journalman's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Brief Assistant (pun not intended) I broke the rules, and I'm lucky there won't be long-term consequences. THE BUILDUP At a friend's corporate Xmas party this past year, I met a very intelligent and lovely woman who I'll call Allie. Beautiful as they come� tall, slender, blonde, piercing blue-grey eyes. Half and half Scandinavian and Cherokee. Very classy, I thought. We traded telephone numbers, and after one or two unsuccessful attempts at making plans with her, I deleted her number and forgot about her. In my recent scramble to hire a few office-helpers (as opposed to putting all my eggs in one non-specializing basket), I put the word out that I was hiring. It turns out Allie was on the job search, and our mutual friend sent me her resume. She'd been on the hunt, was waiting to hear about a few full-time opportunities, was happy to work in the interim, and was also genuinely interested in a full-time offer from my firm. We spoke about the job for a few minutes on Monday, and I hired her immediately to begin a Tues/Thurs schedule. She came in yesterday, 20 minutes early and very well dressed (we even matched both colors and styles), and had a very productive first day. I was pleased that rather than 'date' or some such, we could still strike a mutually satisfying and rewarding arrangement. I shouldn�t have been so optimistic. Yesterday was her first AND her last day. On the bright side, she was the one who turned in her resignation. It may be true that she was offered her dream job last night via e-mail, or it could very well be extraordinarily embarrassed by her actions from last night. NO LOVE FOR BOOZE The single thing that has caused more direct and indirect harm to me in the past year or so has been alcohol. It�s true. I live in a drinking town, and all the bloody drinking�s taking away from my good time here. Alcohol is what triggers bi-polar rage and social inappropriateness in otherwise lovely Tramp/Sparkle. Alcohol nearly cost my friend Berry her job, if not her life. Alcohol is what made my Comair/Delta Connections (never ever again) flight a most horrifying experience. (they don�t have barf bags) Alcohol has threatened several important friendships I�ve developed, including with Shawn. And with regards to Allie, alcohol took my perfectly impressive new assistant and turned her into the bride of Frankenstein. She had seven cosmos at dinner and began slurring uncontrollably while out with 4 people from my Belize trip at a superfancy Frenchie place in midtown. Entirely inappropriate for the first day of work. Even more inappropriate was her behavior in the car as I drove her home. Let�s just say I now know what �bad naked� is. A MANHATTAN NIGHT, ALRIGHT To relate to my past entry, about the loveliness of evenings in Brooklyn, this was a Manhattan night. There were six of us at dinner, and the bill came to $ 600, before tip. I left still slightly hungry and only mildly impressed with the cooking. Julia2 from SC is in town (Belizian, crashing at Ryan�s). So there were 4 Belizians, 2 Hedge Fund people, and my drunk and gorgeous new assistant. We were in manhattan, so inevitably, we spent the night with people in suits who didn�t bother going home after work to change. I always found it to be interesting that people who live NEAR their offices (presumably for convenience, and the ability to change clothes after work) are the same people who go out after work wearing the very suits they wore to work. If you ask them where they live, they can typically point to their apartments from the venue. Are these people out of their minds? Do they have something AGAINST jeans? Call me old-fashioned, but I much prefer my Brooklyn evenings. 12:55 p.m. - 2006-09-14 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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