Proofreading/Copy editing

For you, June, are a slob

I have many topics, the fresh topics of our day, to discuss with you, and all of them are dull. Read on!

Just so I won’t forget them, because you know how I am, they are:

Work
My eyesight
My winter jackets
Turning into my grandmother, Vol. XIV

Did I not TELL you they were all dull? Let’s begin.

Work.
I read a book once, by Stephen King. Or is it Steven King? That guy who scares you. Anyway, he wrote a good book on writing, and he said one thing people love to read about is other people’s work. To which I said, hunh.

Is that true? Did you see that was one of my topics and thrill to the idea, or were you all, I’ll take Winter Jackets for $200, Alex, and by “Alex” I mean all the Alexes at June’s work?

So. Work. I’ve been at my current job for seven years, six months and 15 days. So, I guess you could surmise I must like it, and I often do. But some days? Ridic.

For the first five years, I worked on one account. Then they switched me over, and it’s like that account never existed. Once I was off of it, I was off of it. A clean break. Like the one I had with Ned.

So you can imagine my surprise at 4:59 last night when–bloop!–my computer did what it used to do two and a half years ago, which is pop up with a little assignment from this account.

“You have a task due from [fancy client you’ve heard of]!”

I do?

So I opened it. Yep. There it was, looking just as fine as it did in Two Aught 15. I realize that’s not really how you say 2015. Calm down.

Without having any idea why I was getting this, I just started, you know, copy editing it. It was like riding a bike, except I can’t ride a bike.

Then–bloop!! An email.

“Hey, Juan, here’s the task. Let me know if you have any questions.”

…..

Let me know if I have any questions? Okay. How about, is it 2015? Did I just return from some kind of “I’m in the future” amnesia, where I thought I lived for almost three years working on other stuff? If so, did I really move? Who are my pets? I’ve no idea who Ima go home to.

When is this due?

Am I copy editing it, or are we in that six-month period where I edited instead?

Do I have any questions.

Then–BLOOP!–I get another email from another person. “Thanks for working on this!”

Who ARE you? Do you work on this account? Do we know each other? Do you even work in my company?

Then GRIFF shows up. Griff never left that account. “I hear you’re working on our stuff all day tomorrow.”

I am?

“Yeah. I won’t be here, though. Just use your common sense.”

My common–oh dear god we’re all doomed.

Finally, FINALLY, I get an email from a ninety-seventh person who asks, “Dear June, Would you have time to work on [insert account you’ve so heard of]? The regular copy editor isn’t available. It’s all due tomorrow.”

Sigh. So I guess I’m having a Flashback Friday today, working on my old account, and if Ima do this, can I go all the way and sit at my old desk, on my old floor, kibbitz with my old ridiculous boss who’d get me on tangents about Ode to Billy Jo? Cause that would be magnificent.

If you could flash back to, say, November 2015, what would you be doing?

Eyesight
I’m glad I did that list, above, because I’d already forgotten what else I was gonna talk about.

Yesterday was my annual eye exam, and man, was I excited to go. First of all, I can tell my eyes are most def worse, and so is my vocab. Plus also, the last time I bought glasses was in 2015, and 2015 is a big year with me today. But in that time, my prescription has DEFINITELY changed, and don’t you hate people who write “defiantly” instead of definitely? Plus also too, in those three years, since the apparently magical year of two aught 15, those glasses have been skidded across the floor by cats, ridden at the bottom of my disgusting purse, been stepped on, etc.

I take terrible care of my things.

So they’re uncomfy and twisted and scratched, and I was so excited to order new ones. I never wear my old glasses, even though they’re black cateyes with diamonds and technically I love the IDEA of them, but it feels like I have a bobcat on my face when I wear them.

You know how THAT feels.

My eye doctor is a jovial sort, and very large. I mean he’s tall and has an enormous frame. He’s just a lot of man. But I like it there because they have equipment that makes it so they don’t have to dilate my eyes, which is crueler than April, the cruelest month. April totally texts about you after you’ve gone.

“Well. You are one nearsighted young lady,” said my eye doctor, and it’s now at the point where when people say, “young lady,” they’re being ironic, like Willard Scott and his 105 years young thing.

“But your eyes are great. They’re strong, they’re clear, you’re doing great. No change.”

No…NO CHANGE? But I was CERTAIN they’ve changed. Not even close up? I can’t read the shampoo bottle close up anymore.

Nope. Same.

Goddammit.

But you know what I did? I used my insurance money to get new glasses anyway. I tried on approximately four billion pair, till the glasses guy started tying a noose, and I decided on these sort of rosy tortoiseshells that I will show you when they get in.

I can’t wait to take terrible care of my glasses.

Coats, Soothes and Relieves
Which brings me to my winter coats. [Everyone scoots chair up, as we’re finally getting to the good part.]

Cold weather is upon us here in North Carolina, and for the first time this season, I reached for a winter jacket recently.

Almost every winter frock I own has something fucking wrong with it. Why don’t I take care of my things? So now I have a plan to fix all of the things I can fix. For example…

My leopard coat, which I believe one of you sent me, has a missing snap. Oh, snap. I am horrific today. Why?

Also, every time I got a coat out to photograph for you, ridiculous Milhous came over and posed with it. Yes, his eye IS red. He got in a fight. With a cat. He deserved it.

The fabulous orangey-red coat I got at Kit’s store is missing a little sew-y piece of thread of the cuff of one arm, so instead of turning up saucily, it droops and flops over.

Blue raincoat: Steely Dan chew mark. Also, fur.

Pink raincoat? Coffee AND lipstick stain. I don’t even know if the pink raincoat can be saved.

I should just wear black garbage bags in winter. It’d be cheaper.

