How Hard Can It Be To Find "Hypoallergenic"?

Today marked another appointment to see the wonderful folks at the worker's comp medical facility. It was about 40 degrees outside, and it was about 42 degrees inside. Obviously their heating works wonders, does it not? Luckily the room I was eventually led to was probably closer to 45 degrees. Maybe their windows up front in the waiting area are too big? Whatever. I totally took my big coat, so I meant business in my attempt to stay warm. The M.A. kind of laughed at me as I still bundled under it even after taking it off to he could take my blood pressure.

Luckily I saw the first doctor that I had seen a couple weeks ago. So I didn't have to regale yet another doctor with my back story. I told her that while most of the original spots seem to have started healing, I have had a couple new spots show up. And that the vinyl gloves I've switched to seem to be drying my hands out so bad that my skin gets all flaky. (Why, yes I am full of complaints.) So she tells me to start using hypoallergenic lotions. And she insisted on me wrapping my hands in saran wrap to help my skin absorb the prescription ointment. I did tell her that I did in fact attempt this, and many curse words followed.

So after my uneventful appointment, I drove to the store to find my some hypoallergenic lotion. Now, I use lotion all the time. I am my mother's daughter. I found the store's section of lotion and looked. And looked. And looked. All I could find was "fragrance free". I finally went to the Pharmacist to clarify that fragrance free was not the same at hypoallergenic. I went back to the section and looked some more. I mean, my face was pressed right up to the bottles of lotion making sure I didn't miss the key word "hypoallergenic".

After examining for about 20 minutes, I finally found a brand that had a hypoallergenic formula. Of course, it wasn't whatever brand the doctor was attempting to describe to me - she couldn't remember the name of it. However, in my mind, hypoallergenic is hypoallergenic.

Oh this is just so much freaking fun, I can hardly stand it.

It's Official - I'm Crazy!

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! I've been away from my personal computer since Thursday morning, thus I haven't blogged. I didn't really feel like doing so from my parents desktop. My Thanksgiving went well, my mom hosted dinner for 12 people. That's a lot of people in our house! Everyone took tons of leftovers home. One of my younger cousins who is attending college in Washington drove down to be with family for the holiday and unfortunately got "snowed in" on Saturday. A nice big storm dropped in on Friday night/Saturday morning and dropped a lot of snow on the pass she had to climb to get out of northern California and into Oregon. Luckily, the storm and the roads cleared for her to safely drive to Washington today.

I did check up on the blogs I follow, I didn't always have time to comment, but I was keeping up. And I was very saddened to see that I lost a follower. I'm having a tough time figuring out exactly who left, but I'm sorry to see them go. I hope I haven't offended them or bored them out of their minds, but I hope they might stop by sometimes and comment. That was definitely not the highlight of my Thanksgiving holiday.

My highlight was getting to hang out with my younger cousin, whom I don't get to see very often. We chat like crazy on Facebook quite often, but we were raised on either side of the US, so we rarely got to see each other. We decided to go see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (part 1) and thoroughly loved it. I was very happy about this considering the guy who directed it also did Movie 6, and in my humble opinion he fucking ruined it. The whole middle part of the movie was okay, I can handle what they decided to leave out and could understand their reasons why. However, the director screwed up the beginning and the ending enough that I can hardly stand to watch it without getting all pissy. Oddly enough, this same director also directed Movie 5, which I loved. But I digress. If you haven't seen The Deathly Hallows, I highly suggest that you do - you will enjoy it. The downside? I have to wait six more months for part 2 to come out! Oh well.

I also got to spend Saturday shopping in town with my mom and my cousin. We got to enjoy an extra day with her since chains were required on the roads out of town. In every direction except South. We had a fairly lazy afternoon wandering around stores and chatting. Afterward we took dinner to my dad and grandparents as my cousin had been staying with them and my dad had stayed to do stuff around their house while we women went shopping.

By far the biggest thing to happen during the holiday was my announcement. It's now official, although I have yet to talk to my boss and I probably won't until after the first of the year. I don't need her harassment about me leaving her in a lurch and shit for the next two and a half months. I will indeed be moving away from Sacramento come February. I'm waiting until then because I'm on a lease on my apartment until then. I will move to the Middle of Nowhere in the far reaches of Northeast California. To a region that Wal-Mart has probably never heard of. I will be assisting my grandparents with their cattle ranch and their monthly publication. Hopefully I will be able to find a part-time job somewhere so I can have some cash flow.

Believe me when I say, it was not an easy decision. I have agonized over this for over two months. I have shed a lot of tears, even some this past weekend. I'm sure there will be more. I'm scared shitless, but I do hope it's all for the best. I know several of you, my wonderful followers, have commented on previous posts in regards to this decision and you've been so very supportive. My friends, family, and a few of my co-workers have also been supportive of whatever decision I were to make. My family members at dinner were quite shocked about my decision as only 4 people at the table had any idea of what was going on, and that's not including myself. They were all surprised but gave me their support and love and good wishes that everything turn out well. I was highly embarrassed to have to address my entire immediate family, as I don't like being the center attention all that much. Except for my birthday, because well, I'm supposed to be. Most of them had absolutely no idea about anything. Since it was my decision to make, my parents didn't really tell anyone.

I have no idea if I'm making the right move. I have no idea how it will turn out. It scares me to think I will be leaving a job that pays well and offers me benefits and a 401k. I despise the idea of giving notice to my two volunteer gigs as I have grown to love everyone there and the animals involved. It breaks my heart actually. I hate the idea that I may have to draw unemployment in order to have some sort of monthly cash flow. And it's scary to become so dependent on my family for assistance with bills and food until I basically get on my feet.

But I'm not happy where I am. I've never wanted to be a city-dweller; I hate traffic, smog, and the tight-space-living. While I do enjoy some of the things a city offers, like some shopping or large movie theaters, it's not for me. I miss seeing the stars out at night. The city lights dim most of them, but when you're miles and miles away from the lights, the stars truly come out. I've never really wanted to work in a lab. I've enjoyed learning what I have. Believe me when I say, it's something I didn't think I would have been smart enough to do or learn. But it's just not what I ever really wanted to do. My hours make it hard on me. And not only me, my friends and family as well. They never know when to call because they worry they may wake me up. It doesn't help you with a social life. And it definitely seems to be a turn off in the dating world. Seriously, I miss the sun dammit.

I will no longer to have to share walls with people. Or live above or below them. After my move, I will be living a "modular home". Oh fine. Call it a mobile home. A trailer. Fine. But it has its own four walls. Not a single wall is shared with another house. Unfortunately it's stuck in the disco era.  All of my furniture will fit. I just have to get it up there. That ought to be fun. I will be no further from my immediate family than I am now. Instead of an easy freeway drive, they will instead have a mountain drive. Over several mountains. The one thing that pains me, and I've already discussed this with her, is that instead of being an hour and a half away from my best friend, I will instead be an 8 hour drive from her. I burst into tears when I fully realized just how much distance will be between us. She fully understood my concern/fear, but we do have a solid friendship that distance will have a really hard time in separating us. We are truly sisters at heart.

I'm excited at the next chapter of my life. It's scary. So very scary. I will be dropping everything here, and starting over completely. But I have the support of all of my family and friends, and co-workers. Even if I fail miserably, they will still be there for me with open arms and help dust me off. I hope that you, my faithful peeps, will continue to show me support. I have no idea where this blog will go, but rest assured you will get good funny stories about the dumb things I do while learning how to run a ranch. 

