Dude my feet are KILLING me

So I got a job. A veterinary receptionist job. And the thing was, I was really REALLY good at it for the, uh, five and a half days I worked there. And that turned out to be totally UTTERLY beside the point.

I know a few of the other receptionists and one of the doctors totally knew and appreciated my abilities. By my fourth day I pretty much had a handle on all the front desk duties: phones, files, how their computer system worked, etc. I was probably 85% trained and there were people who had been there a month who were way behind me. It did feel really good to be doing a lot of that stuff again, especially helping clients over the phone, which was always one of my strongest areas. And I got some pretty decent puppy kisses. I even got some Brindle Boxer smooches which, to me really are the caviar of dog kisses.

But the being gone from 9am to 9pm and spending most of those 12 hours STANDING UP just sucked. Only one of the three computer stations allowed you to actually sit while you used it. The other two you had to just stand close to the counter and reach for the keyboard and mouse. God if OSHA saw that place they’d probably shut it down. To speak on one of the phones you actually had to lean over a counter. If you added up all the time I spent sitting down during my 10 hour shifts (not counting eating my lunch upstairs) it never added up to more than 30 minutes any of the days I worked. I came home so tired that if John hadn’t had dinner going I probably wouldn't have bothered to eat before I fell into bed. On the third night when I went to stand back up after sitting on the couch for an hour my legs cramped up and I got stuck.

The idea of working four 10 hour shifts, M – Th, thereby giving me automatic three day weekends, was appealing. The reality of it was that I was getting home so late I didn’t have enough time to wind down before it was time to go to bed. This translated into lying in bed staring at the ceiling desperate to sleep and unable to relax. And then, when I finally did manage to fall asleep, it meant nightmares. Pet and Vet related nightmares, which I have never had before. Snake nightmares? Not fun. VETERINARY SNAKE NIGHTMARES? REALLY NOT FUN.

One of the main problems was that I really disliked the main guy who was “training” me. I mentioned him before on this blog actually, the guy with the full arm tats? Long story very short – they were hiring again and I went back to interview more with the intention of just staying in the job-hunt game and making the effort than of actually accepting a job there. But the manager and I got on like a house on fire and she SOLD it hard and I bought it. And I had long since given up finding the perfect job or even a really clean office. Sad but true. After seeing a reasonable sample of what was out there I'd had to accept that my standards were just too high. So I lowered them.

So that’s how I found myself being trained by a skinny white guy in his early thirties who was not only covered in tattoos (including an Irish clover and a GUN) but who also seemed to hold the disparate beliefs that he was both a white Irish guy from Philly (true) and a black hip hog gangsta (not true). He also held forth, at length, about how WRONG it was for white people to ever wear dreadlocks and that it was a violation to steal something that important from another culture. I was totally all Meg Ryan in Joe Vs. the Volcano, “I have no response to that.”

I discovered the official term for this pale ebonic-spewing dichotomy is "Wigga." That there are enough of them out there to have an official definition is depressing. To spend most all of your day locked in a tiny space with one was exasperating. For example if I did something right he wouldn’t say it was right he’d say, “Yo, you’re money!”  He also had a habit of yelling out random lyrics to rap songs, repeatedly. One day he “rapped” about 12 times during a 3 hour period something to the effect of, “Need money in the bank now I gots to get paid!” Since I had no idea what song was playing in the ipod imbedded in his brain it was just this same phrase over and over again without context. I also just kept thinking, “aren’t you too old to be acting like this?” I mean, he was five years younger than me, tops.

I might have been able to live with the “lingo” if talking hadn’t been something he did so damn much. One night I was there 20 minutes longer than I needed to be (and after already having worked 10 hours and 15 minutes, every extra minute felt like five) because he was talking to a tech and then to one of the vets about his freaking tattoos. Instead of counting out (something I did NOT learn how to do during my very short tenure) so we could close up he was pulling his socks off (after carefully removing the extra padding in the front of his shoe he puts there to make the tongue of his shoes puff out) to show off the huge leering face being inked on his left foot. I thought I was going to have to HURT him.

Halloween morning I arrived to discover that a bunch of people had requested Halloween off so instead of usual FOUR people in reception there was just Justin and me, the new person. And he had to go run an errand because the printer was out of INK so for a while it was JUST me and a tech kind of popping in to check on things. And I actually fucking kept it going, phones answered, questions answered, appointments checked in and out. All of it. BY MYSELF. But, not surprisingly, I missed a few things like writing the weight of a fucking DOG down in his chart. But they cut the new girl up there by herself some slack, right? NOPE. I was snapped at ALL  morning for every single thing I did wrong including, I kid you not, for tossing a post it note in the garbage instead of the recycling bin. I actually got in trouble when I walked IN that morning because the phone rang three times and the manager (who was about to become NOT so cool after all in my book) said, in this tired upset tone, "that call just went to voicemail because you didn't pick it up in time" and I asked, totally confused, "since when do we HAVE voicemail?" and she said, I kid you not, "oh I installed it this morning." And then I blinked at her because, what do you say to that?

The entire morning was so bad that I decided to go home and have cereal for lunch because I desperately needed to call or e-mail someone and let off steam before I faced the rest of what was going to be a really long day. I found out exactly how long that day was going to be when I was informed right before lunch that there would be NO BREKAS that day for either of us receptionists because we were understaffed which meant that I was looking at pretty much 2:45 - 8:45 with no break. Six straight hours with a woman who, instead of telling me what thing I had done wrong, told Justin while I was standing 2 feet away. While gesturing at me. Before I was even introduced to her.  I made the mistake of asking the Wigga (who I thought it was safe to talk to since he was on HIS way out the front door having asked for half of Halloween off) if my leaving would totally jack up the schedule. He said I should talk to the manager and I said I would as soon as I figured out where my head was at.

