Worksheets and Resurfacing

Good morning all!

Since the last time we touched base a few "exciting" things have happened to me I guess. Monday night was my job training program for my kids up in Harlem. Always a joy to top off my work day with crazy kids from the hood. Don't get the wrong idea, I love them and recently our classes have become quite animated. On Monday night we talked about the types of questions that interviewers might ask and also important things to remember before the interview and also the importance of asking questions back to the interviewer. Then we started talking about how to dress (this is where things got interesting). I have these worksheets that I use solely for the purpose of laughter and making a point.

There are four sheets that I hand out to demonstrate what not to wear, as they say. The first is a man dressed badly and it's titled "Dressed to Fail: Men". The man looks like an 80's rocker. He is carrying a boom box, his tie is hanging out of his wrinkled-ass dress shirt, he has a nose ring, he's wearing sneakers and his hair is long and mangled. Picture a white Will Smith with long hair in place of a high top fade and you got it. It is hilarious. The kids were obsessed with making fun of him. There is a female counterpart to the male drawing that is probably even more ridiculous than the former. When the kids flipped the page to examine the what one would, "Dress to Fail: Women", they all busted out laughing and said that she looked like a prostitute. They had hit it right on the ball. She was wearing tons of 80s makeup carrying this big bulky bag. Wearing a really low cute shirt, open toed shoes, and a short skirt with fighnets and her slip was showing. Anyway, they were howling with laughter. Remind me to show anyone who cares the pictures.

Ah well---I thought I was in the clear with the critters but last night when I was taking out my trash, a little mouse scurried out of the bag ONTO MY HAND and then over under the cabinet. It was such a joy. Sike. I know you all are probably like, "Wow, Lauren really is being abnormally calm about this whole situation." It's true. I know it came back (read: possibly never left) because I didn't take the trash out before I went to philly for the weekend. I seriously haven't seen one since that first time. I don't care so much. At first, after I washed my entired arm for about 10 minutes straight for fear of getting rabies or something. I started to not care so much about it. As long as I'm cognizant about cleaning up and taking out the trash, I bet I won't see one again. It's not like I have some sort of infestation where all my boxes are like chewed through and there are mouse droppings all over the place. Plus, I'm sure he'll move out soon once he realizes that there is jack shit in my house to eat.

Observation: There is this woman I work with sort of. She sits close to me on the desk and like she literally is like 43 or something, maybe 45. She has a big booty (which is fine) and a litte (read: big) stomach. Again, those aren't my issues. She dresses like strangely. She often wears short flowy skirts which don't exactly compliment her body shape because since she has such a big booty--the back of the skirt rides up and looks trashy. She also wears really right shirts, like all the cotton ones I have from Gap, she wears those with her "springy/flowy" skirts. It's strange. She's also from Louisiana and her sister with 10 kids homeschools them and they are bible thumpers, shocking huh?

I have a stye. Why do I always get like messed up things in my eyes!? My contacts always start hurting randomly, they are dry, I get pink eye like the common cold, and now styes! What is going on? My gut instinct is to blame it on rabies or something, but I don't think that's the real reason I have a stye.

Last night I went to a lecture on Caravaggio at the Met. I sign up for these things ocassionally to me educated in the art field, especially when they are about an artist that I really like---such as Caravaggio. The lecture was only OK. The woman didn't show slides until the very end, at which point I realized she wasn't even really an art historian, but a novelist. Any art historian would know that you have to show slides throughout to not only keep interest but to provide a basis of reference for the viewer in dealing with the material being talked about. I'm glad I went, but I could have done a better job. :)

I seriously need to get started on my daily work.

Love,
Lauren

P.S I'm in MD this weekend for MLW/family stuff, so give a holla' if you want to hang out!