Monday, January 31, 2011

Flashback: Charles

I have two siblings.  My sister, Casey, is 2 years younger than me, and my brother, Evan, is 5 years younger.  Given those numbers, obviously you have already reached the conclusion that Casey and I used to constantly gang up on Evan.  You are correct.

When Evan was in elementary school, Casey and I invented this game called "Charles."  It consisted of us forcing Evan to be our servant and bring us whatever we demanded.  During the game, we referred to Evan only as "Charles" ... because I guess that sounded like a good servant name to us.

The game started by one of us saying "Evan, be Charles!" and he usually went along with it at first without complaint.  Whenever we wanted Evan to do something for us, we would clap our hands twice and holler "CHARLES" and state whatever we wanted.  Actually, most of the time we didn't really want anything; we just shouted out random objects for him to get simply for the joy of watching him run around obeying us.

After a few minutes of humoring us, Evan would get tired of being Charles and start to protest or threaten to leave if we didn't start being nicer.  Now, Casey and I had no patience for this sort of back talk from the hired help.  When he got like this, we would utter a phrase which made him go absolutely crazy with anger.  The magic phrase was:

"I thought I heard a little voice ... but I guess it was just the wind."

God, that pissed him off.  He would start screaming, refusing to believe that we couldn't hear him, but we would just repeat the phrase over and over each time he said anything.  He would then start shouting insults at us since we "couldn't hear him", but we didn't tolerate that either.  No matter what insults he threw at us, we had one word that would always top them.  That word was: "jerky".

Apparently it wasn't good enough just to call him a "jerk," so we had to put a "y" on the end to give it that little extra flair.  Anyway, we would chant "JERKY, JERKY, JERKY" at Evan until he was about to explode with rage.  Looking back, these were all incredibly mean things to do to a little kid, but whatever, maybe he should have just stayed in character during "Charles" sessions, and he could have avoided all of this.  He brought it on himself.  I'm sure, if faced with a similar situation, anyone would have taken the same disciplinary action on their servant boy.

Once the "jerky" chanting had gotten to be too much for Evan, he would shout something at us like, "THAT'S IT!!!!" and run off to his room.  Casey and I would sit there laughing for a minute ... until Evan reappeared with a baseball bat.  He would then chase us around the house legitimately trying to bash our heads in with it.  I swear I think sometimes Mom and Dad would take their time getting the bat away from Evan because they wanted to teach us a lesson.  Evan never actually caught us, but holy shit did he look terrifying running after us swinging that bat like there was no tomorrow.  Ah, family memories ...

I would like to close by saying that I love Evan a lot, and we now get along splendidly.  Maybe tonight I'll walk by him and say "Charles, get me a sandwich" and see if he turns into the Hulk.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Perfectly Valid "Sick Day" Reasons

I didn't feel like going to work today, which is nothing new.  I am a trooper, though, so I hauled myself out of bed and drove to work like a good little employee; however, I don't agree with this whole "taking a sick day" system in which you actually have to have some sort of medically recognized, boss-approved illness to stay home.  The following is a list of perfectly good reasons for me to have stayed home sick today.  Feel free to try these out if they ever apply to you, and let me know if you still have a job afterwards.

1)  There is half a key lime pie in the fridge.

Well, technically there's less of it now, but there was half when I woke up this morning.  I clearly needed to stay home so I could eat it before it went bad.  Yes, it's only 2 days old, but shut up, that's not important.

2)  My middle finger was really itchy today.

Who's to say I didn't have some temporary finger disease?  I mean it was REALLY itchy for about 15 minutes, and I wish I had been able to concentrate on scratching it instead of doing some stupid report.  Thinking about it right now is making my whole hand itch.  See?  It's spreading.

3)  I need to trim my toenails.

Yeah sure, I could always do this once I get home from work in the evening, but by then my motivation is down.  I have a tiny window of toenail-clipping drive, and by the end of the day I'm pretty much just like, "I don't give a shit" and break out the extra-thick socks.  Which I am wearing right now.

4)  The lighting at work doesn't flatter me.

Every time I go into the bathroom at work, the lights in there make me look like some mutant.  I'll come out of the stall, catch sight of myself in the mirror, and want to flee the scene.  Really, it's not a good plan by management because it just makes me waste time in the bathroom trying to somehow make myself look like a human again.

5)  I couldn't decide what earrings to wear.

So of course, even though I have a billion pairs of earrings, I ended up choosing the plain little silver hoops.  I ALWAYS end up choosing the plain little silver hoops because I don't leave myself enough time to make such an important decision in the morning.  Therefore, instead of waking up 5 minutes earlier, I should just take the whole day off when the stress of a rushed earring decision hits me.

