Give a little bit.

So, the funk is still funky. I'm tired of writing about how things are basically falling apart in my life, so I can only imagine how sick and tired all you three readers are of reading about it. I mean, sobbing in the parking lot of Duds 'n' Suds is way fun, but it's just not the sort of thing you can do every day.

It's called moderation, people.

I'm feeling a bit more in control at the moment, and am working very hard to set the pace for myself at work and in my personal life. I'm trying to kick the crap to the curb and focus on the really important stuff.

Or, kick the carp to the curb, as I initially typed. Damn you, carp! Get your fish-ass self outta here!

Anyway.

I have been hiding. I've been letting everybody go to voicemail. I have about a gazillion unanswered e-mails. I have been turned very much inward. And that's understandable ... but not exactly my long-term style choice.

I found a little somethingsomething that appeals to the Nice Girl in me who always tries to compliment strangers and tip very, very well. It's 29 Gifts - participants give 29 gifts in 29 days and report back on their experience. Put good things out into the universe and get many blessings in return.

Simple enough. I'm going to give it a go. And I'll report about it here. I'm hoping it will shake awake my inner Not Miserable Cha Cha.

Today's gift is with a thankful but heavy heart ... I made a memorial donation in honor of Michelle Mayer at Diary of a Dying Mom. She passed away this weekend, after a long struggle ... and a graceful lesson in what it means to truly be alive. I am richer for her life, and I am humbled by how she shared her experiences. I gave a small gift in honor of that, but really, she gave me a much, much greater gift.

I guess this is progress.

Two things made me laugh today:

1. I love those stupid Swiffer ads that feature the mop and the broom pining away for the housewife to the tune of "Baby Come Back." I think that song is hilarious and wonderful, and the idea of a mop paying a mariachi band to play it to try to woo the housewife? Well, it about makes me pee my pants every time. Because yes, I am just that simple.
2. I took my dogs for separate walks today. Geriatric Poodle's walk is more of a sniffing meander around the block that takes about half an hour. You can tell from his gait that he thinks he is hot shit, and that pleases me. Foxie Doxie's power walk entails a 12-pound dog screaming and pulling me. The screaming isn't like "OMG, someone is hurt." It's more of a "hearn hearn HEARN hearn" that makes you wonder, "OMG, what is she doing to that poor animal?" It's a subtle but important difference.
   
   Anyway, Foxie Doxie stopped to smell a tree. Evidently the scent was intense and definitely required a rebuttal - literally. He peed on the tree, then in a flash of movement turned around and pooped against the tree. Except the poo ricocheted off the tree and bounced about a foot away from the tree, almost hitting my shoe. This is what I think of your problems, mama.

Yeah. My people are a simple people. This is a start.

Cha Cha’s guide to success.

I don’t like to brag, but I recently found myself sitting in my car outside of a Duds ‘n’ Suds laundromat, crying so hard that I couldn’t drive.

I know that you’re wondering, ‘How does she do it? What’s the secret of Cha Cha’s super fantastic life? And how can I get one?’

Gentle reader, I am here to share the secrets of my success. Get a pen or pencil, and prepare to be dazzled.

1. Get waaaaaay too into your job. Derive your sense of self from your work. Skip social events to work.


2. Try to date. Have the good fortune to find a truly amazing man. Attempt to build a lovely ménage a trois with you, your boyfriend, and your job. Watch the ensuing fun.
3. Get burned out at work from being in firefighting mode for eight long, grueling months.


4. Wonder why your relationship is suffering. Be genuinely surprised.


5. Have random-ass and very real fights with boyfriend. Get so mad that you tell him he needs to find a drifter for you to kill.


6. Realize you are in big, big trouble. Realize, too, that you have no idea how to right your ship.


7. Burst into tears when your kind but clueless boss asks how it’s going. Mentally note that this is the worst day of your professional life.


