I never wanted to work in a company where words like, "spondyloarthropathies" would cross my desk routinely. Nor has it improved the quality of my life to know that, "[t]raditional nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs ... inhibit both isoforms of the enzyme cyclooxygenase", okay? "The term angioedema denotes a well demarcated, non-pitting edema that occurs as large erythematous areas in skin and subcutaneous tissues" but I don't really care.

I don't feel I need to know these things. This is why, even at one point when I was in the eighth month of a job-hunting cycle, I never read the Help Wanted, Medical section of the newspaper. An obsessive hypochondriac doesn't need to know everything that can go wrong with the human body.

The only saving grace is that I only understand about one out of every four words that I read on the job.

Anyhow.

Alvin's off for Georgia today. He's meeting the Chipmunk there and they're doing a presentation to someone we hope will become our star client. Fingers are crossed that they love what they see. And that the project's sponsor quits dinking around and turns loose of some more money. Let's wish for lots more money, while we're at it. I'd like to get rich off of my stock options on this job.

The Chipmunk has been acting very oddly recently. Maybe Alvin told him I was aware that we were having "issues" and he decided he didn't feel like a confrontation (Hee. Hee. Fool. I haven't confronted anyone about anything since about 1979), I don't know, but he's been simply charming ever since he heard that our southern clients had dis-invited him from addressing them a second time and requested my presence instead. He actually talks to me when he calls the office and when I call him for information, he doesn't have that, are we done yet? note in his voice.

Trouble in paradise? Darrell and The Other Brother Darrell don't seem quite as inseparable these days as they used to be. TOBDarrell keeps coming over to Alvin and wanting to know if he wants to walk over for coffee, when previously you never saw him without his shadow.

No one ever comes over and asks me if I want to walk over for coffee. What's up with that? I had a bath.

IDoJeannie supposedly handed in her resignation, but she's still here. What did she do, give six months' notice? I've quit covering for her on the phones. Just because I'm the only other female in the office doesn't make me the back-up receptionist, okay? Hmph.

I did notice that Jimmiedean has quit talking to me since I stopped playing receptionist for his company during the many hours that IDoJeannie spends out of the office, which is a shame because he was fun to talk to, but whatever. I have blogs to write and e-mail to answer, so I don't have an unlimited amount of time to chat with people around here anyhow.

I think Buehler likes me, though. He's taken to asking me what's happening every day and seems to find it amusing when I insist that ignorance is bliss and if anything is happening, I wasn't there and I'm not responsible. He also likes the, "I read banned books." button on the lapel of my coat. His approval means little in the scheme of things except that on the days he's in the office, I can count on at least one person besides Alvin actually speaking to me.

Back when they hired me, Alvin and the Chipmunk mentioned that they thought a newsletter, quarterly or monthly, would be a good way to stay in touch with both clients and prospective clients. A few days ago, the subject came back up so I sat down yesterday and wrote the first four. I have to send the first one off to the Chipmunk via e-mail today so he can write the article for the space I left him. We'll see how he reacts. I tend to get comments about the ahem informality, not to mention jocularity, of my writing style from people I work with. I tried to be restrained this time although I do hope the history of paper article in the second newsletter makes it past the censors.

NaNoWriMo Yeah, I joined. No, I'm not doing very well. My work count staggered up to 2005 last night. That means I'm only 19,662 words behind. And I've been writing with pen and paper, so even if, by some miracle, I reached 50,000 words, I couldn't prove it.

Plus which, in some ways it's liberating to write something where quality is completely irrelevant, but in other ways it's entirely painful to write something so entirely awful and not allow myself to tear it up and start over.

Nothing new on the dissing fanfiction front since A Kind Friend traumatized me with a line from a story about someone's ass "throbbing in anticipation of being filled again after so long" or some such crap. I know where she lives and if I suffer a breakdown as a result of these little excerpts she favors me with, I'm taking myself off to her house for an extended recuperation. I'll make her read me "Winnie The Pooh" and "The Wind In the Willows" every day for six months or something.

(There. I just wrote about 900 words. If I wrote on the novel this way, I'd be caught up in no time!

But I did think of a plan to stretch it out last night. I don't know why I didn't think of this before. I'll make my protagonist gay and then I can pad the word count with numerous smut scenes!

It's so obvious, now that I've thought about it.

What I need to write is a fanfiction-style, i.e., not realistic, coming-out story where my guy realizes that the reason he doesn't want to stay down on the farm and marry his best friend's girlfriend's best friend is that he'd rather shag his best friend, right? I can do that in my sleep.

After all, the guy's name is already Mercutio, mainly because someone wrote on a list somewhere recently that you couldn't viably name a character something unusual like "Mercutio" these days and I instantly thought of a way it could work but the point is that if he's named "Mercutio" he might as well be gay.

Especially since it's an AU Science Fiction story anyhow because I always wanted to write a story where people could work magic except that it only does little things so it can't be used to change the fate of the world or anything. If you're thinking that this entire premise sounds pretty sucky, well, just be grateful I'm not posting exerpts here.)