Wednesday 15 December 2010

HO HO HO

Christmas is coming. Those of you trying to escape from the inevitable, surrender, it’s bigger than you (those of you that don’t celebrate, substitute ‘holidays’ wherever you see the word Christmas. I’m too tired to be socially aware this morning). I love Christmas, always have. I’m not sure if it’s the holiday itself – the decorations, the fat bearded man in the suit spreading good cheer, or the coming together of family, but I always look forward to this time of year.

Our family doesn’t do anything out of the norm per se, but it is the mere fact that for one day we try to get as many of us under one roof as possible – not an easy feat. This usually means I’m either on one side of the pond with one group, or flying across to the other side to join the other portion of my family. We’re a big group, it must be said, and from the looks of it, we’re only getting bigger (In numbers, not size. We do our best to keep from sharing Santa’s pant size).

As kids, on Christmas Eve, we always got to open one gift. I would of course have to size up every gift in my pile and then pick the one that would satisfy my curiosity but would not overshadow what was to come the next day. Yes, I gave this serious thought. Then midnight mass would roll around and my mother would insist that we come to mass with her, or try anyway. This is when us heathens would run and hide with my father and claim religious freedom on the grounds of going to church at that hour was downright persecution.

On Christmas day itself, we have the customary feast, you know the one where you eat double your body weight and wonder why you torture yourself. My dad is always in charge of the music; I don’t know about you, but hearing Bing Crosby sing as I stuff pumpkin pie into my gob always turns me into a nostalgic little kid. Then we add our own family twist on things and watch as many movies as possible. Pre grandkids this involved going to a film on opening day, and braving the elements – the fray of course, not the weather. Of course picking the right film is essential. One year we didn’t think things through and ended up watching "Frances" with Jessica Lange. For those of you that have not seen it, it’s not, I repeat NOT something you want to watch at Christmas time, especially when there is a hot oven on only feet away from you. Anything that partially takes place in an institution (of any kind) should be saved until you have a bottle of Prozac in your hands. I’m thinking the lighter the fare, the better. In fact, even Adam Sandler may be too somber for a seasonal flick.

This year I’m doing my first Californian Christmas in quite sometime. The last several have been spent in the freezing snow, which I always thought added to the mood of the season. I must be honest, I find a sunny Christmas day a bit of an oddity and it never quite feels right. I’m never sure what to do with myself and I end up wishing a gigantic snow cloud would sweep across the 405 freeway and dump itself on unsuspecting Hollywood. Then again, people in that city can’t drive in the rain to save their lives. I think snow would cause the city to implode.

The best part of this year of course is now I can introduce Christmas to the King. Although at this point in his young life his biggest thrill is the sound crumpled wrapping paper makes. Cheap date. My partner actually told someone to get him a ream of white paper as a gift. I of course forgot to mention they should throw in a tin of Bandaids as the paper cuts in his future will be in the high numbers.

Saying all this, considering the weather in England at the moment, let’s hope I even make it across the pond. Santa has it so easy, he gets to skip the holiday airport rush, security, intrusive body checks and wear elastic with plenty of give. Lucky bastard.

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Tuesday 14 December 2010

THE CLEAVAGE CONUNDRUM

Is showing too much cleavage too distracting and a liability at work? Yes. You heard me. This gem has been plucked from the morning news cycle, and you know that I never tire of what constitutes ‘news.’ Apparently this debate is considered worth having, so I shall of course throw my hat into the ring.

Last week a survey was done with over 3000 managers (over here in jolly old England, where I guess they've tired of discussing the rising tuition fees and Camilla's brush with an angry mob) and the earth shattering result of this survey? If women show too much in the chest area they can sabotage their career. Half of these managers admitted that they overlooked a woman for a promotion if she had regularly worn low cut tops to ‘attract attention.’ Can’t you just hear them complaining as they justified themselves – "she wanted me to stare; damn her and that low cut silk number!"

Firstly, isn’t there a law against passing over a woman for such a preposterous reason? So just so I have this straight, if the woman is the most qualified person for the job, yet she’s wearing her V-neck a bit low, she’s getting passed over? How about a man getting passed over for being irretrievably stupid? "Well, as you can imagine, his stupidity was attracting attention and bringing the whole IQ of the office down. We had to let him go." Now that's more like it.

