Looking for the next available exit... (this post is LONG and gets UGLY but is worth it in my mind.)

I have to say, if I weren't already looking to get out of my current job, I would most definitely be looking elsewhere after my experiences today.

"What could possibly have so soured you on the job you already clearly hate?" you ask, unsure if you really want to know more.

An excellent question my friend.

After having spent 9 months making daily visits to "the poop house" you'd figure I'd have already dealt with the worst of the worst... And in a way, that's correct. That house was most assuredly the earthly portal to hell. But the bright spot in that festering craphole of humanity was that I never had to touch anything... I mean yes, I did have to wear special "poop shoes" to go into that house, but the poop shoes were only for my own personal comfort, so that I could be sure that those shoes were relegated to the fate of NEVER re-entering my home after taking but a single step into that heap of unfathomable foulness. Those poor shoes, (an old, loyal, well-worn pair of New Balances, previously reserved for lawn mowing duties) took their first steps into the "poop house" and from that moment on they were solidly banished to a secured garbage bag in the floorboard of my back seat, and were ceremonially destroyed/disposed of when the case closed. But all of this is beside the point... The poop house stories are being stored in a deep dark cellar where distance and time will age them like the rare vintage they are... Believe me, if you hang out long enough, you will be allowed to partake in that exceptional selection. On to more pressing matters...

So despite my history of tolerating all the foulness that the poop house dished out, today was a topper.

To give you a little background, this is yet another dirty house. And in my line of work, to get a call on a dirty house, it's a particularly special brand of funk-nasty. I mean, do you have any idea how disgusting a house has to be before the state will take your children away as a result? Well, I'll tell you that whatever you're imagining, triple the level of foulness, rub some dog shit on it, sprinkle on a healthy smattering of human fecal matter, and then don't take the trash out of the equation, EVER... For at least a year... YEAH, just HEAP that garbage on there! Now we're in the neighborhood containing the ballpark... And even if you're not in the neighborhood containing the ballpark, you're at least probably playing the right sport.

There is nothing worse in my office than a dirty house case. Well... strike that... I think that the dirty houses might actually compete with the molestation/incest cases for first place in the "best of the worst" category. (We're getting into the whole "incident vs. lifestyle" argument, and that's a rabbit hole we're not ready to delve into fully... We're talking "The Matrix" level of other worldly comprehension, so really it's just better if you take my word for it and we move on, because I don't have the a $350,000,000 budget to produce the movies to convince you...) Either way, you're getting the idea that this is not a place I want to be even on a good day... And today was BAAAAAAAAAD. REALLY REALLY BAAAAAAAAD.

So yesterday I go into this dirty house thinking I'm going to point out the things that they need to clean, and the order in which tasks need to be accomplished, starting with the most egregious. The father in the home informs me that the mom has head lice. This alone would be plenty foul. But when we compound this with another fact that I learned on Tuesday, both parents were in fact INFESTED with scabies, we again enter that whole other rabbit hole realm of disgusting-funk-tastic. (I'd like to point out that I took a break just before this point to drink off my daily events, and am currently pretty intoxicated, but we've got work to do... Back to the story.)

So... This disgusting dirty house is populated by two adults. There is constantly garbage on every conceivable surface, which I inexplicably have to point out and instruct them to throw away. The laundry hasn't been done in god only knows how long, there are no sheets on the bed because they are content to sleep on a plain ol' grubby beat down mattress, and now they have lice... And SCABIES!!! (...Oh, and I am in hell.)

I call and report all of this to the state case worker, and call the person responsible for providing the visitation, and everyone else I can conceivably drag into this debacle with me. The office supervisor states that he doesn't think we can suspend visitation over lice and scabies, and I essentially told him to fuck off, went over his head, and suspended visitation on my own because it was the right thing to do. They could fire me if they wanted to, (in which case I'd have been extremely grateful, and then they could pay my severance and unemployment while I sit on my ass all day like my clients, because once you know how to work the system, you can live pretty well on very very little.) Either way, I'm right in this instance.

At this point in time, I become a seething, burning, multi-layered anger parfait.

