The new "slut" dress

I have this dress that I love. It's a long black dress that buttons all the way down the front and is "fitted". I like the dress itself - the way it looks, the way it fits...everything.

Well, a few weeks ago I wore this dress to work. I'd been at the office a few minutes when I looked down and realized more cleavage was showing than I was comfortable with. Hadn't really ever noticed that before. Kind of made me a little self-conscious. A little while more had passed and another cleavage shot moment happened. On the third time, I realized the top button (or two) was unbuttoned. Fortunately I had gone in early that day so that if everyone in the office had gotten an eye full, it wasn't that many - because I realized it pretty early (thank goodness!).

Then today, I wore the dress again. I didn't go in early today so pretty much everyone was there when I looked down and was flashing the world again. Thing is, when that happens you don't know if it just came unbuttoned or if you've been flashing people since you left the house. So, I was already pretty self-conscious (who knew if my flashing was a once a day occurrence or if I'd repeat throughout the day) when I ran my hand down the back of my dress. (I sometimes do this self-consciously because I have a fear of having my dress stuck down the back of my panty-hose - yes I wear those! - and I feel better when my hand has a dress to go down, if you know what I mean.) Well, I had a finger "catch" on a HOLE in the dress in the back! It was a small hole but apparently my chest wasn't the only thing I was flashing. I'm thinking I need a new favorite dress. Maybe, instead of being called my "slut" dress, it should be called my peek-a-boo dress.

Here's to hoping there are no more unintentional flashes in my future. ;-)

Status Please

A number of years ago (shortly after my divorce was final) I had to fill out one of those forms which includes the question of "marital status". Well, as far as I'm concerned there are only two relevant options - married or single. That's it. Period. And I feel rather strongly about this. So, when I came to this question I marked "single" because, despite the fact that there was a "divorced" option, I was single. Didn't matter how I came to be that way...I.was.single.

Anyway, I get into the room with the Nazi nurse (oh yeah, it was a medical facility by the way) and she's looking over my form. She gets to that question and looks down her judgmental nose at me and says, "you've never been married?" with disgust present in her voice.

"Yes I have," I said. "But I'm single now."

"Divorced?" she asked.

"I don't see how that's relevant. I'm single."

We got into a very heated discussion about the "accuracy" of my responses. I challenged why it mattered and she spewed out some garbage about the health of a person based on their marital status. That resulted in me going off on a tangent about people who have been married more than once. One of my sisters had been widowed but was remarried. Did she need to check both boxes, I asked. And would someone like say, Elizabeth Taylor, have to put eight (or however many) X's next to married AND divorced? I also wanted to know about those that were unhappily married...why wasn't their a box slotted for them? On and on I went. In the end I admitted to being divorced but said that I WAS SINGLE!!!!! My little card came back with a WFD for white, female, DIVORCED. I was so pissed off.

Now, I'm looking at a form for my jury duty. It has the options of married, single, divorced or widowed. I'm having the same rebellious response to this question. I'M FRIGGIN' SINGLE!!!!! AND I LIKE IT! So leave me the @$%&*@ alone! I'm seriously considering marking through the divorced and widowed options and just marking single. Or just leaving it blank. I'm just a little worried either of those would come back to bite me in the backside though. But it's definitely pushing some of my buttons (or couldn't you tell?).

It's married or single people. There are no other options!!!!!

So that's one of my big pet peeves in life. What pushes your buttons?

Summons

Yesterday I retrieved my mail from my mail box to find I'm being called for jury duty. This is the third time in my life I've been called. The first time I received the summons on the Saturday before I was to appear on Monday. I had moved and it was just catching up to me. Since I'd moved out of the county, I was excused from service.

The second time came when I happened to be taking some college classes. Someone had asked me to take a class with them and rather than sign up for the one class, I took a full load. I'd planned on doing my duty until I realized it came during finals week and I really couldn't afford to be picked so I used the "student" exemption that time.

This time, I have no outs. I'm going to have to go. But I think it's funny that this would happen on the heels of reading a blog post about jury service and what not to do if you don't want to be picked. Guess I laughed too hard at the post. LOL

Actually, part of me would like to be picked, part of me wouldn't. So, I'm looking for ideas on how to get out of it, should the part of me that doesn't want to get picked shows up on D-Day. At the moment my only plan is to take my book How to Murder the Man of Your Dreams and display it prominently during the voir dire. What do you think?

I know I saw it...somewhere

Earlier this year I bought a Weight Watchers comfort food recipe book. It has some great (low point) recipes in it and I fully intended to make a list of ingredients I needed and purchase them at the grocery store and make all these wonderful new foods.

That's what I intended. What happened is I brought the book home and promptly lost it. I've been searching for it for several months now. I thought it was in my "office" room and have been digging through boxes in there (don't ask) for some time now, without success. It was getting to the point that I was considering the possibility that someone broke into my house for the sole purpose of stealing the recipe book. Not likely I know but what else could've happened?

Then fast forward to today. It's Veteran's Day and we had a little celebration at work for the veterans who work there, along with a couple of special guests, including a WWII veteran. It was really nice. Well, eleven years ago I was in an English class and had to write a paper on a veteran. A co-worker had referred me to a friend of hers and we were going to meet for ten minutes or so so that I could interview him for my paper. Well, ten minutes turned into about four hours (during business hours - oops). I remember him getting emotional and my taking notes. And I remember the final product but not writing it (although I do recall looking at my notes and thinking I needed to include something I'd written down). I was very proud of the final product and to this day it's the one thing I've written that I'm most proud of.

