Get Back to Work, Slacker

Muscato asks us, in the comments of our Work, What a Dreadful Idea whinging post, “So how was it?” Oh, the insouciance. It was, in alphabetical order, disgusting, exhausting, filthy, hateful, innervating, loathsome, menial, petty, twisted, uninviting, and yucky. The usual.

Digging my way out from under a medium sized mountain of email, I ran across a convoluted exchange between the members of a committee I am held prisoner by. The series held a growing note of crisis, deepening into hysteria and then just disappeared. I wrote the one member I like and asked what happened. Her reply? “…we finished it. You want to have lunch Friday?”

Yes, bitches, yes. I am back. Don’t call me Friday, I got plans for lunch. Afterwards I plan to speak firmly to Angelus Garibaldi about his underpants.

Work. What a Dreadful Idea

Last Thursday I went back into work for the first time in a couple of weeks and didn’t last long. I had planned to stay for half a day, but after one measly hour, I realized that plan was not going to fly. I may have mentioned I was lying on the floor trying not to faint when I came to this conclusion. That kind of insight is just something I’m noted for.

Before I fled, I had noticed the hundreds of emails that had piled up while I was out, many, many of which include astonishingly generous offers of people I have never met, but who want to share a big chunk of their enormous inheritance with me. Usually they are from some African country which, oddly, I have never heard of. Scattered in amongst them were also plenty of messages about my job. Since staying in a locked and upright position was the most I could focus on right then, I decided I would deal with all that when I felt better. Today, as it turned out.

Do you have a job where you suspect your boss does not actually know just what it is you do? Do you work in an office with several dozen other people who have no apparent function and yet, should you be out sick for a couple of weeks with, oh, say, bronchitis, cannot figure out how to deal with the crises they carefully forward to you? I do.

I love my job. I really do. It’s interesting, the work is gratifying and at times like this, I get the very false impression I am irreplaceable. I know, of course, that’s not true. If I were to accept those kind offers that flood my email to share in the wealth of the Republic of the Ivory Coast and I never came back to my desk, eventually someone would have to figure out how to do what I do. Since I’m only sick, they know they can ignore the problems, place them tidily on my chair (office protocol: the more desperate the situation, the more important it is to leave it in a really neat stack) and go out for more coffee.

Tomorrow mrpeenee will be back in the office, will remove his pathetic voicemail message claiming he is out sick and has no idea when he will return and which 21 people so far have ignored in order to leave increasingly testy voicemails, will respond to a few dozen emails, and will triumph. He will not lie down on the floor. That’s what he gets paid for.

Boys Gone By

It is tragically, tragically true that as a very young gay boy, I had the hots for Jethro Bodine, aka Max Baer. Fortunately, the infatuation passed.
I also was drawn to Ricky Nelson, a phenotype (pretty, luscious lips, thick hair) I NEVER outgrew.He's mine.

The Buzzcocks - Ever Fallen In Love

Eat that, skinny, young whippersnappers.

Quiet, please.

I must be getting better because a) I appear to not be dead yet and b) I'm tired of lying around, but not yet well enough to try anything else. I went out to dinner last night and Friday with our guests and while it was most amusing, it also wore me out. I'm just so darn fragile. Everyone's going out to brunch at Zuni Cafe this afternoon, but I'm staying home like a sensible Miss.

Saki has taken to demonstrating cat yoga for me in hopes that I will take it up, but I refuse.

Not Dead Yet

So I'm going to pretend all the snarky potshots taken in the comments section of my last post were simply playful attempts at humor, expressions of loving concern in disguise. The latest mrpreenee sickroom news: I'm still sick. Being the overachiever I am, I shot through the flu and wound up in bronchitis, from which I write, wheezing and hacking. And just how very not well are we? I am too sick to watch porn, that's how sick. Just kill me now.

We finished re-doing the guest room in the middle of my puniness and just in time for our friends Ehsan and Dennis to arrive. They were very flattering about the room, and have been most solicitous. I sent them off touring around with R Man this morning and we'll be going out for Thai food at the charming Grand Poo Bah shortly. Imagine, actually leaving the house. Except for a brief, ill advised attempt to return to work yesterday, where I wound up lying on the floor of my cubicle thinking maybe this wasn't such a great idea, I haven't been outside for more than a week. Still. I've started a round of very expensive antibiotics, so I expect to better pronto.

Maybe the Thai food will help. If not, I'm sure houseboy Aloysius Tregiautomy will.

In the Grip of the Grippe

Maybe you’ve noticed every other blog includes pathetic whimpering posts about the cold or flu the writer is overwhelmed by. In my ceaseless effort to stay au courant, to remain ahead of the curve, to leave the Joneses in the dirt, I am now sick myself. Snotty and achy with a dry hacking cough that sounds like a student production where they decided to create a mashup of Camille and La Boheme. I am staying home from work today and, oh boy, this is also the day the new carpet is being installed. I’m sure it’s not really any louder than a small war being fought in our guest room and I’m dealing with all the dust stirred up by inhaling it so it doesn’t mess up the house. That’s just how I am, giving, giving, always giving. Do you think it’s possible to drown in your own snot?

I wish I had a houseboy who was talented in nursing, but when you pick them based on their pole dancing ability, like Wolfgang Cupertino here, I guess you can't have everything.