So because of the health risks involved, and because of the fact I am the only one willing to do a damn thing about it, I had to be the one to tell the parents that their visitation was suspended until further notice. It's roughly at this point when I had to get mean. They got all defensive saying, "Well that's not fair!" To which I had no choice but to respond in that hateful, seething tone previously reserved for D-bags at bars who couldn't take a hint, "Actually, NO... You want to know what's unfair? Unfair would be allowing visits with you despite the fact that you have NOT ONE, BUT TWO ailments which are BOTH easily transmittable by any close contact. Let's say you hug your kid, give her either one, or both of your problems, and then not only does she get to suffer from those ailments, she also goes back to foster care, and gives it to every adult and child she comes into contact with, and then 10 people are infected with these problems rather than just you two... Just because you think it's unfair. So... You continue having visits with your kid, despite knowing about the problems which are easily transferable to other people. Your kid gets scabies and lice, the foster parents get scabies and lice, all the other kids at the foster placement get scabies and lice. All the other kids we transport in our cars and car seats get scabies and lice... All because you say that it's unfair? WRONG-O! So, no... Those other people at risk of getting infected because you can't manage some shampoo and a little washcloth time? THAT'S UNFAIR! So whether you like it or not, or whether you think it's fair or not, it's not up to you."

I might have felt like I'd overstepped the mark with tone and manner of delivery, but what came next was the icing on the cake, or in my case, the mustard on the turd sandwich.

"Well we don't know what to do..."

Since I'd called the case worker three days prior, and not heard back, this was something I was forced to deal with.

"What do you want me to do about it?"

"Help."

"Help with what exactly?"

"Help us with the treatment."

"I'll get back to you on that... The scabies you've got to see a doctor for... I can't do anything for that. We'll talk about the lice later."

So I eventually got a call back from the case worker. She determined that I was right in suspending the visitation. (A little vindication which didn't at all make up for what she was about to dump on me.) She determined that since the parents weren't the brightest crayolas in the box that I needed to assist them with the treatment of the lice... And by assist them with treatment, she meant that I would need to go in, spend three hours IN THE SCABIES AND LICE HOUSE, AND TREAT THEM MY GODDAMNED SELF.

SPEC-FUCKING-TACULAR!

SOOOOOO.... I blocked off a LARGE portion of my work day. I put on shorts and a t-shirt. I then put on a pair of adidas track pants with the tight elastic at the bottom cuff, which I had every intention of throwing away anyway, and another shirt which I decided would need to be discarded after this debacle. I then popped on a full length lab coat from my mom's office, (which she told me I could burn after use,) rubber gloves, and a super sexy shower cap... Short of being hermetically sealed in saran wrap, I was covered from head to toe in gear specifically designed for this purpose... (I only wished a haz-mat suit was something I had access to.) And I had every intention of disposing of my garb ASAP upon completion of my mission.

I then spent the next few hours using a fine toothed comb and lice treatment gel on both of them.

Somehow through the whole process I managed to control my gag reflex.

I then told them that they had better have paid attention to how the process was done, because neither I, nor anyone at my office would EVER do it for them EVER again, and informed them about how to go about treating the rest of the home. And then I exited the home.

Prior to re-entering my car, I took off the gloves, the shower cap, the lab coat, the pants, the shirt, and every other conceivable aspect of external garb, and deposited into a plastic bag which was then promptly deposited into a dumpster which happened to be readily available.

I then drove home and proceeded to take the most scalding hot, super exfoliating, uber-scrubbing shower you can possibly imagine. (And, not that you need to know this, but short of removing the hair on the top of my head, and my eyebrows, I shaved pretty much every bodily surface within reach.)

And I still had the psychosomatic itchies all day... as I used to get even post-shower on days when I had to go to the poop house where I never touched a thing. (Never underestimate the brain's retention of latent suggestion, even after you know you've taken every conceivable step to prevent any issues.)

So... If you want to complain about your job, go for it... I'm all ears!

Good luck competing. I hardly think that the abnormally loud talker in the next cubicle compares... But really, go ahead! I can't wait to hear what you've got to complain about!