I just hope one of those does not involve falling face first into a nice steaming pile of cow shit.

Being Thankful

This year I was not fortunate enough to get my request in early enough to get real time off for Thanksgiving. Someone else beat me to it, and since we're short staffed all the time - when one person is on vacation, everyone else gets to work. So, I still have one more night of work before I can head off to my parents house to put myself into a turkey coma.

However, I wanted to get all kinds of sentimental, considering it is Thanksgiving and all. Basically, I wanted to talk a bit about what I am thankful for.

Of course, first comes my family. I am blessed with a family that I couldn't live without. Now, as with every family, we have drama, conflict, and issues, but even so I love them with all my heart. They are always there for me, even when I'm not sure I deserve it. And with current options sitting in front of me (go here and here or further details), they've been nothing but supportive and only want what makes me happy. Many family members I don't get to see very often due to the physical distance between us, and I thoroughly enjoy any real time I get to spend with them. For instance, my younger cousin who is attending University of Washington will be down for the holiday. She grew up in Georgia, 3000 miles away from all her CA family. Hopefully on Friday she and I can steal a couple hours to ourselves to go see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (part 1), seeing as we are the only two people in our family who love the series. All in all, however dysfunctional we all are, my family is my world. 

My friends. I am an one of those people that has a few very close friends. People that know me as well as I know them. My bestest is a girl I've known since we were juniors in high school. We clicked on a certain level and have never once looked back. We understand each other and accept each other. Including the flaws.  And she's still willing to hang out with me in public. She's definitely a keeper. We've had many conversations that end with us laughing hard enough to make us cry, and conversations that where each of us were crying on each others shoulders. My other friends, though not labeled as the "bestest" are no less important. One of my friends, whom I have known for about 22 years (and our mothers have been besties for over 40 years!), has come to my aid at the last minute, even via text message. Awhile back I was in tears over something and didn't know who to ask for help. I texted her and she convinced me I wasn't completely insane and fully understood my "issue". After several texts I was feeling better and had she been there in person, I would have hugged her til her eyes popped out. Even if I don't hang out with them all the time, they always make me smile, laugh, and just feel good. Without friends I wouldn't have made it through living with Suzi or several rough nights at work.

As often as it annoys me or downright pisses me off, I am thankful for my job. It's allowed me to be independent. It pays my bills. It has taught me things. Sometimes I think it teaches me to make up new curse words. But especially, in this economy, I am thankful to have a decent paying job that allows me to keep my car and a roof over my head and food in my fridge. Even if it does give me a knot in my shoulder and a skin irritation from the "personal protection equipment" I'm supposed to use.

A bit of the silly here - I'm also thankful for my cat. Even though she cost me a few hundred dollars a few months ago in vet bills, she's my little snuggle-bug of a lap cat. It's nice to come home to have it not be empty. Not that she's great at giving advice or anything, but it's nice to know I'm completely alone in my apartment. On my days off, I enjoy laying on the couch, cat cuddle on my lap or right next to me, purring in my ear.

I am also thankful for opportunities I've had. Usually thanks to help from my family, without whom I wouldn't have been able to have. They helped me afford to go on my internship to Florida and be unemployed for 9 weeks. I would do it again in a heartbeat. They helped me to afford to go on a 3 week back East trip in high school for government. One day I would love to be able to retrace that trip. They helped me afford plane tickets to see my college boyfriend, and I was able to get to see parts of Montana and Colorado. My wonderful trip to the very first Stagecoach Festival in Indio, CA where my good friend and I finally got to see George Strait. The Nickelback concert last year that was probably one of the funnest concerts ever, and I got to go with a large group of great friends. The tribute Santa Rosa did to Charles Schulz, the creator of the Peanuts comic strip, that my mom and I attended on our last mother/daughter trip. The cruise my mom and I took when I was a senior in high school.  Going to Chicago for work. Visiting family in Georgia. Being a bridesmaid in the weddings of two wonderful friends. Things like that.

I'm not only thankful for any or all of these items at Thanksgiving. I'm always thankful for them. I'm always thankful for the people in my life. And what they help me accomplish. For that, I am truly blessed.

Have a happy and wonderful turkey coma everyone. (And if you're vegetarian, have a wonderful tofurkey  coma).

What Not To Do In A Parking Lot

Yesterday, while waiting around for my BFF to arrive at our lunch-time meeting place, I witnessed something. I'm pretty sure this person saw me, as I was sitting in my car, easily visible, listening to the radio.

A large pickup truck parked a few spaces away from me, and the way the parking lot was made I was perpendicular to them, so I saw everything. Even the diaper change. Well, not all of it, but I figured that's what Mr. Daddy was doing. After parking, Mr. Daddy and Mrs. Mommy got out, and let out their 4 year old and 2 year old. I'm guessing on ages, here, but I'm pretty sure I'm close. Mrs. Mommy is on her cell phone and Mr. Daddy needs to change the youngest of the brood, who's probably barely a year old. While Mr. Daddy is grabbing the diaper bag and all that he needs, Mrs. Mommy has her cell phone practically glued to her ear.

I notice the oldest kid, the 4 year old, running around the little "island" between parked cars, and nearly runs into the aisle where cars could hit him. Mrs. Mommy is still not seeing this.  Eventually, she goes to stand on the island, and the oldest kid finds a Burlington Coat Factory cart half up on the curb of the island and half taking up a parking space. This kid proceeds to try and move the cart and instead, drops his sippy cup into the cart. Naturally, he is about 3 feet too short to reach in and grab it. Eventually Mrs. Mommy sees what happened and goes over to grab the sippy cup and put in the bag. The kid is now enthralled with this cart, and moving it. His little brother wants to play, too, so he starts climbing all over the cart. Big brother decides little brother is a bother, and tries to yank him off the cart. Little brother takes  a fall and starts crying while big brother goes to the other end of the cart to try to move it again. Where's Mrs. Mommy? Still talking her damn cell phone.

After awhile, big brother finally shakes the cart loose, and little brother is upset that his new climbing toy is now moving away from him. Big brother walks backwards with the cart, but doesn't pay attention to where he's going and hits the nice car parked next Mr. Daddy's nice big pickup truck. Several times.

Mrs. Mommy finally sees what is happening and says something to big brother, only he just lets go of the cart so it rolls right smack into the strangers car. Mrs. Mommy finally hauls the cart to it's original resting space. Still on the phone. During all of this, Mr. Daddy is changing the youngest kids diaper. Seriously, Mr. Daddy had to keep going to the other side of the truck to get stuff. I don't know what that kid did in his diaper but it took at least a good 10 to 15 minutes until he dragged the little out of the truck and carried him into the restaurant.

Since the cart is no longer a toy, big brother decides he's going to play hide and seek with himself in the bushes on the island. Little brother wants to join, but he's not fast enough to hid as quickly as big brother. So, little brother just runs around in circles until Mrs. Mommy decides she can't handle it, and picks him up. She's still on the damn phone.