8. Realize that trying to please everyone but yourself has brought you to a very ugly place. Cry some more.


9. Be genuinely surprised when the man you want to spend the rest of your life with tells you that he is on the verge of breaking up with you. Cry some more. Realize this probably isn’t making you more attractive to him, which makes you cry even more in that blubbery, blotchy, gasping for breath sort of way.


10. Realize that you have no idea what would make you happy, but this ain’t it.

And there you have it. What can I say? I’m a giver. You’re welcome.

I need to be alone with The Sandwich.

It was so unfair for me to promise to dish on the The World’s Best Sandwich on Monday … and then not even post at all.

I am so, so sorry, all of you three readers. I will personally make you The Sandwich to make up for it.

But the truth? The truth is that Monday at Corporate Behemoth made me think of nothing but the lolcat with the cat getting a bath and the caption “DO. NOT. WANT.”

I was exhausted. I was so exhausted that I went home and put on sweat pants.

Not yoga pants. Not cute fleece pants. Sweat pants. With the saggy ass and the elastic at the ankles.

I ate The Sandwich. Then I took a bath and realized that my water heater is on its very last legs. Then, I went to bed. At 10.

I haven’t been to bed by 10 p.m. since about the third grade.

If you have any swell ideas about non-Corporate Behemoth things that I should do for a living, please leave a comment.

In exchange, I offer you The World’s Best Sandwich.

Make yourself two slices of wheat bread toast. It’s important that it’s toast – you need the crunchiness that only toast can provide.

Then, get some Skippy Extra Crunchy peanut butter. Accept no substitutes. Must be Skippy. Must be Extra Crunchy. Trust me.

Put a thick layer of the peanut butter on one piece of toast. Then, pile on thick slices of tomato. The homegrown tomatoes that all of your neighbors are desperately trying to pawn off right now are ideal. This is truly the best time of year to be a vegetable mooch.

So, pile on those thick tomato slices and lick the juice off your wrist. Sprinkle the tomatoes with a very liberal application of black pepper.

Then, smear another healthy dose of peanut butter on the other piece of toast. If you like, you can also smoosh some red onion slices into the peanut butter, but this is optional.

Then, combine the two peanut-buttertastic pieces of toast to create your glorious sandwich. Go sit on your couch with a paper towel, the sandwich, and your remote control. Watch a DVRed episode of Dog the Bounty Hunter while you enjoy the delicious, juicy bounty that is a peanut butter and tomato sandwich.

The end.

Rock the vote.

I am hard-core when it comes to a few things. I hate pickles and mustard. I fantasize about rear-ending cars with anti-choice bumperstickers. And I am constantly annoyed with e-mail forwards.

Yes, I am great fun at parties.

However, I received an e-mail forward that is timely, eye-opening, and TRUE.

Yeah, I know – I didn’t know they existed, either. I’m still waiting for all the bad luck that’s supposed to come my way since I have broken every chain letter I’ve ever received.

I checked it out on snopes.com and even our dear Library of Congress. And even though I don’t want to believe it, I can’t deny it. And I’m humbled by it.

This is the story of our Grandmothers and Great-grandmothers; they lived only 90 years ago.

The women were innocent and defenseless, but they were jailed nonetheless for picketing the White House, carrying signs asking for the vote. Remember, it was not until 1920 that women were granted the right to go to the polls and vote.

And by the end of the night, they were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden's blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of 'obstructing sidewalk traffic.'

They beat Lucy Burns, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head and left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air.

They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron bed and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack.

Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing, dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the women. Thus unfolded the 'Night of Terror' on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a lesson to the suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's White House for the right to vote.

For weeks, the women's only water came from an open pail. Their food--all of it colorless slop--was infested with worms.

When one of the leaders, Alice Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a tube down her throat and poured liquid into her until she vomited. She was tortured like this for weeks until word was smuggled out to the press.

It is jarring to watch Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a psychiatrist to declare Alice Paul insane so that she could be permanently institutionalized.