Grammy
Now I’m late of course but my last topic is this. You know how I’ve turned into my grandmother? When she was living alone, she had a fabulous book holder, so she could sit at her kitchen table and read and eat all at the same time, but not have to hold up her book. Yesterday at lunch I was tryina eat something healthy [Burrito Supreme] and read my book and you know what I craved? A book holder. I know the right answer should have been kale, but there it is.

But I’m having the kind of schedule lately where I’m running from one thing to another and haven’t had time to look, although of course I had time to photograph my coats. Anyway, if you find such an item, please alert me in comments so I can go get one.

Oh my god, I have to be at work in literally two minutes.

Efficiently,
June

Catch up on June’s…hard-hitting career. The Asses of Roses edition.

It’s been so long since I’ve gotten up in the morning and not blogged. These other posts I wrote at night, the posts since my triumphant return. Celebrate June’s triumphant return at the country fairgrounds and civic center.

I wish you tell you what’s new with work, but I worry about getting fired. I guess I can tell part of it because the company president told the story at our company meeting. Say “company” one more time, June.

I can’t remember which of the four states I’ve lived in that used to say the utterly hilarious line, “If you don’t like the weather in [Michigan, Washington, California, North Carolina], just wait five minutes and it’ll change.”

Whew. Let me get my needle and thread so I can stitch up m’sides. Oh, I can’t catch my breath.

Anyway, it was probably Washington, although in truth it is 63 degrees and raining in Washington 99% of the time.

Maybe it was Michigan, although in truth it’s 4 below zero there nine months out of the year there.

It wasn’t California. It’s 78 and sunny there. It just is.

Maybe it was here.

The POINT is, for the last year and a half, my job has been like that weather. Wait five minutes and something’s different. We’re going through a lot. And the thing is, I was really happy there, back when it was the way it was for the first six years.

My and my horn hair on my first day of work seven-and-a-half years ago

So the first thing that happened this year was in February, a place I freelance for, a publishing house nearby, offered me a job out of the clear blue sky. I’d have been a senior editor, and it would have been sort of fancy. But they couldn’t pay me much more than I make already, AND I’d have a 40-minute commute instead of a five-minute one, so when I added it up, it didn’t make financial sense, and you all know what a financial guru I am.

“On-time” does not need a hyphen, up there.

You know what, though? I AM being a financial guru lately, so suck it.

I believe that’s Suze Ormon’s slogan. “I’m a financial guru. Suck it.”

Oh my god, anyway. So I turned that job down.

But I know you know that the changes at work had made me sad, feeling isolated. And so this summer I searched for a job and I found one. I got offered a job in Blacksburg, Virginia, although I wouldn’t have had to move there. I know someone in Blacksburg, though, a person I dated maybe three times before the distance got to both of us. So I know it’s cute there, had I been forced to move eventually.

I was going to be the manager of their social media, and that would’ve been exciting because two days ago marked the official 22nd year of me being a copy editor. At this point, there’s not much more I can, you know, learn about copy editing.

“You’re not gaining experience, you’re gaining years,” my Uncle Bill, who is a job guru, told me.

So I accepted the position. I’d be working from home, which I was a little worried about hating, but still.

I put in my notice at work, and my last day was going to be July 3.

I gave notice at the end of one day, and the next morning when I walked into work, I was heavy with regret. What had I done? Sure, I’d had some struggles, but mostly I loved it there.

HR had sent me an exit interview form that I could fill out instead of an in-person thing if I wanted. So I’d filled it out that morning, before work. I was just getting all set up at my desk and had even announced my leaving my job on stupid Instagram–in fact, I’d JUST hit Post–when my phone rang.

It was the president of our company. You know, as you do. Calling June’s phone. Another day, another buzz from the desk of our president.

“Hello, president of our company,” I said. I really did, too. I like to think I’m charmingly quirky, but probably everyone there wishes I’d die a fiery death or maybe melt like the Wicked Witch of the Weird.

“Have you got a minute?” he asked, and I always love it when powerful people ask you that. Well, you know, I just posted to Instagram and I kind of wanted to stay near my phone and watch the emoji responses roll in.

Photo on 10-29-18 at 8.14 AM — My personal fave emoji. Be more dramatic, emoji.

Anyway. You’ll be stunned to hear I said, “Oh, sure, I have a minute,” because hello.

The president of our company is a very likable person who clearly does 230483403205302 sit-ups a day. He probably gets up seven hours before I do and works out and then presidents and also never blogs emoji faces. He’s dignified. I understand that Rip Taylor is more dignified than me, but still.

My point is, there I was in the president’s office, which in the case of my company is not oval. It’s more of a rectangle.

And what we did in there was, we talked. I was honest with him about how I felt, he was honest with me about what’s going on, and in the end, I stayed.

I mean, it’s nice to know a quirky-yet-not-lovable, ancient, cranky copy editor who recently was in a hurry and tried to fix the spelling of assess and accidentally changed it to asses is valued, you know?

So I stayed. And then three days later got set selling my house, because chaos addict.

I have to go to work now, speaking of work, but I have many things to tell you about PAINT, so I know you’re on the edge of your seat, which sounds like a recipe for chafing. Toooooon in tomorrow for JUNE TALKS PAINT. WHAT SMELLS PAINT.

Meanwhile, I just went in to get more coffee and here were the sights I enjoyed.

My favorite thing kittens do is when they just walk around like real cats, not knowing how adorable that is.

Talk to you later. We can asses the situation.

Corporate-ladderly,
JOON

P.S. This latest shooting, and how ridiculous that we have to call it “this latest shooting” makes me want to convert to Judaism. I have no idea why. But I think I’d make a fine Jewish person. I mean, I’m a fine anything. #Solid6.

Eyes that talk like cats

Turns out, I locked Steely Dan in the attic all night, so I’m feeling pretty good about my cat mothering skills.

