labels

Boss gave me a compliment today. Yeah, it freaked the shit out of me, too. I was tired and run down all day, due to fighting off whatever it is that half my office has, and my big plan was to go home after work and face plant into bed. Then the unexpected compliment came and right around the same time I received a text: "Want to go to Wahoo's?"

The compliment came only because Boss was painted into a corner and had no other option but to back me up, since my records were impeccable. Nonetheless, it was nice to not be thrown under the bus. And as anyone who knows me knows, I could go to Wahoo's every single day, so that's a no-brainer.

Wahoo's, to those who are unfamiliar, is the best Mexican food joint in the universe. It's kind of Mexi-Cali-wai'ian food and it's healthy and insanely delicious and cheap, to boot. I've been eating there for over twenty years and I really feel like you can't go wrong with that place. So we hit that up, gorged ourselves and then I decided to walk home, since it was a really nice evening and I had missed my workout for fish tacos.

As I went along, I cut through Madison Square park and saw two twenty-somethings practicing some sort of dance shuffle on the sand. The Flatiron building looked beautiful as always, and I wondered if I was going to have time to come back that way and appreciate that particular area again. I walked down 26th Street past my old apartment, where the Crazy's still live, cruised out on 7th Avenue and watched a guy drumming on a bucket, a couple of pans and some other assorted objects. I even walked (mostly) through Times Square - which was tolerable because of the late hour - and the theater district. By the time I got home, I was engulfed by how much I love this city.

I woke up at 3am to go get some water and my blackberry was blinking. It was Boss. I knew she couldn't handle the pressure of acknowledging that I do a good job. "Where ar my file lbels?", she wrote. "Get yourslef oranized, this is anoying."

Too bad I prioritized work yesterday and got all of our organizing docs sent to Luxembourg instead of printing up labels for her fucking shoes.

closings

Bill's Gay Nineties closed this weekend. I hate it when shit like that happens. The place was open for almost ninety years, has only been owned by two people, was still busy all the time, and is one of the original speakeasies from the roaring twenties. We went over to say goodbye to the place and it was packed to the rafters, tons and tons of people mourning the fact that some dude in Ireland decided not to renew the lease, despite the institution that Bill's has been for multiple generations.

This is one thing that greatly saddens me about New York. Understanding that a city like this is dynamic and ever-changing, there is an aspect of the city that needs to be better preserved. A place like that is a landmark. The story of it makes it worth saving and the foreign aspect of this - with someone who doesn't even live in the city in charge of its fate - is just ridiculous.

But regardless of that little spat that the city and I had, I had an old timey type of weekend, with caviar and creme fraiche, jazz and champagne, and a spicy bloody mary to finish it all off before wandering back home in the fresh, cool air - well, home for the next month, anyway........

This early springtime is wooing me.

i love.....

Breezy nights, wine bars, new connections with old friends.

I have been in the city a long time. I have years and years of stories and memories. My Hells Kitchen stories are positive and random and involve probably my favorite cast of characters. How will I live without the bodega on the corner? Without literally dozens of bars, shops and restaurants within three blocks of my front door? Without twenty four hour access to literally everything? Literally.

Why is the city doing this to me? Romancing me so subtly and so provocatively, right at the end? Don't worry baby, I'm leaving for a little, but I'll be back.....provided my new city doesn't prove to be a better romantic, that is.

trauma

I'm going to write about this a lot more in the future, but I'm still putting together how I want to approach it. However, I keep reading about PTSD, with many different triggers, and I also keep reading about how people think it's an excuse and an easy thing to fake.

I feel compelled to say that it is a real thing and it is something that progresses and intensifies and destroys both the person it is afflicting and everyone around them. Basically what happens is, any even slightly negative aspect of that person is greatly intensified, along with the onset of social paranoia and reclusiveness. So a really fun, nice, outgoing person becomes pretty negative and doesn't come out much, if at all. A person who is kind of a dick, but is still an all right person becomes a downright miserable, angry asshole. Being less than a degree away from this transformation and the aftermath is nothing short of complete torture.

