Memoirs Of An Evil Genius

Someone Tell Pandora To Close Her Fucking Box Already

So I believe I have, several times now, promised to be more diligent with my updates. HA HA HA. Suckers. No, I’m kidding – it’s just been One Of Those Things. First you get really busy during the day at work, and then you go home and the last thing you want to do is “think”, so you just pour a glass of wine and turn on your stories and tell yourself you’ll update tomorrow. And then tomorrow comes and it’s a slow day, and you’re like, “fuck this BLOG shit, I’m going to play Scramble on Facebook for a few hours!” My life is so meaningless.

Actually, some big stuff has happened! My sister had her baby, and he is CUTE AS THE DICKENS. Seriously. So cute. With his big ol’ head and his little tiny fingers. Babies are lucky they’re so cute, because they’re not very good at hunting or gathering, or balancing a checkbook, and if they didn’t have the power to bring adults to their knees they probably wouldn’t get very far in life. Seriously, though, babies are like cynics’ Kryptonite. Their cuteness defies your wry observations about how rotten the world has become.

OH. While we’re on the topic of “how rotten the world has become,” did I mention that my company is shutting down? Because it is doing that. Our parent corporation decided that they “don’t want a production company anymore,” so they’re canceling our award-winning and long-running (MORE THAN A DECADE, PEOPLE) series and we’re all out on our asses by the end of Summer. So much fun! I get to be unemployed again, just like about a million other people in Los Angeles, against whom I get to compete for a continuously narrowing pool of jobs. Hooray. Can one survive on swallowing their own pride? Because that will be all I can afford to eat for WHO KNOWS HOW LONG.

Now, in the meantime they had put me on a two-hour special that is theoretically supposed to deliver at the end of June, giving me an out date of sometime in mid-July, and TODAY I found out that, oh, wait, they might be scrapping the project all together, which means…??? !!! @#!$%@! WTF? HA HA HA. HA! HA! HA! AM I FIRED OR WHAT?

No, seriously, that’s a question. I don’t know if that means I’m possibly going to be shitcanned any day now, or if this is a false alarm, or if they’ll move me onto something else for a while, or what. BUT (and here’s the thing,) I have been making plans with the specific knowledge that I was to have at least five more paychecks coming my way AND I WOULD LIKE THEM PLEASE THANK YOU.

Either way, I have seen the writing on the wall, and I am SINCERELY hoping that the writing says “This way to some more money!” With, like, a big arrow underneath pointing at a bunch of flour sacks with a $ emblazoned on them.

"It's all true or my name isn't Sophia Pe-...Hawkins."

Okay, so it's been a LONG TIME since I last updated, and I want to apologize. It's been a bad few weeks, and the shit has been left, right, and sideways ALL OVER THE FAN at work. I mean, I'm in there with a squeegee and a fire hose trying to get shit off the fan every day, and it's left me without a lot of time to update. Right now, for example, the field shoot we had planned for Friday is lying at my feet, bleeding from a gunshot to the head, but it's more or less beyond the point of help now. So I can take a few minutes!

...and talk about sad shit. Y'all...Estelle Getty died today. I'm actually really bummed about it, too. Not because it was a big surprise -- she'd been sick for a long time, and she was 84 after all -- but because she has a special place in my gay little heart, thanks to Golden Girls. I mean, I used to watch that show all the time with my mom, so it also kind of marks the inevitable passage of time as we all get older and blah blah blah. Anyway, tonight I'm going to get drunk and eat cheesecake with Ulrich and Argyle while we watch a marathon of Sophia Petrillo's best episodes. Here's to your memory, Estelle.

Also, I am seriously considering moving to Switzerland where I will live in a tiny cottage and make cheese or wine or textiles and never speak to another human being again. WHY IS WORK SO AWFUL? I'm sick of getting barked at over shit I can't control, and getting goaded by my producer into pissing people off, because HE doesn't give a shit if I get my ass reamed by some lady on the other side of the country who sounds like an incest baby with a cleft palate for "ignoring protocol" as long as HE gets his results. Which, of course, he DOESN'T get, because after pissing off Cleft Palate Lady, we are shuffled to the bottom of the pile, our shoot gets a double-tap to the head, AND THEN IT DIES IN MY ARMS.

