2. Alt + Tab. That’s right. I keep my recently manicured (see #5) nails poised and ready to pounce over the Arizona and Washington equivalent of the keyboard map, hitting Tucson and Seattle if my spider-senses detect even for a moment someone in the office will walk by my desolate (like AZ!), poorly-lit (like WA!) cubicle. This happens very rarely since I have been placed in an awkwardly empty corner of the office, but nonetheless I am always prepared.

3. Reading. You wish I were reading about company procedures and meeting minutes, but actually I prefer to devote this learned mind to summaries of trashy reality TV shows, geeky reviews of nerdy issues on techy blogs,  and adorable felines with bad grammar. 

4. Writing. This category must be broken into the following task codes:

• Gchatting. There are approximately four people with whom I chat every day, all day; another three or so I chat with at least once a day, a few times a week; and no fewer than five people I randomly talk to with zero predictability.
• Actual work. This happens about once a week. Mostly it’s just the Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V functions, though.
• Blog writing. Case in point: I’m at work right now.

5. Personal grooming. Let it be known that I do NOT engage in shaving, flossing, or nail cutting at my desk, unlike a former colleague who sat directly next to me when I worked in New York; however, I do spend an unreasonable amount of time nervously cleaning the never-present dirt from my nails and filing them to a perfectly curved square-shape approximately1/8 of an inch above the quick. I’m a recovering nail biter, and it’s all I can do to keep my fingers from being mauled into bloody stumps. Case in when I have nail polish on, I’ll chip away at it all day. Consequently I am acutely aware of how expensive OPI is getting.

6. Time on my iPhone. This would normally be much, much higher on the list, but due to AT&T’s ever-wanting coverage  in the San Francisco area, I rarely have 3G or even Edge service. That said, from time to time I check in with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, since the goddamned IT Department blocks all of the above and more with WebSense. The humanity!

7. Naps. Yes, I actually sleep at work. It is an art, since the only HR person in the state has an office with a view directly into my cubicle, but after lunch I pop on an internal training web video and close my eyes. You’d be surprised how long 5-10 minutes of minimal consciousness can sustain you.

8. Bathroom breaks. Normally this isn’t so necessary, but when co-workers are bringing me water in desperate please for me to stop hacking up foul sounds and general discomfort (see #1), I wind up having to pee more frequently. This is especially relevant because if I cough too hard, a little bit of pee comes out involuntarily. Oversharing?

9. Staring off into oblivion. This generally happens in very short spurts, but I’m sure it adds up to at least 15 minutes over the course of the day, and hey: that’s time, thank you very much.

10. Not actually being here. Yes, I am guilty of time theft being in two places at once. Namely, my cubicle (not really) and somewhere that is not inside my office (like outside walking around or on the bus home). I don’t do it much, but I have definitely been known to fudge the lines of when I stay and when I go.

On a completely related note, I need a better job. Anyone know someone who is hiring? Unfortunately all the major job search engines are blocked (see #6).

I cringe when I see the new magazine titled “Real Simple.” Don’t the editors know that in order to for that title to be grammatically correct there needs to be a comma between the two words? Else wise they need to write it “Really Simple.” My peers continuously confuse adjectives for adverbs, and look at me as though I’ve dressed myself in polka dots and plaid when I try to correct them. Then there is the group of pseudo-grammarians who over correct and use adverbs where adjectives are appropriate: “Wow, your dye job looks really well.” Last I checked, dye jobs didn’t have eyes, let alone the capability to see. These are the same people who employ the words “irregardless” and “supposably,” and caption pictures as “my brother and I.” There was a time when sophisticated elocution denoted both education and status, but the parlance of the average layman has plummeted to a level that likely would have embarrassed the middle-class prior to The First World War.

I blame the drone of the mass media, producing poorly thought-out mind-tranquilizers without regard for elevating the comprehension of the masses. But then, I generally hate the entertainment industry and am always quick to point out its culpability in the denigration of our society whenever possible. Meanwhile, if at some point you catch me twitching while listening to you, there’s a good chance you’ve forgotten two very important things: first and foremost, you’ve forgotten your third grade grammar lessons; and second, you’ve forgotten that you’re talking to a grammar snob.

So I bestow upon you the recipe for paella that I learned in Valencia (where the shit was invented, for chrissake). Good luck, but even if you make the whole thing flawlessly, it won’t taste right unless it’s consumed in the traditional fashion, too.

Paella Valenciana

Ingredients:

- 3-5 cloves garlic diced, but hang on to the rest of the root because it’s likely you’ll throw some whole cloves in later on

- Olive oil. Lots.

- Rice. Lots

- Tomatoes. Lots

- Veggies

o Peppers of every color, but none that have any kind of heat spice.

o Peas are good if they’re not in the pod

o Maybe some more tomatoes, diced

o Onions

o Yeah you can put those carrots in there if you have to

o Oooh, mushrooms!

