Nine to Five

The question I'm asked most often by my seven or so dedicated Bambi readers is why I don't post more often. Actually, that's not true. The questions I'm asked most often are in fact, a)When are you coming over? b)When you come over, can you bring wine? and c) You know it's not a good idea to keep seeing that guy...right? To be fair, that last one is really more of a statement, and definitely rhetorical in nature.

After all of that is said and done, I'm usually asked why in the hell it's taken me so long to post anything new. There is an explanation for this phenomenon, and I wish I could say it's because my time has been occupied by much better causes like my dedicated volunteer work with Pool Boys for Puppies or Women Against Bedazzled Vaginas, but I can't. I can't even say these charitable causes currently exist, but perhaps when I'm able to blog as often as I like I can start grassroots movements I'm passionate about.

Also, if you weren't aware there are women out there who bedazzle their vaginas, there are. I'm not certain which of the four horesmen of the Apocalypse bedazzled vaginas represents, but there you have it.

What usually prevents me from writing anything new is actually stress, and lately stress has been preventing me from a lot of activities I would normally perform on a regular basis. Important ones like breathing, and knowing when to stop shovelling dessert into my face.

I try very hard not to write about work, but to not say anything at all about it seems disingenuous at this point. It may be shocking for anybody who only knows me from my blog that I have a career. Long-time readers of this blog would probably be shocked to learn I manage to put my underpants on the right way on the first try, nearly half of the time.

Lately though, my career is in serious jeopardy. My company is being "streamlined." This is what the consultants who've been hired to escort former staff members from their offices to their cars and then off of the company property call the process.

There usually isn't any warning, but I have heard a few times that employees who were let go did receive some hints they should start looking for a cardboard box to pack up their belongings.

On at least one occasion, a staffer on the chopping block received an auto-generated email notice alerting him that his contact details had been removed from the internal distribution list, hours before he was actually called to the HR office and officially told his position had been eliminated.

So far, there hasn't been any way to predict who might be leaving. Purely by accident, I was standing nearby and overheard a discussion amongst key decision makers in the "streamlining" process. They had printed out the company phone list and were trailing their fingers down the alphabetized names asking, "Who is this person again?" and "What does she do?" followed by, "Is that important?"

Abject terror that the axe will swing my way, causing me to lose my home, much needed medical benefits and everything I've worked for to this point would be bad enough, given my rather limited options in this stunted economy. My voice would be much too snarky for either phone sex or fast food drive throughs, and I'm way too pudgy for porn. Basically, I'm totally screwed.

I'm used to random panic. I've written about my rather unique anxiety disorder on this blog, and I admit I'm the worst kind of hypochondriac. Just this morning I convinced myself that the sudden pain in my head and strong smell of toast were sure signs of an oncoming stroke, even though I was eating toast at the time.

The point is, I'm very good at freaking the fuck out for very little reason, but what happens when I have reason?

I spent an hour sitting opposite the vice-president of my company this morning, having a strip surgically removed from my side. The vice-president shared that the president of the company is not happy with me. Is in fact, "livid" with me. Has been for weeks.

Apparently the president thought I did a very poor job of planning a recent event. I made a point of asking how the president could be angry with my work on this recent event when the president hadn't bothered to attend.

This is the point where I begin to question my sanity in 5...4...3...2...

The vice-president said the president said he was there. For the record, the vice-president was also unable to attend, so had to rely on the president for feedback, and I swear on everything holy up to and including Bernard Callebaut chocolate drizzled on a hot naked firefighter that the goddamned president did not attend.

It was a small venue, with a crowd of less than 50 people. I was looking for the president the entire time, as I had several people wanting an introduction. Granted, I didn't look under the tables or check the mens bathroom, but if he was there I would have seen him. And so I reiterated. The president was not there. The VP reiterated that the president said he was. I said that can't be. Then my head exploded.

I'm concerned my company has grown tired of paying severance packages and is going a different route. Employees will now be fired for a combination of simple errors stemming from mind-numbing overwork (after all, the tasks associated with all those eliminated positions have to be picked up somewhere), and failing that, they'll just make shit up to get staff off the payroll.

Hours I could be spending writing are now used fruitlessly searching for job openings. The rest of my time is spent weeping in the fetal position and wondering how much money I can get if I sold one of my eggs. Maybe an ovary? It's not like I'm using any of them.

Seriously...don't tickle me.

