Relocation Fail

I was supposed to move to London. But I didn't.

Let me just start out by saying I never really wanted to move to London. Well, I actually really did want to move there, but not under the circumstances such as they were. The company I worked for was headquartered in NYC, but they were going international and I was offered the job of starting up the customer service department in the UK. I was really excited because I was pretty sick of my job and I figured this would be just the change I needed. Also, London is a super rad city. Or so I've ascertained in my few brief visits there. I guess I didn't really take into account the fact that even if I was moving to London I was moving for a job and I'd be doing the same work, just somewhere else. I thought it would be enough to be in London, and I'd figure out the shitty job thing later. I found out about the move about a year before I was scheduled to go and that was definitely what kept me at that company for the extra year. I loved the company, loved the people, HATED the work.
In the months leading up to the move I was hearing various opinions about the move I had planned. My boss and other co-workers would not stop talking about how lucky I was. What a great opportunity this was . How this would never happen at another company. This is all true. I was really lucky to get this shot. I won't argue with that. I also totally fucking deserved this opportunity. I worked my ass off, gave 150% and was really good at my job. I supposed the problem comes when opportunity is confused with compensation. Also troublesome, when people tell you how excited and grateful you should be. Every day. For A YEAR. Some people created entire relationships with me based solely on asking me if I was excited to move to London. "Hey! How long till the move? You ready? Found an apartment yet? I have a friend who lived in London for 3 months 35 years ago. I'll TOTALLY give you their number! How excited are you? You must be SO excited!! Oh my god, if I was your age / single / not totally fucking lame I would SO move to London!!" *Squeal* This is literally the conversation that would happen at me when I would go to get coffee in the morning. Or a snack in the afternoon. Or to go wash my hands. Or in the elevator. Or when I would go to take shots of triple sec in the snack room after my boss left. Usually I didn't even contribute to the conversation. When it first started I would answer and share my hopes, fears, excitements and concerns. Then I realized they weren't actually listening to me. I don't know if they were just looking for a reason to talk to me because I'm hot and awesome, or if they were trying to live vicariously through me, but it was hard to deal with. I virtually stopped eating and drinking in the office just to avoid these conversations. Some people have empty relationships based on sex. Not I. I have empty relationships based on great opportunities. Motherfucker.
I was also hearing some opposing opinions. I'm not sure if you've heard but apparently the dollar's pretty weak, especially in comparison to the pound. The first thing most people said to me when I told them I was moving to the UK was "You'd best be gettin' a raise. A hyuck!" (For some reason I always remember this comment coming from a toothless hick out of Appalachia.) I was regaled with horror stories of the expense of living in London and how my salary would basically have to double in order to maintain any standard of living. These people would convince me that since I was basically giving up my life as I knew it, I should be compensated infinitely more than I deserved. I was, to say the least, confused. When I brought these concerns up to my boss and HR department I was told that it would all be figured out and that I shouldn't worry. Maybe I should stop trusting people and figure stuff out on my own. Hindsight's always 20/20. Motherfucker. (Note: I'm getting sad and nauseous even writing about this shit. I'm so fucking glad there's some Livingston Cellars in the back room. I'm going to need another spritzer to get through this post. Also, I just checked out a girl. I liked her dress. Whatever.)
Since the company was going international this required the creation of a whole new business unit. We need our own little customer service team (me). A new tech team (a couple of dudes). A new marketing team, sales, etc. All of this was to be managed by a GM who was hired in the UK. She came over to the states for six months to learn the business before we moved back to London together. She was my direct boss and she was really great for me when she first started. She got me a raise straightaway and restored a bit of my faith in the whole project. She also quoted me the salary I would be making once I moved to London and it was well more than I had expected. That was cool. One of my really good friends was originally supposed to be moving to London when I did. That made the whole thing a lot more exciting for me. Then he quit. That sucked. I was already really scared, and this shook my confidence further. My boss tried to make me excited after my friend quit, but there was some shit going on in my head that couldn't be undid. A couple of months after my that guy quit they brought Bob on board as the sales the department in the UK. That was totally radical because Bob is my hooomeboy, and I was super pumped that he would be moving too. But when he became a part of the team I couldn't help feeling like I had tricked him into getting involved in something that might be kind of a shitshow. Now, Bob is an adult, and it's pretty conceited of me to think that I had much effect on his decision to join the team and move to London, but I was feeling pretty crazy at the time and this was just another tire on the Springfield Tire Fire of fear and loathing.
As the months and weeks rolled on I made no preparation whatsoever to move to another country. I tried to look for an apartment, but it couldn't really be done from across the Atlantic also I had some serious drinking to do before I left and that was priority #1. I had a vague notion that I would need a work Visa. When I lived in Italy I tried to apply for a work Visa once I got there only to discover that it needed to be taken care of before entering the country. It worked okay in Italy because I just pretended to be the mute cousin of the owner and the plan was that I would scuttle into the back room when we suspected any restaurant patrons of being INS. Basically if we saw anyone wearing a suit and tie enter the restaurant I would put my head down, mumble something incoherent and run for the basement. I'm sure there are some Italian business men who believed that La Darsena restaurant was doing the universe a solid by employing a retarded chick for the summer. At any rate, I didn't think this plan would work at an internet company in the UK, namely because our office in London was on the 345th floor and I didn't think I could make it to the basement in time to avoid La Migra. So I emailed the HR department about getting my Visa. And then I went and talked to them. They were busy ordering lunch so I didn't hear much, and because they weren't stressed I wasn't going to worry about it. Also I was drunk.
