Cleavage

TMI alert!

Like that's going to stop anybody.

I was a bit of an early bloomer. By the time I was ten years old, I was reasonably chesty. By the time I was twelve, I was perhaps unreasonably chesty. Toss in a few breastfed babies and the fact that when I gain weight, that's the first place it goes, and... well, you get the picture.

My sisters both grew up to be A-cups, and they are pissed.

The thing is, female body image being what it is, and general, non-gender-specific human insecurity about the things that make you, um, stand out, I was always pretty self-conscious about this particular portion of my anatomy. It took a long time for me to get comfortable with it. Well - I'm not entirely comfortable, actually. But you know what? Men seem to like them, I've noticed. So I go with it. Tastefully, so to speak.

Today is the first day of my second week on the new job. I'm in a foul mood to begin with. As much as the old job pissed me off at times, I'd been there for two years, and it wasn't the worst job in the world (we all know what that was). I'd made lots of friends, I have some great memories (NO PUNS) and it was a fun, relaxed environment in a lot of ways, as long as you didn't mind the fact that everything you did was completely pointless. So even though this job is (presumably) a better fit for me, a better division to be in, and the work is substantially more rewarding, I'm terribly homesick. Plus I just called an end to - something we won't go into. Plus I am extremely unhappy about Romeo. Plus Bill Gates is running a little behind, so PMS is absolutely kicking my ass right now. Plus I forgot to bring my thermos of coffee this morning. Plus it's cold and wet and gray and depressing out.

And now, for the punchline, my new supervisor calls me into her office this morning to tell me that my cleavage violates office dress policy. How mortifying is that?! I was so upset, I wasn't even tempted to snicker when she used the phrase "nip this in the bud." (She really did!)

She didn't mention it specifically, but she gave me a copy of the written dress code, and apparently toe rings and ankle bracelets and big dangly earrings are out, too. "This sucks!" I wailed to a friend, "they're going to turn me into a dowdy middle-aged woman!"

"Yes," he said.

So I'm going to have to go joylessly shopping for some boring clothes. Could I file for discrimination if I can't wear something that someone else could get away with, just because of the way I'm built?

Goddamn it. This sucks. Anyway, I'm done. At least I should be good on web traffic for a while.

The Gripping Hand

I honestly cannot believe my new job is in the same agency as the old one.

The bad side of this is that I have been kept too busy, so far, to be able to take regular-length breaks at regular times. And the really bad side of this is that everyone else is so normal, so healthy, so cheerful and intelligent and functional, that I am not sure what I'm going to blog about anymore.

There is no Bubbly Bitching Nonsmoker in the new place; and as of today, there isn't one in the old place either. They've been collecting dirt on her for quite a while - it takes a lot to fire a state employee - and apparently today, the scales tipped over far enough that she was escorted out of the building. By the Sheriff, of all people.

She's something special. I always felt sort of a wary affinity for her. I know she tended to bite, but she had a good sense of humor, and I was usually safe because I tended to stay out of her way. Except for the times Robbie and I were jaywalking to Dominican Joe, standing in the center turn lane, waiting for traffic to pass, and she drove up and we were blocking her way and do you know what? She did not run us over. Not even once. It really seems like that ought to count for something.

Maybe it did. Robbie has been gone for a few months now. I was still there until last Friday. Maybe my leaving was what tipped the balance!

More likely it's just an accident of timing, and the poor panicmonger, who has not yet managed to get a replacement for Robbie in, now has three vacancies to fill. It was suggested at afternoon break today (which I managed to attend by the clever expedient of working through lunch) that the Sheriff is taking a new tack, and plans to eliminate the PM simply by getting rid of everyone who reports to her. So she'd better hurry up and hire some new people, and fast.

If we see the popcorn lady from day before yesterday again, I might send her over.

Compil-arrr-tion

I guess the pirate poem is finished now, unless Jason feels like buckling on a swash or two.

She was a fine ship. The Dread Pirate and I have not found a satisfactory replacement in any other realm - since, due to not being completely familiar with the expectations and common practices in my new work group, I am actually sticking to fifteen minutes for break.

Yeah, you heard me, fifteen minutes. And that's without quotes around it.

This chill and windy afternoon, things came to so desperate a pass that we took refuge in the indoor break room, and lost part of our already diminished time allotment to an unusually stupid state employee (you heard me!!!) who insisted on being given an impromptu lesson on how to prepare microwave popcorn in an oven dating from the Eisenhower administration.

Did we demur, telling her we had never used this oven ourselves? Yes. Did we express our personal feelings regarding microwave popcorn, and the consumption thereof? Well, no. Still, upon being informed that no one in the room was familiar with this particular appliance, she threw up her hands in frustration and exclaimed, "Just figure it out for me! Because I haven't got a brain of my own."

