Blah

It's been forever since I've blogged and now I don't even know where to begin. I am at a loss. 

Basically I haven't had a free moment in the last month to do...well, anything, much less blog. Every weekend has been taken up with real estate stuff, and that all culminated with this past weekend, where J and I did real estate stuff all day, both Saturday and Sunday. I'm talking 8 in the morning till midnight -- both days. I can't really talk about what it is we were doing since it's confidential, but let's just say we are both exhausted. Oh, and we are also finally in escrow on a house, so the clock is ticking.

After eating dinner this morning around 1am (drive-thru at Burger King, yum!), we crashed in bed. J wanted to get into the office today at 5am (since he brought up home a ton of work he wasn't able to do this weekend and had a mediation to attend today) and he ended up oversleeping till 7am. I don't know how he jumped out of bed and put a suit on because I woke up feeling like I'd been hit by a train. After he left I went back to sleep and woke up at noon. And I still feel like I've been hit by a train, or have a college-grade hangover, though no alcohol was involved. 

I feel bad for J since I can work from home in my PJs, but he has to sit in an office all day, exhausted from this weekend.  Part of me just wants to go back to sleep right now. He called this afternoon to say "hi" during his lunch break, and I told him I feel this whole process is like a near-death experience that we've gone through together and will forever bond us. He laughed weakly, since that was all his energy could muster.

Sorry for being so cryptic, but I really can't divulge details. I'm just going to say this: I'm not a religious person but I hope to God we get this house. If not, I'd want to burn the thing to the ground.

That one time I realized my friend was a jackass

The other night J and I went to see Terence Malick's The Tree of Life. I've been looking forward to seeing the movie since rumors of it started circling last year, and against my better judgment (but at the urging of J) I invited a friend of mine and his new fiance to join us. Let's call this friend George, and his fiance, Abigail (because that is essentially what they look like to me).

I first met George in grad school in Boston. George is the typical overachiever with a severe case of ADHD, has collected various degrees, ranging from humanities masters to MBA's across this great big ol' country of ours, and has obvious commitment problems when it comes to relinquishing himself to one profession. (He's currently the CEO of a start-up medical IT company that actually seems to be experiencing modest success in its infancy. This after he made multiple appearances on CNBC and CNN talk shows discussing his "first ever virtual magazine" that he launched about three years ago before virtual mags were the norm.) Well, George recently moved to my town (of all places) with his newly minted fiance he met for the first time last year in line at an Auntie Anne's Pretzels in a mall in Los Angeles. Since I am one of only a handful of people he knows in the area, he's been incessantly calling to hang out with J and I. Which is cool, since I love a good cocktail hour, but it can get a little much when you do it for days in a row. I can only handle so much ADHD.

ANYHOO, after (politely) rejecting his invitations for weeks, J suggested we invite them along to see The Tree of Life...just to show we weren't opposed to hanging out or anything. I was on the fence about extending an invitation since the last time I saw a movie with George was when the two of us went to see Walk the Line opening night in Boston. Let's just say it was a disaster, in every sense of the word. And it all culminated with his cell phone ringing on LOUD during one of the most pivotal moments in the film when Joaquin Phoenix undergoes his home detox with Reese Witherspoon. Not only did George's phone ring in the silent, packed theater, he then proceeded to answer it and have a conversation with the person who called as people yelled at us to be quiet. It was mortifying, and visions of the night resurfaced as I hesitantly extended an invite to Tree of Life.

And what do you know? History has a funny way of repeating itself, in not-an-altogether identical way, yet close enough. We met up with George and Abigail outside of the theater, along with their two friends they decided to invite along and not tell us about till the last minute. No biggie, that I don't mind. But after we took our seats and the theater lights dimmed, George proceeded to talk during the entire first 45 minutes of the movie. No joke. I felt like I had entered Hell, since one of the fléaux de mon existence is when people chatter through movies. Granted he wasn't speaking at a normal volume, but it was still above a whisper and that, combined with Abigail's obnoxious giggling every 20 seconds at whatever he was saying, made me want to throw my tub of popcorn in their direction, douse them with my Diet Coke, anything to make them shut up. It only added to the charm of the situation when George kept standing up and walking over to his friends across the aisle to hold actual conversations with them while he was on bended knee. All while the movie played in a semi-packed, darkened theater. Was this really happening?

