Installment Numero Uno in a Vast Montage of Annoyance

Every day in my job I encounter people who amaze me- -not in their abilities, intelligence or achievement, but in how they were able to get a driver’s license, or get by without wearing Velcro/slip-on shoes. These people are the silent con-artists of society. It’s almost like a ventriloquist act that they play with themselves, to hilariously fool us into thinking they are intelligent, capable and worthy of gainful employment. Sadder still, the joke is on us, People, because some of said people earn significantly better livings than we do…cue the “better luck next time, Loser” brass horn sound à la “The Price is Right.”





One of said people is someone I work quite closely with, but please recognize that there are hierarchical discrepancies in our jobs. Occasionally, he will go through the motions of trying to understand something remedial about our collective jobs…and, from time to time, I will humor myself and try to educate him on the various “wow-a-chimpanzee-could-do-this!” aspects of our job. Today was one of those days where he stood at my desk and made a spectacularly precious face while I explained one of our computer systems. Now, I’m not Steve Jobs, so this was an extremely high-level overview of something very basic. Even still as I explained, he furnished a false expression of understanding accompanied by the frequent blinking and blank stares typically reserved for people wearing helmets. After a valiant attempt, I gave up and told him a story about the computer fairies that live in the computer and make things work….that seemed a little more palatable. I mean, I’m not going to be the one to tell the little fella that there’s no Santa Clause.

If I Started Stripping

Wowee, I hate my job today. To make up for some disappointing mid-year results, the Higher Ups in my company decided to have a little contest in an effort to boost our numbers. Long story short, the despicable fake salesy alternate personalities that some "higher members of staff" employ to talk to the rest of us wee folks is on overload. It’s borderline slutty. It’s like how strippers pretend they give a shit about your life so that you’ll pay for their rent or their nails or “school.”

One of said "higher members of staff" in particular is usually a hideous breed of soul-less asshole. In the several years he’s worked here, no one is really sure who he is in terms of personality, values, friends- -not that we all need to be best friends (or care), but there’s a general level of knowledge you gain about people just by the inevitable diffusion of working 9 hours a day in the wholly non-private discomfort of adjacent cubicles.

Anyway, this one is really an artist in the way he is able to manipulate perceived kindness for self-serving purposes. I mean, I’ve never heard a person consistently ask “how are you today?” in a way that is quintessentially rhetorical (and you are reassured of this fact when he interrupts your response with a new line of discussion that is of more interest)...so, you can imagine the confusion of all of us now that he’s Mary Fucking Poppins today- -skipping around the office, buying lunch and smiling. We’re all speculating why his mood has taken a bi-polar 180, and so far, “kicked a child” is the most convincing theory.

At the height of my disgust, I started entertaining (*cough* fantasizing) about events transpiring and me subsequently collecting unemployment. Sure, waving my middle fingers and smiling like a newly crowned Miss America as I was escorted out of the office would be great, but it’s the unceremonious $400/week aftermath that’s a bit desolate and uninviting.
My co-worker, "Jesse" suggested moonlighting at a local strip club to supplement the $400/week unemployment check (oh, dare to dream)- -to which I reminded him how I’m not really in “get naked in front of strangers for money” shape. Something about sitting on my ass 10 hours a day for the last 3 years that just hasn’t yielded any constructive physical improvements.





Then we started musing about what that would be like, in the event that a strip club owner had enough zest for humor that he would actually employ me, and we think it would go something like this: “Ladies and gentlemen, get your dollars ready for Emily….she is…..really nice. She’s also quite funny….Did I say “good personality” yet?” Maybe once, "assail your eyes" would accidentally slip out.

To help me with my janky nail middle finger salute, I've enlisted the help of Ms. Spears. She'll do just fine.

People who are too nice

Wait…before that. I actually just heard the phrase, “Oh, I love Anne Geddes” from a co-worker(?!?!?!?!?).





Moving on.

When I moved from Maine I had to leave the comforts of my small town bank (the kind where they will call you if your account is nearing being overdrawn, or if you’re depositing a non-round number- -the cashier is apt to throw in a few pennies from their own pocket. It’s the bank where I got my first small car loan- -and I was able to get this at 21 because the branch manager went to high school with my mother and “oh, why not?" It’s the kind of place that Wilford Brimley would endorse in a commercial; a magical and helpful institution of goodness) and switch to a larger, more evil institution.