It is possible to treat and with the help of treatments like EMDR - which is a groundbreaking and intense therapy - it is possible to get better and defeat it. I have now known several people who have gone through this, and after suffering a relationship that ultimately disassembled my life, it pains me to hear people diminish what those who have to deal with PTSD go through.

I do strongly feel however, that it is each person's responsibility to get help and go through treatment with a mind to aggressive recovery. Otherwise, those who are supportive to the process get abused and wrung out.

So here's the point of this: chances are that a disproportionate number of our service members have some form of PTSD. They need help and we need to help them, instead of judging them so harshly. Additionally, there are many, many members of society walking around with this same problem and with the same symptoms. If they claim it, look for the symptoms to back up the claim without judging the person and then help them. And if you happen to be someone who is close to the person who is suffering PTSD, gird yourself and know when to stick up for yourself and when to hit the road and walk away from both the afflicted and a situation you cannot fix.

i'll miss.....

I think this is going to turn into something of a multi-post ode to New York. Now that I have a firm end date, I am noticing all of the things that I will miss about this place. Oddly, there are a bunch of really annoying things that I'm finding I'll miss. Probably I won't, but I'm feeling romantical.

Tonight I was doing a ralk (mostly run with some walking) up the Hudson and I realized I've got a lot of landmarks there. I realized that I have literally run this island from basically the Tri-Boro bridge, all the way down FDR, around the tip, through Battery Park, up Tribeca and up the entire west side to the GW bridge. One of these days I should just run around the damn thing at one time. The way my hip is going, today is not that day, however.

But the thing specific to this post that I will miss, is the particular stretch of water that I run the most - basically from below Chelsea Piers to above 125th St. I will miss the 69th Street transfer exchange and how cool and looming it is, while still being a faint reminder of a New York that still had industry. I love the pilings and the little bridges that go out over the water, the pier, and that fantastic river walk that makes you forget that you just walked two blocks over from fifty story buildings and people swaggering through the streets, drunk. At noon.

By the time I get going, it is usually my favorite time of day - right before dusk, when the water shimmers silver and blue and green and the sky is not quite light but not quite dark. It's the time of day when the city takes a breath before night begins and I love watching the lights come up on the bridge. I love running past the Lackawanna sign, the Colgate clock, the Intrepid....

I love that this little stretch is just mine. And it's all about running.

zipit

I was practically crying, I was laughing so hard, when I read this. Found on Gawker and there's no point in paraphrasing.......enjoy.

Work Out Alone

In order to better address the needs of our fitness-obsessed readers, we are introducing this semi-regular column, "I of the Tiger," to address vital hardcore fitness issues of our time. Today: the journey to hardcoreness is a solitary one. Dig it.

People like to work out in groups. They like to go to classes. They like to do Zumba and Pilates and Yoga and Aerobics with a bunch of like-minded peers. They like to go to Saturday night dance party workouts for singles who like to sweat and mingle.

These people are wrong. Wrong how? I'll do the talking here, thank you very much. Just wrong. Hardcoreness is not achieved in groups. Hardcoreness is achieved via a journey into the sweating painful depths of yourself. Hardcoreness is achieved alone. Therefore you should work out alone. Do you know who works out in groups? Jerks, mostly.

"But," you object in a pitiful manner, "I have a 'workout buddy.' It gives me 'motivation.'" Sure, sure you do. You have a workout buddy, alright. Maybe it is your friend. Maybe it is even your girlfriend. But that workout buddy is only motivating you to do one thing: to talk to them. To discuss things. To chatter.

Chatter about this: shut up.

The gym is not a place for talk. The gym is a place for action. Action consists of doing things. Hardcore things. It could be pulling things, or pushing things, or pulling and then pushing things, or moving things around in a circle. It could be lots of things. One thing it cannot be: talking, to another person. Every word you say in the gym reduces the ambient levels of hardcoreness. Being with somebody therefore places you in imminent danger of subjecting yourself to a workout that is just some bullshit. Here is a scientific statistical breakdown of the time the average person spends at the gym with a "workout buddy:"

21%: Getting changed.
13%: Discussing the plan for today's workout.
18%: Spotting your workout buddy, unnecessarily.
18%: Working out.
30%: Talking to each other, while sitting on a bench that someone else who wants to actually lift something is waiting for.