(Yes, I know I need to get another goddamned job... I'm working on it, as is everyone else I know well enough to call in a hiring-related favor.)

Don't ever wonder why my job makes me hate life EVER AGAIN... And if you know a social worker, go thank them! And if they have had to go into a scabies/lice/poop house lately, after making sure they've showered like any rational human being, HUG THEM!

The direct line...

We all know that I take a pretty direct approach to things around here. And it's easy to be direct when you're just yammering on about anything you want into the vast reaches of anonymity known as the internet. I mean you don't really have to answer to anyone for anything, and provided you keep certain things to yourself, nobody can really do a damn thing about it because it's a right to free speech and editorialism. You might run into a few complaints if you start blogging about your plan to do serious physical harm to public figures, or if you decide you're going to publish your plan to blow up a building or something... (I'm betting that those two key phrases probably have my page being checked out by someone in some national security office right about now... But if that's the case, then they're missing the overall point.) The point is that directness is easily achieved when there is no accountability.

So then there's the remaining question; is it possible that I actually live my life the same way I go on and on here?

Well as a matter of fact, I do.

In fact, in real life I think I am far more brazen and crass than I ever let on here. I mean the editing process obviously allows me to rethink some of the more offensive comments I make before publishing them for the world to find. And in real life I am certainly much more profane. I mean if we're on the subject of profanity, I would like to point out that when I'm alone in my car, driving from one client's home to the next, I curse a blue streak, scream, pound on the steering wheel, and generally wish I had the James Bond budget to install machine guns in my headlights... But that's really neither here nor there.

I suppose I focused in on this topic because today while at the office (in the computer lab/lounge) I was loudly and profanely expressing my displeasure with my caseload. A nearby coworker who is not yet as jaded as I am about the whole thing looked at me blankly in shock and amazement and asked if I was always so brazen. I naturally affirmed this. And several other nearby coworkers nodded or otherwise replied in agreement. The fact that I have no qualms about expressing my displeasure over my job, and the fact that I really don't care who knows about it has only exacerbated this alacrity and zeal for making my honest opinions known. Of course, when with a client, or the company owner/boss from whom I will be needing a letter of recommendation to grad school, I am still capable of civility and censorship. (Or at least the appearance of such for the time being...) But the mental tabulations of any snide remarks is kept and shared with others as soon as those folks are out of earshot.

And while I do on a rare occasion make a total ass of myself, I apologize to the cursory people and move on to more crassness and offensive behavior. (I'm not so crass or offensive to be compared with someone like say Steve-O, but then again, I don't walk down a whole lot of red carpets upon which I have the option to publicly urinate... And I got enough love and attention from my mother while growing up, so that's not something I'm striving to achieve either.) But the apologies are rare, and I only issue them after careful consideration as to whether or not I feel that something I've said or done merits an apology, and whether or not I feel the offended party is deserving of said apology. And I like to think that based on the number of people who seem to really enjoy my company, I'm pretty sure that the judgment on those rare apologies is sound. In fact, the level to which I am revered by the coworkers and friends who have already clearly stated that they will miss me when I depart for greener pastures makes me pretty sure that I'm going about this with the right approach.

One of my favorite lines in "As Good As It Gets" is spoken by Greg Kinnear's character. He notes, "The best thing you have going for you is your willingness to humiliate yourself." Truer words were never spoken, and that has essentially become my motto. If you're not willing to go out on that limb and embarrass and make an ass of yourself from time to time, you miss out on all the fun that's involved. Yes there's a time and a place for civility and refinement, but by comparison it's a pretty small portion of the time.

I mean sure we could pussy foot around an issue all day, saying things in a politically correct and diplomatic way so that nobody gets their feelings hurt, but when you take the opportunity to just go the direct route and say what you mean the way you want to say it, the fact is that you save EPIC amounts of time in the long run.

So, who have you offended today?

Stick it to the man... But not really...

This weekend was essentially an exercise in debauchery... The drunken kind, which became my forte in college and the years immediately after.