- Meat:

o ½ a chicken, chopped by the butcher into cubes that include all the bones – picking it off is the best part!

o ¼ of a rabbit, similarly prepared

o Snails, raw, in the shell

o Oysters, raw, in the shell

o Shrimp, not cleaned, peeled or deveined.

o Cubes of horse meat if you’re feeling adventurous/ you can find it

- Chicken broth and water. Plenty.

- Saffron

- Salt

- Pepper

- Lemons. Lots.

So you need a really big pan that’s about 4 or 5 inches deep and no smaller than Snoop Dog’s hub caps. You’re gonna throw that thing over an open-fire grill and put a bunch of olive in it (to coat the entire bottom with a bit of room to get slippery) and wait for it to get nice and poppin’. While that’s going, grate the tomatoes (probably like 6-8 of them). Yes, you heard correctly. I suppose you could use a blender, but then it would lose that peeled-skin-from-your-fingers flavor. Once the oil is warm, throw in the grated tomato and diced garlic with a dash (or six) of salt and fry it until it looks like ketchup and smells like heaven.

Now you need to cook your meats. If your mother taught you correctly, you know that some meats cook faster than others. I recommend that the horse goes in first, followed by the chicken and rabbit. Then comes the oysters. Wait until after the veggies go in to add the oysters and shrimp, otherwise they’ll get all rubbery and the niños will throw them at each other.

Add your veggies and let them sauté in all the meat fat, soaking up the flavor. Yummm….

Now it’s rice time. Pour the rice over everything. You’ll know how much to use if you make a cross over the food. Plus it will probably make Jesus happy (bonus). Mix it all around, let the rice soak up all the lovely juices and get a little roasting from the pan. Then add all the chicken broth and bring the whole concoction to a boil. Now is when you add the whole cloves of garlic, the extra diced tomatoes, the saffron, and any pepper you want. Almost done!

The pan will boil down and the rice will fluff up over the next 30-40 minutes. Don’t stir it. Did you hear me? Stop stirring it. You’re not supposed to do that. If the rice isn’t soft and the chicken broth has evaporated out/ soaked up, add more water and keep it going. When the rice is soft and the juices are low-ish, remove it and let it “rest” and finish soaking up the rest of the juices. If you’re hard core traditional, you’ll throw it back on the fire for about 5 minutes to burn the bottom. Yes, burn the bottom, intentionally. Why? Because it’s the best freaking part.

Once it’s all done, you put the whole pan in the middle of a park bench, hand out spoons to everyone, they’ll all crowd around and squeeze lemons onto the part in front of them, then they dig in quite literally family-style. BTW this serves 18-20 people.

Now I know what you’re thinking. You say, Hey crazy word-lover, your go-to dish when you fancy a boy is a paella, but that seems excessive for a quiet dinner for two, no? The answer is that I have yet to find horsemeat or snails here in America, and I usually make it on a stovetop with chicken that has no bones and shrimps that have been cleaned. But that’s because I’m making it for an American who would not likely appreciate the subtlety of the flavor that comes from a father re-telling his kid for the two-thousandth time how important it is to make the cross-of-rice.

If all that seems to much for you, and you live in the greater New York City area (I’m looking at you, Solly), then you can just go here. Date soon, m’love?

I feel personally offended when a guy gets off an elevator before I do. I think it’s completely rude when someone doesn’t take off his or her hat when we sit down for a meal. When I have to give up my seat on the subway for a pregnant woman before a guy does, I envision punching him in the twig and giggle berries just to see if they’re even there. And I have long since give up on dating any man who doesn’t open my doors for me.

But the question stands, when did chivalry die? Was it because the feminists insisted on equality and refused polite consideration? Or is it just that there is a general laxing in social standards? I nannied my way through college, and I cannot tell you how many parents have zero follow through with instilling manners in their brats. Like when you’re talking with your neighbor about a series of petty crimes that have been happening in the area, and her four-year-old interrupts your conversation to tell her mother all about the ladybug she found. No excuse me, no reprimand from mommy. Just a full attention switch, thus teaching the child that manners are unnecessary.

We live in a society that uses please, thank you and excuse me when they aren’t even warranted, yet we can’t manage actual manners when they are pertinent? Prime example: You call Acme company to get information regarding X. The friendly person on the phone provides your every request, and when you’re satisfied, you thank her for her help. then she thanks you and the call is over. She thanks you for calling her so she could help you with something. This is something that really only happens in America, bu it’s spreading via globalization to places like India, the UK, China, etc. When I lived in Spain they pointed and laughed at me for thanking people who should be thanking me. Another example: you’re in the grocery  store trying to get passed a lady who is taking up most of the aisle, and as you carefully squeeze past her twinkie-and-big-mac-filled sweat pants, she backs up straight into you, pinning you against the fig newtons. The two of you say “excuse me” in unison. It was totally her fault, yet you apologize.

