for my friend who is leaving town. I never have cash. Not to mention that I’d given her an allowance before I left town.

I was “mean and nasty,” of course, about it. I said you know, how sad is it that you just prefer to sit around all day, waiting for me to hand you money or food … not the slightest bit motivated to do anything for yourself.

I’m not even asking her to work — I’m asking her to fill out paperwork and get some health care. Actually, I take that back. I just ask her to leave me alone. I spent the last week with millionaires who live happy, free lives. I want to be them.

Like one of those happy millionaires told me, most people will never know what they won’t have. In other words, when you’re busy trying to save the world and donate to every cause and hug every tree, basically, you give up tiny parts of your financial future. Think of what you could have saved here, then invested there, then had available for bigger and better things.

And that makes me think about working for a living. And settling for a stressful, exhausting life. And that my only physical happy place (home) is a piping-hot bowl of anger topped with disappointment.

Your happy place shouldn’t be in your heart. It should be your home. It should be with your friends. It should be wherever your vocation is.

Lately I only feel in my element when I’m “managing” my people. I use it in quotes because they do take up a lot of my time, but I love it. I love THEM. My talent is rallying the troops. It’s building loyalty. It’s having dinner together and having drinks and laughs and sharing stories. It’s letting them know that I have their backs … and knowing, in turn, that they will have mine.

Sure, I miss my traders. My big parties. My trips to big cities to hang out with financial-TV stars. And my awesome teams from those days.

But I can re-create some of it. I can create my own punch so that everybody isn’t forced to drink from the turd-flavored ladle. What I need to do is step up and protect my people. I may never have children but I will be damned if my “kids” have to feel like they’re in anything but a loving single-parent home.

I’ll leave it at that for now and get back to work. But I have to take my own advice here. I’ve told them all to go with the flow. To quit swimming upstream. To do everything and then some to ensure a peaceful and productive adventure. That I’ll take care of the battles for them. But I’m tired of fighting, too.

Like I told someone whose soul bruises mine, I don’t deal with negativity. I don’t dwell. I don’t tick off everything they did “wrong” because I want them to do more “right.” And I expect the same for me. ‘Cause I have enough problems.

Besides, I do know what I don’t have. I can find it here. Or I can find it elsewhere. But I’m going to find it. And I’m going to help anyone and everyone I can to find theirs. …

Seagate Club

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

“Now you go to work and you work all day
You smoke and bitch on your coffee break
You grab that phone, rehearse those lines
Then you call home sayin’ you gotta work tonight
You hit those bars, you buy some drinks
For the first one who looks good and thinks you’re cool
You’re closer to nowhere…”

– Jen Foster, “Closer to Nowhere”

Story of my life. The whole damn song.

The saving grace to today is that I started my adjusted meds and I feel really good.

I was thinking of paying a really good psychic to talk to my mother. I say this as my account is bouncing to the sky due to bad budgeting. C’mon Friday payday!

Speaking of bad budgeting, my new dining room set was delivered today — in a gazillion boxes. That the FedEx guys told the UEOEH they weren’t allowed to bring inside. So her weak little ass had to drag them in. Which I had to hear about. So sorry for the inconvenience.

Aside to Lady L: Can I take you up on your offer to help me build these things?

I’m thinking it’s high time for a traditional Thanksgiving meal instead of making reservations. It’s four years ago Thanksgiving that my grandfather died — since the day I knew I was inheriting the UEOEH, although nobody could predict she’d still be all up in mah grill.

Apparently I am having a guest for the holiday. Of the male variety. Who plans to spare no amount of noise to offend said houseguest. I’m sure she’d just sit on the couch and listen. Or watch. As my friend M. noted, the woman has NO BOUNDARIES.

Oh well. As long as I can keep my job and keep making money to fund my trips, that’s all that really matters. I’ll take my happiness where I can get it, since it’s so damn compromised in other places.

“Can you explain why the only place you go is to waste?”

Tonight’s post is sponsored by a Jordan 2004 Alexander Valley Cab that is, shall we say, Dy-No-MITE!!!

Or orgasmic. Whichever.

It was a gift from one of my beloved boys when I left D.C. It’s freaking amazing. I wanted to save it for a special occasion, and being roommate-free is probably the biggest thing worth celebrating in my life right now.

Day 5 of my freedom has come and gone. Work has been a beast this week. I have to take off tonight from even so much as reading e-mails. I’ve had two glasses of wine (just poured No. 3), ate some chi-chi cheese from Whole Foods and smoked an Al Capone bourbon-dipped cigarillo.

Took G-Dawg into the office today. Everyone wanted me to go let him take a smelly poop upstairs, but I was profeshunal and stuck him on a chair next to me. I love me some terrier right now — they don’t jump off! Of course, he managed to jump out of the car on his own, to my utter surprise. Does that say something about my driving or the fact that the car is a rattling death trap?

We went to PetSmart for treats. It was a big day for him! And yes, a beloved male admirer noted tonight how I talk like either a dog owner or a parent about him now. My big boy!

