Rocky Anderson set to clobber Fox 's Hammity

Our future president, Rocky Anderson will engage in a debate with future Randall Tobias apologist Sean Hannity. According to local news outlets, Hannity felt threatened by a documentary being filmed about the progressive SLC mayor, and attempted to squirm out of the agreement- but there is no way out of it now!

These two get along about as well as O'Reilly and Moore (or O'Reilly and Anderson, for that matter). If this conversation from March is any indication of what is to come, they will not disappoint.

Take back the....

I am a woman, and as such, I have been mistreated, demeaned, used, objectified and discriminated against. I fully support any efforts to make the world an easier place to live as a woman. But please, let's not stop after we get finished typing out our posts. We must speak with our dollars and use our time wisely. We must not be afraid to stand up for ourselves or to challenge something that perpetuates the myths about women that some find entertaining and ego-boosting.

I refuse to spend my hard earned money on any type of media that is demeaning to women.
I refuse to sit by quietly when I hear a woman being demeaned in my presence.
I am not afraid to confront those who attempt to demean me as a woman.

Finally...
I recognize that I deserve to be content, to create, to speak, and to enjoy others. And, as humility is to me the greatest gift, I refuse to allow anyone to rob me of it.

In which MH goes nose to nose with rich uncle sam

I lost the last round. Next I will have figured out a way **not** to get cheated on my taxes. Everybody I know uses WAY more public resources than I ever use, but they still get truckloads of cash back, and within a week they've upgraded to the NEW Hummer. So happy for them, whatever.

I need to pay this off because there is too much of my dad's crazy nervous paranoia
in me, and soon I'll be telling everybody that if the IRS storms the house and takes me to IRS prison, somebody better take care of Kitty!

So all night I've been digging around boxes, rooting around closets. Finally found some stuff to get rid of. I'm not sure if I want to do eBay because the whole shipping thing screws over either the buyer or the seller. Oh well, I'm still thinking about that. My sister wants one of my Kramer sets. It's a beautiful pink rhinestone with netted gold tone. It comes with a choker, a bracelet and two earrings. I loaned it to her when she got married, and then I never saw it again. Then I had to make a trip "up north" for a funeral, and my eyes slingshot out of my head when I unexpectedly spotted the 60 yr old jewelry.... wrapped around the stick shift of her truck. The woman said, 'Whaaaaaat, they're fiiiiine MH, don't act like I don't know how to take care of shit." I know she can take care of her stuff. All of her jewelry is in a big huge jewelry box IN HER HOUSE. Mine.... I'm sick just thinking about it. I heroically saved my jewelry, but soon noticed that one of the precious pink gemstones were missing. Bitch!!!!!!!

I took the set home and looked for an extra one somewhere. No luck. Then when I was going through everything, I contemplated parting with the set. The value is less, true, since there isn't a pink rhinestone in the necklace. It's probably under the seat of my sister's truck. But I know my sis likes it, and wanted me to just let her keep it that day I went psycho MH on her. So I called her up. We struck a deal, and now I'll be able to pay uncle sam off, and she'll get her wedding jewelry back (even thought it's missing a rhinestone), and she has promised to keep it all in the jewelry box.

Plus I have a few other little odds and ends to get rid of. Hopefully I won't have to have anymore nightmares about MC Rove.

Take Back the Blog April 28th

Sounds like fun.

Take Back the Blog blogswarm, info here

Hindley's atrocities cause me to consider The No Asshole Rule

As previously claimed, I do like my work.

Unfortunately, of course no office is perfect, right? There has been a small debate buzzing around the office for the past several months. It concerns a single co-worker ( known here as Hindley ) who is sometimes so overcome with hostility towards yours truly, that she plans and executes the most ridiculously complicated schemes meant to sabotage my subsistence. They never work, because it's the same old racket: Hindley notifies the boss that I have done something wrong. Word gets round to me within a few days, and by that time the investigation into my wrongdoing is over.

After a full year of these irksome indictments, I have never once been approached by my boss with regards to such. This is because I never do anything wrong. I might make mistakes now and then, but like any good girl, I simply admit it and move on. I am fiercely loyal to my boss, and would clean toilets if she asked me to. Yes, I am a good employee, but I am not alone in my willingness to serve. Everyone who works for her likes her. Well, Hindley was around before our boss, and found her position and style decidedly cramped when the boss arrived....