About an hour into the movie Abigail, who was seated to my immediate left, leaned over to me and said "George says this movie is so depressing that it makes him want to kill himself. We're going to see Midnight in Paris next door..." She followed this with one of her annoying and expectant giggles, as though perhaps I shared the same sentiment. I shot her a straight-faced look that meant "You've got to be kidding me" and simply said "Fine, go." (No giggles from my end, since the movie, though slow in its start, was actually quite good but would have been better if the charming couple seated to my left would have just shut up and tried to understand it.)

A second later George leaned toward me over Abigail's lap. "Are you annoyed that we're leaving to see the other movie?" he asked.

"No," I whispered, turning back to the movie.

"You look annoyed..." he prodded. I quickly turned back to him.

"I'm annoyed because you've been talking through the entire goddamn movie. This is a theater -- STOP TALKING!!!" I hissed. He gave me a look as though it suddenly dawned on him that movie theaters weren't meant to be socialized in like pool halls. Five minutes later he, Abigail, and his charming friends stood up and lurked out the theater doors.

Of course during the rest of the movie he texted me incessantly from next door, asking if J and I would wait outside of their theater for them when we were finished since we had all planned to grab drinks afterward. But when The Tree of Life was over, the last thing I felt like doing was getting a drink with them. I passed their theater  en route to our car and texted that we were just going to head home. His response?

"Sorry for having left....I feel awful."

I snickered at the cow poo I was actually reading on my cell screen. Really, guy? Do you really feel that awful? Because if you did you probably wouldn't have done it in the first place, but since you are one of the most inconsiderate people I have ever met I seriously doubt you even care. And I think that's what pissed me off the most about the whole situation. It wasn't just the fact that getting up and leaving in the middle of a movie you were invited to is what I would call pretty rude, it's also the fact that you had to talk the entire time you stayed. As if the whole world revolves around George and Abigail and everyone else must be expected to laugh along with their thoughtlessness. 

On the way home I questioned why I even bother returning his calls anymore. Not over just what happened that night, but for every similar inconsiderate thing he's done leading up to it.  I don't really want to associate with people who think it's okay to be rude or disrespectful under the guise of of "having fun" or being "funny." The older I get, the more I just find it classless and irritating.

A few days went by and George called again. His message was upbeat yet vague, requesting that I call him back. (I am 99% sure it was to invite J and I out to Mojito Mondays.) As much as I love my mint-flavored cocktails, I can think of 3,000 other people I'd rather grab mojitos with. (Okay, 3,000 is an exaggeration, more like 20 -- 55 if we're counting celebrities and deceased novelists.) So though I'm pretty good about calling people back, I decided he was no longer worth my time and deleted his message without returning the call. 

My life is too short to deal with bullshit.

The tipping point

Ugh. Where do I even begin. I promised myself I wasn't going to talk about work in every single freaking blog post of mine, but I completely lost it today and so I think this deserves a bit of air time. 

Terrible Coworker (aka TC) -- the one who threw me under the bus months ago at work -- is at it again. Which is funny since I thought things had gotten much better with TC, as most of November and all of December went swimmingly. Better than I could have ever imagined us getting along professionally. But in the last week or so, TC has reverted back to his/her old self. Nasty, passive aggressive comments about how I lack what it takes to be in my position. Constant, back-handed berating about how deficient I am. Normally I let this acerbic behavior go and chalk it up to TC's overly apparent insecurities as a writer. But today I completely fell apart. 

To make a long story short I hauled my boss L into a private meeting and, through frustrated tears, told her that I'm thisclose to quitting, that I'm about to walk right out and that TC is a BITCH. Yes, I used "bitch" twice, and not without pointing out that I can't work with TC's "shitty personality" anymore. (I can't believe I actually said all this.) More than that, I can't believe I finally, very publicly, fell apart at work. 

I was SO embarrassed. 

It was the first time I'd ever cried IN the office. In any office. L obviously felt bad but didn't know how to respond to me, and said it was good to vent in private like I was doing. Well guess what? Venting doesn't solve this problem at all, as my husband can attest to since he has to hear my malaise daily. And I said that. L went into the reasons why TC might be acting the way he/she is: major insecurities with their own work, needing a scapegoat (aka me) to blame those feelings of inadequacy on, etc. etc. And the solution, according to L, is that I need to talk to TC and -- while wearing a thick skin -- let the insults roll off me and reassure TC that we need to communicate better to have a good working relationship. Really? A.) I did this before, it seemed to work for a time and now it's reverted back to being terrible, and B.) I need to accept insults in order for us to function better as a team? This is a new way of thinking to me, and if that's the case I am so beyond out. 

