Caterwauling

I have a friend who has wanted to join my company forever.

Introduced him to all the right people last year. Nothing came of it.

We did hire someone pretty good. But he just quit.

I won’t get into why I think he quit.

The same reason had me so goddamn irritated that I kind of envied him for a hot minute this week.

When I was sick Sunday, it was honestly just anxiety built up in my chest.

The only thing that alleviated that heart attack feeling was to force myself to throw up.

Five pounds lighter, I ran out of stuff to get rid of.

And I didn’t have that devastating anxiety again till Thursday morning.

I was healthier this time and could shake it off like I usually do.

Anyway, I brought up the friend again. Since, you know, brand new opening.

Two junior-ish openings, actually.

I said just combine them and let me pay someone decent money to do this supersized big-boy job.

I … think they are listening. Though one did tell me we aren’t sure this will be challenging enough for him.

Anyway. I got to reading tarot cards today.

All signs point to an offer coming. And him accepting and thriving.

I also asked how this affects me.

Outlook not so good.

Which is weird since I was his boss 15 years ago.

And I’ve been championing this for over a year.

I asked further … like am I about to hire my replacement.

The cards seemed to ask ME a question right back …

They are so worried about HIS intellectual stimulation …

BUT WHO TF IS WORRIED ABOUT YOURS?!

God damn.

I kept throwing cards down.

Basically I could be fine if I stay where I am.

But if I want passion … go West, young lass.

I got that anxiety lump in my throat for about 30 seconds.

But then I got excited.

Like wait … places to go, clothes to wear, horizons to conquer?

TELL ME MORE.

I stopped harassing the cards after I got the Eight of Cups, though.

Like, OK, enough thought food.

For now.

Not saying I’d have less anxiety in another situation. And I really only have one anxiety source anyway.

But I do actually have a new passion within what I do. And I’ve been quietly pleading with the universe to let me do more with it.

What if I gift the stuff I don’t want to this or some other person …

And get to spend MORE time on the part that I have come to love?

Is this an Eight of Cups moment … leaving but not going very far?

“Who do I have to speak to, to change the prophecy” to this?

Mercury finally turned direct today.

This retrograde season has been just like going through a car wash with the sunroof open. Oh wait, did that.

I’m at the tail end of some 24-hour bug. So that’s a fitting end to all the cosmic nonsense.

I find I get sick a lot more than I used to. Probably because when I go out, I go OUT.

My friend Tony had asked in Vegas if Mom passed at home. I said yes and he said omg you have got to move.

I said no I like my place. And if you’ve seen the median South Florida rent prices, mine is well below that.

But … now that I think more about it, I am fine when I leave the house.

Like I felt yucky Friday, totally went out and partied it up Saturday, then couldn’t even keep Pepto Bismol down yesterday.

And in true retrograde form, my toilet stopped flushing after I barfed up Friday’s breakfast yesterday. On Sunday.

Anyway, how did I go throw back margaritas with no problem 48 hours ago?

Gram used to always say, “It’s the house’s fault.” She blamed the house for everything.

I wonder if that’s actually true here.

I really do like it here. I didn’t always. But it’s easy to get to Orlando or the Keys. And the airport is a seven-minute drive away.

OK, so what I like about it, is it’s easy to leave.

My second cat sitter just quit on me. She too is leaving the state. So the kids are going to be on their own for me to go to Orlando for Mickey’s Halloween Party.

In any event, if everyone is buying property out of state, is it a sign I should, too?

Though one of my people just told me she’s moving to Greece. It was supposed to be Paris but she changed her mind at the last minute.

Sounds better than Alabama, right?

I wonder if it IS the house’s fault that I only feel good when I’m out of it.

Forget retrograde. This Mercury cycle is radioactive.

Saturday started with a car wash where I forgot I’d had a passenger. So I didn’t check the passenger side window FOR A WEEK.

Anyway, I finally did it — I drove through a car wash with a window open.

Then I went to put a $10 in the bill changer, so I could buy some towels.

And it ate my $10.

I mean, that beat the week before where I climbed seven floors to my car in a garage. Only to fall over the concrete slab at the head of an accessible parking spot that they put right in front of the stairs.

And when I was backing out of my spot, I looked to ensure I had gotten all the shit that had spilled from my purse.

Well, guess who forgot to BRAKE first.

The car is mostly fine. I haven’t had skinned knees since I was 10. At least my ego isn’t bruised.

Then just now, I got a message from an airline that my flight got rebooked.

Um … what? Which one? Why?

It was one of my multi-city trips.

(Airline) changed the third flight … to the same day as the first two.

So, depart (home) at xx time. Get to layover two hours later. Arrive at third city FOR A SECOND, FIVE-HOUR LAYOVER.

Fut the wack?!