Now, I'm sure there's a time and a place for whatever that phone call was about, but when your kids are running amok in a parking lot - a very busy parking lot - I would think that you would actually pay attention to your children so they don't die. Mrs. Mommy didn't get off the phone until Mr. Daddy was done changing diaper on the youngest. I wanted to leave a note on the car next to their truck that mentioned the folks that owned the nice big pickup truck let their kids bang a shopping cart into it and here's their info if there's any damage.

Seriously, folks. Is that fucking hard to pay attention to your kids? Was somebody else's drama more important that disciplining your children so they don't bang shopping carts into other people's property? I mean, when big brother dropped his sippy cup into the cart, neither parent was actually visible to me. Their kids were running around on a parking island at lunch time. I understand that Mr. Daddy was busy with a diaper issue. But did Mrs. Mommy really have to be on her cell phone the entire time?

Pull your head out of your ass and pay attention to your children. You really don't want to have explain to the cops that the reason your son caused a 1o car pile up and is en route to the ER is because you were busy talking to Muffy about her boy troubles.

Time With the BFF

Today was definitely a good day. It started out extremely early . . . but that's what you get when you pass out at 7pm because you've been up for nearly 24 hours. (God, I love working graveyard). Being that I wound up in bed so early, I was up at 5am. Itching. Itching like I was before I went to the doctor and got anti-itch pills and cream. So I got up in the dark and put the cream on my hands and crawled back into my warm bed (courtesy of my electric blanket) with my kitty and laid there. Awake. For another hour.

I finally dragged my ass out of my nice warm bed and made it to the couch in the cold living room where it was the nice temperature of 62. You bet your ass I turned on the heater. And curled up under the two blankets on my couch and went strait for my laptop. I had several hours to kill before the highlight of my day: lunch with my BFF. Which was at 1pm.

I met up with my BFF in Vacaville for a late lunch today, as it had been far too long since we'd hung out. While it was super awesome catching up with her and laughing about our inside jokes and the shit we go through with our jobs and stupid/crazy shit that happens to "only us", there was a second highlight for me. Our waiter.

Fortunately, he was more my type than hers so there wouldn't have been a fight if he'd been the least bit interested. I stared at his butt every time he walked by  (and trust me, there was lots of that), and loved listening to his southern accent when he asked how we were doing.  (sigh) Luckily there was good food to be had, so he probably assumed that the drool was for the food and not him. That was just the cherry on top of me getting to spend the afternoon with the BFF.

I was finally able to talk face to face with her about my "opportunity" and possible life transition from (never-wanted-to-be) city chick to Sticksville chick. If I move, I would  be approximately 6 hours or more away from my her. Which, for us, really wouldn't mean the end of a beautiful friendship. It would just put a hamper on how often we could see each other and how accessible we would be. Currently she lives in the Bay Area and I live in Sacramento, so we're about an hour and a half from each other (and that really depends on the day of the week and traffic). We often meet in the middle and easily kill an entire afternoon and evening just talking about everything. If I move, easy won't be in the vocabulary. Of course, we do know we have telephones/cell phones available to us, as well as email and Facebook.

But it did hit me hard when I realized just how much distance the possible move would put between us. An entire world, so to speak. While she understood my apprehension to having that much distance between us, she reassured me that it wouldn't have an adverse affect on our friendship. At this stage, we both know too much about each other (i.e., blackmail material) to not be friends. So, we're basically stuck with each other. Besides, she's one of the few people I can count on to help me bury the bodies. In the end, she's behind whatever decision is final. But she, like just about everyone else, thinks I should go and give it a whirl.

The one thing that's not so wonderful about today, is the fact that I'm currently sitting around waiting to go to work. And what's worse? I have to work with the person for whom I have pretty much no respect for. Trust me, there's a possibility for another blog series regarding psychosis, however, it shall wait for the day I am no longer employed at my current job. I'd really hate to have to explain this shit to HR. (Which reminded me to charge my Zune so that I have music tonight as I simply cannot work 8 hours alone with that woman without the headphones to prevent her from talking to me).

However, I am going to try to stay focused on the positives from today. Good times with my BFF and the hot southern waiter with the nice ass.

Psycho Suzi, Part XVI: Reflection

This will be my final posting of Psycho Suzi, not counting future times that I may refer to her. For all of those who require a large bowl of popcorn to go with these posts, I apologize that it comes to an end. Many of you have said how much you've enjoyed reading my stories about (quite possibly) one of the dumbest people around. Also, among the bitchiest. I had no idea it would take 15 posts (or 16 including this one) to tell my story of living with that deranged woman for a year during college. Trust me when I say, it was never easy living with her. Not once. Not even for a millisecond. I saw the way she treated her "friends". I heard her stupid remarks. Her face is forever burned into memory, her voice like nails a chalk board.

Many of you have called me a saint or an angel for having put up with her. I agree that it was an act of God that I didn't kill her in her sleep. I know I could not have handled prison at all, and the thought of being someone's bitch gives me nightmares. Honestly, being a bitch doesn't bother me. Being someone's bitch is a whole different ball of wax.

It was a very long and hard year for me. My friends and family got me through it - letting me vent on a daily basis. I don't know how they withstood that for a whole academic year, but they did. They are the real heroes of the story. Without them I may have required thousands of dollars in therapy to make it out. Or the nice men in white coats may have been called. Or I would be writing this from prison.

I learned a lot by living with Suzi. It was definitely a "character building" year. I learned how to put up a front for when I deal with crazy people now. Like at work. I learned you can't win with crazy. You can't reason with them. You can't negotiate. Basically, just figure on losing and you're already ahead. But I also learned it can be fun to play with them and piss them off and watch them stew.

In my current job and in previous ones, I've had people ask me how I do it. How do I put up a "front" and appear civil to the crazy peoples' faces? How I do manage to look like they don't bother me? Unfortunately, it's not something I can easily explain or teach to someone. It seems like it's one of those things that comes to you after you've experienced something enough. Like living with it. Living with Suzi, many times I had to find a "happy place", a place where she couldn't get to me easily. I could appear happy to her yet be boiling under the surface. In addition, I didn't allow us to talk about a lot of anything. I really didn't ask for details about her and Joey. I didn't ask much at all, period. We barely talked about school, even though we were the same major.

Like I said earlier, my friends and family are the true heroes of it all. How my schoolmates and co-workers at Petco ever continued to study with me or invite to parties, I will never know. How my family didn't just disown me I'll never know. I know my parents felt guilty during that time, but financially it just wasn't feasible. And as much as I wanted out, I understood their dilemma. I never blamed them. In all honesty, how could I? I was the one who saw an opening at the time I needed one and I took it. I just didn't know how fucking crazy the bitch really was. The truth is, you really don't know someone until you've lived with them. You can only hide the flaws so long.

The next year, my last at college, I lived in a small studio apartment on the edge of town. I rarely saw Suzi, which was a relief to me. Sometimes she'd come into Petco. Most times I could see her through the store-front windows and I would mutter something about my psycho roomie and run to the back and hide in the bathroom. Or pretend I was doing stock. There were few times I couldn't get away. Once while I was working the register, and another time I was in the process of hiding and turned a corner and nearly ran her over. Once she even got on my case about not being on the e-mail list for the club she had been a part of - The Professional Animal Science Society. She had graduated, so I had taken her off the e-mailing list (my job as the secretary). However, she got all bent out of shape about it. I plainly told her that we still meet at the same week, same day, same time and if she was truly interested she knew where we hung the fliers in Plumas Hall. She never showed up. Shocker. By the way, she threw her "Nuh-uh!" argument in on that, and held up a line of customers to be all pissy with me. Classy gal.

