Please don’t lie to me, unless you’re absolutely sure I’ll never find out the truth.

Monday on the way into work what I can only assume was a drunk soccer mom swerved across two lanes and almost side swiped my car. Lucky my ninja like reflexes kicked in and I swerved all the way into another lane to avoid the dive bomb. My ninja like reflexes are strong. Like steal. Usually. Sometimes at 5:30 in the morning they are less like steal and more like tin foil.

At the same time I managed to avoid the 4000 pounds of metal, my LARGE McDonalds Iced Coffee flew into the air, did a complete flip, landed on my passenger seat and exploded into a coffee a-bomb. It filled up the cup holders, landed in my hair, left a film on the front window and pooled up on the floor under seat. It took me a full 45 minutes and an entire roll of paper towels to get it cleaned up enough that I didn’t STICK to the seat when I sat down. THANK GOD it was rainy and cold outside because I can only imagine what that would have smelled like after 8 hours of 100 degree heat in the full sun. *shudders*

So, the day can only get better after this, right??

WRONG!

SURPRISE! Major Medical University is REQUIRING all employees to get flu shots this year because JCAHO is an evil asshole. I can understand that the accreditation is important but I’ve never, in four years, EVER come into contact with a patient. I mean, we work a MILE off campus.

I wasn’t going to get one this year because even though the nurse SWEARS that you should not be sore afterwards, I always am. Last year my arm ached for THREE DAYS. This year when I went in I requested that they inject my left arm so that the arm I use to use the adding machine, answer my office phone and make sweet love to my iPhone would not be sore. I mean, I can go a few days without working or talking to people… but don’t get between me and my daily movie binge. Mother fucker.

Again this year the nurse SWORE to me that I’d not be sore since it’s my “off hand” that got injected. Yeah, she’s a lying ass bitch. My arm is sore from the injection spot all the way down to my hand, with the majority of the discomfort at the inside bend of my elbow. Why do they lie to you? Why not just say, “Yes, idiot, it’s going to hurt it’s a SHOT. Now roll up your sleeve and suck it up, pussy!” I’d honestly deal much better with that.

When I was in 2nd grade I broke my arm and it had to be reset. When I asked if it was going to hurt the doctor looked me straight in the face and said, “It’s going to hurt more than anything you’ve ever felt. But it will be fast and when I’m done it will stop hurting and it will heal the way it should.” And he wasn’t lying. When I look back now, it was second in pain level only to squeezing a human out of my vagina. But, at least he TOLD ME. I knew what to expect. In SECOND GRADE.

I’d say things can only get better at this point bit who am I kidding?!

Is it Friday yet?

How NOT to start your Monday morning:

Last night I set my alarm for 4:30 like every workday morning. I really needed to get up on time because the night before I put, like, EVERY PAIR of pants I own in the dryer and when I have that many jeans in there it always takes two dry cycles. So what I normally do is get up, restart the dryer and go on with my morning routine. Then the last thing I do before I leave is put on my dry, hot jeans before I head out into the cold morning. I love that feeling. The hot pants protect me from the evil cold at least long enough to get into my car and get the heater started…

So last night I set my alarm clock for 4:30… PM! My body woke me up at what I thought was 3:09 on the cable box clock. This happens pretty much every morning, I wake up around 3:00AM, snuggle back into Ben’s warm body and fall back asleep. But this morning I kept starring at the clock because I fell asleep with my contacts in and the damn thing WOULD NOT FOCUS. So I roll over to look at the clock on the nightstand. It says 5:09. Wait. What? The damn cat must have waked across the alarm clock again and pushed the hour button so it’s ahead.. Stupid cat.

I figured better be safe than sorry though, forced a yawn to make my eyes water so my contacts would clear, look at the cable box again… 5:09. DAMMIT!