Or words to that effect. Anyway, the practical upshot of this is that enough is enough. We're going back to our old break area even if we have to swim for it.

Here be the finished poem. Raise your mug to the lusty buccaneer who wrote me stanza, arrr!

The Three-Grog Marauding Group

Long ago, at home upon the sea,
A pirate band ruled all that they could see;
But, one by one, they fell away,
Alas! ‘til sadly now, today,
The jolly group lives but in memory, arrr!

Tan Justin was the first old salt to go;
We watched his passin’ wi’ much grief and woe;
Shovin’ a litterbug down the plank,
He fell into the drink, and sank;
The first o’ many, little did we know, arrr!

The Bitch o’ Cheryl stuck fast his wooden leg
Sightin’ a ship from ‘top the powder keg.
We witnessed, horrified, his lot:
Alas! Th’ enemy cannon shot
Into the cask, and blew him off his peg, arrr!

Dread Pirate Roberts, sober and austere,
Was ta’en by angels to a higher sphere.
But for the pirate wench whose heart
He stole, he will not yet depart,
And twice a day his spirit haunts us here, arrr!

B.Rrrrrrrrr, he was a brave and salty dog!
Storm downed a mast, and brained him with a log;
His memory we cheer: three cheers!
And toast the noble buccaneer
Wi’ locally produced, organic grog, arrr!

Rummy Greg, he vanished without trace,
One morn we woke to find his empty place;
Betimes some claim to catch a sight
Of Greg, when it be dark at night,
But by day he never shows his face, arrr!

Andrew the Bloody fought, and lost his life
Just as he lived: in never-ending strife,
For though he touched not milk nor meat,
And for Polly always had a treat,
He kept his fellow man at point o’ knife, arrr!

Bold Sara ruled the sea, and should rule yet;
Gold-haired, the fairest lass ye ever met;
But derring-do she, daring, did
And got grabbed by a hungry squid,
Diving from the crow’s-nest on a bet, arrr!

Bryan Redbeard sailed the ocean wide,
And took a pirate maid to be his bride;
They honeymooned in far Siam
And took ill from eating gingered ham,
And wi’ him, aye, our fair hopes sank and died, arrr!

Mad Thomas buckled on a dashing swash,
No man feared he, nor storm waves’ crash and slosh,
But brought down by a tiny foe,
A fire ant bit him on the toe,
Wi’ pain gone mad, he dove into the wash, arrr!

Black Robbie’s creditors complete our fears;
They've seized him bodily to pay arrears.
“Pirates’ worth,” snarled they, “be down!
Ye’ll fetch more booty in Georgetown.”
Then Bess sailed lonely on this sea o’ tears, arrr!

Elizabeth, who led the scurvy lot,
Met her end by way of some cannon shot.
Broadsides, white smoke, hot lead, full bore,
Our pirate wench was now no more.
To soon forget her, surely, we will not, arrr!

So, silent now, the empty ship sails on,
No trace left of its merry crew, all gone;
Pass me the rum: I’ll drink to ye,
And to the day when all will be
Together once again and all be one, arrr!

First Impressions

Is it a good idea to write your first blog post about your brand-new job while you're PMSing your balls off?

Let's find out!

Actually, overall my impressions are very favorable. Everyone seems nice. More to the point, everyone seems normal.

And indeed there is a certain glamour to the job. "We'll put your photo on our section's web page," my new boss told me this morning, "so the remote offices you support have a face to put with the name."

"Oookaaay," I said slowly, glancing at my ID badge. "I hope they don't mind squished people with terminal jaundice."

"No no," she said, "the staff photographer will take it."

So here I am, first hour of the first day at the new job, standing outside in the sunshine, leaning casually on a brick pillar, hands clasped, smiling fetchingly while the breeze lifts my hair and a professional photographer shouts "Good, very nice!" at me.

Not long after, an email appointment went out for tomorrow morning, to the whole division. They need to take a new group photo and have been holding off until my arrival.

Okay, in my old office, there is a group photo hanging up in the kitchen area. I'm sure some of the people pictured are now dead, and of those, several don't even work there anymore. The live ones, meanwhile, have aged noticeably, or at least matured - one of my former coworkers, always stylish and dapper, sports a mullet in the group photo.

A slightly more recent photo is taped to the Sheriff's office door (and no, it is not riddled with dart holes) but it still features many people who have been gone for more than a couple of years.

I think it will be fine, once I settle in, once I get familiar with the way things are run, once the homesickness wears off. My cube is nicer and I have a real phone. The people seem really cool. The magnetic letters have met with universal approval.

As for the PMS, well, I'm on my own.