The debate is this: Should I make a complaint about Hindley? Thus far, I have consistently resisted acknowledging my antagonist's misdeeds. I reason that there are A-holes in every job, and if it weren't Hindley, it would probably be someone else. My concerned peers disagree en mass. They contend that ignoring the biatch has not worked, and she will not stop until someone stops her.

Today, after I check my miserable bank account, I might look for this book: The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't by Robert I. Sutton. See reviews here at Amazon.

What I will endure for coffee

It is shameful, but I am a hopeless coffee addict. I have been utterly incapable of getting in gear on my weekends. My job requires me to be available during the most peculiar hours, and it varies. So when I get time off, I have lately found myself sleeping for at least a full day, with the exception of the odd hour here or there. Is it catching up or is it something else? I talked to my doctor about it, and she insists that my problem is the schedule. She seems to think that my "internal clock" is thrown off, and this may be more problematic for my body than it would be for someone else.

I mostly agree with her, and it would be fabulous to get a different job if I didn't love what I do so much. Plus, I get paid an obscene salary for very little work, as I see it. Still, I am considering looking around outside my organization. Plus, my interview for that promotion-of-sorts didn't go very well. Couldn't hurt.

Today, I woke up at 5 AM. I lolled about in bed until 9 AM reading, trying to go back to sleep, ignoring my cat, ignoring the phone, ignoring the leaf blowers outside. Dreaded was the sight of my living room and kitchen, which hadn't been attended to in a serious way for two weeks. It sounds like the author is a slob. Perhaps I am ripening into one, as the inclination has always been there, held at bay by a nervous uneasiness that my natural tendencies could attract bugs and repel humans. I am still concerned about the bugs, but I'm beginning to tell myself, "Eh, so-and-so doesn't care what this place looks like," expecting so-and-so to keep her mouth shut about my shoes all over the place or quit stopping by without calling first. When I work, I hardly have time for cleaning anyway. I sometimes work for 16 hours straight, and undoubtedly do not notice anything when I walk in the door. I peel off my clothes, kick off my shoes, turn off the phone, set the alarm and soon am busy sleeping. I wake exactly 8 hours later and tear out of here immediately.

As per this post from March, I am capable of stooping mightily low in order to fill my system with its required 8 cups of coffee before being able to function effectively. Today, as I idled out of bed, my only consolation was that maybe I'd feel better after that first cup. In the kitchen, I was confronted with the most ghastly scene: my water purifier had algae at the bottom of it. This tells me two things. Firstly, perhaps it's time to change the filter... and secondly, maybe it needs to be cleaned out sometimes. I naturally thought that since the water was clean, there was no reason to clean it. I guess that was a testament to my disinterest in anything remotely scientific. I realize that this being lazy on my days off is starting to make me very careless, and I find that I don't enjoy my wonderful little apartment nearly as much anymore....

But I needed some coffee! I knew that I'd be done for if I drank the algae-water, but coffee was much more urgent than cleaning that nasty old thing out. I looked around. There were several half-drank bottles of evian, Arrowhead and whatever other overpriced water, strewn from one end of the apartment to the other. I gathered them up, and dumped them into the coffee maker. The finished product doesn't taste too badly. I was able to clean the purifier, and I even had a spare filter, brand new! I'm so proud.

While I embarked on the drudgery of straightening up my cluttered environment, I briefly recollected how things used to go around my house. X brought me coffee in bed every morning. I almost forgot how to make it. For a few moments, I did miss getting my coffee served in bed, exactly the way I liked it too. One might wonder why a person would divorce someone who performed such a gallant act every single morning. Even I might call someone crazy for doing so. But that was pretty much the full quantity of his manners, and it was unfortunately borne from a place of pure selfishness.

The man did not like the coffee I made. He started jumping out of bed as I was sleepily searching out my slippers with my naked feet. he would quickly race to the coffee maker, having readied it long before I sensed reality. Waiting on his hard-working wife was probably more self-preservation rather than sheer love. If this old girl didn't her her buns out of bed, SOMEBODY wouldn't be free to dilly dally around freely all day without a care. Somebody might have been forced to get a **job** or something unpleasant like that.

