Wednesday, May 25, 2011

I've Found My Limit

Well, it happened. I finally came upon a wall that I could not, try as I may, make myself climb.
I was hungry for some cereal lovin', and I entered my kitchen to pour a bowl. The second I saw that my Trader Joe's brand, Twigs, Flakes, and Clusters was all gone, that's when I should've given up the game. But, not one to give up too easily, I pushed onward. I convinced myself that the granola on top of the fridge was "the cereal my roommate said I could eat", and quickly poured a generous amount in my gratuitous bowl.
The granola and I traveled together up to my room, where we studied and laughed with the cast of Community, sang with the aspiring stars on Glee, and cried with Suki's friends over the loss of her innocence on True Blood. As the new episodes online became fewer and fewer, so did the milk and cereal in my bowl. As the realization that I would have to wait yet another week for new episodes sank in, I sighed, and my eyes dropped their gaze from the now-dark screen to the once-full and now almost empty bowl in my hands. My despair was quickly forgotten, when my sinking heart and eyes locked in disgust with the lifeless ones of the dead bug that was floating in my meal. I stared at the intruder, who challenged my boorish lifestyle with its mere presence. I wanted to keep eating. I wanted to not care. But I couldn't, my stomach was turning and I cursed the gluttony of the pest that had eventually done him in, and was now living a ghostly second life, upending my values, and forcing me to question myself as I reluctantly placed my dish to the side.


As you can imagine, the next few days were spent with long, questioning walks in the rain around the city, listening to angsty music, as I tried to figure out who I was, what this incident made me.
It wasn't until a few days later at work, that I was able to find myself again:
I had recently started my lady time of the month (my period, people) and at this point in time we find myself in the bathroom (which could happen even if it weren't my lady time). I had expelled a lady product in the toilet-which, as a side note, I have recently become aware that it is somewhat of a controversy whether or not tampons should be flushed. I have always flushed, apparently everyone else has not-and the toilet wouldn't flush it. Now, we have some pretty noisy toilets in the office, and the sound of the flushin' is audible throughout the space. I flushed a good six times, before I came out, red faced, but with a plan. I quickly constructed an "out of order" sign, and then scoured the office for a latex glove. Glove placed lovingly around my right hand, I reentered the bathroom.
Using my left hand to pull the glove up my arm, so as to avoid water entering the wrist portion, my hand was submerged in toilet water, the offending article was removed and thrown away, the out of order sign was shred into teeny tiny pieces, and meaning was restored to my life.
I'm a sick piece of work.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Why I LOVE My Job--Part II

Because when I return from lunch I find this on my desk:


And the grand finale:
I was riding the elevator back up to the office, and a lady was accompanying me. She was dressed very nicely (I would say, she was probably an office worker's wife nice, not a employee of the building nice) and carrying a plate of pastries. I noted that we were both going to the same floor, "I feel like so many people work on Floor Four nowadays!" To which she replied, "Oh, I don't work on that floor. I'm just there looking for a Brooke...?" LOOKING FOR A BROOKE.
"Why that's me!" I exclaimed
She just handed the pastries right over, "Well these are for you then!" I was in pure, unadulterated shock. "For me?"
I had helped an office on a higher level move some food upstairs on our carts (with my boss) for their open house party, and they were apparently very grateful. So grateful, in fact, that they had sent down a plate of pastries, for me.
The lady, whom I later learned was actually Joy, (and she was, pure Joy) went on to say, "Oh, well I didn't recognize you, Brooke. For some reason I thought your hair was darker."
My reply? "Maybe I've washed it since then." Obviously, it was answered with peals of laughter. And that's how work is, everyday.