I went up there for some paperwork, which I FOUND, by the way, and then I took it downstairs (there I go again, calling the attic “upstairs” like a giant nutbar) and pored over it obsessively. (I was trying to see how old my roof is. Let’s say it’s, oh, 21. Not only can your roof drink, but also your roof might need replacing, right?) (Crap.)

I didn’t think about how that gray ass GOES UP THERE, goes upstairs, every chance he gets.

Last night, before bed, I opened the front door and tried calling him in, a fruitless effort I make nightly. Well, he’s with his other family, I thought, shutting the door and giving up.

That’s why it alarmed me when I heard him meowing this morning. Usually when I get up, he’s staring at me through some window, with the intensity of a thousand suns. But he never meows to come in. That would be undignified. Unseemly.

“Steely Daaaan!” I called out my front door this morning, a reprise of last night’s siren song. Am certain the neighbors can’t get enough of me. “Who’s she gonna call next, Kajagoogoo?”

I was really worried. Why was he meowing so loudly? Was my gray prince of a kitten hurt? Don’t tell him I said that.

“Steely Daaaan! Kitty!?” I called out the back door, which is not a euphemism.

And then I saw the papers on my table. And right then I knew.

He wasn’t even that huffy about it, till he discovered I’m also out of canned food. After spending a night in an attic like a bat, he was rewarded with dry GIRL food that he only eats to annoy Iris and Lily. He enjoys sticking his head in their bowls when they’re eating, just to be an asshole.

The reason I’m out of cat food is I’m on a very strict $16-a-day budget till next Friday. I’m having a crown put on, and I think we can all agree I’ve deserved one of those for years. But it’s going to cost me $750 out of pocket–not that I ever put money in my pockets because look what happened to my ATM card when I put IT in my pocket on whiskey sour night–so in order to pay for it, I have to live small this pay period.

So far, I’ve failed terribly at living on $16 a day. On Monday I managed till I filled a prescription at $22.

Then on Tuesday I ran out of gas. I don’t mean you saw me on the side of the highway carrying a can, but I was on the last dot of m’gage. So I pulled in to the dodgy gas station that’s on my way home from work, a gas station I almost never go to because they let some random dude run over and offer to fill your tank for you, a guy who doesn’t work there. And then I always tip him because he filled my tank for me and I know that’s how he’s eeking out a living, but the whole thing makes me uncomfortable, and it ends up costing me more.

But of course on Tuesday he wasn’t there. I guess he felt he’s earned vacation time. And this was the ONE TIME I coulda used that guy, because I put my card in, and it asked me if it was credit or debit, and then it said, “Card rejected. Please see cashier.”

Once, this friend of mine in LA asked me to take her to this event, and she lived seriously far from me, and driving to take a friend somewhere is no small task in LA. We’re talking this will be an extra hour both there and back. But I didn’t want to seem like a giant bitch (oh, June…), so I said okay. I drove an hour home from work, ate whatever standing up, then got BACK in the car to pick up HER ass so we could go to our event.

I ran out of gas that day, too, and had to go to this really dodgy gas station in Hollywood, and the next day my identity was stolen. There’s someone going around right now saying, “No, I’M June Gardens!”

So I’m suspicious of gas pumps in general, and I’m REALLY suspicious when it says, “Please see cashier.” So what I did Tuesday was, I got in the car and left.

With guess what. The flappy thing open on my car and the gas cap on my roof.

I drove about a block before it dawned on me I’d done that, so I pulled into a parking lot and walked along the gutter back to the dodgy gas station, looking for that cap.

I found it. It had been run over already.

So I took what’s left of my gas cap and went to the gas station I’ve always resented because they shut off my gas one time when I looked at my phone while pumping. Oh fuck you, explosion police.

So Tuesday cost me gas and a gas cap.

Yesterday I managed to spend nothing, but I did also manage to close my cat in an attic for 12 hours, so.

Just seven more days till I get paid again, but I still have to live small, because crown. I have to pay for this crown. On the 18th. The 18th is crown day. Oooo, what if the royal baby is born on my crown day? That’ll mean I’m royalty.

Oh, June. Delusional June.

Tonight, with my allotted $16, my pal Jo and I are possibly painting the town. Her brother died, which is really sad. I met him, and he was cool. The visitation is tonight, and I’m going to that, and then if there’s time, afterward we’re going to go to the First Friday stuff downtown so she can kind of have a break. We might even pop in on Kit, who of course has to work the First Friday stuff downtown, as she owns a, you know, store there.

Also, someone has moved into Peg’s. They’re busy unpacking and I think building something in the back, there. I’d introduce myself but every time I’ve seen them they look busy or I’m in a robe, so.

I’d better get to work. I have so much to do there that I forget to go pee. By the end of the day lately, my eyes are exhausted. They’re like, no to make us see to drive home. We done seeing.

Eye talk. I don’t know why eyes talk like cats. Especially 52-year-old eyes.

See you. BAH.
Joob

The dodgy tip

It was laundry. That was the smell [see yesterday’s post, ya boob].

Apparently I washed a load of clothes back when I was on the phone with Martha Washington, and I’d forgotten to put those clothes in the dryer, so for 8 centuries they were festering there in the damp, and it’s been warm out.

Guess what’s going now. Is it the washer?

The other news is that for the past three weeks or more, I’ve had a dilemma that I couldn’t tell you about.

Another company wanted me. They desired me. I was IN DEMAND!

It’s a publishing company I’ve freelanced for since 2012. I’m certain you recall March of 2012, when I had a giant project due for them.

Ah, yes, June. That giant–GET OUT’CHER OWN ASS AND CARRY ON, JUAN.

