Managing Change

Last week I complained about a bad day at work, so today I think I will turn it around and discuss a more upbeat work-related topic. Namely, my manager J. J is not like any other manager I have had. In fact, she is not like any other person I have known. A one-time high school cheerleader, J maintains a constantly upbeat demeanor that would normally irritate the hell out of me, but for some reason she wears it just well enough that I find it incredibly refreshing and inspiring. J sees the best in all of her employees and actively connects us with opportunities to challenges us and help us grow. J respects are abilities and does not have a single micro managerial bone in her body. J is a spiffy dresser with an endless supply of beautifully tailored clothing. J brings in cakes for our birthdays and has a major sweet tooth and normally you'd hate somebody who can shovel chocolate into her mouth all day and still maintain a size 0, but with J I somehow don't mind. J inspires me to be better at my job because the thought of disappointing her upsets me to no end. J is the first manager I have ever liked, and has shown me that it is in fact possible to maintain a respectful relationship with the person who ultimately decides if your work is up to snuff.

In the past I have maintained a level of disgruntled resignation to the people I report to. In addition to the year I spent temping when I first moved to the area in 1999, I have had four managers before J.

Manager 1 seemed pretty cool at first, but three months into my stay there it became clear that she had little interest in her own job, let alone mine, and would spend most of her time out of the office planning for her upcoming wedding and the arrival of her new baby. I respected the fact that Manager 1 had achieved all of her professional goals and had opted to spend the next several years of her life concentrating on her family. That was cool with me. What I wasn't cool with however, were her unfilled promises of wanting to "mentor" me, because apparently her idea of mentoring was to let me do her work at a fraction of her salary with no promise of advancement for a job well done.

Manager 1 eventually resigned and was quickly replaced by Manager 2

Manager 2 was a surly Jamaican woman who hated me from first glance. I'm not 100% certain why she took such an instant disliking to me, but boy did she ever. I will admit to having possessed a certain amount of self-entitlement at 25 but she quickly took to work stripping me of that as my life became an endless series of data entry assignments, which having recently been doing the work of the Public Affairs Director, I was a little bored with, which showed in my attitude. Manager 2 also liked to criticize my wardrobe. She didn't look fondly upon my head to toe black sartorial statements and took every opportunity she could to inform me of this. Manager 2 also spent hours each day gossiping with B, the office priss, in her office with the door closed. Manager 2 tried to fire me, without success.

Eventually fate intervened and the President of our organization decided to promote the Development Director to be Manager 2's boss, and mine as well. Manager 2 was no longer my manager, and the Development Director quickly stripped her of most of her responsibilities. The Development Director was now Manager 3. I had previously disliked her overbearing nature that seemed a desperate attempt to overcompensate for some sort of personal insecurity perhaps inspired by her oversized doughy body and unfortunate frizzy black hair. But Manager 3 and I shared one crucial commonality--neither one of us could stand Manager 2, and we quickly bonded. In fact, Manager 2 was eventually forced out altogether and I was promoted to Public Affairs Manager, not a shabby feat for a 26 year old.

However, word that the organization was losing its funding and going under had inspired me to develop a contingency plan, which leads me to Manager 4 who hired me to work at a nationally-based progressive non profit. Early entries of Hey Pretty reflect my experience there so I won't go into major details expect to say that Manager 4 ultimately turned out to be a dud as well. If you've ever had a manager who dressed right out of the Juniors department at Kohl's, used flirting as her primary mode of communication with powerful men, and left you alone to photocopy for two hours while she got her hair done, then you have a good idea of what it was like to work for Manager 4. She laid me off a year ago and I have never missed her for a single moment.

If you're still reading this, all this is to say that J announced this morning that she's moving to Arizona to be closer to her family. As the lynchpin of our little work family, I hate to imagine what it will be like without her here, and her announcement this morning left all of us stoically attempting to not burst into tears, our chins trembling when she delivered her news, made more poignant by the fact that she herself looked like she was about to lose it.