Okay. So I have two options. Option 1: Start dryer and hope to God the jeans dry the rest of the way in 25 minutes. Option 2: Wear a skirt. And option 2 wasn’t really an option because I’d have called in sick before I wore a skirt. Skirt… blech! *shudder*

So option 1 it is. I run downstairs and start the dryer then run back upstairs thinking I can just blow dry my hair tame enough to be presentable. I do this sometimes when it’s cold and I don’t want to wash my hair in the morning. I just blow it with hot air till it’s mostly tame then flat iron the honery parts. As I look at myself in the mirror for the first time though I want to spit in my own face. I have Pippy Longstocking style braids from yesterday. DAMMIT again!! No amount of blow drying is going to get it straight. And there’s NO WAY that I have enough time to flat iron… So I frechbraid it. And for ONCE I actually like to way my hair looks frenchbraided. The light and dark hair look pretty cool that way all weaved together. SCORE!

Okay, dress from the waist up, brush teeth, deodorant, perfume, makeup. My makeup actually looks pretty dang good considering the amount of time I had. I take a second to cherish my makeup and daydream about my Barbie collection on the way… then snap back into reality when I look down and it’s 5:37. DAMMIT! I need to be in the car and moving by 5:35 to be at work on time.

Run downstairs, throw open dryer, close eyes, reach in… they are hot! And dry! YAY!!! Throw on most favorite jeans, grab keys, open garage, run out door. My car is not in the garage!! DOUBLE DAMMIT AGAIN!! My car in on the street, all the windows are frosted up and it looks cold. Then it hits me… My pants ARE NOT DRY! They were just hot and FAKING!! My pants are, in fact, quite moist and instantly cold. Like, freezer cold. I consider for a split second calling in sick, climbing back into bed with Ben and forgetting Monday ever happened. Then I remember I’m a PTO Nazi and that’s out of the question.

I run to my car while making a giant middle finger gesture to the sky. It might have looked like I was flipping off God but really I was flipping of MONDAY. FUCK YOU, MONDAY!

As I got on the freeway I had wide open road and every single cell in my body wanted to run the M3 wide open. To cherish the feeling of acceleration, the roar of the motor through my intake, feeling every curve and bump in the road though my stiff suspension… letting the crappy morning fade away by the rush of speed. But something held me back and after taking the onramp with speed, I throttled down and let the car drift down to 67 and cruised.

About a minute and a half later the motorcycle that was a tiny spec when I got on the freeway in the car pool lane caught up and passed me. It was a CHP.

I take it back Monday, I love you. *hugs*

Kelly.

Today marks the end of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It’s also the last day that Kelly, an inspirational breast cancer survivor, will be working with me. She got a job at Nasa just a few freeway exits down from here. I hate Nasa now because they are stealing her away from me. Except for whoever it was that invented the freeze dried food. It would be very hard to hate that person.

Kelly has saved my sanity here at work for the last year. Seriously, without her there would have been days I came home with enough stress to fill the house, pour out into the streets and flood most of downtown San Jose. Instead, I just flooded the streets in our immediate neighborhood. This has been ESPECIALLY true for the last month or so as a series of events played out that really reminded me what it is I look for in a friend. Kelly is without a doubt, somebody I proudly consider a friend. She love me EVEN THOUGH I drop F-bombs, and am loud, and opinionated, and curt, and vain sometimes overly confident. She has reminded me how wonderful it is to have a true, genuine friendship. The fact this has happened in a building full of people I’d never associate with if not for the fact that I’m PAID to do so has been a fantastic bonus.

People like Kelly should be a reminder to us how important it is, as women, to get a mammogram EVERY YEAR. Get a pap smear EVERY YEAR. I know that these things are uncomfortable, and sometimes painful, and can be embarrassing, and scarry… but it is SO important. Kelly is a survivor. And in some weird twist of serendipity, her surviving saved my sanity.

I’ll miss you, Kelly. Don’t worry though, I’ll remind you how much you miss me in emails. Daily. Sometimes hourly. Probably more.