Anyway, I’ve worked for them on and off ever since, and several weeks ago the executive editor wanted to meet in real life, finally, so we got up one night and I thought, “I wonder if she wants a job at my company.”

People are always trying to work at my company. People were always crossing rooms to talk to Maxine (When Harry Met Sally™).

But she wasn’t. She was trying to get me over to her. She wanted me to be a senior editor, and be all fancy, and so on.

So for three weeks, I’ve had that opportunity in front of me, and I had to think about where I work now, and what it’d be like there. So these past few weeks, when I’ve been being hilarious

Let me try that sentence anew.

So these past few weeks, when you’ve smiled wanly at me every once in awhile, I’ve been consumed with the idea that I might switch jobs. I even considered moving to Winston-Salem, where I’d be closer to said publishing house.

But in the end, I stayed at my company. For I like it there, and I’ve been there seven years, and it’s six minutes away. I fit in. Kind of.

Then once I made my final decision, I had to take work home this weekend. Taaa-daaaaa!

For it IS the weekend, for me. We have Good Friday off, and THANK YOU, WEIRD BIBLE BELT. We even got to leave at 3:00 yesterday, although I stayed till about 3:45 to try to get more work done, and THANK YOU, WEIRD JUNE BELT.

As he was leaving, my boss’s boss, fmr., tried to out-Easter-pun me. He’s known as the pun MASTER at work, but walked away, defeated, when I came back at him with,

“Why are you so cross? You’d think it was Maunday, not Thursday.”

Nailed it.

So because I’d had a stressy, thinky several weeks, and because it was warm out, and because we were out at 3:00, I headed downtown. To drive all the old men crazy.

Dear June: GET.OVER.THAT.LINE.

I like to go downtown, so to speak. First of all, the mental status of old men is important to me, and also because it keeps growing and changing, so to speak. I can make anything dirty. What is wrong with me? Perhaps the old men have driven me crazy.

On the drive to find parking, I saw two coworkers and then also two young girls kissing against their car, a thing that likely did drive all the old men crazy.

I admired the sites beyond young-girl love, and I also shopped and didn’t buy anything. You’re welcome, fledgling downtown Greensboro!

They have all these cool new stores now over in the once-dodgy end of downtown, a place I never went unless I was desperate to get to the bakery that was way down at the dodgy tip. But now none of it’s dodgy anymore!

I stopped at store (not the store above. That place above is super cool) and had The World’s Worst Tarot Reading®, where I was told my Workers Comp claim will come out in my favor (??) and that I feel trapped in my marriage (??) and won’t move from Greensboro due to my four kids (!!?!).

So.

Do you feel it’s possible that tarot cards are bullshit?

Oh, she also told me three people are very critical of me right now and FUCK YOU, THREE PEOPLE.

Eventually I joined my coworkers for a drink, and I really had a good time, and then when I went home I saw other coworkers on Instagram, drinking at another downtown bar, and I was all, Was there a cooler, subversive happy hour that I was not privy to?

FUCK YOU, OTHER SUBVERSIVE COOLER DRINKERS.

Anyway, now that it’s my day off, I have to go to the grocer, as apparently I need to shop in 1930s London. Maybe I’ll even go to the greengrocer.

My alarm went off today, because I have it set to go off M–F and this is F, but I shut it off and said to Edsel, “You know what we get to do today, Eds? We get to sleep in.” And I swear to you he did his dog sigh/moan and put his snout on my neck and we slept like that for another hour.

Anyway, I hafta go to the grocer because am seriously out of ERR’THANG. I have no beverages. Well, coffee. But that’s not a bev so much as an addic. But last night I had no bottles of water, no soda, no V-8. The only thing in my fridge was a disgusting black beer that Ned left here when he came to get his cat, which is NOT A EUPHEMISM.

The point is, I tried to drink it. So desperate was I. I realize I have a, you know, TAP, but blech.

That was not a successful jaunt. June’s Legend of Blackbeer.

I like how I have my earrings on with my pajamas. I’m Aladdin, over here.

I will leave you now, and wish you a good Friday.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

heeeee [is risen]

June

For me, it’s not so much March as Hobble

Rabbit, rabbit.

Why do people say that at the beginning of the month? Sarah Jessica Parker always does (she’s my Instagram friend), and because she does it, I think it’s cute, but all my life I have no idea why people say it.

But isn’t this literally a rabbit, rabbit month? Isn’t Easter this month? My calendar doesn’t tell me.

My mother got me this calendar for Christmas. It’s vintage pictures of dogs, which you’d think Edsel would rip up, given his love for other canines.

Guess who chews it instead.

Anyway, I love an Irish terrier. A friend in LA had two. They were adorable. So wiry! She rode horses, this friend did, and she’d take the Irish terriers to the stable with her, and they were thrilled.

I lived near there, and if you wanted to see my friend, you pretty much had to go to the stables. She once said they should just automatically deposit her paycheck to it.

The point is, I remember going there one night and sitting on the side, there, watching her ride under a full moon, with the hills of Burbank in the background. It’s such a cool memory. When did I go from being a peaceful person to a chaotic one?

steeelee not shur. he on fence about it. hah.

Do you think Steely Dan ever laughs, or does he more sort of just smirk?

Speaking of how I need to get out more and stop thinking about my pets, I went to see all the live-action shorts last night. Not that bermudas and gyms were dancing about.

I saw the wrestling competition between madras and culottes!

Oh, can the jorts ever dance. Could you believe?

Speaking of how there’s something wrong with me because I hang around pets too much, I went to the movies last night to see the live-action shorts. Now I’m all set for the Oscars. I’ve seen all the bitches up in there, which is how they plan to announce them.

“And now, all the bitches up in are will be announced.”

The shorts were good, although all of them were incredibly depressing. The khakis pleated with me to nominate them, but I don’t know.

