BS Talks

Redneck is NOT the new black.

I wouldn’t know fashion if he kicked me in the face with his Louis Vuitton kitten heels. 

And, frankly, I am completely fine with this because I believe in Newton’s 3^rd law of relative fashion: for every great outfit there must be an equal and opposite faux pas.  In our fashion class system, there could not be the fashionistas without the fashion ruhtards.

Needless to say, I am not at the top of the fashion food chain but I’m not at the very bottom either.  I put myself somewhere in the lower-middle fashion class.  The vast majority of my clothes come from the clearance rack at Target with a few Ross and Old Navy finds thrown in the mix for good measure.  I buy my panties in packages far more often than individually and the most expensive garment I own is a bra from Victoria’s Secret.  "Dry Clean Only' is a dirty word.  But, on most days, I match.  And I think that should get a lot more credit than it does.  My friend Aar (that’s not her actual name, she used to work for me and when I ordered her name tag, I added an extra A creating the sweet pirate sound to her name, it was an accident but I like it) has been known to wear a black lacy skirt, a grey camisole and a navy sweater with dark teal tights and black boots.  We call her Rainbow Bright for obvious reasons.  But it’s okay because somewhere in the world is Aar’s fashion counterpart and that person creates such a clothing masterpiece that it cancels out Aar’s fashion assault, keeping the fashion equilibrium in check.

My point in all of this is that while I may not be at the height of fashion I CAN spot a fashion fuck-up.  And I am here to tell you, dear eFriends, someone has lied to you.  Somehow, a fashion ruhtard has managed to go unchecked for far too long and they have tricked you into thinking plaid is cool.  It’s not.  It is all a sham, a fashion mirage.  

Plaid wasn’t cool a year ago when a rather hairy, pot bellied man sat in my section at the BBQ joint.  How do I know he was rather hairy and pot bellied if he was wearing plaid?  Well, let me tell you about the honktastic outfit this catch of a man beast was wearing.  He was wearing jean overalls without a shirt but since we are a classy BBQ joint, he had to put on a shirt or else the ‘NO shirt, NO service’ policy would come into effect.  But this gent put the ASSY in classy and beat our policy by simply putting the plaid shirt on OVER his overalls (apparently, he didn’t get that overalls go over all and not under all) and not bothering with the buttons lest that would hinder the hair around his nipples from blowing in the cool breeze created by my running away from his table to throw up in mouth.

Plaid wasn’t cool when Billy Ray Cyrus did it in 1992.

And plaid is not cool now even though you can’t go 5 feet without seeing someone in it, someone selling it or someone longing for it.

(I will admit that the AF picture is pleasing to look at even in the plaid shirt)

Chapstick – the baking soda of lubricants

Today has been a peach of a day to be female.

My day started with the usual, first Wednesday of the month meeting with my counterparts and our boss.  For fun, my boss thought it would be neat to have our meeting off-site at a Starbucks.  I was pretty excited, I thought this would be a nice change of pace, but then she told me which Starbucks.  There are more flipping Starbucks in this town than there are school bus stops (see post) and my boss picks the one farthest from me.  According to Google maps, it’s 13.6 miles door to door.  On paper, that distance seems ridiculously close.  In reality, on the road, it took me 48 minutes!  48 minutes!  I purposely do not live in an area that causes me to deal with long commute times.  If I can get there in single digit travel time, I ain’t going.  Just ask my friends.  Plus, the meeting was scheduled 30 minutes earlier than my standard in time. 

My boss did buy us coffee so it wasn’t a total wash.  I do love me some peppermint white chocolate mocha frappuccino®.  They are delic.    

Beginning 1 hour and 18 minutes early with a 48 minute car ride is enough to make a girl pissy  but the fun didn’t stop there.

I’m single, (again, on its own, that’s enough to cause a bad day, never-mind that the holidays are coming and I may have to kiss my cousin Will at midnight again (what?  we’re second or is it third, maybe first once removed, what ev, he's cute when he doesn't wear white jeans. wtf?) and with my schedule today, there was a craptillion to none chance I might get laid, but I thought it would be a good idea to shave all the usual bits and pieces last night anyway.  On a good day, when my body isn’t rebelling against me, shaving is mildly irritating.  But I suffer through regularly enough to not embarrass my mother should I ever need to have my clothes ripped off my body in public and/or keep the rumors of being a feminist lesbian at bay (not that being a feminist lesbian is bad, I’m all for carpet munching-girl power if that's your thing, I just happen to prefer man bits and the men attached to those bits seem to prefer shaved lady bits (is this still true?  I have been single for AWHILE I could be torturing myself for naught.  (Reason 413.7 to find boyfriend – confirm men still like shaved bits)).  Moving on.  My office is always cold, always.  In the summer, when it’s 95° outside, it’s 68° in the office.  Seriously.  When it’s cold outside, it’s still 68° in the office.  I know this and I am usually prepared but take the recent cold weather, add dry skin and a shavingpaloosa and you get a sweet, fiery, razor-burn hell that traveled across my body like it took lessons from a California wildfire.   

But wait, I was having so much fun, why stop there?  The incessant attempts on my part to quell the inferno in my armpits somehow caused the underwire in one of the cups of my bra to poke through.  I fought valiantly to keep the wire down for a full 1.7 seconds but I had to admit defeat and rip that sucker out.  I didn’t see any reason to deface the other cup so I spent the day with one boob propped up like a pert 23 year old and the other one dangling precariously close to the floor. 

The cold scored a second blow against me by making my cuticles dried and cracked like I spent the day digging my way out of a well Baby Jessica style (if she wasn’t 18 months old at the time) (you remember that, right?  No?  shit, I just dated myself.).  One of my staff members did offer the sage advice of putting Chapstick on my cuticles to create a seal and I’ll be damned if she wasn’t spot on!  My hands still look like hell but they don’t hurt anymore! Take that Wednesday.

HOT SCHEDULES

We just started using Hot Schedules at work and I love it! I was off today but from the comfort of my bed, I was able to switch sections on two different days, pick up a shift over the weekend and send out a request to pick up two more shifts. I love the ease of it! What a brilliant concept. I can’t believe I didn’t come up with it! After 3 years of schedule writing complete with pre-dawn callers whining about shifts they can’t work, one would think an automated system would have come to me! Ah, but that is why they are rich and I am still slinging bbq to honkies. (I love that word, honkies, where did it even come from?)