6)  I'm a lazy ass who just wants someone to knock on the door biweekly and give me a check for a huge amount of money.

Yep.

Monday, January 24, 2011

Shower Spider

Yesterday I was standing in the shower working conditioner into my hair when suddenly a huge black thing dropped onto the bottom of the tub.  I looked down and saw ...

The Scariest F-ing Spider Ever

I do not remain calm when faced with even the tiniest of spiders, so this thing really got me worked up.  It was being pelted by water but still moving towards my feet.  My first solution was to stand on one foot, but I quickly realized this left my other foot still in the path of danger.  I haven't yet mastered the ability to hover, so I had to formulate an alternate plan.

I looked around for something to squash it with and chose a shampoo bottle.  At this point, the water had caused the spider to lose its balance so it was swirling around all over the place.  I kept having to hop to different areas of the tub to avoid it, and of course it never just swirled down the drain like a nice guy - oh no, it kept trying to stand up and touch me.

Weapon in hand, I bent down to deliver my crushing blow.  I was shaking so much with fear that I barely hit him.  He stopped moving for a second, and I hoped that somehow the one broken leg had cause him to die.  Turns out, all it did was seriously piss him off, and he now started darting around even faster.  No idea how, since he was clearly handicapped, but that's just my luck.

I hit him again and this time he looked pretty squashed.  Satisfied, I started to push him towards the drain when OUT OF NOWHERE all of his remaining legs (about 4) started wildly flailing about.  His squashed body was stuck to the floor, but the legs were all crazy waving at me as if to say, "Hi there!  I'm so not dead yet!  My legs will destroy you and your family!!!!"

For a few seconds, all I could do was stand there staring at the legs in disbelief.  I started to go a little insane.  I thought maybe this was a spider incapable of being killed.  Maybe God or Thor or the Spider King or whoever had sent him into the shower as some kind of unstoppable force to take my life.  I figured I needed to beat the legs about a hundred times with the shampoo bottle to prevent him from using his powers to morph into an even bigger instrument of destruction. 

After I was done, I was able to finally wash the conditioner out of my hair.  It wasn't an easy task.  The spider was still stuck to the tub floor, and I was afraid to move my eyes from him since I was still half anticipating a sneak attack from the grave.  So, head bent, I finished my shower and got out of the tub.  I then grabbed a HUGE wad of toilet paper (like half the roll - I wasn't taking chances) and gathered up the corpse.  I spazzed out and thrust the wad into the toilet, slammed the lid down, and flushed.

Then I flushed again.

And again.

Part of me still wonders if he's hiding out in the pipes, slowly regaining his strength, preparing for another showdown.

Monday, January 17, 2011

Flashback: Craft Store Lady

My mom is one of those crafty people who loves making things 24/7.  When my sister Casey and I were young, Mom used to drag us to the craft store with her sometimes when she needed supplies.  Obviously these trips bored us out of our minds, so we would usually wander around the aisles looking at/touching all the crafty stuff.

On one of these trips, however, we came across a woman who was clearly out of her freakin' mind.  At the time, Casey and I were both middle school age.  Casey couldn't have been older than 11.  We were minding our own business when the woman approached us:

Woman: Where are ya'll's candles??????
Me and Casey: .........

We just stood there having no idea what to say.  Why was she talking to us and demanding candles?  We hadn't brought any candles into the store!  Did she want us to give a detailed description of where all the candles in our house were so she could get some decorating tips??  After a few seconds of our stunned silence, she continued, and the mystery was solved:

Woman (now visibly annoyed):  Come on; ya'll work here!!!!
Casey: ........
Me: Um, we don't work here.

Seriously?  How the hell could she think we worked there???  We were kids!  I wanted to be like "Yeah, this isn't a candle-making sweatshop, you psycho!"  Casey remained too shocked to speak throughout the entire encounter, and it's a wonder I managed to say anything myself, given how ridiculous the situation was.  The chick didn't even apologize - she just went off on her quest for candles.  She probably stopped to ask every kid she saw along the way if THEY knew where the candles were.

I don't know ... maybe she had been searching for the candles for hours and had gotten lost in the glue or paint section and was delirious from the fumes and hallucinated 2 uniform-clad adults instead of 2 kids.  Speaking of uniforms, Casey still blames the whole encounter on me since I was wearing overalls at the time and apparently that's what the employees wore.  Well, first of all, Casey wasn't wearing overalls, but the woman still thought SHE worked there.  Second, I doubt my super cool overalls (barf) caused me to look that much older.

I wish I had been quick-thinking enough to pretend that I did work there:

"The candles are in aisle 4, but because you didn't ask for them nicely, you are hereby banned from this store.  Please exit immediately before my colleague and I are forced to call Big Hank, our security officer."