June. Stop.

Really, though, when did “good” have to mean “earnestly depressing”? Can’t we just see a nice story in 20 minutes? This year’s crop included a school shooting in America, racism that lead to murder in the ’50s in the South, more murder in Somalia, and a deaf child whose parents suck ass.

These were not Richard Simmons’ cheerful ribbed shorts, man.

But now I can watch smugly, never thinking, “I wonder what this movie was about.”

Also, at work, they asked those of us who are into movies what we thought would win this year, and I don’t want to cockblock their surprise, so I won’t say which one I am, but they had us each reenact one of the movie posters of the best-picture nominees. Let’s just say I had to lie on the studio floor at work. In a dress.

I’d better go. I had some…trouble last night, in the stomach-al arena, and I wouldn’t go to work at all, but I’m in the middle of that huge project that I do at the end of every month that I launch into dramatically on the regular, and no one would be able to just pick it up and finish it, as I have my own method. So. I’ll go. I’ll hobble into work with my broken bone and queasiness, and no one will notice anyway because copy editor? Who cares?

Unless there’s a mistake. That’s how you know you’re good. When no one notices what you do. It’s odd, but it’s true.

I guess this post about seeing the shorts was short.

March on,

June

How to Have a Migraine: A Step-By-Step Guide

Yesterday morning, after I’d gotten up early and stressed own self over adding polls to this here not-blog (good participation, by the way!), I got an email.

“Can you knock this out this morning?”

I wasn’t even at work yet, and already I was anxious. It’s this big, several-tabbed Excel document that I copy edit every month, and of course copy editing is what I do, but this is several rows long, like sometimes 20 rows, and if you know from Excel, it extends all the way to the letter M.

Some squares I have to copy edit. Some I don’t. Some I have to count characters. Some I don’t. And it’s so big that I can’t see it all at once and actually proofread the words in it at the same time, so I have to blow it up and then clunk around on the thing, wondering, “Did I already read that? Did I count characters for this one?”

And always they need it in like two hours.

I keep saying, “Ideally, I’d like five hours to do this thing” but there never are five hours to be spared.

So that makes me tense every month, and there it was, the dreaded spreadsheet. And did I mention I wasn’t even at work yet?

As I was in the middle of that, someone ran up to me. “Can you look at this real fast?” It was a magazine cover. You screw that up, and you cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars to reprint.

So I stopped the scary thing to look at another scary thing, and as I was doing that, my boss’s boss, fmr., came over. “Come back in 20,” I groused, and just as I was getting that cranky sentence out, the phone rang.

“CAN I CALL YOU BACK.”

Then I finished my scary magazine cover, and my horrifyingly clunky spreadsheet, and addressed the request of my boss’s boss, fmr., and called back the poor person who’d phoned me (I explained to her all that was going on at my desk when she’d called. “You were surprisingly polite, with all that going on,” she said) and boom.

I got an email from a woman I used to work with. “I was hoping we could get a glass of wine or some coffee or something,” she said, and seeing as no one likes me (see above) I agreed immediately. “We can meet somewhere, but also I have four foster kittens at my house, if that’s a thing you’d enjoy.”

I mean, you come to my house right now, you’re gonna be covered in kittens. For some, that is paradise. We’re knocking on heaven’s door. And for others, it sucks. I don’t understand those “others,” either.

Anyway, she agreed that my pad was the place to be.

Meanwhile, I got an immediate-turnaround, emergency article, and it was all financial info that I didn’t understand, and unfortunately for me, there seemed to be a par-tayyy going on at another desk, with everyone talking and laughing, and I was totally Cinderella with her headphones on, tryina concentrate and sweep the hearth.

At 1:00, I finally got done, and headed home for lunch. I’d had one piece of toast all day, and I was feeling decidedly peckish.

But you know how your house seems okay until you know someone is coming over? “Aw, man, I should change the throw rug in the bathroom. Man, I should sweep this floor.”

Next thing you know, almost an hour had passed, and I STILL HAD MY COAT ON, and was taking out the recycling and scrubbing the stove top and oh my god.

I was already late for returning to work when I realized I couldn’t find two of the kittens.

I was missing goddamn Lexi.

And motherfucking Vicki, the tortoiseshell. Hey, June, why don’t you recover that chair.

Anyway, having had cats m’whole life, I wasn’t too worried. I looked under chairs, under desks, behind squeezy things.

No cats.

Matt the tabby and Trixie the black one were in their room, being good cats.

MY COAT STILL ON, I started shining a flashlight under things, and by the way, did you ever have your lights off and shine a flashlight on your hardwoods?

MOTHER OF GOD with the fur everywhere. I mean, maybe it’s because lately I’ve had nine fricking animals here, but good lord.

I wrote my boss. Current. “Minor emergency, working from home.” And then, even though I’d gotten everything done that was due, I did work. I figured maybe if I sat still, they’d come out.

Then I started having dreadful thoughts. What if I’d washed them with Edsel’s bed? What if I’d taken them out with the trash? I actually went out and searched the trash.

By the end of the day, I was exhausted and worried. “Ima get a migraine,” I thought, because I also hadn’t eaten, and I know the kind of day I had was like a poster: How To Get a Migraine.

Right at 5:00, I heard a mew. I’d been sitting on the couch, proofreading things, and when I get to work today, Ima be bored stiff, I got so far ahead of self. Really, you get a lot more work done at home.

Anyway, “mew!”

Where was it? Where was I hearing it? Was it outside? Oh, no, was it?

“mew!”

Those mother

FUCKERS

were under the sink. And then of course I had to worry they ate poison, but if they did they seem to be thriving on it, so.

My chins and me carrying Lexi back to her room. Fucking adventure cat.