Mean streets and The Great O'Malley

The best thing happened yesterday. I finally remembered the name of a movie that I have been wondering about since the age of 8. Hm, that's a long time. Once in a while, I would try to recall the exact wording, but nothing ever came of it. I used to call it "Policeman O'Malley," and it played an integral role in the growth of my adult values. My memory is fuzzy, and I probably have it all wrong, but here goes what I think happened:
O'Malley is one of those "buy-the-book" officers. He's always hauling people in for little petty infractions. One day, he pulls some guy over for something minor. He spends forever lecturing the guy and giving him a ticket. The guy pleads with O'Malley to let him go because he is trying to make it to his first day of work, and since it's the depression, he REALLY needs a job. But the guy ends up being late, doesn't have a job, and something bad happens to him, I forgot what it is.

So O'Malley's sergeant is fed up with him and tells him he needs to have more compassion for people. He reassigns O'Malley to be a crosswalk policeman. There's a little girl who he starts to help all the time because she has a bad foot or something. They get to be great friends, and he really likes her.

Then one day, the little girl's father gets sick or in an accident and somehow O'Malley goes over to their apartment to see the child. When he gets there, he realizes that the father is the guy who caused him to get reassigned. But of course everybody blames him for the guy's troubles and being in need of a lifesaving blood transfusion, which OH MY GOODNESS, O'Malley shares the father's RARE blood type! So in the end, O'Malley donates the lifesaving blood and everybody lives happily ever after.

It's a tale of redemption, ask anybody. Turns out that it is a Humphrey Bogart movie, but he plays the dad and he doesn't even get top billing. The movie is really entitled The Great O'Malley.

I suppose one would assume that when I say the movie influenced me, it taught me to be more compassionate. But this is why I've never forgotten it- I knew exactly how the filmmakers intended us to perceive it, but didn't care. I was on O'Malley's side the whole time. When the dad made it to work late, I thought to myself, "Well, he should have gotten up earlier, that way he would have had plenty of time." When O'Malley was busting other people's asses, I thought the people had major attitudes with him, an officer who gets PAID to catch people breaking laws, no matter what laws. When O'Malley was reassigned, I didn't feel too sorry for him because, being 8, I wished that I knew a police officer just like him, and it would be ever so convenient if he could be a crossing guard near my own school. I pictured myself lagging behind all the other kids, pretending to limp, trying to look as cute as possible so my hero would notice me.

I still pretty much feel the same way. I do have compassion for people to some extent, but I get so sick of people whining about getting busted for "little" crimes like traffic infractions. I think, "Well if EVERYBODY got away with not bothering to put a quarter in the parking meter, why the fuck would anyone ever move their cars? Free parking!" And I live downtown, so don't anybody mess with the parking around here. Pay up or get your ugly big old Hummer out of there. People litter and expect not to be called on it, and YES, if you throw your nasty cigarette butts out our car window, I'm talking about you. You deserve to be fined or even jailed. I get so annoyed every time I see a friggin' Big Gulp cup or Popeye's back in the curb. Somebody actually made a decision to THROW that stuff on the ground instead of throw it in a garbage can. JAIL, I say. JAIL!! What would happen if all of us just threw our leftover packaging everywhere? Why don't we all try it and see what happens? That way, eventually those A-holes would be forced to live in their own filth. I can't stand people who think their particular situation is so special that they shouldn't be bothered by police. So I can't wait to watch the movie again to see if it's really the way I remember it. I may be crushed if it isn't.

Alec Baldwin got a good spanx -ing this week

It seems so redundant to write about the VT tragedy, but my thoughts have been with everyone who was impacted by it. Every day I come in contact with people who are mentally ill, and many of them are violent. Sometimes all it takes is the right medication and therapy. But it's that one in a billion opportunity of illness, environment and inattention on the part of others, and this is what we get. There is constant debate in my business about how a person like this guy should be treated. He didn't commit any crimes up to that point, so people probably assumed that he was just weird. But many people ignored their intuition because you know why? Warning others or confronting the individual about their anti-social thoughts and behaviors based on intuition gets you nowhere. That's the problem.