My bosses heard my concerns about the fact that it would be really tough to find an apartment without actually being in the city, so they decided to send me to London to attend some conferences, get familiar with the city and scope out some possible areas to in which to live. That was totally rad. In theory. I went to a couple of conferences and talked to some realtors but mostly I was by myself walking around London, which was fucking awesome. I really love that city. At one point in the trip we realized that my hotel room hadn't been paid for in advance and that we would need to put it on a corporate card. My boss was really sketchy about helping me figure this out and at one point it looked like I was going to have to put $2,000 worth of hotel room charges on my own credit card. Which was maxed out. I distinctly remember walking along the Thames thinking "Okay, if I call my mom and get her to wire me $2,050 I can afford the hotel room and maybe I can eat tomorrow." I lost 6 pounds on that trip because I couldn't afford to eat. If these were the problems I was having on a fucking recon mission to London imagine what would happen when I actually moved there. Forget seeds of doubt, doubt had just taken a huge steaming dump in my brain. (Wow, I just really grossed myself out. But I'm not erasing it.) Also when I got back my boss was angry that I had charged food to my room. The 2 meals that I did eat in a week were a source of major stress in my happy little business unit. I think this is when I started to drink at lunch.
Now my departure is just weeks away. At this point Bob and I were starting to get stressed out about all of the stuff that HR and our bosses hadn't figured out, so we kind of formed a two-person ACLU for white kids moving to London. We were still really unsure about how our salaries (and a million other things) were going to work, so we wrote down a list of our concerns, emailed them to our boss and he sat down with us after he'd gone through the list to try and figure everything out. Also joining us was the VP of People who apparently was instrumental in forming the "relocation plan". Here it was: We were to have no Visas. We would go as "consultants" until the HR department had time to figure everything out. We would continue to be paid in US dollars, however the company would pay for our housing which, in a white board diagram, in purple ink, explained in a thick French accent seemed to show we were breaking exactly even to what we were making in the US. (This does make sense considering the dollar is half the value of the pound and half our salaries were going to rent. Or it doesn't make sense. I was probably drunk.) There would be no raises. We hadn't proven ourselves to deserve a raise thus far. This would be reassessed at a later date. The VP of People then went on to discuss that everything else aside, this was going to be "awesome". And the really important thing was that once we got to London we had to make sure to plan a super fun time for him when he came to visit. And then he left. And got on a plane to Japan. Leaving myself, Bob and our two bosses in a room with no air. This line rang in my head for weeks after this meeting: "You're going to be consultants, and we're going to figure it all out, and it'll be AWESOME!" At this point I'd pretty much checked out. You know that scene in Austin Powers when the steam roller is coming towards the guy really slowly, and he just stands there screaming and never gets out of the way? That was me. I was in the great opportunity barrel going over Niagra Falls. Just pass me the sippy cup full of vodka and make sure you don't spill any as you do.
Time, like the shitty asshole that it is, waits for no man. I didn't start packing up my apartment until a week before I left. And by "packing up" I mean throwing everything away. I triaged 60% of my worldly good. When Jan. 4th, departure day, rolled around I had 5 boxes and 5 bags left. No home, no furniture, no nothing. I had a great New Years. My best friend Annie came to New York and I think she was one of the only people who actually said to me "If you don't want to go, you don't have to go." I also think she was one of the only people I told of my fears. She returned to me a lot of the faith I had lost in conversations with my bosses and the snack room carrion. I realized that opportunity is in the eye of the beholder. Maybe this wasn't mine. The day Annie left I went out to dinner with my mom and my brother. I told them how I felt, and my mom agreed with Annie. If I had spoken to only those two women in the days before I left I would never have gotten on the plane. But my brother, as only your motherfucking brother can, urged that I just get on the plane. He echoed what I had been thinking, that if I didn't just get on the plane I would regret it forever. So that's what I did. I got on the mother FUCKING plane.
Okay, speaking of the plane. Always looking to save a buck, the plane tickets our company booked were really weird. We went through Munich to get to London. (Look at a map. That's retarded.) I in fact helped find the tickets and Bob and I thought it was pretty funny. We were actually sort of excited to get a stein in the mother country en route to our new home. Too bad it was 9am when we go there. (The first time.) When we were booking the tickets it didn't seem to matter, but this becomes important later in the story.
Rewind to day of departure. The plane left at like 5pm and I had one of those hangovers that gets worse as the day goes on. I had been staying at Morgan Freeman's house because I'd sold my bed three days prior, so everything felt extra surreal. We took a cab to work, I packed up the rest of my shit, said goodbye to like 4 people and headed back home to "finish packing". (Read: "start packing".) I had been so lazy and reticent in my packing job that I had decided that instead of shipping stuff I would just bring 5 bags to the airport and pay the extra $150 a piece to check them. My brother was at my apartment and I made him wait for FedEx to come pick up all of my boxes so he was totally annoyed with me when I finally left. (Also when I was born, on my 3rd birthday, yesterday, March 13th of '02 and that time I walked in on him when he was hooking up with that chick.) I got to the airport and checked in after paying $300 to get the extra bags on the plane. We had a fun flight to Munich because Bob speaks a lot of German so he was translating a lot of stuff the pilot said. (Even though he also said everything in English.) Munich Airport at 9am may as well have been Louisville, then back on Lufthansa to London.
This is the part of the story that I always tell quickly, in a mumble. It's these minutes of my life that my boss used to throw me under the bus. To make the whole thing my fault. He used these couple of words to pit Bob against me so he wouldn't be totally demoralized and quit. (Or so I believed in my guilt / fear / vodka addled brain.) This brief moment is something I have replayed in my head 1,000 times and can't figure out a way I could have done it better.
When we were in line at customs I was ahead of Bob and was called to the counter first. (Deeeep breath. I'm about to start crying.) I had my passport ready, and just like I had done dozens of times, I walked up to the customs agent and presented myself. He looked at me and asked "What's the purpose of your visit to the UK?" Um. Well. I have no fucking idea. I had had so many conversations with so many different people regarding the purpose of my fucking visit to the UK. I knew I couldn't say business because I would need a Visa for that, right? But I'll be lying if I say I'm going for pleasure. Especially because I want nothing more than to poke my pointer finger and my middle finger into your two eyes, turn around and run right back onto the glorious Lufthansa plane that brought me here. If I'm a consultant, does that mean I'm here on business? And for how long should I be here if I'm a consultant? Why is your head so shiny? Why can't I hear anything? WHY WAS HR ALWAYS ORDERING LUNCH? Fuck.