This bank doesn’t let you forget for a minute that your patronage is ultimately insignificant, your concerns (large or small) are inconsequential, and that in addition to raping your bank account little by little every month- -they may also try to sneak into your home and rape you while you sleep at night. After months, and probably thousands of dollars paid in overdraft fees and god-knows-what-else- -after debating hiding my money under the mattress and in carefully dug holes in the back yard- -I decided to switch to what felt like a “more local” bank. Not precious and loving like my hometown bank, but seemingly a step up. The first day I walked into the bank, there was a woman seated neatly at a desk who welcomed me. “Well, that’s nice,” I thought. Her friendly greeting was the tiny uplift I needed in my day.


The next time I went to the bank, the same woman greeted, “Hi! How are you today?” Sigh. Oh, that’s nice. She’s nice.

Shortly after that, I entered the bank and she greeted, per usual. I smiled back. I thought to myself, “that’s nice.” Then I assumed my position in the line. After a minute or two of waiting, she chimed in from the corner of the bank, “Thanks for your patience, Folks; we’ll be right with you.” I freshly appreciated the acknowledgment that I was slightly inconvenienced by having to wait in a line.

Let’s go ahead and fast forward several months of going to this bank with regularity.

I walk in and what formerly seemed like a polite and friendly acknowledgment, is now wholeheartedly evocative of the inane squawking from a parrot that only knows two phrases. I must have been in a fog the first several times, because now I’ve caught on that when she greets you, she’s not even looking at you when she says it- -she’s actually looking through you. She’s an automated person. She’s a Walmart greeter with better pay and benefits and a better door at which to greet people. Every time she greets me I hear, “Polly want a cracker?”



Once the first greeting has been robotically reverberated in your direction, you get in line and wait for the other phrase she’s been programmed to say… “Thanks for your patience, Folks, we’ll be right with you.” It’s like, “REALLY?!?! Thank you! I’m the one who just voluntarily got in this fucking line! I know what a line is all about- -it’s about fucking waiting. I’ve prepared myself for the waiting aspect of this line all ready!” Then as more people saunter in on their lunch hour, you hear the greeting TEN…THOUSAND…FUCKING….TIMES. It’s like the admin with the shrilly voice from the movie “Office Space” that only udders one phrase, except it’s not funny when it’s real and you’re living it.

Then the line gets longer, and for the entirety of your wait, the parrot lady is continuously thanking you for your patience. It becomes more like a taunt. Like, “I’m killing you. I’m killing you with my kindness. Do you feel me pushing your buttons? Pushing…..pushing. You can’t get mad, I’m too nice.”
It’s worse when the line suddenly gets too long, and she gets up from the desk to help. This is the absolute worst thing. The extent of her Teller niceness supercedes the “going out of your way” niceness that a Special Education Teacher may have. It evokes shudders and dry heaves. She thanks you for every step of your transaction. She thanks you for existing. She thanks you for going through the motions of normal respiration. “Thank you for waiting (original.thanks.).” “What can we do for you today?.......Oh, I would be HAPPY to do that for you today?” “Speaking of, how are you today?” “Oh, thank you for signing that check.” “Your signature is lovely.” “Thank you for waiting while I punch these numbers into the computer.” It’s a running verbal catalog of everything that is taking place, real time, but in the form of a “thank you.”

Worse still, she has a lazy eye. So, as she’s being nice and you’re internally seething at how ingenuine it feels, you feel BAD that you feel this way….because she has a lazy eye. It makes that bitchy internal voice cajole, “Oh great….get mad at someone with a disability. Real nice. You’re a terrible person.”

Everything about this woman reminds me of the desperate compliments delivered by someone with no friends who wants very much to be accepted, even by perfect strangers. She was likely that girl in high school- -the invisible one who was so painfully nice that people didn’t trust her. Being THAT nice just doesn’t exist anymore- -not in that flagrant sense where it’s inescapable and forced on you. It just gives you an uneasy feeling. It makes you think, “What the hell does this woman do when she goes home for the evening? Is she killing the neighborhood cats? Is she really into hardcore German feces porn?” The mind employs endless hobbies and pastimes for this person whose sincerity is perceived as creepy.

The punchline? The punchline is that this woman frustrates me to no end, and now I’ve written this, and now I feel bad for writing it…..BECAUSE SHE’S SO NICE (the lazy eye is just an added dig). And there you have it. She wins and I am a PMSy bitch. Even the Russian judge gives that one a 9.