All of this goes to show that there is no more standard for polite behavior in this country, which is obviously being interpreted by the masses as a complete disregard for any level of consideration for our fellow civilians. No wonder there is no more chivalry in America! We can’t even manage basic manners for everyone, let alone extra manners for the less thoughtful of the two sexes.

So how do we reverse this horrible defecit that will inevitably lead to the complete and total denegration of our society? I have no idea. I’ll do my part by not dating rude men (anymore), and hopefully by raising sons who know better than to get into an elevator without taking their hats off first.

Marathon runners coldn’t sprint as fast as I did to her desk–at least not in 4-inch heels, dodging through the obstacle course of cublicles from my office to hers.

Naturally I ordered my ususal six boxes, and I acquiesced for a seventh so I could try the new Dulce de Leche (not worth it).

So what is it about Girl Scout cookies that makes us so crazy for them? I know I’m not the only one who joneses for Samoas and Do-Si-Dos. My big sis told me, in reference to not-for-profits asking for support in front of drug stores and the like, ” I see vets and disabled people asking for donations and I’m like, ‘psh, get real: I’m broke.’ And then I see those Girl Scouts and I’m like, ‘YES PLEASE, HOW MANY BOXES DO YOU HAVE!?’” And evert ime I share with someone the picture of the Girl Scout Cookie warehouse with thousands of boxes of cookies, their first instinct is to steal them. (Clearly not an original idea.)

What’s interesting is that in most of the rest of the world, Girl Scouts hang out in front of Wallgreenses and Rite Aids, hoping to panhandle their addictive substances to you even after the pre-ordering season has ended. In New York City, such is not the case! I have seen nary a Brownie standing curbside, asking if you want a score. Strangely enough, if you need your fix in the Big Apple, you need to know where to go, which , from the sounds of it is a building on the west side that’s only open for a few hours every day. You then have to know the secret knock, shake the left hand of the correct man (Pablo, the one with the eye patch), you have to execute a double pirouette, then recite the entire Gettysburg Address backwards. Actually I think you have to go to Girl Scout’s Headquarters on 23rd Street, but that too seems pretty complicated!

I digress.

The point is, these sweet little biscusts are a rare commodity in New York , which means the street value of each box is likely more than it’s front cost. A savvy entrepreneuer may just buy in bulk, then sell on craigslist for a small profit. The potential for this market is huge, which only proves my point: Girl Scout cookies are no less addictive that crack, and therefore should be a substance that is controlled by the federal government, lest I eat my weight in Samoas and lose the bikini body I’ve been working so hard for all winter. (I write this as I finish the las of the Dulce de Leches. Hey, the only reason they lasted as long as they did is they realy aren’t as good as I was hoping for.)

Fret not! This weekend, not only is it scheduled to rain a plenty in the fabulous city of New York, but I also just purchased a brand new MacBook, so I can finally pour out the blogs that have been accumulating in my brain into this beautiful new piece of hardware. Woot!

Stay tuned sportsfans…

To be fair, I did invite my mother to join facebook. We don’t talk much because I hate talking on the phone, so I thought it might be a way to bridge the gap between conversations. Don’t worry, though: she and all my other relatives are on limited profile, which–according to my personal settings–means she can’t see my tagged photos and the more risque photo albums I’ve posted with exceptionally appropriate titles such as “I have to pay to have sex on my birthday?!” and “A handful’s all you need” (this one is an artistic series of photos in which I am grabbing one or both of my best friend’s D-cups over the course of several nights out during our senior year of college). Now, it’s not that I’m afraid of my parents seeing me in such compromising situations as doing a keg stand in a mini-skirt while one of my friends pinches the fabric between my legs (we are a classy lot, and don’t you forget it), for I’m pretty sure they had at least a vague idea of what I was up to when I was allegedly doing the family proud and earning my degree. Even though I think they know more or less about my youthful indiscretions, I doubt very seriously they want to see evidence of it. Likewise, I wouldn’t want to see my father snorting coke off a Turkish whore’s ass while he and his Army buddies drink cheap liquor and make fun of/ have fun with the locals–damn am I glad these events were never documented, let alone published on the interwebs.

I digress.

Since my mother joined facebook, she discovered the handy little tool that allows you to import your email contacts and see whether any of them are on facebook. Now, I’m not sure whether she got confused or ambitious, but she wound up inviting all her contacts to join facebook.  So now all of my aunts and uncles are jumping aboard and I am beginning to think that I’ve created a slippery  slope that can be proved in a court of law to bring about the apocalypse (Parli Pro: You just lost the debate. In your FACE).