You and your workout buddy are not creating fitness synergy. You two are carrying on like the cast of Perfect Strangers while monopolizing valuable workout real estate. You two insist on alternating your workouts and spotting each other despite the fact that neither of you are lifting enough weight to imperil yourself. You are, in effect, giving yourself a plausible excuse to rest for the majority of time in the gym. I'm onto you. The only plausible reasons to have a partner with you as you work out are 1) Because you are actually hardcore enough to require a spotter. (You're not.) Or, 2) Because that partner is a specialized trainer who is screaming at you a lot and forcing you to work out harder and faster.

We're not even going to talk about "classes" here. Get real. The ideal workout is you, alone, in a locked room, a lone dirty bulb flickering overhead, the faint scurrying of rat paws the only sound, squatting a heavy barbell, or perhaps just a big rock, over, and over, and over, unto death.

Failing that, you may go to a gym. Do not bring a buddy to your workout. Do not go to the trouble of checking the "schedule" to go to a "class." Do not tell anyone you are going to the gym. Just go to the gym, in secret. Do not say hello to the person at the desk. Do not smile and chit chat with your fellow gymgoers. Get ready quickly and in private. Dedicate every thought in your head to hardcoreness. Speech is just HARDCORENESS LEAVING THE BODY. Don't let it happen to you.

not a fluke.

In following yesterday's rant, I have copied Sandra Fluke's article on cnn.com. It is well a worded, direct and calmly articulated argument and I support what she stands for on this issue.

(CNN) -- Last month, students from several Catholic universities gathered to send a message to the nation that contraception is basic health care. I was among them, and I was proud to share the stories of my friends at Georgetown Law who have suffered dire medical consequences because our student insurance does not cover contraception for the purpose of preventing pregnancy.

I joined these students in speaking at a media event because I believe that stories of how real women are affected are the most powerful argument for access to affordable, quality reproductive health care services.

I also joined these students because now is a critical time to raise this issue in our public consciousness.

Thanks to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, preventive care services, including contraception, will be covered by private insurance plans without co-pays or deductibles. If appropriately implemented, this important law will finally guarantee women access to contraception, regardless of the religious affiliation of their workplace or school.

By now, many have heard the stories I wanted to share thanks to the congressional leaders and members of the media who have supported me and millions of women in speaking out.

Because we spoke so loudly, opponents of reproductive health access demonized and smeared me and others on the public airwaves. These smears are obvious attempts to distract from meaningful policy discussions and to silence women's voices regarding their own health care.

These attempts to silence women and the men who support them have clearly failed. I know this because I have received so many messages of support from across the country -- women and men speaking out because they agree that contraception needs to be treated as a basic health care service.

Who are these supporters?

They are women with polycystic ovarian syndrome, who need contraception to prevent cysts from growing on their ovaries, which if unaddressed can lead to infertility and deadly ovarian cancer. They are sexual assault victims, who need contraception to prevent unwanted pregnancy.

They are Catholic women, who see no conflict between their social justice -based faith and family planning. They are new moms, whose doctors fear that another pregnancy too soon could jeopardize the mother's health and the potential child's health too. They are mothers and grandmothers who remember all too well what it was like to be called names decades ago, when they were fighting for a job, for health care benefits, for equality.

They are husbands, partners, boyfriends and male friends who know that without access to contraception, the women they care about can face unfair obstacles to participating in public life. And yes, they are young women of all income levels, races, classes and ethnicities who need access to contraception to control their reproduction, pursue their education and career goals and prevent unintended pregnancy. And they will not be silenced.

These women know how expensive birth control pills can be, with or without insurance coverage. For a single mother with kids, a woman making minimum wage, or a student living on loans, a high monthly co-pay could be the difference between buying contraception or one week of groceries.

