Soup Is Not A Finger Food

Human Resources, Illustrated

ThERE IS THIS FUNNY MEME going around on The Facebook. It characterizes professions from different points of view.  Take the writer:

Hilarious! I have to credit my pal Amy, because she posted it on her Facebook page, though I don't know if she created it or reposted it. (If it's yours, leave a comment, I'm happy to give credit where credit is due.)

Also hilarious was the Professors version! I found it on a friend's page, which linked back to this guy, so credit goes to him as OP, if not creator:

There are many of these flying around right now, but I didn't see any that illustrated my profession: Human Resources. So I made my own. Feel free to share, just link back to my blog if you do.

So very taxing

IT'S TAX SEASON, and again this year, I'm using a popular web-based tax preparation program. As I was estimating the damage entering our info today, I decided to take advantage of their on-line community to search questions and answers posted by other users to  see if I could clarify something I found a little bit confusing.

I know what you're thinking - it's redundant to say "taxes" and "confusing" in the same sentence! But you know what they say - misery loves company - and there were plenty of equally confused citizens seeking clarity in the Q&A message board.  Luckily, my question was straightforward and I was able to confirm my hunch. But as I browsed, another question caught my eye: 

CAN I CLAIM MY BOYFRIEND THAT DIDNT WORK ALL YEAR

Maybe it's just me, but that question seems to be oozing with lots more than a simple inquiry about a potential tax deduction. I sense frustration with a note of accusation. Impatience. One informed citizen weighed in (copied verbatim, typos and all):

If he meets the following criterea he can be claimed as a dependent 

The person must:

1) Not be the taxpayer’s or anyone else’s qualifying child. 

2) Either (a) live with the taxpayer all year as a member of his household or (b) be related to the taxpayer.

3) Have gross income less than $3,650.

The taxpayer must provide more than half of the person’s total support for the year.

Now, a scene is developing inside my head. A skinny woman with long, stringy hair sits on a barstool in a cramped apartment, frantically typing her question into her old laptop which is perched atop the paper-strewn breakfast bar. Her back is to the living room, where her boyfriend is sitting on the sofa. Again. He's wearing sweats and an old black "Motley Crue" T-shirt, has holes in his unmatched socks, is swilling cheap beer from a 40-ounce can, his feet propped on a black laquered coffee table. With his big toe, he nudges aside a crumpled, empty bag of Combos, the better to view whatever's on the tube. Crumbs and a lone, uneaten Combo spill onto the table.

"AHA!" She yells.

Boyfriend belches. "KEEP IT DOWN," he growls. "I can't hear the teevee."

"THIS IS IMPORTANT!" she snarls back. "It says right here, you ARE good for something - I can take a tax deduction for you NOT WORKING!"

With this scene in my mind, I continued reading more of the responses to the question, imagining the reaction of my fictional taxpayer:

yes u can if u was takin care of him all year and if he is under 22

"I WAS takin' care of him," the lady thinks to herself. "But he's...24. Crap." 

I claim my boyfriend and he is over 22. As long as he fits the criteria mentioned, he qualifies as a dependent.

"Well there you go!, she thinks. "Cha-CHING!" She reads on:

what if that boyfriend is 28 years old as of dec 31, 2010, has state medical assistance, and food stamps?

"WOW, now there's a helluva scenario," she thinks. "What if...?"

"....The taxpayer must provide more than half of the person’s total support for the year" in reference to claiming a boyfriend as a dependent, what paperwork exactly is needed to support this?

"Right - how do you PROVE it?"

Can i be claimed by my bf if i meet all those criteria but made $4200 myself and he helped support my two children?

"Well, at least he helped you with the kids, sister."

What if I claim him and he owes money for student loans, will they take my tax return????

"What do his student loans have to do with it?"

i have a boyfriend thats in jail that i have been supporting for about 3 years now can i claim him

"WHOA," she thinks. "At least I'm not supporting a convict! That lady's got it BAD!"