D has a second interview with a firm tomorrow afternoon, just after a first interview with a different firm tomorrow morning. Praying that something good comes out of these, but I'm tired of waiting where we're going to "end up" because of his job. Tonight I've officially started sending out resumes, and I hope to put in my two weeks as soon as possible -- either when D finally gets an offer or I find something else as quickly as I can. 

Earlier this month I'd started thinking of good excuses to give my bosses when they question my resignation. After all, I haven't been there that long. At first I thought I'd lie and say I was leaving the country to do something like teach English in a foreign land. Then I thought that sounded too flighty, that I'd need to say something more along the lines of "I need to care for a close elderly relative of mine with a health issue," which sounds much more responsible and upright. To perpetuate that sentiment I started looking more "sad" than usual, so when I eventually drop the health issue bomb on them it will make complete sense. I had to remind myself, though, to not overly pout as it could look like I simply had a problem with my lower lip. I simply needed to look a little lost and confused, like I just smelled a fart. 

But now the act is over. It will now come as no surprise when I put in my two weeks. And I won't have to lie about a thing. ;)

One of the worst situations of all time

Okay, maybe it could be worse, but I'm currently sitting holed up in my bedroom while my husband and his lug-headed best friend are out in the living room, which they've somehow taken over, playing video games.  Call me crazy or selfish or whatever, but how how the hell did this happen? One minute my husband is telling me over lunch today that his best friend Doug is planning to pick us up from the metro stop after work to take us home since he'd "forgotten something." The next minute I find myself in hell.

What was it Doug had forgotten? A video game console. No biggie, I figured he'd pick it up, have a glass of wine perhaps, and leave. I mean, it is Tuesday night after all and Millionaire Matchmaker is premiering this evening. My plan for the night was to laze around in my negligee and laugh at all of Patti Stanger's bad jokes on Bravo while drinking Two-Buck Chuck out of the bottle. Instead I found myself sitting on the couch net to Doug, his sweaty hands clutching his gaming controller, his tongue sticking out of his half-open mouth in intense concentration, as he and my husband played something that sounded like we were sitting on the sidelines of a battle in Kuwait.

Three hours later? Same thing. I asked politely if we could do something else, but all I get are the token "Yeah, five more minutes" responses that lead nowhere. And what am I supposed to do? Blow up at husband for ruining my night and taking over out living room with Doug? He's check-mated me into submission by having company over like this, and he knows it. Sigh. In the meantime I've moved to the bedroom to get away from the obnoxious shooting sounds and I hope Doug goes home soon. Not that I don't like him, but I CAN'T STAND VIDEO GAMES! They are SUCH a waste of time! (And I know, it's not like anything on Bravo is that much more productive, but something about video games irritates the flip out of me!) 

Right about now I'd love to put on my trannie pumps and clomp all over my husband's stupid video game discs, cackling with glee each time my 4-inch heel punctures the glossy surfaces. But such things are better left to the imagination, I suppose.

Highs and lows, Oct. 10th edition

Highs:

This week was pretty uneventful, but the weekend was fantastique. It shall hereby be known as The Weekend of the Dinner Party. Saturday night my whole family gathered at my grandmother's to celebrate that good news I mentioned before. I brought over a bottle of Veuve and we spent hours laughing and talking over hors d'oeuvres and dinner, wine and champagne. It was all very Italian (though I have no Italian in my family line), but the weather was beautiful and it made for an excellent backyard soiree. Good food, good conversation, good people. Then Sunday night my friends and I had an informal dinner of wings and beer at B's house. We got to see B's new engagement ring and see all her pictures of Europe, and I hope she liked the bottle of Moet that my husband and I bought as an engagement present for those two crazy lovebirds. 

As you can see I'm a sucker for celebrations. (Whether or not there's something to actually celebrate.) And I'm really getting into this whole "dinner party" thing. Does that mean I'm getting older? Wiser? Barhopping no longer appeals to me (and stopped appealing to me a couple years ago. I much prefer heading over to a friends' home with a bottle of wine and dessert, or have people meet at my place for a (hopefully) gourmet meal.