“You know you might be PMSing when you start playing head games with your dogs”

It is in my opinion that women have a subconscious affinity for head games. We can’t help it. There is something in our genetic make up (okay, we know what it is; it’s estrogen) that makes us ask open-ended questions, even though there is only one right answer and, in all honesty, we most definitely know this answer when we pose the question. It’s a pass/fail test that is designed to set the taker up for failure nearly every time. Poor men. I mean, at least lesbians have a fighting chance because they are wired similarly- -but men don’t even see this psycho/psychological onslaught coming. I once heard a married man say, “I can be right or I can be happy” which I thought was hilarious and true, but also sort of sad…...have I said “true” yet? I have to say, I appreciate the simplicity of men, and I commend lesbians. I couldn’t deal with me as a partner, this I’m sure of.

Anyway, my natural headgameyness (I’m insisting that’s a word) paired with PMS yielded some really singular results yesterday. I decided to be a good ‘dog mom’ and take my two dogs for a ride as I ran a few errands. Now, to paint a picture- -I have two very different dogs. I have Xavier, who is 8 years old and wise and sweet and obedient with a soul a mile wide. Then I have X.E. who is 3 and……well, let’s just say she’s “special.” Towards the end of my errand trip yesterday, X.E. opted to shit in the back seat of the car. For those of you who haven’t ever had the privilege of being in a small enclosed space, in city traffic, with a steaming pile of shit, let me just say that I make no apologies for my grievance- -even fucking Jesus wouldn’t have been immune to the likes of this kind of agitation, so I make no apologies.
I like to think that X.E. knows better, but this is a dog who licks windows and thinks her reflection in my foyer mirror is another dog. It’s an added thorn to have proverbial egg on your face for overestimating that your housebroken, 3 year old dog won’t shit in the car. Silly me. So, I pulled over as soon as I was able (into a Mexican Restaurant parking lot) and broke out the poop bags that are kept in the trunk and usually designated for outdoor shitting. So then for about five minutes, the people with the fine pleasure of dining window side of Muchas Gracias Mexican Grill & Cantina (I'm not kidding; I can't even make up stuff that good) had the rare privilege of watching me clean feces out of my car while I swore and carried on like a crazy person. I know it made my night better knowing that Darwin’s forgotten creatures eating their $6 entrées pitifully mused, “Wow, it sucks to be her.”

I drove home, still not excited about the events that had just transpired. Plus, even though I had gotten rid of the poo with expert timeliness, the whole car was still ripe with X.E.’s unholy wrongdoing. I felt the need to remind X.E. what a bad girl she was for the entire ride home; meanwhile she greeted my reprimand with a dead stare and some sporadic window-licking. I felt really frustrated that she didn’t seem to be understanding the scope of my anger and aggravation, so when we arrived back at the house, I hysterically blurted out, “Well, X.E., you get to go in your crate while Xavier and I watch a movie!” Sadder still, I felt vindicated for about ten minutes until I realized that I was laying in a bed with a stinky 8 year old dog watching a movie- -like that should be some sort of triumph. “I showed her.”

PMS Chronicle 4 29 2010

Despite having not one, not two, but THREE heaving closets of gorgeous clothing, today I opted to sift through the “transitional laundry” pile on the floor of my bedroom, and select the very black loose pants that I wore to work yesterday. They’re the kind of pants that encompass all ends of the dressiness spectrum depending on what you pair them with. They can either be yoga pants or youthful, funky dress pants…or somewhere in between. Despite this versatility, yesterday I paired them with a hooded sweatshirt- -thus making them yoga pants (The clashing 1” heeled open-toed sandals I added to that outfit were a hideously offensive and apathetic attempt at “business casual,” at best). Immediately after that I nixed wearing a bra, so I paired my black snug/loose pants with a similar caliber of shirt- -and then added a poncho. Because nothing says, “I’ve given up on myself” quite like a poncho (plus it hides that my too-big-to-be-braless breasts are delightfully un-tethered). I’m basically a Snuggie infomercial, minus the smiling faces, make up, and couch.

“With Emily being so comfortable, how is it possible for her to be disgruntled?” Good question. Today’s disgruntled demeanor is brought to you by “Home Office Incompetence”…and the letter ‘C.’