Thursday night I went out to celebrate my interview with the firm I'm looking to join, and to just carouse and enjoy myself as a mode of decompression during the work week. It was a rousing success for the three of us who showed up.

Friday I worked, got off of work a little early when a mom no-showed for her visit, and so I then went to a friend's house for a little drunken get together she was having. (Momma had a date, and since my friends all know and adore momma, she came along to give up some of the details, and she enjoyed herself.) I drank sufficiently that an overnight (without the possibility of getting laid) was in order.

Saturday I got up obscenely early considering I'd been up until 5 AM the night before, worked a cursory amount, and then momma invited me out to dinner to meet this new fella. So I went to dinner, found him to be pretty charming, handsome for a gentleman of an appropriate age bracket to date my mother, and engaging. All in all, I approved.

By the time I got home from dinner, I was so tired from my previous nights outings, and elected to go to bed... Never in my life have I been so excited to go to bed alone. By 8:30 PM, despite still having my eyes open, my body was doing that jerking-to-stay-awake thing, and I resolved to myself that I was going to make it to 9:00 merely out of principle. I made it to 9:15, and then I slept for the next 13 hours. Proving yet again that I don't have the short recovery time that I once did.

Sunday I did the church thing, lazed around the house, chatted on the phone, and accomplished very very little. Momma had invited me to dinner at her house complete with her fella and grandpa. I again found her beau to be charming, and there was only one small hiccup which bothered me for a moment. It seems that this gentleman has a bit of difficulty with taking a compliment, but I'll let that slide as long as he's good to my mom. I left reasonably early under the guise that I was going to work on my paperwork... That paperwork thing didn't happen.

I toyed with the idea of doing it, knowing that even on the three day holiday weekends that paperwork is generally still due on Monday at 9 AM. I fiddle-farted around until I decided that it just wasn't in the cards and elected to go to bed.

Monday morning rolls around and I still hadn't started my paperwork by the time 9 AM rolled by. On an ordinary Monday, I'd have received roughly three calls by 9:15 if my paperwork was still out. I knew that there was nobody in the office at that point. But I also know that my office is famous for inane policy, which usually translates into someone having to go into the office and check-in everyone's paperwork packets by 1 PM on those few Monday holidays... Nobody processes it or does anything else with it, it's just a stupid thing that they do which inconveniences both the worker that has to go in and do the check-in process, and the rest of us who just want a Monday without answering to "The Man." Well, again, I toyed with the idea of doing my paperwork, but 1PM rolls around, and I find myself consumed with a personal call and can't be bothered with paperwork. By 1:15, when no one had called my work phone, I figured the deadline was 3:00 PM which I found absurd considering the workday ends at 5 and knowing that no one will be processing it then anyway, so I elected to skip the paperwork, and if I got a phone call at 3:15, I just wasn't answering. At 4:30 there were still no calls, so I called Traci to find out what was up with the paperwork situation. She noted that during a meeting I'd missed they had made the announcement that paperwork wasn't due until 9:00 AM on Tuesday. So all day long, I felt like I had been sticking it to the man saying, "Dammit, I'll get to that paperwork when I'm damn well good and ready." Turns out I was merely slacking like everyone else already knew they were entitled to.

So after visiting with momma for a bit today, I finally sat down this evening and cranked it out, because I'll be damned if I have to get up a few minutes early to print that shit out before going to the weekly staff meeting. So it's done, and turned in early for a holiday weekend, and I didn't get to stick it to the man quite the way I initially thought I was going to, but I still enjoyed the day a little bit more by just feeling like I was.

So I've got that going for me, which is nice.

The dark place...

It should come as no shock to any of you loyal readers that I am currently not myself.

I am the Lizzle in the dark place. I'm swingin' for the fences to get back to the good stuff, but at the moment, the dark place is all I have. I have had rough patches before, and FAR rougher than this one, but the long and short of it is that I've got to change things up, or I'll seriously consider taking out a small business loan and set myself to the task of destroying my liver on a full time basis.