On to other dangerous people who have grabbed my attention...

Alec Baldwin has got to be the biggest A-hole ever. I have vowed to see what happens if I try not to swear, so this commentary will most likely be shorter than it would otherwise be. Where does that %$&^er get off talking to his child like that? Kim Bassinger is probably so sick and tired of his (^*$ing mouth and his low blows in the media that she did the one thing that she knows will get him to behave- leaked the EVIDENCE of his anger problem. Good job, Kim. Don't let that A-hole call your kid a rotten pig. Talk about a bully. Now he's acting like KB is the villain because she allowed the rest of the world to hear what she probably has to listen to constantly. Poooooor Baldwin. Man, Alec! Why didn't you "straighten" that B(^*$ out when you were married and had the chance? Guess your rants aren't as effective as you'd like.

Since I don't want to have nightmares about AB, I must briefly switch gears before signing off. My brother and I have breakfast at least once every week. We meet at 4:15 am at one of the very few restaurants around here who stay open 24 hours. Our favorite place is a well-known chain that I usually avoid. But this particular facility is new and clean. God Bless the USA, they knocked the old one down and had a new one built in mere weeks. There is a nice young man who works there and always prepares our breakfast perfectly. He is obviously a hard worker, and I have been wondering what in the world he's doing working there graveyard shift. I thought good-looking people never had to work at s*%( jobs, but I guess I was wrong. Not only is he good looking, but he is also articulate, funny, and polite. What the heck??? I should probably email the corporate office about what fine employees they hire at that branch, just in case they give bonuses or whatever.

Should have worn Spanx, slacks and flats.

My "body shaper" climbed up and bunched at the top of my thighs as I attempted to saunter into the building. The wind blew my hair over my face and sent my skirt flying up to my bunched up girdle-thing. No time to fool around with bulging synthetic fabric or faint with embarrassment over everybody on the first floor catching a glimpse of it, because at this moment I needed to convince myself that under NO circumstances was it possible for anybody to rattle this professional woman who deserves to make a few bucks more an hour so she can pay more taxes.

No way. I casually glided into the powder room, where I quickly adjusted my girdle thing and briefly considered taking the damn thing off and sticking it in my purse. But I opted to leave it on, fearing that this would be the day security decides to search it. I checked out my formerly perfectly coiffed mane. It looked about as good as it did last night after I finished carving my path of destruction. Except this morning I noticed a swarm of little flyaway strands sticking out every which way. I guess I cut a little bit too short in a few places.

Annoyed by the ugly mess created by a marriage of my folly and gale force winds, I threw it up in a sloppy-looking ponytail- which, I might add, looked much better. Very much satisfied with the work, I smugly strutted out the door. At which time I promptly twisted my big clown foot in an unnatural direction and came crashing down about as gracefully as Jack & the Beanstalk's giant.

Of course I let out a shrill yelp as I fell, throwing my lanky arms to the heavens instead of trying to regain some equilibrium. For one or two seconds, I sat on the floor stunned, legs sprawled in different directions, and looking back at the hordes of people witnessing my downward spiral into yet more humiliation for just being ME. I tried to get up, but had of course forgotten about the DAMN sling-back heels and the DAMN skirt, but remembered about the girdle thing, which caused me to slip and plop right back down. I again stared back at the crowd of onlookers. Even security had stopped wanding people to get a good look. I knew that I would never be able to stand up by myself, so I picked out the nerdiest looking guy, and gave him a helpless come-hither.

Thankfully it worked on others, because that idiot continued to dumbly glare at my not-so-well-covered crotch while I was being hoisted aloft by two superheros who turned out to be attorneys. I love attorneys. As long as I don't need one for anything besides helping me peel my sweaty legs off a dirty marble floor. I realized that my elbow hurt and my beautiful, bone-colored linen-blend skirt was all dusty and dirty, where else? On my ass. I intermingled thank-yous with "Ooooooh nooooo, look at my skirt" and "Ouch, do you see a scrape on my elbow?" I was starting to think I chipped a bone.