I work in a field office, and sometimes that makes me feel like I’ve had to earn my job- -either through my own aptitude, demonstration of intellectual capacity, work ethic….or because my uncle is one of the most successful sales reps in the company and his niece needed a job. *Cough* Tomato-Tomato. Point being, sometimes I feel like the small pool of individuals in this office makes individual failure a bright neon sign of apparentness. Your peers keep you in check. Your manager keeps you in check. You understand that your own shortcomings will be recognized.
Our Home Office employs several thousand people, and there are days…lots of days….where I feel like there was some contest at a local 7-11 where you were the 50th customer of the day and you won a position in my company’s Home Office. Yay- -tell the kids that Mom doesn’t have to stay home and watch 17 hours of soap operas anymore! Now, she has a “purpose”…and that purpose is to make my 9-5 life HELL. Instead of passing her days how she’s accustomed…by eating processed foods and vacantly staring at this month’s featured doll collection on QVC, now she gets to play corporate “hot potato” with any legitimate request that comes from her co-workers and partners in the field offices. The extent to this “game” makes it very difficult to believe that there isn’t some kind of home office incentive, unbeknownst to the field, where the individual Home Office employees who accomplish the least amount of work are awarded on a quarterly basis.

One particular Home Office partner is the focus of my current ass-chappery. For the purposes of venting frustration to prevent sending very tonal and unprofessional emails to this person, I drafted a fake suggestion to an imaginary company suggestion box today. Here is how it reads:

“_______________ may be better suited as a relatively stagnant cog in another company’s mailroom or one of the unhappy Wal-Mart greeters that’s afforded the ability to sit at the entrance of said establishments and apathetically force a word and/or facial expression at approaching shoppers. Clearly she doesn’t like to work, she doesn’t like to answer the phone, and she is less resourceful than some humans are prenatally. Maybe she could gain 400 lbs and be relegated to a bed somewhere, and make a living off disability payments and money that tabloids would pay to photograph the “giant slothy slug woman.”

This is probably why I’m not God, despite our similar slapstick senses of humor. This has me thinking…maybe it’s socially irresponsible of me to keep this blog going(?). I can see conservative males citing my blog as the reason why we should never have a female president. PMS is a pretty powerful force. Now I’m imagining that I’m the president…right now….in my semi-clean black stretch pants and poncho with my disdain for the human race. Nahh, I’d never make it into office with the forceful and inspired campaign slogan of “Emily Lariviere: Heyyyy.”

PMS Chronicle 10.20.09

All of the various devices, systems, servers, and equipment that I need to do my job today are fucking broken. By definition, my job is not great, and it is certainly not difficult- -but do you ever just feel like all of technology has teamed up to play a cruel joke on you? I may not derive particular satisfaction from assessing the risk of various companies, BUT I like it even less……WHEN I CAN’T FUCKING DO IT!!!!!

This is my day today.

I have been having problems with the printer near my desk. In an effort to seek revenge on the inanimate printer (post screaming various “Corporate-unfriendly” words at it to such an extent that people have been closing their office doors and avoiding eye contact with me*), I sent out a note to the office informing them that one of printers was not working and to avoid sending anything to that printer until further notice. Emily-1, Printer-1. Ha! To add insult to injury, the whitest white collar in the office, who undoubtedly has made it this far in life without owning a single tool, succeeded in resolving the imaginary jam after haphazardly trying his unskilled hand at it for two minutes.

My festering bitterness and gripes with all-things-life-and-work have been momentarily interrupted by the fact that, “Janie’s Got a Gun” just came on the radio, and just in time to punctuate my last irrational thought! Either the universe is encouraging me to laugh at myself for a minute, of the universe is telling me… (insert unsettling maniacal laughter).




* I discovered that the “jam” the printer was claiming was, in fact, imaginary or otherwise invented…..by the printer.

Dunkin Donuts vs. Starbucks

When Unum offered me a job in Portland, Oregon…it wasn’t moving 3200 miles away from my friends or family. It wasn’t entering into a new and unfamiliar job. It even wasn’t having to live in a new, strange place….It was “can I live without Dunkin Donuts?” and “will I be the same person in its absence?”

Portland, like much of the world, has a substantial Starbucks presence/occupancy. Think of it in the military presence sense, and just like in the military sense I’ve had to learn how to exist with there being a looming Starbucks on every third street corner. Eventually, I was forced to give in …I mean, I need caffeine in order to do my job (or even just to function at 50% of normal capacity, for that matter). Upon walking into Starbucks one immediately notices the merchandise. It’s like a friggin’ mall in there. Espresso machines, coffee mugs, stuffed animals- -there really isn’t an item that Starbucks has qualms slapping their logo on. So then you get into the neatly formed line and everyone in front of you is the veritable “face” of Corporate America. The lobby is like a snapshot of what it looks like to work in an office; well-dressed, and donning a suit or dress. Every briefcase-laden person order drinks that involves 25 moving parts. I never thought I’d be part of this world. A bit of my soul died the day I learned how to order a drink at Starbucks; how to “speak Starbucks,” if you will. You feel like a sell out to Dunkin Donuts. It’s the kind of underhanded team-switching that is only en par with a Red Sox fan suddenly cheering for the Yankees.