The dark place is an amusing little land where one is not restricted by the rules of friendliness and lovability. Rather, the dark place is dominated by hostility and the openness to be frank about the ugly and unpleasant reality of things. The dark place is the place for the residents of the world with hostile, confrontational personalities like that of Jack Nicholson in "As Good As It Gets" but without the OCD and the money. It's for people who have something genuine to be hostile about. It's a great place to be if I'm working on the "bitch school" curriculum! (And Brenda, if I could figure out how to make that a money-maker in the near future, I'd be all over it!) Basically I need to get laid, and I need to get the hell out of here, and if anyone wants to help me with either, I'm accepting offers on a rolling basis.

I've been looking for various avenues out of this crap hatchery, but so far nothing is panning out. And contrary to all good sense, I'm at the point where since I've got a bit of a safety net in the city where I plan to relocate, I am tempted to make the leap without something firmly in place to go to. Hell, I can work at Starbucks and have health insurance... Anything is better than this.

Embarrassment.

As we may or may not have clearly established here, I'm a compulsive cleaner... Usually.

There have been times when I've let things go. There have been times when I've let things go for too long. And with this recent bout of what I can only classify as mild depression, (stemming almost entirely from the shit storm of my life/profession,) I can now say that I have now on at least one occasion as an adult, I have officially let things go to the point where I have been embarrassed by my own squalor.

Yep, you read it here first.

I. actually. got. embarrassed.

My face was as red as a baboon's ass.

And all because I couldn't muster the will to get up and do a little basic housekeeping.

Now let me state quite clearly, and without doubt, that there are worse places out there. If I had kids, they wouldn't have been taken away over my messiness. (It's usually in those cases that I have to go in and instruct people on how to clean a house, or worse yet, put on some rubber gloves and go in and do it for them.) No, this was just my unwillingness to put away clean clothes, to put dirty clothes in the hamper, to put the dirty (but rinsed) dishes into the dishwasher, to take out the trash, to put things where they belong, to throw away the junk mail which tends to accumulate at an alarming rate, and to generally keep up with the messes that everyday life produces. And it wouldn't be so bad, but I've let it go for entirely too long because I've become lethargic and apathetic about the whole thing.

And I knew it was a mess. I KNEW IT. But it was clean the last time that the property manager sent anyone in to do maintenance, and those guys notwithstanding, I have a really tight control over who enters my domicile, and lately that guest list has been reduced to pathetic lil' ol' me.

So when I heard the knocking on my door this morning, I didn't panic right off. I get a fair amount of door-to-door solicitation here, so I thought it was someone wanting me to get cable, or delivery from the Schwann's man, or even the UPS guy delivering my latest Amazon book order.

I ignored the knocking and stayed prone in bed until I heard, "HELLO!? Maintenance! We're here to do the quarterly preventative spray for bugs."

Mentally: "SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!"

They do this every three months. I should have seen this coming. But then again, I've been too consumed by my own misery to care about much of anything lately, so of course, I neglected to mark the calendar.

Instantly I yelled, "UMMM, GIVE ME A MINUTE!" (The minute was used to haul my ass out of bed and throw on a bathrobe, not to even consider the mess which I knew was FARRRR too great to be contained before they lost all patience and barged in anyway.)

So I tried to contain the most egregious areas of concern. I knew they were spraying for bugs, even though we don't have bugs, so my first thought was to try to somewhat contain the garbage situation. (I tend to wait until the last minute, or until things start to smell funny to take out the trash... Whichever comes first.) I tidied up the garbage situation a little bit just to ensure that an instant eviction wasn't cataloged on my already besmirched personal history, and let them in. They seemed to take a little pity on me given that I was in my bathrobe and slippers, noting that they were sorry to have to get me out of bed for this.

I hung my head in shame, apologized for the extent of the mess, and let them go about their business. One guy stood at the doorway, trying not to ogle the mess inside, making idle chit chat about the recent rain we've been having. The other guy went and sprayed the porch doorway in the living room, the kitchen vents, the bathroom vent, and the window in the bedroom. Basically, he took the full tour of the destruction. And despite my apology, I'm more than a bit certain that they had a little conversation about the tornado that must've blown through my place to cause such a classic study in filth, squalor, and ickyness. (This especially troubles me because my usual fastidious cleaning regimen has ensured that this place has looked like I can afford a live-in housekeeper every other time they've come by, and today was a study in the polar opposite.) They were here for a grand total of less than two minutes, and the whole time I hung my head in shame and apologized for my grossness.