It only took the Wigga (who apparently swooped right around back in the side door) about 2 minutes to rat me out because he’d only been gone 20 minutes when I got called upstairs.

The manager said, “so I hear today may be your last day” which was interesting because *I* hadn’t actually said that to anyone, but it led to my expressing my concerns with how exhausted I was and my frustration with how oblivious the rest of the staff seemed to be with the fact that I’d only been working there a few days. I will be fair. She was totally willing to tell off the two women who had been mean to me that morning. She actually thought that it would be much more appropriate if I got in their faces myself. When I pointed out that one of the people causing me frustration was a VET she essentially said that wasn’t important and something along the lines of everyone was equal there. Which: No. I actually believe if someone has made it through the rigors of veterinary school and gotten a job where they spend their days actually saving LIVES they are higher up on the food and respect chain that a person who answers phones and fills prescriptions, no matter how good she is at it.

What it came down to, in the end, was that what they were looking for MORE than, oh, say, someone who could really do the job well, was someone who could spend 10 hours a day on their feet while desperately trying to keep up with the insane pace of the hospital. And what was required was a total commitment to the job over everything else. Period.

She told me that she had broken up with her boyfriend over the job, the Wigga's girlfriend had broken up with him twice and was still really mad he worked there (I already knew that because I’d overheard several of her calls to him – and I can’t blame her – since he was training me he was working TWELVE hour shifts and she was his ride) and that pretty much everyone else was either single or had an angry spouse at home. I said that the reason I’d been happily married for over 11 years was that the biggest commitment in my life was to my marriage. It felt really corny making that statement out loud to a woman I barely knew but it was true.  I also said that I always gave my best to the job while I was there, and that I was pretty sure that was obvious to everyone. And she agreed totally with what a fabulous job I had been doing, how amazingly quickly I had picked things up, how hard I was working. She also said that if I couldn’t keep doing it for those hours, and probably longer hours, then it wasn’t the right job for me. She said she’d had a lot of people quit because they couldn’t handle the hours and the pace and that she’d also fired people who “couldn’t keep up”  She said, “I haven’t showered in three days because I’ve been working 16 hours a days and between here and school I haven’t had time to go home.”

What do you say to someone who is thinks it is reasonable to give up their partner, sleep and personal hygiene for the sake of their job? I decided to go with, “I just can’t make that kind of commitment” I also said I was still willing to finish my shift and work the next day if she needed me and she said, “no, it is what it is” and she clocked me out right then, and that was it. I was escorted out like I'd been caught with my hand in the till.

It was jarring to all of the sudden be out on the sidewalk with my stuff in my arms but it was also a HUGE relief. The realization I didn’t have to go back ever again almost made me cry. And then there was this funny moment where I felt like I should go do something since I was free four hours earlier than I’d planned. And then I realized it was 4:45 and that I was freaking tired. So I went home.

My thoughts a few days later?

I seriously think one of the vets killed a turtle and a bird in one day. Two pets dying under one vet in one day? Not normal.

That same vet is putting other pets at risk every week. I overheard a conversation about how the techs were leaving cats UNATTENDEND under anesthesia for like 15 minutes which really upset the one vet I really liked. I know this because I overheard him say "because anesthesia is like, controlled DEATH and you really don't want cats under that any longer than they need to be.” Hello, understatement. I never EVER would have taken Tandy there no matter how good the discount was. The reason for the delay and the totally unnecessary increased risk to people’s beloved pets? The above mentioned vet would show up half an hour late for his surgeries. If I was a tech I wouldn’t have put the animals under until I saw the whites of his eyes, but that’s just me. When I mentioned THAT to the manager during our last conversation she said she knew and he was a discipline problem, that he really liked to test the boundaries, and they all knew about him and were trying to work around him.

Again what do you say to that? You have a vet whose actions are putting animals’ lives at risk and, what, it is what it is? Fuck that noise. I actually wish I could figure out a way to post a warning about them on yelp.com that wouldn’t (since I brought it up to her and so she knows I was upset about it) totally be traced back to me by, oh, their lawyers. The Wigga and then insane pace aside that is just BAD.

During the entirety of my very short tenure there the manager had a copy of "Nordstrom's Guide to Management" under her arm almost every single time I saw her. I'm thinking she hasn't had time to actually read it.

I’ve also gotten over feeling defensive for not being willing to commit my whole life to that place because, well, that place sucks. When I was at SNAH I was totally 100% committed to it. I worked as hard as I could, I put all of myself into it and I was proud of it. And it was worthy of that. All I could think during the manager’s sermon about how she’d dedicated her life to that hospital was, “you’ve picked a really shitty place.” I mean, she’s willing to give up everything for that place and it isn’t a good place. And it isn’t like she’s on a mission to MAKE it a better place. Her goal seems to be to just somehow keep the damn thing going. And with the Wigga being the most senior employee there (as in, he’s worked there eight months) that probably does take 16 hours a day. God I’m glad that’s not my mess.

I think I’ll let the BBC link I followed from wikipedia have the last say on this:

A wigga is an affluent young white male, who admires and absorbs certain aspects of black culture, which happen to have cooler music and sharper clothes. He adopts the slang of the black city. Wigga is attracted to hip hop and rap.

But what are the roots of white teenagers' fascination with black culture? Is it a genuine attempt to cross racial boundaries, or is it looking for a new, cooler identity? Is it a genuine affiliation to another culture or a desire of nerdy white boys to feel well hard, get rid of hang-ups and to up their cred.