The Starbucks baristas, though, have to be the nicest people I’ve encountered in any industry (they also, curiously enough, seem to comprise 78% of the gay workforce in any city). It’s like the difference between customer service at a Motel 6 and a W Hotel. The baristas will help you order, they’ll make suggestions, and once you become a regular face in the line of pant suits and briefcases they are even given to assigning a cute nickname to write on your drink cup. You laugh and joke with them, and they provide you with a drink that is responsible for getting you through the mental auto pilot of corporate hum drum. The warmth of the coffee is only rivaled by the warmth of the precious baristas. I’m not going to lie- -Starbucks has wormed its way into my heart a little (even despite my misgivings about the prices which beg, “I’m paying what for a coffee?!”).

Ah…then there’s my beloved Dunkin Donuts…it’s like the asshole boyfriend from “the other side of the tracks” that you can’t bring yourself to desert because, in all of their shittiness, there is still something about them that makes you feel good. Unlike the “Corporateite”-laden, mall-like, retail setting of a Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts offers no charming little keepsakes and their clientele is anything but homogenous. Instead of a chipper, flamboyantly gay barista who is just as excited about caffeinated beverages at 5 am on a Monday as he is at 5pm on a Friday…you have someone who “doesn’t make enough money to smile,” and was placed behind the Dunkin’ Donuts counter as a condition of parole through the majesty of work release. Dunkin Donuts’ employees and truck stop diner waitresses are really not far off when it comes to an overt seething hatred for the public at large. Even though I went to the same Dunkin Donuts in Maine at least once a day, every day, there was no chance that any of the 3 American and 6 Eastern European staff members were going to learn my name, let alone give me some cute nickname that they write on every beverage I order. In fact, there’s a good chance they’re going to consistently fuck my coffee up in some significant way, intentionally or otherwise. It’s an internal struggle where most interactions force me to question my love and devotion for DD- -and then I take the first sip of my extra large French Vanilla coffee (with regular cream and three Splendas®) and through sighs of enjoyment I entirely forget my train of thought.

Not to say I’ve learned the names of any of my local Starbucks baristas, they all seem to blend into a delightful sea of gay, and I’m just as happy to see one as I am to see them all. At Dunkin Donuts I didn’t know the names of the people serving my coffee either. Only, I usually give them nicknames to help me to distinguish them to other people who also frequent that same Dunkin Donuts. My former and favorite DD was employed by such aptly referred-to characters as: “Russian” (that was 6 people), “Meth Mouth,” “Drug Mug,” and “Medieval Man.” True story. I’m glad they never discovered my monikers for them- -but luckily I’m current on all of my inoculations, which also probably protected from even the normal, day-to-day coffee tamperings.

Despite all of these factors (and to keep with the “asshole boyfriend” theme), I’ll never get over Dunkin’ Donuts. I go back to it despite the abuse. I love all of the flaws and the mistakes. It’s safe to say that I love Dunkin Donuts unconditionally.
Starbucks, conversely, is like a rebound fling- -just a bump in my own personal road called ‘Life.’ I could forget Starbucks in an afternoon, especially if it weren’t for its overbearing and unavoidable presence. The other thing about Dunkin Donuts…is that it’s not just me. Everyone that has been touched by Dunkin Donuts pledges their caffeine homage to it wholeheartedly. Ask around. It’s not a hypothesis that needs proving. I have not met a single person who “doesn’t like” or “won’t drink” Dunkin Donuts, and people who haven’t experienced Dunkin Donuts, are just future converts- -and that’s not naïve optimism. The comedian, Lewis Black believes that the first sign of the apocalypse is the day he visits a Starbucks only to realize that it is across the street from another Starbucks. Funny and clever, but nay- -I say the first sign of the apocalypse is the day Starbucks buys out Dunkin’ Donuts and subsequently eradicates it from existence. On that day a war will be waged, as the pissed off “Joe’s” of the world unite to put a stop to $6 lattes. In the meantime, I don’t consider my relationship with Dunkin’ Donuts to be over- -we’re just taking a break.