But yeah, clearly this woman had no sense of how to tell a person's age.  She probably went around bothering kids in every store she entered.  I keep picturing her going to buy herself a new shirt and asking a toddler to please get her a fitting room.

Friday, January 14, 2011

The Herman Saga Continues

That damn mouse is still alive.  I just know he is waiting to sneak up on me.

A few weeks ago, Rick and I kept hearing him scurrying around in the kitchen.  He is SUPER loud for such a tiny creature ... unless he has turned into some sort of giant mutant mouse (an image that haunts my dreams now).  Once, Rick even saw him venture out into the dining room!  We decided at that point that we needed to set a trap for him.  I mean, I didn't want to be in the shower one day, look down, and see Herman peeking in like the sick pervy mouse I know he must be.

I have to convince myself that he's a horrible creature.  That's the only way I can feel good about setting a trap to kill him.

When Rick came home with the trap and set it, I had sort of a weird reaction ... I burst into tears.  At that moment, all I could think of was poor little Herman just trying to have these harmless social interactions with us, and here we are, being the worst hosts ever, murdering our guest.

So, Rick came up with a plan.  Because he is a genius.  And knows how to handle his insane girlfriend.

He came over to where I was curled up on the bed, crying like a moron, and told me that it was ok to kill Herman because he is, in fact, not a good mouse at all:

"You know, he only sneaks in here looking for other girl mice to cheat on his wife with.  That's the whole reason he comes over.  He sneaks over here after his wife and kids are asleep and looks for mouse whores, and if he can't find any, he just keeps going from apartment to apartment looking for them.  He's a player!" 

I knew he was right.  I fully convinced myself that all the noises we heard were Herman banging some prostitute mouse while his perfect wife and children were at home.  So now I am totally cool with killing him.

HOWEVER it's been weeks and he is apparently way too smart for our trap.  Herman is still at large ... or, at small ... since he's a mouse.  Ha.  Ok, bad joke. 

Monday, January 10, 2011

Flashback: Receptionist

My first job out of college was a receptionist position.  The job wasn't difficult, but I greatly overestimated the sanity of the people calling into the office.  I had to answer all incoming calls and then transfer them to the appropriate person using a switchboard.  The phone was pretty busy all day, so I got really annoyed when some lunatic would keep me on the phone longer than necessary with their insane ramblings.  Below are some examples of shit I had to deal with:

1) The Terrifying Father

Me: How may I direct your call?
TF: Yeah, I need to make an appointment for my son with Christian Psychotherapy.

Ok so, I definitely didn't work at a place that was associated with whatever "Christian Psychotherapy" is, and I have no idea how that guy got the office number.  I felt really bad for his son, though.  That sounds like the most horrible thing in the world.  I mean, I kept picturing this poor little kid sitting in a room like they show on tv when police try to make criminals confess.  I imagined some "therapist" shouting things at the kid like, "EAT YOUR VEGETABLES OR JESUS WILL KILL YOUR DOG!!!!!"

2) The Overreactor

Me: How may I direct your call?
TO: Sarah
Me: One moment (transfers call)

**one minute later**

Me: How may I direct your call?
TO: You just transferred me to Sarah and her voicemail picked up!  It wasn't her!!!
Me: I'm sorry.  She must be away from her desk.  Let me see if I can get someone else for you.
TO: If you transfer me to another voicemail,  I will report you to the police!  I will call the police right now!

Yikes.  Seriously, what I wanted to do was tell him to go ahead and try to report me and see what happened.  I also wanted to keep transferring him to Sarah's voicemail and then convince him that it wasn't her voicemail; that's just how Sarah answers the phone.

3) The EXTREME Overreactor

Me: How may I direct your call?
TEO: I need to talk to Derek RIGHT AWAY.
Me: Ok, one moment (dials extension, hears that Derek's voicemail immediately picks up) I'm sorry, he seems to be out of the office.  Would you like to leave him a voicemail?
TEO: Oh holy shit!  What is wrong with you people?!
Me: ... um ...
TEO: Does no one work around there?  What the hell is going on???
Me: Or ... um ... I could transfer you to his cell phone ...
TEO:  Don't bother 'cause I just know he won't pick up!  JESUS CHRIST!!!  What are you trying to do to me?  Do you treat everyone like this?!
Me: I'm sorry, I just -
TEO: You know what I think?  I think people like YOU are directly responsible for everything that happened on 9/11!!!! (hangs up)

That is not an exaggeration.  The man actually accused me of being some sort of terrorist.  I realize now he was probably insane, but at the time all I could do was sit there in shock.  I wonder what happens when someone is actually rude to that guy.  He probably just shoots them on the spot.