Now with prestigious publications like Time and Internetnews.com (what?) telling us that all our beloved social networking sites are age-appropriate for our parents, why does it feel so wrong? Perhaps it’s because through trial, error and a lot of awkward situations we have mastered the Rules of Facebook. Our parents, however have not. Take, for example, how I recently found my parents’ 30-somethings next-door-neighbors on facebook. I am fairly close with these people, having worked for him and having lived just a train ride apart from them while we both lived in England. Their son is one of my favorite kids ever. So imagine my shock and confusion when I add Tracey as a friend, only to find she’s already friends with my mom’s brother Steve–a man she has never met and probably doesn’t even know exists in any comprehensible social capacity.  That’s because Awkward Uncle Steve used the Gmail contact importer and friended everyone who has ever been on an email chain with him, including my best friend and my 2nd cousin on my dad’s side.

So yes, I am glad I am friends with my mom (and my Uncle David, Aunt Karyn, Aunt Kathi, Aunt Nancy, and Uncle Steve) on facebook, but I don’t think I will ever have with them the same experience I have with my friends who understand the importance of the phrase “everybody does it, nobody talks about it” with respect to facebook stalking.

“We fall in love when our imagination projects nonexistent perfection upon another person. One day, the fantasy evaporates and with it, love dies.”
- Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega y Gasset

I learned more about love from a single sentence uttered to me when I was seventeen years old than I have from all my relationships, experiences, observations and studies to date combined. The summer of 2002 I was gearing up to move to Spain for a semester in the fall, and in order to get a taste of what was to come for me, I asked my parents if we could host a student from Spain for a month. In retrospect this was one of the best impulsive decisions I’ve ever made, since I wound up living with Paloma in Madrid after I very clearly did not get on well with the host family with whom I was placed.

I digress.

The adviser for the 30-some students who spent the summer of 2002 in Atascadero, California was a man named Julian (hoo-lee-AHN, not JOO-lee-en), and he was a close friend to my exchange student, Paloma. I liked spending time with Julian and Paloma because I could understand much of what they said in Spanish, having studied the language in high school for three years. One day as the group was touring the Santa Barbara Missions, I overheard Julian say to Paloma “no existe el amor”—love does not exist.

I was single at the time, but I had broken up with my high-school sweetheart only a few months earlier, and I was convinced that by the oh-so-knowledgeable age of seventeen I had known true love. I immediately began denying Julian’s claims, and I wrote him off as a cynic.

Several months later, after I moved to Madrid to live with Paloma when things went sour between myself and the aforementioned host family I initially lived with when I moved to Spain, I was spending the afternoon with Paloma and Julian, when once again Julian declared that love did not exist. At first I started to push back, but Julian stopped me and explained to me what he meant. To this day, I can tell you that not only is this one of the most beautiful concepts I’ve ever wrapped my head around, but hearing it explained in Spanish made it radiate with an essence that cannot describe to you unless you understand the language.

“Love does not exist,” explained Julian. Commitment exists, and loyalty exists. Trust, honor, patience, desire, compassion—all these things exist. They’re all specific and measurable, and they all contribute to the emotional health of any relationship between two people. But when you bundle them up and wrap a blanket called ‘love’ around them, they lose a certain amount of their value as qualities in their own right. It’s sad that the word ‘love’ is used to undermine the complex emotions that should exist between two lovers. People often forget or neglect some of these important feelings because they can simply say the words ‘I love you’ and evade any demand for proof of the sentiments that are perhaps lacking and consequently damaging to the relationship.

This is exactly why there needs to be some level of substance between two people when, as Ortega y Gasset so aptly posits, the unrealistic delusion of perfection subsides.

Now mind you, this was an involved conversation that lasted the duration of a paella de mariscos served with rioja. Still, these were the points Julian made that rang home to me. Ironically, his message does not stray far from the meaning of the song “More Than Words” by eighties one-hit-wonder band Extreme, which my high school sweetheart had put onto a mix tape for me and never once executed in his actions while we were together. Still, it took saffron-infused rice, a bottle of red wine and a cultural immersion in one of the most captivating countries in the world to make me realize that love—the abstraction that is love—does not exist. It is merely a concept.

Have I clung to this notion and required that every person I dated henceforth be true to the ideology that the emotions that love comprises are more important than the blanket, worthless word in and of itself? Absolutely not. Like so many women before me I have dated far too many horrible men and not enough good guys. But to be sure, the only man to whom I’ve said the words “I love you” since that day in Madrid that I spoke with Julian was, in fact, a great guy, and he did show me love instead of just saying empty words. Of this I fact I am very proud, and I hope that whatever lies in my future, I can maintain that any man whom I truly love treats me as though love does not exist.