He Thought It Was A Party Favor

So last Saturday, a bunch of us were at Regina's place for a small get-together-- or what I like to call her "Working is for Suckers" party. In case you haven't guessed from my self-imposed party theme, Gina quit the rat race to do her own thang for a little while. And this shindig was her friends' and family's way of wishing her well (while seething with jealousy).

The party was excellent. Everyone brought a ton of food. We talked and laughed. And Regina, ever the gracious hostess, made mixed drinks with her Magic Bullet for anyone who wanted one. I had some delicious pina-colada-type drink, which name has completely slipped my mind. (Sorry, Gina. I know you told me twice.)

Anyway, as all good things must come to an end, the party finally wound to a close. And since there was a ton of food, and only eight of us at the party, there was plenty left over. Naturally, some of us made To-Go plates. Actually, Gina insisted-- especially because at any given time, Regina has enough food packed into her fridge to host a dinner party for ten at a moment's notice.

But, understandably, there are limits to her generosity. That much was evident when I heard her indignantly ask, "What are you doing?" I look up to see another guest in the process of putting a half-full bottle of rum in a plastic bag.

In all of my years of experience in witnessing trifling To-Go plate behavior, this has got to be the most outrageous! And I've seen people bring tin foil (and no food) to a potluck picnic! Alcohol is NEVER a To-Go item! Why would it be? It doesn't need refrigeration and has no expiration date. What I'm saying is that there's no rush to consume it like, say, freshly made Taffy Apple Salad. (Thanks again, Gina! It was even better the second day!)

But wait! It gets even more trifling-er! I assumed that he contributed the rum and, in a fit of selfishness, decided to take the remainder home with him. BUT NO!!! Regina bought the rum herself! Why he thought he was entitled to half a pint of rum purchased by the host of the party is beyond me!

Which leads us to his response to Regina's justly perturbed inquiry. What was his reason for taking the booze? He blithely explained that he was taking the rum home to drink later.

Really?

C'mon, really?

Why stop there? He could have taken a few rolls of toilet paper from the bathroom to use for later. Or taken several packets of detergent from her laundry room. You know, to use for later. Once you eliminate the unspoken rule that To-Go items should be limited to perishable food, then the sky's the limit on the things you can help yourself to in your host's home: toothpaste, light bulbs, cosmetics, cold medication... Literally anything!

Anyway, Regina explained to her alcohol-absconding guest that he could have had ALL of the rum that he wanted during the party, but that's it. Funny thing is that earlier in the evening, she offered to make him a drink. Twice. Both times he refused. I guess you have to be in the mood for rum.

The cherry on top of this bizarro sundae is that the guest then had the audacity to act offended by Regina's refusal to allow him to scavenge through her belongings. He actually stomped out, leaving behind the person he came to the party with!

Well. I guess it's too bad that this was Gina's last foreseeable house party. I was starting to get a little low on shampoo.

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An Involuntary Book Donation

Despite the various Discovery Channel shows to the contrary, it has been my experience that most individuals fall into one of two categories: people who are afraid of spiders, and people who completely lose their s**t if they come within 100 feet of a single, minuscule spider.

I fall into the first group, and my sister, Ethel, is the poster child for the second. A spider crawling across my arm or leg will send me into hysterics, no question, but one crawling up the wall won't even raise my blood pressure (although I am obligated to grab the nearest shoe for its summary execution). Ethel, on the other hand, once saw a small spider crawling across a roll of paper towels that was sitting on a table three feet away from where she was standing, and she still screamed like a pantie-clad extra from a slasher movie. Needless to say, rational thinking tends to take a breather whenever Ethel encounters a spider, and hilarious circumstances are bound to happen.

Ethel and rational thinking briefly parted company this last Labor Day weekend as she, Steven and I drove down to Evansville, IN for our family reunion. We had just left a gas station somewhere south of Effingham, IL when Steve said in the calmest possible voice, "Mom, I don't want to alarm you, but there's a spider right by you." I would have been fine-- in fact, I'd have been deliriously happy-- if Ethel had merely become alarmed. Instead, she opted to freak the hell out. She started whipping back and forth in her seat, shouting, "Where?! Where?! WHERE?!"