Since I've moved to Sacramento, I've only heard stories from Betty every so often. Betty would still see her roaming around. Oddly enough, we found that Suzi holds grudges very well. She apparently started harassing Betty at her place of employment (a local sandwich shop) for a good month. Suzi had a new little friend, and every time they ordered, they filed a complaint about Betty - how she had horrible customer service, how she screwed up their orders, etc. It got to the point where Betty's boss finally had to take her aside and Betty had to rehash the roommate story to her boss. Luckily, nothing happened to Betty - Suzi lost that game, and eventually stopped showing her face at that particular sandwich shop.

It took a good couple years at least before these stories stopped making my blood boil and started becoming downright funny. These stories are ones where I typically like to tell them in person so I can see the reactions on people's faces. It's priceless.

I know there are so many others out there that had bad roommate experiences; each one is different. I know that mine was probably mild compared to some. At least she didn't try to suffocate me in my sleep or lace my cookies with arsenic or something. I tried to do everything to where she wouldn't have to come to me to have me "do it right". Like the time I apparently missed a teeny tiny spot of pasta sauce on a pot handle. It would have taken her 30 seconds to scrub it off. But instead, she came knocking on my door and hounded me for 10 minutes on how to properly wash dishes. Seriously, WTF? And I still had to clean it off so she'd shut her freaking trap.

So, while Suzi was a nightmare to live with, in the end, she gave me funny stories. She helped give me the ability to deal with stupid crazy assholes later in life. She helped to teach me how to grow a spine and stand up for myself. And that even though sticking her wet laundry on her pillow seems like an awesome idea, it's probably not. Because I'd have to deal with the aftermath that would have included the parental units from Hell. And that simply wasn't worth the hassle. Someone once mentioned they would have put a crayon in with her clothes . . . that might have worked - had I owned a crayon.

I hope you enjoyed my Psycho Suzi stories. For those that were always wondering what happened next . . . 

We survived.

And Karma is still a bitch.  

Whoohoo! I got me a big shiny turkey!

I awoke this fine morning after one hell of a nights sleep. I'm not sure I've ever taken Benadryl for anything, but damn. It knocked my ass out last night. If I hadn't basically been in bed when I'd taken it, it may have turned to a very well known story between me, my BFF, and a bottle of NyQuil. I wound up sleeping damn near 15 hours. Seriously, a Benadryl-induced coma. But I feel like I got some rest. And the itching on the hands has actually been minimal thus far today. Perhaps progress on the first visit?!

I popped online to see which of the blogs I follow had new ones up, and to check my comments. And I had a surprise waiting for me!

Miss Vicki over at Core Blimey bestowed upon me The Shiny Turkey Blog Award. I'd like to thank Miss Vicki for saying such wonderful things and passing it along to me. The rules seem pretty lax with this award, I'm to pass it on to 3 or 4 other deserving blogs and also tell a story that includes any of the following: intoxication, food, kitchen, cooking/baking, or holiday.

Well, as most of you might know, I don't really drink much. So that's out. I'm also not the greatest cook and I don't believe I have any awesome cooking stories to tell you. Unless you missed my infamous story of Suzi and the Hot Dog. I love to bake but I can't recall any funny stories. So, I believe I'm left with holiday. It will involve lots of food, just none cooked by yours truly.

I believe it was last year that this happened for Thanksgiving. The story of the Three Thanksgivings. Now, you're probably wondering, why would someone have 3 Thanksgiving dinners? Good question. We were only supposed to have two. And if you've never seen the show Gilmore Girls, I believe one season that they had 5 Thanksgiving dinners, all in one day. Mine was over several days. I could only aspire to be as daring as the Gilmore Girls.

Last year, my parents were going to have Thanksgiving with my mom's side of the family. We were to go to my Nana's house for Thanksgiving, and on Friday or Saturday, go to my grandfather's house. A the last minute, my mom decided to buy one of those pre-cooked meals from the grocery store for my dad's parents. They were going to have Thanksgiving with my uncle and aunt, and my aunt was to cook a stew. My mom couldn't stand the idea that her in-laws wouldn't get a turkey for Thanksgiving, so we did an impromptu Thanksgiving the night before. Those pre-done dinners are actually pretty good. So, we began the holiday a day early.

We arose the morning of Thanksgiving for our second turkey meal of the week. We arrived at Nana's house and had lots of goodies to snack on and watched the football game that was on. For the followers that aren't American, when I say "football", I don't mean soccer, I mean, American Football. I remember asking my cousin the name of the band playing at half time and she told me it was the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I later found out it was Daughtry. As we usually are, we were full of snacks when the turkey was done. But we had an awesome meal, tons of food on the table.

I don't remember if our third dinner was actually Friday or Saturday, but either way, we did in fact have our third dinner. I rode with my parents the 3 hours to my grandfather's ranch. They don't often leave the ranch unattended for very long, and also I believe their monthly publication was due at the printers that weekend. I believe that was my first meeting with Brandy, my grandfather's dog - sweetest thing ever. My grandmother's brother and and niece were also in attendance for dinner. We had some snacks, and visited lots. My grandmother allows pretty much no one to cook in her kitchen, especially while she's doing the cooking. Dinner showed up on the table, again too much food. After dessert, we piled back into the truck and drove back home.

Needless to say, I didn't want any kind of turkey for a very long time. I love turkey, but three days straight of turkey is only slightly insane. It took several months before I even ate a turkey sandwich. I doubt that will happen again anytime soon. For a fact I know it won't happen this year. My mom is once again hosting it for both sides of the family. A houseful of family always makes for a good day. However, my mom refuses to move all the furniture around again to make room for all the tables, so we're out in the garage this year. My mom had to find portable heaters so we don't freeze while eating too much food. Hard to believe Thanksgiving is already upon us, I'm not sure where the year went, but it went by too fast.

So, that's my holiday/food story. Now it's time for me to pass this award on to a few blogs that I feel deserve an award. Passing around the Blog Lovin', as it were.

Content Unrelated - I'm still fairly new to this blog, but it always makes me laugh, and he's just celebrated a year of owning his site name. If you haven't checked it out, please do so, you won't regret it.

The Frisky Virgin - I often laugh over the scenarios that she depicts, but I also admire her for her decisions. It takes guts to stick to your guns. And she does it. With style.

Ramblings of an Emotional Idiot - Just the title alone made me know I'd enjoy following her blog!

Turning 30: A Journey of Self Exploration - from so called "fluff" blogs to the funny to the heart-felt blogs, I'm always waiting for Jewels to write a new blog. She recently bought her "domain" or site or whatever and for a whole day I thought I'd lost her as her link kept taking me to GoDaddy which wasn't where I wanted to be!

The Adventures of Cinderita - I aspire to be as happy as she is. While I know she has her moments, she never seems to let them get her down for very long.

Simple Dude in a Complex World - Funniest. Shit. Ever. I have no recollection how I stumbled onto his blog, but I am so very glad I did.

Okay, so I passed it onto 5 blogs. Whatever. The rules were pretty lax to begin with.

Numb Butts and Frostbite.

Fun: Taking yourself to a movie on your day off. Hanging with a friend. Shopping. Reading the blogs I follow. Splurging your precious pennies for a pizza and salad.

