Still employed...

Thanks to all of you who expressed concern over my job with that last post. Frankly? It hadn't even occurred to me that my job was at risk. Now, this could be the pinnacle of dumbassery on my part, but I'll give you my line of reasoning (applied retroactively on my part, of course) as to why I wasn't concerned.

1. In spite of the erm, overlapping with my other money making endeavor, the fact is, the slashfic really was an academic exercise. Backed with historical fact and everything. Although the sex is what freaked people out, it was an exploration in power more than an exploration in kinky sex--completely justifiable from an academic standpoint.

2. To back that up, their conversation followed the text of the play relatively closely--again, nothing says 'legit' like bare Willy himself. (snark... okay, I'll stop that.)

3. Every day in the lunch room, the chatter turns to poop. Literally--size, texture, how to take a dump--you name the application of doing the number two and all of it's accessorizing (farting, wiping, smelling, the advent of corn) and it has been covered--in breadth, depth, width, weight, color and composition, in the last fifteen minutes of lunch. And not by me. (In fact, my only contribution to this particular line of conversation is via Bone Daddy, who tends to say things like "I had a smoothy poop, mom! I like those kind. They're smooth on the side and not all bumpy. Bumpy poop hurts.") Although my department gives me a constant stream of crap about my writing in all its forms, I think it's safe to say the scatalogical nature of the conversation lies mostly on other shoulders. In short,compared to what I'm up against daily? My academic slashfic was really not that bad. My (once drunken) colleague did tell me that it made him nauseous, but given the fact that 'a perfect ten' has a whole different meaning during these conversations at lunch, I think I'm safe.

That being said, I will watch my future need to publish single-gendered pr0n in a public forum. And I PROMISE not to share anymore of my lunch time conversations with the world. Really? They're better left in the sanctuary of crappy couches and radioactive microwaves which spawned them.

And in other news... I got nothin'. The brokeness continues, my guilt at working part-time and trying hard to write and make money quadruples, and the house is a cheetoh away from falling into a black hole punching through the crust of California into madness. Yikes! On the other hand I've got some good quotes! (I was going to include the 'smoothy poop' one in this section, but really, it fit better up above.)

* This one is from curmudgeonly colleague (with a little help from me.) "It's not the stupid people I mind so much, it's the dumbasses."

* This one is from Ladybug: "Hey, mom--what are YOU gonna be for Halloween?" (I had no answer. I should have said "Young, thin, and running on enough sleep!")

* Chicken went to homecoming--and I have promised not to post any pictures, but apparently, it was decided that she cleans up nice. Lots of kids stopped her and said, "Holy shit, Chicken, is that YOU?" In fact, her confidence went up so high that she came home and texted her manga buddy (a kid I introduced her to) and tried to get him to invite her to HIS homecoming. When she told me this, I said, "Manga-buddy is gonna have to get his shit together first." Her face got a little more philosophical and a little less 'high on idea!' and she said, "Yeah--that's what Manga-buddy said. How bad ARE his grades, mom?" I didn't have the heart to tell her I didn't want to look them up for just this reason.

* We watched 'Marley and Me' which was really good, but, well, it's about a dog and the trailer tells you that it covers 'a fifteen year time span'... we can all do the math. We know how it ends, right? So we're watching the movie and suddenly, Mate notices Bone Daddy is laying on the floor, fighting tears in the manliest way possible. It didn't work. When the movie was over, he disappeared, and came back with a drawing. "This is me. This is my tears. And this... *sob* is my broken heart..." And then he proceeded to cry on me for AN HOUR. Fucking movie. Seriously--oughtabeafuckinglaw!

* Big T asked me today if I knew how teenagers got Herpes. I said, "Presumably from having sex--is this a trick question?" He laughed, and said "Okay... that's not what I meant..." I still don't know what he meant, but at least we're clear on the fact that I heartily approve of sex education.

And that's about all for the moment... I need to go put kids to bed. So I can catch a pillow-drool too...