This is only the latest in a long line of bullshit problems we've been having, and it's pushing me to the edge. It is also turning me into an alcoholic, because every time the message light on my phone blinks, I think to myself, "I NEED A GLASS OF WINE." And then I look at the clock and it's 10am, and I'm like, "ONLY EIGHT MORE HOURS TO GO! MAYBE I'LL MAKE THAT TWO GLASSES." One of these days I'm going to actually get a lunch break again, and then I'm going to get into trouble.

Sigh. But I'm trying not to turn this into my bitchfest-about-work, because I've been there and done that already. It's therapeutic, if not productive. Anyway, hope everyone is doing okay. Watch some Golden Girls tonight for Estelle Getty and get drunk for me.

Smile When You Say That

Wow!  Look at me, everybody!  Look at what I'M doing!  I'm updating my blog!  Whoa, I better slow down -- I am unaccustomed to this and it's making me seasick!

I'm being sarcastic.  It has been a while, but once again I swear I have a decent excuse.  I have been working my ASS OFF for a TOTAL INGRATE.  You know, it's bad enough when you have to really put your nose to the grindstone -- coming in early, skipping lunches, staying late -- and getting stressed and being barely able to keep your head above water anyway.  It is SO MUCH WORSE when the dickhole you're doing it all for is totally unappreciative of your efforts.  Worse still when he meets your accomplishments with a brusque, "Is this it?"  YES, THIS IS IT!  THIS IS THE END.  PREPARE TO DIE.

He's the worst, seriously, but there are others I work with that fare no better on my imaginary hit list.  There's a guy here who is totally passive-aggressive in that smarmy, smiley-faced kind of way that makes you want to punch them in the groin.  With a car.  The other day he called and left me a voice mail, just to say in his smiley way that he was assuming I had forgotten to do something important and so was going to do it himself.  In a voice mail.  This is douche behavior, people.

Okay, dig it: WHY would you leave a message like that?  No, wait -- YOU wouldn't, because if you're still reading this it's because YOU ARE NOT A DOUCHEBAG.  If you're going to just take care of, just take care of it.  There is no need to call and leave a self-aggrandizing message beforehand.  Also?  The thing that you're going to assume I didn't do?  You're right.  I didn't.  Because it WASN'T MY RESPONSIBILITY IN THE FIRST PLACE.  Way to investigate, Douche Tracy.

And that is only one small example of what I'm talking about.  I would list some of the rest, but, oh surprise, I have to get back to work.  Frowny face.

Hair Today, If You Don't Pull It All Out

I'M NOT DEAD!  I swear!  I know it's been a month or so since my last update, but it's just because I've been busy.  Busy NOT choking my producer to death, which believe you me has been a lot of work.  I don't want to go into details because it will kick-start a rage that will NEVER DIE, but suffice it to say that my homicidal impulses have been getting a workout like decathletes preparing for the Olympic games.

Other things I've been doing: removing the old, beat-up chair from my bedroom and replacing it with a cabinet; filling said cabinet with the pile of books, rapidly expanding like the blob, beside my bed; restocking said pile of books with rash and ill-conceived purchases from Amazon; eating Cadbury Creme Eggs; and going to bad movies.  I've been doing more than that, but I've been out drinking tonight and can't remember all that stuff.

Oh!  I also got a haircut.  There's a place in my neighborhood and I've never gone there - mostly because it has a person's name in the title without words like "super" or "fantastic" or "EZ", which translates loosely to "expensive" -- but I was kind of feeling like I wanted an expert at the helm for once.  Frankly, though, it seems like a waste of money as I wear my hair pretty short and it doesn't take much skill or critical thinking to execute that particular look.  And back when I decided that I wanted to do that "shaggy" look the kids were all going in for, I found out that when my hair gets longer?  It gets all wavy and curly and impossible to manage.  So I went to one of these pricey salons and asked the hairdresser (I feel so sophisticated!) to help me find a controllable look I could sport while continuing to let my hair grow out.  So she said she'd just cut the curl out of it, and fifty dollars later I walked out with a buzz cut.