"I'm here on vacation."

"For how long."

"3 months."

"Are you traveling alone?" And that's why writing this makes me cry. It was bad enough that my fucking bumbling uninformed retardation fucked my chances of getting into the country. I was drowning, and I had just pulled Bob down with me. He was so excited to get to London. And I wasn't. Had I fucked this up subconsciously/on purpose so I would get to go home and had I just fucked Bob's life up while doing so? (This is crazy. Bob: I know you're a grown up, but this is how I felt in the weeks after shit went down.)
The shitshow got good after that. I went on some spiel about being on a sabbatical from work while we investigated possible business opportunities in the UK. I may have shat my pants at this point. I can't really remember. The customs official, who we'll call Pat Sajak, told us to have a seat while he went over our documents. Pat left for a long time. Bob and I shat our pants more, joked around, waited, complained, stressed etc. until he came back. We talked about how any moron could clearly see that we were both dressed in multiple articles of clothing with our company logo on them. Two of my pieces of luggage had the logo. It was like shooting fish in a barrel for UK Immigration. We won the Darwin award over drinks that night, I'm sure. "Can you believe these two homeless looking motherfuckers tried to tell me they were coming to London on vacation? FOR 3 MONTHS? HAHAHA, Americans. If they hadn't destroyed us in the revolution it'd be another prison colony for hippies and rejects just like Austafuckingralia." Then they brought us to baggage claim to pick up all of our bags. We brought our stuff to some back room and they started going through everything. They went through EVERYTHING and took anything that was on paper. Birthday cards, letters, pictures, everything. Then they put all of our stuff back, very poorly. I watched a $400 dress get stuck in the zipper of my suitcase and laughed to myself.
It is now, dear reader, that I will tell you of our temporary home. The Heathrow Airport Detention Center. It looked like the lobby of the DMV. In Hell. If you needed to get you driver's license renewed in Hell, this is what the surroundings would look like. We had to leave all of our stuff outside. They wouldn't let us bring anything in because "Ya neveh know whaaash in that shhtaff." (That's supposed to be a cockney accent. Sorry, Eliza Doolittle.) The attendants at the detention center were the nicest people. They seemed to understand the fact that the protocol they were expected to enforce was stupid, but it had to be enforced nonetheless. They offered us the full array of vending machine fare available. This consisted of the following: Three different types of sandwiches. White bread with cheese and mayonnaise. White bread with cucumbers and mayonnaise. White bread with ham and mayonnaise. Two different types of "crisps". Plain, and I think the other was Mayo and Fried Cod flavor or something. (That should be the next Dorito flavor. I'm calling them.) The beverage assortment consisted of water, PG Tips tea and two types of Starburst brand fruit drinks. Lemon and strawberry, I believe. All of the beverages were served in the little plastic cups you drink floride out of at the dentists' office. Basically one sip of liquid. If you were still thirsty you had to go back up to the little hole in the plexiglass, flag down the chap who was watching the telly at full blast and ask for something else. The PG Tips was the best thing either Bob and I had tasted in all of our lives. The Starburst drinks were the sweetest thing I had ever ingested. And I've downed and entire bottle of Watermelon pucker in a night. I guess that's what comes with a Starburst brand drink. When we first arrived neither of us took part in the sammies because we didn't think we'd be there that long. As the night wore on I managed to eat one of each kind. The cheese one was my fav, but I really liked them all. Bob wanted no part. I think that poor guy really lost some weight on this adventure.
Before he dropped us off at the crib, Pat S. told us that he needed to go talk to his boss to see what was to be done with us, but first we would be interrogated by ourselves. (I don't think he actually used the word "interrogate" but just give me this one little thing.) So this guy pulls me and Bob out of our one room palace to get the real scoop on just what the fuck we were doing in London. I went in first. I think he was expecting me to try and keep lying. But no. Oh nononono. It was time to start playing a little game called "Throw EVERYONE under the bus." I told Pat the whole story. about how I'd tried to get my Visa worked out, how I didn't know how they'd come up with this plan, that I was a blinding alcoholic, how I was scared of thunderstorms and loved to sleep with the windows open. I told him everything. This guy made me feel like and A+, #1 moron. The second to last question he asked me was "So after you quit your job, what are you going to do?" His last question was "So you really thought this plan was going to work?" Whelp, Pat, to be honest I hadn't really thought about it. That's probably the problem here. Can I please buy a fucking vowel now?
After Bob went in he came in to talk to the both of us to tell us that we need to get mug shots and finger prints taken. Bob and I both perked up at the mention of shots, but our excitement waned as we realized our mistake. I really wish I had gotten a copy of my mug shot. I think my picture probably looked like Nick Nolte's mug shot. Bob somehow managed to get his hand in the picture while he was wiping the detention center and shame off of his face. I almost asked for the picture but I think Sajak would have tazered me. He was a total weenie. Then we were escorted back to our palatial estate to await the verdict. He had to go talk to his boss again to find out if were going to be let into the UK or sent back to the US. I frankly think he went to go flog the dolphin at the idea of exercising his massive and impressive immigration power over a couple of American douche bags, but whatever.

There was a phone in the room. We managed to talk to some people back in the States. Our UK boss was in pretty close contact with us, and she even managed to get a lawyer sent down to the airport. We called them, they called us but nothing was going to happen until we heard from Pat and Pat's boss. When the phone would ring it was usually for us, but sometimes it wasn't. When it wasn't for us it sounded like Osama Bin Laden calling to order pizza. I couldn't get the address of his cave right, so I usually just hung up.
The room we were housed in was totally weird. There were only three posters on the wall that didn't involve some list of customs infractions. One was an eagle (a symbol of America, no?), one was a flower and then the other was either a big horn sheep or an elk of some sort (do they have either of those species in the UK? I think they are indigenous to the US. Bob thought so too.) At some point in the proceedings Bob developed an extreme distaste for these posters and started to rant about it. Now, dear readers, many if not all of you know Bob. And you know if his ability to rant. This poster hatred produced some of the best Bobrant I have ever been privy to. Almost equal to when the temperature goes above 65 degrees or when Outback is out of potato soup. All in all Bob was an ideal cell mate. He has an amazing sense of humor and I think it was his presence which makes the whole thing seem funny in retrospect.
Sajak can back about 4 hours later. Or 8 hours. I have no idea. I think we landed at about 11. We got our verdict at about 9pm. We were going home. We had been found to be guilty of trying to pull a fast one on the Queen. Fuck us. We would have to go home, apply for Visas and then come back again once we got them. So the next question was "When do we get to go home?" Well rules state that when you get detained and then sent back you have to travel the exact same route that you came. This means that we had to find a flight that went from London to Munich, Munich to NYC. There was one of those flights. It didn't leave until 9am the next morning. We were staying here over night. Okay, fine. That sucks. Here's what sucks more: there were no beds for us. Apparently there were beds in this detention facility but only the real criminals (aka drug mules, weapon smugglers, terrorists etc.) got to sleep in beds. Corporate pawns with misplaced trust issues had to sleep on metal benches. We weren't even allowed to go get our books or iPods or anything. There were only a few books in the room. The only ones that looked mildly interesting were some shitty mystery book and the Koran. I read the whole mystery book and still had 8 hours to go. The TV came on at about 2am playing the original of the movie Carrie. With no sound. And the grate in front of the screen made it impossible to see the picture. You can imagine the fantasies I had of exploding a certain internet company with my mind. I tried to find a comfortable place to sleep. There was a side room that I kind of made my own. We were the lifers of the detention center so we got first dibs on the best chairs and shit. Nobody else was there for more than a couple of hours. I was pretty pumped about my little room until I discovered that this used to be the smoking lounge and I had most likely contracted contact emphysema by nestling my face into the pleather seat covers. I was in there alone for awhile until Bob woke up and came in to chat and then promptly take a snorecoma on the floor. (I love you Bob. You were very tired and uncomfortable.) So I didn't sleep. I just thought. About my life. And decided that this must be a sign from God, or Jen Savage or whoever is in control out there to make a change in my life. I had decided to quit my job many times. I'd actually got the words out to a superior twice, but those quits never quite stuck. I wasn't really sure this one would either, but the events that had unfolded and would continue to unfold were making it pretty hard to stay at the company with any of my pride intact. Plus, whilst lying awake for 12 hours I'd come up with some pretty radical ideas for food dehydrators and closet organizing implements and was resolved to call up Ron Popeil the minute I got within a PG Tips throw of a telephone. Having a job would just get in the way of my career as a great inventor.