We'll get a new team leader but nobody will be able to replace J. In this age of disgruntled office workers blogging about their sucky work environments I am proud to offer tribute to her. Here's betting she'll be just as happy and successful in her new job of full-time mom.

Watching You Watching Me

Doesn't that title sound deliciously stalkerish? I-66 already stole my thunder a bit on this, but its a topic I've been meaning to address for a while anyway, so I think I will just dive in and blog about it anyway. Ever since I installed it, I have come to delight in my site meter. Sure, posting is a joy and reading your comments makes my day, but checking my site meter to see who has visited is becoming a favorite procrastination activity. Some of the time I can deduce who has visited because site meter, lovely site meter, registers the company or organization that somebody logs on from. Since I know where most of my friends work, It's pretty easy for me to tell when certain regulars have been reading. Other visitors register as IP addresses, which does me little good but I can tell that the same IP addresses are Hey Pretty regulars. Most readers are from the area, although I have noticed an increase in visitors from New York, interesting because I don't know anyone there. Also intriguing are the referral links. Last week when traffic skyrocketed due to links from Wonkette and the Express, the majority of my readers were there through those links. My favorite however, are referrals from internet searches. The Ophal Mehta fiasco brought me some traffic, but more often than not its people who like to do Google searches in order to answer vexing romantic issues. That particular activity basically amounts to treating Google like a Magic 8 ball, but many people don't realize this, so I occasionally get referrals from searches such as "what does the 3-day rule mean?" And then I laugh because it means that somebody actually read my blog in search of romantic advice. Suckers. Once I caught a friend reading my blog after doing a Google search on himself, which also made me laugh. A few of the referrals are confusing as I recognize the organizations but can't fathom who I know who works there, so its sort of interesting seeing them return to the site again and again. But its also flattering. Since I seriously doubt any of you are trying to be slick and stealth about your reading habits, none of this should come as a surprise to you. But if you are, then you have been warned. Oh, and if you're my semi-regular reader who is in possession of my email, but whose email I don't have, could you kindly email me your email so I will have it for future uses for exciting things party invites? If you are unsure if you are that reader, you sent me an evite to a Kentucky Derby Party a while back.

Hey Pretty and the No Good Very Bad Day

Marcia, Marcia, Marcia. Ever just had one of those days? Yeah, me too, and I'm having one now. It started off great. I had made peace with some confusing situations that have plagued me for months, I was generally happy and satisfied with where I was, I produced some good writing for work, my hair was even behaving itself for once. And then things slowly began to unravel somewhere around 11 am. Preferential treatment for a fellow coworker who seems the eternal do-no-wrong golden boy of our team; an assignment I really don't want to do; clueless managers; annoying coworkers in the lunch room distracting me from the Times Crossword; demanding industry stakeholders. All this workplace angst is leading me to wonder the following: how does one motivate oneself in the face of discouraging forces? Yes, there's the promise of happy hour at the end of the day, the fact that there will be a pitcher of beer at whichever social engagement I select to attend tonight. There's the thought of my Wednesday plans. There's the anticipation of coming home and unwinding at whatever hour that will be and the prospect of our ritual recap-of-our days with K, which are always a pleasure. But none of those are preventing me from staring sullenly into space for the rest of the afternoon while my work goes neglected. I understand the concept of reward for determination, but the determination part isn't sinking in. How do you, dear readers, muster up the motivation to focus on your work when you're in a crummy mood?