I never did see where that inconsiderate spider had the audacity to plant itself. But it must have been near the passenger side door because Ethel then lowered her window about half way, I guess hoping it would jump for freedom. I can only imagine that the spider considered my sister's generous offer of leaping into oblivion and then decided to take its chances in Freak-out Town, population: Ethel, because it didn't budge.

So, Ethel's Plan B was to forcefully evict the spider by smacking it out of the window with the closest object she could reach. The closest object just happened to be my church phone directory. It was a small pamphlet of about 80 pages that I kept on the dashboard of my car for easy reference (and because I was too lazy to take it into the house).

Anyway, Ethel was using the directory to smack and sweep along the car door, demonstrating to the spider her calm and levelheaded argument of GET OUT! I believe she had managed to get the spider onto the pamphlet because Ethel then began shaking the directory out of the open window. (Man, that spider was not taking the hint!)

Now, by this point, I had reached the open highway, which means I was rapidly approaching 55 miles per hour, if I hadn't reached it already. At that speed, the pages of my booklet that Ethel was desperately flinging about began to flap violently in the wind. It then occurred to me that this was not a good Plan B. And I thought, "I sure hope she has a firm grip on that book because..."

Zwoosh!

That was the sound of my phone directory taking flight. Apparently the spider wouldn't have to venture into the unknown alone. Ethel was immediately sorry, apologizing and offering to get out of the car and retrieve it (the directory, not the spider that used it as a landing craft). I actually slowed the car and considered taking her up on her offer since there was absolutely no one else on the road.

Then, rational thinking decided to punch back in from its coffee break, and I realized that doing something foolish like picking things up from the middle of the highway is a good way to get dead. And really, when was the last time I used that book, anyway?

So, I took one last look in my rear view mirror at my directory lying forlornly on the pavement and then sped off. I guess the lessons we can take away from this experience are: a calm, rational tone of voice is no match for a spider freak-out. And always keep a box of tissue in the car for bug-related emergencies.

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Exactly What is My Deal?!

I know it has been quite a while since my last post. And I do apologize for leaving you all hanging. I just had a lot to do these past couple of weeks and couldn't find the time to squeeze in a single entry. I'm working on getting one out soon. In the meantime, please enjoy this crude drawing, which is my visual representation of your annoyance with me.

Do Not Pass Go. Do Not Collect $200.

The American Dream of achieving prosperity through ingenuity and hard work is still alive and well. However, when you combine this with someone who is functionally insane (or maybe just not the sharpest knife in the drawer-- it's sometimes hard to tell the difference), the results are often entertaining. And illegal.

The borderline-criminal act in question occurred back when I worked at a local college. One afternoon I went to the copier room to make use of the machine, but it was already occupied by my coworker, Brian. Whatever I had was not urgent, so I decided to just come back at a later time.

An hour or so went by, and I returned to the copier room, only to find Brian still there making copies. Nothing about our jobs required us to be tied to the copy machine for that long. If that was the case, our employer would make us hand over our shoelaces and all sharp objects at the start of each work day. So, obviously he was working on something personal. And massive. There was a good story behind this marathon usage of the copier. I HAD to know.

I managed to pry Brian off the copier and asked him what in the Sam Hill was he doing. He explained that he had devised a brilliant plan for making extra cash. He had a textbook for one of the classes that the college was offering that semester (I assumed he had taken the class in a previous semester). His plan was to make copies to sell to students that were taking the course. He was so excited about the profit margin of this little venture that he was even contemplating buying textbooks for additional classes and selling copies of them.

There were SO many things wrong with his plan that I sat silently for several seconds deciding what to tackle first. I chose to start small. I pointed out that while most businesses look the other way when their employees make the occasional personal photocopy, they tend to blow a gasket when an employee abuses company resources in order to subsidize his side business. And, in fact, if our company knew that he had just burned through over 80 sheets of paper and no telling how much toner, they would fire him on the spot. And then they would fire the spot.