And imagine the financial burden of unplanned pregnancy and raising a child. For women without insurance coverage or with insurance that doesn't cover contraception, the costs create a significant financial burden.

Many women cannot medically use the least expensive types of contraception. As a result, many women, especially those 18 to 34 who have the most trouble affording contraception, simply go without. They face any number of medical risks as well as unintended pregnancy -- all of which damage their productivity and the health of their families.

Most recently, certain political commentators have started spreading misinformation about the underlying government regulation we are discussing. To be clear, through programs such as Medicaid, the government already does and should fund contraception coverage for the poorest women in our country.

But, despite the misinformation being spread, the regulation under discussion has absolutely nothing to do with government funding: It is all about the insurance policies provided by private employers and universities that are financed by individual workers, students and their families -- not taxpayers.

I am talking about women who, despite paying their own premiums, cannot obtain coverage of contraception on their private insurance, even when their employer or university contributes nothing to that insurance.

Restricting access to such a basic health care service, which 99% of sexually experienced American women have used and 62% of American women are using right now, is out of touch with public sentiment. In fact, more than 60% of Americans support this regulation and affordable access to contraception, according to the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation.

Attacking me and women who use contraception by calling us prostitutes and worse cannot silence us.

I am proud to stand with the millions of women and men who recognize that our government should legislate according to the reality of our lives -- not for ideology.

pills n bills

Okay, I'm actually going to write about this. I have alluded to it before, but I'm actually just going to come out and rip the Republican party apart on this whole birth control / abortion / 'religious freedom' debate.

You wackjobs that have hijacked what would otherwise be a somewhat logical party in American politics, have fucked a lot of things up and are pushing our society backward. Why do I say this? Let's have a little look-see into Republican politics these days. I should point out that I am fully aware that great ideas come from Republicans too. I'm not in any way insinuating that there are not logical, forward thinking Republicans in the world. There are, I know many of them. However my friends, your party has been co-opted and dropped off the cliff of sanity.

At the moment, if you want any of the fiscal policies, tax breaks or whatever the party is offering via their candidates - things that they claim will boost jobs numbers and strengthen the economy, you have to buy the package. The package, is the super, duper, far right tea party, which comes inextricably with the right's bag of goods. This means, that while there is the campaign push for alternative policies to the ones currently in place economically, if you even think about going for that, you'll get hooked into a sharp right turn once the Republicans take office and all sorts of fun things like legislating god into government and the creation of road blocks that insert a bunch of old, white dudes into what goes on between a woman and her doctor, before an abortion, among other things.

But wait, isn't this the party of less government? Isn't this the party that wants the man out of their lives? Of course! How did I not put together that assuming all women are stupid and forcing them through an unnecessary and shaming medical procedure prior to undertaking something as intensely personal as the termination of a pregnancy, is logical? Of course, this means that if a lot of abortions are stopped due to the shame, or the unnecessary financial burden that paying for an expensive, last-minute ultrasound would bring, then yaaaay Republicans, right? I mean, lookit all those babies! Although statistically the majority of these babies would be born to lower income people. Lower income people, who can't afford to properly care for all of these children that the Tea Party contingent has saved. Lower income women who maybe already have a couple of children they are struggling to do right by. But that's the woman's problem TOO, as it turns out. She'll soon get no help at all.

And before you even say it, this whole 'well just don't have sex, then' argument is a bunch of shit and anyone who says it, must be delivering that message tongue-in-cheek. Even Republicans and Tea Partiers are fucking, often times waaaayy more kinkily than the rest of us.

But no bother.....we'll just go ahead and take away your birth control in the name of 'religious freedom', because some wacky right-winger in a fly-over red state pushed a bill through a republican controlled house and senate, because god told him to - despite the fact that what is up for discussion involves insurance that is paid for not by taxpayers, but by individuals themselves. So even though there is the medical fact that the medicine in birth control does more than just prevent babies, it should be made unavailable to vast numbers of women, because without insurance or planned parenthood, that, too, is prohibitively expensive. Don't think he'll undo coverage of Cialis, though. No way.