She exits out of the message board and enters the information to claim her boyfriend as a dependent, turning her running total into a modest tax refund. "Maybe this year will be better," she thinks as she closes her laptop. She's feeling a little bit better about things; those comments on the message board helped. After all, misery loves company.

 

Brown

A FEW WEEKS AGO, I was shopping in one of those big cosmetic stores. I looooove makeup and nail polish and beauty supplies. Depending on the day, I love them slightly more than, or just a tad less than, office supplies. (Don't judge.) If I had unlimited money, I would buy a lot more of this stuff. But I don't, so I often end up buying my stuff in hasty dashes to CVS.

That's why a trip to my local Ulta (or Sephora, oh how I love Sephora!) can be a dangerous thing for me. But in Ulta I was, with 20 minutes to spare, and so I was talking myself out of buying everything filling my basket with a few items I'd rationalized really, reeeeally needing. Including some new nail polish for Fall! You see, I'm either a nail-biter, or obsessed with achieving the perfect manicure. Right now, I'm the latter. And it's Autumn, so the bright, light colors of spring and summer are no longer appropriate, right?

Are you with me?

I wear a lot of brown. I tell myself this is okay not because I'm a harried working mother, but because it's oh-so... of-the-day. Brown is the new black. Or maybe gray is; I can never remember. The point is, I was in Ulta and I picked up this collection of four miniature bottles of OPI nail lacquer. It's their Touring America collection, and it features some nice autumnal shades of gray, a deep merlot, a medium pinkish tone, and... "A-taupe the Space Needle" - a deep taupe shade with a name that could only come from OPI:

(That's not me. My nails aren't that long. I got the photo from Amazon.)

I applied it to my nails, and I liked it. It was trendy. It matched all of my clothes! And I loved it right up until the moment when it occurred to me where I've seen that shade before:

It is the exact color of baby poo.

Not the very first poo - the meconium - it's a lighter shade than that. And not newborn breastfed infant poo, which is more of a puce tone than a brown. No, A-Taupe the Space Needle is more the shade of several-month-old baby poo, the kind they start having right after you start them on rice cereal.

Once I had that little epiphany, I couldn't stop thinking about it. And I couldn't wear it anymore. I came straight home and removed it from my fingernails.  And that's fine; I should be able to find another trendy taupe that doesn't remind me of baby poo, right?

Or maybe not. My fear is that now, all shades of brown are ruined for me forever, just because of this one little notion. And that's gonna be a problem, because I LIVE in neutrals. What about my eye shadow? Do my eyelids look as if I've swiped the feces of a wee human? And does it have to stop at human poo? Maybe I have slacks the shade of, say, deer poo. What about the paint on my bathroom walls? It's a medium brown shade... whose poo does THAT resemble?

Really, where does it END??

I really must figure out a way to overcome this. 

Or maybe I shouldn't think so much.

Germophobic (or not)

I DIDN'T USED TO BE A GERMOPHOBE. But there is nothing like going into the hospital at the height of flu season and giving birth to a completely vulnerable baby human to make you freak the F**K out about germs. I couldn't get outta there fast enough.

Mostly, I'm pretty oblivious relaxed about germs. I mean, isn't it said that we all eat a full pound of dirt before we die? I'm ok with that; I'd drive myself crazy trying to completely sanitize my children's environment. Plus, I don't much like the smell of antibacterial gel.

That's how I happily roll along, until it's a slow news day and the local TV station does an expose about how hotels don't wash the bedspreads for weeks at a time and bar glasses are splattered with traces of feces. Or, I'll hear about a hook-like device that assists in in exiting a public restroom without having to touch the door. Or, I'll see someone using a napkin to protect her hand from the pole in the Metro car. And then I am jolted into remembering that IT'S A GERMY WORLD OUT THERE, PEOPLE!

It's a wonder we don't all die from the germiness of it all.

Anyway, I was poking around over at The Oatmeal - and if you don't read it, you should, because it's hilarious! - and I took a handy quiz to see how many germs are on my cell phone. I'm sure its methodology is firmly rooted in the scientific method and thus correctly calculated this:

Created by Oatmeal

(Margin of error, plus or minus 1,000.)