I'm leaving for a mini-holiday in Banff to visit a great friend this long weekend, and I couldn't be more excited to drink and eat her and her lovely husband out of house and home for four days (Hi Heidi! I apologize in advance for any damage to your property! Please send me an itemized invoice upon my return to the island.)

Since moving to Banff, my friends have taken up all kinds of extreme outdoor pursuits such as snowshoeing, hiking in areas without flush toilets, and leaving the house. While they're very excited about their new lifestyle, I'm excited just to know people who do things for fun that I would only consider doing as part of a desperate attempt to survive following some sort of horrible apres ski chalet collapse. I'm open to the idea of trying anything this weekend though, because I will most likely be drunk.

I've been trying many new exciting things lately while sober too, and the results have not been stellar. My list of things I'm getting really, really tired of hearing has expanded lately, with several friends telling me (more than once)that I should probably think about lowering my standards with regards to dating.

Initially I felt that if I lowered my standards any more I'd be trying to show off my cleavage while still dressing for the cold in the local morgue, because a steady pulse rate has really been the only requirement I've refused to compromise. After more careful consideration though, I thought that maybe my friends might have a point.

Despite my love for firefighters and all men with demonstrably more testosterone than brains, what I'm looking for is actually more nuanced than that. I would like to find a man who I consider to be attractive, who is intelligent and kind, and who makes me laugh. For anything to work out, he would also have to think that I am the fucking rapture. It's actually not a long list of must-haves, but I realized that perhaps I'd have to be more flexible in at least one area.

For example, the men I find most attractive don't often feel the same way about me. After extensive research, and by research I mean waiting to see who replies to my profile on Plenty of Fish, I've discovered that the segment of the male population most interested in meeting me are the short, bald, and egg-shaped contingent.

It's easy to understand how my thinking may change when told enough times that what I'm looking for is just unrealistic. When I used to watch Seinfeld I would marvel at the idea that a guy like George Costanza was always dating hot women. Now I understand that those women likely had friends telling them they should probably give their previously higher standards a bit of a rest.

Perhaps by only pursuing men I might one day want to see naked in this lifetime, I was really setting my standards too high. The little bald guy with dandruff on his bare head and boobs bigger than mine wearing a stained Star Trek t-shirt two sizes too small may actually be a diamond in the rough. Surrounded by tonnes of coal. Buried deep, deep within a yet undiscovered mine, but a diamond nonetheless. He may treat me well. He may be fabulously wealthy. He may look the other way when I hump the pool boy's leg in some future fit of unrequited lust. Who am I to judge based solely on appearances?

Lately, I've been accepting dates with guys whose online pictures might once have made me cringe a little bit. If he seems to be a nice guy then I will give him a chance. This is how I found myself in a Starbucks last night, feigning interest in my date's story about how he never leaves the house without his inhaler, sunscreen and cough drops, because his throat and skin are very delicate. In his defense, he was quite pale and the comb over wouldn't do very much to protect his head from UV rays.

Finally, I had to interrupt to ask something important. While we had chatted on MSN for a little while before agreeing to meet, I only knew him by his screen name, and felt very foolish meeting somebody without knowing his actual name. I told him his screen name was very cute, but we should probably be properly introduced.

Apparently...the screen name he goes by is his real name. He was quite surprised and insulted I would imply otherwise, because his name is not that unusual. Even though I try very hard not to use real names in my little blog, I have to share this one with my six loyal readers.

People...his name was Elmo.

El. Mo.

Elmo.

Certainly, this isn't unusual at all. I've met so many people named after a fire-engine red giggling muppet that I can't even recollect them all. And this was the moment I had an epiphany.

I am a shallow, shallow bitch. I really am. Let's set aside the fact that this guy wouldn't make my lady parts quiver if his was the very last penis left on earth, and I won't even mention how he had these long yellow and curved thumb nails for some godforsaken reason that made me want to retch and let's ignore the fact that if I really truly have to lower my standards enough to spend one more second listening to the sound his tongue made every time he licked his lips and glanced at my tits I will commit flamboyant ritual suicide. Let's set all of that aside, because none of that matters.

I will NOT date somebody named Elmo. Apparently, I've found a low I will not sink to, and in doing so, I'm embracing my inner shallow bitch.

From now on, when I see my date I want my panties to fall off, my knees to go weak and my heart to flutter. I will wait for this, even if it means a lifetime spent with my only physical comfort coming from a well-stocked battery supply for my vibrator and whatever animals I eventually end up hoarding.

I deserve nothing less.