And before all you swinging dicks out there say that a woman "should find another partner to buy her birth control for her" (and yes, someone actually made that argument to me), condoms are not the only - or the best - way to prevent unwanted pregnancy. Taking away a woman's right to family planning is unethical and fucked up. Adding the insult of telling her to find a man to take care of her is just a misogynistic, asshole thing to do. Because now you take away pretty much every way a woman has to control her sexuality and her procreation. And here's something to note, old, out of touch dudes in government....the only reason this is even the quandary that it is, is that we as women are simply outnumbered in government representation. But your grip, it's slipping.

See men don't get this because they are not the ones that have to actually deal with it all. You know who is left holding the bag every time? The woman. She has to make the decisions, go to all of the appointments, carry the baby, go through the pains, rearrange her entire life and then, for at least the next eighteen years, be the primary caretaker of this child. By putting a woman through unnecessary procedures, prior to allowing her to exercise her right to an abortion - and I predict that without reliable and affordable birth control, the rate of unwanted pregnancies and therefor abortions will rise - the woman is left to deal with all of it, taking on the financial and emotional burden of a child she did not want or could not afford to want. And then, of course, add in the likelihood that she is not getting any help from the guy who knocked her up, because he doesn't have to carry the baby and he can run around acting like he doesn't know, it's not his, or he just doesn't want it. This, incidentally, is not a man-hating kind of post. Men are fantastic in many situations. On the subject of a woman's uterus as it pertains to legalese and the stripping of rights....not so much.

Yeah, you don't see a ton of men sticking around in these situations. No emotional, physical, or financial responsibility for men, unless they choose to take it - at least for the duration of the unwanted pregnancy. He can just say no and drop off, until the [unwanted] child is born and the woman puts up the money to drag the guy to court. Again, all on her. And you know why that is? Because men don't have to stick around. I guess technically neither do women, but you don't often see women abandoning their own kids.

No, instead, the woman will work 3 jobs trying to make ends meet. She can't go to school to get ahead in the job market, because she's got to feed these kids. And she's got to get them to school and when they get sick, she needs to find a way to pay for their medical care, since she can't get insurance at any of her 3 working class jobs; or the amount she has to pay in to get insurance, means she wouldn't be able to afford her rent, or get her 1991 Nissan Sentra fixed again, since she can't afford a new car. All of this could have been avoided if she could have gone to Planned Parenthood to get her annual check up, get screened for both cervical and breast cancer, and get some birth control, which would then pretty much clear up that future part of her financial burden, as she'd be able to prevent an unwanted pregnancy. This is obviously not every story, but this scenario in sum or in part is the story for a disproportionate number of women.

Taking away something as simple and important as birth control has a ripple effect that no one seems to want to think about, or that Republicans don't give a shit about (take your pick). If the Republican party in its current form continues with it's line of reasoning on this subject, this mother won't get any support with medical care for her children - since the state took away her ability to feasibly limit the size of her family, because it's apparently wrong for an elected government to care - in any form - for its constituents.

This may seem insanely illogical, but it seems to me that the cost of birth control is far, far less costly than entire households draining the system - be it welfare, prison, or otherwise. And to Rush Limbaugh's comment that the Democrats are "afraid of birth", um, you, sir, have a spotless record of not producing offspring. And while I'm at it, thank the universe for that gift - someone in Limbaugh's camp seems to be hitting the birth control pretty hard.

As for all of these hoops that women - who have been called stupid, irresponsible and slut - have to jump through to terminate a pregnancy, all I can say is:

Right wing nut-jobs, get the fuck away from my uterus and to use the old phrase, 'keep your laws off my body'. Our population is 51% women. We clearly need a representative goverment.

p.a.

