There I was, scouring the kitchen for the perfect receptable to hold the large amount of orange juice and DiSaronno I was about to pour, when Henry disbanded the party.

"Uh, are you sure you should be drinking? You do have a kidney infection."

"Oh shit, you’re probably right." My shoulders caved a little as I replaced the amaretto on the shelf.

"And did you take your antibiotic today?"

"Oh shit…"

I sent Henry off to the market with his little wicker basket to fetch the ingredients I need for my SECRET pie.

He just called and yelled, "I’d like to thank you for sending me to Giant Eagle so I could have some jackass back into me!"

I was really panicked about it, wanting to know the degree of damage, but first I had to sit through Henry’s painful (because he’s a crappy storyteller) account of the accident. "….and I was just sitting there, at a complete stop, waiting for someone to pull out of the space ahead of me, when this dick comes backing out real fast into me and then he has the nerve to get out and yell at me! ‘Don’t you see people backing out?!’ Yeah, and I’m at a standstill!"

"And is there a lot of damage?" I cut in.

"….he just gets back in his car and leaves. Dumb bastard."

"Damage?" I ask again.

"I mean, if he hadn’t pulled out so fast…."

"Damage?" I ask with a mouthful of fingernails.

"….didn’t do any damage to the van…."

"Oh, you’re in the company van? Then I don’t care. Good bye."

When I was in high school, I bought this totally awesome blue neon frame, which I used as a “Now Playing” CD display. I would leave it on all night as I slept, much to the chagrin of any friend who happened to be sleeping over.

“Can’t you turn this off while we sleep?” they’d whine. Sure, it might not have been very conducive to restful slumber, but every night as that blue neon washed over my sleeping mound on the bed, I was getting more resilient for city-living, for one day in the near future when I’d be living in an NYC loft, bedroom bathed in the bright lights of bordellos and theaters and all-night chicken shacks, bathroom mirror reflecting fragments of the twirling reds and blues of cop lights, the TV unwatchable from the glare of my roommates cooking crack and the sounds of subway riots pealing past my crumbling plaster walls.

Instead, I wound up in Brookline.

I might not be in the center of a neon circus, but I have a hole in my bedroom wall, my stereo is capped with a bright blue light and I’m fairly certain my neighbor has a meth lab in her basement.

I’d say that’s pretty damn close to realizing a dream.

I’ve been fighting with a new neighbor over parking courtesy. I realize it’s a trivial thing to risk stroking over, but I have pent up anger and aggression and the situation presented itself as the perfect way to let it all out. She and I had a very strained discussion about it last Sunday, but I sort of kept my cool, as I was holding the hand of my toddler and he sees me ranting and raving enough as it is.

The gist of it is that the landlord told her that the center space is hers, but I’ve been parking in that space for eight years. Typically, when I come home from work and wherever, she’s in that space so I have no choice but to park in  the one next to her.

This morning, when I was leaving for school, she was also in her car, about to leave. However, I gunned it and shot out of the driveway before she had a chance to blink, totally cutting her off. Dumb fucking bitch.

Then I stewed about it all during my Calculus class.

When I came home, she was still gone, so I shot down the driveway into my old space.

A few minutes ago, she came a’knocking. Henry answered the door, but she requested to speak to me personally. I joined her on the porch, after Christina gave me a sad glance, silently pleading with me to be nice.

And I was nice. Sort of. Through gritted teeth. We hashed out our differences — I told her I wasn’t happy with the way she came at me last week without even introducing herself, and she countered with the fact that when she first saw me a few weeks ago, I was slamming my front door and yelling about how I always get screwed with parking. ”

I mean, I saw that and thought ‘A-ight, she’s pissed off at someone, maybe me.’ Of course I’m not going to come up to and say ‘Hello, my name…’ at that point.

Henry and Christina were listening to the whole thing from inside, and when I came back in later, Henry said, “You DO have an attitude, you know” and Christina quickly echoed his sentiment. Then they talked about how I get so unnecessarily angry over nothing, simply because I crave tension and conflict. I know, and then I wonder why every muscle in my being is taut enough to snap.

