The ongoing battle between Calgon and Chuck E.

I have the feeling that I may have to escape the office during lunch.

I have been fighting a sore throat and general malaise since yesterday. This morning, I woke up with a cough that leaves my throat feeling raw, along with the unmovable urge to stay in bed. I went to work anyway, where I was greeted with at least six e-mails all asking for the impossible, along with the distinct stench of coffee burnt to tar at the bottom of a coffee pot.

After tending to the coffee pot (by turning off the burner) and the e-mails (half I replied to, the other half I flipped the bird at), I made every attempt to let my dear co-workers know that I would rather not try to speak today, despite the fact that I sound just like Selma Diamond. Most were sympathetic; the small gaggle of idiots that constantly raise my ire proceeded to ignore my ill health and send calls and patients back to my office, left and right.

Excuse me? Let's send oncology and hematology patients, who are more than likely either already sick or highly susceptible to illness, to the sick-ass person suffering in the small, enclosed office in the back!

More patients coming in right now. Goodness. On goes my SARS mask.

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Either I have too much time on my hands...

Or I'm trying to avoid work/wedding planning/everything else. Yes, probably that.

I just signed up for that Grand Central business you see in the form of the "Call Me!" button to your right. Apparently, you plug in your phone number, and the system calls you and connects you to my assigned phone number or voice mail. And it's all free. I have yet to get a phone call in this manner; probably because I'm not quite sure whether or not I want to give out the number. But I guess that's part of the charm, since I'm not actually giving out my cell number or anything, just a number I've been assigned.

I think I was just really missing the old audio blog capability and felt like maybe, just maybe, someone will get soused enough to leave me drunken voice mails to post on the blog to be reviewed in later moments of clarity. Drunk dialing a blog? Oh, hell yes. It's starting to feel like college all over again (except without all the vomiting and early morning shame)!

And I see your mouse pointer hovering over the button contemplatively. Give in and call it, already! At the very least, we'll know how the hell this works, and your dulcet tones may be broadcast far and wide! Why am I yelling?

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Dirtbag.

Lately, instead of calling perturbing people fucksticks or douche nozzles (or just "nozzles," for brevity's sake) under my breath, I'm calling them dirtbags. It's just been in the past few days, and I think it's because I can't get the following joke out of my head:

What's the difference between a Harley and a Hoover?
The location of the dirtbag.

Oh, well. It'll probably pass when the word "fucktard" gets back in my good graces, which is probably right after I've called people "dirtbags" twenty times before I clock out today.

Today's going pretty well. It's a slow Friday, which is almost how I prefer them. I'm not running around the office like an idiot trying to put out small fires like I often do on Wednesdays, which is the day all the doctors are here, and everyone's scrambling for room. And air. And sanity. Most of the patients coming in on Fridays are regularly scheduled for treatment on those days, and they're usually all set, just chilling in their chemo chairs, reading, talking on their cells, watching a movie, or sleeping.

Oh yeah, if I've neglected to mention it before, I got a new job last April. The fact that I'm approaching a full year at this "new job" is just crazy. I work for a bunch of oncology/hematology doctors now, and strangely enough, I really, really enjoy this job. I get to interact with patients a lot less than as a therapist, but a whole lot more than when I worked at Eviltown, USA (one of my many pet names for the job before this).

The people I work with are pretty cool, except for one person who has made it her mission in life to make her job seem more important than it actually is; and who, by her actions, makes it less and less meaningful in the process (now, that's some talent). I don't want to waste precious time on her, as it wastes my energies...

Oh, now, here we go. She just walked into my office, sat down next to my desk, and proceeded to stare directly at this screen for fifteen seconds before making up some lame excuse that she was trying to find out what music I was listening to. Oh, so it's not being a nosy, nicotine-soaked idiot who wants to pretend she has any say over me or what I do?

Now I have to cut this post short, before she comes back in here, snoops some more, then reports some tall tale to someone who actually has authority.

Effing dirtbag. I swear.

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Thirty and flirty and... oh, who am I kidding?

I swear, my main mission for the day was two-fold: get through work without killing anyone, and ending my evening watching 13 Going On 30, because, well, dammit, the day's here, and I owe it to myself. I also miss seeing La Garfleck on my tele on a regular basis, but that's neither here nor there.