Next, I introduced Brian to the term "copyright infringement." It was apparently a new concept for him that a book company (not to mention the bookstore and the authors) wouldn't want some Joe Blow from off the street to sell their product without permission. It was understandable that he did not know the exact term for his misdeed. (Actually, it's not understandable, but go with me on this.) However, he should have at least known that his plan wasn't strictly legal. I guess he was too busy counting the big piles of money he thought he was going to make.

Brian was a little disappointed that I had crushed his get-slightly-richer-quick plan. Still, he was grateful that I had stumbled upon him first and not someone with keys to the pink-slip drawer. I was happy to help. It was important to help Brian understand the legal implications of his actions. Plus, it gave me the opportunity to laugh at his attempt at entrepreneurship. Of course, it was mostly about the helping. The laughs were just extra.

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The Mysteries of Cellophane

The thing about being functionally insane is that crazy is rarely on the surface. Usually, insanity is buried deep under many layers of "socially acceptable behavior" and "work place decorum." But like a $1.29 goldfish after three months, crazy eventually rises to the top in one form or another.

It took almost a year of working a temp job before this particular woman's bloated carcass of crazy broke the surface. And I would like to stress that she was completely normal up to that point: normal conversations, normal behavior, and normal appearance. Normal, normal, normal.

"Tina" and I had developed a pretty good friendship over the months. We even got into the habit of trading office gossip. On this day, our conversation wandered onto (believe it or not) 'crazy coworker' stories. Having been with the company for several years, Tina had a wealth of stories. But I didn't hear a single one of them. Her actions spoke louder than her words.

As she talked to me, Tina reached into her desk drawer and removed a packet of vitamins sealed in a cellophane pouch about the size of an index card. She opened the packet and emptied the pills into her hand. Next, while she was yakking on about somebody else being crazy, she proceeded to fold that cellophane wrapper into tiny squares about eight times!

Now that's merely odd. What made it outhouse rat insane is that she then pulled out a rubber band, which she wrapped snugly around the tiny square of plastic. And finally, she tucked her little bundle into a pocket inside of her purse.

By this time, the whole conversation was a wash for me. My mind couldn't hold onto a thing Tina was saying because it was abuzz with questions, such as:

• What's so important about that cellophane?
• What does she do with the cellophane when she gets home?
• Is whatever she does with the cellophane so complicated that she can't take care of it here at work?
• Why the rubber band?
• Does she think the cellophane will make a break for it if she doesn't secure it tightly?
• Is this a hobby for her?
• If so, then what particular qualities does she look for in her collectible cellophane?

I didn't, however, ask Tina any of these questions. I couldn't. It would have meant acknowledging the crazy, which would have resulted in one of two possible outcomes. One, she would become embarrassed by the acknowledgement, and then things would become awkward between us from then on. Or two, she (thinking that her actions were board-certified sane) would invite me into her crazy cellophane imprisonment/hobby, which would make things super awkward between us. Either way: no fun for me.

So I did the only thing I could. I nodded and smiled for the next ten minutes. Then I said something nonsensical, like "I guess these papers aren't going to staple themselves." And then I got the heck away. Thankfully, Tina never did this in front of me again (although based on her near-automatic actions, this was clearly a habit for her). Maybe she wisely added another layer of "socially acceptable behaviors" to hide her crazy from me. Or maybe with that last piece of vitamin wrapper, her cellophane collection was finally complete.

I'd like the meal, hold the food.

Sometimes a person can have a lot on her mind. She can be juggling a mental list of errands that span from what she has to do that day, to the things she needs to do next week. Therefore, it is perfectly excusable if she accidentally does something that makes you not only question her sanity, but also wonder how she dresses herself in the morning. After all, she is normally an intelligent, quick-witted, smart, brilliant, clever and unassuming genius who hates to toot her own horn.

You do realize that this "she" is me, right?

Anyway, here are the details of my temporarily-stuck-on-stupid moment. I was going home after a long day of work and running errands. I had decided to stop by Wendy's drive-thru for a quick dinner, and then straight home. I still had to throw something in a bag because I was driving out of town at 5am the next morning. I was also working on a project for my upcoming family reunion, which involved several trips to Target and Walgreens, not to mention the countless man-hours I was putting in with all the cutting and pasting (I mean literally, with scissors and glue).

