For all the hype and anticipation Tina was trying to stir in me last week, she never said one word to me last night. That’s not saying she was quiet though. Her shrill voice and strangulated laughter curdled my blood for about 95% of the night. Apparently, she and Eleanore have a little club and I’m not invited. Trust me — I’d be pawing at her high-waisted jeans and crying in her salt-and-pepper mullet, begging for an invitation if I wasn’t so fearful of getting eczema flakes on my clothes.

Things included in the membership kit that I’m missing out on:

• secret emails between the two of them, which they read and immediately laugh out loud, before furiously pecking away replies laden with run-ons and emoticons
• smoke breaks centered around Eleanore’s rants of things that are stupid to her and Tina spreading whine-voiced gossip like wild fire while jutting out her pelvis and shoving her fists in her pockets like a dude
• email forward packed with girl power (Tina hates men), pictures of kitties being cute, and religious bullshit

At least I managed to scrape two good quotes from my pain and agony:

"When I have dry spots on my face, I scratch them."

"I’m just here to do my work, not be bothered by people."

Oh, STFU.

[Edit: WordPress is being a prick, so I apologize to everyone who got fifty billion email notifications for this lame ass post.]

The verdict is in and Tina is officially crossing back over to the night shift. Every muscle in my body is petrified from nerves, horror, anger and disgust.

Before she left today, she cheerfully exclaimed, "Soon I’ll be saying hi to you instead of good night!" and as she turned the corner, I tersely whispered "Yay" and then searched my desk for a noose.

And she has new facial scabs that she’ll be bringing with her. You know what else she’ll be bringing?

1. An argumentative hunger.
2. A desire to talk to me about sex.
3. Bull-headed opinions.
4. Constant reminder that she was in the Service.
5. A high-pitched voice full of whine and entitlement.
6. A phlegm-y laugh full of perversion and sleaze.
7. Camel toe.

Can’t wait.

Bob thinks this is funny. Apparently he derives pleasure from my pain, so I guess I have more frienemies here than I thought!

My brother Corey and I are going to Philly this weekend to see the Cure and of course I’m completely unprepared. He keeps asking me all kinds of questions. Stupid questions, you know? Like:

Q: What time are we leaving?

A: I don’t know.

Q: Where are we staying?

A: I don’t know.

Q: What time does it start?

A: I don’t know.

Q: Where are our seats?

A: On a floor somewhere.

Q: How much money do I need?

A: A lot.

A few things of which I am certain:

1. I will be playing car DJ and Corey will have absolutely no say whatsoever in song selection. If I choose to listen to Yanni, Corey will snap his fingers and tap his fucking toes.
2. I will probably end up crying at some point during the show, even though I boldly claimed last week that I’m just not that into the Cure anymore.
3. I will be eating ridiculous cereal combinations at Cereality the next morning.
4. I will be home early enough on Mother’s Day in case my son wants to serve me cake and drape diamonds over my wrists.
5. I’ll be wearing a new Cure t-shirt to work on Monday.

I hope I remember to pack a change of underwear.

A few weeks ago, I reported that Tina had a mysterious wound on her temple. Days passed and it was still there, sometimes scabbed over, sometimes just as fresh and juicy as the first time I noticed it.

Today, I came in early and she asked that I take a walk with her so she could rant and rave like old times. As we walked to the door, I noticed that she was dabbing at her temple trauma with a folded napkin. She pulled the napkin away and it was saturated with bright red blood.

It was BLEEDING.

The question was begging to be asked, so I did. I asked her what the fuck it was, that sticky mound of ruined flesh on the side of her head, what was it?! I tried really hard to keep my mouth from becoming too agape, eyes from becoming too widened.

"Oh, it’s a bug bite. I’ve been picking at it today."

I’m not entirely sure I believe her, but when we came back inside, I excitedly emailed Bob to fill him in. He read it, laughed and said, "I can’t believe you asked her!"

"Dude, it was BLEEDING. Right in front of me! Of course I’m going to ask!"

Then he joked that it was more like an anaconda bite and we laughed and of course Big Bob turned around and asked what was so funny, but we didn’t tell him.

I still like my theory that her husband bitch-slapped her with a candle stick.

The lady I steal candy from at work is going to see Joe Jackson this Saturday. I know this because I saw it scribbled (in high-alert red marker) on her calendar as I fisted a generous helping of prailine pecans from the jar on her shelf.

Eleanore’s not here tonight, which is a blessing (it’s quiet!) and a curse (it’s quiet!) all at once. I’m not missing the way she tapdances upon my nerves, but now there’s NO ONE sitting near me so I can’t swivel in my seat and start talking.

Except to myself.