I love that the definition assumes it is a TEENAGE BOY they are defining.

OH! And it turns out they made a whole MOVIE about the guy I worked with & I didn’t even know it! This may need to go in my Netflix queue

- Related Link: http://malibusmostwanted.warnerbros.com/

Hey, did y’all know San Francisco is surrounded by WATER?

For a smart woman I can be pretty dumb sometimes. All of you out there fake-clutching at your hearts going “Laurel DUMB!? Never! Blasphemy!” can shut it. Let’s say that I can be, uh, forgetful. Or that maybe I’m not good with putting stuff in context. Whatever. Shut up. ANYWAY, I KNOW that I live in San Francisco. I know that the city is about seven miles across and I know that the REASON it is only that long is that if you drive any further than seven miles you end up in the ocean or stuck in traffic on a bridge. I know that. And I know that therefore I am... uh, let me consult yahoo maps for a second… hold on… I am 3.9 miles from the ocean*. I knew that in some vague sort of way beforehand. But somehow that technical knowledge stored in the back of my brain doesn’t translate into, “I am four miles from the BEACH!"

However, today I was driving John’s convertible for reasons unimportant to anyone but us and I, as is my custom when I borrow John’s car (unless it is raining), had the top down. I had an errand to run. While driving to and from this errand, with a quick stop at the grocery store, it occurred to me that it was a really really nice day. REALLY nice. The kind that makes you realize it is the first day of summer and that somewhere people are sweaty and hot but here it is 72 degrees and there is a slight breeze and not a cloud or fogbank to be seen. The kind of day that makes the people who live here willing to pay hundreds of dollars per square foot for rent. And then I thought, “I could go to the beach! One of the benefits of not being able to find a damn job has GOT to be the ability to just GO to the beach!” So I did! I came home, shoved the groceries in the fridge, coated the exposed portions of myself in SPF billion, shoved a book in my purse, grabbed a jacket and headed back out.

The drive down Judah (a street I prefer to the more popular Irving because I like passing the Muni trains in my Mini because it makes me feel, for a few seconds, like I am in "The Italian Job") towards the ocean was nice. I managed, between radio station hopping (note to self: get Ipod adaptor installed in John’s car), to find happy driving music and pretty soon I could see the ocean. Still no fog. San Francisco can be tricky like that, beautiful in one spot and then you get out to the coast and the temperature drops 20 degrees and you’re being knocked over by rushing fog and your eyes start running and your nose joins in and you’re like “never mind” and you go back home and put on your flannel jammies muttering “fucking microclimates”. Or you get to the zoo and you can't see any of the animals because they're all hiding from view in their warm little cubbyholes. The lemur exhibit on a cold day? Is a "trees and ropes and a pond" exhibit.

Luckily where we live is a pretty good indicator of the weather at the beach because we live on the mountain (or hill, I suppose) where the fog rolling in from the ocean gets stuck. Which we totally love by the way. Spending 18 years growing up in Bakersfield means that I don’t think I have yet to answer “Yes” to the question “aren’t you cold?”  Maybe the next time someone asks me if I’m cold I should try out “Yes, thank you!” and see how that goes over. I’m still SO busy being grateful it is NOT 110 degrees that to me being swamped by fog feels like a cool refreshing hug. A hug that totally ruins my hair, but a hug nonetheless. But I digress (of course, if I didn’t, this blog would have some really damn short entries). My point was… ummm.. . oh yeah… so if WE have fog, usually the coast has fog too. But today there was no fog.

I drove up and down the Great Highway a few miles in each direction because just driving around in a convertible NEXT to the ocean is fabulous (although also ruinous to your hair) and then I parked. I put the top up, grabbed my stuff and crossed the street and there I was: at the beach. The sunny fabulous wonderful beach. I took a brief moment to berate myself for not doing this more often and then set off towards and unoccupied log in the distance. I used it to form the back part of a sand lounge chair, leaned up against it, sat down on my jacket, stretched my legs out and just sat there for a while watching the waves, the seagulls and the fisherman who were spaced out every fifty or so yards in front of me. Then I pulled out my book and read for an hour. It was SO decadent. When I got tired of reading I sat there another ten minutes or so just breathing it all in and then headed back to the car. Feeling great. It was like I’d somehow snuck a weekend away at the coast into a two-hour period. I put the top back down and headed home promising myself that I have GOT to do that more often. And that I’d go home and blog about how I am dumb and spoiled. Mission accomplished. Time for some iced tea, I think.

BTW: Those of you reading this that are NOT 3.9 miles from the ocean and who kind of would like to throw sand in my face right now? Please electronically poke me to go to the beach every so often in case I get dumb and forget again. Thanks.

*In self defense most of my life “the beach” was NOT something I really wanted to be close to. In Bakersfield we weren’t close to anything except oil fields so if I had to choose somewhere to drive several hours to it would not be the ocean. The forest? Yes, please. A lake? With boats? Perfect. Someplace that requires I display my glow in the dark pale body into a bathing suit? PASS. When I was growing up it was hard to even find ANY sunscreen as tanning was still in. Yes I am old enough to remember tanning oil commercials on TV. I am genetically precluded from tanning (burn, peal, repeat) which makes me genetically predisposed to skin cancer (yeeks) and after several YEARS of being teased about how pale I am (genetically pre-disposed to being Goth too, I guess) and getting BURNED I pretty much decided that I just wasn’t ever putting a bathing suit on again. And this was back when I was a size five. Black lingerie indoors? SURE! Neon bikini outdoors? HELLS NO. Not even back in college for my luscious, British, speedo-sporting lifeguard boyfriend. I met him at the pool wearing a hoodie, cut off jeans and Docs. A couple years ago I actually wore a bathing suit for 45 minutes at the New York New York hotel pool on my girls weekend in Vegas. I covered every inch of myself with SPF 45 and I STILL burned. Screw that. Once I discovered COLD beaches my attitude changed. If you need to wear a jacket while you’re walking along the sand, THAT is my kind of beach. Let's go! If there are blond women laying on towels wearing butt floss? Count me out.

