Happy Obligatory Dress Up Day...

I'm traditional. I want to think about ghosts and spirits and dead people on Halloween. Not grown men dressed up like a product sold in seedy liquor stores.

Nonetheless, I stuck a green leaf in my hair, and I'm Nancy Botwin (Weeds). High-concept, low-production value.

I'm also trying to stay away from the Pumpkin cookies...

Just for today, I can celebrate Halloween.

...as in, I bit the dust. Or, I made love to the pavement. I was jogging towards the beach where I usually run in the late evening on nights when I don't have anything to do.

I used to be scared of night time running due to the fact that beach is the perfect place to rob somebody because nobody could hear a person screaming. But at night, the only people I see are probably too high to run after me, let alone wrangle me.

Anyway, danger aside, I was heading out of my apartment and towards the beach when I looked out and noticed an exceptionally dark night. (Many moonlit nights are actually really bright and I can see my shadow). However, this night was dark, and I was thinking it looked kind of scary when the next thing to know I was flat on the pavement. Nobody saw me (except God), and after that I went on my merry way.

There's really no other point to this story...

Just for today, I can fall down.

Without being too explicit, I'll just say that I have recently encountered a group of people who are living in 1990.

I've said it before (and I don't know if I'll say it again...), that if there's one thing that I've learned in the past 36 years - and is a syndrome that I live in fear of - is that we are all susceptible to a little known disease that I refer to as the Stuck In A Previous Decade Syndrome (I'm working on a shorter name), whose symptoms consist of embodying the spirit, customs, music, and, in a worst case scenario, fashion sense of a previous decade. It could be the last one, or it could be three decades ago. Usually, as someone once told me, it's the decade in which said person had the most sex and felt the hottest. If life is good the way it is, why be open to change?

For this particular group, mostly men in their late 30's and early 40's, that decade was the late 80's or early 90's. These guys are like the hot cool guys that Ralph Macchio fought in Karate Kid, only twenty years down the road. I'm not saying they would swipe anyone's foot in a championship karate match, but they might shed a tear or two listening to Survivor.

Ok, 'nuff said. Because I feel like I'm being mean, I will qualify that I am PMSing...

Just for today, I can hope and pray that I never suffer unknowingly from SIAPDS.

I have no friends at work. Well, that's not true, I do have Food Guy and the Receptionist, who has been here all of three days. Actually, I was friends with the last Receptionist but that's only because he thought I might be able to "help his career." I once mentioned that I used to know some people on TV and, thus, he wanted to have coffee with me....He has a law degree, but hates lawyering and blah, blah, blah...(see how jaded and cynical I've become?...it's so awesome).

Anyway, having no friends at work except Food Guy is not so bad, as it turns out. I told him I live on cheerios and BAM! the kitchen is stocked with cheerios. I told him I don't eat wheat and BAM! a box of Cliff bars shows up. It goes without saying that he's my new BFF. But it's not one-sided. I listen to him talk about his personal life and offer my pathetic, I'm-no-one-to-give-advice advice.

Still, I'm kind of lonely.

Just for today, I can wish for more friends at work.

I was talking on my cell to my friend while at the gas station the other day.

"What's that noise?" she asked.

"That's the television by the gas pump."

"It's so loud," she replied.

"I know, but there's no way to turn it off."

It wasn't even real TV, but gas station TV, some weird hybrid news program. I don't even like CNN, I'm sure as hell not going to watch television created by oil execs. The thing that really annoyed me was that there's no Off switch. So, I had no choice but to listen to pretend news. Maybe that's the price you pay for cheap gas.

I never thought about the quality of my gas station pumping experience, but I realized that I wouldn't mind paying $.40 to fill my tank in peace.

Just for today, I can hate gas station TV.

I went to an over 40 social networking site today. I'm not over 40, but I can see it from here. Sort of in the same way that I can see the ocean from my apartment if the condo blocking my view disappeared. Well, in terms of aging, that condos coming down...

So, I came across this site because I was taking a moment of quiet time at work after asking - or, rather, telling - everyone that I need some space. I figured, after my supervisor quit last week, I had performed enough heroics in the last week to warrant some quality Office Coma time...

The over-40 social networking site was "packaged" as a place for people with some "life experience." I wonder if the word "old" is going to go the way of "broad" and "negro." Seriously, though, I think there's some serious denial going on about the aging process. While there's no chance that someone can turn female or black, we're all going to get old, so why not just say it?

You're getting old. Lest you die, you will turn 40. Deal with it.

I'm not saying it's good for marketing, but it's a more honest approach.

Just for today, I can become cynical when I take a break from work.

This weekend, I attended the wedding ceremony of a good college friend in Palm Springs. Seven other women from college attended and we had a great time milking the open bar for all it was worth (which was, apparently, more than what we capable of drinking), and rehashing stories about college and our early days of living in LA. Of course, I got stuck at Table #8 (AKA, The Randoms) right next to the bride's old boyfriend, Five Foot Two Lawyer, who I never got along with (to her endless credit she maintained a relationship with him) because he used to taunt me ruthlessly about my personal life. Why I let short guys get under my skin is another matter. [As an irrelevant aside, I confess to going on his cable access show twice. The second time, the other guest was a guy I went on one date with once and the entire show was about what happened on our date. Everyone who saw him on the show insisted he was gay...].

Needless, to say mid-way through the salmon I realized that certain relationship dynamics never change, as FFTL kept threatening to set me up with the only other single person there. When I asked him and his wife what made their marriage work, I got.

"Money," he said.

"Kids," she said.

The night included dancing to a few 90's hits including "Groove is in the heart," and a varied list of mixed drinks including White Russian, Mojito, and Irish coffee (gee, no wonder I'm so hung over). The real joy of the weekend was realizing how much history I share with these women and how much fun we had together.

Just for today, I can enjoy my friend's wedding.

On Monday, my supervisor/boss/person-with-more-responsibility-than-me suddenly announced (via email) that she was done with work (her father is very ill so she had a good excuse). On Tuesday, I spilled my coffee all over my glass desk two seconds after arriving. On Wednesday, I had a panic attack and ran out of the building crying (I managed to leave the building before the tears came). And today I went into an Office Coma, in which my brain ceased to function.

I know that certain personality types are attracted to high-stress jobs that can only be properly done with loads of adrenaline and caffeine, or cocaine. Since I still don't make enough money to afford cocaine and I'm not sure it came back with retro-80's fashions, I've settled on a high-stress job as my drug of choice.

Since my blogs haven't really made any sense since February anyway, I'll use my last bits of cellular brain mass to say that cocaine aside, if I stay in this line of work I will surely develop some kind of legitimate substance abuse problem.

Just for today, I can survive a stressful week.