the Admiral’s Neighborhood

I feel like I've been on radio silence.  It's the new job.  I don't have 8 uninterrupted hours of goofing off on the internet anymore, so I tend to have less of an internet footprint.  I don't really have a computer at home, either.  This doohickey I'm typing on now is Allen's.  I try to limit my internet time on it, because it's in the guest-room/studio, AKA "Man Space" so I try to limit spreading my estrogen around in here.  The next thing you know, I'll be vacuuming and changing the sheets on the futon.  HORRORS!

So, let's see.  What's new?  Um, the garden is going gangbusters.  It's been hot, so my tomatoes are finally ripening, but they have a fair amount of blossom end rot on the first few 'maters, so they're getting chucked over the fence into the neighbor's Swath Of Debris.  The peppers are doing great this year:  we've been freezing dozens of jalapenos, whole, waiting for Salsa Party 2008.  I've also got Serrano peppers and tabasco peppers and some cayenne, oh, and the hungarian wax.  It's a good pepper year.   The tomatillos are finally setting fruit... they take a while longer to get going, but they add a really delicious sweetness to salsa that is hard to replicate with anything else.   The beans are all done, and I need to harvest the last batch and pull the plants and replant more edamame beans, but that'll wait until it's not 100F out.

Smitty the Kitten went home to his new house.  Three kids, two boys and a little girl, so that makes, what, like 5 cats/kittens in a row that I've sent home with kids?  Kitten Whisperer strikes again.  Smitty was a little overwhelmed with all those kids, but I think once he realizes that he hit the Fun Times Jackpot, he'll be rip-roaring around there.  He's going to have a blast, and I'm excited for him.  He is a super great little kitty, he scored himself a sweet ride with a really awesome family.  Go Smitty!

Everything else is about the same.  Allen and I are still doing well.  He's still in the studio a couple nights a week.  tonight's that night, so I'm going to try to clean up the bathroom (where Smitty was staying), and watch Kiss Kiss Bang Bang while eating popsicles in my underpants.  You know how I roll.  Rufus and Bunny are still kickin' it.   Zsazsa's going to miss Smitty, because they were becoming BFFs, but Eva the Dumptruck is glad that tiny motherfucker is gone----Eva can't stand change, and she is on a personal mission to DESTROY ALL KITTENS!

Oh, and we finally saw WANTED.  Man, it was awesome.  There's this one scene where... well, I won't ruin it for you, but we've got a new phrase in our lexicon, and it's the title of this post.

I hope you are well, friends!  If I haven't responded to an email, it's just because, well, I probably haven't had time.  I have been picking up the phone and calling people more often.  OH, so THAT's what that little ringy box is for in my pocket!  It is a TELEPHONE, and you use it to COMMUNICATE with OTHER HUMANS.    WILD.

Surf the corpse, dudes.

I drank an entire bottle of prosecco by myself last night while watching a terrible romantic comedy.  I texted danielle like 100 times.  Sorry for blowing up your phone, D.

I haven't been drunk by myself in a long time.  It was kind of awesome.  Allen thought I was hilarious when he got home.  WOO WASTED!

surprisingly, i feel damn good today.  I hope i am not still drunk.

One of my coworkers that rarely comes in to the office hired himself an intern and then proceeded to not show up for work and not give any instructions about who or what should take care of this kid.  Two Mondays ago Intern showed up at our office and I totally called him.

He now answers to me.  But if he looks me directly in the eye, he has to buy me lunch.

Now, to the (ever expanding) list:

• I refuse to learn his name and only call him Intern, and generally avoid gender specific pronouns even in official correspondence. 
  
• FedEx was unable to pick up two large, heavy boxes full of PPMs in a timely manner, so I asked the intern to take them down several blocks to FedEx by hand.  In the 85 degree weather.  In the middle of the day.  And when he asked if he really needed to do it and couldn't we just wait, I responded, "DID I STUTTER?"
• I invited my intern out to drinks on my birthday.  I then proceeded to make him pay because seriously, who pays for drinks on their birthday, Intern?
• When comparing the strengths of our interns, KOC mentioned that his could speak four languages, to which I replied, "WELL MY INTERN COULD KICK YOUR INTERN'S ASS."  Thus, I am now arranging an Intern Fight.
  
• I then proceeded to tell Intern that when he wasn't working, I needed him to start working out, that I was organizing said fight, and he better not embarrass me or he's out of here.
• I handed him two coloring activity books from the Olive Garden and asked him to complete them by the end of the day, and also to produce a spreadsheet for each word search with the words alphabetized.  He totally did it and even illustrated little feet on some of the mazes showing the correct path. 
  
• I asked him to get me Bon Jovi tickets to the show in Central Park on Saturday.  When he asked if he could come with me if he found them, I just laughed, shook my head and walked away
• I sent him an official memo stating I would only allow him to wear blue ties on Tuesdays.  Any other day is forbidden
  

This kid is clearly the best and most ridiculous thing that has ever happened to me.

Things that are fucking sweet:

• That dumbass contractor didn't show for the trial, so we won by default.  My lawyer made me take the back stairs out of the court room because, "If he shows, we have to go to trial.  This way, we win!"   I was all, "Stairs it is, dude!"   Now he's going to work on the collection part.  I took three xanax before the trial, and went to lunch with my friend patrick afterwards.  We drank beer, and the minute we got back to my house, we both passed out on the sofa for like 2 hours.  TEAM NAP FTW!
• I never, ever, ever have to go back to the plantation.  It just hit me yesterday.  I am fucking PSYCHED.
• I start my new job today!  I have an aeron chair!  I made homemade cinnamon rolls!  Shit is sweet!
• Do y'all remember a website called The Safeword?  Well, the awesome lady who ran that site emailed me today, and it was awesome to hear from her.  I'd thought of her recently, and tried unsuccessfully to hunt her down.  It's always awesome to hear from old pals.  High-five!

All right dudes, PEACE OUT.  (As Erin once said to me in the desert, after taking another pair of Tylenol PM at 6 in the morning.)

Today's my last day at my old job.  I feel like I'm being freed from the plantation.  In fact, I'm going to start referring to my old job as The Plantation.  My boss gave this ridiculously insincere card and this gift that obviously came out of her "gift closet."   In my exit interview, the woman asked me why I was leaving, and I said, "Well, there just really wasn't any room for career growth here, I tried to stay but I didn't get any of the jobs I interviewed for, so my only real option was to, you know, leave [The Plantation].  So you know, it's been a fun 8 years, but uh, I guess it's time for me to peace out!"

Her eyes bugged out of her head when I said "peace out."

On Wednesday I went out and ended up accidentally drinking way more than I should've and then walked home with a dead mp3 player but a fully charged phone. 

This was the end result.

Pray for humanity.