ANYWAY, my other highs were a couple highlights from spending way too much money this weekend:

BOOTS!!!

The coolest cheese spreaders EVER from Sur La Table. Let the wine and cheese parties commence.

Low:

Friday morning my husband and I were walking up the metro stairs to get to the street level when I saw cops up near the top of the steps, roping off part of the with police tape. Mind you, we work in a REALLY seedy area of this city that shall be deemed Anonymous. In this part of town it's a normal occurrence to witness homeless people vomiting on sidewalks in the middle of the afternoon, or watch homeless women relieve themselves in walkways in broad daylight. So.

"Oh god, someone probably just died on the steps or something," I said, motioning up at the police tape.  Once on street level we pass the area the police had cordoned off....and there was a gigantic pile of diarrhea on the top step. HUMAN diarrhea. I had to force myself not to throw up. The police had the guy (who was so beyond homeless, his bare feet looked like they hadn't seen a pair of shoes in a while, they were all calloused and gangrened) in a gurney chair next to the disgusting mess. I think what happened was that the guy had dropped trou and sat on the top step to go, as though it were a toilet, and now I'm permanently scarred with the mental image of seeing the aftermath.

Stupid job, putting me in these stupid situations daily on my way into work. I'm never, ever going to walk on those part of the steps again. ...Not like it matters, I'm sure that's happened on every single step of that Godforsaken metro stop. Ugh.

TGI...F?

What I should be doing every weekend.

Normally I'd be elated about today being Friday. Instead I am drained, abrasive and particularly sorry about an episode I had at lunch earlier with my husband. Before going further I should preface this post with the fact that I'm prone to extreme pissiness (including uncalled-for outbursts toward loved ones) when I have no other outlet to vent my frustration. (It might be time to take up kickboxing again, or make like Regina George and join a competitive lacrosse team.)

Anyway I was supposed to meet up with my husband at 12:30 for our 1-hour lunch but got stuck in a God-awful meeting that went way over schedule and made me seriously think of gouging my eyeballs out with the nearest ballpoint pen to put myself out of my misery. After the meeting was (finally) over, I dashed out of the office and down the street, meeting up with my husband who'd already been waiting for 30 minutes. There went half our lunch break. Ugh.

So what did I do next? I yelled at him. Totally uncalled for, but I was so angry about the meeting, about the entire day, my entire decision in taking this job and making him give up his dream job just so I'd wind up complaining about mine daily. (None of this is an excuse, by the way, to lash out at poor, unsuspecting husband who just wanted to share a pastrami sandwich with his wife on a sunny afternoon.) But with me, when it rains it pours. A bad day or week or month can make me feel like my life is falling apart indefinitely. Today proved no different.

Husband, smiling on street corner: "Hi!"

Me, with a scowl: "Hey."

Husband: "I take it the meeting didn't --"

Me: "GOD, I don't want to talk about the meeting! I don't want to talk about work at all, okay?"

(Silence)

Me: "When are you going to start networking, huh? How do you expect to find a job just looking at job boards? Why don't you get your crap together and get started networking already."*

* - Saying this makes me SUCH a monster. I fully realize I have no right to even utter these words; it's my fault, after all, that he doesn't have a full-time job and is instead getting a three-month stipend while he works for a federal office. It was all for me. And now he's got nothing. No prospects, nothing. Just a wretched wife who makes disgusting accusations as though he didn't have the world, at one point, in the palm of his hand. Moral of the story: I should not have launched into the above tirade without counting to 10 and calming down.

Husband (starting to walk away, no more smile): "I can't believe you."

Me: "Where are you going?"

Husband: "Back to work. I don't want to have lunch with you if you're going to talk to me like that."

A few more words were exchanged, more me than him, and that's when he whipped around and with a hurt look on his face told me he understands I'm frustrated with how everything turned out, but that I can't keep taking it out on him or else someday soon I was going to "find myself alone." Ouch. Of course this comment not only stung but succeeded in antagonizing me and I was about -- about -- to blurt out the most TERRIBLE THING EVER...:

"Oh yeah? Well at least maybe then I'd find someone successful!"

So, so bad. LUCKILY I bit my tongue right before these words came out because I knew it was only the anger talking. It's a lie (I will always love him regardless of how successful he is) and it might make me feel better in the heat of the moment, but all it would do is succeed in hurting him deeply.

