Thoughts on 46

I have spent 23 years of the 46 working at the same place. 15 at the same job.
Spent 21 years, 10 months of it sober.

And had a deluxe birthday courtesy of my dear friends S and, also known as High IQ Temptress Girl and Pirate Boy Slim.

Updated note: as I'm an accountant and all it occurs to me that having 21 years, 10 months out of 46 years sober might indicate that I took up my drinking career at birth rather than at 15.

Harry Potter

The latest Harry Potter was in my mailbox upon my return from points north last night. The hype and allure of the 3 lbs of literary frolic was quite compelling, and I know me so in order that I be awake for work this morning I read the last 100 pages first, then the first 100 pages. Now I'm confused about what the hell is going on, but I do know how it ends. And I ain't telling.

The Squish

Every year for more years than I care to count, I dutifully take the girls (a/k/a the twins, the boobages) for the squish. My first squish was memorable for two reasons, 1- the technician's head did not come up as high as my breasts and so to hoist the either of the girls onto the appropriate spot on the machine required her to execute what looked essentially a two handed overhead slam dunk with the one or the other as the basketball, ok more like a softball but you get the idea. Needless to say, I was hysterical with laughter because I'd not ever before or since seen my breast at so unique an angle, not to mentioned handled in such a fashion by a perfect stranger whilst I was sober but I digress. So I'm in this state of hysterical laughter and of course, one need be stock still for the xray. And of course, once they put the machine into that very special mode known as FLATTEN IT! the laughter ceased, nor did it return for any of the remainder of the mammography as Lefty required a total of 8 trips through the wringer. Lefty has a lot of calcium deposits,as I used to fight, a lot.

I now go to a specialty breast center ( or as I like to call it, All Breasts All the Time) and I know the drill, as do the girls, who trembled in fear within the comforting confines of my bullet proof sports bra, at least until it was time to put on the robe. FYI - when you go for a mammogram the usual instruction is strip from the waist up, put on the robe. And as I'm a girl who shops in the Vast sector of most major department stores, most off the shelf robes don't fit me, happily this one did, but again I digress. So the drill: whip off the robe (most places will just let you whip one twin out at a time if you're a modest kind of gal (but I like to show off my ink), step to the machine, follow the instructions of the technician. And you want to follow the instructions of the technician because she's got your boobage in her hands and is placing it on the plate where it will transform in shape. Well, BJ, the technician directed me ably and the communication flowed admirably until such time as she had my breast pancaked in the machine, my arm draped around the machinery and my chin(s) tilted up, out of the way of the xray. The resulting muscular tautness ran from my hamstrings (which cramped, I hate that)to my skull and rendered me pretty close to speechless, aside from an occasional muttering of son of a bitch. And then she had the unmitigated gall to say relax. I howled with laughter, loudly. as this was among the most absurd things I've ever heard in my young queer life and mind you I work for the government. Probably would have laughed up a lung had it not been ably trapped in the fucking machine. To add to the indignity, somehow my nipple had managed to curl beneath my breast in fear, so we had to reshoot that mammary portrait. This involves decompressing the breast, having this perfect stranger rearrange it and squish the living shit out of it again. I finally mentioned usually before my boobs are handled thusly we'd have had dinner.

Happily, the doc had good news for me. Perfectly normal. Which I absolutely prefer to the more clinical, unremarkable. Hell, that these boobages are not down around my knees is pretty damned remarkable.

So, if you find yourself 35 or older. Cowgirl up and get it done.

I am a sentimental jackass from hell

Today is the 9th anniversary of Puppy the cat having adopted me. She was a grown cat at the time so I'm not sure of her age or date of birth but I am sure of what day she came home with me. So for the sentimental jackass part, to celebrate I ventured to Wegman's for a half pound of tuna (yellowfin, $21.99 lb. But it gets worse, I fire up the charcoal grill wait for the coals to become grey and hot for searing (but not too much because the cats don't like it) and grilled the tuna, sprayed with PAM for the grill but otherwise as is. No garlic, no lemon, no pepper no nothing. When it was done, I split it and seasoned mine and we sang happy birthday to Puppy(ok, so I sang and the other 2 just looked) and chowed on grilled tuna fish. It was lovely but I am a sentimental ass.

Biography

For various reasons, lately in my professional life there have emerged requests for me to provide a biography. This is usually lackluster and so damnably dull I fall asleep writing it, but hey I'm an accountant so how much WOW! can one reasonably expect.