So I took a picture of myself which I’m going to print out and tape up in front of me to make the conversations more legit.

My friend Amelia sent me a surprise package today which completely made me squeal. It came at the best time, too — I was just leaving for work when the mail girl hurled it upon my porch. Asshole.

Hidden under a mound of that sparkly silver ribbon stuff that my cats love to eat then regurgitate was pretty much a mother lode of odds and ends; in other words: stuff that someone weird like me would covet. In addition to a black baby doll, a pair of doll arms, a roll of b&w 120 film (which I needed!) and two small handmade notebooks (scribbling has already commenced) was a giant gummi heart, the kind of delicious treat that I’ve always wanted a Valentine to place into my outstretched hands, perhaps with a pack of Garbage Pail Kids for that extra special touch.

The back of the package says:

THUMP THUMP BEAT BEAT

MY HEART FOR YOU

THAT’S OH SO SWEET.

Who doesn’t want that?? Skinheads, animal sacrificers, and Kathie Lee, that’s who.

So now instead of doing actual work, I’ll be overdosing on candy organs and sticking doll parts in things, which is much better than Thursday night, when I listened to Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge* for six hours straight and dreamt of slowly draining the blood from my veins. Thanks, Amelia!

(*I know, what the fuck, right? More proof that I’m secretly sixteen.)

I don’t see Dennis very often, because he’s usually assigned at my company’s other office, but when he’s at this location he always stops by to chat. He’s an older man, fifties at least, and always smiling. Sometimes he comes packing candy, and he’s always packing compliments.

One night, he begged for permission to tug on my pigtails and I laughed because it’s funny when old men flirt with young girls. And kind of sick, but I’ll take it, because I’m hard pressed for some action these days.

Earlier tonight, Dennis stopped over to say hello to Eleanore and me. In conversation, he mentioned that he had plans on eating popcorn and watching golf this weekend.

"I love golf! Phil Mickleson in the house!" I cheered, happy to finally be a part of a sports convo.

Dennis’s smile faltered slightly, so I repeated, in regular adult speech, "Phil Mickelson is my favorite."

Dennis’s smile was all but a sweet memory by that admission. "You think so? I think he’s a terrible putter. He’s not that good at all."

My lips tightened. "I love him," I said tersely, blood rushing to my cheeks.

"He’s left-handed. Watch his putts sometime – they all veer off to the left!" He chuckled and shook his head, clearly delighting in some fucked up replay of Phil putting.

I couldn’t think of a retort so I sat here with my mouth slightly agape, eyes squinting back ire.

"You don’t really know anything about golf, do you?" Dennis asked, laughing.

"Phil Mickelson is handsome!" I shouted, shoving past him to go cool off in the kitchen. Then I emailed Collin about it, hoping he’d sock Dennis in the nuts for me, but instead he LAUGHED. You know, through email he laughed. It was easier being on LOLpatrol when I sat next to him.

Seriously, don’t fuck with Phil Mickelson. One time, I was perusing his website (this was back in the height of my adoration for him, back when I had a Phil desktop shrine and cat-called every time his ExxonMobil commercial came on) and in the forums, some ASSHOLE had the audacity to post, in a very slanderous manner, that Phil had sired an illegitimate child.

Oh no. No, no, no. I wasn’t about to sit back and let some dickshitter sling such scandelous words about my Phil, so you know what I said?

"STFU!!!!!!"

And you know what that bag of shit jelly said back to me?

NOTHING. NOT A GODDAMNED THING.

EDIT: My favorite security guard is here right now and he just said, "Oh Phil! Yeah, Phil’s i-ight." This is why he’s my FAVORITE guard. Also because he’s cute. And has the boy version of my name, best name ever.

Last night I needed a short break from my loneliness, so I went outside and called Christina. While on the phone, a car crept into the lot. The headlights were suspiciously out. It only took me .3 seconds to yell, "Oh my god, DRIVE BY!" into the phone before taking off like a cartoon blur. It could have been gang initiation or something. I could have died so some asshole could become a Crip.

Once inside, I lingered in the hallway by the guard station. The loading dock door was open, and I saw the shady car pull into a spot up front. The lesbian security guard saw me huffing and holding my hand over my chest and she laughed at me because it was just one of the cleaning people.

But like that’s any better! There’s a new person on the cleaning staff and he appears to be straight out of the Pen. Last night, as he emptied my garbage can, as he lifted that garbage can with the same hands that maybe have garroted a hooker or stabbed a dealer, I politely thanked him. He grunted at me. GRUNTED at me. You know I whimpered audibly. 

Bob replied to my frantic email today and said the new cleaning guy is probably going to abduct me Buffalo Bill-style and now I’m full of fear and paranoia. Thank you, Bobby!