A Fine Line

As a writer its natural that I should feel inclined to use this blog thing here as a sounding board for whatever issues are dominating my thoughts on a particular day. Blogging is great for the opportunity it gives me to turn ideas over in my mind and share them with my loved ones who regularly read whatever it is I have to say. As evidenced by the material I have posted over the past couple of years, the range of issues I post about varies. What began as an exercise in examining mass media representations of gender identities has clearly morphed into a hodge-podge of intellectual and emotional goods. But saying that Hey Pretty has adopted an "anything goes" approach to reporting would be a clear misrepresentation . I thought it might be useful to explain my process here for a second. Every entry of Hey Pretty is drafted in an empty email in Outlook during spare minutes of my day. A typical post takes several hours to write, as I tend to blurt everything in my head at out once, and then return to it sporadically to refine the message, and more importantly carefully edit certain pieces of information out when I feel that I have gone too far. In the case of posts that describe situations involving other people, I have grown somewhat apprehensive about reporting at all. The possibility of violating anyone's privacy or confidence in in me hurts beyond words, and the posts that do involve others, especially romantic ones, are the most agonizing of all. As regular readers know, I never go so far as to call specific people out on anything and only those who know me well ever really know the specific players referred to in my entries. But for those in the know, it's all there. Writing in all forms is, and has always been, a huge part of my life. When I'm not doing it everything feels off and highly unsatisfying. Because I lack the discipline to start a novel or the great ideas to pen a work of non-fiction, blogging is my attempt to satisfy the immediate, every day urges that drive me to write. I also like to think that in the future, reading old entries will be an interesting glimpse into a younger version of myself, much in the way that reading old junior high diaries are for me today. Its reassuring to have a record of where you've been and how far you've come. It's also a way for me to express thoughts that I might not have the courage to share out loud--as open as I pride myself on being, there's often a line that can be easily tripped over if you're not careful. Certain situations, those defined by emotional intimacy are too sacred to be discussed, so if it seems like I drop the ball on certain topics (as I am about to) its simply out of respect for other individuals.

Having said all that, it's time for a nice innocuous Friday morning post about nothing at all, a list of reasons to be happy today:

-A nice long weekend is on the horizon, and I have fun activities to look forward to
-Men in button down shirts and shorts
-The lunch I am about to have with coworkers because margaritas might be involved
-A certain Italian restaurant with mint green walls
-Bar golf tomorrow and the prospect of buying something hideously preppy to wear. I'm considering the idea of making people call me Muffy all night. If it's not rainy, I'm blowing my hair out straight for the ultimate country club bitch look
-Dr. Dremos tonight!
-I have yet to read the paper today and am blissfully ignorant of current events
-The fact that EJ coined the term "pride and prejudice moments" a while back, and the more I think about it, the more I adore it and seriously hope she someday writes a chick-lit book and includes that phrase.

and many more as I think of them, some of which I will even share with you, others I will oh-so-mysteriously keep to myself.

Blab to Me About Your Love Life and I Will Immortalize It

Dearest, darlingest hey pretty readers:

I need help. My fate is in your hands and only you can help. I am currently seeking interview leads for a writing project I am pursuing where I will examine the various kinds of romantic relationships that evolve out of playing kickball in Washington, DC. We all know what a mack-fest the game can be, but there are the rare occasions when a flirtation across the flip cup table evolves into something more substantial and enduring. As people in my OWN division are frustratingly unwilling to help, I am reaching beyond my comfort zone to find possible interviewees. If you have met somebody special through kickbll, or even if you're the kind to makeout with five different people in one night, and would like to participate, please indicate your desire to do so in the comments section and we can proceed from there.

