In which I should have spoken up

I was watching an Oprah episode yesterday that had Suze Orman's guide to surviving the economy.  She talked about having an 8 month savings and contributing to your 401K and all that.  And she said that you should understand the difference between your needs and your wants and don't buy anything you don't need.

Turns out you don't need a lot of stuff.  Dangit.

I ran into one of my big bosses in the kitchen this afternoon.  He was looking for money.  Aren't we all, bub?  

"Do you have eighty-five cents?" he asked.

I patted myself down and said, "Not on me, sorry." 

"Well, usually I can only get what I want if I have exact change," he explained.  "I only have bills today.  Let's see what happens."  He put his dollar into the machine and successfully got his eighty-five cent Wheat Thins.  "You know," he said, as he began to make a cup of coffee, "you should just be able to forfeit your change."

"What?"

"You know, forfeit your change so that you can get what you want if you only have a dollar."

"Suze would not like that," I pointed out.

"Who?" he asked.

"Suze Orman.  She says you should save your change and put it in your savings account,"  I explained.  

He looked nonplussed.  "But I should be able to get what I want. "

  

"Ah ha!  Suze says that you have to figure out what it is you need and what you just want."

"Well, I could come to your house and take away a lot of things you have that you don't need.  I mean, you probably only need a couple of outfits-"

I wear the same pair of pants every day, so close enough, right?  I'm on board with that.

"-and probably only one pair of shoes-"

Check.  I wear tennis shoes every day, because otherwise I walk like Frankenstein.

 "-your makeup-"

Ok.  That'll save me some time in the morning.

"-jewelry..."

Whoa.  Wait a second, there.  "Jewelry?"  I asked.  "You want to take my jewelry?"  I hid my hand behind my back.  "You can't have my flower ring.  No."

"See?" He smiled.  "We all want something."

"Fine.  I said,  "You can have your Wheat Thins.  I'm keeping my ring."

"That's what I'm saying.  You should be able to have what you want."

That's when I left.  But now I realize I should've asked for a raise.  Or at least some nachos.

In which I play Nancy Drew

I have always been nosy.  In fact, I like to list it as one of my best character traits.  I can eavesdrop anyone under the table (even with the ringing in my ears), as well as read upside down.  That, coupled with the fact that I am good at reading people and my very active imagination make me a damn good detective.  My sister used to call me a busybody, like it was a flaw or something.  Of course, she was a teenager then and I was annoying.  Who can blame her?  She didn't know that I was training to be AWESOME in my future life. 

I'm so good, in fact, that I used to be able to tell my boss who would be getting fired next.  "How do you know?" he'd ask.  "I can smell it," I'd say, and I'd be right.  Really, all you have to do is pay attention to what's going on around you and what people are saying here and there and you can piece information together fairly easily.

The other day one of my colleagues looked at me and said "you keep your ears open and your mouth closed, don't you?"  She was right for the most part.  I do have a history of being verbose, as my mother will be happy to prove by telling stories about my behavior in church, but I know how to keep other people's secrets.  I think my ability to dig up a good story is equally valuable, though.

It is precisely this skill that got me a compliment at work the other day.  Part of my job is to do research on possible jobs to see if there is something scandalous lurking in the background.  My love of the internet and nose for news told me something was up with this one particular person.  So I snooped and snooped until I found it - a good old fashioned scurrilous scandal.  The information was so scandalous, though, that my bosses decided not to follow through with the deal.  This has not happened in all the time I have been involved in doing this research, so I was shocked when I got the email.  The phone rang a few minutes later.  "Who did that background research?" my old boss from LA asked.  "Was that you?"  

"Yes, " I admitted, figuring I might be in some kind of trouble.

"Good job.  Thanks," he said.

Wait, what?

"That was a really good catch and we wanted to thank you.  Good work." 

And for once I was kind of speechless.  But not for too long.

Oh, what's that?  You want to know what the scandal was?  Sorry.  See above.  I am a big talker, but an excellent secret-keeper.  Get on the interweb and dredge up your own scandal.

In which I issue a cry for help

Hey, 'member when I used to be funny?  Those were the days.

*********

I have been trying for well, years, literally, to get up early in the morning.  Like at 7.  Which is not really that early, compared to you know, when babies get up and stuff.  So you'd think I could do 7.  But I can't.  

Unless, of course, it happens to be the weekend.  For some reason, it is easier for me to get up early on the weekends.  Sure, if I can sit around and drink coffee and watch some bad movie or The Universe or something, THEN I can get up at 7.  But not if I actually have to be somewhere in a timely fashion.  No, then I can only wake up in a slobbering panic 30 minutes before I have to leave.  

Am I the only one who has this problem?  Any suggestions on how to fix it?

In which I am making big plans

When I moved from LA I shipped all my belongings to my office here, and they have been in storage ever since.  I have brought some things home bit by bit, but one thing has been sitting on my shelf for a while now.

My scale. 

Duhn duhn DUHN!

I weighed myself when I got home tonight and I wasn't surprised.  I weigh the most I have ever weighed in my life.

That's why I've made a decision.  I am going to lose weight and get healthy.  Finally.  And to help out, I'm going to blog about it.  I am starting a new blog here to tell all my wacky weight loss stories and make a lot of jokes about doughnuts.  (oooh, doughnuts!)  Yes, that's right, now I'll have two, count 'em, TWO blogs to ignore!  Where will I find the time to not update BOTH of them??

In which I tell you things you may not know

You may not know:

If you wash your Metrocard, it still works.  I don't know what happens if you dry it, too.

Smoked gouda with jalepenos on rosemary flatbread is not as good as it sounds.

When you forget to change your address on Netflix, they send your DVD three thousand miles away from where you live.

If you leave your home on a slightly cloudy New York morning and leave the window over your bed open, then you will be sleeping on a wet pillow that night.  Whoops.

No one cares about your Nip stories.

Or any of your other stories, for that matter.

If you wear anything other than that pair of pants you wear to work every day, people will notice and tell you you look good.  Even if it is only a belted nightgown.

When you listen to the same song over and over again because you are obsessed with it, and then you watch the video from DWTS over and over again, you can't get upset because that song is running through your head.  

If you don't update your blog more often, people will stop reading.  Sorry.  I'll try to do better.