Let us never speak of this again

I do not wish to waste your time and mine complaining about:

1) The status and activity of my uterus.
2) How much I hate my job.

The reasons for this are:

1) Some you are female; you have your own reproductive issues. If you are one of those irritating women who have never had cramps and don't understand why everyone makes such a big deal over PMS, well then we simply will never be friends. Those of you who are male likely don't care and/or are freaked out by the reality that is the female menstrual cycle and would prefer to never, ever have to hear about it.
2) If you hate your job, I know you understand without my saying a word. If you love your job, I fear you will lecture me about it and make me feel even worse about my dumb-ass employment situation. I both envy and despise you - you who actually enjoy your jobs.

This being said:

1) I am outrageously hormonal. Any injustice (real or imagined) perpetrated upon my person will result in caustic verbal attack or an outburst of angry tears. I am way too sensitive right now to watch any TV programs about helpless animals in danger. No Animal Precinct for me.
2) I cannot begin to explain the depths of idiocy that have swept the company that employs me. You know that Anonymous Question/Suggestion box that was set up to allow my scaredy cat co-workers to submit questions and suggestions without fear of reprisal? Those submissions are now required to have a legible employee signature. Utterly ridiculous.

The hormone levels will work themselves out. The job is a tougher problem. So until a suitable substitute can be found, it seems the best thing to do is divorce my emotional self from the job. There's a certain beauty in not caring about the politics of your workplace. It's a simple reversion to the old temp employee mindset. Only even more carefree since I know the paycheck is going to appear in my checking account every other week.

So no more complaining. Take some Advil - no more cramps! Go out with friends - when you're not on the clock, pretend that work doesn't even exist!

And let us never speak of this again.

In Dreams

Well hello there.  Fancy meeting you here. 

I’d like to kick things off by telling you about a dream I recently had about an ex-boyfriend. Fascinating, I know.

This is the latest in a months-long string of dreams I’ve had about said ex-bf.  Let’s call him Utah.  May I mention that we broke up YEARS ago.  And that until about 5 months ago, I had exactly zero dreams about him.  That last spring he had infact moved with his girlfriend to a different city.  So I haven’t laid eyes on him in many a moon.  Other than the occasional brief email exchange, we have had little contact in the past five years, and almost no contact in the last year or so. 

At the beginning of 2004, I started having dreams about him.  Not real down-n-dirty dreams, but they were awfully romantic.  Even in the absence of any serious dreamland action, these dreams left me swooning. 

Co-incidentally, he moved back to town a few months ago, sans girlfriend.  And despite the fact that there has been zero contact between us since his return, the dreams persist.  On to last night’s dream. 

It was my birthday, or some such occasion on which I was receiving gifts.  All the guests were gone except Utah.  I was sitting on a small crème-colored loveseat, a la Ikea, infront of a fireplace.  Utah walked over to me smiling.  He unzipped his jacket and pulled out a giftwrapped package that he handed to me.  There was much exclamation on my part.  I was particularly surprised by the gift b/c despite dating for 2 1/2 years, he had never once recognized my birthday (true story – he was a real peach that boy was). 

I unwrapped the package to find a copy of the New Yorker.  The date on the cover was February 23, 1927.  Utah asked me to open the magazine to a specific page.  On that page was a crazy love poem of which I remember nothing except for the syrupy love poem-y-ness of it all.  Then Utah looked at me, reached into his jacket, and pulled out another copy of the New Yorker from February 23, 1927, opened it to the poem, showed it to me and just stood there with a big sappy smile on his face. 

Ah yes, a story interesting to no one but me. Welcome to the world of Shelby Gelato.