One of my heroes said, "Oh wait hold on." He drew his cell phone, like a knight unsheathing his sword, and told somebody to bring the Shout wipes down to the first floor. Within seconds, it seemed, a young lady showed up with the shout wipes, and the situation was explained to her. She knowingly nodded, as if she understood completely, and suggested that we fix my little problem in the bathroom. I was all for that, but looked back at Perry Mason and Matlock, wondering if they would be gone when I emerged. Maria, the secretary or assistant person, deftly wiped my dusty butt off and then soaked the spot with a damp towel. Then she slapped efficiently at the hand dryer and told me to stand there until it dried. I looked at my watch. "Any guess how long this will take?" I yelled. She shrugged her shoulders empathetically. "Ten minutes?"

I looked at my watch again. I had fifteen minutes before I was due on the second floor. At least I'm always early, that was definitely a blessing today. I stood there for a few minutes until people started giving me nasty looks for taking up a hand dryer. I pulled my knit blouse over the splotch and walked back out towards the elevators. Lo and behold, Mason and Matlock were standing nearby, chatting about something lawyer-like. I thanked them both from the bottom of my pathetic soul, and made as many disparaging comments about my maladroitness as possible before we moved on to more pleasant subjects, like the fact that they both have offices in this building. We all entered the elevator, and I noticed that we all got along famously; we really would make a wonderful Three's Company situation, until I spotted wedding bands. Damn! The door opened and out I stepped. This time I only stumbled, and as the doors closed, I could hear booming laughter.

Glad somebody could laugh. And I still had that interview.

I flopped into a chair after checking in with the chick at the computer. Looking around, I started to not feel so badly, as everybody else around there looked like a bunch of hung-over clods. Why did I go to all this trouble, I heard my inner voice begin to whine. Why didn't I just wear jeans like them? But I started to feel superior, and arched my regal back as I basked in my elegance. A very tall woman in high heels that made her tower over all of us opened a door and said in a raspy voice, "Mental Hygiene Unit," and looked right at me. Losing all composure, I grabbed my papers and my handbag and rushed towards the door. "That's me," I eagerly bellowed. As we walked through cubicles and past break rooms, the Amazon woman said, "I'm Cruella, and I'll be conducting your interview, along with another director, Walter. Do you have any questions?"

No, I didn't have any questions. I handed Cruella my application, which was hardly filled out. She looked at it as we continued to walk. I tried to pull my girdle-thing down every time Cruella glanced into an office to see if she could bug the occupant with one of her witty one-liners. I wished to God I'd ordered some Spanx last time I was up for my weekly insomnia attack watching QVC. Damn! Why didn't I get some of those! I would have been fine if I had just ordered the fucking Spanx.

"I can't interview you today," Cruella squealed, losing the raspiness and wheeling around as she planted her big foot in front of me. "How do you expect me to interview you if you don't even fill out your application?" I replied that I was already employed with our fair organization, and I was under the impression that I could dispense with that formality. "Formality?!" I could see this was going in the wrong direction, so I quickly blamed it all on the HR girl who contacted me a couple weeks ago, saying that she had told me not to bother with it, although I downloaded it myself and filled some of it out just in case the information could be of use to someone. The old shrew softened a bit, but was still wary of my last statement.

The interview commenced, with the same old stupid "What skills do you bring...." type of questions that I can never answer for shit. After succeeding of making a huge fool out of myself, I was set free, and oddly had no problem walking in my elbow-crushing sling-backs for the rest of the day. Even the girdle thing didn't seem to bother me. I didn't care.

I was exhausted. I hadn't slept a wink, I'd fucked up my interview, thus closing the deal on my future with the Organization, I had made a huge ass out of myself in front of at least a hundred people, and I suspected that there was a large round discolored spot on my ass where Maria had blotted and dabbed like she was basting her Thanksgiving turkey. I wasn't in the mood.

I had to go to a stupid training class right after the interview/slaughter. The room was empty. Good, I thought. A moment of peace and quiet. All of a sudden, the nerdy guy who stared intently at my crotch instead of help me get my ass off the floor appeared in the doorway. He turned around and walked back out and down the hall. That's weird, I thought. Am I that much of an idiot? A couple minutes later, he reappeared. His pants were all bunched at the crotch as well, but it was definitely not because he had a girdle on. He seated himself at the opposite end of the room from me. Good, I telepathically communicated. You are the very last person in the world I'd like to sit next to right now. By the way, nerdy guy. Have you ever heard of Spanx?