Anyway, I avoided the expensive places after that, because what's the point, right?  Except that the last two times I went to the cheap places they cut that part above my right ear just a smidge too high, and I looked like Claus Von Stauffenberg's mentally handicapped cousin from Mayberry.  So I thought I'd give it a try one more time.  The woman who cut my hair was a close-talker, and an over-sharer to boot, and as she styled me she YANKED on my hair about A HUNDRED AND FIFTY TIMES.  I'm surprised I have any left.  More so because, in addition to the yanking, she CUT ALL MY HAIR OFF AGAIN.  They all say the same thing: "I LOVE your hair!  I wish MY hair was like yours!  I'm just going to cut the curl out of it."  And then later, "You like SHORT hair...right?"  I do like it, though.  I just with it hadn't cost FIFTY DOLLARS.

There I go with the rage again.  Anyway, you'll all love to know that Argyle totally told our loud-sex neighbor's roommate all about the loud sex, and apparently the roommate has been mortified on the loud-sexer's behalf about the loud sex.  Maybe you didn't love to know that.  But I've had wine.

Okay, I'm going to bed now.

No Place Like Homicidal

OMG.  Argyle is at a bar RIGHT NOW sitting next to FANCY CRANE, and I am out of town and cannot drive to the bar like a lunatic, get all up in her face, and GEEK the FUCK OUT.  I AM SO MAD.  I AM CRAZED.  Seriously. This is NOT FAIR.  The Universe is trying to hurt me, right?  WHAT IS THIS?  No, but I'm really like insane about this.  To be fair, Ulrich and I have been out wine-tasting all day, so my judgment is somewhat impaired, but I AM REALLY PISSED ABOUT THIS.  I will never speak to Argyle again!  HOW DARE SHE MEET FANCY WITHOUT ME!  THAT BITCH!

Okay.  It's okay.  I'm okay now.  I swear.  I'm...going to breathe.  And maybe have more wine.  AND SEETHE.  No, not that last part.  I'm going to practice my Zen breathing and I'm going to be okay.  It's all okay.

IT IS NOT OKAY.  I am losing my mind.  I'm going to cry for a minute, but then I'll be fine.  No!  I'm fine.  Don't worry about me.  *sob*

Actually, there are possibly worries needed for my future, because I may commit a murder and be incarcerated.  Not Argyle -- I talk a good game, but I could never kill her because there would be no one left who knows how to Swiffer without leaving clumps of residue all over the fucking apartment.  (Seriously, why can't I figure this out?  I'm a college graduate, people!)  No, I am going to assassinate A CERTAIN PERSON I WORK WITH*.  I don't want to go into the whole thing because it would just piss me off all over again, and I spent two hours explaining it all to Ulrich yesterday, but the man needs to just die.

Between the passive-aggressive denunciations of my efforts on the job, and the way he a) doesn't listen, b) doesn't communicate, and c) expects me to nevertheless divine exactly what he wants and do it the way he wants it while not listening to me or answering my questions and telling me 'do whatever, I don't care' before then publicly accusing me of screwing things up by not doing what he wanted WHICH HE NEVER TOLD ME OH MY G-D I'M LOSING MY MIND AND I CANNOT STOP SHOUTING WITH WORDS!  He seriously ruined my life like eight times on Friday, to the point where everyone sitting in my cubicle area offered to buy me drinks and/or help hide the body.

I am trying to be calm and sensible about this, believe it or not.  I am trying to remember to forget about work when I'm not at work, but for reals?  This man makes me glad that I may be testifying in court on Monday and unable to go to the office.  Let him figure out how to do shit without me for a day.

Except that he won't.  He'll just wait and give me a passive-aggressive lecture about how I've wasted time by being subpoenaed and now have to really buckle down to make up for it.  That fucker.

Okay.  I need to go and practice more Zen breathing.  Send help.

*I am changing certain indicators in order to preserve a little privacy.  Not that I think THIS PERSON will ever read this?  But loose lips sink ships.  The person sitting in front of me has been leaning over my wall all day long to talk very loudly about my homicidal impulses, and I don't need to add any fuel to the fire.

Food For Thought

How is it that I haven't written anything for, like, three weeks and yet don't have anything to say?  I ALWAYS have something to say.  Even when I say nothing.  Problem is that laziness makes you rusty, and lately I'm like the fucking Tin Man.