I had to go find my email and argue with the chatbot.

When I blew up the chatbot, I got a nice agent who restored order and gave me a flight credit for my trouble.

I mean, that flight credit will get me a Bloody Mary. But still.

Also I’ve spoken to DTOM a good 14 times this week. But I got a fun comment in with their boss about, “Hey they told me this but let me run that by you real quick.”

The reply was ok go push back. Like, GLADLY.

I got another fun comment in. This person keeps trying to sell us on hiring all their old colleagues from another company.

I said, “There is only one person from that company who ever impressed me. His name is (Redacted). Otherwise, that place is not exactly a talent factory.”

Then I let that sink in for a minute.

I know someone who is not invited to read this page or comment on anything about me will sit there and blow their bangs when I say this, but fuck you — I WON TODAY.

Gonna need a new nickname for DTOM.

Since the memo went out, they’ve been seated for every single call.

I feel through the screen that they are unhappy.

This is pure speculation on my part.

But when you can’t necessarily rein in unappealing but otherwise ungovernable behavior — like, me delivering good prose an hour after deadline, every damn time — you rein in what you can.

This explains so much about my past.

I was talking with Shan the other day (interesting how Wildebeest jumped straight to K — silly beast) about how we can come up with our assassin names.

I say best pet and worst boss.

For her, Jazzypants Yep. For me, I was going to go with Cocoa H.

But Shan said god that Carol was so awful to you. Maybe she’s retired or dead.

And for the life of me, I couldn’t remember Carol’s last name. I just remember she had hairspray-coated glasses and looked like Janet Reno.

Anyway, apparently Cocoa Reno is my assassin name.

In any event, Carol absolutely couldn’t rein in my friend. So she had this insane meeting with me to tell me I dressed “too Pittsburgh” and my hair was terrible and my suits/dresses were too short for how fat I was.

Or maybe she had my friend have it with me. To break his spirit a different way.

Either way, and this is a rare moment when I will pay him a compliment, but we had more talent in our pinkys than that 60,000-member organization had combined.

Ungovernable. I want that as a tattoo.

She was happy when I rolled in with flat hair and sweatshirts and a broken spirit.

The empath in me almost feels bad for DTOM. Like if you’re not the T person, who are you?

For me, Carol might have taken away the way I chose to express myself.

And that “friend” turned on me anyway. He made sure they saw this blog, where I documented all that shit, because I had to express myself in some OTHER way.

Though I do have to say, having the HR person sit there humbled at not having any clue how to deal with the “look what you made me do” — long before Taylor Swift sang that lyric — was quite a moment in my young life.

The one thing I always maintained — and have since proven true — was that I always held value that Carol et al didn’t deserve to have access to anyway.

They sure fucking didn’t pay for that talent. Most of what I gave them was “on me.”

Anyway, part of me almost wants to restore the T to the DTOM of it all. But I can find plenty of other things to head scratch about that aren’t motion-sickness-induced.

A friend called tonight.

We got to talking about her wack-ass roommate.

I had said she really does just sit around waiting for you to breathe so she can complain publicly about it.

(I read these public posts — chickie is crazy AF.)

My friend says, “She’s just like Cindy. You are in New York, or Key West, or Las Vegas, or New Orleans … and she’s posting from her couch about your posts.”

We laughed.

Then we made plans to meet up in Orlando and another city before the year is out.

Keep watching. Keep hating. Keep making shit up. Keep rotting away from the inside.

We’ll just be over here glowing and going.

Got to thinking about yesterday’s diatribe.

If parts of it were unfair.

I don’t believe people set out to make me wonder about their mental health.

But I don’t see them being entirely oblivious to their (albeit small) impact on mine.

Anyway, yesterday’s big project launch appears to be another smashing success.

I love everything I do for a living, but I would love love love to do more of THAT for a living.

There will always be fools to suffer. But some different fools would be a nice change of scenery from the usual two.

But between people bugging me all morning for top secret data that only I hold …

And half of those people already revealed a customer’s (correct) guess about that secret data to half the company …

And the know-it-all who pasted that info for half the company to see, when I called them out privately, suddenly acted like they arrived on earth just today (like they haven’t been with me 4-5 times a year for the past 3+ years through this exact process) …

Then same know-it-all falsely said there’s a problem when I guarantee you I looked for problems BEFORE go-live and found none … and neither I nor the operator of that website could replicate said problem … but knowing the know-it-all, they will act like they did something great when all they did was add to five people’s workloads …

And then someone gave my employee newsletter to DTOM, who first misunderstood it and insisted I add something (not appropriate for the audience) to it …

Then when that was clarified, DTOM decided I need to turn it into a public-facing thing … and to run it by them when I do, of course …

And then I got a project that i cannot even fit into my little girl brain right now …

And I’m too tired to even be upset about all the interruptions as I was editing/writing/proofing in a big fat hurry this morning because no one can see my work till we push it live.

