No! My Chair!!

Sometimes I become very petulant about very stupid things.  It's like somewhere inside of me, four-year-old Kiki is alive and well.  Four-year-old Kiki will always make an appearance when someone asks me to move seats.  When someone asks, "Can you move?" my immediate reaction is to stomp my feet, cross my arms, pout and say, "NO!  MY CHAIR!!" 

For example, at the movies, let's say there is one empty chair on one side of me and an empty chair on the other side of the person I'm with.  I turn into a rage monster when someone comes in after the previews have started or worse when the movie has started and says, "Can you move down so we can sit together?"  It's a very easy thing to do, it's not really an inconvenience, yet to me, those people might as well have been asking "Can I have your kidney?" "NO!  MY KIDNEY!"  I'll move, but like the big bad wolf, I'll also huff and puff as I move one seat down.  

Most recently, I was in the city having lunch with my good friend.  We were enjoying some delicious Mexican food at Qdoba which was deserted.  We were about halfway through our food when a group of young 20-somethings come into the restaurant, get their food and take over the three tables on one side of us.  Keep in mind the rest of the restaurant, including two high tables with 10 chairs each were free.  A few minutes after these people sit down, two more of their friends come along.  Alas, there are no more seats at the tables the group took.  They never discussed moving their group anywhere else in the empty restaurant.  Instead, this douchemonkey looked right at me and said, "Would you two mind moving down a table so we can sit with our team?"  In my head I screamed "YES I WOULD MIND.  THIS IS MY TABLE!  MY TABLE!!!  I WAS HERE FIRST!!!!!"  While I was throwing this fit in my head, my friend stared at all the empty tables especially the empty 10-top table in the restaurant and the guy says, "Oh, we didn't see that when we sat down," then kept standing over us waiting for us to move.  I really wanted to throw my queso all over the table, scream and be forced to be dragged to the next table like four-year-old Kiki would do.  Instead, we grudgingly got up and moved to the next table and then gave death glares for the rest of our lunch. 

I could try to come up with some psychological explanation that deep down I'm super possessive over things because I have a twin and a brother only 20 months older and so I had to guard your territory with my life when I was growing up, but I think the plain truth is that sometimes, I'm just a brat.  So don't ask me to move my chair, OK?!

How I Narrowly Escaped Death, or, My Views on Travel

I maintain that train travel (Amtrak) is the only civilized way to travel.  "Road trips" by car just kill me.  They take too long, you invariably get stuck in traffic and there always comes that time when you have to unceremoniously announce to the rest of the car that you HAVE TO FIND A REST STOP. NOW.  Air travel is somewhat better.  Once you've survived the indignity of having a 40 year old man body scan you and rifle through your carry on bag on underbritches and prescription drugs, you can at least calm you nerves and wait for you plane to board at the hotel bar.  However, planes seem to be delayed at the slightest weather and I resent having to go a solid twenty minutes without my iPhone while waiting for the plane to reach "altitude" - whatever that means.  

Train travel.  That's where its at.  You can roll up to the train gate 15 minutes or so before boarding, just show your ticket and then its off to the platform to pick where you'd like to sit.  You can lean back, relax and once the train gets going, saunter to the cafe car at your leisure to get a glass of wine (or four - no waiting for a flight attendant here). Natch, when I took the train recently to visit my brother and his family, this is exactly what I expected.  

My train was scheduled to leave around 7am, getting me into NYC at 11:30.  I rolled up to the gate at 6:40, ready to get in line and board.  10 minutes went by, 20 minutes by, 30 minutes went by and ..... no boarding, no announcement.  Meanwhile, an overeager train rider was trying to make friends with everyone standing by the gate.  She was talking to children, elderly people and young couples who clearly wanted to be in their own world.  She tried to talk to me and got a blank stare.  Like my mother taught me, I do not talk to strangers, especially at that hour of the morning.  

Once on board (30 minutes behind schedule), I was happily nestled in my window seat, with a securities regulation treatise on my lap.  Just as I was opening it, a girl about my age sat down next to me.  Damn, my plans of being alone foiled.  I hoped she would be quiet and let me engross myself in 10b-5 liability.  No such luck.  She proceeded to try to force feed me granola bars (I did eat one, just to shut her up) but I was terrified the whole time that she was some kind of granola bar serial killer.  In fact, I'm still not sure there's not some latent poison in my blood.  Then, she showed me a stuffed yellow chick she'd brought on the train - she called him the "train ride mascot."  The craycray meter was near boiling at this point. Finally, when she stopped trying to be my friend/kill me she pulled out her Bible to read.  She would read her Bible, then journal, then read, then journal.  I read Helter Skelter, and I'm pretty sure Charlie Mason used to do that too.  I made note of the emergency exits and started to mentally catalogue the items in my purse that might serve as good weapons.  For the record, lip gloss was on this list.  

At long last, I arrived in NYC, alive, unharmed and in one piece.  Do I still love train travel?  Oh my yes.  But I might just have to develop a pre-screening questionnaire for any potential train seat partners. 