So all of this was going through my mind when I ordered and paid for my value meal, plus it was important to remember to get my debit card back with my receipt. The girl at the window handed me my card, receipt and pop. Great. I put everything away securely and pulled off. As luck would have it, there was a perfect opening in the rush hour traffic for me to jump in and speed off for home.

I'd driven about four blocks, still arranging in my head that evening's schedule of eating, packing and scrapbook-making, when I realized that I could not smell my food. As a matter of fact, I couldn't remember even receiving my food from the drive-thru lady. I then replayed the transaction in my mind: card, receipt, pop, pulled off... Dang it!

Do you know how difficult it is to make a three-point turn in rush hour traffic? Let me tell you, people in a hurry to get home do not want to be inconvenienced by some moron doing a traffic-clogging driving maneuver. Well, too damn bad! This moron left her paid-for food at the drive-thru, and she is going back to get it RIGHT NOW. Try not to burst a blood vessel during the 15 seconds it takes me to turn around.

The girl at the window was really sweet when I returned for my food. In other words, she managed not to laugh in my face when handing me my meal. But we all know she laughed afterwards. Well, as long as my stupidity gave her (and you) a moment's joy, then I guess I've done some good in the world. You're welcome.

Um, can I have my pen back?

I'm a sucker for writing implements: pens (roller ball, gel & felt tip), mechanical pencils, markers and I believe I mentioned my college obsession with paint pens. Due to this, one of my biggest pet peeves is pen borrowing. Mainly because while most people have mastered the art of borrowing a pen, few have yet to acquire the skill of returning it.

Here's a perfect example that made my blood boil: one afternoon, I was sitting in Panera Bread eating lunch, but mostly taking advantage of their free Wi-Fi. That day, Panera was accepting applications for staff positions. They had set aside the big table for people to fill out apps and another couple of tables for brief interviews. I happened to be sitting across from the big table.

Well, I and my Broccoli Cheddar soup were minding our own business when a girl in a seriously tight Baby Phat t-shirt and jeans ensemble (her lucky job-hunting outfit?) approached my table and asked to borrow my pen. My first instinct was to claim that I didn't have a pen on me. Unfortunately, it was sitting in plain sight on the table (Dang it!). I could have still said no, but I'm not comfortable being that blatant a douche bag. So, I begrudgingly said, "sure" and handed over my precious, precious pen.

The whole time she filled out her application, I stole glances her way, ready to snatch back my pen the moment she finished. I also wondered if she thought wearing a t-shirt that exposed her midriff would give her the competitive edge she needed to obtain a job making sandwiches. But then I shook it off because her apparent ignorance of proper job-interview attire was really none of my business.

Anyway, she finally completed her app, and I half expected her to take the pen with her to the interviewing table (because I get it that people sometimes totally forget the pen that's in their hands). But she didn't do that. She set the pen down and walked away.

C'mon, really? It didn't jog her memory that the fancy pen she just sat on the table belonged to someone? Not once did she think, "Hey, where did I get this pen from?" OK, maybe she was focused on her upcoming interview. Or maybe she was distracted by the loss of circulation in her legs due to her tourniquet-tight jeans. (At a job interview! I can't stress that enough!)

In any case, my pen sat naked and alone on the table, but not for long. To add insult to injury, another applicant immediately sat down and started using my pen like it was Panera's community pen.

Now, I didn't blame the guy that was using my pen since he had no idea of what just happened. And I guess that I could have held off retrieving it until after he had completed his form. But surely I was not going to run the risk of having my pen passed from person to person until someone walked out with it!

We had finally reached the level of douche bag that I was comfortable being. So, I walked up to the guy, politely but firmly reacquired my pen and, on the way back to my table, punched Ms. Hot Thang in the back of her head 3 or 4 times during her interview. Then I calmly went back to my soup because you don't want those bread bowls to get too soggy.

Alright, I might have made up that head-punching part. It's not like she didn't deserve it, though.