The Emily Post of our times

Lately I’ve been a little unnerved by how relevant someecards.com is to my life. There’s this:

followed by this:

and of course:

Let’s not forget:

I wish someone had shown the courtesy of sending this:

so I could have had the pleasure of responding like this:

PS:

 

Words Added to My Cell Phone Dictionary

alcoholic alembic aww Backlund balboa basil bedsores bergen Blech blog brunchable btw charlottesville chugged cobble cornland cornucopia Coyle cupcakes Daft dick didion Donnie doorman douchebag dunzo Edna Eiji flt fucked Gessen ghandi gonna gq Greil haight Hallelujah honeymooning hotlanta hoyt hungover Iluna Joe kara karaoke liss magnolia Malibu marcel marcus milkshake millay Modesto mozz netflixing newlywed obvs Omg Oooh Papalote Peeler pms pompadour potty probs prosecco puked Pulp pussy Quach repairman restorative Rhiannon Ringer Sanchez searingly Shrader signifiers Skipping slutty soooo sux temping theatah Thx tix totes txt uszh Vicodin vom weds wikipedia Williamsburg wtf xx yuck

I tried to add “SOS” yesterday, but I got this message:

My Words List entries are full. Please erase an old entry.

I don’t think I will, though. That list is pretty much the most perfect 100 words written about the last six months.

 

Eeeeww, Facebook!!

Am I alone in finding this new “People You May Know” feature unsettling?  Chances are,  if there’s someone on Facebook with whom I already have friends/networks in common and who is not ALREADY my friend, then there’s, um, a good reason.  For these regular reminders of embarrassing hookups, past humiliations, and professional bridges burned, Facebook, I thank you!

 

Impostor Syndrome

Earlier this week, I was flown to Seattle for a job interview. The company I interviewed with is very successful and has tons of money to throw around — you would recognize the name right away if I told you. They put me up in a luxury hotel. My room had panoramic views of the city, a huge bed with a cushion-top mattress and about a dozen pillows, and an all-marble bathroom perfect for abusing coke with a pair of high-class call girls (though I merely wallowed in the soaking tub and enjoyed the feeling of really clean hair — hooray for great water pressure!).

I checked into the hotel wearing faded jeans and a hoodie and basically felt like an impostor from that moment on. It would not have surprised me to have been roughly shaken awake at 3 AM and told to get out, we know all about you, and YOU do not belong here. Only at the end of my trip and after my interview (which went well but not great) was I finally able to tell myself, You know, I’m a smart, talented, and hard-working young woman. There is NO reason why I shouldn’t be here. There is NO reason, in fact, why my life shouldn’t be like this from here on out.

Then I took the extra roll of toilet paper in the bathroom and packed it in my suitcase. We always seem to need it at my apartment.

 

If you still believe I’m thinking of you, you are dreaming

Anyways.  2007!   That happened.  And when I was ready for it to be over, it still kept happening.

So, yeah, resolutions.  Dreams.   How to ensure that 2008 is as little like 2007 as possible?  And what is the difference between “dreams” and “resolutions” anyway? Allow me to do a little thought experiment with you.

Dreams:

1.  Pitney-Bowes calls a press conference.  CEO Michael J. Critelli steps to the podium.  “I am here to publicly apologize for the manufacture and distribution of the DI-350 mailing machine with separate folding/insertion mechanism,” he reads from a statement.  “It has come to my attention that quality control for this particular product is far, far below the accepted standards for doing business.  I know that my heartfelt apology cannot even begin to make up for the countless man-hours lost in attempting to operate this catastrophically poorly-designed piece of equipment, but I hope that all the mailroom clerks and temporary office workers listening will weigh my words on the scales of forgiveness and understanding rather than justice.”  A federal court rules that Critelli’s year-end bonus must be paid incrementally in a series of one-dollar checks, each of which must be folded and inserted into a mailing envelope via a DI-350 machine operated by Critelli.

2.  I wake up and turn on the radio.  Due to a freak copier malfunction, Kikkoman International, Incorporated (KII), headquartered at XX California Street, has burned to the ground.  No one is hurt; however, all databases and related Consumer Services materials are destroyed.  Irretrievably.  My temp agency calls to say they are paying me through January anyway.

3.  All my Netflix movies arrive today, even though they are scheduled to arrive tomorrow.

Resolutions:

1. To write in this online diary more than once a month.

2.  To stop calling it an “online diary.”

3.  To avoid Bridget Jones mannerisms and stereotypes as much as possible.

Let’s see how I go.

 

Nuts and Bolts

Recently I did an interview for Expat Interviews. If you are curious about the general logistics of moving to New Zealand: visas, finances, broad advantages and disadvantages, etc., then have a look!

 

Spotted on the Street Today

A very portly and also very chilled out-looking dude in his early thirties, wearing sunglasses and T-shirt that read:

I’M A REAL GO-GETTER

MY GIRL WORKS

I GO AND GET HER

Sometimes I kind of love this place.

 

Protected: Things of Which I Have Had Enough

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Other people’s lives seem more interesting / ’cause they ain’t mine. . .

And so, just in time for the graduation gift-giving season, let me tell you about some interesting things my friends have been doing.

**Zareen and Emily wrote a book! Hex Education is about the trials (ha) of Sophie Stone, a girl whose mysterious visions and strange headaches seem eerily connected to her new home in Mystic, Massachusetts and the super-exclusive group of popular girls who accept her immediately as one of their own. Get over your snobbery about YA literature and buy this book, or, if you can’t, buy it for the 8th grade graduate in your life and steal it when they’re finished. Emily and Zareen will be participating in a reading at Borders–Columbus Circle on May 31, so if you’re in New York City, please go and cheer loudly for me.

**Andrew Palmer (technically a friend of a friend, for those of you taking notes) has released the first volume of Avery, an anthology of new, never-published fiction from the likes of Stephen Dixon, Ander Monson, and Dean Bakopoulos. He and his co-editors plan on releasing two volumes per year, and one can subscribe for $16.00. Andrew, Stephanie, and Adam also write a blog about the daily trials and triumphs of creating a literary magazine/anthology, which will be of interest to bookish nerds like myself. If anyone finds themselves with some extra change and the desire to get me a gift, consider this a big hint.

**This bullet point is reserved for Burning Down Rome, my friend Matt Gelfer’s band, whose unique sound blends improv with folk, classical, and rock. I heard they were finished recording their first album, but I WON’T KNOW MORE UNTIL MATT EMAILS ME, not that I would like that or anything. In the meantime, please make friends with them on MySpace.

**Psyche! I AM actually doing something interesting and worthwhile in New Zealand this week, even compared to other people “pursuing careers” or “spending time with friends and family.” Tomorrow I leave to do the Heaphy Track, and in between fighting off bionic sandflies and walking the 82 K (!), I won’t be writing here again until next Thursday at the earliest. Until then!

 

Generation X Revisited:Tales for a New Generation

JONESED OUT– a state of chronic and pernicious overexposure to blandly appealling, lite-fm folk or rock (e.g. Jack Johnson, acoustic Sheryl Crow), most likely at the sufferer’s low-prestige, low-paying place of work. Usually presents as an obsessive need for control of musical choices at parties, in the car, at friends’ apartments, etc. coupled with a disproportionally vehement hatred for seemingly-innocuous “adult contemporary” artists.
“Julie was so jonesed out after that year she worked at Starbucks. She wouldn’t even go to yoga with me anymore because she said the instructor might play David Gray during savasana.”