Not Fun: Waiting around in a doctor's office for 3 hours. 'Nuf said.

Guess which of those happened today? Obviously not "taking yourself to a movie", as I'm waiting for the new Harry Potter. (One more week baby!) Definitely not "hanging with a friend". Not enough money to do damage for "shopping". However, after my not fun incident, I decided to splurge on my first Round Table Pizza in two months. My God. It never tasted so good. After gorging myself with pizza and salad I was able to catch up some recent blogs. And now this.

Some of you may have read my post about eczema, well, I finally went to my boss regarding my little skin irritation. It got to the point where my hands were just itching constantly, and more spots of this crap kept popping up. My hands look diseased at this point. I filled out an incident report, and talked to our gal in our headquarters for health services and she told me where I could go to see a doctor if I felt I needed to. I said I did, and she called ahead and informed them one of their employees would be coming in and had forwarded the necessary paperwork.

I finally find the clinic buried in some building. I walk inside and I swear to God I could see my breath. I mean, it was probably like 50-55 degrees outside. It was much colder inside. I fill out my paperwork and then promptly sit for over an hour in the waiting room. Freezing. My. Ass. Off. Luckily I'd brought a book, so I was semi-entertained. However, at some point I lost feeling in my feet due to the cold. I thought my nose fell off. And I swore I saw the beginnings of frostbite on my fingertips. Plus, to make matters worse, my butt was numb. Not from cold. But because the of the stupid chairs. I worried how I'd look when they finally did call my name. Falling flat on my face would have been embarrassing.

Luckily that didn't happen. After what seemed like an eternity, a guy opened the door and called my name and took me to a tiny room and took my vitals and asked me a ton of questions. Now, I've never had a male M.A. before, so it was only slightly weird when this strange man asked me some of the standard questions like, "How much do you weigh?" and "Are you pregnant?" and "When was your last menstrual period?". No man ever actually wants know the answer to of those questions - unless you and he are staring at a pregnancy test. Otherwise, nope. Never. And it's not something I ever just tell a guy. Not even guys I'm dating. Seriously. There are somethings they never need to know. After asking said standard questions, he finally turns to me to take my temperature and my pulse. Would you like to know my body temp? It was 87 degrees. He kind of looked at me funny when he told me and I simply said, "Um, you're waiting area is kind of freezing." He should know how cold I was considering he touched my freezing arm to take my pulse. Then of course came the super fun blood pressure cuff.

He leaves and I'm left contemplating my freaking navel. For a good 20 minutes or so. At some point, I see this on the back of the door.


Suddenly there's a loud knock on the door and it whips open and in blows this tall, lanky, blonde doctor with aquamarine colored glasses, and tan Velcro shoes on. She came across as the human equivalent to a tornado. She immediately introduces herself and hesitates before shaking my hand. I politely said, "Don't worry, I'm not contagious." She laughed and muttered something about not wanting to hurt me. Riiiight. So then we enter the next freaking 45 minutes of my life. She badgers me with questions about my little "lesions" as she calls them. Makes me sound like I have Ebola or something. It's freaking dermatitis folks. It's not like it's going to kill me. I tell her how long I've worked for my job, what type of gloves I use (which is what I think caused my "lesions"), and what I've used to try to treat it.

Once we got past the basics and I had to actually describe what she can physically see on my hands. My irritation, which is technically a form of eczema, beautifully stops where my gloves stop. She then says that she's basically stumped. She figures it for an allergic reaction, and she was quite surprised to find I was having an allergic reaction to Nitrile gloves. For those that don't have to wear gloves for their jobs, let me explain. We all know about latex and that there are a lot of people who are allergic to it. I am one of those people. I don't have a horribly bad reaction to latex, but if I wear gloves for awhile, my hands itch. So, I use Nitrile gloves, which are latex free. However, those are not completely devoid of giving people allergic reactions. Not to mention my job over the summer decided to find cheaper gloves and so we changed brands of Nitrile gloves about 4 times before they found one cheap enough to suit them. So I told her my boss as of last night switched me to Vinyl gloves and the health services gal in Maine is having someone ship me an extra special kind of glove that no one can remember the name of.

After the doctor flew out of the room to get a dermatitis book and flew back into the room, she still wasn't sure exactly what was going on with my hands nor exactly how to go about treating it. She flung herself out of the room once more leaving me once more to contemplate my navel - which by then had been contemplated on enough. Awhile later I hear this light knock on the door and a hesitation, so I say, "Yes?". Some random M.A. comes in with two bottles of meds and sets them on the counter saying the doctor will talk to me about them. Again I'm left to contemplate . . . the Earth's axis. The doctor flings herself back into the room, sees the meds on the counter and says, "Oh good! They set them in here - I was looking all over for those!" Um. Isn't that why you have the M.A.'s? So they can do that stuff for you?

So she hands me two bottles of meds - they are prescription strength Benadryl (for bed time, because it'll make me sleepy) and Claritin (for when I'm at work, because it's not supposed to make me sleepy). And wrote a prescription in some of the worst doctor handwriting ever for some topical cream. The best part? When I put the cream on my hands at night she'd like me to then wrap my hands in saran wrap.

Yes. You read that right.

Here's my problem. I live alone. I get one hand wrapped, then what the fuck do I do? Use my teeth?! I don't know a single neighbor and I'm pretty sure that it would not be a great way to meet them. "Oh hi, I'm your neighbor. It's so nice to meet you. Would you wrap me in saran wrap? Ohhh. You must be his girlfriend . . . " I don't think so, Tim.

After all that, I wait patiently for the poor over-worked receptionist to type up my report whilst answering phones and helping the folks in the waiting area. And she can't even read the doctor's handwriting. Eventually, with the help of another receptionist, they finally figure it out. Although I nearly ended up with "must provide cabbage" or "must provide garbage" on my report to give to my boss. That is how bad the doctor's handwriting was. I'm finally given everything I need, and they make an appointment for me on Friday morning to make sure the medications aren't killing me.

I then hop in my car and run off to the local pharmacy. Which was so conveniently located next to a Round Table Pizza. And I was starving. You do the math. So I walk in to the store only to be hit over the head with the strongest cinnamon smell on Earth. Seriously. I had to hold my breath it was that strong. And I love the smell of cinnamon. Anyway, I get to the pharmacy and this older lady comes over to help me. I said I needed to drop off a prescription and handed it to her. She saw the "worker's comp" box checked and asked if they'd filled anything for me for workers come before. I said that "No I hadn't used their pharmacy before." She then asks if they've ever filled anything for me before. Um. No. Didn't I just answer that? She then asks how to pronounce my name and proceeds to say it American style and then Spanish style. Um. I'm sorry. Do I look Hispanic to you? I'm about as white as they get! But I guess you just never know anymore. I fill out some paperwork and she says it'll be 15 minutes.

So I sauntered over to Round Table. I hadn't purchased a pizza in over two months. My mouth was watering at the mere thought of a tasty Ulti-Meat pizza and a salad drenched in Bleu Cheese dressing. I sauntered back over to the pharmacy, and the lady gave me my meds and had the pharmacist go over the meds with me. Dude. It's prescription cortisone basically - as long as I don't eat it or stick it in my eyes, I'm pretty much good to go. But thanks for spitting in my general direction. I went back to get my pizza and the guy there was a moron. I said I had ordered it about 15 minutes prior so I wasn't sure if it was ready yet. I gave him my name, then he asked if I had called it in. I held up my receipt and said, no I came inside to order it a few minutes ago. He asked me two more times if I had called it in. I nearly slammed my head onto their counter. Really?! I finally get my pizza and make my salad and go home.