Bad haircut, bad skin, shameful tax preparation

Sometimes when things need to get done, I become completely useless, kind of like the way X was ALL the time. I can't seem to do anything right. Of course I wait until the last day to do taxes, and I made the mistake of using Turbo Tax instead of going early to an accountant. So now I owe the government lots of money.

I guess when you don't own a home and you don't have any kids, you have to pay more than everybody else. I have a huge problem with that. I don't agree with people getting REWARDED by the government for having kids. We should be rewarded for NOT having kids. I ought to be getting thousands of dollars every year for not producing more people to clog up our overcrowded school or prison system. Just think. Everybody who is in prison was a tax credit for their parents. Now they are a burden to the system in another way. I think that I ought to get a tax break for being female. Women HAVE to spend money in order to assimilate ourselves into society. If society didn't expect us to eliminate hair from our bodies, we'd save LOTS of cash every year. One year, I spent $600 on laser treatments, and that was only on one area. What a PITA.

Enough about taxes, it's too depressing.

I know! I'll record the first thought that went through my mind when I saw the haircut I gave myself in preparation for my interview tomorrow: "You are so fucked." That's right. I really did it this time. I was trying to save money, but all I succeeded in doing was assuring myself my current position for the rest of my life. I asked a friend of mine to tell me the easiest way to trim my hair. Being a stylist, she offered to come over and just do it for me. I was sure that it wouldn't be necessary, plus I know what that would turn into. This particular friend is one of those girls who likes to "try out" new bars every so often, presumably because she sleeps with the regulars at a bar and once they all figure out that she's sleeping with all of them, nobody wants to talk to her anymore. So I know that she would say, "MH, why don't we go for a drink?" No thanks. I can't stand going to bars with my slutty friends because it only makes my excessive prudishness that much more conspicuous. So my friend just gave me some quick tips: separate your hair into equal sections, make sure that the sections across from each other are even, and always cut a straight line. I thought I followed her directions just fine, but now my head looks like Anasazi ruins. I have been trying to decide whether or not I'll give myself a facial tonight, but the way things are going today, I'll end up burning the hell out of my skin.

Tomorrow will come and go, and who knows what is going to happen? It's probably a waste of time to stress out. 12 hours from now, I'll be finished with those annoying questions like, "Name a situation in which you would have done something different." or "Talk about a time you faced your fears." I can't stand questions like that.

Today while I was fighting my way through rush-hour traffic, I began to notice everybody's nice cars. How do these people afford brand new beautiful cars? I can't even afford to save up a little down-payment for a studio condo next to the airport. I sometimes wish I could be a teenager again. Ignorance is bliss.

In which I continue my tyrade about computers and men.

I truly underwent some kind of Internet addiction withdrawal while my computer had its little tantrum. I believe it must have been nearing the terminal stage ( my corny sister would love that rotten pun) because I even have a computer at work. But I can't do what I WANT on that computer. All Internet activity is monitored. I'm still waiting to find out what is going to happen to me when the computer police tell my boss that I went to You Tube and watched that Chris Rock skit "How To Not Get Your Ass Kicked By The Police." I couldn't resist when I actually talked to someone who had never seen it. It's one of those things in life that you must not miss before you die. Since I have been near death lately, it was only natural that I would have to see it one more time and share it with another. It was all very innocent.

But now I know that I do have a problem. I enjoy typing out my daily gripes and adding images when my words fall short of my real feelings. You simply cannot do that with a regular journal. Plus, I always end up buying journals that are too big or too small; too many lines on the sheet or lines that are too large; books that fall apart before I get six pages written; books that start to annoy me because I associate it with the last evil person I've profiled. This just feels better. Am I an addict? Is there something wrong with it? I guess it is only a problem if I'm too poor to support my habit, and if the damn thing breaks again, it will very well be the case.

