Why I, Given The Choice, Would Rather Work At Home, AKA Wishing I Were Male

If I were a male, I would have needed to visit the restroom at 11:02 and been back at my desk at 11:05. In order to take care of business, I would need to touch two non-personal surfaces with my bare hand - the bathroom doorknob and the sink faucet. But as a FEMALE:

11:02 Lord, how that coffee does run through a girl.

11:03 Enter the restroom. Encounter coworker brushing her hair. Make friendly comment about said hair.

11:08 Eyeball favorite stall as things are now considerably urgent, consider just sitting down. Think about the inability to tell the difference between pee and flushing water splashback. Coworker leaves.

11:09 Retrieve paper seat cover from dispenser, located not inside the stall but outside by the sink because building management is fucking cheap. Enter stall, trying not to touch anything but the latch on the door. Carefully rip along the little inner lines. Gently lay seat cover on toilet with the inner flap hanging down into the water.

11:10 Repeat seat cover retrieval, door latch touching, tearing, and laying, as original seat cover immediately soaks up all the water on the seat.

11:11 Repeat process for the third time, since without water to adhere the cover to the seat, the tissue paper drifts into the toilet from the mighty draft of my ass coming towards it.

11:12 Sit down.

11:12 Another coworker enters and recognizes shoes. Conversation commences. Coworker is identified as someone with whom I am not close enough to explain that I cannot do my business with someone else in the room.

11:14 Coworker leaves.

11:14 Business type one commences.

11:15 Stomach cramping reminds me not to drink coffee on an empty stomach.

11:16 Coworker enters.

11:17 Stomach cramping worsens. Two more coworkers enter and begin conversation about the perils of home plumbing and leaking hot water valves. None of these people are those with whom I wish to confess my issues.

11:18 What the hell is this, the new office party spot? There are six women chattering by the goddamn sink. Leave! Go! Shoo! I'm dying over here!

11:19 My shoes are recognized again.

11:21 Well, on the bright side, it appears that I am in fact capable of doing business type two with other life forms present.

11:22 Jesus, I feel like a soft-serve machine. Resolve not to eat double helpings of curry at dinner time ever again.

11:22 The reason I have issues regarding my business with others in the room to begin with becomes apparent. Someone has moved the air freshener out of this stall. Fuck. That was why this was my favorite stall. Why else would I have a favorite stall? It's not like the decor was anything special.

11:23 Protect hand with tissue and flush toilet.

11:23 Look at stall latch and try not to think about all the other restroom users who have to root around in their personal regions during That Time Of The Month and then touch the latch.

11:24 Touch latch, leave stall and go straight to the sink. Pretend not to notice poisonous cloud trailing me.

11:25 See can of air freshener located across the room behind two of the chatty women. Realize that by grabbing it and racing back to the stall, I will be all but screaming "INDIAN FOOD AND COFFEE MAKES ME POOP!" Opt not to make a scene.

11:27 Participate in conversation hoping that the smell is all in my head.

11:28 Unknown woman enters restroom. The smell is not all in my head.

11:28 Finish washing hands, use paper towel to turn off the faucet.

11:29 Use elbow to open bathroom door in memory of the former assistant who would root around in the personal region during That Time and then leave restroom without washing hands.

I DO NOT ENJOY BEING A GIRL.

A Window Into My Home, Part 6

Me: "Gah, I hate those tailights, they look like spider eyes."

Him: "Some spiders are okay."

Me: "No."

Him: "You liked Charlotte's Web."

Me: "That's different."

Him: "So what if they made some other spider cuter? Like Shelob's Web."

Me: (laughing) "Oh, no."

Him: "Instead of writing stuff in the web she'd just talk. (Switches to raspy, growly spidery voice) You're some pig, Wilbur."

Me: (dying with laughter)

Him: "When they come to slaughter you, I will take them DOWN."

Fucking Fucker

From inside the computer you came and to the computer you shall return. At last the circle is complete. Polish up the jackboots. At least they're de riguer where you're going, the thirteenth century sinkhole. I hope you sweat like Satan's own nutsack this August.

I wish you really were my brother. Fucking fucker.

Dick Cheney, Mighty Hunter

By now, everyone has had a wee giggle over Dick Cheney shooting someone in Texas.

As a side note, am I the only person who thought, damn, the Bush family can make ANYTHING legal in Texas?

Anyway, I was watching the Olympics, and heard NBC's carefully neutral take on the topic first. Then my neighborhood lost power, and when the power came back on, my digital cable box needed to cycle up. It defaults to channel five, which, around here, is Fox. Thus it was that I heard Fox's version of the Cheney Chuckle.

According to them, the victim approached the mighty hunter from behind just after a quail was flushed.

Only Fox News* would make it the victim's fault when a member of this administration shoots someone.

* NBC just picked up the "blame the victim" undercurrent. Yeah, between our copycat networks and the New York Times refusing to print the Danish cartoons, I'm really excited about our free and independent media, aren't you?

Olympics on the 'Quils

Fact: I am horribly, miserably sick with a nasty cold.

Fact: The Olympic opening ceremony is ALWAYS a cross between the sublime and the insane.

Fact: I got two hours of sleep last night, because with insufficient Nyquil in the house, I decided to snarf some Benydryl before going to sleep.

Fact: While most people are knocked out by Benydryl, I appear to be one of those rare people who is completely WIRED by Benydryl.

So I'm dozing, fading in and out of the opening ceremony for the Games in Torino. I am used to these spectacles, so I didn't even bat an eye at the cows on wheels, or the vinyl clad rollerskaters with flames coming out of their heads.

But during the parade of nations, I was sure I was hallucinating. The music was all... stuff from my iPod. Eighties dance hits. Mongolia strutted in to "Video Killed the Radio Star." No way was this actually happening. I've had no sleep, my skull is draining into various overpriced tissues, and I'm high on cold drugs. Just a dream.

Then the announcer said, "Bob, the nations appear to be marching in to a random assortment of American pop hits from the eighties." The other one said, "Yes, Bob, and if I can only hear "Betty Davis Eyes" by the incomparable Kim Carnes, my night will be complete."

One To Enrage, One To Amuse:

Don't Eavesdrop On My Lunch Pod, Part 18

Me: Fundamentalism is all the same.

Guy #2: I think we should stop buying their oil and leave them to fester in the thirteenth century sinkhole they so obviously want to be in.

Guy #1: What, you mean Texas?

Don't Eavesdrop On My Lunch Pod, Part 17

Me: The thing that was most awesome about her was that she had no filters. She just let her id race around out in the open. I loved that.

Guy #1: I let my id race around in the open. Why is it bad when I do it?

Me: You let your id pee on things.

Guys #1, #2, and #3: So do I.

Guy #2: My id's an outie.

Me: You people are so wrong.