I understand the whole argument that one has to dress appropriately at the office. In fact, I think there are many out there that look as if they got dressed in the dark…or their local brothel. But if a woman has a large chest, or any chest that constitutes cleavage she has to dress like an Amish woman or suffer the consequences? I will also readily admit that there are women out there that love to put it all on display; in fact many make a living of doing just that. But when it comes to the mercurial chest area - the bermuda triangle apparently to many a men - I have known a slew of women that no matter what they wear, their chest just seems to have a mind of its own and it becomes very hard to hide or disguise. And sometimes, the mere hiding of the chest area makes it that much more apparent. Ah the irony! And it’s not like we can cut them off when the situation demands it, and then strap them back on once we clock out.

I have a tip, how about men learn how to NOT look (or shut up and enjoy the view. Oh yeah, that's right, you can't multi-task). I realize this is not in their DNA, but you don’t see us walking around staring at men’s groins. We can handle the dizzying allure, we are strong enough to say to ourselves, hmm, gee, while I’m out in public, I’ll talk to a man’s face, not his pants. What is so damn hard, are men not used to them by now. They’re there. They’re not moving anywhere else on our body. So either get used to it, or wear sunglasses to work. And you can even paste a little photo of women’s breasts on the inside of the glasses in case you just can’t handle it. Cause I realize cold turkey is just too much for some chest gazers.

HOWDY NEIGHBOR

Neighbors are a funny thing – or a flat out maddening, want to clean one’s shotgun type of thing. Just kidding, I’m totally anti-gun and have never even held one before. Riflery at camp does not count. I’ve always likened neighbors to family only in the sense that you cannot choose them. They’re simply there in your building when you move in (if you live in a shared block of course; if you own a home, I'd call the police promptly!), like it or not. I suppose if you were really neurotic you could canvas the building before hand to see if you liked the people. And yes, I am that neurotic, or certainly will be in the future.

My building, whilst amazing in its location, has many factors that are slowly driving me insane. One being that the walls are paper-thin and I’m sandwiched between two of the most annoying sets of neighbors within greater London. The guy upstairs we call ‘dead body’ guy. In short, he drags heavy objects across the floor incessantly, followed by bangs and thuds, and other mysterious noises, to which my partner and I have decided can only be corpses that he hides within his lair.

I shall paint you a picture of his other sunny attributes. He never leaves the flat, he does not work as far as I can tell; he occasionally skulks out for food (the man does not walk. He definitely skulks), plays video games incessantly on top volume (which of course I can hear), sneezes with such ferocity that it causes me to jump every time he does so, and plays his music so loudly that my living room shakes. But it doesn’t stop there. He doesn’t just play his music. A few times a day he powers up his airplane engine that clearly operates his stereo, sets the bass on 1 zillion and then plays ten seconds of forty different songs all in a row. And of course these songs, to make my ears really want to recoil and crawl inside my brain, vary from NWA to Olivia Newton John. He even busted out Celine Dion the other day followed by Eminem. If he starts playing John Denver I’m calling the authorities.

Now for those of you thinking why have I not filed any complaints re. this freak show? Oh, I have. When I was pregnant, all hopped up on hormones, he and I got into it. Well, I used a broom handle and knocked on the ceiling to which he responded by cursing at me thru the floor and banging on my front door (I didn’t answer. I’m not a total idiot). The building’s response? He is an angel, a no fly zone, and we would never reprimand him cause everyone that works for the building loves him (or fears the hell out of him) and I am a crazy hormonal woman. Gee, thanks for that.

The neighbors downstairs are the drunkards. As we call them. We like nicknames. They love to party, come home at all hours blitzed out of their minds (and have been known to forget their keys and ring the entire building), fight like Richard Burton and Liz Taylor and are very fond of slamming doors. In the light of day, and in sobriety, she is quite nice. He, not so much. Yes, I can hear pretty much everything that goes on in this building.

So, I realized that instead of complaining about the noise, the second hand smoke that seeps up through the pipes (seriously), or the Celine Dion, I have the best revenge money can buy. THE KING. Since his arrival, I have sat back with a smile on my face and thought, so neighbors, what do you think of them screaming apples? And the best part is, no one can complain about a baby (except me of course). As far as I can tell he has no volume control or sense of propriety. If it’s 5:30 am on a Saturday morning and he feels like screaming his little head off, then that’s just what he’s going to do. In fact, if he wants to scream, talk, and coo for 10 hours straight, I’m thinking there is also not much I can do about it. Now if only I could get him to cry in the tune of My Heart Will Go On. We’ll have to work on that.