So here's the one I want to write,

A burly, yet sultry, surly mass of contradictions Sharkb has been occupying herself with paying work for more years that she cares to recall. Chief among the requirements of paying work would be that if it's not entertaining it must take place in silence. Hence, she often finds herself inviting people to help themselves to a hot steaming mug of shut the fuck up. She often entertains herself by baying at the moon, speaking with dogs, cats and fish, also dancing with her brassiere on her head (as a result of that her breasts are no longer amused with her). As a presenter she's highly entertaining and humorous but will lose her train of thought in a heartbeat.

So Crazy Doesn't Always Look or Smell Crazy

Among my very closest friends, I count a number of people who are inordinately sane and kind. All have different ways of coping with stress, but they all seem to cope quite well, so obviously resiliency is among their noteworthy traits. I am around a fairly large collection of people at work some who are friends, many who are not, many of whome are suffering from a bad case of the JFN's (which is DSM-V code for just fucking nuts - the only DSM code anyone will ever need). Somedays it's absolutely amazing how crazy some of the people are. I used to think that my employer held job fairs up at the Psych Hospital and recruited from bedside to deskside without passing go or parties involved necessarily getting therapy or treatment of any kind. Today has found me rethinking that theory, I was observing a fairly lively conversation regarding one coworker's vacation schedule and her boss, in his frustration, asked "don't any of you take vacation in the winter?" And no, they don't. Perhaps rather than being recruited out of the psych hospital which would still explain alot, the recruiting effort concentrates on off season out of work carnies as these folks are for sure an intinerant lot of colorful characters, in the main blessed with loud, booming voices and a steady amount of engaging patter which doesn't seem insane except in retrospect. So, yeah we recruit carnies. It explains a lot.

Observations from Work

It would appear from the contents of the toilets at work that a coworker is strengthening her nethers by carrying coinage in them (or it). Several of the toilets are beginning to look like coin strewn fountains. And I can tell that we who utilize the women's rest facility are all glancing at each other warily, thinking so what kind of freaky shit can you do with your whup now that you're using it as a change purse? Can you make change with it or is this just some kinked up version of a Kegel exercise? Should I ever in life ask for change of a dollar at work again? AND........... If you're keeping your coins in your whatsis, just where are you keeping your dollars?

Hmmmm

My friend J and I were chatting via email and she asked me what animal does she bring to mind. Hers is a very leonine energy, coupled with a hawkish awareness and vigilance. So I said a lion hawk if there was such an animal. When I asked her what she thought I might embody, she said a wolf. Because, I'm a loner when I choose to be, social when I choose to be and mysterious. I can work with that.

An Adventure

My friend J and I had planned a mission to shop for some crystals for energy enhancement and protection purposes. The energy in typical "New Age" shops frequently sends me for a spin so I tend to avoid them. There is a great rockshop out in the wilds of PA that I'de previously visited with a friend. J and I set out for points west at about 10. Got where we were going at nearly 1130. And well, they're not open on Mondays. So we set off East again thinking we'd travel to New Hope and check out one of the New Agey places there. I missed an exit sign so we wound up in Center City Philadelphia. At the zoo, and it was awesome. I do love a zoo. Saw flamingos, elephants, tigers, lions, bears, pumas, penguins and other wild life.

Isn't It Rich?

When things are going especially stupidly at work I will frequently burst into song. The beauty of this is I’m quite tone deaf (pronounced deef in my fluent Jerseyese), the result of which is that everything pretty much sounds sea shantyish ala the Sponge Bob theme song. So, as may have become obvious from previous reading, I work for the government (pronounced gubmint – and in gubmint words like pronounced are convoluted into pronunciated, but I digress) so frequently what does transpire here is escalating stupidity. So the song of choice is often “Send in the Clowns”, because really nothing else fits quite so well.

It's going to get a little graphic here

Got home at midnight on Friday, noticed a missive from the IRS in the mail, the were merely explaining that my serial killer like handwriting precluded them from reading my banking info to direct deposit my refund. If you've got to get mail from the IRS or the initials as I fondly refer to them, that's the kind to get.

So after feeding the cats, and getting ready for bed, within 5 minutes of being in bed, got up to hurl. And felt rather crappy (not literally thankfully) for the rest of the night. Got up the next morning, tried a cracker and coughed that back up. Joy.

I hate stomach virii. Alot.

Unique Expertise

The mothership phoned me today. She was in need of expert advice about how long after the expiration date on the yogurt can one safely eat the yogurt. As I've been researching this very subject for most of my adult life, I can report the following = technically yogurt is not likely to go bad, it already is 'bad'. I've eaten yogurt that was one year past the date and no harm came to me. Although apparently my eyesight is questionable as I coulda sworn it said December 2005 not December 2004. Occasionally, if I have packed a yogurt in my lunch that's a bit well-aged, I will call the consumer advisory line on the container. That's often a hoot, more than once I've driven a frustrated consumer service rep to say "Look lady, if you're waiting for me to tell you it's okay to eat a 6 month old yogurt, it's just not gonna happen.' Call me silly, but that warms my evil little heart every time.

