Old Wallpaper: Pants On Fire

I'm not interfering with this post at all except to urge you to note the date of publication and that I was at that time still The World's Most Dissatisfied And Underpaid Office Manager Of All Time Ever Amen. Enjoy - I even cracked myself up when rereading this one.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Pants On Fire

I just want all of you to know that my office is very cold. Very, very cold, all the time. No, really. My office is colder than your office. Full stop, the end. I win forever.

In the summer, the air conditioning is on, and it never gets above 65 degrees in here. In the winter, the heat is set at 69 - such a concession! - and so of course it never gets above 65 degrees in here.

Others in the office don't seem to mind the cold, but I am weak, and wimpy, and thin-blooded, and a smoker, so that when I get up from my chair to do something, there are numerous popping, crackling, and snapping noises. Those noises are my bones, shattering from the icy frozen tundra conditions in this office. I am my own little old-lady percussion system, right in one wimpy, cold body.

I have a little space heater that sits under my desk. In all weathers, in all seasons, my little space heater is on full blast, warming my legs and hips and stomach. Unfortunately, it does not warm my whole person; my back is left out in the howling winds and numbing chill that is this office, as are my upper torso, my arms, and my fingers. So of course to make up for this, I sit as close to on top of the little space heater as I possibly can. I go home at night with legs baked lobster-pink. You can almost smell the frying bacon.

But today I think I went too far.

I am wearing a pair of my brother's Navy uniform pants. (Don't talk to me about it. I know. But he really was very young and skinny when he wore these.) They are comfortable, but they are also some kind of poly blend, which means they retain heat.

So today, straddling my little space heater, as I got more and more absorbed in what I was doing, I didn't notice how warm my legs and stomach were getting. Until the zipper on the pants finally became superheated enough to leave a tattoo of itself on my stomach, and the pants leg tried to heat-seal itself to my shin.

And then I got up, walked outside very quickly, and did a spectacular little dance for the neighborhood, thumbs inside the waistband of muh britches (to keep the zipper away from my belly), legs kicking out (to keep the molten fabric away from my shins).

I realized at that moment that I probably looked just like a leprechaun. A tall blonde leprechaun. On crack. Doing a kicky little dance on the front porch of my office.

I wonder exactly how many people think I'm a big nutbar now?

Oh, well.

You're welcome for the visual.