The days I missed being able to write, I had so many things to talk about! I had read an old book from the back of my closet for want of anything new, and it was a whole new experience. I fell in love with the author and couldn't talk or write about anything else for at least a whole day. The guy was Richard Hillary, a young fighter pilot who was shot down over the English Channel during WWII. I found a link to an online version of the book here. My favorite part:

The water was not unwarm and I was pleasantly surprised to find that my life-jacket kept me afloat. I looked at my watch: it was not there. Then, for the first time, I noticed how burnt my hands were: down to the writs, the skin was dead white and hung in shreds: I felt faintly sick from the smell of burn flesh. By closing one eye I could see my lips, jutting out like motor tires. The side of my parachute harness was cutting into me particularly painfully, so that I guessed my right hip was burnt. I made a further attempt to undo the harness, but owing to the pain of my hands, soon desisted. Instead, I lay back and reviewed my position: I was a long way from land; my hands were burnt, and so, judging from the pain of the sun, was my face; it was unlikely that anyone on shore had seen me come down and even more unlikely that a ship would come by; I could float for possibly four hours in my Mae West. I began to feel that I had perhaps been premature in considering myself lucky to have escaped from the machine. After about half an hour my teeth started chattering, and to quiet them I kept up a regular tuneless chant, varying it from time to time with calls for help. There can be few more futile pastimes than yelling for help alone in the North Sea, with a solitary seagull for company, yet it gave me a certain melancholy satisfaction, for I had once written a short story in which the hero (falling from a liner) had done just this. It was rejected.

I love this guy! But of course, he's dead, just like all the other lovable guys.

Today, I ran into a colleague whom I haven't seen in awhile. He's only about fifty years older than me. I was happy to see him, and we chatted about our work. He is well-respected in our business, and knows EVERYBODY. I told him that I'd applied for a different position in my department, which might get me transferred to a different office- but that I plan on working towards getting back to my current office so I'd probably still see him around here and there. He wished me luck, bla bla bla, and as we were saying our goodbye, he said, "Hey, would you like to have lunch sometime?" It wasn't a professional kind of a question because I noticed this OLD MAN giving me the once-over, and it made me want to vomit!

First I thought he was married! Although I don't remember seeing a ring on his finger- although I didn't look today because I was so startled I immediately started trotting back to the building... But damn! I looked UP to this guy, sort-of like a mentor, a fatherly figure in a way. But noooooo. Just because I'm happy to see him, now it's time to try to get into my pants, to put it crassly. I realized that I never know what to say when I get asked out. I freeze up. I say, "Oh yeah, of course," because I've been switched over to auto-pilot.

When I got back to the safety of my office, I tried to process what had just happened. Did I just get asked out by an OLD, possibly MARRIED guy? Why was I so nervous about it? Damn, it's as if I thought I was about to be attacked and sexually assaulted just because he asked me to have lunch with him "sometime." What a psycho you are, MH. I asked a co-worker if she knew whether or not the guy was married. She said that she had always assumed that he was, but she wasn't sure. She said, "He's an attractive man, though. If I weren't married, I'd consider having lunch with him." I don't find him all that attractive, but then again, he isn't gross or anything. He seems like one of those genuinely nice people who you can count on to do the right thing. If he's married, of course, that whole analysis of his character will send me to a counselor or a psychic, questioning why I can't read people anymore.

But the more I thought about it, the more I could see why so many younger women choose older men. First, maybe their levels of maturity are a better match. Because most of the guys my age are less mature than most women my age and we all know it. Also, maybe I wouldn't have to worry about his cheating since he's finally getting too old for all of that shit. And he probably isn't going to be using me for my meager paycheck because I know damn well that he has GOT to be banking some serious cash, but at the very least he has a kick-ass retirement account by now. Then of course I can't deny that pretty much everybody Audrey Hepburn got with (except George Peppard in B@T) had to be way too old for her. She didn't have one problem with it apparently.

But I told myself I simply was not going to see anybody who I wasn't hopelessly attracted to. I'm sick of getting sucked into relationships because I had no backbone and wasn't assertive enough to say, "I'm just not that into you."

It would also be a huge PITA if I started seeing this guy, I come to my senses, break it off, and then I have to run into him and everybody else who knows the sordid details of our May-December romance for God knows how long. Yeah, I'll just have to pass on this one.

Where is my George Peppard?