The next morning Bob managed to smooth talk his way into laying hands on a toothbrush and face wash, and I rode on his coat tails in order to do the same. Then we noshed on a healthy breakfast of Starburst syrup and Fish and Chips....chips. Eventually we were escorted out of the DMV, to our stuff and we began to make our way to the plane that would take us home. Little did you know, dear reader, the benefit of being exported from a country. We were shot to the front of the line for our flight. And then we didn't have to take the normal passenger bus that brought all the other sheep to the plane. Oh no. We got our very own van. With a metal cage between us and the driver. It was a beautiful morning to be in a prison van in London. The van ride was pretty fun, and Bob chatted it up with the driver asking him all about how the gear shift configuration works in a van of this sort across the pond. Were things different because the steering mechanism was on the other side? Bob couldn't get enough. I was so amazed at Bob's ability to still wonder about anything at this point. I had given up, and he was still asking questions. He's a far better man than I.

When we got to Munich we were released from the authorities and if we weren't sleeping we were drinking. I crushed a split of 'pagne in Germany. At least I can say I did that. Proud, Mom? After minor crushing we got back on the plane and were homebound.

When we landed we both had 1,000 messages and emails from various member of the company. Apparently lodging had been arranged and we would be staying at one of the okayest hotels in Manhattan. All we wanted was to get back to some semblance of home, shower, eat, sleep and stare at a TV for at least elevendy blue hours. This was not to be. I still can't discern the motives here, but our boss had arranged for a "welcome home" dinner with our friends from work. We weren't going home to sleep. We were going out to dinner. With our boss. No. Fucking. Way. He took us to a fancy steak house and needless to say, without agreeing to it beforehand we all ordered the most expensive thing on the menu. If I hadn't been so tired I would have ordered a Gold Martini with a side of Sergio Rossi sling backs (Wow. I've never sounded more like a gay man in mah life.) I did manage to get a seafood extravaganza tower which made le boss wince, so that made me feel kind of good.

The next morning I woke up and decided I would go take a walk and think about shit. (Not actual POOP, silly.) I walked out the front door of the hotel and lo and behold there was a giant, inflatable rat standing out front surrounded by protesters. The employees of the hotel were protesting unfair and semi-illegal employment practices by the hotel chain. And this was the hotel where my company had chosen to put us up. Par for the motherfucking course. If I indeed needed another sign, here it was. Thanks for sending it over, God Savage.

So there it is. In a long, long, long blog post. I think I still left some shit out. Bob, if you feel that I've missed anything vital please feel free to start your own blog entitled "ThisDrunkBitchFuckedUpMyLifeGood III.blogspot.com" (There are two other with the same title originally penned right around the same time I discovered double bottles of wine.)

Postscript: Okay, in the company's defense, HR did send us an email outlining what were were supposed to say to customs when we arrived in London. Everything was legal, I just didn't read the email. Maybe I deserve the blame for that reason. Neither of us assumed that anything this important would be sent in an email with no follow up. But then who could have known that it was going to be this important? If we had tried to enter the UK at a different time, on a different day, talked to someone other than Sajak things could have been completely different. Who knows. Can't change the past. Just passive-agressively blog about it.

"Yeah, Sorry. I get NO cell service out where I live."

Okay, dear readers, (I stole that from Brad Neely, who I think stole it from someone more famous.  Dear Brad Neely,  If you're reading my blog you must be drunk, but you'll remember me as the wierdo who was sitting behind you chair handing you beers and blocking the door to the bathroom during the rendition of 'Dear Readers' after the showing of "We Are Wizards" at the Boston Independent Film Festival.  Remember the chick that passed out drunk in the comic book aisle and snored?  No, it wasn't me but we shared that.  I love you very much.  Let's make sex.  Love, The Wierdo Door Blocker Chick.)  Holy parenthetical digression, Batman.

Okay, as I was saying, dear READER, (Sup Jen.  What's going on?  How was your pizza?) I'm entering into some uncharted territory here, and I thought I'd share it with you because it's NOT pompous and self-centered to believe anybody gives a day-old shit about what's going on in my life. 

 This may be obvious to the outside observer: I'm totally single.  Totally, completely, terminally single.  This means that I'm allowed to go out and meet dudes.  I recently met one such dude, and was rather proud or myself because for fucking ONCE we don't work together.  We met at a coffee shop.  (Hello?  Cliche?  Can you call me back?  I think we have a bad connection.)  We talked and he seemed pretty unretarded, had the use of all four limbs and he could use words and stuff.  All in all we were off to a good start.  He walked me back to work and I, in a totally bold, un-me move, gave him my phone number.  He called and we went out for a drink and I, in a totally bold, un-me move, did NOT get pantshittingly drunk and went home que solo.  Then my good pal Jennifer came to visit and I dusted off my drunken-tard-whore mantle, got hammered and made out with the kid.  Oh yes "kid" implies he's younger than I.  What else would you expect?  Primordial Dwarfism?  Yeah, I guess that's a safe bet too. 

