Circulars in a cubicle...

Circulars and cubicles...got me thinking lately about the shape of things in my life. My new job is all about checking those minor details that people take for granted in their daily lives. You know the teeny tiny signs with teeny tiny font and barcodes on the shelves in drugstores beneath your bags of candy, condoms, feminine hygiene products or cans of hairspray? Yeah---someone (ME) has to proofread those suckers. And the ad circulars that you throw away (unless you're 90) that come in your weekly newspaper---the ones that tell you when cranberry juice is 50% off? ME again, folks.

I can honestly say that my workaday life is now chock full of the kind of excitement that Jack Bauer cannot rival. Sure he's saving the world, but I'm saving hundreds upon hundreds of people cold, hard cash. It adds up, ya know. Anyway...one bonus of the new place is that I have found some very groovy (ok, look---it's a good word---I do not care how outdated it is or how old it makes me sound) kindred spirits...like my new boss who is pretty laid back...I knew I liked him when he told me in the interview, "Its ad circulars, its not cold fusion." Here is a man with the right perspective.

Mainly I've been taking stock of how much my eyeballs will hate me after long days of squinting at Excel sheets in 6 point type. I fully expect to be blind by the end of the year if this keeps up. But the upside is that then I can get some Ray Charles sunglasses, a cane, a lovely German Shepherd I will name Fred and I WILL NOT HAVE TO WORK ON A COMPUTER EVER AGAIN. Do you think the Devil will reserve me a room with a view (probably moot by then since I'll be more than halfway to Helen Kellerdom) of one of the nicer parts of hell? You know---I wouldn't mind so much if it were just *hot*...but the endless burning and all that screaming would kind of suck. Ok, I guess I take back the Ray Charles thing AND the Helen Keller thing...I mean who are we kidding? I might be able to not see or hear, but not TALK? Ain't happening.

On the upside, I am adoring my commute. Seven minutes to work. Nine minutes home...boy that extra two minutes can be a real drag. I usually leave the office and head straight to the pool. Then home to swelter in my apt. I do have an AC unit in the bedroom (thank you sweet Jesus for the one pocket of non-stagnant air that doesn't feel like Lucifer is continuously exhaling on me in this Hades-like environment). See?---I'm used to the heat...I'll be fine down under. Just gimme my pitchfork and giddyup! It's not that I cannot afford an extra AC unit for my living room. I fully plan on getting one as soon as I can shanghai a burly musclebound man to lug it up the four flights of stairs and install it for me. Or plan B is to rope my friend Jess into helping me on a day when it doesn't feel like Campbell's soup outside. Mmmmm mmm not so good with the fainting, and the sweating profusely (or perspiring daintily if you are a lady like me, ahem...what?! Shut up!) while the box goes tumbling down the stairwell leaving little sad machine parts in its wake.

In the meantime, the library and cafes and movie theaters and bookstores are fine cool havens to kill some time until that evil ball of pulsating light in the sky stops cooking my apt. and making it 126.9 degrees in every room except the cave where I sleep.

I also just confirmed that I will meet my self-imposed deadline of self-publishing my memoir, "Lipstick and Thongs in the Loony Bin" by Labor Day. It will be the day I give birth to my 'baby' (appropriate since this process has been alternately joyful, painful and messy) and the birth announcement (press release) will be forthcoming upon its launch and availability on http://www.lulu.com/.

My kickass graphic designer gal-pal Dani http://www.daninordin.net/ has agreed to help me format the manuscript for uploading. She also did a cover that is absolutely AWESOME...I couldn't be happier if one of the big boys in a NY publishing house did it.

So all in all...things are shaping up pretty damned well (other than the whole impending sight loss business of course)...stay tuned...if you want to know all about the Halloween candy sales you know who to ask.*


*The blind chick clutching her designer pitchfork--melting in a dainty puddle of her own perspiration.