I've been trying to up my reading habits.  Last year I read fifteen books, and while that's well above the nation's average of four per year (that's 4, as in 4 SHAME), I still feel like I need to pick up the pace.  I used to read fifteen books in the summer.  Granted they were all crap, but at least I was taking stuff in, you know?  Anyway, I like crap.  DON'T YOU JUDGE ME.  I have decided, in addition to reading more, to broaden my horizons as well.  This is why I've been reading more travelogues and culinary retrospectives!  Okay, so, not setting the intellectual world on fire, but at least it's not all dime novel shit!  Not all of it, anyway.

This one summer, when I was in summer school (I barely passed geometry that year, and my parents were so mad at me for not getting an A -- excuse me, "living up to my potential" -- that they forced me to retake it in summer school; it was hard for me to communicate to them that barely passing was actually where my potential hit the wall, and further that if one hour of geometry five days a week for the school year wasn't enough to help me maximize said potential then two hours a day six days a week during my vacation wasn't going to do it either) (I believe I finally got that message across by failing miserably) (point: mine), I was reading a different book every one to two days.  This was during class, of course, so I wasn't the teacher's pet I don't think, but he didn't look like he was good with pets anyway.

Right now I'm reading The United States of Arugula by David Kamp, and I really love it.  If you like food and culinary anthropology, it's really a great read.  For Christmas I got a copy of A Revolution In Eating, and I cannot wait to start it.  Unfortunately, it makes me want to throw a French dinner party.  Truly unfortunately, I am not equipped to throw a French dinner party.  I mean, I could certainly try my hand at the dishes themselves, and likely have the batterie de cuisine to put it together, but what we DON'T have is a table.  This is an issue for dinner parties.

Okay, I need to get the fuck out of the office.  I am tired and I am going to Arizona this weekend, which is going to be a long drive, and we are leaving tonight.  TONIGHT.  I still haven't packed.  It should be fun, though!  (The trip, not the packing.)

Everyone enjoy your three-day weekend, and I'll see you back here on Tuesday, whereupon I will ruminate on this new show called Make Me a Supermodel! 

Happy Holiday$!

What's this "writing"?  It seems so new, so unfamiliar!

I kid, but not really.  It's been forever since I've updated, but it's been forever since I've done just about anything except for work.  Fortunately, my episode is in the finalization process, so MOST of the headachey parts are over.  OVER!  Of course, the qualifier "most" is "most" important here.  I've learned to stop relaxing, because at 6:30 when I'm supposed to leave I know someone will come running up, all, "OMG!  There's a thing that needs to be done RIGHT NOW for tomorrow, and if you don't do it nine million people will die!!!!" and then the 24 clock starts beeping and the screen goes to a four-way split screen, and...well, you know the drill.

But!  I am finally approaching the finish line for reals.  For REALS, for reals, because we deliver on the 21st and I go home on the 21st for the holidays, and I'm not doing any work on Christmas.  (Incidentally, I did a typo right there and said I wasn't going to do any qork on Christmas -- I'm not going to make that promise.  Frankly, I have to do a lot of qork just to get me through the holidays.)  What I WILL be doing is freezing my buns off and feeling poverty-stricken.

Oh, did I neglect to mention that I have had my car in the shop THREE TIMES since I bought it IN SEPTEMBER?  First the engine light came on and it cost ~$200 to repair.  Then the engine light came on and it cost $700 to repair.  Then, and you'll love this, the ENGINE LIGHT CAME ON -- ten days later -- and it cost $600 to repair!  And now?  Do you want to know what's happening now?  Do you?  Just listen: NOW the BRAKES are making horrific groaning noises, in manner of Shrieking Eels or similar, like they might be fixing to give up the ghost any old day.  Not comforting!  Add to these expenses the holidays -- WHICH, by the way, are taking off downhill like MY CAR WITH NO BRAKES -- and I'm practically sweating money.  I would love to stop my bank account from hemorrhaging, but it appears to be hemophiliac at this point.

Which reminds me: has everybody finished their Christmas shopping?  I HAVEN'T!  Who has time?  I bought a bunch of shit over Thanksgiving, and a bunch more over the subsequent week, but I've got more and more and more people to buy for every year.  And now that I have a "better" "job", people seem to expect more.  Apparently I can't get away with shopping at the 99¢ Store anymore.  I don't care what people say -- you never have too many ceramic hobo clown candle holders.