I got out of my car, and walked around to the passenger side to grab my pizza and salad from the floor. Where I notice my baby's first scratch. I nearly fell over. My new car finally got a scratch. All down the side of the rear passenger door. My stomach lurched. I tried to take a picture, but the sun glared on it wrong so all I got was my reflection and no scratch. I get upstairs to my apartment and dig in. My pizza . . . I'm pretty sure it tasted good. I sort of devoured three pieces. However, before I started devouring, I did notice something.



So, that is how I got to spend my day off today. All I can say is that the only good thing about seeing a tornado of a doctor on worker's comp. is that it's free. Otherwise it's a lot of hoopla and a lot of numb asses sitting around contemplating their navel.

Something's amiss here . . .

I turned the corner to get to work last night and the lighting isn't the best and I nearly smack my beautiful new car into the ass end of a semi. I'm sure if I were a truck driver, I would see the perks to a dimly lit cul-de-sac with easy freeway access. I might have thought to put on my parking lights, though. I mean, the dark green of the trailer doesn't exactly jump out at you.

I did notice one thing he didn't.

And I'm curious how Mr. I Can't Read was able to pass trucking school. Or got a license to begin with, since an eye exam is required.

I mean, he is only parked right next to it and all.

Clearly he forgot his reading glasses.

Whistle while you work

Nothing makes a day (or night, in my case) of work go by slower than silence. Especially a strained or forced silence. This is geared to those professions that do not directly deal with the public.

Every day, millions of people get up and go spend 8 hours a day with a set of people they see as much or more of than their own families. You spend at least 40 hours a week with these people; you get to know each other. In some cases you might make a few friends out of it. Some are more or less acquaintances, and others you downright despise.

People have a tendency to talk to one another. It's only natural to do so. Because we wind up spending so much time together at work, you find that maybe you have similar movie or book interests. Sometimes you want to tell a funny story because you know your co-workers have a similar sense of humor and you'll know they'll find it funny, too. But most of all, you talk while you work to make the day go by faster.

Unfortunately, not everyone agrees to this. Managers hate to discover that their minions are doing more talking than working. They hate when they realize that their minions are having far too much fun while at work. They hate not being involved in said fun.

I find this to be true. In my experience, when the managers are a part of the loudness and the laughter, they don't really give a snit. However, when they are working or sitting in their office and they can't be a part of it, they "politely" tell us to shut it.

Lately, my job has been pretty stressful. For those of us on the front lines, we feel that we are incredibly short staffed. We are busting our collective asses to get the job done on time. When one person is on vacation, we don't have enough coverage. This is because we have to rotate weekends so during the week there is always someone off on any given weekday. It's tough when someone is scheduled "off", but when you add in "vacations" or "sick time" we are screwed. Simply put, there's not enough minions to cover yet we are expected to do so.

With all the staffing stress, we also deal with machine stress. While mechanization is extremely handy in our profession, it's also a headache. Why? Machines apparently have minds of their own; or rather, they have temper tantrums. Case in point - last night, one of our analyzers decided it couldn't figure out how to replace a reagent. This was definitely not operator error, it was a simple matter of the machine not figuring out that the box of reagent was in fact full, but apparently it didn't want to suck it up. I had to call service, who decided the best option would be to send out our local service engineer on Monday morning to take a look at it. Our analyzers have issues, folks. Some nights I swear they all are stuck in the "terrible twos".

On top of staffing issues and analyzer issues, then you have personal conflicts. We can't all get along. I mean, where's the fun in that? Whatever conflicts you have with another co-worker can massively affect how your day at work will go.

Either way, there's quite a bit of stress in all our jobs. My job is no different. I have a permanent knot in my right shoulder from my job. Just ask my mother, she's tried rubbing it out on several occasions. But that's where the laughter comes in. Laughter helps melt away some of that stress. In all reality, if you can't joke about it, it's not a good sign. However, we do have a tendency to get a bit loud sometimes without realizing it, and that's when people will complain. But the complainers have a tendency to make it look like we were standing around doing nothing while talking and laughing real loud. It's actually pretty rare that we're doing that. Most of us can talk and work at the same time, and that's typically how it happens.

I myself wind up getting in trouble for talking. Not so much for the talking part, but because I was blessed with a nice set of lungs. Meaning, I can be a bit on the loud side. Now, I don't try to be loud, it just unfortunately happens. So, I get in trouble most often because people can hear me. However, I'm not sitting there talking and laughing with myself now am I? No. Why? Because I don't require a straight jacket, an IV full of meds, nor a padded cell. Thank. You. Very. Much.

My favorite complainers of the loud talking are the managers. Who can be quite loud on their own. Considering they have conversations that are being hollered from one department to another. And half the time they can barely hear or understand what the other is saying. If you need a reminder of the types of conversations these folks will have, please go here, to my very first blog to get a taste.

My second favorite complainers are those that often feel "left out" of said fun. And love to complain about everything anyway, so why not about the fun that's going on without them?

So, to those that complain about those of that can talk and laugh while at work: Get a life. Just because you're not involved in said fun, doesn't mean you have to suck it all out of the room. Don't go tattling on us to the managers later that we weren't doing anything. Because oddly enough, all the shit still got done. Pretty much on time, too. Go suck the fun out of another room, ya funsuckers.

Psycho Roomie, Part XV: The Finale.

At some point during the year I lived with Suzi, I got this idea into my head that perhaps I should look for an internship. Something that would be interesting to me. And I really didn't give a hoot where it was, so long as it was in the US, since I didn't have a passport at the time. Actually, I have a passport now, however, I have no money with which to travel. However, in case I suddenly have to be on the run - like if Suzi ever found out about this blog - I have my passport to run off to Mexico or Canada.

Anyway, I wanted my internship to deal with horses. Now, maybe I was looking in all the wrong places, but those seemed fairly few and far between. I applied to odd fellowship/internship programs in Kentucky, horse capital of the world, and never got accepted. I finally did find my salvation in a little business called EquiGen in Florida. They are in the business of embryo transfer.

I was itching to put some distance between myself and Suzi and 3000 miles seemed good enough to me. I emailed the owner regarding internship possibilities and snagged it. I felt so lucky. I thought this place was a huge facility with tons of people. Turns out, it's on quite a bit of acreage, but with one building and basically two employees - the two owners. And their volunteer interns. But, that was still perfectly fine with me. I was going to be spending the summer in Florida with horses. It couldn't get much better than that.

It became official around March that I was really going to run off to Florida for the whole summer, and Suzi (of course) mentioned all of this to her parents. She was probably all freaked out that I wouldn't pay my share of the rent while I was gone for 9 weeks. She kept telling me that it seemed like a great opportunity for me. I knew there was something behind all of it.

At some point that spring, her parents came for one of their many visits. I was getting some stuff of mine from the hall closet which was between my bathroom and the front bedroom. Her parents were sitting on the couch and brought up that Suzi mentioned I had snagged an internship. They asked for some particulars, like what I would be doing, where it was, etc. I answered their questions, just knowing there was something else they weren't saying.