And maybe that's the problem. Maybe I want him to be as miserable as I am now, so I have someone to commiserate with. But that's ridiculous and such a waste of energy. Even with his job situation he manages to stay positive. I love him for that. Maybe I do just need an invigorating outlet to release all my pent-up frustration. Competitive racquetball anyone?

It's only Friday and I'm already dreading having to go in on Monday. Something is seriously wrong with this scenario.

Fool if you think it's over

So I'm in what Duck Philips would call a “sticky wicket.”

The reason (which I publicly glossed over in my other blog) why I was moving to more anonymous territory was because I was “found out” at work. Not a big deal, right? What I do outside of work is my business and I'm fully entitled to own and maintain my own personal blog.

But in the heat of a particularly terrible and stressful week recently, I made the mistake of mentioning work on the blog. Again, fully within my rights. Was what I wrote, a tongue-in-cheek look at my management style, that bad? No. (Hyperbole, as always, was generously used). Could what I have written been worse? Yes. Judging from my track record of making light of people in situations I'm silently thanking GOD I refrained from poking fun at anyone but myself in said post. Was it a smart thing to do, venting my frustrations about work on a blog that I THOUGHT was unknown to coworkers? Probably not, no.

But in my defense, that week and all weeks before and after have been been simply dreadful (which I'll save for another post). The day I wrote the “incriminating” blog post I was bawling my eyes out at lunch to my husband, who had elicited my meltdown by simply asking how my workday was going. As I choked on my sobs I could barely breathe I was so frustrated and stressed out. It was terrible. The rest of that day I spent puffy-eyed behind a pair of Wayfarers at my desk, silently cursing my decision to ever take the stupid job. Oh, and this is after the stress caused me to miss my period earlier in the month. (I've since gotten it, not coincidentally, on the day I called in sick last week and had a blissful 24-hour time span to relax.)

The problem is I don't like the atmosphere at work. There's no such thing as general common courtesy, or social etiquette, or anything, but there's lots of passive aggression, lots of eye rolling. It makes working there very, very hard and now it's even worse because I made the impulsive decision to go home and blog about the tip-of-my iceberg of frustrations. Little did I know that I was being watched.

Recently one of my coworkers -- who's been throwing me under the bus from the beginning -- confronted me in private about the blog post. (For the record I have NO idea how he/she found it, but I have a sneaking suspicion he/she is buddies with the IT guy and he's been perusing my work computer to troll for incriminating “gossipy” information to pass on. Not cool.) I assumed that after our talk he/she would go tell my boss, which is fully within his/her right to do. But no, coming to me was an after-thought. Not only did he/she first circulate it to the entire office to smear my name, they then went and talked to my boss about it BEFORE coming to me, because they wanted to “know how to approach me,” which is complete bullshit. He/she knows exactly what they're doing and I couldn't believe how conniving and mean they were in their approach to the situation.

Luckily my boss, L, thought the whole thing to be petty and largely stayed out of it. L and I had a private discussion about it and that was that. But now the office atmosphere is even more toxic and I honestly don't know how much longer I can “hang in there.” No amount of money is worth this kind of stress and workplace bullying. What I hate the most about the bullying is that it's done so passive aggressively that it's hard to tack down and confront.

Basically taking this job and having my husband turn down his six-figure offer down south was THE WORST DECISION OF MY LIFE. I have tried my hardest to live a life with no regrets and had succeeded until I took this job. I was wooed by the notoriety of the company and the stellar income they offered, and didn't stop to question whether they were actually a good fit for me. (Though how would I have known about the office vibe from just my interview?) Either way, I was a fool.

Now I'm crying more often, snapping at my husband over trivial things, and dreading going to sleep at night because I know that in the morning I will have to traipse to the Gulag. I kind of feel like Meg Ryan in French Kiss when she goes to Paris to try and win back her husband and instead runs into terrible luck. Standing in a phonebooth near the Arc de Triomphe, weeping about her misery, she raises one fist in the air and squeaks “I will triumph!”

I could only wish that my now-miserable days were spent in Paris having my luggage stolen. Heck I would even walk the the red light district in Montmartre if it meant I no longer had to do this. But as I get pulled deeper into the mire, I feel myself losing sight of who I am and what I want. I want to cry but I can't. I am becoming numb.

I have no idea how I will triumph.