Do not under any circumstances ingest green/blue/pink moldy yogurt and eat it within the expiration date for your optimal enjoyment.

Playin' Hooky

The weather is delightful and work was quiet and stupid today so I ventured up to see the boss and asked him if I could take the afternoon off. He said sure. So I went to the beach, it's about 15 degrees cooler there and quite breezy. Then I went to the gym and did 2 hours of frolic. Now that it's shorts weather, one sees sights at the gym that one need not see. Fortunately, most folks run to baggy shorts, but very occasionally a guy will be wearing a pair of shorts that suffer from cheap hotel syndrome - No Ballroom. And said balls will make a break for it. Not for the faint of heart.

Another Reminder About Attachment

I had another object lesson in attachment recently. About 6 weeks ago I treated myself to the high tech bauble that is the Blackberry Pearl. It’s sleek, gets email and phone calls, plays mp3’s, and is a pda attached. And I quickly filled it up with the myriad mundane yet utterly necessary details of my life, including my exercise routines, my datebook, my phonebook and the all important keeping track of the money I squander. After all, the Pearl is what is euphemistically known as a smart phone. It is deluxe. It is not, however, immersible, let alone submersible.

I found this out the hard way when after excreting some of the coffee I ingested Sunday morning, I stood up to hear the tell-tale plop of something of substance falling out of the pocket into the toilet. The red LED blinked at me most ominously as I attempted to rapidly dry the Pearl. No joy. It no longer functioned and the red LED blinked its last in what I am now certain was Morse code for I’m drowning. Sigh…I had an appointment near the land of the mall and set out for it. After the appointment, I ventured to the mall, with my previously functioning Pearl and my old cell phone. Figuring I needed something of a cell phone ilk, with the weather and so forth. Got the old phone up and running, became well acquainted the fine fine folk at Asurion, the cell phone insurers, who are replacing the Crackberry even as we speak.

Then as news of the flooding from the storm, and the tragedy at VA TECH came up, I’m once again reminded of the fragility of the really important things in life, not just the baubles.

Juicing And Nudity

Damn that sounds nearly pornographic, anyway, I was making beet juice this morning. And beet juice makes for all red all the time all over the place. So I stripped down and of course, the doorbell rings. I must confess to being tempted to answer the door in the state of undress in which I found myself. Even went so far as to peer out the peephole but alas whomever it was, was travelling with small children so I refrained.

Panties

Hmmm, that got your attention. Didn't it?

I'm a functional kind of gal when it comes to me undies. I want the twins to stay where I put 'em and I want my drawers to cover both my business and my butt. I tend to wear black panties, with a rare foray into athletic grey. Once upon a time, a friend waxed so eloquently rhapsodic about the erotic nature of wearing a thong that she talked me into purchasing and wearing one, I can only conclude that either I was wearing it wrong or she's full of shit.

So as happens with most rejected undies that are still somewhat presentable, as presentable as underpants ever are anyway, I recently used it as a face mask whilst cleaning out the cat box. As invariably can be counted upon to happen in such a circumstance (because in addition to sporting the thong as a face mask, I'm clad in sportsbra, tattoos and rubber gloves, oh and sweatpants) the doorbell rings with what I presumed to be local Jehovah's but were, in fact, candidates for the boro council. 'Cuz that's the way my dumb luck runs.

Work

They say distance lends perspective, but sometimes it's difficult to gain perspective on one's work life when change is incremental (when it's not decremental) and one is spending a whole lot of time beating one's head against the wall because it feels so damned good when I stop.

Computers

Wireless networking should be idiot proof for an ably accomplished idiot such as my self and my even more ably accomplished idiot friend but nooooooooooooooooooooooo..... Goddamn router.

My Buddy Ack

My buddy Ack is 7, he has a very organic kind of wisdom. I was hanging out with he and his 2 older sisters who are fairly literal minded down to earth gals when he says, I'm going to read a story with my eyes closed. His sisters told him no, you can't do that. His reply "watch and learn." and he proceeded to tell a story with his eyes closed, it was a good one, Ack's stories are always imaginative and funny and he's quite a character. And I will carry his reply with me for the next time someone tells me I can't do something, or when I start to tell me I can't do something.

Watch and learn!

Overheard at Work

Spokesmodel - Did you see that Dollar Tree across the bridge has Victoria Pannie?
Evil - What are you talkin' about?
Me - Who the hell is Victoria Pannie?
S - You know, pannies from Victoria?
E - Your ass ain't flat what are you going to do with panties from Victoria's Secret?