Seriously — if you want me to talk about trials not trails, you gotta pipe down, man.

Anyway, it’s been a good day. It really has. I have been working with my absolute favorite people today otherwise.

I just need a couple others to give me my dancing space, as Momma would quote “Dirty Dancing” at a moment like this.

Or “recreational fucking space,” as Momma would quote “About Last Night” at a moment like this.

Or both!

Miss you, Momma.

So sorry I gave up as much time with you as I did over the years.

So sorry you were at home without a car or without anyone to talk to or do things with, and not just during the workday. And not even while I was two feet from you.

Was it all worth it? I mean, yeah I do mostly like what I’m doing with my life.

But more often than not, what I wouldn’t give for a Momma hug and a big fat fuck you from her to the two trumpian types who create a problem that doesn’t exist then take credit for solving it.

This popped in my head this morning.

I was looking at some recent expenditures that didn’t feel big at the time.

But boy did they add up into one Big not so Beautiful credit card Bill.

And I realized, who is more grateful than me when it comes to being out and about? No one, that’s who.

The last few years have been a bit mental.

Losing Momma at 66 … and Sia at not-quite-30 ON THIS DAY nine years ago … and Janna at not-yet-50 … and Cocoa at 4 (sob) … and everyone else loved/lost … it fucks you up good.

I got in a fight in a “Mama June” community (LOL) when Josh said he’s middle-aged and everyone was so mad because he’s 30. Like WTF, youngster.

And I’m rattling off stats about how Boomers and now GenXers are dying younger than the Silent Generation. Like hey he is actually right at middle age, cuties.

Anyway I get into these moments where what’s the point in worrying about all my unfinished novels and unfinished work projects when the Grim Reaper is probably five or 10 years away.

But it’s not about time. It’s about quality of it.

I’ve got a lot of plot left.

And I will be over here trying to cram a lot of plot into those 5-10 years so that anything after that is a bonus.

So when I fret over this frankenvacation I’m plotting … that began with a two-night trip I bought from Ticketmaster Travel that’s now a multi-airport adventure … I will remind myself today’s me loves walking 35,000 steps a day.

A future, older me that “saved up” for it might not enjoy it so much.

I am trying to sell myself on “I’ll only do this once.” But future me is betting that it will do the trip better, so it thanks me for getting a first one down so she can plot a more efficient vacation.

Let’s just pay off this one first, future me, hey?

Anyway the reason this is a frankentrip is because I need to redo something that got messed up.

Also TBH the new leg is something I messed up a long time ago, too.

I mean, I didn’t mess it up. Poverty did.

I had gone on a work trip to a city. And the per diem was like $35. And the pay was horrid.

So when I wandered around and saw the thing I wanted to do was $100, I gulped.

Literally stood there and mentally counted my money a thousand times.

And … couldn’t do it.

Like, could not scrape together $100 to do it.

That same admission is like $200 today.

What I did do … and I am very happy with that … is I bought a souvenir for myself, and the same souvenir for Mom and Grampy to share.

I wasn’t sad about The Thing I Didn’t Get to Do after that.

I was happy to bring a little sunshine to people who deserved it too and didn’t get make it to the entrance like I did.

This trip is for Counseling Today me. Who at 30-ish was too buried in student loan debt and living in D.C. debt to also afford JOY.

I’m taking her back. And reclaiming HER plot.

Vintage SATC.

As is my new outfit that just arrived in the mail from Chelsea Market.

Not that anyone has ever made fun of my “matchy matchy” clothes or looked down their nose calling me a “shallow shopaholic.”

No they told all their friends they don’t make fun of me … on the same platforms where they *checks notes* make fun of me.

They also make fun of my “blog that nobody reads.”

But they sure do bitch to their somehow thousand followers when by their own admission they are my only reader “to drive up visits so she doesn’t feel so alone.”

I hope you hit every red light for the rest of your life. And that you think of me hitting every green light I ever encounter.

“That green light. I want it.”

I am sure they take credit for an itinerary I planned when i was avoiding them like the plague they are.

Like I didn’t go to college with future Broadway geeks. Like I don’t have a friend A who works at Hilton and books employee rooms in Hell’s Kitchen and sees every show. Like M isn’t my NYC spiritual adviser.

Like I said on the socials, I don’t know what this person wants.

But it isn’t theirs to have even if it’s mine to give.

Good morning to everyone but the lying narcissist.

Since she clearly comes here for something to get aggrieved about.

Go post 49 more tweets about me this morning.

I can’t even be bothered to look in the one place I can still see.

Nothing fake here. No fake accounts. No fake stories. And no sorries since I never did anything wrong.