Category Archives: Slice of Life – Two Writing Teachers

I’ve Gotta Be Me

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I informed a colleague last week, that there is very little that I cannot somehow smutty up without even trying hard, case in point a call with a bank…

Bank Operator (with one killer baritone): Good Morning, welcome to X Bank. My name is Joe and what can I do to give you outstanding service this morning?

No seriously, the man had a voice. Now I know the emphasis on “outstanding” is part of the telephone script spiel, but the way he delivers the line? Dang.

And just like that, I’m off.

Me (with my never far from dirty, but now pure gutter mind for that voice, is remembering to behave): Well regrettably there’s nothing you can do for me Joe, however you can make *Name on Debit Card in My Hand* very happy. I found the card on the subway platform and I’m sure *Name* would appreciate knowing it’s not just floating out there.

Joe: Oh! Well that’s very nice of you to report it in. Let me check the system; what is the number on the card?

Me (in best professional voice – I said I was trying to behave wasn’t I?):*card number*

Joe: Thank you, one moment please…

I grab my scissors out of the drawer while I wait because I know what’s coming next.

Joe: Yes, I have it. Again I would like to thank you for calling this in; that was very nice of you to do. As for the card…

Me (interrupting): I know, I know. I’m taking scissors to it as we speak and will drop it in the shredder for confetti making in a moment.

Joe: Okay. Thank you. Is that all Miss… (he realizes I never gave my name and quickly sallies forth) or is there anything I can do for you?

Oh and there goes that dang emphasis again.

Me (not entirely joking): Read the phone book or 50 Shades or… oh never mind.

Joe (definitely laughing): Wow it’s only Monday morning and not even nine o’clock.

Me (behaving myself thrown out of the window): Right, as though you’ve never talked dirty on the phone first thing on a Monday morning before. You’ve given outstanding oral service today, Joe. You have an excellent day.

Joe (barely keeping the amusement out of his voice): And you as well, thank you for using X Bank.

Me (stage whisper): Not the way I’d like to use you and your voice right now.

I hang up the phone to the sound of much chuckling on the other end.

I gotta be me, I gotta be meeeeee 

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Let’s see how the others are slicing it this Tuesday…

Slice of Life : Two Writing Teachers

Slice of Life : Two Writing Teachers

 

Verbal Diarrhea Diaries: Toot

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Verbal Diarrhea Diaries aka the crap that comes out of my mouth sometimes that surprises even me.

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A little ego tripping twixt myself and a recent attendee of one of my classes with whom a fun rapport developed via email exchange.

Me:  Weren’t you supposed to email me and remind me to send you this information?

Erstwhile Student:  I had full faith in you that you would remember 😉 Thanks for a seriously awesome training day! You rock…but I’m sure you already knew that.

Me:  * clutches pearls and gasps *

Why, it would be far too immodest of me to self-accolade in such an unseemly manner! I cannot openly concede the methodical superiority in which trainings held under my exacting tutelage are conducted. It would merely serve to further exemplify the depth of all other instructors lacking and that is unkind and unfair.  Luckily, I’m not fair, kind or modest and the horn in which I personally toot is often of a decibel suitable to guide coastal ships in inclement weather.  😉

Besides, the class is only is good as the attendees, many thanks to you for being an equally awesome student.

Erstwhile Student:  LOL! Oh, if only an eighth of my technical classes were even half  as entertaining as yours. Thanks!

Note to my fellow trainers, instructors and teachers reading this. JUST KIDDING!!!!  As I said ego tripping, but it is always wonderful to receive such emails acknowledging your work.

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Let’s see how others are slicing through their Tuesday…

Slice of Life : Two Writing Teachers

Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

I Cannot Tech This Anymore

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I cannot tech today.

I who work in a technology based industry have been in relative fail mode for anything that has a power button today.

The overhead projector and instructor PC in the training room are in an apparent lover’s snit and do not want to talk each other. I check the wires, display format etc. nothing.  Of course I discover this minutes before a class is set to start.

Fine ain’t got time for dat as the saying goes. We’ll do this the ol’ fashioned way and use the still active portable projector like I used to do not too long ago. It’s not as pretty or as high-tech as the overhead, but it will get the job done right? Right. Wrong. Keystone. Horizontal and Vertical settings. Zoom, only showing one monitor. It’s not happening. Oh come the freak on already! All this futzing around is still happening at 10:15 for a class that was supposed to start at 9:30. I look at my students admit tech failure and start to talk talk them through the training.  I speak a lot as it takes longer to describe a concept where a simple click of the mouse to show them all at once would have worked miracles, but we get through it.