Get it ironed-on for the Captain!

So a few days ago this showed up in my e-mail box from Captain Karl. Karl being, of course, the Captain and lead singer of WARP 11 the Star Trek Tribute band (the song playing during the opening minutes of the William Shatner roast on Comedy Central? “Everything I do, I do with William Shatner”. They were paid $17,000 for the use of that song. Or so I heard.) and friend of John who is having both a birthday and gig/CD release party tomorrow and they’re letting John sit in for a few songs. This makes John very happy.
I am not even going to go into how embarrassing it is to admit, even in cyberspace on a blog that no one reads, any association with a Star Trek tribute band. Although Star Trek Tribute Band isn't entirely accurate. More like Sex and Drugs and Rock and Star Trek Band. It is a wee bit difficult to explain. Anything I might say such as, “they’re really good for a tribute band” or “they’re really funny” or “I was a little sister for an Engineering fraternity in college and was passively exposed to a LOT of Star Trek” doesn’t make it any less geeky. It is DEEPLY geeky. Does the fact that most of the songs are about sex AND Star Trek make it less geeky? Of course not. Watching white boys jumping around and “spocking out” and doing the Mugatu? There really are no words. I can feel whatever cool I once had draining out of me each time I attend one of their shows. The hip facade I spent so much time building up during high school and college? Melts right off. All that time spent accumulating black clothing and perfecting a disinterested/bored/superior look? Wasted. "Hey Laurel, your geek is showing!" But fate made John Karl’s boss a few years ago and even though we’ve moved and time has passed John is still Ensign Merlino and he gets to sit in. And I give in (usually with the help of my very good friend BEER) and just go with it. ANYWAY, I got this e-mail.

Hello Crewmen

Here's a list of things to do for the Warp 11 CD release party this weekend.

1. Buy Captain Karl a present since it’s his birthday.
2. Find a designated driver.
3. Save money to buy new CD and a drink for Captain Karl since it's his birthday.
4. Preview 2 of the new songs on the revamped MySpace page. http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=2108938
5. Prepare your mind and your body… to Rock!

See ya Saturday… It’s gonna be a good one.

Which leads me to Karl. Karl is the “captain” of Warp 11. Karl is one of those people with endless charisma, a huge ego, and no fear. He gets up on stage, this white, geeky, slightly paunchy bald guy in his mid 30’s screaming, “give it up for the captain!” and everyone fully does. Hell, I do. I fully do. Here are a few of the lyrics:

I don’t know
Here’s the thing
I’m just the captain
I’m here to sing
I’m on a mission – I ain’t afraid
I’m just out here in space to get laid
And now I’m rappin’
Was bound to happen
Show me an alien ass
I’ll be tappin’
Balls are slappin’
Your hands are clappin’
Everybody give it up for the captain

Yeah we all give it up. And if you were there, you would too. You might feel all dirty and ashamed afterwards but you would. And I have no doubts that if Kiki (the ridiculously hot red-haired female member of the band) wasn’t his live-in girlfriend he’d be scraping the girl-geeks off with a stick after each show. Or taking them all back to his house to play naked twister. Anyway, Karl loves being Karl and, since he is also highly intelligent, witty and pretty twisted, I love Karl. Except of course, for when I don’t. I have occasionally gotten cool presents for Karl before and I can never resist an opportunity to try and pull a really COOL present out of my ass.

So my friend Michelle and I were trying to come up with an idea for a shirt to have made for Karl and so I sent him this e-mail a couple days ago titled:

What do you get for the man who has Kiki?

Hey Karl,

So Michelle and I were trying to figure out what I could have printed on a T shirt for you (there's this great place in the Haight that will totally iron-on obscenities at no extra charge) for your birthday and we kinda liked:

GIVE IT UP FOR THE
MOTHERFUCKING
CAPTAIN!
I mean it,
give it up right now
you fucking Pakleds!

or maybe:
 

My Ass is made of
the finest Corinthian Leather

or

It's my Birthday and I'll
SPOCK if I want to

or
 

Sulu sudsed me up and all I got
was a rimjob
and this stupid T-shirt

Anyway, nothing GOOD ENOUGH or worthy of YOU obviously, but it DID remind us of another conversation we had which was WHY doesn't WARP 11 sell, like, some kind of wifebeater shirt? Some stretchy tank top that GIRLS could wear? Does everything even remotely sexy have to remain ONLY in the domain of Kiki? Take Ryan's girl. She could totally rock a wife beater with a Warp 11 graphic. OOOH the art from the new album on a black wifebeater would be awesome...

Just a thought... happy birthday.

-------------------

to which he unhelpfully replied:

You really can't go wrong with any of them.

We had red wife beaters with the logo but stopped selling them a long time ago. Where were you?

K

--------------------
Where was I when they were selling red wife beaters? Living in Petaluma in blissful ignorance of the existence of Star Trek Tribute bands in general and of KARL in particular. This didn’t help ME any with the what to put on the shirt problem so I got Karl’s damn cell number from John and CALLED him and he was like, "well it isn't really exciting if I already know what the shirt is going to SAY so you should come up with something ELSE new and witty" and I was like, "GRRRRRR fuckdammit." So I called John back and was like, "okay so yeah so I told him I would make him a shirt but now he's telling me it won't be any fun unless I make up something funny he hasn't SEEN yet. Do I have to do it?" And my husband, who usually thinks my need to do fabulous and cool things for people on their birthdays is ridculous said, in short, "YES."