Anyway, I just wanted everyone to know I'm not dead.  Like my mom.  Who called me two weeks ago, and when I didn't answer called everyone I'd ever met to ask where I was and was I okay.  I was fine, by the way.  I was just drunk.  It was a Tuesday morning, after all.

(Kidding!  It was Saturday morning.)

(Kidding again!  It was Saturday afternoon.)

GASP

That's me, gulping air into my lungs, because I have FINALLY been able to get my head out of work for a few minutes.  Things have seriously been crazy hectic this week.  The shit hit the fan, like, six different ways.  Fortunately, I'm getting to be an expert shit-handler.  That sounded wrong.  But it is actually fairly accurate.

Okay, but for reals?  Why do people have to be assholes?  Like, especially (JUST FOR EXAMPLE) people in public relations.  Isn't their job to RELATE?  To THE PUBLIC?  If I had a dollar for every douchebag PR guy who gave me the runaround this week and/or acted like I was planning to slander them To Catch a Predator style and run some kind of child labor exposé ("We'd love to come down there and film you guys!  Could you make sure your workers don't bathe or put on makeup?  We'll be bringing some shackles -- for atmosphere -- so make sure everyone's aware.  We'd also like them to sing some old spirituals or whatever.  If you have any with broken limbs, let's put them in the front with extra welts on their flesh.") I would have...a whole lot of dollars.

But it's cool.  I got my car situation all straightened out at last, and it's mine, mine, mine!  Ironically, while I was sitting there and waiting for them to process my title transfer, I recognized this guy who was working there at Triple-A.  At first I was confused, because he looked familiar but still seemed so different, and I convinced myself I was wrong.  But then I heard him answer the phone, and sure enough: it was Tony, my old compatriot from the shackles-and-child-laboring pits of Arts-Friendly!  I didn't have time to go over and ask him how he was or what he's up to, because I had to haul ass to the office, but it's kind of nice just to know where he is and that he seems to be doing better than ever now that he's broken free of the chain gang.

In other news, both Tex and Ulrich have officially completed their respective local obligations and have returned to whence they came.  Ulrich is back up north at school, and Tex has gone back down south to his other obligations, so Argyle and I are alone.  Just us and TiVo.  And pie.  (I made pie this weekend.) I don't know what we did in the days before TiVo, though, I swear.  Of course, it's not all roses -- last night I was up till 3am trying to catch up on shows, because I'm going up north myself this weekend and will be missing all my leisurely opportunities to watch at my own convenience.

Okay, speaking of which, I need to get the FUCK out of the office.  RIGHT. NOW.  I will go for a run, I will drive the fifteen or so miles all the way back home to get shit I forgot this morning when I was running out the door, and then I will drive all the way back that and THEN some to go visit my boyfriend.  Toodles, y'all -- have a great and relaxing weekend!
 

Mountain High

Sorry for the unintentional vacation, y'all!  It's been a hectic couple of weeks.  I got back from my trip on the 2nd, worked four days, and left for the mountains last Friday so Ulrich and I could celebrate our two-year anniversary.  Hooray!  It was actually a wonderful getaway, and the B&B was amazing, even though our room had a slight...rabbit problem.

Okay, I don't mean there were, like, rabbits chewing on shit or whatever; I mean the room was decorated like Beatrix Potter blew up all over it.  Ceramic rabbits, stuffed rabbits, painted rabbits, ragdoll rabbits.  We picked the room because it had a raised spa tub for two (hooray!) with a view looking out at the woods, and were thoroughly satisfied, but...rabbits, y'all.

We did some wine tasting on Saturday, and that was a shitload of fun, as always.  We made a record haul, too!  We're usually pretty reserved when it comes to the tasting -- like, we'll split one between us, and at most we'll buy like two bottles if we're feeling good -- but we went all the fuck out this time.   I'm serious.  I'm going to have to cancel my cell phone or something, because we spent a fortune on booze and food.

