Tag Archives: adulthood

Job: Version 2.0 (Plus: Weekend Fun)

July 1, 2009

As of last Thursday I have a New and Improved Job, Version 2.0. My previous job was as a barista — although, I never did make any coffee. When I was offered the New and Improved Job, I felt rather badly about quitting, that is until the owner peevishly told me that she had “turned down” someone else for the position and would now have to find someone else, as if it were ALL MY FAULT. Yes, lady, I recognise that it is a hassle for you, but there has not been a BETTER time in the past several decades to be an employer than now! You can hire a college graduate to take out your trash for you, and they’ll just be happy that they actually HAVE A JOB! DON’T WHINE AT ME LADY! I WILL BLOG ABOUT YOU! In yo’ face! [Insert gangstah hand gestures].

My New and Improved Job is as an administrative assistant, which basically means that I am a secretary (well, maybe pre-sexual revolution I would be a secretary: now I think the term is considered sexist. Mostly thanks to Maggie Gyllenhaal). This job is not nearly as glamorous as movies have made it… nor as licentious as pornography would lead one to believe. I answer phones, print off papers, staple stacks of papers, sort papers, un-staple other stacks of papers, sort them, and then re-staple them. I also order things for the company, wait for the things to arrive, and then put them away. It’s all about as exciting as I’m sure it was for you to read about it. That said, I LOVE MY JOB! No, really! For the first time in my life, I’m actually making enough money to not only stop going into greater debt, but to actually start getting out of debt. As a result of this cheery news, I now spend much of my day in a giddy haze of happiness. (Admittedly this mental state is mostly due to sleep deprivation and hunger, and compounded by a nicotine buzz, but I enjoy it nonetheless).

I have spent my entire life floating barely above poverty, and I am so ready to finally start rising above it. I recognise that I have always been very lucky to never have to go hungry or homeless, but that being said, I doubt very many people can relate to the level of psychological trauma of being raised by a fundamentalist Christian father who CHOSE to live off of other’s charity and then complains endlessly of financial woes, who believes that being in debt is a sin against Almighty God, and who repeatedly placed the well-being of the entire family on the behaviour of his children (as in, “if you don’t obey me, I will lose my job [as a Christian minister], and the family will starve”). Thanks, Dad, for helping me to become a functional adult!

(Feel free to psychoanalyse the previous paragraph. I’m sure it will do you good.)

On to my previous weekend adventures: On Saturday, my cousin Jacob got his Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do. This is an awesome accomplishment at any age, but particularly at 13 years old, so everyone is quite proud of him. I was able to see the first half of his test on Friday night, but missed the second half on Saturday morning due to sleeping in too late. I’m blaming my cat for that one: Earnest ran away late on Friday evening, and I spent several worried hours looking for him before giving up and just waiting until he came home at 1am. On Sunday, my cousin Kyle and our friend Emilee went to the gay pride parade in downtown Seattle. It was quite marvelous! Despite the abundance of naked people and drag queens, there was only one thing I was truly surprised by: the number of churches that marched in the parade. I was shocked. I would estimate that about a sixth of the marchers were affiliated with a local church. They carried signs proclaiming God’s love and acceptance with slogans like “For God So Loved THE WORLD,” “Straight, But Not Narrow,” “I Support My Gay Son/Daughter/Bishop” and (my personal favourite) “Jesus Had Two Daddies”. I doubt I’ll ever attend church regularly again, but it certainly warmed my heart to see this public expression of love and acceptance for gays.

I know I said only one thing shocked me, but there were a few other little things that surprised me. And by little, I do mean SMALL. DIMINUTIVE. TEENY WEENY. The naked bikers were… how shall I say this… disappointing? I will admit that I have a very limited experience with male anatomy, and by “limited,” I do mean that my experience mainly has to do with pornography and working on a horse breeding farm… oh, and My Ex, The Rapist. I suppose it is irrational to compare regular men to porn stars and stallions, BUT C’MON! REALLY? I’m sorry to say, I have lost all faith in mankind.

On that tragic and disturbing note, I’m off to bed. Tomorrow is another day at the New and Improved Job, Version 2.0

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Pondering: Laziness

April 4, 2009

After weeks of quitting, quitting quitting, and quitting quitting quitting smoking (et cetera, ad nauseam) for Lent, I finally gave up on trying to keep any sort of blog about the whole debacle. It is frankly embarrassing just how difficult it was for me, a fairly casual smoker, to quit. The more I thought about quitting, the more I told people I had quit, the more I wanted to quit, the more I craved it.

It certainly didn’t help that the whole experience of smoking has always been intensely emotional and therapeutic for me, and since one of my roommates was also a smoker, at any given time I always had access to cigarettes (even when it meant swallowing my pride and acknowledging that I was failing… again).

Today marks the twelfth day in a row that I have not smoked, also, not coincidentally, the twelth day since I moved (actually thirteenth, as it is now after midnight). When I have to go out and buy cigarettes myself my craving is outweighed by my deep-seated and blessed natural laziness.