Later, my pal from work came by, and enjoyed her some kittens and an indifferent Iris. Or was appalled by them. Also, I did not ask her if I could put her in said not-blog, so I hope she does not kick my ass.

It’s possible she was more appalled than happy.

Right as she was leaving, I felt the first twinge. It ended up being a two-pill migraine, and I went to bed about 9:00. Felt dreadful.

As I was drifting to sleep spooning Steely Dan (don’t tell anyone), I heard a

“meep!”

IMG_4983 2.jpg Fucking adventure tortie, seen here with her good pal and biggest fan, Edsel, had escaped the room, despite the 47 pillows I’ve crammed in the space. Like a day in the sink wasn’t fun enough. Now she has to creep about in the night.

So that was my day, and am sincerely hoping today is more copasetic, especially given that I have a migraine hangover.

Searchingly,

June

I forgot a damn title

In case anyone was worried sick, my presentation went fine. I had to present to the rest of the creatives–that’s what they call us: “creatives.” I had to show the rest of the CREATIVES why copy editing is necessary and why it takes so damn long.

We copy editors get a lot of, “Can you look at this real quick?” which is just exactly the opposite of what we do, so no. We can’t.

For the presentation, I wrote The World’s Worst Paragraph, with every error, every fact you have to research, every is-this-written-in-the-client’s-voice issue, and all the first person/third person woes you can imagine, to show how just one paragraph might take us two hours to complete.

“Can you look at this real fast? Just do a quick read.” Madre de Dios.

Anyway, it went well, and people laughed, which was my goal. I even used Oprah’s “A new day is ON THE HORIZON” line, so yay. Everyone needs more Oprah impreshes.

I also forced all the other copy editors, or CEs, and we’re called amongst the CREATIVES, to wear black and red, the official colors of copy editing. Behold The Poet, who even threw in her bunny socks.

I’ve fatted out of the red shirt I’d planned to wear, which was unwelcome news. But you see I made up for it in accessories.

The Poet is going to the opera, as opposed to the Oprah, this Friday. They stream New York operas to the movie theater, and you can buy a ticket for nine hundred dollars and watch at the movies. I’d expressed interest in it, but in a stunning display of How We Both Are, I can’t join The Fancy Cello-Playing Poet this weekend, because that day I have drag queen bingo.

So.

In other news, I have this one cat named Steely Dan.

Have you heard about him? For he is ridiculous.

So far this year, it’s been damn cold. Un-The-South-y cold. And the only good part of that is that my wandering Jew stays home.

Steely Dan is not, in fact, a Jew. I always thought Francis might be. Edsel sure is. Steely Dan is all Presbyterian. Maybe working-class Catholic. With zero guilt.

Anyway, he’s been home a lot due to the cold, playing with that giant computer box that he enjoys so much that I’m loath to put it away, and fetching his mice till they all disappear and I have to go buy new ones. It’s lovely having him here, like a wayward husband who has a broken collarbone and has to stay in or something.

The point is, he chews. He chews clothes. He’s a clothes chewer. I’ve never had a cat who did this, but I’ve had other cats who left their mother too soon (See: Jewish Francis) and developed other odd allegedly soothing habits. Fran liked to chew plastic, and also paw euphorically at it while swinging his head from side to side like Stevie Wonder. He’d even eat plastic.

You’ve no idea how many times that cat swished into a room with dry cleaner bags half out his ass. Well. Like, twice. After that we got rid of all dry cleaner bags as soon as they got to the house. Remember when we all had to dry clean everything?

Have I ever told you the “Hello, Garden?” story? It involves doing an impression of an Asian accent, after all that yesterday.

…Actually, there used to be a punchline to this story, but now so many years have passed that I can’t remember it. Still, I used to live in Seattle near this place called Ace Cleaner, which was technically Ace Cleaners but they’d always call themselves Ace Cleaner when they called. And called they did, as I was never getting my clothes once they were ready. Because cost.

As a busy important receptionist at the time, a welcome addition to my wealthy existence was having to dry clean business clothes, which I had to wear every day. I can wear jeans to work now, and it’s funny to think of the long purple blazers over long black skirts because hello ’90s, and also the black hose hose hose out my ass like Fran’s dry cleaner bags. So many pair of hose. We MAY have had casual Friday, but I don’t think so.

Anyway, I was forever taking stuff to Ace Cleaner and then getting the fairly annoyed call. “Hello, Garden. This Ace Cleaner. Your clothes are ready” answering machine message. Because hello ’90s.

They always called me by my last name, but slightly mispronounced. And then I’d go there and just pick up one item, as it was all I could afford. I’m certain I wasn’t annoying at all.

I think they paid me $21,000 a year at that job, and insisted I wear fancy clothes that needed to be dry cleaned. What a rip. They DID pay for my bus card every month, though, so that’s good.

Oh my god, anyway.

So of course we don’t KNOW what tragedy befell Steely Dan’s motherless self, but we DO know that those two adorable gay college students saw a teensy, barely able to walk yet, barely legal all nude Steely Dan was toddling up the sidewalk in the rain two summers ago. So he left mom at a young age for sure, and thank heavens those boys took him in and cared for him, not knowing he’d grow up to be a panther with commitment issues.

So, whether it’s because his mom left too soon or he’s just a dick, Steely Dan eats clothes, a realization it took me awhile to have. I was all Ace Cleaner with my “just one” item of clothing suddenly having holes a’plenty, and I’d be all, that damn dryer.

That damn moth.

That damn hole punch I got stuck in and forgot.

Eventually I figured it out. I may have actually seen him ecstatically chewing chonies or whatever, but in general he tends to do his clothes chaw when I’m not around. It’s a private moment for The Dan.

So at this point, I’ve Anne Franked my clothes to the Nth degree. I hide the laundry baskets in the spare-room closet with the real door. Yes, he can open doors, but he hasn’t figured out that particular door contains a clothing smorgasbord yet.

