Time Flies

From an unnamed production office for an undisclosed television show in an address-withheld building in LA where the elevators are shockingly slow...

I went away to the East Coast this past weekend, and after I flew overnight on Thursday (sleeping for 2 hours of a 4 hour flight to Chicago, pinching myself into consciousness for a 2 hour layover, and then dozing on a 2 hour flight to Boston) I went to lunch in Providence on Friday and stayed up until 2:30 p.m. and then napped to the Kourtney and Khloe and their ridiculous shenanigans (although I do think that Scott is real-life Patrick Bateman and no one is taking it seriously enough) after which I saw 2 plays and then stayed out late for drinks and then repeated that the next day when I saw 3 plays and had even more drinks and didn't go to bed until 4 in the morning, but didn't get to sleep it off because the day after that I got up early to hang out with a 3-year-old and 1-year-old who are the cutest of buttons, but children nonetheless and then this morning I got up at 3:45 a.m. Providence time- which was 12:45 a.m. L.A. time- and L.A. was where I was headed to go directly to my office which was particularly horrifying because after I'd been up for 2 hours, I saw on Facebook that one of my office mates hadn't even gone to bed for the night and I knew that I was so effed that I couldn't concentrate on work all day and wasn't even sure I could post more than a single sentence on the blog, and for those keeping track: I didn't.

Mini-soda

From an unnamed hotel room in the Twin Cities...

Yes, you read right. I'm in Minnesota. And if I wasn't already not wearing pants*, this place would have charmed them right off of me. It's green, it's clean, it's other things that rhyme with green. People are friendly and there are sculptures of Peanuts characters everywhere. It makes me feel right at home, as my hometown is also littered with Peanuts memorabilia. Apparently I just go wherever Charles Schulz goes.

The conference doesn't officially start until tomorrow, so I don't have much to report, work-wise, but I will tell you about my new love interest. He's 3, and his name is Aaron. I met him on the plane. He was sitting in front of me and stood up on his seat and turned around to say "how are you?" but he hasn't totally mastered enunciation yet, so it came out like "howyou?" but I knew what he was getting at. He then asked me for me name and proudly announced that "I Aaron."

At that point, his mom made him turn around and leave me to read my book, but the connection was just too strong. He kept sneaking a peek, and finally made his move when he offered me one of his cookies. I thanked him and went to grab it, he regaled me with a full course of "Happy Birthday," which his mom says is currently his favorite song. I've never felt so special.

The course of true love never did run smooth, though. He was also flirting with the lady in the seat next to me, a Minnesota native who complained that "these airplane seats just get smaller and smaller!" She decided to regale me with information about why Minnesota is superior to the Bay Area and attempted to monopolize Aaron's attention, but the battle and the war were won when he offered me the cookie and serenade. "They always go for the pretty young things!" she said with a laugh, but I knew she was crying on the inside.

Tragically, our romance was cut short as it turned out that Aaron's family was catching a connecting flight to Memphis, and I was deplaning in Minneapolis/St. Paul. I don't know if our paths will ever cross again, but I've got a cookie in my belly and a song in my heart for the rest of my life.

*I'm wearing a dress.

Stay Classy

From an unnamed university in the greater San Francisco Bay Area...

I knew it! I knew my boss was going to be able to go right back to sucking as soon as she returned to the office! Man, when she brings the suck, she really brings it.

So she was about 2 hours late yesterday because she took her cat to the vet. Then we went out to lunch to "celebrate" her return. I mentioned to her that everything is ready for the conference she's attending next week in San Diego (the one she said I couldn't go to because it's "important that [she] be there." It was all I could do not to say "bitch, no one is aware of your 'importance' besides you."); we just need to book her flight and how about we do that after lunch?

She replied that she doesn't want to go because she doesn't want to leave her cat alone overnight so soon after her getting so sick and can't I just go? I'm already going to Minneapolis this week, a trip she decided she didn't want to go on minutes before she left for her 9-week vacation. I told her I thought that two trips in the course of a week was too many for me and she said "Well, then I guess our office doesn't need to be represented. We have a good enough relationship with this organization anyway."

A) She said it super bitchy.
B) We already paid the $800 registration fee to attend, as well as reserved a hotel room.

San Diego, here I come. Look who's important enough now!