So I gave a big heaving sigh, swore a lot and then went online, started reading old Warp 11 lyrics and then got on Wikifuckingpedia to remind myself of what all the Star Trek drinks were called and then I sort of extrapolated on the first witty t-shirt saying on the list. So then I called John back and read it to him and HE said I "should make it CLEAN" and I was like "WHY? They use the word FUCK in every song they sing?!"  They have albums titled Suck My Spock and Boldly Go Down On Me. I’ve seen them sing “Set your phase for fuck” in front of 10 year olds. Clean? Right. So then I e-mailed Karl THIS:

John says that I shouldn't put any dirty words on your shirt so that you can wear it in public...  so maybe I'll just go with something about how you're as cute as a hairless cat or something...   maybe a nice iron on of that graphic of that kitten dangling from a tree that says "HANG IN THERE!"

And then I took my ass down to the Haight to order this (of which I was very proud... a full-on rant contained on a shirt):

(front of shirt)
  GIVE IT UP FOR THE
MOTHERFUCKING
CAPTAIN!

Seriously, give it up!
Where are my gifts? My tributes?
My pack of writhing Orion slave girls?
What the fuck kind of birthday is this?

(back of shirt)
 I mean SERIOUSLY
every time we fucking perform
I give you ALL the gift of KARL and then
on my actual birthday you buy me a BEER?
That’s all I get? Not even a glass of Romulan Ale,
 a cup of Iw Hiq or some Tranya?

You fucking Pakleds…

But it turned out that would cost $302 (I really don't like Karl THAT much and I'm pretty sure John doesn't either) and they actually didn't have enough of any one kind of letter to spell all that out SO I trimmed it down a bit... and even trimmed they said it was going to be "EPIC" and the longest and funniest shirt they've ever done... when I pick the shirt up I may make them sign something to that effect...they're probably still cutting out letters as I type this... this is what the FINAL $159 shirt will be:
 

(front of shirt)
 GIVE IT UP FOR THE
MOTHERFUCKING
CAPTAIN!

(back of shirt)
Seriously, give it up!
Where are my gifts? My tributes?
My pack of writhing Orion slave girls?
Not even a glass of Romulan Ale?
What the fuck kind of birthday is this?

You fucking Pakleds…

And tomorrow we will give it to Karl before the gig and he will like it and wear it or I swear to GOD I will FEED it to him. Because that’s the kind of friend I am!

----------

So the shirt was a hit. It was iffy there for a moment when I handed the bag to Karl and he said, “you didn’t even wrap it” and I started to snarl and lunge for his neck but John held me back long enough for Karl to READ the shirt, make a gleeful noise, yank his own shirt off and pull my shirt on. Which made me happy. So he spent the afternoon wearing it and showing it off and having other people read it and laugh and that totally made it worth it to me. If later that night my shirt died in a tragic accident when someone used it to put out a fire when the flaming jello shots went horribly awry: that’s fine. It served its purpose.

And as a bonus I got a little shout out for my ego when, during MONTALBAN, in the place where he usually either yells out, "Smiles everyone, smiles!" or "rich Corinthian leather" he yelled out, "my ass feels like rich Corinthian leather" and it was nice to know one of my alternate t-shirt suggestions was funny enough for Karl to plagiarize it.

But I know you have to be wondering, as I know some of my friends were, was John mad I spent $159 on a T-shirt? And the answer is: NOPE. John only would have been upset with me if, after I’d spent all this time and effort and money I had then been disappointed in Karl’s reaction. I have this bad habit of expecting people to get as excited about things as I am. Once I explained that, no, I didn’t expect it to be Karl’s FAVORITE present or anything I just expected him to think it was cool and funny, we were cool. Although he did admit that the $302 would indeed have been too much. But I already knew that. Which is how we’ve managed to stay happily married for 11 years.

- Related Link: http://www.warp11.com/

THE BUS: the good, the bad and the WAITING.

Okay, so I rode the bus. And it wasn’t that bad. Enough time has passed that I think I can safely say no one coughed Avian-flu onto me and, since no one actually coughed on me at all, I’m probably safe from T.B. as well. And I ate lunch without washing my hands first (although I wasn’t happy about it) and still seem to be free of any bacterial problems. I mean if I had a tapeworm I’d have seen some serious weight loss by now, right? So I survived unscathed. I haven’t been too ill to tell the rest of my bus tale, just too busy. I’m sorry if any of you were worried I had contracted brain fever and was no longer coherent enough to log onto the internet. My bad.

We had a simple plan: take a bus to the Haight, which would necessitate at least one transfer, shop for boots, eat lunch, take the bus back home. We also had a pocketful of quarters in case we were still in the Haight or between buses after our first transfer timed out. Although one useful thing I had already learned from the few times I road the train from the Sunset to the Castro is that most of the time no one actually checks for transfers – you can just get on and sit down. You could ride the bus for free until the unlucky day a cop checking transfers caught you and wrote you a ticket. I assume they make the penalty harsh enough that it isn’t cheaper to just employ this method full time. Okay, I tried to look that up but all I found was an anecdotal story that indicated a citation for not having a muni pass is $250. I did find THIS quote from an article on the subject,“Though statistics aren't available, MUNI (SF Transit) estimates put unpaid fares at five million dollars each year.”  And I’m already off-topic. Hard to believe I once got paid the medium-bucks for marketing, isn’t it? That I used to get paid for my ability to quickly and effectively get to the point? ANYWAY, heading out we were the only ones riding the bus that stops in front of our house (nine times out of ten when it passes us it is complete empty, except for the driver, and chugs on by without stopping) and the bus we transferred to was only mildly full (I think everyone onboard was seated) when it let us off in the Haight.