I come back to my desk and accidentally kick something, that hits something, that pulls the plug on one of my monitors.  Greeeeeeaaat! Follow the affected line down through the spaghetti of cords under my desk and get it all plugged up, only to realize I have now pulled out my mouse in the process and back into the spaghetti I go.

A run to Starbucks struck me as a right fine idea, by then.  Well, that my colleague leaving me a note, putting the bug in my ear (a really creepy crawly action if taken literally I must say). So I grab my phone with my Starbucks app, insure I have my cardkey to get back in the building, take my sunglasses and head out for some much needed refreshment.

So, do you want to guess who got in line at Starbucks, got all the way to the front of the line, was one measly person away from placing an order when she pulled out her phone and realized the damned thing was as dead as a door nail? No really, guess who! Hint: It’s the same person who did not have a dime on her otherwise. The same person who could not use her Starbucks card instead because it was in her wallet. The same person who left her wallet at her desk, because why would I need my wallet when I have my Starbucks app on my trustee phone? Uh huh.

Technology: 4 – Raivenne: zilch

Silver lining? Yes, there is one. I made it back into the office building Starbucks-less, but just before it started to to pour outside (good thing I had my shades with me, huh?).  Also, this computer has not done anything else untoward since I started typing. Yay, the tides are turning…

But I’m not touching any light switches with my bare hands for the rest of the day, just in case…

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Let’s see how others are slicing it up this Tuesday.Slice of Life : Two Writing Teachers
Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

No Photos Please!

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A friend of mine was posting in a group on Facebook and apparently “Funeral Selfies” is a thing now.

Yes, it’s exactly what it sounds like, taking photos of oneself at a wake or funeral and then posting it to social media for the world can see. Really. And I hate to think this, but in this land of you know you want to know what’s happening with me right this minute! instant information, it so feels so much like something some in the “millennial” generation would do and I don’t understand it. I don’t understand how anyone could be so incredibly narcissistic, at a funeral nonetheless, and think it is okay.

At the wake for my late-husband, Del, a cousin I had not seen in nearly a decade at that point, showed up in bright pink rollers and a scarf that was a joke of an attempt at covering them, so she was already pissing me off. I mean, who shows up at a wake in rollers? As I’m speaking with Reese, my late-husband’s cousin and best friend, I hear the familiar click of a camera behind me. I spin around and call out “No.” waving my index finger. It is Del taking a picture of a couple of friends/family near of the back of the room.

“It’s okay, he’s not in the picture”. She explained at my reaction. “He” being my late husband, aka the deceased that was laying at the front of the same room, and the reason why we were all there at that moment. I continued shaking my head and waving my finger in the negative, but Del lifted the camera preparing to take another picture. I remember thinking “Oh, you’re going to argue with me, the widow at her own husband’s wake?” instead what came out of my mouth was “NO!” at a volume that stopped everyone in the room. I had not even realized that I had taken the physical steps to beat her with her camera until I felt Reese restrain me. Whatever was on my face, Del and those she wanted pictures of were quickly going outside. Luckily, selfies as we know and use them now did not exist then. Because I know if she were truly taking a picture of herself at the moment Reese could not have held me back.

I find even taking photos outside of a funeral parlor or at a church where it’s obviously a funeral is gauche. A wake/funeral is not about you. If you yourself are not in deep mourning, you are there for the deceased and/o for those who are in mourning. That’s why it’s called paying your last respects. How are taking photos of yourself showing that respect? At the very least have the manners to wait until the repast for such.

If you don’t have pictures of friends/family members at happier events whose fault is that? Show up at a party, a BBQ, a wedding or family reunion. Or better yet host one to have people over so you can happy photos.

I think taking pictures at a wake/funeral/interment of the living or dead is so disrespectful enough. Turning around and then posting such on social media is a level of gracelessness I simply cannot comprehend.

“You look lovely, that dress is so cute! Where was this?”

“Oh thanks! I got it at the boutique. That was at Nana’s funeral last month.”

My immediate family knows “NO PHOTOS”. God help anyone taking pictures at my funeral. Just for spite, I am showing up in every photo as the creepy shadowy figure that doesn’t go away no matter how they try to crop or Photoshop me out.

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Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

Slice of Life Writing Challenge | Two Writing Teachers

A Pearl Among Stores

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How did I not know Pearl Paint closed?!?! Not just closed, but closed for a little over a year now. It felt as though I was just there recently, but time is indeed fluid to the heart as it was December 2013 I was there last according to my bank statement.

I had wanted to go by Pearl on a day off just because. The place always inspired me and as one can see from the dearth of posting as of late, I could use it. Still, something said go online and check the store’s opening hours before I drag my tail down there and that’s how I learned yet another NYC societal if not historical landmark that has fallen victim to the giant called capitalism.