Cheers,

Your local neighborhood fledgling freelance writer

Hosts With the Mostest

Last weekend Lulu and I hosted an engagement party in honor of friends who are set to be married in late October. As one of the only members of the wedding party who live in DC, I thought it would be only proper to offer my party planning skills to throw the soiree. I had no prior experience in planning engagement parties. In fact, the sum total of my party planning experience was when I served as social chair in kickball for two seasons, and that mostly entailed trying to wrangle cheap keg deals out of DC bar proprietors. But my mother has perfected the art of high-brow cocktail parties tinged with bohemian whimsy, so I figured I had an hereditary advantage. Surely party planning is an inherited skill. The group house that I live in throws several fetes a year, always resembling the usual DC house party of several hundred strangers stuffed into our downstairs, cheap beer flowing freely, and at least one visit from the local law enforcement officials. This one would be different, so I turned to my experience as a party attendee for inspiration. It was then that I realized how one-dimensional my celebratory experiences in DC have been. With the exception of the occasional spontaneous "small gathering" in a friend's living room where attendees tend to get ridiculously plastered on cheap wine, the majority of the non-bar parties I have attended in DC have fallen within the raucous house party variety--the kind that although fun, tend to represent a stubborn allegiance to the Peter Pan school of adult responsibilities where 20-somethings cast aside their goals of someday perfecting normal adult behavior in order to chug Miller High Life and chase the elusive dream of eternal post-adolescence. There's nothing wrong with this, but it in no way resembles the events I envisioned myself attending when I was younger when I thought that my 20s would resemble a Wilt Stilmanesque world of dashingly disheveled fallen preppies trading witticisms over martinis.

Ironically, the closest I have ever experienced to the latter was cocktail hour in my friend Ted's room my junior year of college. Ted actively sought to be the most destructive force in the lives of everyone around him, while at the same time embodying the qualities of stuffy lock-jawed Brahmin culture. He spent his weekends roaming the Ohio countryside in his decrepit old Saab in search of antiques, perfecting the art of the perfect Beef Wellington, and chasing willowy blond field hockey players, much of it in some sort of quixotic gesture to John Cheever, an author he had at one point unsuccessfully lobbied our school's English department to include in its syllabus (asking PhDs in Post Modern Theory and Post Colonial Theory to value the insights of the muse of WASP America was ultimately a lesson in futility, much like the lives of the characters in Cheever works themselves). On the other hand, his favorite activity often included dropping several tabs of acid and finger painting the walls of his room. I think he just liked to be a contrarians, and its probably for that reason that he and I hit it off so well. Anyway, my junior year, Ted decided that it was an absolute abomination that nobody had yet thought to throw weekly cocktail hours on Friday afternoons so he set to work making it happen. It was decreed that every Friday from 6-7 (or 5-6, I can't remember which), 50 of Ted's nearest and dearest would cram themselves into his room (it was a tight fit, but the room was unusually large), dressed in their cocktailery finest to sip gin and tonics or gin martinis (those were our only beverage options. Ted felt strongly that we all had to learn how to appreciate the juniper berry). Although it seemed perfectly natural at the time, in retrospect, I am sure that the site of a couple dozen wealthy bohemian hipsters shedding their vintage bootcut Levis and too-small indie rock tee shirts to don suits and cocktail dresses, while exposing indecent body piercings and body hair may not have been met with approval from Mr. Cheever himself. But we fancied ourselves the height of sophistication at the time and we were too young, stupid, and arrogant to appreciate our folly. If you had the audacity to show up in your normal clothing you were sent away to change, and if you refused to drink gin you were denied alcohol altogether. Pretentious yes, but loads of fun, as the events would inevitably drag out for hours as the hard core among us lingered and the toxicity of the substances ingested multiplied exponentially (the gin was merely a precursor to the harder stuff).

So, in planning this fete my experiences in Ted's room were present in my mind, although I in no way sought to emulate their debauchedness. Rather, Lulu and I simply invited a couple dozen of those near and dear to the couple to bring over a bottle of wine to share with the group. We provided finger food, cups, plates, napkins, seating, and my living room to enjoy them in. Amazing how smoothly things fell together. The main challenge we encountered was overcoming the obstacle imposed by little sleep the night before (damn you Cop Week and cute boys who tend bar!) to buy supplies. But once that was over with, it was smooth sailing. Snacks were prepared, guests arrived with wine in hand, and most everyone followed our instructions to don "festive attire." Seeing a bunch of 20- and 30-somethings decked out in cocktail dresses and sports coats while hanging out in my shabby living room made me oddly proud. It seems counterintuitive but hosting can be a great activity for those of us who are naturally introverted or not always into making small talk. Having the need to freshen somebody's drink, answer the door, or putter around in the kitchen is the perfect excuse to exit a boring conversation. An added bonus of party-throwing is excellent left-overs. There was no extra wine, but my fridge is stocked with cheese and exotic spreads.