So I guess the lesson here is: If you are ever a receptionist, you better make sure everyone stays at their desks 24/7 ... or, just smuggle alcohol in to help ease the pain of the calls.

Just kidding, I never did that.

No seriously, I didn't.

I swear!

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Drive-Thru Recorded Greetings

I love fast food.  Duh.

What I do NOT love is when I pull up to the little order-taking speaker thing and I get a recorded greeting.  I never know what to do with that, but I figure these are my options:

1) Be insulted that I was not greeted by an actual human and complain to management about poor customer service
2) Give my order immediately after the recording stops, all the time worrying that the real person isn't ready yet
3) Sit silently in protest until a real person starts talking to me

I used to go with option 2.  Right after the recording prompted me to place my order, I would follow directions and do so.  This is how that always went:

Recording: May I take your order?
Me: Yeah, can I get a number 3 combo with a -
Angry Drive-Thru Worker: BE RIGHT WITH YOU!!!!!

What the hell?  Why would you have a recorded greeting if, by the time it finished speaking, you weren't ready?  Who invented this in the first place?  I would also like to say that the recording is always MUCH more cheerful than the actual person working.  It is so deceptive.  Where does that recorded voice come from?  Some corporate headquarters?  Did they pay an actress?  I have never encountered a drive-thru employee that nice.

Anyway, now I go with option 3:

Recording: May I take your order?
Me: ...............
Angry Drive-Thru Worker: Uh, PLEASE go ahead with your order, MA'AM!

Seriously, I can't win.  If I start talking, they get annoyed.  If I patiently wait for them to be ready, they get annoyed. 

There is also secret fantasy option 4, which would go like this if I were brave enough:

Recording: May I take your order?
Me: I'm not talking to this god damn cheery robot voice, so you bitches just let me know when you're ready to punch in my food order which you will probably screw up anyway.  Actually, I don't wanna talk to you either, so I'm just gonna repeat my order over and over and you give me a signal like coughing when you want me to f-ing drive around and pay your ass.  I figure it'll take at least ten minutes.

But I don't do things like that because I am always the nicest girl in the world.

Well, that and I don't want people spitting into my coke.

Sunday, January 2, 2011

Stomach Disease

I tend to overreact and am a big fan of hyperbole.  My boyfriend knows this and is very patient with me during those moments.

Last night, my stomach was launching an attack on me.  I think it's safe to assume that my combination of food throughout the evening was the cause.  I ate 2 kinds of chips, onion dip, cookie dough, salmon, garlic bread, and chocolate.  It was good at the time; just trust me.

Anyway, I was lying in bed feeling pretty nauseous and moaning to myself.  By the time my boyfriend came to bed, my stomach had gotten even worse and I began to slightly freak out.  When I get like this, I for some reason expect to be taken totally seriously, no matter how ridiculous I sound:

Me: I have a disease.
Rick: What disease?
Me: Stomach disease.
Rick: You don't have a disease.

He wasn't taking me seriously.  Some boyfriend.  I began to get irritated:

Me: Ugh!  It smells like a dentist's office in here!  What is that?
Rick: I had to put some antiseptic on the cut on my thumb.  How could you think that smells like a dentist's office?
Me: You brought dentist smell into this bed.  It's gonna make my disease worse.
Rick: I doubt that, considering you don't have a disease.

At that point, I guess he was getting tired of my insane rambling.  He turned away from me, pulling the blankets up to his chin and therefore over my entire face.  I took this as an attempt on my life:

Me: You're trying to suffocate me!!!
Rick: If I were trying to do that, I'd just use the pillow.

Great.  Nice to know he's thought about how he would kill me.  That's when my mind began to spin out of control:

Me: I can't breathe, and now it smells like pepperoni in here!
Rick: Did you fart, and that's the pepperoni smell?
Me: NO!!! 

He was making fun of me.  He was not at all concerned that my stomach might explode or something.  I decided then that the cure for my disease was water.  Don't ask me why.

Me: I need water.
Rick: Is that your way of kindly asking me to get you some water?

Jerk.  The diseased don't have time to think about being polite with their requests.  He ended up getting me the water, though.  Upon taking my first sip, I quickly discovered that it was definitely not the cure:

Me: This tastes like pencil lead!!
Rick: What???
Me: The water ... something is wrong with the water.
Rick: I just drank some five minutes ago; it's fine.
Me: No, it's a pencil.  I can't drink this.

I recognize now that I seemed pretty ungrateful.  I would like to now say that I love my boyfriend very much, and I greatly appreciate him getting out of bed to get me that cup of water.

... even though it did taste like a fucking pencil.