The Miseducation Of America's Youth

Let me apologize AGAIN for the stench of laziness wafting from my blog this week.

I still haven't caught up from vacation and now I'm taking five MORE vacation days to teach an undergraduate advertising class at a local college. I've been spending all of my free time reading the textbook (which I never bothered to do when I was actully in college) and getting my lectures ready.

Tuition is about $4000 per kid with 11 students. And someday, I will pay roughly twice the GDP of Guam in order to send my own Spawn to college. This makes me feel like a high-priced call girl and therefore obligated to give my paying customers their money's worth. And if they start getting bored, I can always bust out some stories about how high Tom Green appeared to be on one of my photoshoots, or list of all of the reasons why it's a bad idea to eat craft services sushi.

In honor of the damage I will be inflicting on tomorrow's business leaders, this recycled post is from another time that I faced a hostile audience. It's old, so it kind of sucks. Endure/ignore at your discretion.


Perils Of The Linen Closet

Yesterday morning, I was struggling with my still newish, un-MILFy haircut, trying to get it to a place that didn't make me look so much like Tilda Swinton. Somehow I managed to cut my hand on my hairdryer, causing me to smear blood all over my tasteful Banana Republic career separates.

After working my way through all of my favorite expletives (The Boy – (“Mommy, what does (rhymes with rock pucker) mean?”) I grabbed a Band-Aid from the messy bin in the linen closet and doctored myself up.

After changing into a new outfit that had the least amount of stains and wrinkles, I passed out hugs and lunches, wrote a preemptive note of apology to The Boy's teachers for when he repeated the new words I'd taught him, and headed off to Dunkin Donuts (the High Ridge location if you're keeping score) for 24-ounces of sweet caffeinated salvation.

With the double D in my car cupholder (because there ain't no D's in my other cupholders - The Evil Twins can barely muster up a 34A nowadays) and twenty minutes of driving ahead, I tried to put my mind through the mental gymnastics that help me get into work mode. I had a big presentation to give to some important types at work, and I didn't want to LOOK like as big of a jackass as I was FEELING like on this particular day.

Flash ahead to noon. I had just finished delivering my presentation. It was jam-packed with every feature and function that Powerpoint has to offer: charts, graphs (of the pie, line, AND bar varieties), bullet-pointing, animations. I'd hit them with forecasts, projections, conclusions, educated guesses, visionary speculations. I used words like "paradigm shift"and "step change." I had props and prototypes. I had my admin order lunch, because serving food is pretty much always guaranteed to put managerial cogs in a good mood.

But my magnificence was met with silence. Finally, one of the women spoke up. Six heads in various states of gray and/or baldness swiveled toward the sound of her voice.

“Hey,” Female Executive That I Had Once Liked said loudly. “Is that a Hello Kitty band-aid on your hand?”

Why yes. Of course it was. Thanks for pointing that out. And let's all also watch the spectacular explosion of my professional reputation, while we're at it.

Six heads whipped back and forth between staring at her and staring at my hand. It was like a bunch of teenage boys watching Anna Kournikova and Maria Sharapova play Wimbledon naked.

“Um, yes," I said. "They sell them at Target." If I didn't sound stupid enough, I added, "They have My Little Pony ones too.”

“Good to know," said Female Senior Executive Who Just Barely Spared Herself a Blog-Lashing. "I need to get some of those. My daughter hurts herself all the time. Now, let’s talk about your recommendations….”

Life Lesson #1: Sometimes, the Power of Mom can be your saving grace.

Life Lesson #2: Always look before you Band-Aid.