How To Meet a Bravolebrity

It's a Brad Brad World

Confession: I love Bravo.  It's very hard for Andy Cohen to put on a show that I won't want to watch in marathon form.  Real Housewives of Everywhere?  Yes please.  Shahs of Sunset?  How could there only be six episodes?!  Tabitha Takes Over?  That takes over my TV set.  Rachel Zoe?  I die.  A few months ago when I saw that stylist Brad Goreski was going to get his own show after appearing on several seasons of Rachel Zoe, I got crazy excited because I looooved him on Rachel Zoe and missed seeing him on TV.  Obvi, I totes watched the show and loved it. 

Fast forward to a week and a half ago.  I was out for happy hour with my law school friends that we kicked off early and kept going through dinner and after.  Several glasses of wine later (ok probably bottles) my group ended up at a pretty nice restaurant/lounge with a beautiful rooftop patio.  We walked up to the door and my friend says, "Hey, I think that guy from Bravo just walked in ahead of us."  Immediately my ears perked up like my dog's do when I suggest we go for a walk.  A Bravolebrity?!  Here?!  It can't be!  Christian Bale-Batman style I demanded my friend tell me, "WHO IS IT?!  WHICH BRAVOLEBRITY IS HERE?!"  He says, "Brad from It's a Brad Brad World."  I said "Impossible."  He says, "No, I'm pretty sure it was him."  I said, "No and I'll prove it."  I then proceeded to shout at the top of my lungs, "BRAD!  BRAD!  TURN AROUND BRAD!!!" 

I was heading up the stairs to the patio at that moment when my friend said, "Um, turn around."  At the bottom of the stairs was Brad Goreski himself looking incredibly dapper.  I died a little inside of mortification at my rudeness, but my mortification was overpowered by my Bravolebrity obsession.  I trampled down the stairs and apologized to Brad for being rude, telling him I was trying to prove that Brad was not in fact Brad, said I was a big fan, and chatted for a second.  He was so wonderfully gracious and even posed for a picture which he did not have to do with a drunken a-hole such as myself.  This experience taught me that Bravolebrities are incredibly gracious even to barking fans.

So take note sugars, apparently being a complete idiot is how you meet a Bravolebrity.

He's Just Not That Into You: Vol I

A recent conversation with a male friend of mine made me realize that, as ladies, we still need a little help in the relationship department.  Men may be from Mars and women from Venus, but that doesn't give us a free pass to go all stalker crazy on the men in our lives. 

So, my friend.  We were catching up and he was relaying to me how his most recent relationship had ended.  He had been dating this girl.  Everything was going along perfectly fine until he decided that OMG-HE-VISIT-HIS-OLD-FRIENDS-IN-OHIO (I'm imagining that this it was flashed through his lady love's mind when he said that).  Instantly, she assumed that, because he was visiting his old friends, he would be sleeping with everything and everyone he could in Ohio (clearly, a rational assumption).  She let her assumption fester and fester and take over every inch of her consciousness until finally, on Saturday, after a series of angry texts, she BROKE IT OFF WITH THIS PERFECTLY DATEABLE GUY (and we know just how many of those there are in the world) wait for it..... OVER TEXT. Honey, the last time I broke it off with someone over text, I was in middle school.  I'm pretty sure that now that we're in our late twenties/early thirties, that's not acceptable behavior anymore. 

Ladies, the mere fact that he's visiting his friends in Ohio is not a dead giveaway, red flag that he's going to be cheating on you.  The dead giveaway, red flag that he's cheating on you is when you go to a function with him, and he spends half his night with a bevy of different blondes sitting on his lap.

Sh*t We Didn't Care About This Week

We here at Oh Sugar Please are pleased to bring you a new weekly feature--the week in review, otherwise known as "Shit We DIdn't Care About This Week" where we offer our unique take on overhyped news stories of the week.  Let's get to it shall we?!

Brangelina Got Engaged
JanJan: Looks like its about time for Brad to do another movie with a hot actress, fall in love with her, cheat on Angelina and divorce her.  #TeamAnistonForever

Kiki: This is the most anticlimactic news I've heard since Kim Kardashian announced she was getting divorced.  The only engagement news I care about is Prince Harry because that means I need to call off my elaborate plot to make him fall in love with me.

The Space Shuttle Discovery Landed at Dulles
Kiki: I don't get what is so special about watching a space shuttle on top of an airplane flying Ace and Gary style over the National Mall.  Plus the last time I saw people standing on rooftops looking at spaceships was the movie Independence Day and that activity did not end well for those people.

JanJan: At first I thought this was the real discovery flying by itself and I thought, oh, that's cool.  When I found out it was actually more like some hooptie trailer hitched to a 1990 Ford pick up, I lost interest.

Pippa Middelton's Friend Had a Toy Gun
JanJan:  "Wah.  I am le French paparazzi and a reeech boy waved a toy gun at me.  Wah."  Buck up.  In America, we brandish real weapons.  P.S. Who makes that toy gun?  I want to buy it.  Pippa touched it.

Kiki: How is this even a news story?  You couldn't see her slammin hiney in any of the pictures. 

The Secret Service Got Busted In Columbia
Kiki: Oooo a bunch of agents went to Columbia and hired prostitutes.  So in other words they just went to Columbia...excuse me if I don't faint when it comes out that blow was involved. 