Right in front of Fluevog. So of course I have to digress and talk about boots. No surprise there. But this is not the story you think it is. This is a story… about JOHN. Yep. While I was picking up boots and putting them back down and frowning and trying to figure out what I exactly wanted out of the practical ankle boots I had come seeking I suggested John might kill time by trying on some boots of his own. So he did. And then something shocking and miraculous happened. For just a fleeting second John UNDERSTOOD how I feel about boots, or at least about the boots currently on his feet. He said, I swear to god, “Can I wear them out of the store?” Yes, not only had he found boots HE really liked (see picture) but he liked them so much, thought they were so great, he didn’t want to put his Converse back on. He was in boot love! An emotional state I have tried endlessly to explain to him. I had repeatedly gushed about how ridiculously amazing Fluevog’s Angel-Soled boots were (they resist alkali, water, acid, fatigue and Satan) but since I tend to gush about, well, lots of things, he didn’t really believe me that putting them on the first time was like “putting on your favorite boots you’ve already broken in” even though really, it is. I still actually marvel, when I lace up my knee-highs and stand up, how comfortable they are.

In the meantime I was having NO boot luck. They didn’t have either of the boots I liked in my size and I wasn’t going to get the exact same boots as John in a smaller size because: lame. The boots he picked out were similar to mine but different enough that we could wear them out together without feeling dorky. I finally decided (to the disapointment of the Fluevog sales associate) that I would just order boots online since I knew a 6 ½ of whatever I wanted would fit me. And later, that was exactly what I did and they arrived and made me quite happy. If they came in white I would order a pair to wear to work with my scrubs. I mean, if they resist alkali and acid they probably also resist dog-pee, right? Sadly the only white Fluevog shoes only come in MEN’S sizes, not women’s or unisex.

ANYWAY, I then discovered something else, which is you can totally get a contact high from someone else’s boot purchase. I was almost as happy that John had found boots (which yeah, I thought looked really yummy on him) as I would have been if we’d BOTH found boots. I still felt that warm “BOOTS” glow. Once the boot purchasing was done we had a quite tasty lunch (getting to eat really good BBQ ribs, while not as exciting as getting boots, is still pretty high on my list of happy-making-things) and then geared up for part two of our afternoon: Taking the bus back HOME.

This ended up being much more what I had expected from the bus riding thing. The two buses that were supposed to be half an hour apart were running, literally, right behind each other and when we got on (after 25 minutes of waiting, and not just random waiting, but “the bus should have been here at 2:00 and now it is 2:20 and it just went by the other way” kind of waiting. We got the last two seats. By the time we got off at the station to wait for the bus back to OUR neighborhood there were people onboard standing (and swaying) waiting to take our seats. So we got off, crossed the street and waited. And waited. And waited s’more. As bus after bus after bus that was not OUR bus pulled up, waited to see if we would get on and then pulled away again when we failed to move. Finally our bus came, we boarded with our just barely expired transfers and I got to experience the F.U.L.L. route (since we’d gotten on at practically the END of the route in front of our house) of OUR bus. It slowly ground up and down and around the hills of Twin Peaks. I’m pretty sure it did two circles, a capital cursiveR and a large figure eight before it finally lurched up our street. John opined that it would have been faster to just walk back up the mountain to our house from the station but, factoring in the 3 – 5 stops we would have had to make for me to have mini-asthma attacks (I wasn’t carrying my inhaler) I figure it would have timed out about the same. There was only one other couple on the bus, a cute little Asian couple that looked like they’d been married 50 years, and, unsurprisingly since our neighborhood is a residential area filled largely with retirees, they got off at our stop. And the empty bus chugged away.

Our mission was successfully completed! And for $3.00 we’d done in 3 ½ hours what we could have done for probably $0.41 cents in gas in less than two hours. Whoo!

Surprisingly (to me) what I ended up hating most about the bus was not that people were breathing germs on me. It was that these germ-infested people all have the ability and the right to YANK the damn cord and have the bus STOP where they want to get off. And since it is human nature (or at least American nature, which is why we all weigh an extra 20 – 100 pounds) to want to get off as close to where you are going as possible, the damn cord got yanked every couple blocks. I ended up thinking, “you could have gotten off two blocks ago the last time the cord was yanked and WALKED from there dammit!” about 27 times during our brief bus venture. The bus is SO freaking slow. Agonizingly slow. Between stopping at bus stops where people are waiting, stopping quite a bit in general SF traffic and then obligingly stopping every single time someone yanks the cord the bus is STOPPED more than it is in motion. As a control freak THIS, of course, bugs the CRAP out of me. If I have to be stopped in traffic I would SO rather be alone in my climate-controlled, doesn’t-smell like feet, comfy little Mini. But that’s okay, because I found a website that will calculate how many trees need to be planted to offset the damage you’re doing to the atmosphere and then you just pay them to go plant them for you.

A few days later, when John and I mapped out the route I would need to take after I was offered a job downtown and I realized I would have to take the bus, the TRAIN (which is notorious for being late and breaking down) and then ANOTHER bus I had to politely decline the offer. I also had to say no because the floors were dirty. It literally took all my restraint not to clean the exam room I was in while I was waiting to be interviewed. But even if it had been my dream* job, there was no way I was taking on that morning commute. I was trying to imagine it in the rain in the dark and I came up with a BIG OLD NO FREAKING WAY.