I was mortified.

I have since done some cleaning, despite the fact that the damage is done, but the shame of the whole thing really just kind of fits with the theme I've got going here, which in case you're particularly dense, (which I don't think is the case,) is that my whole life seems to be degrading into a giant steaming heap of shit... and I'm getting to the point where I'm embarrassed by it in front of strangers, and yet still can't muster the ability to genuinely care enough to fix it.

The ultimate D-bag....

So I recently went out for drinks with some of my fellow disgruntled co-workers. And one of them being a kind of passive therapist, it was really just a matter of time before a colossal douche became some kind of problem.

I suppose that my years of boozing in a real city have hardened me to an extent where I have absolutely no qualms about calling out someone on their doucheyness. It just kind of goes with the territory, and in the end it saves everyone a huge amount of time. Courtney the passive therapist has never lived in a major city, and thus has never had the opportunity to acquire this skill... But D-bags are everywhere, so there really is no excuse for her apparent lack of judgment on this momentous occasion.

I was up at the bar, demanding a little service, meanwhile a guy approached our table. Now, for those of you who have any kind of cynicism and hardness about you, and for those of you who have a finely honed douche-dar, let me tell you, this guy was the type to set off bells and raise red flags IMMEDIATELY.

He introduced himself as "David," a motivational speaker from Los Angeles... This profession in and of itself should start the cursory eye-rolling. He had thinning hair, and was sporting some khaki cargo shorts and a NY Giants superbowl hooded sweatshirt. Some of you are like me, and thinking, "Ok, I don't even have to see this guy, and the mental image is already sending up flares for d-bag all over!" When I returned to the table from chatting up the bartender and getting a drink up at the bar, he was standing next to my chair... And by "next to" I mean practically on top of. I proceeded to sit back down, and despite the fact that he had ample room at the end of the table, he continued to stand RIGHT THERE... RIGHT NEXT TO ME... SO CLOSE HE WAS IN MY BUBBLE. I volubly announced my displeasure to those not engaging him in conversation. "SO... I SUPPOSE I COULD MOVE TO THE END OF THE TABLE... SO THAT I ACTUALLY HAVE THE ELBOW ROOM TO LIFT MY BEER... SEEING AS THE PLACE ISN'T EXACTLY JAM-PACKED TONIGHT, OR EVER... BUT SINCE THIS IS MY TABLE, AND I WAS HERE FIRST, I DON'T THINK THAT SEEMS RIGHT, DO YOU, LADIES?" Douchey McDouche did not take the hint for another 10 minutes or so, when I finally lost my gourd and said flat out, "You're in my space. You need to move away from me... The farther the better."

He tried to be impressive. He came off as crass, (and not the good kind of crass like me). He talked about how much money he made, to the point of giving an actual dollar figure. He rambled about how great his life was, and how he whiled away the days in sunny California by walking with his dog on the beach while smoking a joint. He name-dropped the celebrities he claimed to know. (We were not impressed.) Here's a conversational sampling:

D-bag: "Well, my friend 'Charlie' ... I won't use his last name, because he's pretty famous..."
Liz: "Sheen?" (Don't read that as an interested Sheen. Read it as a 'This is obviously what you're shooting for, so maybe if we hustle you through this story and still show absolutely no interest so hopefully you'll go away")
D-bag: "Yes. Well, Charlie had a really fucked up childhood."
Liz: "I'm pretty sure that's common knowledge actually. And if you're talking to a table of social workers and therapists, at least to us, his adult life makes it pretty evident that his upbringing was totally fucked... Or we could just watch the E! True Hollywood Story."
Addison: "I'd have been more impressed if it was Charlie Gibson."
Liz: "Yeah, me too, or maybe Charlie Rose...but Charlie Gibson is based in New York."
D-bag: "Well, so anyway... BLAH BLAH (insert efforts at trying to sound impressive and interesting and failing miserably here.)"

