Guess what I don't want to do?

Go into work today. On a Saturday. And not just any Saturday--this has got to be about the most gorgeous day we've had all summer, so far. It's sunny, clear, and the perfect temperature, with no humidity. A perfect day for blogging and reading on the porch and then taking Josie for a long walk through the woods and then maybe going out with a friend to eat dinner on a patio somewhere. But no. I must go into work and sit in my office, far from any window, and spend the day e-mailing instructions to vendors and answering their questions on the phone, because they're all working today too. We have a major deadline coming up, and my life is not my own right now.

At least I have the luxury of going in basically whenever I want, although I really should go soon. The vendors have been working since 5 this morning already, or at least that's what they tell me. Which means I'll have about 600 e-mails waiting for me when I get in. (O.K., that's a slight exaggeration. . . . ) Which means I'd better go. More later.

Experiment

So, yesterday I left a half-full cup of chocolate pudding in the fridge at work. (In the work cafeteria, they sell these huge cups of pudding, so I usually only eat half of it, or I share it with someone. Sometimes our whole lunch table shares a cup. We're tight like that.) Anyway, today I get to see if the pudding is still there, or if someone took it.

This has happened before.

Holy Crap

As most of you know, I'm in NYC this week for work. So I get back from the office a little while ago after a long day of meetings, and I stop at the hotel bar for a beer to take to my room. I'm staying in Times Square, so maybe this shouldn't actually shock me, but the result of my bar visit? One Corona: $8.13. Thankfully, I didn't pay for it myself--thanks, Corporation!

So this is what it's like . . .

. . . to not have a life.

I've always heard about people who work 60-80 hours a week, all the time. Generally, these people fall into one of two categories. Either they're completely consumed by ambition and the pursuit of money (e.g., corporate attorneys, stockbrokers, certain corporate ladder-climbers, etc.), or they're just obsessed with what they do (e.g., entrepreneurs, scientists, artists, etc.). I fall into neither of these categories. Although I've sometimes wished I could force myself to become an obsessed artist, I'm just not. I'm more of a balance seeker--you know, work hard, play hard, rest frequently. That's been my life . . . for as long as I can remember. But not lately. As most of you know, lately it's just been work hard.

The scary part? You can get used to it.

Over the past few weeks, I've actually grown used to not really making plans, to not having weekends free. I've gotten used to bringing work home at night and looking at page proofs until 11:00. The nagging voice in my head telling me I really should find time to call my friends and family, to go visit my nephew and niece, to balance my checkbook, go to the store, get a haircut, do laundry, actually cook a meal rather than order one, blog, etc., has finally shut up. It realizes I have to focus on other things right now.

It's O.K., though, because it will end in a couple of weeks. This is not my life all the time, and I'm not going to waste time bitching about it incessantly. I can handle almost anything for a short while. My question is: How the hell do some people do this all the time???

I just don't get it. I don't see the appeal. I don't see how the pursuit of money or power or an obsessed-upon goal can outweigh the simple pleasures of maintaining good hygiene, having a clean house and clothes, eating decent meals, and getting a good night's sleep. Not to mention actually having a social life--you know, occasionally talking to people outside of work, going out now and then, etc.

Of course, I realize that many of these people have other people doing some of this stuff for them. They might have a maid or laundry service, or a spouse or partner to cook for them and clean up after them. But still, there's more to life than working. Or at least, there should be.

I really can't wait to get my life back.

Some examples of how out-of-whack things are right now:

*I really need a haircut. The situation is getting desperate. I'm starting to resemble Cousin It from The Addams Family. The amount of product I have to use on my hair on a daily basis just to keep it under a semblance of control could choke a horse.

*The other day, I bought underwear in lieu of doing laundry.

*Current contents of my fridge: 3 cans of ginger ale, 4 beers, some Half-n-Half, 2 eggs, 3 pickles, and some condiments. That's it. I'm not kidding.

*Last night for dinner, I had couscous from a box. (Cooks in 5 Minutes!) The night before, I had some cheese.

*As I type this, a tumbleweed of cat hair floats lazily around the floor of the office. I haven't cleaned in here in about two months.

Oh well. The end is near, and in two days, I leave for Vegas, baby. Then, six more days of hell, and things should get back to normal. Hopefully. We'll see.

(To Rick, Paul, and Dad--so sorry I haven't been in touch this week. I will soon--promise.)

What I think about all the time, unfortunately . . .

I don't blog much about my job, because, as we all know, there is always the danger of getting dooced from doing so. However, I've never hidden the fact that I'm an editor--more specifically, a textbook editor, and more specifically still, a high school social studies textbook editor. Upon hearing my job title, some people think, "That sounds cool," while even more people think, "God, that sounds fucking boring." Actually, it's both. In some respects, my job is pretty cool--I get to be creative, I have a lot of autonomy, I write and edit all day, and sometimes, I even get to travel. In other respects, it's tedious and extremely stressful, and the pressure is never really off. And then there's the whole thing about getting addicted to one's salary and benefits package, said benefits package being pretty fucking awesome and basically having the effect of doubling the salary, for all intents and purposes . . . but I digress.