So I have to find a job with either PARKING or only one tranfer. Hopefully one that doesn't involve waiting for the train that sometimes never comes. Wish me luck.

*I am pretty confident my dream job will never include GROOMING cats. Sure, watching them blink bitterly into the gusting hairdryers that clip onto their kennels is pretty entertaining but that would certainly NOT make up for the scratches I would incur while trying to shove a feline into soapy water. I’ve learned this the hard way – Cats don’t like baths. At all. I have the scars to prove it.


- Related Link: http://www.fluevog.com

Laurel VS. Public Transportation

Tomorrow I am taking the bus somewhere. I haven’t figured out where yet. But I know the bus that stops literally right across from my house goes to a main stationy-thing (I should probably find out what that is called) and that from there you can get on MANY different buses that go many different places. So that’s what John and I are going to do. Get on the bus, get off the bus, get on another bus and then get off and walk to, well, maybe someplace that sells boots. And yes I know I need to know the number of the bus and of other buses and where they go and when they pick up and after I post this I plan to get online and figure all that out along with what, exactly, a transfer is, how it works, how long it is good for and why it looks like some people get on and off the bus without ever paying. I have many things to learn.

So why does this rate a blog entry? Because, with ONE exception about eight years ago when I came into the city to hang out with Joel and somehow he convinced me it would be easier to get wherever we were going on the bus, I have NEVER ridden the bus. In my memory there was an old lady with live chickens in her lap but I think my memory may have added that later for narrative amusement. I do remember it was gross and crowded and slow and I didn’t like it AT ALL. Because *I* am a SUBURBS girl.

Until we moved to the city last fall I had spent my entire life living in a variety of suburbs. The ugly suburbs of Northeast Bakersfield, the dorms surrounded by houses of UOP, the rolling hills of Marin county (I don’t actually think it gets more suburban than that), the Victorian houses of Old Petaluma (I could walk to the store and to the downtown shops but my little cottage was still totally in the ‘burbs part of it) and last but not least the delusions-of-grandeur-having suburbs of Folsom (once a nice little town with a famous prison and many oak trees -- now an ever-expanding parking lot covered with foreclosed houses that didn’t exist two years ago).

Yep – 36 years of suburb living. Not suburban living (which would mean more like city living which is weird but so is MUCH of the English language – growing up in the suburbs probably means that you are NOT suburban and now I’ve gotten to the point where neither even sounds like a real word in my head anymore so I am going to just leave it) but actual living in the suburbs. I’m not proud of it. But I grew up in Bakersfield where if you wanted to see something OTHER than tract houses and fog (winter) or tract houses and heat haze (summer) you had to walk at least ¾ of a mile. Which I did. As soon as I got old enough I walked to school and as a teenager I was willing to walk, in 100 degree weather, in full “summer” goth regalia (black boots, shorts, t-shirt and SPF 15 which is, I THINK, as high as it went back them) to get to my friend’s house or to Longs to buy an ice cream cone. But if you wanted to go any further than that you had to drive or be driven. So my parents drove me all over the place when I was little.

And pretty much from the MOMENT I got my drivers license I never walked anywhere again. Thus starting the pattern in my life of always being the friend who had a car. In high school, in college, I was the girl who had a car and would drive. Especially in high school when the car I was driving was a brand new Chrysler Laser Turbo which, after I wrecked it the first weekend I got it and then they put it all back together again, I drove everywhere. Sometimes with as many as six people crammed into it. That law they have now about how during the first six months teenagers have their licenses they can’t drive any OTHER teenagers without a grown up in the car? That’s because of me. Sorry teenagers. But I digress. The point is I liked driving, never minded having to drive, never even minded being the designated driver once that became an issue because being the driver means you are IN CONTROL. I love, both metaphorically and literally, being in the driver’s seat.

I like it to the point that, if possible, I will drive somewhere instead of fly. Or take the train. I hate AMTRACK. My parents thought it might be a good way of my getting back and forth from University to Bakersfield for holidays and so I tried it. Once. And I hated it. The train stopped in every single town and never got over 50mph. A drive I could have done in three hours and forty minutes took SIX hours on the train. SIX! Also, if you are driving you get to decide that, if you want to stop for Taco Bell two hours into the drive and then stop again at hour four to use a restroom and buy a Hershey bar, you can. I like that control. I like controlling the temperature of the car, what kind of music is playing and how loud it is. I pretty much like everything about driving. I like driving so much that for fifteen years I bought stick-shifts on purpose because it felt MORE like driving. I do NOT, however, like feeling like I need knee replacement surgery after being stuck in traffic for an hour and I REALLY do not like rolling BACKWARDS into the car behind me (which is always a Mercedes, don’t ask me why) after I get stuck on a steep hill. So once I knew we were moving to the city I knew it was time to trade my stick shift in for an automatic. Since that automatic engine was packaged in a brand new green Mini Cooper S, I didn’t mind at all. Now I giggle manically while accelerating up the mountain to my house.

So yeah, I love driving. I’m a control freak who is, incidentally, terrified of flying (but they make pills for that so I CAN fly when I need to go someplace I can’t really drive to, like New Jersey). But that isn’t the ONLY reason I dread the bus and have managed to avoid it for nearly ten months. I’m ALSO a bit of a germaphobe. Just running errands in the city I always try to remember to WASH MY HANDS before I eat something. I don’t fear CRIME, just bacteria. I don’t even like using shopping carts at the Safeway because I have seen the OTHER people who use them and while they are a HIGHLY diverse and entertaining bunch (I can’t imagine I will ever get tired of the street theater that goes on 24/7 here) I can tell some of them aren’t quite as obsessed with cleanliness as I am. Plus I saw that episode of Oprah where she had people go around and swab things in public for germs and all KINDS of nasty stuff was on everything.

