A Sincere Question from an Insincere Person

There is an employee at work that drives me up the wall. When I’m alone in the office, I cringe when he comes in because I know my peace and quiet will be disturbed by his incessant rambling. Even if I don’t answer him – he will continue to talk. It’s like a nervous twitch – he can’t control himself. And he doesn’t ever say anything of importance, he tries to be funny but never is, and he needs so much positive affirmation that he fishes for compliments constantly. At Christmas we were painting mugs for the clients and he held up each and every mug he did to ask if it was ok? Does it look good? I think it looks bad. You think its ok? Really? He is the kid in third grade that shamelessly begs for attention in any way possible. When people pay him a compliment he denies it over and over just so you have to keep going. In short, he is much like myself, so he bugs the crap outta me.

The other day I was in a particularly foul mood when he came in the office. I barely acknowledged him – hoping to send non verbal “don’t talk to me” vibes. He did not pick up on this, of course. Luckily his phone rang so he was distracted for a moment. He said something to the person on the line about being “juvenilely delicious” and I gritted my teeth. Seriously. Who says shit like that?

He hung up the phone and turned to me, “So how are you doing with all this?”

He was referring to my pregnancy – I’m about two weeks away from my due date so I’m used to getting questions about it. Usually the questions are how’s the baby? Or, how are you feeling? I know how to answer these questions – the baby is fine, kicking a lot, getting big. I am tired and big as a house but fine. This question was different, though. It was more sincere, and he wasn’t asking about me or the baby physically – he was asking about how I was feeling. I stopped. “Ummm, I don’t know,” I said.

“Honestly,” he said.

“A little nervous, I guess. Thanks for asking.” And I meant, I wasn’t being sarcastic or anything, it was nice to be asked.

Then he started singing “you and me baby ain’t nothing but mammals so lets do it like they do in the discovery channel,” and I was back to hating him. But maybe not quite as much.

The Reason we Had Kids...

...was so we could torture them and capture it on video.
The first time she tried this salsa I thought her head was going to explode. But! She wanted to do it again so we could tape it and watch it on the computer. Already so willing to suffer for the sake of the camera - I see a reality TV show in this girl's future.