GAH. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to scrub my phone with antibacterial wipes and douse my hands (and my left ear) with Purell! 

I feel the earth move under my feet

WE HAD AN EARTHQUAKE TODAY! In Maryland!! It was reported to have measured 5.9 on the Richter Scale, although it was later downgraded to 5.8. Which is good, because that's exactly what I was thinking as I spazzed the hell out:  No WAY is that a 5.9. Not nearly seizmic enough.

Fortunately, I had decided to work from home instead of going to my client in DC. I'd like to claim I'm prescient, but that would be a lie stretch. I rearranged my schedule so I could sleep in be here when the air conditioner repair man came to my house to conduct the funeral for our 18 year old sell me a new condenser unit. Because we were wondering what to do with that extra FOUR LARGE that was rotting in the coffee can, buried in the back yard.

Last Saturday, we heard a strange rumbling and noticed our lights dimming intermittently. Dumb luck Expert troubleshooting skills enabled us to pinpoint the source: Our air conditioner unit, outside. We turned it off, after which I immediately ran to K-Mart to buy four window fans. 

About an hour after the Nice Man pronounced my air conditioning dead and left me with a quote for a new unit, things started rumbling again. My first thought was: "Dammit! He didn't turn off the unit!" Followed closely by, "WHAT'S GOING TO EXPLODE??"  I ran out into the foyer and spun in circles. I opened the front door, then closed it. By then, Seth, who - amazingly! - was awake, had run into the foyer, too, and told me it felt just like last year's earthquake! Which I had missed because I was in Virginia, visiting Cheaspeake Bay Woman and my other Blogfest pals. But that one was only a 3.6. THIS ONE? Was a 5.9 5.8!

So Seth says, "Quick! Turn on the TV! Check the news!" To which I replied, "You do it - I'm going to Facebook!" And sure enough, friends started posting. I learned that friends in DC/MD/VA had felt it, but also friends in Pennsylvania, Maine, Toronto, Connecticut, New York, Tennessee and South Carolina!

IT'S THE BIG ONE, ELIZABETH!

I carefully ventured out to inspect the damage to my home.  I can report that we are all safe and sound, though we did experience some minor damage:

 

THAT'S IT. Some things on the wall were slightly askew.

(Please; give me a moment. I'm still...processing.)

If you live in DC, you know the subsequent inevitable mayhem. Office buildings downtown evacuated. Employees were left with no choice but to head home, so they all poured onto the outbound 14th Street Bridge at once, causing major gridlock, THE END. No! I kid! Some of them boarded Metro, which was running at half-speed, just in case there was a buckled rail or something, which means it's taking, like, a whole HOUR to get from downtown out to the 'burbs, and that's if you don't have to transfer.

You know what I'd have done? Found the nearest bar and settled in for an earthquake happy hour!  In fact, after the calamity Event, my nerves were all a-jangle, so I poured myself a mid-afternoon glass of wine. But, ever mindful of the predicted after-shocks, I was careful to select a plastic tumbler. Because I don't feel like cleaning up broken glass.

And that was it; my afternoon was shot. I settled in to drink wine watch the Breaking News. There was DRAMA! MAYHEM! People stopped emailing me. My clients had all closed their offices. Everyone was trying to get home. The afternoon fell somewhere on the scale of a weekday Halloween, which always prompts an unusually early rush hour here, and - God forbid - September 11, 2001, when we all were sent home, struggling to process the morning's events, frantic to collect our children from daycare so we could hug the daylights out of them, even as the late-summer weather was more perfect than perfect. Just like today's.

So there you have it. My first-hand account of our region's biggest earthquake in a century.  It feels a little silly to say it was a big deal, but it was. (Shut up, California people. I'd like to see how you handle a blizzard! Oh wait - we don't do those well, either.)

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go hunker in my bunker pour some more wine and brace for aftershocks HURRICANE IRENE. Because it isn't a month unless we have at least TWO natural disasters.