I also keep my bedroom door shut AND a spare medicine cabinet–something we all have–shoved against the doors to the closet in there, as they are swingy, hello-I’m-in-a-Western double doors with no knob, for some reason.

Every once in awhile I’ll nap with the bedroom door open and I’ve heard from time to time a soft shove, and there SD will be, just starting to move the damn medicine cabinet to get to his closet.

Because the thing is, see, he loves my bedroom. It’s his home. It’s where he spent his childhood.

When he was a kitten, I kept him back in that room a lot. His canned kitten food was presented to him there, and while he ate, I had to shut the door so Edsel wouldn’t burst over and eat all the kitten food.

Then, unlike other kittens who’ve resided in my room, he was content to leap onto the rocking chair and just hang out alone rather than find a way to get back to all of us in the rest of the house. We matter little to SD, in the grand scheme. And now his goal in life is to reside in his old room, maybe casually meander to the food fest that is behind my swinging Western door closet.

So I’ve been careful to not let him have more clothes to eat, and I’ve even given him a whole SD Chewing Shirt that he’d already ruined. One month my Stitch Fix came, and I left it all in the box, and he got in there and helped himself to a whole shirt that I had to then buy already ruined.

So after I fed him poison razor blades and ran him over repeatedly with the car and he sprang back to life like the Friday the 13th guy, I gave him the damn shirt to chew at his leisure.

News flash: All the time, every moment, is Steely Dan’s leisure.

THE POINT IS, somehow this week, I left out ONE SOCK, one of my new soft Christmas socks with the rubbery stuff on the bottom so I don’t slide, and I discovered SD’s assigned shirt that he’d LEFT ALONE, next to my NEW SOCK chewed to bits.

And that is why I drink.

Love,

Sockless June

P.S. My new computer has new effects on its webcam, a feature I’ve been wanting to show you and forget to show you. You know how I am. See above.

Photo on 1-6-18 at 8.55 PM #2.jpg — Comic-book effect

Photo on 1-6-18 at 8.51 PM #7.jpg — Andy Warhol effect

Photo on 1-6-18 at 8.56 PM #4 — Steely Dan is evil effect

Busy executive

I have to give a presentation today at work, so I’m distracted. But when I return to you, to your arms, where will hug in the dark of night, remind me to tell you about sitting next to The World’s Worst Person at the manicure place.

Demonstrably,

June

Proofreader’s gang sign I made up. It’s a carat. Google fucking it. Also, note the remaining dregs of the Dean & Deluca candy ALWAYS NEARBY. Why so chubby, gansta?

June pops her head out of the cupboard (TM Dick Whitman’s mom. RIP)

A few things. A few matters. Some housekeeping. Don’t you fucking hate people who say that? Is there anything you want to read less about than someone’s “housekeeping matters”? I mean, other than how little you want to hear the “let me back up” details.

I didn’t get to go to my work Christmas party. I had to work, like I was Cinderella. And all the powers that be said to me,”You’d better not stay here and work. We’d better see you at that Christmas party.” But I knew, in my heart of hearts, that I really had to get this thing done or it wouldn’t get done on time. I have to work on it today, too.

Then the next day I felt very sad for self, looking at people’s Instagram shots of our very lovely party at the lovely country club.

Alo, regarding my windfall from our last conversation/poll, June did something responsible.

[I’ll give everyone a moment to gather him- or herself.] [Like there are any hims reading this.]

When I get paid on the 1st, I use that paycheck to cover utilities, credit cards (fmr., as the only credit card I have now is the vet one, which, hello, keeps having a balance and why? Why, one wonders), the car payment, bullshit like that.

And why do I have to pay for electricity AND gas? Aren’t they the same thing, practically? Annoying.

Then the 15th, I pay my mortgage. Technically it’s due on the 1st, but they give you a “grace period” of the 16th. Why not just say it’s due on the 16th, then? I don’t know.

Anyway, I refinanced m’car recently, and they charge me less if I let them do an automatic withdrawal, and they insist on doing that on the 15th. So for several sad months now, my car payment and my mortgage come out of the same paycheck, leaving me with about 11 dollars that pay period.

So because I was flush this time? I paid my mortgage AND all my regular bills, to get myself out of that cycle, and now the first of the month will be sort of sad, but the 15th will always be really good, so I can save

HAHAHAHAHAHA.

save some of that flush-15th money to tide me over for the billsy 1st.

God, June, tell us more. Tell us about a couple housekeeping matters.

Also,

Who sent me this? Weeks ago this was on my doorstep, with treats for the pets and so on, and it was lovely, but no note.

And who sent me this? Came with a note about being glad I had a cyst, but no signature.

Whoever you anonymous gift-givers are, thank you!!

And finally, last night I started my end-of-the-year video, and even though I have 28 more days of this year, I am presenting it to you now, because really, what is going to possibly happen that I’ll need to include it in my veeeedeo? Hmmm? What?

Every time there’s a picture of a table, it’s from yet another date I went on that proved unfruitful. If you wanna see it full screen, click on the video’s title, and it’ll take you to YouTube where you can choose “full screen” in the lower right.

Sigh.

Sighs matter,

Junederella

The one where June misses Halloween

For years, we’ve been doing this project at work that is what you might call detailed.

If you’re a proofreader or a copy editor, all three of you, it has everything that takes time. Names you need to check? Yes. Numbers? Yes. Details that’re listed in several places and they all must match? Yes. Fact-checking up the ying? Oui.

Is it really important, so you can’t mess up? Yes, yes, yes.

