LUNCH MATTERS

February 2, 2010
LIBRA HOROSCOPE (from astrology.com): Your senses are heightened today, and you are definitely in tune with beauty and your personal aesthetic. It's the perfect day to redecorate, create your own art or discover something new and lovely.

Laura’s Log:
Well, I doodled all over the margin of the classified ads. Très abstract. Rorschach-ian. Bunnies or bombs? That’s as in touch as I’m going to get with my arty side today.

Some of the job postings seemed just as abstract. What’s an “A/R Supervisor”? I suppose, since I don’t know, I don’t have the requisite 3-5 years of A/R experience. Draw an “X” through that one. On the bright side, there’s an office administrator position that pays a whopping $14/hour. If only I had the “preferred” command of the Russian and Ukrainian languages. Sadly, the job section seems to have shrunk and I didn’t find a single ad to pursue. I am pleased to report, however, that smack in the midst of the job ads I found THE contact info for the “Guaranteed, FASTEST pardons, LOWEST prices.” Gives me a better idea of who my competitors are in the current market.

Mom took me to lunch at Nick's Spaghetti House. I fretted that she would lay into me with an agenda of what I needed to do in order to get a new job by tomorrow. Thankfully, my life didn’t even enter into the conversation. She was too consumed by the antics of Marella and Lucy. Thank God for sisters!

“Your sister was on the news last night,” she began as soon as I walked in the restaurant.

“Which one?”

“What do you mean, ‘Which one?’! Lucy, of course. She was in the background, but there she was grinning like an idiot and holding up her SHAME sign about the homeless. Let me say that I do think that those whitening strips she’s using are really working. But, honestly, does she not think about the shame she brings to this family? We have to go about—”

“I’m not ashamed of Lucy.”

“Of course you are, dear. You just don’t realize it.” That’s when I decided to have some wine with lunch. I needed to not realize a whole lot more and pronto. Mom went on blasting Lucy and Carl(a) and the Olympic naysayers and Tony Parsons who “takes too much time off from the news.”

“He’s retired now, Mom.”

“Well, how would I ever know the difference.” And then she paused to allow the patient waitress to finally take our order. It was a suitable transition point to lay into Marella’s smoking, her “reckless sexual shenanigans” and her “unhealthy obsession with work.” Then this golden nugget: “Considering how little a role your father played in raising the lot of you, I don’t how it is that I have not one, but two daughters who think they have a pair of balls in their panties. I’d slice them off myself, but you can’t snip what you can’t see.”

And right on cue came Mom’s spaghetti and meatballs. Bon appetit.

KEN’S JOURNAL (via iPhone):
SWUNG OVER TO THE PACIFIC CENTRE @ LUNCH. DECIDED TO UPDATE MY WARDROBE SO I’LL HAVE SOMETHING I NEVER WORE W/CLARA WHEN I GO OUT WITH MARIBETH. ALREADY EXCHANGED 2 MSGES W/HER ON PLENTYOFFISH. SHE’S 40 BUT LOOKS 28. LIKES HIKING, KAYAKING, SNOWBOARDING & THE CANUCKS. NO MENTION OF PORCELAIN DOLLS ANYWHERE IN HER PROFILE!

DROPPED IN AT HARRY ROSEN & BOUGHT A HUGO BOSS DRESS SHIRT, 2 TIES, & A $325 CASUAL SHIRT BY ETRO THAT THE SALES ASSOCIATE ASSURED ME DIDN’T RESEMBLE A PAJAMA TOP. THE TAB SURPASSED MY MORTGAGE PAYMENT, BUT 1ST IMPRESSIONS ARE KEY. HAVEN’T ASKED HER OUT YET, BUT I’D BETTER STEP UP SOON. WOMEN LIKE MARIBETH DON’T COME ‘ROUND OFTEN.