The first place that we stopped at, we were clearly the only ones to show up that day.  The lady kept pouring and pouring, and asking us about ourselves, and we obliged as comfortably as one can be expected while talking about your relationship to a total stranger.  Then she pulls out this weird, unmarked bottle, and goes, "Now we're going to try something!"  She poured us a wine that had only been in the bottle for a week, the first harvest of newly planted grapes, and said that she tasted "fruit and onions".

A) WTF?  B) Worst. Combination. Of flavors.  Ever.  We had some.  It tasted like fruit and onions, all right.  Like fruit and onions BOILED IN FECES.  I am serious, it was the worst thing I have ever had in my mouth, and I once fell off the monkey bars and landed mouth-first in a pile of fucking dirt.  It was like...if someone stuffed a rotting beaver corpse with feta cheese, garlic bulbs, and aluminum shavings, then soaked it in sweat and gasoline, and then liquefied it, you MIGHT approach what we tasted.

That night, we walked into town and had an amazing dinner, followed by some seriously awesome apple pie for dessert.  We started to walk home, when we realized that the sky was so clear up there that you could actually see the Milky Way.  We also realized that there were no street lights on the mile-long twisty mountain road leading back to the B&B, and we stood a good chance of getting mowed down by an SUV and left to die in the obscuring underbrush.  So we called our hostess, and she came to pick us up.  THAT'S why a B&B is the way to go, people.

Anyway, there was more, of course, but this entry is long enough and I have to get back to work.  I only have one more week!  This was a shock to me, because I thought this job was pretty much permanent.  Imagine my surprise when I came in this morning to find out that I'm getting a promotion and starting a new, higher-paying job come the 24th.  Hooray!  My horoscope even told me this would happen, and I totally didn't believe.  Shows how much I know.

Pride of Dracula

I am going stir crazy.  My boss has asked all of us in my department to put in "an extra hour" every day for this next little while in order to meet a hastily organized deadline or two.  Seeing as I do NOT get up earlier than I absolutely have to, and seeing as I refuse to stay any later than I can possibly manage, this means I have been working through my lunches of late.  This means I have not gotten a BREAK at WORK all WEEK.  I am going crazy now.  All work and no play, and all that, right?  I have half a brownie sitting on my desk and it is STARING at me, because it wants to seduce me into eating it, but I am STRONG!

That's bullshit.  I'm totally eating that brownie right now.

I'm going on vacation next week, and that should be nice.  In the meantime, we're watching The Hills again, and although it's not quite as titillating as last year, it's still generating a lot of conversation.  See, we like to stop our shows every minute or so to expound on why Spencer is a scary douchebag, and how he looks like a serial killer in training.  This is not really a joke -- we are seriously afraid that when he gets a little older, he's going to start keeping women in a pit in his basement.

I just finished my brownie.  OMG, if and when I die?  Please promise me that you guys will see to it I am buried in a coffin made of brownies.  That was so awesome.

Oh, and that reminds me of a humiliating story that's as good as any to end this post: when I was in college, I took this sociology class.  My professor would routinely go on these colorful and bizarre rants about personal space issues, his cat, eating a gallon of ice cream in one sitting, and odd behavioral quirks.  One day he happened to bring up Bela Lugosi -- I don't know what y'all know of the original Dracula, but the man sort of...became obsessed with the role and lived it.  Not with the blood drinking, but he walked around in costume all the time and slept in his make-up in a coffin and shit; weird.

Anyway.  My professor asked if any of us were familiar with how he was buried, and of course I knew the answer, so I practically LUNGED out of my chair with my hand raised, and he called on me, and I blurted out in this really smug voice, "In a COFFIN."  And then I looked around all proudly as I sat back down, like, suck on THAT bit of trivia, bitches!  It wasn't until he supplied the additional (and salient!) factoid, "...in full Dracula costume," that I realized I'd sort of picked the wrong element of that funeral on which to focus.  Like, yes, dumb-ass, he was buried in a coffin; as it turns out, that's not so uncommon. 

I was thinking about how he SLEPT in a coffin, and how creepy it was, but I couldn't exactly explain that to the rest of the class, so everyone just sort of SMILED at me after that -- in that way that you do whenever you're about to use the Royal We with an adult. ("And how are we doing today?")  Not my finest moment.

And let that be a lesson.