I guess it won’t matter that I’m all alone here at night once I’m DEAD. Because I doubt Eleanore will hear my screams over top of her coupon-cutting frenzy. Where’s Tina when you need her, you know?

No more Collin. No more Bob. All I have in my company now during these long nights are Eleanore’s scissors and loud rap music;  Kim’s incessant complaining and motorcycle discourse.

Look how sad those chairs are! Just sitting there, no one to move their wheels, static and empty. EMPTY. EMPTY LIKE MY HEART.

I might kill myself. Or find another job. Right now I’m too lazy to achieve either, so probably I’ll just whine a lot about being bored and alone and abandoned.

You know, the usual.

Eleanore is cutting what I can only guess is miniature coupons for little woodland dwarves and even though I know that it’s paper she’s cutting, the tiny snip-snipping sounds painfully similar to finger nails being cut and my shoulders are now earrings, thank you Eleanore.

EDIT: Um, never mind, ew ew ew, definitely finger nails.

So fucking disgusting.

• Someone took a nice big shit in the bathroom right before I went in, so that was a thoughtful, and very fragrant, "Welcome Back from the Weekend!" gift.
• There’s some man who pukes in the mens room every day. It’s kind of anthemic.
• Bob started a new job today. He still sits two seats down from me, but he works daylight now. When he logged off his computer at 5:00pm and said, "Have a nice night guys," I kind of died a little. Who will I exchange juicy celebrity gossip with every night now? Who will serve as a diversion the next time I stalk someone here? WHO WILL TELL ME WHAT MOVIES TO ADD TO MY NETFLIX QUEUE? I am so abandoned.
• Big Bob is listening to the Pirates game with one ear bud in, and when he occasionally turns around to give Collin an update, he doesn’t realize how loudly he’s talking and I’m blasted into the atmosphere by the sheer volume of his exuberance.
• I feel like I don’t have enough decor on my desk.  I guess now that this is a Girls Only Zone (Collin moves to his new big boy cubicle tomorrow), I can:
  • string up a garland of tampons,
  • fan out episiotomy literature, 
  • talk about ovaries and placenta at my leisure,
  • squirt breast milk into Kim’s cube and she’ll retaliate by chucking a Nuva Ring at my head, and 
  • FINALLY hang up my poster about yeast infections which I stole from the gynecologist’s exam room.

• Gangsta rap from the ’90s
• MTV and VH1’s signature blend of homogenized reality programming
• Celebrity couples and their awesomely annoying nick names
• Guns

It’s like if Us Weekly had a TV show on BET.

During a riveting discussion about MTV’s "The Hills" being nothing more than scripted reality, I argued, "Yeah, well, that’s even how ‘The Real World’ is anymore…"

Bob started to nod his head in agreement, then, thinking that I might be delving into deeper trains of thought, he asked, "Wait — the show, or like, the actual real world?"

"The show," I clarified. Then we laughed jovially at the idea of me actually philosophizing here at work. Or ever.

It’s been a long time since I gave an update on Tina, the fiesty scabby-skinned know-it-all broad who used to work with me on the evening shift but has been busy plaguing the day crew with her inherent bossiness and nails-on-chalkboard voice for the past eight months.

We had one of our monthly meetings today, which is usually the only time I get a good, strong dose of Tina’s aggressive brand of self-righteousness these days. In between thinking about how far behind I am on "Days of Our LIves" and desperately blocking out Tina’s whiny questions and rebuttals, my eyes couldn’t help but glue themselves mercilessly to the strange open wound on her right temple. It was relatively fresh in appearance, the color of raw meat with the sheen of a glazed donut.

At first I thought it was that flesh-eating disease, but now I think it’s probably just where her husband hit her with a candle stick.

Big Bob (not to be confused with the Bob I usually mention): You know what I could go for? Some Bel Biv Devoe.  *sings “Cool It Now”*

Me: That wasn’t BBD

Last week, he was wearing a Vlad the Impaler t-shirt and my innocent compliment was returned with a fifty thousand word verbal history on the life of Vlad the Impaler and did you know he USED TO IMPALE PEOPLE ON STAKES AND LEAVE THEM WRITHING THERE ALONG THE ROAD AS A WARNING TO  OTHERS????

Oh look, he’s wearing that shirt today, too. At least now I know if he ever comes in here wearing a Bel Biv Devoe shirt to keep my fucking mouth shut.

Collin is still sitting next to me, even though he has a new Big Boy job here, because his computer isn’t ready for him. (I think that’s what he said? I wasn’t listening.)

And boy am I glad, otherwise I wouldn’t have the satisfaction of viewing the spectacular display of gayness as he freaks out excitedly while listening to the Penguins game on his iPod.