Random Esquire

I believe The Italian and Instigator may be doing guest appearances and posting in my blog.  More details as events warrant.

I saw Instigator today for the first time in over a month. We used to see each other daily but since the onset of a telecommuting policy, we find ourselves in the office together only one day a week. With the holidays and time off, our days in the office did not coincide in December. Last week, on the phone, Instigator noted that it had been at least a month since we’d last been seen each other. I exclaimed, “What kind of Work-Girlfriend are you?”

I shall now detail the complexities of my work relationships.

I have previously mentioned that I have a Work-Wife. She also happens to be the person I referenced in this entry – (the one with whom the sex would be good but she’d yell at you afterwards). To be clear, no sex is being had…these names just stem from my previous assertion that my job is like bad sex. I work with her closely and she sends me a great deal of work. Hence: Work Wife.

I call Instigator my Work Girlfriend because she doesn’t send me work and we don’t discuss work. We don’t just mix work with pleasure, we skip the work all together and go to lunch. I look forward to time with Instigator whereas I have to spend time with Work-Wife. Make sense?

Then, there’s the Italian. The Italian and I are buddies. We discuss women, antics, and a lot of things we might not otherwise discuss with someone else. He’s a good guy. I explained to The Italian my complex dating names in the office. I thought he might be impressed. Not so. He said, “Well?”

I thought, “?”

He said, “Who am I? What am I?”

So now I’ve got a Work Life Partner.

[Edited to Add:  I should be clear...nothing romantic is going on with any of these people.  I just use the names to describe my relationship with them.]

1. I have the unfortunate habit of excusing offensive behavior or an offensive comment if I find it funny enough. This is bad, I know. This, combined with my general inclination to find humor in everything, means I probably excuse a lot of offensive behavior. I’m not sure it can be helped.

To be clear, I do not typically act offensive. I admit to saying offensive things every so often but, that is generally done unintentionally. I just realized that that means I am ignorantly offensive. Fan-tastique.

2. Little Filthy has a plush toy that looks like a small bucket of popcorn. He watched as I put it in the washing machine. He whimpered while it washed until I took it out and then he whimpered more when I did not promptly give it to him but instead set it on the washing machine to dry thoroughly. It was seriously like Linus and his blanket. He’s sleeping with his head resting on it now.

3. I have an itch to go out tonight which is wholly unnecessary. I blame it on someone who called and whipped me into a frenzy with weekend stories of bad behavior.

Thus, I regress.

I am too tempered. Too measured. I’ve decided this today.

A friend of mine in college would call me and say, “We’re going to dinner. Will you come? It would make me happy.”

I remember being struck by how easily she said this. That she did not care that it made her a little raw or naked.

I like people who can be this honest and bare. People who say, “I’d love to!” instead of, “that sounds good.” People who express feelings by dropping them at your feet instead of requiring the dust of their words to settle like tea leaves, waiting for interpretation.

I like.

I went to Fulton Lounge last night with a friend. I’m starting to really like the Fulton Market District in Chicago. The one downside is that you can buy a girl two, maybe three, martinis and be down $50. I thought, “I might as well be gambling.” I have gambling on the brain because I head to Vegas next month.

Then, of course, I realized that buying drinks for women is a form of gambling.

I met one particularly oddball brunette who lived about two blocks away and asked me to go with her to her place so she could change her shoes. None of this made sense to me. However, she was attractive and I am gullible… so I went. I sat on the steps leading up to her bedroom, entertaining myself by sending text messages to someone (a more attractive someone, if I’m being honest), while Dizzy upstairs sing songed her way through her closet.

There was a small noise from downstairs and said brunette yelled, “Oh my God, it’s my husband!”

There is little else in the world that will make a person duck faster than those six words. Even an innocent person. I hadn’t moved from the stairs anywhere near her and, more importantly, she wasn’t married. She was kidding.

ha.

ha.

I live to lounge another day.

