It Just Don’t Stop

Am I grotesquely inhibited if I admit that it really bothers me when people bring reading material into bathrooms other than their own? I went to the coffee shop today to work on a project and was met with various and sundry ills, not the least of which was a man who thought that we all wanted to be in on his business meeting and rested his cell phone on the table ON SPEAKERPHONE and proceeded to conduct the meeting as though he were ensconced in a soundproof conference room. As if this weren’t offensive enough, I went to the bathroom to discover someone’s half-finished sudoku puzzle resting on the floor with a pen, as though it were a dynamic public entity designed to be continued by the next person afflicted with a bad case of constipation away from home.

Gross, right? And yet, you’d be surprised how often this happens. At nearly every job I’ve had, it wasn’t unusual to find the sports section missing from the pile of papers out front as the creeping realization took hold that one of the men in the office absconded with it for a lengthy stay in the public restroom. And worse — oh yes, this is way worse — they would often PUT THE PAPER BACK LATER, right into the pile as though it had never rested on the floor of the men’s room. I watched them do it, those little bastards. This meant, naturally, that some poor unsuspecting soul would go to read the paper without understanding that it was rife with foul bathroom-type things.

It was always worse when it was an executive. When I worked for a large public company, I could never look at the CFO the same way after I caught him leaving the bathroom with my personal copy of The Wall Street Journal that he’d borrowed earlier. And again he would try to return it as if I didn’t know precisely where it had been. I saw him with it! I saw him! I SEE EVERYTHING.

I hope tax season is treating you as well as it is us, which is to say that we have to pay back taxes on YET ANOTHER YEAR, which is one of the greatest pleasures in being audited back in 2004 — they never let us go, and each year, they find something on us. And even better? I have the same case worker each time, who spent much of our last phone call screaming, “SCHEDULE D! SCHEDULE D! THIS IS NOT HARD! SEND SCHEDULE D!” in a Blanche Devereaux accent and of course, I thought she said Schedule BEE, and hilarity ensued, except it wasn’t funny at all, really.

Right. Just know that the IRS often uses a zero cost basis for stock sold, EVEN IF YOU PROVIDED DOCUMENTATION OTHERWISE, is all I’m saying. Prepare yourself. And then, send in Schedule D, not B. I don’t know what B does, but it’s not what you need and asking for it will cause great confusion.

(And I haven’t even gone into the excitement of being a sole proprietor come tax time. Another day, another riveting post!)

Surprisingly, and this is embarrassing, if slightly cleansing to admit, I have not missed many shows since the writer’s strike began and perhaps even more surprisingly, I have found new ones to like. In addition to my boyfriend Bravo, there is the sad fact that I have taken to um, TiVo-ing Charmed in the mornings for late-night viewing and also, and this might be the worst thing I’ve ever said with regards to television, I have a small affection for The Ghost Whisperer. Yes. Ahem. You read that right. It’s the BOOBS. It’s all in Jennifer Love Hewitt’s boobs and eyelashes the thickness of spider legs. They hypnotize you and never let go.

Speaking of spiders, I wasn’t kidding the other day when I said that there was a spider in my bed. A big black one, in fact. And yesterday, I awoke to a little brown one hovering eight inches above my head. OH OH OH, and I kill about three wasps a day STILL. INSIDE THE HOUSE. (FIVE ON SATURDAY)

Living in the country is AWESOME.

Hooray for Thursdays!

*The Roots

26 comments April 9th, 2008