Which brings me to the point of this post:

The Three Greatest Things Laziness Has Done For Me And How It Can Change Your Life, Too
(Yes, that will be the title of my inspirational self-help novel, coming soon to a cheap-paperback-“Don’t-You-Mean-Augusten-Burroughs?”-selling bookstore near you)

1. I cannot maintain an addiction on my own power.
Smoking is a prime example of this, but also other substance abuse, namely, alcoholism: I love drinking, way more than is healthy for someone of my age with my history of liver damage. Thankfully, though, I’m so lazy that unless someone else is providing the booze, I am unlikely to indulge excessively. One could make the point that this is more due to stinginess than laziness, but the less I spend, the less I have to work.

2. I avoid many unnecessary altercations.
You may be surprised (alarmed, perhaps) to learn that I am actually far more inclined towards violent overreaction than one would guess from spending time with me. Because most people would consider me a rather volatile person already, I would like you to know that there are many, many instances where I do not fly off the proverbial handle. This is not due to any sort of inherent goodness, but rather due to the realisation garnered from many, many years of flipping out: it’s a LOT of work to get that mad. These days I’m so tame that if you cut me off in traffic, chances are I won’t even flip you the bird. It’s not because I forgive you, it’s because I’m lazy.

3. I really can’t be bothered to think of a third point.

Laziness (or, “Sloth”) is considered one of the Seven Deadly Sins, but really, if it prevents me from committing the other six, can it be all that bad?

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Being an Adult Sucks. No One Told Me.

March 11, 2009

Following the Great Lima Bean Debacle of ‘95, at the tender age of 7, I solemnly swore to myself that when I had reached that mythical pinnacle of human achievement (AKA “Adulthood”) I would never again eat food that I hated. This embargo generally included such categories as anything that had “-meal” in its name, like oatmeal, cornmeal, or any other plant made into a porridge-like concoction.

I remember many a meal my poor mother prepared that I turned my nose up at, but then choked down after learning that there was no other food to be had, and yes, I would starve if I refused to eat it. Where my friends were eating such nutrition-rich breakfasts as Chocolate Coco Puffs and Frosted Flakes and (for all I knew) Cheetos deep-fat fried in oil, rolled in powdered sugar and soaked in chocolate milk, I was forced to gum down tasteless oatmeal reminiscent of the toothsome texture of phlegm. Oh the injustice of it all!

Reaching adulthood, though, came with many disappointments and hardships, not the least of these my inability to eat anything sweet before noon without feeling sick for the rest of the day. Gone are my youthful dreams of donuts and Lucky Charms for breakfast, and in their place I find myself voluntarily gumming down oatmeal, and have even developed a taste for farina, so much so that I buy it in bulk at WinCo.

I’m not a health-nut, by any stretch of the imagination, but my desire for all things deep-fat-fried is definitely tempered by my desire to NOT look like a beached and bloated whale.

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A Brief Episode of Self-Discovery, Courtesy of the Meridian Police Dept.

March 6, 2009

About a month ago I transferred the ownership of my car from my brother’s name to my own. I have had the car since 2006, but for some reason never got around to changing the title to my name. Recently, for various reasons, mostly involving three parking tickets at BSU and *ahem* an academic hold on my brother’s account preventing him from registering for classes, it became necessary that I stop procrastinating on the issue.

So, off to the DMV I went. I transferred the title, got shiny new license plates, and renewed my expired registration. All was well, except that I still neglected to actually put the new plates on my car. This was due entirely to sheer negligence and laziness. Once, I even went out to the car with a phillips screwdriver, only to discover I needed a flathead, went back inside, spent approximately 2 seconds looking for another screwdriver, and said SCREW IT and went back to driving like a grandma knitting an afghan, except with a little more environmental awareness and a whole lot more road rage.

Tonight, I was in Meridian driving back from a friend’s house when I noticed that the car behind me was following too closely. My normal response to this is to brake suddenly and then speed up, causing the tailgater’s frontal lobe region to light up with OH MY GOD CRAZY WOMAN DRIVER warning lights, and usually they’ll back off. Thankfully, despite it being so dark out that I couldn’t tell what kind of car was behind me, I had a sinking suspicion it was a cop. My premonition (that’s right, I’m a soothsayer) was confirmed when flashing lights blinded me through my mirrors. I pulled over to the side of the road, put my hands on the wheel (always do this, kids, ALWAYS. Unless you want to get shot, then don’t bother) and immediately began to think lie or tell the truth, lie or tell the truth.

I opted for the latter (mostly), with a heavy dose of “look at me, I’m blonde and I have boobs. TWO BOOBS OFFICER!” thrown in for good measure. That’s right, I played dumb.

Him: I pulled you over because your license plates are expired since October
Me: Uh, right. I have the license plates right here in my back seat
Him: Hmm, I see.
Me: I just didn’t know how to switch out the old plates! I tried and couldn’t! *puppy dog eyes*

It’s almost shameful, and I would be ashamed, except it worked. He spent a few minutes explaining to me how to replace the plates (”all you have to do is unscrew the old ones and put in the new ones”) before sending me on my way.

What did I learn from this? First off, that I only, ever learn the hard way, and secondly, that sometimes I really like being a girl, because, really, how many guys can smile at a cop and tell them they “just don’t know how” to unscrew an old license plate?

One last thing: “screw” is a fabulous word. Better, in some ways than “fuck,” if only because it has a legitimately non-vulgar meaning in addition to its slang connotation.

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