Post-make out I was having second thoughts.  The very idea of him made me feel a little queasy.  Maybe it's because I was wicked hungover, or maybe it was his gingerism, either way I was having regrets.  Here's where I get into unknown territory.  This has never happened to me before.  I've never liked a guy, hooked up with him, and then been over it.  I've always gone from MO to clinger in t-minus 2 days.  This is totally new, and to be completely honest, pretty fucking great.  

I'm snubbing.  I've never been the snubber, only the snubee.  This is fun.  I've been using all sorts of tricks that I didn't know were in my arsenal.  So far my favorite is the "Call back 30 seconds before you drive out of range of a cell tower".  I've done that twice.  Also, the "Pretend to not get text until the next day and weave elaborate tale of how you were busy trying to cajole a 4 year-old into taking a dump."  I do these things because I'm a dick and I don't want to be honest and say to him "Listen, Ginger, I really like my life and I don't need any supplement to it.  I'm going to go home, hang out with my rag-tag band of roomates and a four year old child.  I might watch an episode of Starship Galactica.  I might read the first 3 pages of a self-help book and fall asleep.  I don't know.  I don't know if I'll have enough time.  I have to get up super early tomorrow to sit at the coffee table and drink 4 cups of coffee before I eventually pour myself into my bathing suit and decrode on the beach for 3 hours. At any rate, what I'm trying to say is that it's not me.  I'm perfect.  It's you.  You're not a good fit for my awesome life.  Sorry.  I'll keep  your resume on file in case I get depressed and lonely at some point.  Chances are that I will, but I probably won't call you.  That's what booze is for."  I wish I could just say that to him, because I'm sure he'd just be like "Uh, okay psycho.  It's called 'Battlestar Galactica'.  Thanks for letting me know.  I'm all tore up.  I'll go bang the same 19 year old Scottish chick you saw me talking to when we met at the coffee shop.  Good luck with your wicked fun life." 

I'm not trying to be mean.  I find that real meanness only occurs when you're not trying.  So although I'm not trying to I probably am.  Whatever, I'm just a scared little douche trying to get through the day, and it's making me kind of happy to be able to snub for once in my life.  If you're going to begrudge me that you fucking suck.  Get off my blog......No.  Wait.  COME BACK.  I'm sorry.  I was wrong.  You don't suck, you're allowed to have an opinion too.  I love you.  NO I love YOU.  

Wait, fuck.  Did I tell him I had a blog?           

CONGRATULATIONS ON ALL OF THE FIRING!!!

                                                           

3 of the best people in the world were recently fired from their jobs.  This leads me to believe one thing: the world is going to hell in a hand basket designed by Rue McClanahan.

  

Dear Economy, 

Stop being sluggish.  Your posture is terrible.  If you keep making that face it's going to stick that way.   

 

Love, 

Me

Getting fired from  your job fucking sucks.  It's one of the more embarrassing things that can happen.  Besides pooping your pants in public.  In the daytime.  And having boogers coming out of your nose after you get out of the water to talk to the guy you've had a crush on for like 11 years.  (Don't assume that either of these things happened to me.  You're very assump....tu....ous.  Fuck.) Wow.  Now that I listed those two things I realize getting fired isn't really even in the top 10 most embarrassing things.  What about falling down in public?  Or spilling water on your crotch so it makes you look like you peed?  Oh what about ass sweat stains?  Sex farts?  Neckne?  Gingerism?  Being Canadian?  At any rate and all of that aside, getting fired fucking sucks.  A LOT.  But it happens.  And then once the firing is over, you're left with something.  It's actually the lack of something.  It's the lack of a job.  It's the lack of a mothertrucking JOB.  You have NO JOB!!  HAHAHAHA!  SCORE!

Why has society turned the phrase "I have no job." into some sort of admission of failure or fault?  To my mind, that's a cry of victory.  You have arrived!  You aint got shit to do!  Or, more accurately, you have everything to do.  For a brief time in your life, pretty much anything could happen.  That's fucking SWEET. 

 This post will be a list of all of the things which can possibly be accomplished during a period of unemployment.  I'l begin with some examples of real achievements already banged out by this crack team of jobless wonders:

1. Two kickball championships, and a successful reverse sleeper choke hold on some dude that was going to beat up your good buddy Karl: Completed.  (All three of these things happened in one night.  Who does that?  WHY DID YOU GET ALL OF THE AWESOME GENES? I WANT TO BE THE WILLIAM WALLACE OF KICKBALL.  MOOOOMMMM!!!!)

2. One shower caddy dissassembling mission: Aborted.  (Mission aborted because of decreased fine motor skills due to 9am Red-Headed Slut shots.)

3. 9am Red-Headed Slut shots: Completed.

4. Mission to Martha's Vineyard: Completed.

5. NOT being the reason a passenger ferry became engulfed in flames, crashed into China and sunk to the bottom of the ocean.  (Nice job, Savage.  Way to look where you were going this time.): Priceless.  For everything else, there's American Express. 

6. MO with wicked hot baseball player:  Check.  

7. Daytime margarita crushing: Completed.  

8. Dance Party at random local bar: Check.  

9. MO with waiter: Aborted.  (I can't disclose the details of this mission as only those on the "Need to Know" list have that information, however it is this reporter's belief that the eyes of history will look fondly on the reasons this mission was not completed.  For further information contact jensavage@ifuckingrule.net)   

Wow.  Now that I look at that list, there's not too many more things these guys could possibly want to do.  The above list is pretty comprehensive.  

But let's give it a whirl, shall we?

Things to do whilst unemployed:  

1. Get a haircut that makes you look like you have a bony growths on your skull that could be the beginning of devil horns.

2. Give a haircut that makes someone look like they have a bony growths on their skull that could be the beginning of devil horns.

3. Whittle.  

4. Boat.

5. Spelunk.

6. Carabeen.

7. Belay. 

8.  Stage a live performance of an episode of The Hills.  Use a real couture dress for the scene when LC realizes she fucked up huge.  

9.  Learn to impersonate a D-list celebrity perfectly and use that ability to get laid by a moderately attractive person that you probably could have hooked up with even if you hadn't nailed the impersonation.

10.  Learn all the swear words from that sweet African click language, and hurl insults at strangers.  "CLICK$$#$%#CLICK#$ YOU!!"