Monday 13 December 2010

YOU MAY NOW HUMILIATE YOURSELF

I spent the weekend at a wedding. I love weddings, and it’s not even about the coming together of two people in wedded bliss that I like. [I’m not sure what that says about me?] Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about people declaring their love for one another in a romantic and unified fashion, but that’s usually the part that’s the most predictable; we get it, you love one another and promise to do so in sickness and health, bla bla bla, no one is going to jump up Graduate style and object to your union. Let’s just get to the part where your guests totally and utterly embarrass themselves. Now that’s when it gets interesting.

Plus, this weekend’s ceremony was a traditional Catholic ceremony. Those that know me, know how hard it is for me to sit still when I’m confined in a church…for an entire hour no less. I regress in such a profound way, that my eight year old (former) Catholic school girl self comes barreling out and suddenly I’m this squirming, whispering, giggling idiot that can’t stop whispering to my partner that if they don’t end this thing I’m going to running screaming from the building. In fact, there was a five year old in the pew in front of us that was behaving far more maturely that I was. Granted, he had crayons and some paper, which is cheating in my book. If I had crayons I could behave too.

Anyway, it is the reception thereafter that always sparks my writer mind into overdrive – although the ass grabbing couple in front of me in the church was certainly getting us off to a good start. I of course kept asking my partner if the ass grab was acceptable in the eyes of God? I have no clue about these things. Anyway, I digress....Once people get to the reception something seems to take over; I’m not sure if it’s the fact that no one has been fed for hours and they quickly start guzzling liquor like its water and they’ve just crawled out of the Sahara. But people start to get sloppy very quickly. Which of course is where I become very amused as I’m usually the only sober person there. Although that said, my behavior does not always reflect this, as I am a brilliant contagious drunk.

For some reason weddings just seem to lower people’s inhibitions. Suddenly they feel like they can do or say anything and it’s somehow fair game. “I just puked in the centerpiece after streaking thru the lobby. But hey it’s a wedding!” Then again, maybe it’s just the weddings I’ve attended. I fear to say that often times it is the table I am seated at that turns into the miscreants that run amuck. I’m not proud of this fact, of course. This weekend, my partner and I managed to set two napkins on fire at our table. The funny thing was, the first one that went up in flames, no one noticed for several minutes as it burned in the center of the table. I suppose they thought it was some sort of art deco table setting. I of course starting screaming and blowing on it, like that was going to do anything. Finally another guest poured a pitcher of water on it, which then drenched the table and turned the patch in front of us into a soupy ashen mess. Added to this detritus were the 3 zillion cherry stones and nut shells in a lovely pile in front of my partner – these were the decorations on the table in which he decided as they were ‘food’ they were fair game.

Then of course there are the speeches to sit through – which is perhaps how the second napkin went up in flames. Sometimes entertainment needs to be taken into one’s own hands. If done right, a best man’s speech can be sheer sublime hilarity. If done wrong, pulling one’s teeth out with tweezers is a more enjoyable experience. My most favorite part of a wedding is the dancing. And admittedly, I turn into a psychotic who forgot to take her meds when I hit the dance floor. I am of the no rules, shake it however the hell you want it, dancing persuasion. If you’re in my way, lookout cause some part of me is coming your way. I lose all sense of propriety and don’t care how I look in terms of choreography. If I love the song, I’m going for it. This of course makes me partner crazy, as he never knows how to dance ‘with’ me. He claims it is virtually impossible to keep up or even remain in my circumference. My response to him, 'babe, there are tables worth of centerpieces you can go gorge on, eat up my nut swilling lover, baby’s got to shake her moneymaker!'

Oh, and by the way, as we were leaving the reception, and we passed by our empty table that was now a total disaster zone, (once the cheese plate came out it was all downhill), there was a THIRD napkin on fire. Just sitting there at the end of the table. We were then convinced our table was cursed, or possessed. Whatever it was, we threw another pitcher of water over it and got the hell out of there.

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