I come from a world that is fairly straightforward. If you like something, you say so (ie: "I really like this!"). If you don't like something, you say so in the most diplomatic, yet direct way possible (ie: "I'm uncomfortable with this, what can we do about it?"). I'm used to things being on the table and people having the ability to communicate directly, regarding their thoughts and / or feelings about things.

In the last several years however, I have been presented with a slew of people for whom direct communication is just not an option. I have unwillingly and unwittingly been witness to the passive aggressive world - a world where no one speaks directly, or can, or will actually identify the root cause of a problem and take steps to resolve it, no matter how big, or small. It should be mentioned that a disproportionate chunk of these non-direct people communicate almost exclusively through text and chat, leaving a 100% chance for miscommunication open, because they only communicate in over-emotinal soundbytes. This intensifies the irritation factor greatly, due to the lack of concise and often far quicker ways to relay a message and move on.

In short, this uncommunicative, passive aggressive world is fucking annoying.

The PA world is populated by a bunch of friggin sandbags whose mission is solely to find some sort of conflict (though they will swear up and down that such is not the case), and to say stupid things like:

"well, I put it on facebook, so I shouldn't have to remember to invite / tell you. You should check my page",

or "you didn't express enough interest when I told you what I was doing, so I didn't invite you [and now am going to pout because you're not begging to come along] ",

or my personal favorite: the constant use of the word 'maybe' in response to direct yes or no questions (followed of course by silence, rather than information).

I don't understand that shit. The whole spider web of intimation, hints, pouting, phone-turning off, and fishing for responses to questions that were never asked, is just terribly inefficient. Those who espouse the whole PA lifestyle seem to me to be addicted to creating and sustaining some sort of drama, in an attempt to conduct some sort of weird social experiment, to see exactly how much frustration and mixed message a person will stick around for. I see it in the office, among friends and especially in dating. People, this - at the very least - doubles the amount of time one will have to spend navigating a situation to find a positive or amicable resolution.

New rules I've set up for myself include:
a) clear explanation (by me) of my perceived role in a situation, whether it be work, romantic, or otherwise, to avoid confusion on my part
b) not dating or associating with anyone whose name includes anywhere in it, the word drama, or who describes themselves as lonely, angry, or sad
c) exiting the conversation after the maybe trap is set to give the other person some time to think about the yes or no
d) discontinuing discussions after three (3) nonsensical fights, or misunderstandings are mustered out of thin air
e) running far, far away, the moment someone is fishing, yet will not cop to what it is he or she is fishing for.

The passive aggressive world is on notice. If you are a part of that world, I ask you kindly to stay the hell away from this girl, because I ain't got time for your antics anywhere in my world. I invite non-overly-emotive, highly intelligent people to join me in my quest for a drama-free existence. Together, we can polarize the passive-aggressives and they can whine and emote and manipulate each other into oblivion. Good plan.

fifty two days

I have 52 days left in New York. Fifty two more sunrises and ten o'clocks.

And so it starts.....the NYC bucket list. Luckily, I will be in the city for spring, which I love, and I'll be near enough to the park and the water that I can enjoy it.

I'm overwhelmed by leaving the city, a little, and I don't care what anyone says; if you have lived in the city and moved around and much as I have, and experienced as many different sides of the city as I have, this becomes home. I am a New Yorker from California, but I'm a part of this place and it is my home. Consequently, I may be back in a few years.

But I'm off for now.......more to come.

quitters

The hammer has begun to drop. Two people quit this week, from very different positions, both with incredibly similar reasons for leaving. Both of these people are really nice, very hardworking people, who are part of 'the group'.

'The group' is short for 'the group that will never reach its full potential'. A small collection of individuals that make life in this gilded cage at least moderately better, because they are....well.....not assholes. So the group is down two members now, soon to be three, when I give my notice in just four short weeks (assuming all goes well).

After I found out the quitting news today, I received an email from Boss titled "URGENT". There was a three paragraph, word document attached and the body of the email said this:

"Please make the spacing in paragraph 3 the same as the other paragraphs and send back to me right away."