And then, her dad picked up the "snake in the grass" and whipped it out. He started lecturing me about how I was still under obligations here at home while I was off gallivanting around the country.

I will repeat that: He started lecturing me.

Did they really think I'd skip out on the rent? I don't want that much bad Karma floating around me. Seriously. When I told my parents about it, they were upset as well. They couldn't believe he had the balls to start lecturing me - me, who had really done nothing to do deserve being lectured.

This is when the shit hit the fan. This is when it started to get ugly. And this is when I stopped playing so nice with Suzi. The last month I lived there. The month of May.

After talking things over with my parents regarding money while I would be gone, we decided that I should not have to pay for PG&E or cable. I wasn't going to be there to use the air conditioner, the washer/dryer, or any other appliances. I wasn't going to be watching TV there, either. I must mention that my family helped me get to Florida, money-wise (for which I am eternally grateful) and what little I did have went to pay the gal that I lived with for rent and gas, and groceries. I didn't spend money on anything other than that, really. I came back as broke as when I left. But it was fun and totally worth it.

Now all we had to do was tell Suzi. Actually, I had to tell Suzi. When I did tell her, I thought her head might explode. She started using her grown-up argument of "Nuh-uh!" and going on about how I'm under obligation to pay my half of the bills. My argument that I wouldn't be there to use either the TV or the power fell on deaf ears. Shocker.

She, of course, involved her parents. Which meant I had to involve mine since 3 against 1 is unfair in any circumstance. My mom even talked to a lawyer, who agreed with us on principle, but said that it was really more trouble that it was worth, and to just pay something. So began the negotiations. We finally got them to agree that cable was not a necessity and that I wouldn't have to pay for it while I was gone. PG&E was a different story. In the end my dad did some math and said that we wouldn't pay any more than $50 for the time I was gone. And that if the bill came out that our share would be more than that, we wouldn't pay extra as I wasn't the one who was living there at the time. Meaning I obviously would have had nothing to do with bill increasing.

Here's where it got down and dirty. During these negotiations, I had told my parents about Joey staying over all the time and that money-wise, I had never heard of an offer from him to help out during his stays. My dad mentioned something to Suzi's dad about it, and he argued that Joey wasn't there very often. When my dad called back to tell me that side of the story, and that they argued that I had had over-night guests myself on several occasions. I actually laughed. I then told my dad this: "Dad, they ought to know just how often he's here. They pick him up at the San Jose airport and drive him up here. They also pick him up when it's time for him to leave and take him back to the San Jose airport. Would you like to know the exact times he was here?" When my dad said yes, I told him that Joey was there for a week in November for his first visit, a week in February for Valentine's Day, a week in March for our spring break, a week in April for Easter, and the entire of month of May to support Suzi for her graduation. Then I asked if he'd like to know how many over-night guests I've had. Of course he said yes. I told him that my cousin had visited my first couple nights, and my best friend had stayed two, maybe three nights. So, all in all, my over-night guests in total maybe spent 4 or 5 nights in the year I lived with Suzi. As opposed to Joey's estimated 7 to 8 weeks of time he had spent in our apartment.

Just so you know, that shut their asses up for good.

And of course, during May I was slowly packing everything I owned so that when I left for Florida I was ready to move when I got back. My mom had brought down a huge box filled with boxes for me from her office. It sat in the living room because it was huge and awkward. I started filling my bedroom with filled boxes. Now, this was no small feat as I had very little space for this in my room. I had to move other bits of furniture in different directions so I could make space. That huge box of boxes annoyed Suzi to no end. I freaking loved it. However, the closer it got to her graduation the worse she got. She wanted it in my room so it wouldn't be an eye-sore when her family came for graduation. My argument? Just tell your family your roommate is packing and there are some boxes around. People understand those things. Oddly enough, that wasn't a good enough argument.

One day, while I was in my room packing, she came to the door - she never set foot inside - and basically yelled at me to move the damn box into my room. I stood there, in my tiny room and yelled right back, "Tell me where in my fucking room I'm going to put it Suzi? On my bed? Please, tell me, where I have space for that box?" Naturally, her come back was something akin to "I don't know". Eventually I got Joey to help me move it into the third bedroom, although it barely fit in the doorway.

By the time the semester was over, everything I owned was packed away. If it wasn't packed away for moving, it was in a suitcase for Florida. The only food of mine left in the kitchen were things that had to be kept refrigerated. All of my electronics I took to my parents house because I didn't trust the bitch with my stuff. My bed was torn down and standing against the wall. As was my computer desk. I had changed my address on my bills to go to my parents house while I was gone. The only thing in the living room that was still mine, was my popazon chair and my TV stand which her TV was now on, and my coffee table. My dining table was still in the dinette nook. I had found a studio apartment across town, we already had a deposit on it. The day after I got back from Florida, we would clean the apartment and move my stuff and we'd be done with Suzi forever.

When, after I returned from Florida, I did come back to clean, Suzi and I barely said a word to each other. Her mother came to help us clean as well, and we left the apartment spotless. The manager was quite impressed. We pretty got much the full deposit back.

And just like that, my "dark year" of living with that psychotic, dumb, naive bitch was over.

You'll Get Yours, Henry Higgins . . .

There are so many things that happen in life that just aren't right. For now, I'm talking about work related issues. Working for any kind of corporation really means just selling a portion of your soul for 40 years. To spend more time with them then you do your own families.

And of course, with people, comes the drama. I've written about random work place drama queens. Sometimes known as "helpers". Now I'll be talking about the shit-for-brains.

These wonderful co-workers are full of a lot of hot hair. They talk a lot of smack, thinking they're the bomb. They are the bomb. A stink bomb at that. They will often try to blame others for stuff, or at least make sure the blame isn't all on them. Especially when it is. They tell different people different stories. Eventually they will hang themselves with their lies. Because they are morons.

I have recently found out something that happened at my work place that rightfully pissed me off. It's pissed off a few others. One of my co-workers, a person whom I would consider a friend as well, was recently called a snitch behind their back. They weren't being a snitch. What they did was the right thing to do. If I had seen it, I would have done the same exact thing - told a supervisor.

The reason this person is singled out as the snitch as there was only skeleton crew on staff when the issue arose, so there were only about 4 people in the building. There weren't a lot of people who would have known. However, someone else inadvertently got punished due to the jerkwad who started it all. Because the dickweed said they'd do something for that person and then never did it. So certain things never got done. Certain things that have to get done. Things that got traced back to someone whom people were willing to cover for. Someone who was going to stay off the clock to finish their "boo-boo".

So, because the idiot didn't do their job because they wanted to leave early, they didn't do what they promised, and it came back to haunt them. In the name of my friend, mostly. And now, my friend is being called a snitch, another person got punished when no one thinks they should have, and thus far, shit for brains hasn't been punished. Although, I think it'll happen at some point.

But they are running their mouth, bragging they haven't been in trouble. Dude, let me just say, I've witnessed people doing what you're doing. And I helped get their cheating ass fired. Because it was the right thing to do. So believe me when I say, watch your back asshole. You don't piss off this many people, or hurt others and think you're going to get away with it. Karma is one helluva bitch.

You will get yours, Henry Higgins. You will get yours.