After the shock of the discovery, I semi-joked I have not been this mournful since I read the Red Wedding scene in George R.R. Martin’s “A Storm of Swords“.  If you do not know what the Red Wedding is by now, don’t bother asking. Just understand that it’s something bad.  Sucker punch, gasp out loud, gut wrenching bad.

Because it’s a new wound for me, i want to pass by the site and poor libations on its threshold. That’s how the unexpected loss of Pearl Paint has struck me.

Pearl Paint was an eight decades old institution. Whether the amateur looking for stamped tin foil for an occasional scrapbook or the professional looking for gold foil leaf for a mural in a skyscraper, Pearl had it. I did not go there often, as Pearl was off my beaten path, but once I was there, I was there for a couple of hours minimum. Since the early 80’s, when I first discovered the place, it was six floors of dusty, seemingly nonsensical, glorious mayhem.  But if I needed it artistically, Pearl Paint had it. And it was not just an art supply store for many of the staff and fellow shoppers were artists in their own right. I come in with what I think is a simple question or request and leave some time later having absorbed knowledge, techniques, tools and sometimes gossip.

And now it’s all gone.

I mean doors locked, gates closed, assets sold off .

*Gone*.

Yes, there are other art supply stores, this is New York City, but none like Pearl Paint. I Alas no, like so many other places and spaced becoming a part of my past, it’s now just memory.

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Come see how others are slicing up their days.

Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

Tuesday Slice of Life Story Challenge – Two Writing Teachers

 

Straight Up

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As I am walking back from Starbucks I see this guy in The Commons, casually walking opposite me, heading towards my direction. A natural ginger, his hair was a thick curling ombre of dark russet at the roots, to the much brighter near strawberry blonde tips where the sunlight touched. The overall effect was that of an ochre nimbus of sorts as he strolled.  But that was not what caught my attention.  Was he attractive? Yes. Oh yes. Not in the he could be a model vein, but definitely eye-catching and holding. I smile behind my grande whole milk, low foam, no water, extra shot, dash of chocolate, but nothing complicated chai cup, watching a couple of college girls turning their necks in an Exorcist worthy near 180 degree twist as they notice him pass.

What really struck me about him was his stature. He stood, or rather walked, very straight.  Not the tight gripped; stick up the arse kind of straight, either. Most of tall adults I know, male and female, walk with a slight curve to their shoulders and backs from years of ducking doorways etc.  Not him. His stride is confident, shoulders relaxed and straight.  Yet there was a definitive uprightness to his posture.

“Didn’t your mother teach you that it’s not polite to stare?”

I was not aware of staring, but clearly I was as he stopped right in front of me with his teasing chastisement. Caught by surprise I simply said exactly what I was thinking.

“I was admiring your erectness.”

“What?!”

He blinked, looking at his crotch and then back at me incredulously. Only then did I realize my wording. Crap! So that’s what that feels like from the other side! Such Freudian slips are so rarely accidental from me that I caught my own self off guard.

“Your posture! I meant your posture! Your posture is very straight for such a tall guy. Oh Jiminy Crickets!” I nearly spit out my chai, fumbling over my words and laughing, making a concentrated effort to keep my eyes on the head I can see.

“Good save!” He grinned. “My chiropractor, proctologist and I thank you.”

“Oh for Christ’s sake!” I laugh walking away. “You enjoy your day!”

“I most certainly will now.” His fading chuckle reached me.

I bet he’s still laughing.

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Slice of Life Writing Challenge | Two Writing Teachers

Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

But A Moment Away

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The new morning air
The fresh beginnings there
Dawning but a moment away

Early birding songs sung
The new daying begun
Dawning but a moment away

For once a sense of inspiration
And not of desperation
Dawning but a moment away

A sense a joy begins to stir
And a first smile does occur
Dawning but a moment away

First lighting pierces dark
In the night and in my heart
Dawning but a moment away

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Woke up cranky and have been in a foul mood all day. Putting out this wish for a better dawning.

Let’s see how my fellow Slicers were feeling it the 24th day of the challenge:

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Verbal Diarrhea Diaries: The Look of Loath

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As a colleague and I are crossing a street, I spy a “gentleman” waiting for the bus at the corner. He coughs up what seems to be some three-quarters of his lungs, generating considerable phlegm in his throat.  As the Neanderthal did not have enough manners to at least step to the curb first, he aims away from his own person in complete disregard of any other person near him, causing a woman near him to flinch out-of-the-way as his personal refuse lands near her foot with quite an audible splat upon the sidewalk.  Charmed, I’m not.