JanJan: Damn.  I missed out when I skipped that booth on career day. 

Have a good weekend now sugars! 

The Good Ol' Days

Call it nostalgia, call it sentimentality, call it wistfulness, but my last days of law school and upcoming graduation have me pining away for my good ol' college days.  I can't help but compare where I am now, to where I was at this point in my life four years ago:

1.  This time four years ago, I was planning my costume for the Dance of the Decades, a retro-themed costume party for all the graduating seniors during senior week.  I wore a short version of a Marie Antoinette dress (a look which Pippa Middleton borrowed from me four years later at her party with the Viscount), pinned my hair up into a mile high pile of curls and even spray colored it white, just to give it that "wigged" effect.  I don't know why I thought this would be easier than actually buying a wig.  To this day, I'm still finding white sprayed bobby pins all over my condo.  Four years later, the closest I get to a costume party at finals time is showering and changing from a Juicy tracksuit to yoga pants and a tee shirt while I mire myself in my outlines and mainline 5 Hour Energy. 

2.  This time four years ago, I was really really really really sad to leave all my friends at college.  I mean really sad.  It was pathetic.  I literally teared up almost every day in the final weeks leading up to graduation, no matter what the situation (my roommates can vouch for this).  I teared up at commercials, in the gym and at happy hour over a pitcher of Roggie's punch.  Four years later, while I'll be sad not to see my law school friends every day, the only tears I'm shedding come from the knowledge that my student loans will soon be in repayment. 

3.  This time four years ago, my friends and I were making random, sometimes middle of the night trips to various locations in New England.  I won "big" at the penny slots at Mohegan Sun, visited the Ben and Jerry's Factory and visited the Cabot Creamery.  Four years later, my idea of a "day trip" is a run out to my parents' house (they live twenty minutes from me) to ransack their cabinets for groceries and goad my mom into making me one of her famous grilled cheese sandwiches. 

4.  This time four years ago, one of my friends woke up with skinned knees, a bowl of chicken noodle soup in her laundry basket and just the wrapper of an entire block of Cabot Cheese (she had eaten the entire block of cheese) in her bedsheets.  We had had a good, good night.  Now, four years later, my idea of a good night is watching The Dark Knight (for the 15millionth time),  killing a bottle (or two or three) of wine and ordering in some nuclear buffalo wings (which I will regret around 4am when Mr. Heartburn decides to wake me from a dead sleep).

Is this lame? Maybe.  But hey, I've got a pretty badass highlighter tattoo that suggests otherwise. 

My [Former] Boss Is Making My Working Conditions Unbearable

It is time for a new segment here at Oh Sugar Please to share stories from the working trenches.  I've been working ever since I was fifteen years old [grocery store, pool concession stand, nanny, front desk at my dorm, state legislature page, political consulting, dog walker/house sitter, local government employee, the Hill & law firms] and let me tell you, I've seen a few things.  Something I never thought I'd see was a bill from my employer when I quit.

Here's the backstory.  As I've mentioned, I had some health problems last year.  I decimated my leave balance with my first surgery last year.  Though I accrued a few days back in the fall thanks to ongoing health problems I had to take more days off.  In December I had to take a day for a procedure (I'll tell you about that joy at a later date).  After I submitted my request, I received a charming email from HR informing me that I was out of leave time, but out of the goodness of their hearts, I was being granted ONE additional day off.  I'm not sure what would have happened if they had not granted me this ONE additional day off since this procedure was happening whether they liked it or not, but the message was clear: I had no leave. 

Fast forward to February.  I had only accrued a few days leave but found out that I had to have another operation.  I asked for a month off work but I would not be paid while I was on leave.  I get that legally they were not obligated to pay me when I was out of leave.  But seriously?  They couldn't find somewhere a few bones to throw my way?  I'm a student.  I work hard.  I made them quite a bit of money.  I don't get why it's so hard to be decent. 

I negotiated with HR that since I would be missing a paycheck, we would double up on my benefit deductions at the beginning of March on my last paycheck.  Halfway through my recovery, I decided that I needed more time to heal and finish my semester of law school, so I looked at my finances, figured out a way to swing not working for a few months and turned in my notice. 

Then I got a bill.  For $400.  SERIOUSLY?!?! WHO BILLS A DEPARTING, SICK EMPLOYEE?!?!?  Apparently the deductions were not taken out at the beginning of March as we had discussed and now I had to pay for them out of pocket.  Oh and they wanted me to cover the balance in my FSA, even though I know I had money left over from 2011 and submitted receipts during the grace period, so that was covered anyway.  I argued my way out of paying for the FSA balance.  I didn't write a check immediately because frankly, it was not a priority for me to give them money.  Then the comptroller called me asking where my check was.  Not only did they bill me, but not even a month after sending me the bill, they're already leaning on me to pay them $200.  I guess they're hurting for cash?  It is a down economy for law firms, but this is pushing it. 

I recognize that it's not illegal for them to be acting like this.  If there's one thing I've learned in law school it's that it's not illegal to be a dickhead.  But is it so hard for people to be decent?  You stay classy former employer.