11. Just one day, start drinking the MINUTE you wake up. 

12. Hang out with me and repeat 5,9, 10 and 11.  

13. Hire a camera guy to film you walking around being yourselves.  Fame and fortune will follow.

14. Hire me to be your Brian Gerard "Kato" Kaelin.  

I love you guys.  Congratulations.  GET TO WORK YOU CLICKING CLICKS!!    

 

The "Do"s and "Don't"s of Dealing with a Girl You Don't Want to Date. Alternate Title: Sorry Oak

That title is something I made up back when I lived in NYC. Pretty cool, right? Yeah? Totally awesome, I say.
I used to think I was pretttttty radical. Still kind of do. I fancied myself the ADA of my own personal episode of Law and Order. Not the dykey red-haired one that's always trying to fist Olivia, but the tall, brunette that gave Jack McCoy the only stiff-arm of his long ADA-bedding career. (Or so I imagine. She very well could have had one too many Sloe Gin Fizzes and let him play "just the tip". I hope not though. These people are real to me. They're all I have.) I thought I was so cool, so cool that I could pick and choose what feelings I had, and avoid any sort of emotion that made me look less than totally ADA-y. In hindsight I was and still am, sweetly retarded. (Thanks Jen). Samantha Jones I am not. She's fictional. I don't think a lot of people understand that. Hot. Cool. Totally fictional. I'm not saying I've had my heart broken or anything. I've always been too chickenshit to fully get my heart broken, but I've been really fucking pissed off a couple of times and also one time I wasn't allowed to get pissed off. (I did anyway, but because I couldn't get mad at the dude I channeled it into an awesome diet which I have yet to be able to replicate. If I could bottle that shit I'd be a gazillionaire.)
I'm going to go over three real-life case studies of examples of guys that I wanted to date but that didn't want to date me and how things played out. (Note: I hate ALL of the nomenclature for the male gender in the English language. I hate "man", "guy", "boy". I also hate all words for female underpants. Actually, I kind of like the word "underpants". If I ever get a dog I might name him Underpants. DON'T STEAL THAT!!!!) This post is for all the homies out there who want to be able to bag chicks but still look like the good guy. Or less cynically, how to stay friend with girls you've hooked up with and want to be your GF. I'm going to teach you all you want to know. Why? Because I want you to think I'm the cool girl that has all of this figured out, thus fooling you into thinking that I'm too cool to become a clinger when in fact I'm the worst clinger of them all but you don't realize that until AT LEAST week 3 when you notice that my ability to climb tree and look in your window is neither cool nor cute. What do we think, Jen? Bored yet? Well it's only going to get worse so pour yourself some wine. Oh can't get the cork out? Sad face.

Case Study #1. Subject: Richard Dreyfuss. (names may or may not be real or spelled correctly.)
Richard was my roommate and we worked together. (I KNOW. Please hold all questions, comments, exclamations, under the breath mutters, rebukes, cat calls, racial slurs and facial tics until AFTER the lecture.) We hit it off immediately. We were both well into our respective alcoholism at this point but one time we even bailed on the bar to sit at home and hang out with our pet spider, Max. (Granted he drank 12 beers and I a bottle and a half of wine, but it doesn't count because we weren't at the bar.) Those were the happy times. A couple of weeks later I came to find Richard had a girlfriend who lived in Vermont. I think he may have told me straightaway, but I was either too drunk or too deluded to realize it. This was hard for me because I was totally clinger status at this point and we lived and worked together and he was wicked fun AND I was always drunk. But I managed stop anything really serious from happening further. Actually he may have stopped it, but history is written by the person with the blog so fuck you. Things were okay for awhile, and Richard and I still hung pretty tight. That is until he started fucking another girl with whom we worked. Nuclear. Psycho. Rage. Spiral. K-Hole. Crazy. I was inconsolable. Completely taken by surprise that this guy who cheated on his girlfriend with me would bang another girl IN FRONT OF MY FACE. The humanity!! The summer took a sharp turn for the worst at this point, and things ended with me smoking a enormous amount of pot, writing him a long hate letter and leaving it in a drawer in the house for him to find. Or to not find. "Dude, I'll just like, leave this here and if he's meant to find it, he like totally will and if he's not meant to find it, he like, won't. Totally, man. Pssshhh."

Case Study #2. Subject: Morgan Freeman
Morgan Freeman and I worked together. (Yup. I know.) Morgan was really nice. I was just coming out on the other side of Case Study #3 when MF and I started hanging out. I was sad, and he was nice. It was pretty innocent at first. Movies and shit. We made out once and then nothing for months. Then one night I went out to sushi dinner, got drunk, called him and shit got real. I was surprised by the whole thing and I think he was too. Especially considering I was supposed to be moving to another country in a month, so no matter what happened we had a hard date when it would all be over. I suppose that's what made it easier for me to commit. I didn't actually have to. So I totally threw myself into it, and from what I understood he did as well. We spent almost every day and night together in the two weeks up to my departure. Then I left. We hugged. It was sad. Get on plane. Arrive in foreign country. Said country didn't like the taste of me, and spit me right back to the U.S. like so much rancid Unagi. So I was back. And I called him. And he didn't call back. And then I saw him. And he wasn't happy to see me. So I got drunk, and I called. And I called. And I called. Then I moved to another city (in America) and cried. For a million different reason (probably least among them, Morgan) I cried for about a week. Then I emailed him, and he was very nice and tried to explain the best he could but I still don't get it and probably never will. What happened in the 22 hours I was on an airplane? If it was anything less than at least 3 phenomenal blow jobs with full ball cuppage this kid is fucking hit.
Case Study #3. Subject: Anjelica Houston
WE FUCKING WORKED TOGETHER. WHAT?? I could have gotten fired for this shit. I don't even know how the whole thing stared, but I know there was booze. I think the moment I hit clinger stage with him was watching him take shots of vodka and chase with water. SWOON!!!! Anjelica was very honest with me. He told me daily that he was a total asshole. That he was going to hook up with other girls, that he didn't want a girlfriend. That totally sucked to hear. But you know what sucked more? The night we were out at a bar and he tells me that he's going home to hook up with another girl. He looked me in the eye and told me this. I think he even said "sorry". Well, fuck. What's a girl to do? No self-righteous rage? No lies? He has not lied to me at any point. How am I going to deal with this? And he knew I was fucking pissed, at least I hope I told him as much. I'm not sure that I actually did. In my experience with Richard and Morgan (And TV shows.) this is when dudes check out. Peace. It's been nice knowing you. You're about to go crazy and kill my bunny. I'm cutting all ties. Anjelica didn't check out. He stayed around, but not in a mean, taunting kind of way. He didn't go out to the bar when I was there and let me throw myself at him like the sad, battered drag queen I turn into when I have too much Boone's Farm. He still talked to me and treated me as he always had, but he wasn't around as much as he used to be. I was incensed. How can he not let me hate him? How can he be treating me like he still cares about me but just as a friend so I'm not totally confused? How could he be helping he deal with this in the healthiest way possible? I don't even know if he was doing it on purpose, which is even worse! Is this dude so good to his core that he just naturally treats all people as he would wish to be treated himself? WHAT A FUCKING COCK SUCKER!! The real shitty part about the situation with Anjelica was that we had to be in the same office and the other chick he hooked up with was there too. Otherwise I've moved on from that pretty nicely and I count this chap among my best friends.
So what? Who fucking cares? No really. Who cares. I'm not going to try and answer those questions. I wrote this post because it's my blog and I wanted to get it all out. I think deep down I hope Richard, Morgan and Anjelica read this because I never had the balls to be as honest with them as I'm now asking them to be with me. If they do read this I want them to know one thing: THEY'RE FUCKING REAL!!! ALSO, that I know all of you (well maybe not Richard) were doing the best you could. We're all just fucking chumps walking around trying to not die and in the process protecting ourselves the best we can. I guess the one thing that stands out with Anjelica is the honesty, which is the hardest fucking thing in the world. Why did he have the balls to just be honest with me when nobody else did? I don't know why. I wish Morgan had known that he wasn't into me before I'd left and told me as much. The worst part about that situation was feeling like a total idiot. I wish Richard had...well I wish I'd never met Richard. (Richard: Call me. Seriously.) Clearly I made mistakes too......Ha. Just kidding. I totally didn't.