It may not have been quite the Fitzgeraldian experience I would have liked (and they were narcissistic alcoholics anyway and I have no immediate plans to perish by fire anyway), but people had fun, and the couple was pleased. In the end, that's what's counts. In relating the evening to my mom, she was thrilled that her daughter had finally incorporated something remotely adultish into her chaotic social life.

Here's to many more "adultish" evenings to come.

Sitting Pretty for 15 Minutes

Blearily reading the Post's Express rag on the metro in the morning has become an integral part of my weekday morning ritual. I usually flip to the back, peruse the gossip, horoscopes, blog log and trends articles before tossing it aside for whatever book I threw into my bag two seconds before running out of my house. This morning was no different. I quickly scanned the blog log to see if any of my favorites had received shoutouts. Not recognizing any of the names, I was about to flip to another page when a familiar set of words danced across my peripheral vision. Printed as an excerpt from the Express's own blog were these words: Washington, Romance, Brooks, Brothers, and Georgetown. "That's interesting," said my still half-asleep inner self, "I recently wrote a blog entry containing those words." Still too sleepy to really care what another blogger could have to say about prepster love in DC, I turned the page to read about how the fashion label Victor and Rolf will be designing a line for H&M. The article was accompanied by photos of a Victor & Rolf show, which featured models in these creepy yet fabulous hats that also served as face masks, similar to the kinds worn by fencers, giving those who wore them the aura of potentially disfigured avant guard scensters. After several minutes of staring at this page and contemplating all the fabulous uses for a fishnet face mask hat, I decided to flip back to the proceeding page to check out what my apparent doppelganger had to say about bi-partisan love in DC. Let me note here that I am a notoriously bad morning person and it usually takes me several hours of "awake" time before I am indeed "awake." So it was after reading this pithy little article three times that it finally sank in that the commentary of the commentary attributed to the blog prettiestboy.blogspot.com was indeed MY work. Damn. Nothing like being jolted awake on the metro by realizing that the blog for a major urban publication has 1.) read your blog; 2.) determined that it in someway fits into the broader dialog of the minutiae of life in DC; 3.) prepared a mini-commentary on it. Or to put it another way--my love life was referenced in the Express and people who I don't know and who I will probably never meet are speculating as to whether or not the "relationship" will weather the election year, a question I have been actively trying to avoid. Interesting isn't it, when a total stranger contextualizes your life for you, no? The piece was accompanied by photos of the Governator of California and his famously Democrat wife, Ms. Maria Shriver, which sort of bothered me because I don't really like either one of them. But I guess that is what I get for blogging about my romantic issues. So on the one hand I'm completely flattered, but on the other, it's incredibly surreal to stumble across something like this with absolutely no warning.

You can check out the Express's commentary here.

When Did My Life Become an Episode of Dharma and Greg?

I have liked boys preppier and more conservative than me before but this particular pairing borders on comical. The Georgetown Waterfront is his favorite hangout. Meeting up for dinner, I am dressed in head to toe black with a big beaded necklace my mom once made for me, and my hair its typical rebellious mess of curls. He is in head to toe Brooks Brothers, sipping a gin and tonic, looking as if he just returned from briefing a Senator. The conversation turns to politics once again, and of course we disagree on every issue. But there's something in his delivery as he explains to me why he doesn't support the living wage, the depth of knowledge he has obtained on the subject, and his absolute passion in his convictions that I gotta respect. In fact, its downright endearing. We watch a Red Sox game which I have trouble following. I go to the rest room and when I return he is despondent. The Yankees scored a run while I was gone, their first since we had started watching the game. I am his good luck charm. This morning on the metro I express distaste for his views on same-sex marriage. He kisses me lightly on the lips and reminds me that "the political is not always the personal." I think about how I have been raised to not distinguish between the two, how my entire life they've been enmeshed as one. I wonder if people struggle over the political affiliations of the people they're attracted to elsewhere, or if this is just a nerdy Washington thing. If Mary Matelin and James Carville can do it, I guess I can too.

