t snickering in chagrined evil over erika's post

note to self: hide copy of the Hustler edition of Lives of the Saints before wife gets home.

Exactly. The Velveteen Rabbit may be a touching childhood tale for human children, but smart bunnies ought to heed it as a cautionary tale.

(I am a sap. A mere *mention* of The Velveteen Rabbit makes me sniffly.)

Yeah, they're immune. They can, admittedly, be bought.

With shiny things and candy, which are some of the things the Devilbunny likes best. Along with Orbital Mind Control Lasers.

Okay, here's the NOLA food report. Apologies in advance for the length, but Hec did ask for a FULL report.

Let's see...

Thursday lunch: Mandina's, cup of artichoke-oyster soup and a oyster/shrimp po'boy. (Which was HUGE, but delicious.)

Thursday dinner: Um...some place on Decatur that's not Tujaques, because the pris fixe didn't really work out for the vegetarian in the group. No idea what I ate/drank. Some kind of cajun seafood thing. Drank something, I'm sure, but I'm damned if I can remember what. Probably a vodka tonic.

Friday breakfast: Cafe Beignet, traditional breakfast (scrambled eggs, bacon, grits, coffee). YUM. Grits fucking rock.

Friday lunch: Central Grocery muffuletta! Split with DH. Diet Coke.

Friday pre-dinner: Ghost tour leaving from Flannagan's Pub, which included buy-one-get-one-free drink gift certificates. Most people got Hurricane's. I tried a sip of DH's, decreed it nasty, and did not end up taking advantage of my potential free drink.

Friday dinner: That place on the corner of that street and that other street. Red beans and rice, which were nummy, and procecco, which turned out not to go with the red beans and rice very well. But still nummy.

Friday late night: Walked over to Frenchman Street, had a vodka tonic at Bad Apples, and listened to some live jazz. During the set breaks, we took over the jukebox.

Saturday breakfast: Hotel buffet. BIG MISTAKE. Not to be repeated.

Saturday lunch: No clue. Did I eat lunch on Saturday? I know we did the swamp tour...huh. We may have skipped lunch.

Saturday mid-afternoon pit stop: Pimm's Cup and cheese board at Napolean House. It was lovely and refreshing, exactly as advertised.

Saturday dinner: Cafe Giovanni's. Drinks in the bar beforehand because our table wasn't ready. I had a vodka tonic, even though I was kind of tired of them. Dinner was two courses of pasta stuffed with/covered in cheese, with shrimp on top, and some hot peppers added for Cajun-ness. And red wine. Nummy.

Sunday brunch: Palace Cafe. Coffee, mimosa, and a shrimp quiche w/ creamed spinach that broke. me. in. half. It was too rich for me to finish, but DAYUM it was good. Oh, and a cappucino with Godiva liqueur, and kahlua. Next time, maybe I'll try something off the three-course pris fixe menu.

Sunday mid-afternoon pit stop/dinner: Muriel's. We got to the bar around 5, started drinking (and enjoying the free bread that the hot waiter kept bringing us), and by dinnertime, we decided that, really, we had no reason to leave. At only 2 vodka martinis with extra olives, I was the lightest drinker of the group. But the atmosphere was so pleasant, and the restaurant smelled so good that we persuaded the remaining 4 members of our group to join us there for dinner, instead of making us go out in the cold and walk somewhere else. While we were waiting for our table, HARRY FREAKING SHEARER came in behind us. Those of us who recognized him squeed quietly and explained who he was to everyone else. I had goat-cheese filled crepes topped with shrimp (SO GOOD) and salmon in a mustard-dill sauce (ALSO SO GOOD) and bread pudding (SO SO GOOD EVEN IF I COULD ONLY EAT TWO BITES BECAUSE IT WAS SO RICH). And another martini. With more extra olives. I like olives.

We shall not speak of Monday.

I missed a checkbox on a Fed Ex Slip and got a "SEE THESE ARE YOUR MISTAKES THAT I'M TALKING ABOUT" I wanted to punch him.

Heather, I feel your pain. For some reason, I was feeling a resurgence of resentment towards a not-my-boss-but-micromanaged-me-anyway bitch at my old workplace. She pulled that kind of shit with me all the time.

I'm not so much mad at her right now as I am mad at myself for a) still feelin upset about this, and b) not having taken the opportunity at my exit interview to tell HR that I thought this person needed to have a large stick surgically removed from her ass.

but Hec did ask for a FULL report.

MmmmHmmmm. Oh, mama, dat's good stuff.

Heather! The person in charge of that stuff where I work is equally a pain.

Perhaps it's in the job description?

Thanks Anne. Thing is, I don't think he's an ass. Just clueless. At the review when he asked if there was anything he could do to make my job easier, one of the things I said was to leave me alone for 30 minutes when I get here, to give me a chance to check emails and set a tentative agenda for the day. I still get bombarded from the second I arrive with, "Did you read that e-mail?" "We need to make sure we do this" "Later this afternoon you're going to have to go out and..." "I just forward you an e-mail you need to read."

Thanks, JZ. You said what I wanted to say, but with more eloquence and less ranting than I think I could've managed.

If only Flylady were a bit less mother-as-household-martyr. I'm going to try to use the techniques and ignore the subtext.

Oh, that's totally how I do it. With me it's more the huggy Southern emotionality of it all that drives me crazy, as in, "I left that place in part because I never was comfortable with emotional effusiveness, people I don't feel that close to insisting upon 'hugging my neck,' and the like. So I'll use the system, while laughing at the 'Purple Puddles' and 'God breezes' and cradling my Seattle standoffishness and Philly attytude close to my heart."

The problem with my bete-noire was that once she decided I was a screw-up, it was as if she looked for things I was doing wrong.

I don't think her dislike had anything to do with why I was laid off, but it had a lot to do with why relief was one of the first reactions I had when I lost my job. One thing I've learned is that I will not work for another micro-manager or anywhere near one if I can help it.