I was chatting with a friend (who shall remain anonymous unless said person is okay with saying who s/he is…) who told me about an old friend who bared her soul recently by saying that when she (old friend) was in 6th grade, she’d go to slumber parties and all the girls would 69 each other all night and she thought that’s just what girls do at slumber parties.

*blink*

What the hell? Why does this delight me to no end and make me giggle nonstop? Where were these parents?!

Of course, everyone knows that all male 6th grade slumber parties involved a circle jerk.

Led by the Cub Scout leader. But they are not okay with the gays.

They just like the bonding experience.

I saw an ad today for metal detectors. The non-stop fun and enjoyment was heavily touted as reason to get a metal detector, in addition to the massive quantities of treasure you’d discover. They showed a family of four on the beach and each person had their own metal detector. I couldn’t help but wonder if there was any family in the entire U.S. that owned more than one metal detector for recreational purposes. If you lost your wedding ring in the yard…I can see why you might get one of these but are people really just searching for random bits of metal? Where do people buy metal detectors, anyway? Like, if you didn’t want to wait until you spotted a television ad? I don’t think I’ve ever seen one at a store.

Okay, I just checked Amazon. First reviewer. The guy said he wanted to find “coins, rings, and Civil War relics”. He found “beer cans, shotgun shells, nail.” FIVE STARS.

I love another review by a guy who pretty much has to be a grumpy old man: “And lastly a warning. If you go into a park, or any area attended by kids, you will be spotted. Within a short amount of time you will be surrounded by kids “helping you” to dig up buried treasure. At that point you have to decide whether to be a meanie and bark at them, or write the rest of the hunt off and let them shred the area every time the detector beeps. I generally tell them how it’s been a long day and “see ya” since they will invariably have their hands in there digging away no matter what you say… ”

Blasted kids.

Apparently, this metal detecting is some serious stuff. Hmm, it makes different noises based upon the metal. Another guy said he has found $3,000 in coins so far.

Get a load of this review:

I collect rare bottle caps, and try to take care not to lose any of my collection. I was coming back from a convention recently and one of my collection boxes hopped out of the back of the pickup as I was crossing an old hump-back bridge, and fell into a small stream.

So I bought the metal detector to try to get my valuable collection back. This one said it is waterproof so I figured it might do the job.

Well, after three weeks of wading up and down the stream I have had mixed fortunes. A Celtic chalice, the silver cumtach (cover) from a medieval bible, two viking swords, a couple of daggers, a mound of celtic, roman and viking coins, an array of viking hacksilver, medieval broches and buckes from shoes and belts, delicately filigreed celtic gold jewellry and most notable of all (since the Romans never made it to Ireland) the metal fittings from eight complete and six incomplete sets of roman imperial legionnary armour.

OK, so I am famous now amongst scholars of the Romano-Celtic world. I have been awarded three honorary doctorate degrees for my finds, and I have been given freedom of the cities of Dublin and York, and I had to decline a Royal knighthood offered by the English Queen (I do have principles and I am an Irish Republican). But what is all this fame? I have lost a box of 200 bottle caps and not found a single one with the detector.

*blink*

Okay, I want one.

If you have your own website and no one has ever told you this before, …backup your junk. It is nothing less than a miracle that I managed to put the pieces back together again.

The wife of one of my buddies e-mail me today to tell me to watch a video link on MSNBC. It was an interview with John and Elizabeth Edwards and about three feet away from John Edwards was my buddy, stoic faced and listening intently. Apparently, he’s so excited about the elections that he traveled to Iowa to hear everyone speak and be amidst the action. I wish he’d known that we’d all see him because serious though he is, he is also the kind of guy that might peek at a woman’s chest and waggle his eyebrows at the camera, a la Quagmire.

While I’m on the topic, is anyone else concerned that Iowa has so much influence on the presidential race? Though, in all honesty, Florida was worse with the election. I heard a decent suggestion earlier today that Florida simply be sliced off and set adrift.

Curious about what the hell a Caucus actually is?  Check this blog entry by someone wondering the exact same thing.