Advertisements

We have all seen "those" ads. We've all heard "those" ads. Several times. They can be quite disturbing if you're paying attention to the TV or radio. Disturbing more in the fact that society simply doesn't seem to care that "those" ads are everywhere. Society simply accepts them. Is it the openness that society accepts? Or is it simply a matter of society no longer cares?

The ads I refer to are the kind that refer to the enlargement of certain male body parts. Or the ads that refer to clinics that offer liposuction and "laser contouring".

I don't remember how it started, or when really. Possibly with Bob from Enzyte. And then it just went crazy. Maybe it started with Viagra. Who knows?

The ads I'm forced to hear on the radio every night at work state "the results are ah-mazing", "nothing short of a miracle" and that "you're name will not appear on any list" and "our name won't show up on the package". Just call in and you'll get a free sample of some sort of "miracle pill" to make Mr. Dingleberry be 2cm larger.

Besides, anyone else feel a smidge uncomfortable hearing said commercials while standing next to a male co-worker? Or seeing it on the TV? Let's just pretend that commercial didn't just make it to our eardrums.




And men, if you think I'm picking on you, I will say that I don't get breast implants either.

Another ad I'm bombarded with on the radio at work is for a local clinic that offers liposuction and "laser contouring" for your trouble areas. Now, being a woman, I am my own worst critic. And I have several trouble areas. However, I'm not about to run off to a miracle clinic to pay them thousands of dollars to contour me with lasers and suck the (much) unwanted fat out of my body. Their ad says, "If you wake up every morning and aren't happy with what you see" (or some version of that) "then call ".

Hold your horses.

Isn't society trying to tell young girls to love themselves? For who they are? To not conform to the skinny model look?

Then W.T.F., mate? Women are bombarded with images of "perfect" models. While everyone knows they're airbrushed and photo-shopped to perfection, we are shown that they are the "model" for how we should be. Then, we are bombarded with people telling us to love ourselves for who we are and what we look like - even if love-handles are involved. Then we are bombarded with ads from clinics and the like that says if you hate yourself enough we can make you look prettier like those models on the billboards.

But if you start, where do you stop? Once you take care of the original problem areas, you find more. It's a never ending cycle.

How are we supposed to handle hearing all the contradictions out there? Love yourself, but come in here and we contour you with lasers and make you better. Don't starve yourself to look like a model, just come in here and we'll use the lasers to make you look like them.

It's enough to make one's head spin 'round.

In case anyone hasn't noticed, I'm sick of seeing/hearing commercials that tell me to call in to enlarge a body part I don't have, telling me to call a clinic to suck and contour the fat out of my body, and all the like. Including the TV commercials for the "special time" couples need magic pills for. Dude, talk to your doctor, don't just call the 1-800 number on the screen for free samples.

Just give me Happy Cow commercials and anything else that's funny and stop making me listen to enlargement and fat sucking/contouring commercials. I beg you.

Psycho Roomie, Part XIV: The Initials

Before we had even moved in together, Suzi had us sit down with her mother to go over house rules. And other random stupid stuff. I'm not kidding, her mother was there. Please read this if you haven't already. In that post, I mention our sit-down meeting regarding our living together and how we'd work things out. Things like, sharing condiments and such. The three of us agreed to share such things and whoever used the last of it would buy more. Sounded fair enough.

A few months later, I borrowed a couple packets of her hot chocolate as I was out, with every intention of buying her more. I got bitch slapped twice - once by opening up the cupboard the day I bought her more to find a box with her mother's handwriting that said "Suzi's Hot Chocolate!", and "Suzi Only!" all over the damn box; and the second time by Suzi giving me a box of her hot chocolate in my stocking for Christmas. If you don't believe me and have yet to read about this, please go here.

I bring this old posts up, because of the sheer bitchiness and stupidity of this girl. All the agreements that were made, out the window. I'm not sure why we bothered with the pre-move-in-meeting at all, actually. Possibly to just waste a few hours of mine and Betty's time. Because we had so much freaking spare time being full-time college kids with near full-time jobs.

Sometime in the spring, April or May, I noticed a change in the kitchen. It was subtle, but it still made me think, "This chic is fucking insane."

One day, I was in the kitchen (not sure why, but I'm sure I had a good solid reason), and I happened to see Suzi's bananas. She bought a bunch of bananas each time she was in the grocery store. She wouldn't just tear off one or two, she'd buy a big ol' bunch. It was a rare day that she actually ate a banana. Nine times out of ten, those pretty green/yellow bananas turned brown. Sometimes black before she threw them out. Complete. Waste. Of. Money. I had to stop what I was doing, and actually slide the banana basket towards me to inspect said bananas. I wasn't dreaming. She had actually written her initials on the damn bananas.



Now, let me say this: I never once ate one of her bananas. They are not my favorite fruit. I will eat them, but I don't really care for them. Never really have. I don't like banana flavored things, either. So, it was safe to say, that unless someone held a freaking gun to my head at that point I wasn't going to eat one of her bananas. And before you ask, this was months after the hot chocolate incident (that was before Christmas).

So why was she suddenly writing her initials on the fruit?

I haven't the foggiest idea. Hell could freeze over before I could even come up with something remotely credible. I mean, besides the obvious fact that she was fucking psychotic.

I went about my business. I never mentioned the banana thing to her. In the next week or two, I started noticing her initials on other things. Like her butter. Her mayonnaise. And other random shit. I was slightly dumbfounded and had no idea what prompted this. I mean, how could it be the whole hot chocolate thing considering that had been like 5 months prior to all this happening? Delayed reaction perhaps? Doubtful.

Also, I have to mention why she had her own butter and mayo. She used the squeezable jar of mayo - which isn't a big deal, but I equate that to like, camping or BBQ style mayo. It's easy and accessible when you have lots of people that need mayo. As for the butter, it was blue. I shit you not. You think that stuff is invented for kids? Hell no. It's invented for psychotic idiots who think blue butter is cool. Personally I find it disgusting and treated it like it was the plague. I like my butter normal and yellow please. Thank you. I mean, it looked disgusting in the bottle (oh yeah it was squeezable, too), but it looked wrong on toast. I shudder just thinking about it.

Anyway, so I start finding her initials on all sorts of things. Things in the fridge and things in the cupboards. So I play along. I start initialing my shit. My ketchup, mustard, mayo - you name it, I initialed it. Hey, she started it.

Finally, on a week when her boy-toy Joey was visiting she said something. I walked into the kitchen for something and they were sitting at the dining table, eating. She said something like, "So, are we not sharing stuff anymore?" Seriously?! I simply replied by saying that I had noticed her initials on a lot of items, so I took that as my cue that we suddenly weren't sharing anymore. Her argument? The ever so childish "Nuh-uh". I mentioned the bananas and several other items that still bore her initials - clear as day. Whatever she said was complete and utter bullshit, and I shrugged my shoulders and said, "Not my problem."

You know what happens to crazy people when you stop playing along with them? You piss them off. It's fucking fantastic. It was at this time that I stopped playing as nice as I had been. I didn't go out of my way to piss her off, it just happened. I got tired of saying, "Oh I'm sorry, I misunderstood." There were no more "misunderstandings". I called her on her shit and she didn't like it. I would tell her if she could think of another solution then fine, otherwise fuck off.

And you know what?

I don't know about her, but I had no trouble sleeping at night. ;o)