At this point he looks up, sees me crossing, wipes his mouth with his coat sleeve and breaks out into this most beatific smile. Regrettably, there is no question at all that the smile is for me as I knew there was no one close enough behind me for this and I was reasonably sure it was not blown at the burly E beside me. No, really? He cannot be serious? Surely he is aware of what I just witnessed in the past 30 seconds?  I audibly groan to E’s bemusement.

Loverman then blows a kiss in my direction, quickly dashing any hopes I held that I was mistaken in his intended target. I think it is fair to surmise that my aversion was clearly shown on my face as the smile was quickly rescinded.

“You mean you don’t want to swap saliva with him?” E, having witnessed the whole thing, does not try to hold his laughter, to my annoyance.

“Oh, not is he, the most beguiling of man? How near swooned with most ardent desire was I, upon his visage gazed.” I grumbled as I angle our direction to clearly indicate I was not walking towards the would-be Lothario, just in case there was any doubt. E, not up on my latest butchering of Elizabethan, raised an eyebrow not understanding, so I translated:

“The dude is disgusting! I nearly passed out in revulsion at the sight of him.”

And it’s only Monday morning people.

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Let’s see how my fellow Slicers are doing on the 23rd day of the challenge:

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Springing for More Snow

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♫ ♬ On the first day of spring Old Man Winter gave to New York City, more freaking inches of snow! ♫ ♪

Yo Demeter! Give the curmudgeon his exit papers already!

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Let’s see how my fellow Slicers are doing on the 20th day of the challenge:

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Not So Daily Grind

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So far today:

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From a colleague who I have not seen in over a year:

“Oh, you changed you hair! I liked it better the other way.”

My response:

“Oh, you lost your manners! I liked you better the other way.”

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Prima Donna I: disrupts my training session in progress to ask about a personal training session. Had the nerve to be annoyed when called-out on it and asked to leave.

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Student would not take polite “no”s for an answer until bluntly told “Ask once you’re being curious, ask twice with a smile you’re being cute, ask a third time -regardless of smile- you’re being annoying, ask a fourth time you’re being disruptive, ask a fifth time when specifically instructed not to, you’re being petty, ask again and you’re being put out. Drop it, now.”

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Had to insist Student leave class, now.

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Go to my desk during break–

Prima Donna II: Leaves a voice mail and an email request that I move a pre-scheduled training class to another date because they want to use the room.  Leaves another voice mail about an hour after the fact as I had not responded to the earlier queries.

If Prima Donna II knows I had the training room next week, they should have also noticed that I had the training room today and perhaps the reason I had not responded to requests in a prompt manner was because I  – oh I don’t know – in the flipping training room conducting class.

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And this was all before noon peeps. Grrr

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After training —

Stepped into an elevator that smelled. No seriously it smelled. It smelled the smell of a thousand unwashed masses smelled, of a thousand locker rooms minutes after a thousand games smelled.

It smelled an instant reaction of What the fuck IS that? smelled.

A man who boarded with me and I exchanged glances, not wanting to speak as we simultaneously held our breaths. My eyes watered; I could barely breathe covering my mouth and nose with my coat collar, in dire fear of my lungs giving out before I disembark and silently praying to the deities that this please not be the last smell I’ll ever smell for all smellternity. We stumbled out of the elevator at my floor gasping  for air as a colleague walked past us to get in. We tried to give warning, but still gasping, it was too late.  I turned in time to hear “What the fuck is that STENCH?!” just as the doors closed. The guy who rode with me simply shrugged as he pressed the call button for a different and hopefully better smelling elevator.

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Prima Donna II  tried pulling rank by emailing Higher Authority and CCing me on it.

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Received email from ejected Student’s Boss wanting to know what happened. Suffice it to say the account Student gave was vastly different from what really happened.

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On the plus side 1-

Higher Authority realized the who, what and why of the situation and not only diplomatically told the Prima Donna II to grow the hell up and schedule a different day, but also CCed me on the exchange so I would know about it.

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On the plus side 2-

As I calmed down and attempted to compose a more EEO friendly, than what was in my head, email to Student’s Boss, a new email arrived from the same boss. with an apology. It turned out another  student in the class is a colleague of said boss from another unit, wanting to know “what assholes are being hired over there” and gave a harsh, but accurate account of the ejected student’s actions.

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Just saw Prima Donna I has sent an email. It’s almost 6:30pm (I should have left at 5pm) not even looking at it. I’m going home now.

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Hopefully my fellow Slicers are having a better daily grind on the 19th day of the challenge – come read what they’re up to…

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