ADDENDUM: Victory is mine! I don't have to go anymore! We conned a very sweet student who views the conference as a "networking opportunity" and a free trip to sunny San Diego and is actually HAPPY about going! HAPPY. Bless her sweet, dumb little heart.

Spray Fan

From an unnamed production office for an undisclosed television show in an address-withheld building in LA where the elevators are shockingly slow...

Last Friday was a particularly annoying day at work.  All the usual annoying things happened, and then I tried to book a flight online.  Maybe I never tried to go somewhere so far (the East Coast) for such a brief period (2 days), but it seemed pretty impossible to wade through Kayak and JetBlue and finally United to get travel times that would actually put me on the ground for the days I needed without flying and being laid over for equally as long.  Once I found my highly specific flights, I entered all my personal and billing information to book them.  I hit Enter.  United told me there was an error.  Then it told me that five more times, and- because I really needed those particular flights, and they were only pulled up on my work computer, and it was Friday afternoon and almost time to go as far away from my desk as I could for as long as I could- it became clear that I was going to have to step back in time and book my flights over the phone.  All was going well with the innocuous-bordering-on-pleasant computer voice system; I had the flights I needed, had listened to all the baggage and cancellation policies, and all I needed to do was enter my frequent flyer number by speaking it aloud.  But the computer couldn't understand me.  It couldn't understand me three times in a row, which meant that I was transferred to a real live person who was real live hard to understand, and I got to start all over again requesting the particular flights and listening to policies and wishing I could throw my phone through the window.  I couldn't.  It's a very strong window.

I did finally get my flight booked, but all of that frustrating back story was to explain why- when I heard that someone was giving free spray tans in the second floor bathroom across the building- I asked no questions other than, "Do I still have time?!" before I ran there.  When I got to the bathroom, there was a small tent-type thing, a woman with a spraying machine, and a girl I kind of know who works down the hall from me who let me borrow her bathing suit top to go with the paper thong I was given to wear as bottoms.  Interestingly, in a mathematical way, they were out of paper bras, but not paper underwear.  A puzzle.  Anyway, I took off all my clothes and put on a hairnet in the handicapped stall, as I felt that getting naked in a public bathroom with the threat of both colleagues and strangers walking in was totally worth it if it meant turning my stupid afternoon into a slightly less stupid, way more tan one.  And I was right.  When I, pretty naked with my eyes closed against the (harmful?) spray, finally got around to asking why exactly this was happening at my place of work and for free, someone said it was because the spray tan company really wanted to get their name out into the world.  Then I asked what the name of their company was three times and no on answered me.  Or it's possible that, with my new found tan awesomeness, I just didn't think that it was important for me to listen. 

Get Off My Plane

From an unnamed university in the greater San Francisco Bay Area...

Sorry I didn't post yesterday; I was actually down in LA for a Slobs reunion. Well, technically I was there for a conference and to do some outreach to other universities, but the highlight of my trip was drinking keg beer with K.

Anyway, the conference was boring, the outreach was okay, the aforementioned keg beer was awesome, but the coolest part of my trip was watching AIR FORCE ONE land in LAX yesterday evening. Yeah, dude, Air Force One! It was carrying THE PRESIDENT. POTUS. El jefe. Maybe Michelle, too, I don't know. It was so exciting.

Usually, I hate LAX the most. Not just the most of any airport, but really the most of all places that exist (yes, I've been to Hartsfield, O'Hare and De Gaulle. But I'm there so infrequently it just doesn't compare.). The Southwest terminal is the worst. It's impossible to find a good place to sit, there's no delicious food, and the bathrooms are super gross. I dread it every time I fly there, but for some reason yesterday seemed charmed. I breezed through security, found a seat close to an outlet to charge my iPhone and they've installed a PINKBERRY in the food court. What could be better?

Seeing freaking Air Force One. I am a HUGE presidential geek. I spent a quarter in DC back in college and fell in love with all things POTUS. I love "The West Wing" (and, if I'm being totally honest, in my mind, the plane I saw was carrying President Bartlet and all my favorite staffers. What up, CJ?), I love the official seal, I love "Hail to the Chief". It was fantastic.

Now I'm back to the regular old, no-President-sighting-life. You know, having ham and coffee for breakfast, sleeping past the time I'm supposed to be at work and dreaming up ways to torture the guys next door. Hail to the Chief, indeed.