I'll go out on a limb here and divulge the information that I'm currently working on an economics textbook. An economics textbook that somehow needs to be "hip" and "cool" and "cutting edge." Which means that, whether I'm actually at work or not, I'm keeping a constant eye out for market trends and new products and other stuff that I might be able to put in my book, eventually. And I gotta tell you, it's pretty exhausting. I can no longer watch TV, listen to the radio, or look through a magazine (all of which are supposed to be "relaxing" activities) without constantly evaluating everything I see and hear, consciously or subconsciously, on its potential merits as a feature or mention in my book. And in case you haven't noticed, advertising is everywhere. There is no escape.

It's really no wonder I'm exhausted and/or drunk all the time.

Anyway, it probably makes sense that with all this scrutiny, I've become particularly critical about ads and whatnot. And I have a particular favorite right now. One that makes me wonder what people are thinking and what's going to happen to this product in the long run. Really, I'm curious and incredulous. Without further ado, the product in question is:

VEET.

Have you all heard of this? It's yet another way for women to remove hair from their bodies, supposedly. First off, let me say that I'm a little suspicious of alternative over-the-counter hair-removal solutions. Remember "Nair"? Of the "We wear short-shorts" long-legged skinny women commercial fame? Nair was supposed to be this cream you just rubbed on your legs and, magically, the hair came right off. Did that stuff work? Did anyone ever actually try it? I remember asking my mom about it many years ago, when I was still a young lass with barely a leg hair to bitch about. According to Mom, no, it didn't work at all. Then why would people buy it, I asked? Because, she said, they had great TV ads, and a lot of women would go out and buy it once, and then realize it didn't work, but by then it would be too late, because they'd already spent the money. That's how the company made money, she said, by all these women buying it once. But why wouldn't all these women tell their friends it didn't work, I asked, and then no one would buy it?

Oh, what a sophisticated young consumer I was.

As far as I know, that' s what DID happen with Nair--it's not around anymore, right? So now, I'm wondering what will happen with VEET.

The marketers of VEET are pretty sophisticated as well, as marketers tend to be. In the commercial, they focus consumers' attention not on the dilapitory cream that one must use, but on the "special tool" that you get when you buy VEET. This "tool," by the way, looks exactly like a razor with no blade. In the commercial, a woman (whose face you never see, of course) runs this "tool" over her slender, perfectly toned, apparently already hairless leg, and suddenly . . . well, I guess we're supposed to assume that whatever hair that was there that we couldn't see in the first place is now gone. That is the magic of VEET. Can you dig it?

Now, I have many questions about all of this, but none of them center on whether or not VEET really works. Honestly, I don't care. I made my peace with razors a long time ago. Sure, shaving is a pain, but it gets the job done. It's reliable. Compared to most of life's trials, it's no big deal. I'm O.K. with it.

Of more interest to me is the thinking behind this whole marketing campaign. I don't know, maybe it's the particularly astute discernment abilities I've developed after months of working on this economics book, but a lot of things in the campaign make no sense whatsoever to me. Allow me to lay them out for you:

1. What, exactly, is VEET? Is it the "special tool"? Is it the cream? Is it the whole system, as a whole? Or is it more a concept, an idea, a dream of living a leg-hair-free existence? I'm just not sure.

2. Who was the genius who decided to call a major part of this product, marketed very specifically to women, a "tool"? Really, you couldn't come up with anything better and/or more appropriate? Honestly, the idea of using a "tool" on my legs doesn't sound very appealing. It seems vaguely surgical, and to some, it might conjure up images of people's shins being cracked with a wrench or something. I won't even go into the possible sexual innuendos that could be derived from an alternative definition. Just a really, really bad choice of terminology, in my opinion. (The assertion that the tool is somehow "special" doesn't help either. Not at all.)

3. And finally--VEET??? What the hell does that even mean? Is it an acronym? Is it supposed to summon up some association with something else? And what would that be, exactly? To me, it sounds like a word aliens would use. If an alien landed in my backyard, descended from his/her/its ship, floated up to me, and said, "Veet!" I would not be surprised. That would make sense, in some strange way. But as a way for my legs to be sleek and smooth? Nah, it just doesn't work.

So, while I'm curious to learn what others might think of VEET, I have no plans to include it in my book in any way. Apart from the mind-boggling aspects of the marketing side of the whole thing, I just don't think teenage girls need more cajoling into trying to be even more hairless than they're already encouraged to be.