So after a time which felt like FOREVER, but in actual time was probably about 15 minutes, the rest of us had lost ALL patience. Courtney however was doing as therapists do, and asking open ended questions. The rest of us exchanged glances and basically made it evident that this douche must be stopped, and he must be stopped now, and that Courtney wasn't helping... And she was officially voted out of all future nights at the bar. I remained engaged in conversation with the other girls at the table and pulled out my phone to play a little brick breaker and make it abundantly clear how over this guy the rest of us were.

So then the douche drew his metaphorical sword... Little did he know he was about to be hacked up into little pieces with it. He was talking about his motivational speaking career, and how everyone had insecurities... And then he reached over and pulled back Courtney's hair. He proceeded to say, "See, I'm betting that these ears are her insecurity, I mean she could fly home on these things!"

[Cut to flashing red alarm lights and sirens common to films about German U-Boats and failed missions... Like those U-Boats, this guy was going down. He was going down HARD. He was to be crushed by the pressure of the surroundings. He was to be consumed by all the little fishies, And we will only remember him as that douche now resting for all eternity in a watery grave at the bottom of the sea.]

Despite the fact that we were displeased with Courtney at this point, we were not going to let this insult of her physical features go. [Keep in mind that during this whole conversation, I continued to play brick breaker on my phone, because despite the insults, he was not worth my full undivided attention.]

Liz: "Umm, I don't know how things work in California, but let me inform you of the way things work here in ol' country bumpkin Indiana. I know it may come as a shock, but around here insulting women 20 minutes after you meet them is not any way to get into their pants."
D-Bag: "No, I mean we all have our insecurities... I mean look at her, (indicating Addison). She's insecure about her looks."
Liz: "No she's not. She's fuckin' hot. She's just dressed down because she already has a boyfriend, and because like the rest of us normal folk, she's been at work all day."
D-bag: "Well, she's cute, but she's not hot."
Liz: "Actually she is fuckin' hot. And I suggest you drop it, because that's not up for debate."
D-bag: "Well what about you?"
Liz: "Ohhh buddy... WHAT ABOUT ME?"
D-bag: "How about your insecurity?"
Liz: "OHHH PUH-LEEEZE tell me what my insecurity is... I'm actually dying to hear this one."
D-bag: "You're insecure about your weight." (The rest of the table was totally up in arms that this was said, but I waved them off, knowing that this guy was no match, and I relished the opportunity to unleash the wrath for a little bit.)
Liz: "Actually, no."
D-bag: "Well sure you are. I'm looking at you, and I can tell you're a really sweet girl, but you're insecure because you're not the 'Barbie' of the world."
Liz: "WRONG-O, and let me tell you why. [Enter seething, scorching tone.] You can see I'm a really sweet person? That's just the beginning of where you are wrong. I'M MEAN, I'm hateful and I'll tell you something else, I enjoy it intensely. And as for my weight and being the 'Barbie' I realize that by Hollywood standards, I'm more than a bit chunky. I also realize that every magazine cover produced in the last 20 years has been photoshopped to death. I also have the self esteem to know that I don't have to adhere to some prepackaged plastic ideals of what is beautiful. Furthermore, if I was insecure about my weight, I also know how to use a phone book to look up the address of a gym so that I can work my fat ass out on the treadmill if it was something that caused me any genuine concern. While we're on the subjects of insecurity, women, and weight, let me point out that 99% of American women have body issues, and rationally or not, most of them are genuinely unhappy about their weight. So that little 'This is what you're insecure about' schpiel is worthless because you couldn't have picked a more general concern of American women if you tried... I happen to be in the other 1%, but that's because I know myself very well, and know that for me, the weight, while present, is a non-issue, because as I've already stated, I could easily change it if I wanted to. And as for my friends, she's hot, her ears are fine, and you are not worth any more of our time. But if we're honing in on insecurities, let's look at yours."
Addison: "I'm guessing that receding hairline and thinning hair in general is what you're insecure about."
D-bag: "Well, no, I just grow it out a little bit and comb it and it doesn't bother me."
Addison: "Yeah, because we all know combovers are SOOOO SEXY."
Liz: "I'm actually going to go with the obvious one here. You're insecure about you microscopically tiny penis... I mean you have name-dropped every celebrity you think you know, and you mistakenly thought we'd find impressive. You have repeatedly tried to impress us with all the money you claim to be making, and just so you know, quite frankly, talk of money is crass in ANY social circle. And as for your motivational speaking career which you claim is so lucrative, clearly the public speaking course at your local community college or learning annex, or wherever did not go so far as to teach you that alienating your audience is not a wise route to go, because before long your audience WILL turn on you. NOW... Since we've established that your have a miserably tiny dick, and since, in general, we're talking about the pathetic area of anatomy known as your genitals, as a woman concerned for your testicular health, I suggest you turn around and walk away because if you don't, I'll rip your nuts off, stomp on them, and throw them in the river... It's only about 20 yards from here... My fat ass plays on the company softball team. I might be fat, but I've DEFINITELY got a good arm... So, stay or go, your choice."