So dudes, here's moral #1: Never hook up with me. Moral #2: if you absolutely HAVE to hook up with me NEVER tell me you like me. Moral #3: If you have to hook up with me and you have to tell me you like me and you actually don't like me JUST TELL ME THE TRUTH. And then duck. You're a fucking deadman.

Preppies. Wow.

I live in Martha's Vineyard. I won't get into why I haven't posted in more than a year. Nobody noticed. Except Jen. I love you Jen.
SOOO I live in (or on) Martha's Vineyard. I came here for a job, which is interesting considering I grew up on Cape Cod and never came here before two weeks ago. (For those of you that don't know, MV is an island off the coast of Cape Cod. Oh wait, Jen is the only one reading this. Jen, MV is and island off of Cape Cod.) The locals here call me a "recent transplant". I keep telling everyone they're real. Then we all get uncomfortable and I go home and cry into my pillow.
There are a lot of preppies here. I thought I knew what a preppy was. I went to boarding school. All those guys wore khakis and "bucks" and called each other by their last named and fantasized about sodomizing each other. I figured they were the true preppies. I had head rumors of the denizens of Martha's Vineyard. I have a ribbon belt with bass on it. I've stolen a flippy wallet from J. Crew. I figured with that wealth of knowledge and experience I knew exactly what was up with the people on this island. To say that I had any idea of preppiness from my days at boarding school is like saying that I am a marine biologist because I once looked into the toilet after I peed. (I always do. It's a sign if health when...whatever. Judge me if you will.)
This place is out of effing hand. You go to a game park in Kenya to taunt wild lions by hanging your younger siblings out of the door of the jeep until they cry so hard they poop their pants. You come to Martha's Vineyard to see preppies in their natural habitat. I realize now that the buck wearing sodomites in high school were either total preppy posers or they were scared to practice their true, undiluted preppy religion lest they be persecuted for their beliefs. I know how THAT is. I DO look at my pee, and it's intolerant jerks like YOU people that make me ashamed to talk about it.
I've never really thought about the meaning behind the term "preppy". If you have you're a huge douche bag. Wikipedia says "Preppy also spelled "preppie", is a chiefly North American adjective or noun traditionally used in relation to northeastern private university-preparatory schools, as well as those who attend some of America's prestigious private colleges and universities." I say poppycock. (Ha. I just said cock.) I think "Preppy" is short for "Prepared" because these people are fucking PREPARED! For what you might ask? Well I'll tell you in a roundabout, super confusing manner.
I'm sure the people of Martha's Vineyard don't go out onto their yachts every day. They're just humans, right? They lead normal lives. They have families and cars and other shit that makes someone appear normal. But what if they had to go out on a yacht at a moments notice? What if they were whisked up in a yachting plan with no forewarning whatsoever? Well, they would not be caught with their oddly colored pants down. Oh no. They would be ready. Armed to the teeth with all of the accoutrement required for an emergency day of yachting. Let's start from the bottom up, shall we? (Everybody now: THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID!!)
Deck shoes. Those yacht decks are slippery! We should all wear shoes that are made of leather and don't really have a good tread on them, but someone once told us this was the appropriate footwear for yachting, they say! Wait! Make sure the laces aren't too long! Mother Buffy warned us with tales of little prepsters pitching over the side of our 100-footer after tripping on an errant lace. Just go ahead and tuck those suckers right inside. Who cares? It's not like you're wearing socks!
Shorts! Pale red, or even better PATCHWORK MADRAS! We like pale red because when the sun beats down on regular red this is the color it fades to so we're just preempting the harsh effects of mother nature. I submit the madras fabric came the famous marine disaster tale of the "Buffy III" out of Edgartown, MA. Old salts tell of the 2 harrowing hours that Jock Hippenpoof Von Waterdale IV spent with a Pepsi stain on his favorite pair of Nantucket Reds, and how he heroically saved his reputation and his snazzy ensemble by crafting a pair of shorts out of small square pieces of dinner napkins he got from his yacht maid. And thus a hectic style was born.
Next, and arguably the most iconic image of preppy style; the polo shirt. The polo shirt spans many style movements and can be seen anywhere from the front-butts of fat, old, tourist ladies to the fake-tanned biceps of the Gotti set of Strong Island, NY. However, what earmarks the preppy polo is the "popping" of the collar. Popping means to ignore the manufacturers pre-fabricated fold of the collar, and instead flip the collar up and away from the body. This, of course, serves the function of protecting the neck from the harmful UV rays of the sun. Thank goodness all the traders on Wall Street have that protection on casual Friday or we might see some serious irregularly edged moles on the St. Paul's class of 2003!! An additional element of sun protection is of course the hat, which is not complete without some embroidery announcing the wearer as a crew member of one the America's Cup boats. Gosh, where do they hold the America's Cup? Is the starting line the entire coast of Australia? It would sort of have to be because if all of these hats are to be believed there are a KAGILLION ex-crew members of the America's Cup.
These "prep"ared people have really got all of their proverbial bases covered. Footwear, thighwear, neck and head protection. What could they possibly be missing? Oh GOD! The retinas!! They must be protected as well! That's what sunglasses are for. But we're not just strolling around on land! We're yachting! Shit gets pretty messy on a yacht. What if the sunglasses are suddenly flung from the wearers face into the briny! Really? Do you REALLY think the preppy set would be unprepared for this eventuality? Hell NO they would NOT! Those sunglasses are held onto their ever-so-tan faces with FROGGIES!! Neon pieces of squishy fabric that not only clash with the baker's dozen of hues they are already wearing but make sure that no Ray Bans will be lost to Davey Jones' Locker this day! (Note: I might have made the name "Froggy" up. I can't find any evidence to back up my claim that this is what they are actually called. But neither could Copernicus.)
I can not pretend to be making a scholarly report on the full life cycle of the preppy. I know nothing of their behavior in the fall or winter. I know nothing of their mating habits (But who knows, I'm here all summer! Know what I'm saying? Huh? Right? No? Okay.) I only know what I have observed of the early summer preppy in their natural habitat, and from what I can see these folk are READY!! So in conclusion, preppies: I salute you. If the world is ever under alien attack, and our only means of escape is via yacht, the lives of every man, woman and child will depend on your preparedness to man aforementioned yacht. The rest of us will be slipping around on the desk, with faded red shorts, sunburned necks and we will be blind because our goddam sunglasses fell into the frigging ocean! I think we can all breathe a sigh of relief knowing that you preppies are more then prepared to save the world.