Urgent means different things to different people.

recovery

I have taken a tiny break here. Things have been crazy, busy and there is a lot going on - which is probably why I don't see myself lasting past about 8pm tonight.

Suffice it to say, I have some good stories to tell and I need a massage. Stay tuned.

HR

Today's installment involves the simple transaction of a document compilation and hand-off. This should be a fairly straightforward process. A book of documents was needed for a board meeting, and I was tasked with putting said book together.

While compiling this book, I couldn't print a doc because it wouldn't open properly. I had other people try, also with no success. After much tribulation on the part of about four people - one of whom was our top IT person, another of whom is Boss - we finally got it to open and print, I completed the pack and walked it in to give to Boss. This should be simple and straightforward....I walk in, hand her the book, walk out. Of course if that were the case in actuality, there would be no story and I would not be writing about this right now.



I walk into Boss's office to give it to Boss and say as a matter of affirmation, "I got that doc to print---" and am promptly cut me off with "I have no idea what you're talking about." With that snip, Boss turns her back to me in a huff, despite having been part of the process not five minutes earlier. I replied, "that's probably because I hadn't finished the sentence." I stood there for a second, out of curiosity to see what she would say next.
No reply, just her back turned to me, nose in the air. I'm not even exaggerating about the nose in the air. It really was - as much as it can be for a sexagenarian troll. Ahh, Tuesday.

cupid

I think this about sums it up:

no glove, no.....

So let me get this straight.

It's not okay for insurers to provide free birth control to needy  (read: low income) people - the people who can LEAST afford to procreate, but who are obviously fornicating. So no birth control for them, says the religious right and the Catholic church.

However, if those people continue to multiply - as the church seems to want them to - and are unable to afford to take care of their children, the religious right and the Catholic church won't help them out then, either. I don't know about you, but I think a pack of condoms or a wheel of pills costs a hell of a lot less for the state than a bunch of kids, who very well may turn into a bunch of adults, in need.

You'd think that all of these devoutly religious folks would adopt the Christlike stance of taking care of their fellow brother and trying to help him get out of a terrible cycle of poverty and despair. Way to go weirdo right-wingers.

mallet

A mallet to the temples, that is. I'll just jump right in. The backstory, quickly, is......

Weekly meeting with several people, Boss among them. Meeting was coordinated with other work dude (who is actually a nice person) and his assistant and was set for a time / date that worked for everyone. And here's how everything becomes my fuck up. This is all via email at 11pm on a Monday.

Dude at work: Apologies…I see that we are booked for tomorrow at 5pm…I have a Doctor appt at 4:30pm, and know that I won’t be back by then… Apologies, that this was overlooked… Assistant/Tall Girl, can you find another time that works..?

Boss (to me only): You scheduled this, so why is it scheduled at a time he could not do?

Me: His assistant and I confirmed with him and he signed off on it at the time.

Boss: You need to check something wrong (nice punctuation)

Me: I'm confused. I'm aware he cannot make it and it needs to be rescheduled, but what else is wrong?

Boss: The meeting should not have been scheduled when he could not attend

......Does Boss read? Did she not see that he overlooked his own appointment and that there was no way for me to know this? Clearly not.

Me: I'm aware of that. When his assistant and I scheduled, he said he could make it. The error was not mine, nor his assistant's.

Boss: speak iwth him (yes, misspelled, with no punctuation, as per usual)
Me: Of course, as we are rescheduling. I did not set this up unilaterally.


That was at 11pm, with the last message at 11:49, on a Monday. I work for a consummate professional.

gettin hyoooch

This is awesome.

The "fitness industry" makes more money than all of us combined will ever see in a lifetime, largely off of candy bars and shit you can't pronounce, that is most likely really bad for you.

I make myself protein shakes occasionally, when I am not getting enough protein through my regular diet to deal with lifting. After very long workouts, I will take something called Endurox, which is a drink that is made for recovery purposes. It works. Beyond that, I think most supplements are pretty dumb and not very healthful.