Of course he left after that.

But just in case you were wondering, THIS is why I am awesome.

Welcome to my life...

We all know that my job makes me hate life. We also know that while it might be earning me some karma points, I totally counteract those bad boys by thinking really awful things in my head that I save up to spout to all my friends later at the bar. And furthermore, we know that social workers get paid SHIT. While we're on that topic, let's talk about my compensation... When I took this job, I was told, "Oh if gas gets anywhere near $3 a gallon (back then we were still in the $2.25-2.50 range) then the office usually throws a little money at us to make sure we can afford to make it out to see everyone." Well, let me tell you... Gas is nearly $4.00 a gallon, and has been WELL ABOVE $3.00 a gallon for some time now, and we haven't seen an extra dime. So I am forced to spend what VERY LITTLE extra money I WOULD have saved or used as disposable income to fill up my tank so that I can just get the bare minimum done and keep any kind of measly, paltry paycheck rolling in. This only enhances my bitterness about the whole thing.

In addition to all that, I recently got a phone call. "Hey, Liz! It's Mary Sunshine from We-Own-Your-Life bank and trust! Oh, someone forgot to tell you that your loan with us was not rolled into your consolidation of college loans, so basically, we've been silently fucking up your credit for a while now, and we've finally decided that we want to collect. That'll be $5,500. Oh, and we'll be needing that ... umm, roughly, NOW... Or we start taking it involuntarily from your paycheck."

This is just wonderful, because OBVIOUSLY I have $5,500 just lying around... I mean I just keep this shitty job for shits and giggles because I want to hate life and ruin my opinion of humankind and really, who wants to have kids someday? Not me! Because the little bastards are just asking for a beating with an electrical cord and a belt! Or better yet, I'll keep them in my house full of 14 cats and 6 dogs which never go outside and play dumb when I get a call from the school complaining that they are being sent home because they are covered in shit. Really, I mean, the only reason that $5,500 is not in my bank account because I stuff it in my mattress like an old miser who mistrusts federal banks. Oh wait... Nope, that's not right! I keep this goddamn job because I have to, even with it's shitty pay, it's something coming in the door, and since the job market is so spectacular at the moment, and I have SOOOOO many options, I MUST be keeping this job because it keeps me rolling in the dough, right? RIGHT?

Yeah.

This is my life.

Welcome to hell.

In related news, I woke up this morning, figured out that I am a low-level mental health professional and that when I turn my symptom knowledge around and look at myself lately, I probably have a diagnosable level of mild depression, but I can't do anything about it because despite that health insurance that gets paid for automatically with part of my paycheck, I can't afford to spend the money on a co-pay to go see a doctor, get a diagnosis, and then have to purchase medication if that is deemed necessary... At least not if I plan on eating. FUCK!

My life is just a steaming heap of shit salad... Who wants a taste? It's really delicious!