Warning: Rant with questionable language

So we have this website at work. Part of what the website does is list other organizations that we have worked with. As we are a nationally-focused program, we work with a lot of different organizations, and thus list a lot of different organizations. Over the past two weeks a representative from one such organization has taken it upon herself to micromanage every minute of my professional life. This comes in the form of calling and emailing basically every day to ask if their listing has been changed to reflect the totally insignificant change to their name that the enacted a few weeks ago. As I am not the website updater, merely a middle-manager and thus a cog in the machinery of government contracting, it is my job to pass her request on to somebody else and to politely tell her several times a week that the changes are forthcoming. I have little control over when these changes are enacted and it doesn't help that the person making them is barely literate and something of an idiot. Well, her calls are increasing in frequency and her emails now have those charming exclamation points on them, that in my opinion, should only be used when something dire is occurring, like the grant that will prevent your non-profit from closing down forever is due in five minutes and nobody is available to run it over to the grant office. THAT is a problem. As you may be able to guess, or you may know first hand, I do not deal well with aggressive personalities. Being pressured, hurried, disrespected, or condescended to will cause one of two things to occur: I will either lash out with my best acidic one-liner or shut down altogether and refuse to communicate with you. Neither is preferable in a professional environment so I feel now as if I am hanging on by a mere thread, trying with all my will to prevent either from occurring. It isn't easy... Having just been assigned to a major project feeding research to the CEO of our organization, that if executed well could very much create some extremely preferable professional opportunities, the pidley name change of some unknown manufacturing association is not a high priority for me. A higher priority is reading and summarizing 10 policy briefs, conducting internet research, reading newspaper articles, and forming an opinion about a very salient public affairs issue all in the span of three days while getting my "other work done" as well. Who is this cunt?

Awesome

awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesomeawesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome and finally, awesome.

At some point today I will arrive at a creative way to cryptically EXPLAIN this awesome awesomeness. But for now that's all I got. Mores laters.

Abby Hoffman Would Be Proud..?

Stealing books can be lots of fun. I regard books as neat, conveniently contained sources of knowledge and pleasure. I also think of them as objects to be freely shared and exchanged with those around you. I cannot bear the idea of selling my used books to total strangers, but I am perfectly down with the idea of swapping a volume or two with a friend in exchange for something I have yet to read. I understand the mechanisms of capitalist culture, and to me, books exist outside of that (ironic for a girl who from a publishing family, or somewhat inevitable?)--their value dependent on far more than their asking price in the market place and so I treat them as such. I have a habit of borrowing books from places that I probably shouldn't (donation boxes at work for instance, or the used book shelf at the place where I am taking a writing class), but I do bring them back when I am finished with the, only slightly worse for wear. Yesterday I "borrowed" a volume of Christopher Buckley essays, which I fully intend to return once I have read it cover-to-cover. I will note here that I never left books from commercial ventures, as I have no interest in being arrested for shoplifting at the age of 29.