Bravery: Cruella, Kate and Nicole (If you're easily offended...fuck off.)

I've been thinking about writing a post about weight issues and images in the media for a while now, but haven't been sober enough to come up with any coherent thought in a while.

One of my first idols was Cruella Deville. She was really skinny, and she wore a huge fur coat. I knew that she was probably way too busy hunting dalmation puppies and smoking butts to eat every meal and that seemed so cool to me. I was always a tubby little fuck, so to see her dress hanging off her gaunt frame made me want to work hard to lose any and all extra lbs. I actually haven't changed. At all. In the last 20 years. (Awesome.) I still think it's cool to be skinny. That's why i'm particularly struck by the strength, bravery and fortitude of two young women in the media today.

I'm pretty sick of the way the media is harshing on the proverbial mellow of people like Kate Bosworth and Nicole Ritchie. (Okay, I think "mellow" might always be proverbial as it's not an actual object. Oh well. I went to a commuter college.) Okay, sure, them bitches is mad skinny. Who cares? I think Nicole looks better tan and skinny with good hair than she did fat and drunk with pink dreadlocks. And Bosworth looked pretty dope in Blue Crush as boyish girls go, then she got herself so that she looked awesome in couture. Again, who fucking cares? These girls felt a pressure to be a certain way so they dedicated themselves to a goal. How is that bad? I've been trying to get anorexic for like 16 years. That shit is hard! You get hungry! I'm proud of them. And you know what? They are helping our society. In a world where people don't have enough to eat, we should thank people like Kate and Nicole who are leaving more resources for the less fourtunate. I used to hate it when my mom would use the rationale: "There are starving children in Ethiopia." to get me to eat my dinner. I would always think to myself "What the fuck are you going to do, Mom? Package up this leg of boiled chicken and mail it over to Addis Abad
c /o Skinny Black Children?" (Yes, i thought "fuck". I don't lie. Stop looking at me like that.)

Back to the societal pressure thing. One might say that it's a negative thing that our society puts pressure on women to be really skinny. One might say it's unhealthy, and that we should all just be happy the way we are. Well i'm a fucking alcoholic. Is that okay? Bad example. What about the pressure that is placed on people to be doctors or lawyers and the devote their whole being and existence to that effort. They may not be healthy in mind spirit or body, but because the end product is considered prestegious nobody writes any US Weekly articles about it. I don't think fat people should be praised for being "just who they are". Fat is unhealthy. The human body was not made to hold up a whole lot of weight. People weren't meant to sit on their asses all day and eat Wendy's. You slobs aren't being who you are, you're being lazy. Work out. Eat less. Look to Bosworth. She's dumb as hair, and she managed to work it out. (Jokes, Kate. You're my girl.)

So i say "you go girls". Blow your coke. Eat your cotton balls. Do what you've got to do to get to where you want to be. I think MTV should do a Made show about Anorexia. I'd be first in line. If i wasn't so damn old.

Glossary of Terms

Spice: n, v, adj:

• n. something that adds flavor. See also Spicy.
• v. to spice. To engage in an amorous encounter, usu. (hopefully) without emotional attachment.
• adj. spice / spicy. The predecessor to the Paris Hilton catch phrase "That's hot" but way more nuanced. Spice refers to anything cool, interesting, sexy, intelligent, controversial, and will be used by someone who is too drunk to think up anything more eloquent.
  

Schoolie: n.:

• n. Literally "a school aged person". The meaning of this word is derived from the practice of pursuing those that are much younger that oneself. See also Schoolie Stalk. Originally it referred to recent college graduates going after those in their teens. More recently it has evolved to also encompass almost 30 year olds going after late teen / 20-somethings. See ie eg Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused . "I keep getting older, and they stay the same age."

Jag: n, v, adj.:

• n. A party or celebration of epic proportion usu. without any floor for classlessness. Often schoolies are stalked at the jag with every intention of spicing them. See also Jagger.
• v. to jag. To drink without regard for societal norms or conventions. Jagging is usu. done in the company of other jaggers, who have a similar taste for strong spirits.
• adj. On the jag. Engaging in a consecutive series of jags, resulting in a perpetual state of drunkeness. Only the hardcore jagger can truly be on the jag, and other more novice will aspire to such said level of jag.