Oh, come on. You know you miss them.

Alas, things didn't pan out exactly the way I had hoped. I did manage to complete my workday sans casualties, but I didn't have the time to watch La Garfleck "spectacularrrr" (imagine Uncle Jimbo from South Park during the episode when he went to Mexico with Ned to get illegal fireworks, and you've got it). Oh, well.

I did, however, manage to have a great dinner whilst sitting in a booth behind who had to be the strangest couple I have ever witnessed eating together (ever), and across from a booth occupied by what I could only conclude was a rehearsal for one of those "real-life" dining scenes on Laguna Beach.

It did get weird, however, when Mr. Pretentious (half of the Strangest Eating Team Ever power-couple) started to talk louder, thus drawing the attention of the LBers. This somehow encouraged him and he started what I guess was his style of flirting, which consisted of him getting even louder and having his two-person conversation heard by the whole restaurant, along with openly mocking the LB Rehearsal Girls. The two LBers (and the rest of the joint) grew increasingly uncomfortable, while I was just glad Ben and I were sitting behind the guy, so he couldn't really turn around and engage us in his general dickery.

Did I neglect to mention that when the Eating Team got up in the middle of their meal to burn one, it was only then that I noticed that Mr. Pretentious looked to be as tall as Danny Devito, and his female counterpart was a fucking Amazon? Sorry I forgot. But enough of my Birthday Dinner Theater.

So, this is thirty. Not much different from twenty-nine, except I referred to myself as thirty today, and the reality of those words coming out of my mouth somehow startled me. I'm not sure why.

As long as I keep getting carded for R-rated movies, however, I think I'm good.

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The downward spiral.

It was another craptacular day at work. Even more calls today from irate people who will blame anyone who will listen for all that ails them. The main issue I found today was that most of the jackballs I spoke to today had problems answering simple and direct questions.

Me: Are you having problems with your system, sir?
He: The patient's number is 123-45-6789Y.
Me: Sir, did you try to use your system to check this information? You do have to try to access the system for the information you're looking for, since you need to print out your results. Were you able to log on to the system?
He: The patient's name is ... Date of birth ... gender...
Me: Sir? Do you have access to the system at all?
He: He says he has HMO.

This is the part where my head explodes.

It wouldn't be so bad if I only got characters like that some of the time. But, as it stands, every third call is someone trying to dodge the question of whether or not they are following the rules by avoiding the question, pretending they didn't hear me, getting indignant with me ("Well, we've been doing this for twenty years, and we've NEVER been told we had to do THAT!"), and just plain lying.

She: I'm calling to check eligibility for this client.
Me: I can help you with that. Are you having problems using the system to pull up that information?
She: Yeah. We had a lot of rain here this afternoon/Our system is down/Someone stole our computers (the list goes and goes and goes)...

My personal fave happened a couple of weeks ago. I answered my phone and was about to un-mute myself and give my greeting when I heard the person calling tell their co-worker, "Oh, I know we're supposed to use the system to check this. But when I call, I just lie to them and tell them our system is down." After a second or two of shock, I happily un-muted, gave the cheeriest greeting ever, then sat with three seconds of silence as the scoundrel, realizing I had heard everything she had just said, suddenly sucked in her breath, then slammed down the phone. Since the call came through on the Caller ID, I had half a notion to call her back and let her have it. I did jot down her number, and scrawled "Friggin' Idiot" on the Post-It. I think it gives me some comfort.

Whoever you are, liar/hanger-upper, I hope you are hanging your head down in shame for lying because you were too damned lazy to do your own work. I will not hesitate to point you out and laugh obnoxiously should I run into you in public and witness the deli worker give the very last stuffed potato balls you'd been thinking about all day to the person directly ahead of you in line. I will laugh even harder should that person in line right ahead of you be someone you were going to spend time with immediately after going to the store, and that person proceeds to eat those very stuffed potato balls right in front of your fucking face without offering you a bite.

See? This is what happens when I don't get enough rest. I get sidetracked and start talkin' potato balls.

Yikes, and it's only Tuesday.

Downward spiral, here I come!

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Mid-week bitchery.

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