*mmmm wine. Slurp*

So I have to put that dipshit asshole at my house on my car insurance policy. Which MORE than doubles now that I own her car. Grrr. I told her she has to call around and get her own damn quotes. Would it kill her to pay her own car insurance, for fuck’s sake? Of course it would. She pushed it back on me, I pushed back, she pushed back … etc. I’m like, fine. No insurance for your lazy ass. Don’t drive my car. Love, moi.

My friends have commented how calm I am now that I don’t live there. (For this week, anyway.) I actually had to stop one of my boys on the phone last night from talking about her. It’s like, no, do not break The Zen.

UEOEH texted me first with a photo of my cat looking miserable in a headband, and then with a note that it would have been my grandmother’s 83rd. birthday on Saturday. You know what else Saturday represents? The day she moved in three years ago. My grandfather died on Thanksgiving 2006. She spent the insurance money on living on her own till September 2007.

I wanted to text her that, really? It’s also the three-year anniversary of the WORST DAY OF MY LIFE that your lazy, dependent ass moved in. Fuck you and stuff yourself into a handbasket bound for guess where. Love, moi.

I can’t believe it’s only been three years that she’s been torturing me. I also can’t believe that a person can go three years with no purpose in life. Er, 53 … but who’s counting?

I also can’t believe how much FREE TIME I have that’s not spent hating her this week.

Fucking whore.

I was planning to walk to Ben & Jerry’s. But the last time I shoved a $20 in my pocket to walk the dog, I lost it on the street. Never did find it. I can only hope the wind carried it over to Boo Boo. In any case, I’d rather lose it on the A1A to some random person than keep funding the mooch in my apartment.

Ah, G-Dawg. Time to curl up with treats and watch some TV. …

Lantana Public Beach

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

Where does one even begin to describe today?

Sexually charged. (Not frustrated.)

Well, yeah, that’s about it.

I could go on about work, but why? It’s not bad; I just feel like, for the past week, I’ve ended the day with things turning out like I’d never even showed up. And today was the first day I left before, oh, 8 p.m.

I leave for Canada in T minus four days. Squee! Cannot WAIT. Haven’t packed or done laundry, for that matter. But the suitcase is still half-packed from the last trip, so at least my toiletries are packed.

It’s not that I’m lazy — I’m just forward-thinking!

I got my Florida driver’s license this week. Which means I’ll be staying here, because the photo turned out well. It’s good for nine years. Hunh. I’m used to all the states that make you re-do everything either annually or bi-annually — it’s kind of nice to forget about it!

I have to get the car registered, since my tags expire in a few days. I just wanted to be sure I got my money’s worth on all the repairs I had to make to register that piece of shit in Maryland.

Went to my beloved Cupcake Couture today. Haven’t gone there since my birthday, when someone took one of the cupcakes I’d bought for that night and ATE IT. Even though the pretty pink box was SEALED.

Luckily, no one hijacked my Red Valentino or Christian Louboutinilla (the latter of which was stolen last time). I vainly attempted to try a whoopie pie, but skip ‘em — marshmallow = ew. I wish someone had stolen THAT before I bit into it and tossed that bitch.

The mint iced tea, though? Fabulous!

I thought I’d share the cupcakes with the obnoxious presence in my apartment, since I barely speak to or feed it.

She got an e-mail from her ex-husband’s new wife. (I guess it’s not new, though, since they were fucking around since I was 10 years old.)

I hate that bastard, by the way. The way he treated me, he should NEVER have gone on to have kids and … now … grandkids.

The wife contacted my mom about something — errant bill collector. (Yay — another thing I’ll probably end up being responsible for. Whee!) And they’ve kept talking.

The woman asked how many grandbabies I’ve given my mother. I almost flew up to Pittsburgh and stabbed her in her sleep at the mere thought of that.

I asked mom whether she needed help spelling my job title.

Mom answered with a, “Dawn’s into her career, her friends and herself. She’s too busy traveling the world. She’s a (insert job title) — excuse us ALL!”

If not for the Paxil I pop every morning to dull my boiling rage toward her, this would have been an obituary and not a rant.

So the woman writes back with a “must be nice” and gushes all about how children and grandchildren make life so very blessed and wonderful and “don’t you wish you were me” cakes.

She tossed in a, “Well, if she has the money to do all that, then good for her.”

OH REALLY?

I am taking a wild guess that mom’s next response did NOT contain, “I siphon her money and will to live every day of my life … I have for the past four years and WILL till the end of time! *muahahaaaaa*”

I have to remind myself that I have a great job. I have not been affected by the recession. I own every product Apple makes. I am not in a bad place at all. And if having a sack of dead weight in my house 24 hours a fucking day is the worst part of my life, I still have it good, right?

I just feel like that woman’s ominous presence is the reason I’ll hit my sexual peak alone. Or at least, I’ll be keeping the travel-and-tourism industry afloat with my endeavors to NOT bring anyone home with me!