Semi Adult

Holy shit. I just watched that show Hoarders on A&E and as a result instantly threw out everything I own, including all my Christmas presents. That show seriously scared the shit out of me and I highly recommend that you never watch it. Not only is it disgusting and horrifying, it will scare you into thinking you may have a hoarding problem. I usually buy toilet paper in bulk but now realize that I may be a hoarder so I threw it all out the window and will only buy toilet paper one roll at a time, as needed. In the episode that I saw after they cleaned 5,000 pounds of garbage out of her house, they found 2 dead cats. Seriously. Can you imagine what that house must have smelled like? I’m bummed when I lose a pair of earrings, but when a few pets go missing it may be time to check yourself. The one thing that’s good about the show is that it makes you feel a lot better about yourself, like sometimes I feel bad that I can’t remember what happened the night before or that I woke up covered in bruises, but have having two dead cats in your house is wayyy worse.

If one more person emails me the article “What not to wear at your company holiday party” I’m going to lose it. Every year it’s the same thing, I get these articles forwarded to me like “Choosing the appropriate outfit for a work function” or “Crossing the line with co-workers” — get off my back! What are holiday parties for if not to let loose and get to know your co-workers on a different level. You’re going to provide me with unlimited alcohol, a dance floor and no rules or regulations, what do you think is going to happen?? My friends that I don’t even work with are always the ones most concerned — Sarah, remember what happened last year? How once you got to the party you realized how inappropriate a tube top with tights was?”  How do you expect me to get ahead? Hard work and dedication? Please….(and this picture is of my outfit from this year’s party, cute right??)

One of the main problems with starting a new job (other than the whole working thing) is making friends. Let me be clear up front - people love me and line up to be graced by my friendship, but when you enter a new environment you have to put in a little work upfront to make sure you get associated with the cool kids and don’t accidentally end up at happy hour with the people who like talking about work and their kids. It’s important to identify someone who is friends with all the good looking, fun, party people but who you know that you’re ultimately cooler than, it’s a science really. The problem is ensuring that you don’t seem creepy when you’re trying to befriend these people. Generally speaking you need to find a common ground or better yet a joke that bonds you together, however; you need to ensure that the joke translates into friendship before you beat the joke to death. Sadly, I’m at the point of beating a joke to death. I have my eye on a friend prospect and we bonded over a joke about Razor cellphones so now every time I see her I bring up the Razor….it lost its humor about 10 mentions ago. I’ve never  been in this situation before. I was at my last job for so long, I had all the friends I needed and had to put a sign on my door saying “not accepting friend applications”, now I’m suddenly that girl who says “we should grab a drink sometime” so often that people definitely think I have a boozing problem. They’re going to be sorry when they see me at the holiday party tonight in a bathing suit, with my dance crew and my own private VIP area.

It has been brought to our attention (thanks Morgan) that we never addressed the fact that Aldous and I have rejoined the workforce. Let’s be clear — we’re freelancing and we’re only doing it cause they’re paying us in gold and threw in chauffeurs with 24 hour access. It’s really weird working again (oh and awful) after loving the life of unemployment. We were a rare specimen, probably the only two on the planet, who were unemployed, not even thinking about going back to work and not caring. We kind of didn’t realize that the rest of the world has been panicking about “finding work” and “paying bills” and “feeding my children”, all that crap. So after months of answering the question “what do you do?” with “be awesome, work out, watch One Tree Hill and drink for free”, I now have to say, “ugh, I work in advertising”. After I explain to people how much I hate it ,everyone has the same response “you’re lucky you have a job!”. WTF?! Lucky to have a job?! Well this must be the worst luck ever. Luck was sitting on the couch watching Hoda & Kathie Lee and waiting on the stoop for the mailman everyday. People have got their priorities out of wack. I’m more embarrassed to say that I have a job than I ever was saying I was unemployed. However; based on my productivity and dedication levels I doubt it will be long before I’m back on the couch, man, those were the days.

Some are good and some are bad. Like seeing someone fall down the subway staircase is hilarious, but then can get awkward if they really can’t get up and appear to be injured. But I’m here to talk about the awkward situations that are just annoying. For example, my boss walks into the office today and has a band-aid on her face. Yea, thats right, straight up Nelly style, (and I don’t mean Furtado, I’m talking about hot in herreee Nelly). Like what the hell am I supposed to say when someone walks in and has a fucking band-aid on their face? I guess there are a few options — Hey, do you know that there is a band-aid on your face? OR Hey, what happened to your face? Did you cut yourself shaving? (my boss is a woman) OR the option I went with — say nothing. It’s probably the worst option because then I couldn’t look at anything else, I found myself wondering what was underneath the band-aid and did she think about how awkward and uncomfortable it would make her co-workers. I mean seriously, I don’t care what the story was, if I had to walk into work with a band-aid on my face I would make an announcement saying “yea assholes I’m wearing a face band-aid, lets get it out in the open”. Personally, I think it’s inconsiderate to put your co-workers in this kind of situation, I think she should have stayed home and let her face “heal” so I could write this post without having the minimize my screen every five seconds.

Many, many months ago I posted about the “unique, eye-catching” tactics desperate job-hunters were using to get their foot in the door. For example, the loser who sent a company a shoe with a note saying “trying to get my foot in the door”. As the recession continues to drag on (seriously?) I have to imagine that job seekers are getting wayyy more desperate. Like they’ve probably gone from cute and interesting to scary and disturbing. I’m not saying these are my ideas but let’s say “someone” thought of a few ways to stand out from the crowd and really get your point across.  Mail the human resources department of your dream company a bloody knife with a note “Accidents happen when you don’t hire the right candidate. See resume attached”. OR mail feces to a recruiter saying “this is what will happen to your company without me. Call me!”  Consider this free job advice, and practically guaranteed to get a response, you can thank me when you land your new job selling knives for Cutco.

So I  have a new pet peeve which I think could lead to a huge business opportunity for one of our legions of readers — dudes and chapstick. While I understand that in the winter it gets cold and everyone does suffer from chapped lips, I get seriously creeped the fuck out when I see a dude put on chapstick. Like the thought of a guy even carrying chapstick grosses me out. I mean it looks like they’re putting on lipstick when they apply it and people tend to make this weird face when they put it on, just thinking about it makes me want to vomit. I was at a bar recently with a guy when apparently he could no longer deal with the cracking of his lips, he pulled out his chapstick but thanks my quick reflexes I was able to slap it out of his hand before he embarrassed both of us. There has to be a better way for men to deal with their chapped lips — for one, they could just step it up and be men and not give a shit or if they’re so delicate and ladylike and need to have chapstick, they need some super manly application device, like a blowtorch. Someone please get on this.