So riding the bus is a bit like being trapped IN the germy shopping cart. A big germy shopping cart filled with germy people coughing TB on you that goes really slowly, stops all the time to let more germy people on and then doesn’t even go exactly where I want to go. I do not want to take the bus. Really.

But, I do want to get a job soon and I have no delusions whatsoever that whatever vet hires me is going to have employee parking. There IS no free parking. John has to pay some ridiculous price every month to park on the roof of his own building. If the vet I end up working for DOES actually have, say, four parking spaces in a teeny lot they will be for clients. And maybe the vet himself. But certainly not for smock-wearing me. And most likely what will surround the building I work in will be many other buildings and metered parking. And at $1.50 an HOUR I couldn’t really afford to keep the meter fed even if they WERE willing to let me stop working every HOUR to run outside and feed quarters into the meter.

So tomorrow I ride the bus. I’m taking John so that while I may have to battle germs I at least know I won’t get lost or get distracted by reading my book and look up and realize I’ve taken the bus to Bayview. Something I would so do. So we’re going to practice. Wish me luck! Hopefully we’ll get safely home and back without getting lost OR having someone cough bird flu onto me.

If I had a brother…

Most of the 37 years I’ve been on this planet I’ve really enjoyed being an only child. I tend to be quiet and bookish and don’t really like noise or games or, well, other children. I’ve never been sure if this was a chicken or the egg thing but it worked out. I was always the kid sneaking off to read. My parents, after they adopted me, fully intended to GET me a brother but they were told that, having GOTTEN one child, they now would go to the end of the list. Which was seven YEARS long. And back then they were already OLD for parents – my mom turned 31 a few weeks after they got me and my dad was closing in on 40. Another seven years would have made them REALLY old parents. They also had enough foresight to realize that a brother seven years younger than I was really wouldn’t do me any good. He wouldn’t be a play-mate, he’d be someone I’d have to baby-sit. So they decided to stick with the just the one which was, as I said, fine by me

Instead of having a fantasy that I had a twin sister out there I had a NIGHTMARE that I had a twin sister out there. I used to worry she’d show up and I’d have to change my hair color and style and get colored contacts so I wouldn’t look like her. I never had those “stay on your side” fights on car trips in the backseat. I had the WHOLE thing to myself. I could stretch all the way out and SLEEP. No one ever broke my toys or told my boyfriends embarrassing things. And when I was 16 I got a sports car. The ultimate symbol of being a spoiled only child.

BUT

There have been times, mostly as an adult, that I really wished I had a brother. A funny, supportive Waltons, Eight is Enough kind of brother to share the load, help out with my parents, visit them on holidays so I don’t have to feel guilty for every single one I miss. Someone who would give me that "hang in there -- only 5 more hours until Thanksgiving is over" look and refill my wine glass again without being asked. Somone for my husband to hide in the den with while my mother and I are fighting. But I have this feeling that if I actually HAD a brother it would suck. WHY? Well, lots of anecdotal evidence on other “State” adoptions that happened in Bakersfield the same decade I was adopted (as well as all the people I know who actually HAVE brothers). I was born of two smart teenage nerds* who were good at school but bad at birth control. My mother’s best friend’s daughter was born of a woman and one of five men; she couldn’t narrow it down any further than that. Her younger son was born of a teenager and a felon. I turned out to be a smart teenage nerd. Guess how THEY turned out? Yep. Slut and juvenile felon, respectively. My mom, after getting a baby and thinking she could mold and shape it to her will has, over the years, become a GREAT believer in the power of genetics. So taking into account the likely parentage of little bro (let’s give him a name shall we? The most popular baby name seven years after I was born was Michael so let’s call him Mike) and knowing my own parents I think it would have gone down like this:

• Mike would be my mom’s favorite
• Even though he’d been in jail
• She’d totally be in denial about the jail thing
• I’d still have all the responsibilities of visiting and caretaking even though Mike would still live in the same town
• My mom would have all kinds of excuses why it was easier for ME to drive 300 miles to do stuff than for Mike to do it, whatever IT was
• I totally would have had to baby-sit Mike all through my teenage years
• Mike would have read my diaries and listened in on my phone calls
• I would have gotten in trouble for hitting him after I caught him doing this
• After refusing to pay ME to get As because “that isn’t the way the world works” they would have rewarded Mike monetarily for getting Cs because he needed the encouragement.
• And since he’s the boy HE probably would have gotten the sports car
• By now he’d probably be married to some woman I couldn’t stand
• Some bitchy blond republican woman with a spray on tan and fake nails
• And have three bratty kids that aren’t nearly as cute or smart as my faux nieces and nephews
• Who I would have to buy presents for all the time
• And who would groan and complain if I got them books
• And who would never send thank you notes
• Not even after I gave up and just started sending money
• Every time I ever tried to talk to my mom about Mike or his bratty kids she’d defend him and make me want to kick things
• Even though he was a grown man with three kids Mike would still try and borrow money from me
• And then when I wouldn’t give him any he’d “borrow” it from my parents
• I would say “MAN I wish I was an only child” a lot.

*there is, of course, a part of me that is terrified that this was just state adoption agency propaganda and that they were white trash too. One of many reasons I have never been at all interested in trying to find my “real” parents is my DEEP ROOTED fear that I would find my mom sitting on the porch of her mobile home in Oildale, smoking and wearing thongs and a tube top that obscured half of the faded tattoo running down her left breast. She’d take a deep drag off her menthol cigarette and say, “Your father?  I haven’t seen that son of a bitch in years… so… you got any money?” At which point I would run away.