What isn't cool is another kind of textual appropriation, and that is the activity of plagiarism, which has gotten Harvard undergrad Kaavya Viswanathan in a whole host of trouble recently. For those of you who don't read Gawker or the NYT book section a million times a day, Ms. Viswanthan is attracting heat for possibly "borrowing" many passages from her recent book How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got A Life from other writers such as Megan McCafferty and Sophie Kinsella. To every frustrated unpublished writer, this development comes as something of a dose of schadenfreude--a well anointed young writer (with a hefty advance for her second novel) falling from grace when it is revealed that she may not be all that after all. It's also an interesting commentary on the publishing industry's hunger for revenues and their willingness to heavily package and market a new work at the expense of literary integrity--books valued more for the entertainment factor than their intellectual worth.

The popular website The Morning News is capitalizing on the train wreck that is the Kaavya Viswanathan story by offering up a new contest aptly named "Steal This Book, and That Book, and That Book..." wherein readers must pen a work of fiction up to 750 words composed entirely of sentences and passages previously published in a book by another author. In other words, if you've ever had an urge to mesh passages from American Psycho with Anne of Green Gables, this is the contest for you. Not only is this completely clever in the fact that it both exploits and mocks the Viswanathan controversy, but it further illuminates the intellectual property issue firestorm that it has ignited. To totally dork out for a second, it also perfectly embodies the oh-so post modern practice of "pastiche" wherein works of other artists are referenced with a satirical intent.

Rock on.

Welcome to the Working Week

Ugh. Standing in a crowded metro car that is slowly filling up with the smell of burning rubber is so not a good way to start one's week. But because we rarely have the luxury of *deciding* how our week is going to start, as Mondays are normally foisted at us by the cruel Gods of the post-weekend, so began the week in the land of Hey Pretty. Another bad way to start the week is by spending Sunday night closing down the bar after kickball. Okay, so I didn't close it exactly, but I was the second to last kickballer to leave. The last one, my partner in crime for the last hour or so of the night, stubbornly stayed behind and refused to walk me to the ATM leaving me to my own devices when dealing with the homeless guys outside. Thanks. Thank you, very much. No goodbye kiss for you. (which was probably your rationale, actually because for some people, the slope from tequila shots to walking out of a door is a slippery one indeed).

Spring is causing people to act in all sorts of weird ways. DC has spring fever and it has it bad. And because DC is the smallest big city anywhere, I keep on running into faces from my past. There's nothing quite like the experience of going to a party specifically because you have a crush on the person who invited you only to run into the person who you dated for a month or so over the winter who mysteriously lost interest in you. It really throws off one's game and distracts one from the purpose of the evening, which is to flirt with the host of the party, not get into a conversation with winter dumper about the fact that he broke up with you because you wouldn't put out. Oh. Mystery solved. Also, it's bad to share that sort of information with certain girls, because certain girls are just to the type put out simply to prove a point. Not that I would ever do that, mind you. I'm just sayin'. So after all that fretting about how soon is too soon is turns out that there wasn't a "too soon." In fact, "now" wouldn't have been soon enough. Kids these days. Anyway, so DC has spring fever and all weekend I felt like people from the past (even those who I see pretty regularly) were resurfacing in odd ways and propositioning me strangely or telling me weird things about myself based on their perceptions, which are only half way correct. Apparently, I have an uncanny ability to create chaos without even really meaning to, wanting to, or trying. I guess you could call it my special super hero power. Maybe they should make a TV show about me.

Speaking of TV, I just had a revelation based on the show 24. I think it would be hilarious to do a 24 about me. If you imagine the typical week of DC 9-5er I think this idea is so hilarious simply because it is so bad. The first episode would be all about me hitting snooze, sleeping, showering, getting ready, walking to the metro and the metro delay. It would have a great cliff hanger as well because the episode would end just as the next train was pulling in to the station and viewers would be forced to wonder if I actually got to work on time. The rest of the season would include me sitting at a desk typing stuff, wandering outside to have a cigarette, chatting with a coworker, and leaving work. There could be all sorts of interactions with people based on my histories with them that they viewer would have to infer for themselves. To spice things up I could go to a happy hour later in the season and stay for a long time so there could be a good five episodes based on my experience at there. It's something for the network execs to think about.