And it is inspiring to watch the doctor refuse. Alice Paul was strong, he said, and brave. That didn't make her crazy. The doctor admonished the men: 'Courage in women is often mistaken for insanity.'

In this day and age, it doesn’t take much courage to leave the house an hour early or take a different bus so you can vote. Get an absentee ballot and vote now. Make sure your elderly neighbors have a way to get to the polls. Don’t let the weather or a sick kid or a stupid work deadline get in your way.

Plan now. This is a priority. This is a privilege.

And now I’ll step off my soapbox and tomorrow we’ll return to our regularly-scheduled drivel. Next: I dish on the world’s best sandwich!

This post brought to you by exhaustion. And gratitude.

It’s been a very, very long week.

Mass explosions of work at Corporate Behemoth meant that if you had checked in on me at 1 a.m. Monday morning, 10:30 p.m. Thursday night, or pretty much any time between the hours of 7:30 a.m. and 9 p.m., you would have found me attached to my laptop.

Mr. Wonderful and I have been Working Through Things. This is good. But this also means that I got to bed before 1:30 a.m. exactly one night this week.

And so, it’s finally Saturday. And I have to run various and sundry errands. And then I have to come home and finish painting my laundry room so that I can get crap like my ironing board out of my living room.

Side note: why do I own an ironing board? I last used it in 2000, back when a) I still valued ironing and b) I hadn’t yet discovered that getting shirts laundered is so worth the cost and c) I still wore anything besides t-shirts from Target.

T-shirts from Target are good. They are cheap and come in a plethora of colors. My mom says the v-neck is the most flattering neckline, but I need some crew neck ones to go with some round-neck sweaters. You know?

Anyway.

I’m trying to slow down. I’m trying to breathe. I’m trying to remember what’s what.

During my crazed marathon of work Thursday, I took a few minutes to surf a few of my favorite blogs. And one of them stopped me in my tracks.

Dear Michelle at Diary of a Dying Mom has been letting the good folks at hospice take care of her and help her manage her symptoms. And Thursday’s post brought about an honest but painful revelation.

It was a message about what’s really important, and it completely knocked me down. What’s important isn’t about content management, or comma placement, or busting your ass and making yourself physically ill in order to meet a ridiculous, irrational deadline. Strangely, it is also not about t-shirts from Target.

Do yourself a favor and visit Michelle. She will teach you a lot.

Dispatch from Corporate Behemoth.

• The head security guard at our front desk is an older gentleman who prides himself on learning the names of each and every employee at Corporate Behemoth. He says it’s a mind game that keeps him fresh. When I walk through the turnstiles to get on the elevator, he greets me with “Good morning, Cha Cha!”
  
  Except that sometimes he loses his touch.
  
  Lately, he’s been greeting me enthusiastically with “Good morning, Carlotta!”
  
  Considering that some of the IT guys are still calling me Gladys, this is cause for concern.



• I have a coworker whom I like very much. He’s friendly, always up for answering random questions, and he reminds me of my dad.
  
  He reminds me of my dad, except that he greets my chest, not my face. I’m sure he would be mortified if he realized the extent of his blatant boobwatching, and I like him, and so I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. But if I didn’t like him? Dude, my face is UP HERE.



• The worst thing possible has happened.
  
  Those of you who have worked in an office – any office – know what I’m talking about.
  
  My cubemate with the candy dish has moved jobs and therefore moved desks. There is no candy. No chocolate. No SweetTarts. Nothing. And right as all the good Halloween candy is coming out, too. I am bewildered and frightened, and have a very low blood sugar level.



• Last week, I was in a meeting where a coworker said, “We’ve established that ‘a lot’ is ‘quite a bit.’”
  
  And everyone in the room nodded their heads in agreement.
  
  This is how I spend the precious days of my one and only life.
  
  But it’s tempered with comments like this one, from one of my Indian cohorts: “With him, I am on the open war, to be very frankly.”