Diary of a MILF in Progress

And lo, another year passes

Ah, the inevitable year-end recap (I know there are still a few days left in the year, but who knows whether I'll be able to arse myself to post before Tuesday.)  As we say farewell to 2007, I lrealize...nothing's changed. 

I'm still hung up on my looks and have no concept of whether my hair cut/hair color/clothing choices are doing me any favors, and I continue to obsess about what the interweb or my co-workers or other party guests think of me.  To review: short hair is mostly considered not sexy, although my March haircut was not a complete disaster; this Fall's experimentation with a new brand was a bust, but the overall choice to be a redhead sets me apart (in a good way) even if it's a pain in the ass to find the John Frieda shampoo (Brilliant Brunette and Sheer Blonde, no problem.  Radiant Red?  Sorry, we don't carry that.); yes, these jeans do make my ass look good; damn, I sure know how to knit a sweater/tank top/color blocked dress.

My husband is sometimes a jackass.  I may  never live down the money stuff, and he still hasn't learned not to remark about my weight.  Sometimes he's a really good guy, and sometimes he means well and chooses an unfortunate way to express himself.

Casey is a category unto himself.   He of the dreams and chance meetings, and the studious avoidances.  Flirt?  Kiss?  Ignore?  Bail?  We did run the gamut.  In any case, our interactions (potential and realized) are never boring.

Natalie is my best work friend ever in the entire history of my life.   Whether she's my co-conspirator, the voice of reason, or the woman who tells her husband to flirt with me and check out my ass.  Our crazy-ass  CEO better not drive her to quit or I will jump off the roof of the building.

Farewell, my readers, until next year.  Unless something either  pisses me off or makes me laugh enough to post over the weekend.  MWAH!  You know I love you (all eight of you.)

Another example of the brilliance of TWoP

OMG, Jacob is too damned good at this.  I enjoy recaps of the Rufus scenes more than I enjoy the scenes themselves.

Bravo, my good man.

It's time for giant blue things at two dollars off!

So we are off to the holiday happy hour, I and Natalie and Casey and Dan and Shel and Dr. Mike and Big Dog (our resident HH king). And while I cannot promise that I won't jump up on a table and dance to "Boogie Shoes," I shall try my hardest to be on my best behavior. There ought to be quite a crowd, ranging from the on air types all the way down to the Monica Brazeltons of the office, and to all I wish a happy Christmas (or at least a pleasant long weekend). Peace, y'all

Things I'm not so much loving this week

• I met Casey's wife, Lisa, at the company Christmas party.  She seems really funny and nice enough, but now I am convinced that she thinks I am a big dork.  We were all laughing about old Christmas specials, I said something about being able to recite them because of the age of my kids (9, 6.5 and 4.5, in case you're keeping track).  She got a horrified look on her face and said "That's way too many kids under the age of 10!  I'm so thankful that mine is 27 and only drops by for visits!" 
• During said Christmas party (sorry, Holiday party) conversation, I mentioned my annual baking fest, and how I take a day off to make a gazillion cookies and such.  Upon hearing how many people get their own batches to take home (as opposed to just feeding from the massive tray I put in a central location), she said I should send some home with Casey.  So, imagine my surprise when I dropped the container off at Casey's desk, only to have one of the other sales team people tell me that Casey and Lisa do not partake of sweets.  So I don't know if I totally missed the social cue, in which case I should take the cookies back before Casey comes in the office, or whether our co-worker was off-base, in which case taking the cookies back would look like I was promising my famous triple-chip cookies and not delivering.
• My boss sent me edits to a rules and regs document, but the version she used looks to me as though it was not the most current (i.e., it was the version from October '06, and we made a subsequent set of edits in June '07).  I took her edits and incorporated them into what I think is the right version, and saved it in its appopriate network drive with a filename extension so as not to overwrite the version she had saved, make sure that all of the applicable permutations of the document (i.e., the October '06, June '07 and December '07) are all saved in the same subdirectory with the proper filename conventions.  And I emailed her my revised version.  I didn't say anything derogatory or anything, just "I think your edits may have been to the October version, so I pulled the June and added the most recent changes.  I'll do another comparison of the documents to make sure I didn't miss any of the edits," but still- having to tell my boss (the second highest ranking member of our organization) that she goofed is not fun.
• We are going to my mother's house on Saturday, since it is her birthday as well as a perfect opportunity to do exchanges of presents and see the light show at the park near her house.  My sister just emailed me to pin down a time for presents, dinner and lights, since as the mom of the little ones, I am the one to determine how late is too late to be up and whether gifts can be put aside to eat without anyone having a meltdown and how early can be realistically be at the house to see the 'rents/g'rents after having done what needs done at home in terms of grocery shopping and house cleaning and the like.  Fabulous, one more thing for me to try to figure out, and one more thing for everyone to question my judgement once I do come up with a schedule!
• My pants are chapping my ass.  "Why do you dislike the pants, Dana?" you may ask.  I don't dislike the pants at all, actually.  They're a nice grey shade, with a bit of brown and off-white in the pinstriping.  Wide legged, quite flattering.  But I have really really dry skin.  And no matter how much I try to combat it (tepid showers, moisturizing lotion, whatever), I spend most of the winter with very tender and red patches in various areas of my body.  And I have a thong on today, so the pants are rubbing against a couple of tender areas of my upper thigh and lower ass.  Everything else may be figuratively chapping my ass this week, but in the case of the pants, I'm being literal.

Eye of the beholder

So, I was talking to Natalie the other day.  And the topic turned to perceived levels of attractiveness.  On the few occaisions when she has her husband on hand at a party or whatever, I confess that I flirt madly with him.  Natalie is totally OK with this, and even encourages the behavior, since we are secure enough in our friendship and our marriages that we all know nothing is going to happen so we can interact with no subtext or strange implications.  Apparently the two of them have discussed, as she delicately put it today, my "various attributes."

"That must have been a pretty short conversation," I said.  "There aren't too many things in the 'plus' column when it comes to my looks, and it goes even further downhill if you consider what I look like naked."  [Neither Natalie nor her husband has actually seen me naked, so get that thought out of your head right now!]

"You're delusional," she shot back.  "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Should I go head to toe, or in order of magnitude?  My hair is frizzy and can't hold a style- it's not smooth enough to be straight, but not enough body to be curly.  I've got dark circles under my eyes, no matter how much sleep I get each night.  These..." I said as I indicated the vertical wrinkles between my desperately-in-need-of-a-tweeze eyebrows, "... make me look like I'm pissed off all the time.  My complexion is blotchy because of the rosacea, so I look like crap if I don't have my make-up on.  Unless pear-shaped is making a big splash these days, the difference between my non-existent bustline and my childbearing hips is not at all appealing.  I've got a poochy tummy from the c-sections, no matter how many Pilates sessions I've done in the past four and a half years, and don't even get me started on the stretch marks that come from three pregnancies.  My legs are short, my calves are so chunky that I can't find boots to fit except at the plus-size stores, my butt is all cellulite-y.  I can't get a tan, so all my freckles and moles are nice and prominent against my sickly-white skin.  Between the scars from the moles that were removed and the moles that are still there, you could connect the dots on my back to make every constellation visible to the naked eye.  My triceps are saggy, so I don't like to wear sleeveless blouses..."

"STOP!" Natalie admonished me, rolling her eyes. "Really, just go ahead and shoot yourself now and put us all out of your misery."