In which Perez Hilton becomes more important than bank overdrafts

I have not died, but I have witnessed myself narrowly avoid complete emotional devastation. Or whatever happens to a person when her computer decides to misbehave coincidentally on the very same day she sneaked over to Apple to get a new iPod. So I guess I just about died. But toDAY, I'm alright. Who knows what will happen tomorrow. This crappy old thing will most likely wait until I REALLY need it. It's no fun to break down if your human companion doesn't need you, right? Just like my car. The only consistent force in my life is my cat, and she'll probably outlive me.

It all started like I said; when I couldn't STAND living without an iPod, and thus, without my run. I need to run. But I can't run anymore without my favorite music to drown out all of the insulting dumbass catcalls by the most undesirable assholes. I'd rather it never happen in the first place, but can somebody PLEASE explain WHY the most disgusting idiots in their '78 Trans-Ams have to assess the deliciousness of my buns LOUDLY and OBNOXIOUSLY, but the good-looking successful guys with their friendly golden retrievers galloping giddily by their side don't say one fucking word about me or my ass? No interest whatsoever. I have mostly succeeded in convincing myself that they are all gay. But I know gay men. They don't like animals with long hair because it's not conducive to their OCD identities. I still don't appreciate the Trans-Am guys. Never ever! I'd sooner try out being gay myself, before I'd slide into the vinyl and rusted splendor of my current admirers.

But anyway, so I got the friggin iPod already. I zoomed home, and went on a nice run without being bothered in the least. Later, I decided that I better check my bank account since I couldn't really AFFORD an iPod. But I didn't check it right away; rather, I dinked around at CNN, MSNBC, and Perez Hilton. Just when I navigated to the bank page, bam. My monitor blacked out.

Now, I know how to treat a crabby monitor. You give it the old one-two, and it shapes back up. This time, however, it did not acquiesce. It stubbornly stayed black, save for the .5 second-long flash every ten or so blows. It teased me for close to an hour before I gave up. For an hour. Tried again for another hour. After realizing that my hand was swollen and my big toe might just be broken, I went out for a drink with a friend of mine who actually has a life. She found it hilarious that I was so distraught. Well, I still hadn't checked my bank account! I did still more damage by bellying up to the bar and wasting 30 bucks on however many neat Johnny Walker Blacks you get for that much. I forgot just how many I drank.

But, as any alcoholic who is any alcoholic at all can tell you, my drunken escape did little to improve my situation, and there that fucking monitor was when I got home, eying me triumphantly, as if to say, "Yeah, here I am, why don't you come over here and try me out, see what I have in store for you?" I took the bait. At midnight, I was still beating it mercilessly when I heard the guy downstairs beat something on his ceiling/my floor and scream, "Shut that shit up, FUCK FUCK FUCK!"

Next morning, the only difference between my head and my hand was the fact that my hand was bruised. My pinkie has still not yet fully recovered.

Somebody told me to go to Goodwill and get a monitor for 10 bucks. I had to wait until I could squeeze out twenty of the thousands of bucks my brother owes me, and I did go to Goodwill and found one for 15 bucks! I hooked that baby up and abracadabra, I had my computer back. I immediately hopped online, and almost as immediately, the pages stopped loading. I was booted off, somehow. Sigh. I was a bit annoyed, but tried to get on again. And again. Tried unplugging every fucking electric thing in the damn house; tried kicking my old monitor, just because I didn't like the look on its face; restarted the computer 50 million times. Nothing worked.

Me and Kitty spent no less than five hours on the phone with my cable service and the firewall company and then the cable service again and then the cable service AGAIN. Nothing worked. "You have a bad gamma-interface-blickety-blick card," the cable "tech" said, doing his best to sound sympathetic yet importantly busy and Bill-Gatesish. "Ohhhhhh," I said. "Sounds like I'm fucked, huh?" He hummed and hawed, but wasted no time before agreeing with my assessment of the situation. Good thing I had THOSE assholes around to tell me it's not THEIR equipment causing a problem.

Borrowed a laptop from my brother. Of course it didn't work either.

Finally, yesterday, I tried the internet on my computer again. It fucking WORKED. It worked! WTF?? Oh well, I'm not even going to ask.