Hives: Day 74

Turns out I’m allergic to wheat. This might not even be what’s causing the hives but the only way to really find out is to cut wheat out of my diet, totally, for three weeks. Then I can reintroduce it and see if there’s a reaction. Reading through some websites quickly when I got home, this could explain A LOT. The tummy problems, tired rundown feeling at completely random times, hives…

So I’m gonna start Sunday with the wheat free diet. I had NO IDEA there was wheat in so may food products. It’s in EVERYTHING. It’s basically an Atkins diet. I’ve NEVER been fond of the Atkins diet because I like my heart and I don’t want it to kill me at 50. Skinny but dead doesn’t seem like a wonderful alternative to a tad chubby and alive to me.

Why Sunday, you ask? Because Saturday we are going to Tyrolean Inn and I HAVE to eat the yummy food…

This week at work has been long and hard. The Boss is out of town so covering for him, helping another team catch up with work they are behind on, having do deal with co-workers who have the work ethic of a retarded monkey and the fact that one of my FAVORITE co-workers last day is tomorrow has made me REALLY want for Friday to just. get. here. already. It really sucks that I can’t post work related stuff here because man, the comic relief…

Anyway, I’m exhausted so I’m off to give Ben puppy dog eye’s to 1) Convince him to come crawl into bed with me, 2) Let me have a kitten PRETTY PLEASE WITH A CHERRY ON TOP?!?

Spam is whack, kids.

The comments are getting spammed like a mofo. 200+ yesterday, 70+ today. It seems as if every once in awhile some spambot comes around and starts hitting all the posts in pretty much sequential order. It’s now on this post from November of last year so hopefully the bastard will go away soon. If you post something and it gets deleted in the mess I’m very, very, very, very sorry. You should only be moderated the first comment you make anyway unless you use a new email addy.

Traci, I found your comment. It was #74 from yesterday’s mess. It’s there now. : )

I’m happy to report that I’ve only itched about 10 times today and it was only during a stressful conversation. I am officially on the road to recovery. So, if you are here from some search engine ‘hives are teh suck’ hit or something, push away from the computer and RUN to the nearest doctor for some Prednizone.

Also, something totally bloggable happened at work today that would have made you all laugh and would have proved my “kinda bitchy-ness” but I’m really skeptical about posting work stuff here anymore in the off chance somebody would happen to stumble across it. Ben and I kinda broached this topic at dinner last night and really, the job/pay/free health benefits are more important to me than making you all laugh. So, till I find some more convenient way to post them, you’ll just have to believe me when I tell you how fun it is to work with 350 retarded monkeys women. heh

Word of the day: Yackass

I listen to The Brian Lehrer Show everyday on the New York NPR station, WNYC. Shoutcast = love. Anyway, today he had on Barbara Wallraff, contributing editor at The Atlantic Monthly and author of Word Fugitives: In Pursuit of Wanted Words.

From an Amazon review:

Despite the many thousands of dictionary words at our disposal, our language can be dismayingly inadequate. How many times have you searched for a word that means just what you want it to but failed to find anything suitable anywhere? Most of us, it turns out, lead lives rife with experiences, people, and things that have no names.

At least, they lacked names until now. Word Fugitives comes to the rescue, supplying hundreds of inspired words coined or redefined to meet everyday needs. For instance, wouldn’t it be handy to have a word for the momentary confusion people experience when they hear a cell phone ringing and wonder whether it’s theirs? (How about fauxcellarm, phonundrum, or pandephonium?)

Or what about a word for offspring who are adults? (Try unchildren or offsprung.) Or a word for the irrational fear when you’re throwing a party that no one will show up? (That might be guestlessness, empty-fest syndrome, or fete-alism.)

During the show they were inviting people to call in and reveal the words THEY used or “coined”. One man and his wife, for instance, define the men that spend too many hours at the mall shopping with a significent other as: meanderthals. HAR!

Anyway, this entire post leads up to my favorite new word which I plan to use often. And by often, I mean I plan to use it in context, in front of and hopefully TO one of my co-workers who spends more time on the phone than any hormonal teenage girl I’ve even known.

Yackass: A person who talks on the phone loudly and/or often. (Usually will refer to people on cell phones in public. But I think that the since I can now tell you what every member of her family is named, their favorite food, color, restaurant, article of clothing and sexual position (including that of her husband and boyfriend) the term applies to her too.)