I hadn’t worked on this thing in years, but last month I did, and found all sorts of errors that would excite only another copy editor (a word was lowercase in a few places, then capped in a few others, then…ready, three copy editors?…BACK TO CAPS AGAIN!) and I was extremely in love with self. This is the shit that gives us life.

So, I found all these errors, and was excited, then I got the thing again at blueline and found an extra word (“to”) in a paragraph.

What’s a blueline, June? This is riveting, we promise.

It’s the final, final version of something before it goes to print. And lots of what we do at work anymore doesn’t even GET printed, but print is scary. You screw up with print, that mistake is there forever. Or worse, that mistake means you have to reprint, and that’s never good.

The point is, because this thing is so huge and detailed and so on, I worked with the manager of the project and we worked out a schedule to determine when I’d read this thing, and when I’d again reread it, because detailed.

That schedule started yesterday. I’d had it on my calendar for weeks: Big project starts today. I was supposed to take all day yesterday and all day today on it.

Then next weekend I take it home and read it again.

When I got to work yesterday, it wasn’t ready yet, as everyone working on it is on business trips. They’re working on it from said trips, so it’d be with me any second.

“Hey, June, here’s another project. Can you work on this today?”

Well.

The thing is, I was just sitting there waiting, unsure of when it’d get to me. So I hemmed and I hawed, and I finally took the project, which turned out to be (wait for it) a lot of stuff, and detailed, and so on.

Naturally, the second I began, I got an email. “You can start that other big project now!”

Yeah.

Then I got two other emails from two other accounts I work on. “Here’s some work. Can we also discuss it in detail?”

And, “Here’s a project. Can you not just edit it, but write this and this? Here’s what I was thinking and what I want and…”

I had to write both those poor folks back and say, I can’t even read this whole email right now.

So I worked. And worked. I hadn’t put on my Frida costume yet, because everything that could have gone wrong yesterday morning DID go wrong, including THE CITY SHUTTING DOWN MY FREEWAY EXIT to get to work, so the plan was I’d get dressed at lunch.

Naturally I worked through lunch, then when I did get away, I had to run errands, so okay. I wouldn’t dress up.

“The costume contest is starting on the dock,” I heard the front desk announce, at 2:00. For the first time in my seven Halloweens there, I did not watch the contest, much less participate, as I had planned. I don’t even know what people dressed up as.

At 4:00, kids were coming for candy, so around 3:00 I just took my computer and went home, so I could work in peace. I was that curmudgeon.

Kit was supposed to come over last night, help me hand out the candies, and I had to cancel on her.

And by the way, just like my morning, everything that COULD go wrong with me getting the work and doing the work, did go wrong.

And truth be told, by 6:00, I was done. I could not make myself think any more. I’d been thinking so intensely. So I shut off the computer and lay blankly for awhile, till

“Trick or treat!”

“Wooo! WOO WOO WOOO WO!” snarled Eds.

If Edsel were a normal dog, we could do things like I could dress up as Little Red Riding Hood (Medium-to-Large, Depending, Red Riding Hood) and he could dress as the big, bad wolf. He could sit next to me nicely, with his gummy fangs or whatever, and everyone who came to trick or treat could say “Oh, there’s that cute dog that we pet on his walks” and so on.

would like salty dog, or maybe banana dakkeri.

Instead, Edsel dressed as banished-to-the-back-room guy.

wate. dis not jist for blawg? eds really back heer?

I did not photograph trick or treaters, even though you want me to be the weird woman who photographs every fucking thing, because how, exactly, was I going to ask, “Can I photograph your children and put them online?”

The best parts were the one kid who said, “Oh, please, not a Snickers.” I gave that child coal I had left over from my own Christmas stocking.

And then this very small person just started barreling in. “You have a doggie!” she said, and my reputation precedes me. “Yes, I–”

“I want to see the doggie!” Her parents were all Ebony, don’t go in that lady’s house. Ebony didn’t give a shit. She wanted to see the doggie.

And finally, I saw Ava’s family. Of course, I recognized Jane right away, with her June hair and her attitude. In years past, she’s been Katniss or whoever that is, and other popular costumes of the day, and I’m all, Why aren’t you dressed in a pumpkin head or a plastic mask from the grocery store the way I would have been at your age?

But this year, she was just barely dressed as anything, and was taking a smaller child around, so I guess she’s aging out of this process. Jane is, I’d estimate, between seven and 19 years old.

Her brother I met way, way back, when I just had Tallulah. He’s the kid I ran into on a walk once, when Talu had been rolling in the blackberries or boysenberries or whatever the fuck grows in my yard that she used to roll in and get purple spots.

“I wish I had a yellow and blue dog,” I remember him saying. He asked about Lu’s breed for awhile, and told me about his dog. “What kind of dog is he?” I asked. I hadn’t met his dog yet, who in fact is an enormous, calm, steel-gray 100% pit who is Ava’s best friend.

“Oh, he’s a pet bull and a beagle,” that kid said at the time. And that is when I knew he was full of the shit.

The point is, a group of teenaged boys came to the door, boys who really should not even be trying to trick or treat, and he had cool hair, but I didn’t register that was old pet-bull-and-a-beagle, there.

“Ava’s gotten really big,” he said to me, and right then I knew. Oh, it’s that kid!

He’s somewhere between 11 and 32.

So, in reality, I guess I had the kind of Halloween most adults have who don’t work at a creative agency. I mean, I worked all day and handed out candy at night and The End. BUT I’M USED TO COSTUMES AND PARTIES AT WORK.

I gotta go. I’m slap in the middle of that project, and when you think of June today, and you will, think of me bent unergonomically over details. Deets. June checks the deets.

I know that seems scary in general, but when it comes to copy editing, I am stellar at the deets. Copy editing and stalking boyfriends: June is the deets master at those.

Okay, boo.

You’re so already out, Eds.

Luff,

Joooon

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