I used to know a dude that would buy huge bottles of L-tyrosine and take them fistfulls at a time. The recommended dosage is about 2 pills a day. He said they were his 'happy pills' and that he couldn't function without them. It was a ruse; there was nothing happy about him, pills or no.

tah-cohhs.

I am unreasonably stoked right now. I'm sitting here listening to this song and noticing just how damn clean this room is. These sheets are nice and with the limited space and the new wall I built, because I'm fucking McGuyver, I'm feeling okay about the space.

This is a good step. Acceptance. And here's what I'm learning right now.....that things take time. That I fight. Okay, too personal. I'm all stoked on this song because of the prospect of being un-stuck and scheming. And there is something about the crispness of this song and artist that I'm just really into.

I had dinner tonight with two of the people in my life who I rarely see together and who I dig and trust the most. I made tacos, we drank a lot of wine, we cracked up, we talked about climate change, we talked about future plans. Future. More. There is always more and there is definitely better. So thanks to Flo for putting the dropping of the dead horse to music; I took it to heart just now.

How many people do you know who are on the verge of so much? It's like half of the world is on a rope bridge and safe passage means the life you want and too big a slip means broken bones and a hike back to the top to pass that bridge again. But if you look down, it's over. Like the analogy of mountain biking. When you think you might fall, go faster. Press harder and shake the breaking shell as you speed up. Only way you'll be okay, dude. Seriously. Fucking speed up, already.

Evolution.

shifty

People will tell you a lot. I mean a LOT. All you have to do is listen and they will tell you everything one way or the other. They will say what they want you to know, or what will point you in the direction of what they want you to think most of the time, but drop in bits here and there that tell you how they deal with things and what they really think of themselves. Lisssssen to people. Then after the listening, observe. Because after all of the talking, they will DO what they really do and their actions will show you who they really are and how much of what they said was true. It's a proven theory, a million times over. I'm not suggesting entrapment, manipulation or judgement. Just simple listening and observing, as with this approach to human relationships it is easy to determine what your level of involvement with a person should be.

It's pretty easy when someone's words and actions match up, whether good or bad. I'm highly in favor of the simplicity of that, but things tend to get muddled when someone begins talking and acting out of both sides of themselves, in an effort to manipulate a person or situation to his or her benefit. In my studies, I've found that it can be easy to get caught up, without the aforementioned observation plan. Getting caught up in the drama is bad and there is no point. I have also learned that after one has observed capricious behavior, the shiftiness will often increase in defense of bad behavior. If you've already taken note of the inconsistency, it can be quite amusing to sit back and watch the 'I'm-over-here-no-wait-now-I'm-over-heeere-show'. Amusing because of the labrynthine lengths some will go to in order to make it seem as though they are projecting their best self to others. Basically, it's funny - though not necessarily haha funny - because it's so not simple, is fairly obviously off and is a waste of everyone's time.

At one point in my life, I would get caught up in the web from time to time, trying to sift through the inconsistencies to figure out what is really going on. That, my friends, is like quicksand. There is no point and the only thing that can come of that is that you feel overwhelmed and confused and have to figure your way out, while the quicksand feels nothing out of the ordinary and just cruises on. The new policy is - and I don't give a shit if it's harsh - when inconsistencies arise, ask. If it seems fishy, there is a lot of over-explanation, or I'm met with anger, I simply move on. I don't have time for inconsistencies or elaborate stories. If something doesn't make sense, especially after explanation, it, or some part of it, is probably not true. 'Nuff said. No big challenge, no fight. Just keepin it moving.

This tends to aggravate the shifty one and often he or she will react with snide anger, or some sort of challenge, or insult, thus making those little tidbits that were divulged in a cleverly disguised moment of joking self-deprecation, float to the top and be seen clearly, making it yet more logical to just walk away from the situation entirely.

We only have time for simple, now.

simplicity.

I continue to sort of mail it in, but this is a pretty simple and poignant message. It is also how I have approached life for quite sometime now. You'd think this would go over, wouldn't you? I guess the word needs to spread. Passive aggressiveness and teenage games are the way of the past, people.