Anyway, since it was Veterans Day (and I had planned on meeting this person at the celebration but due to a mix-up we're having lunch together instead) I wanted to find the paper (yes, I still have it...somewhere). So this evening I went digging for it. Without success (although I found a draft copy of pages 1, 2 and 3).

However, following is a list of a few things I DID find:

1. A pair of smiley face underwear (who they belong(ed) to is anyone's guess).
2. Several paintings I did a number of years ago.
3. Some leftover author promotional items that I thought I had returned (oops).
4. A ton of books (I'm starting to think I might have a problem).
5. The 2006 Golden Heart entries I judged.
6. A book all about Leonardo DiCaprio (don't ask).
7. A letter I wrote to my ex-husband five days before we separated (I read it and I cannot believe I said the things I did in it - and I only remember the date we separated because it was my mother's birthday).
8. Notes, papers and tests from a bunch of my college classes.
9. A belt to a dress I can't quite fit into yet, but is my goal.
10. An erotic story I wrote a number of years ago.
11. A picture I had forgotten I had but never got framed. (I really need to because I really, really like it)
12. Performance evaluations from 1986.
13. Several letters of recommendation, including one from a company that shortly after they gave me the LOR, I left during lunch and never returned.
14. About ten copies of a resume and letter of recommendation on someone I worked with nine years ago.

and.....

15. The cookbook. Wanna know where I found it? On my nightstand!!!!! Yeah, because THAT's where all cookbooks should be kept. (Really makes me wonder where the heck this paper can be now...)

Anyway, if you enjoy your freedom, thank a vet. :-)

Stupid "Announcements"

Lately I've been reading things that just seem stupid. Periodically (monthly, quarterly? I have no idea) my work sends these newsletters about health related matters. This month's(?) newsletter was about diabetes. In one article it was said that one million people (I think that was the number) have diabetes but didn't know it. The thought that went through my head in the instant that I read that was "well you obviously know who they are so why don't you tell them?"

It's like the census poll. They'll say x number of people didn't report their information. If you know that, just add them. Not to mention, why is a poll being done if the numbers are already known? Seriously.

But I also love the cautions on items. For example, I heated up a microwave dinner for lunch today. The instructions tell you to 1) take it out of the box (were there people who would heat it up still in the box???), 2) ventilate; 3) cook on high for so many minutes; 4) remove from microvave (um, has this been an issue for people?); 5) remove plastic cover (okay, I want the names of the people that warranted this addition). Then it has a caution...It will be HOT. Really? No kidding! Learn something new every day.

Thing is you know they have to add all those things because someone did something stupid and there were probably lawsuits involved. But it just cracks me up.

So what about you...read anything lately that made you wonder why those details were necessary?

P.S. To answer a couple of questions recently asked in comments...No I didn't dress up for Halloween (I know, I'm a party pooper). And yes, I am doing some writing.
Thanks for asking. :-)

What's on your Mind?

I'm taking an online class right now (my first in a couple of years) on showing vs. telling. We've been given writing assignments that we're to post for the instructor (and other students) to comment on. Well, I told a friend (which I think most of you know in one way or another) about the class and she signed up with me. She's like the teacher's pet, turning in her assignments first and getting high praise from the teacher and other students. And then there's me...waiting until the last possible minute to turn in my homework, waiting for the instructor to ask "did you not understand the assignment?".

You see, I have this thing about people reading what I've written (yes, I know I have to get over that but does it help explain the secret blog at all?). Anyway, the assignment for yesterday (which we received on Thursday or Friday, and my friend, who went out of town this weekend still got hers in first) was to write a "flowery" scene and then rewrite it, tightening it up. I had a million ideas of what to write about and even started six or seven of them. What I ended up writing was a sex scene. A sex scene! Where that came from is anyone's guess...just something on my mind I guess. LOL

Inspired by Mel, I thought I would post what my local chapter does when they show up to support their friends at a book signing. (I figure it's okay to post here since a couple of the participants have posted it on their respective webpages.) Enjoy. :-)

And what's on your mind these days?

What DWTS and Writing have in common

I was watching Dancing with the Stars last Tuesday and was as surprised as anyone when they announced that Sabrina and Mark were going home. Now, I have to say that there was something about Sabrina that I just didn't like. I don't know what it was - I could never quite put my finger on it - but I just couldn't get behind her, even though I, like everyone else, had her pegged for the finals. I kept saying I wanted her to be gone but still, as I said, like everyone else, I was stunned. Despite how I felt about her personally, she didn't deserve to go.

So anyway, you're probably wondering what that has to do with writing. Well, I'll tell you. First of all let me say that I'm pretty easy when it comes to books. It has to be really bad for me not to find something good about it. I don't even so much mind predictable books if I'm on board with where they're going. However, I love it when things are shaken up by something that is so totally unexpected that you never saw it coming. That if you'd stretched your imagination it never would have gone where the author took you. But it works for the story, and the eventual conclusion.

Tuesday night's show was the unpredicted shake up that is taking the story somewhere else. Somewhere unexpected but in the end everything will turn out fine. (It is, after all, just a show. It's not like anyone's life is being ruined or anything.) But it got me to thinking about my writing. I don't want to be predictable. I want to shake things up and take the reader somewhere unexpected, but where they'll be pleasantly surprised. So that's what I'm working on.

And just think, if I wasn't a DWTS addict, I might never have had that little epiphany. ;-)