Anyway, the neighbor explained to me that the only reason she’s been making a big deal about wanting to park in the middle is because the landlord has been drilling it into her head. Apparently, he keeps dumping all these rules on her without telling the rest of us (she said he also told her that none of us are allowed to park on the road, but we all do it because she’s the only one he told), and by doing so, he’s effectively pitted us all against each other. Realizing that it’s the landlord on which I should be directing my hostility (I know where I’ll be on Monday), she and I started over by going through friendly motions of introducing ourselves.

Her name is Toya, and I guess she’s not too bad. I still hate Ruth though, who hasn’t been talking to me for a few weeks now, god only knows why. Fucking fake nurse.

From now on, I’ll be parking my car on the street, to push my landlord’s buttons.

On a normal Friday evening at work, I act like a half-lit reject from a GED testing facility. But on a Friday night where my belly is made full with Thai food and my BFF is expected to be perched upon my porch by the time I return home, I’m all kinds of riled up. Every last thing has me doubled over in laughter:

Thai Place charged Joe $2.25 for a can of Pepsi.

My boss Kim told me I’m mean and she doesn’t know how people put up with me, in response to my tale of metaphorically kneeing a Canuck in the balls and still managing to keep him in love with me.

Eleanore asked me, “Erin, what’s the matter with you tonight?” which I believe is her polite way of saying, “STFU honky.”

I got Collin the New Guy to call me Your Majesty.

In order to retrieve a bag of my favorite honey wheat pretzels, I had to embark on an excavation clear across the building, to the other break room. The problem is that on Fridays, the cleaning people are off, so the guards shut off most of the lights back there. I ended up jogging the whole way back, in near dark, hands clutching my flopping boobs and chanting, “Oh my Christ, MSA rapist” over and over. (MSA is the company’s name, not some brand new Internet acronym whose memo missed your desk.) Once I returned to my desk, I was able to remove my coat, having been warmed up by my eschewal of MSA’s imaginary rapist.

It’s a good thing I can run in heels.

I really hope I have this job for awhile.

I quite like it. Well, except when Eleanore is in a bad mood and slamming down the phone and humming gutterally along to gangsta rap (west coast, whatwhat), or yelling at her daughter on the phone while gumming a handful of popcorn.

Those things I could take or leave. Or just leave; I’d prefer not to take them. The popcorn, I might.

A few weeks ago, I was seiged by some foreign and atypical desire to participate in holiday work activities, so I signed up for this year’s Secret Santa (except some half-Jewish dude got all riled up so they’re now calling it the Holiday Giftbag). I figure it will look good on my “Please let me into Heaven” resume, and also because I’m a spoiled bitch who loves getting gifts. On my info sheet, I listed all the pertinents: fifteen of my favorite music genres and my dislike of meat and things with flowers on them. For favorite candy, I put “the delicious kinds.” I hope whoever chose me knows to decipher that as, “I am holding a box of fine confections of the cacao persuasion. Now I ask myself, ‘Are these of a quality high enough for even the Queen of England herself to pop between her dry matronly lips?'” In other words, please don’t give me a bag of M&Ms.

I was hoping that I could really change the life of whomever I drew from the lot. Maybe gift them with an original Somnambulant piece of fine, museum-quality art or a trinket to store poison or cocaine. Or poisonous cocaine.

But today, I picked Letisha (after I picked myself, durr). Letisha works daylight and sits two workstations down from me. She has the distinction of being the loudest, skilled gum popper I’ve encountered this side of the high school bleachers and I have a strong hunch that she’d make a fantastic lesbian. According to her fact sheet, she does not like bats or clownes (sic), but has a love affair with r&b and all of its lusty subgenres (especially those that are “smooth’), which she might possibly listen to with her teddy bear collection while lighting melon-scented candles.

At the end, she listed three things she’d like to receive, so I know that if I bought her a “dvd by Tyler Perry” or a picture frame (hello, flea market) she would be a satisfied customer of the Erin Holiday Store. I’m not sure she would be terribly pleased with my original art or The Cure’s Greatest Hits, but I know that food containing the possibility of peanut traces would be alright, because she has no food allergies.

I’m really thankful for this list, because now I feel like I know her a lot better. She went from an aggro gum-smacking, fake-laughing weave-wearer to a Snickers-eating low-brow comedy watching aggro gum-smacking, fake-laughing weave-wearer. I was really quite judgemental of her before this.

At least I know what I won’t be getting her. Gum.