Today we had "Sharing Day." I missed the first one because it was my birthday (though I did my "share," i.e. crafting Power Point, during the office "birthday party" the day before, but I got myself all ready to share again!

Things I found out about my coworkers:

(a) After my boss's kid showed his favorite shark toy, another coworker revealed that he owns a random shark head mask that he just happened to have around the house. He announced that he was going to go read to third graders soon, and then a bunch of Baby Shark jokes erupted.

(b) After the whole Baby Shark thing, said coworker said that "I'm not very interesting during work," but did show a picture of himself all freaked out hanging out of a helicopter and said he was pondering using that shot as his photo on email.

(c) Our newest temp showed us pictures of hiking around Lake Berryessa(?) and I was all, "That's gorgeous graffiti" about one tunnel. She was all, "I didn't do that." Later after there was some discussion of an underground city in the area, someone was all, "So, you know the location of Atlantis and never shared?"

(d) The coworker making cracks about Atlantis showed us a collection of silly science memes.

(e) Another coworker is randomly growing celery and stuff like that.

(f) Penguin Girl showed off her geek toys-- "I"m a kid they allowed to give a salary to--" and showed off her lightsabers and her giant Thanos glove (seen recently on Brooklyn Nine Nine in the latest competition episode). "I can't make it snap--" she said, and I said, "That's probably all for the best that you can't make it snap." She later said, "I don't have pets so I can spend more money on toys."

(g) Some folks, of course, showed off animals. BigBoss tried to get her dog to get into her lap and said, "She's kind of high maintenance. I think she's neurotic." Boss's other kid showed photos of their old dog on his iPad because "photos don't pee in houses."

Later I had the "but your emails" meeting this morning, which boiled down to "please keep them short but sweet" (no, I am not going to do this, don't tell me that someone who has to read a chemical engineering textbook can't read an email because it's too long) and "okay, we'll actually start sending comms about these things now." I restrained myself from saying "hey, I asked for comms for like, 2 months here." And they were all "what do you mean, it takes two weeks to approve comms? We can send them within like, hours," and I was all "see here where it says it takes two weeks to approve?" Ohhhhhhh. Then I had Another Damn Thing dropped on my head, and two Important Document Orders that must be done RIGHT NOW, of course. THE EMAILS are around 100 right now and someone wanted me to go through every single one, opening every single attachment, to find their thing. And I was all, l ABSOLUTELY CANNOT FREAKING DO THAT RIGHT NOW, I CAN'T I CAN'T I CAN'T.

I had to do FOUR Important Document Orders by the end of the day, and I wasn't even able to finish the last one due to reasons beyond my control. I did about three emails today. Tigress will kill me. Gonna spend the rest of the weekend drunk, y'all.

I read an amusing article about reviewing your home like it was a hotel.

Yemi, my partner in running Yarn Club (work knitting group), decided that now she's okay with Zoom since they improved their security and wants to start up meetings again. So there's some good news.

After work I watched this lecture by Meredith Goldstein, an advice columnist I like. However, she thinks more positively of her commenters than I do--she said some things like "once they realized it was a girl reading and not a guy, they'd stop telling him to buck up," and I was all, O RLY? Because I like her very thoughtful advice, and then she has to be all, "Readers? What do you think?" and then there's a complete cesspool of assholes ripping the letter writer five new assholes for 11 pages. I really can't stand her commenters. Ah well, I guess, nothing much you can do if assholes gonna asshole and it gets you hits these days.

Now I am watching the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert, of course. (Yes, Scott is aware of this going on per Wednesday, no idea if he has any ability to watch under the no-Internet-at-home, work-is-now-moving circumstances, I was afraid to ask.)

I heard from Melinda. I think she is feeling wanky. Definitely said she was tired of this. I am trying not to think about that since there is no escape. Projects, projects, projects, as ever.

I read the sides for the Femme Fatale auditions. Some scripts I wasn't particularly feeling, but I did really enjoy the daughter character in a play called "Dropping Bombs" (reminded me of my life), enjoyed the hysterical Courtney in "In The Woods" who keeps freaking out that she's going to turn into The Blair Witch Project, and kinda got into the "Heart of Oak" leading lady. Other plays I signed up to audition for involved robot women (I...didn't think I had for that one?), one just a monologue play, I dunno if I'm the right one for that, there's a couple hanging out in a diner that I wasn't really feeling so much, and I wasn't sure what to make of "Cyrano on the Moon" even though I think it's an interesting concept. We'll see.

In other news, I made an inventory of all the official Meal Food left in the house, as opposed to say, snacks, cookies, candy, and alcohol.

Freezer:
* 2 frozen pizzas
* 5 Marie Callender's dinners
* 1 chicken marsala dinner
* 1 big bag of fried rice
* 1 big box of fried rice (maybe 2 dinners there)
* 1/2 bag of pizza rolls (maybe 2 dinners there)
* 1/2 bag of popcorn chicken (maybe 2 dinners there)

Cabinets:
* 1 small bag of rice to cook
* 2 cans of clam chowder
* 1 Campbell's chicken soup (I had a bunch of chicken soup in case I came down with coronavirus)
* 2 Lipton's chicken noodle soups
* 11 packs of ramen
* 2 noodle dishes
* 1 box of butternut squash soup (probably about 2 meals there)
* 1 box of stuffing (about 1.5 meals)
* I jumbo box of stuffings with 6 stuffings in them
(note: have about enough butter left in the house to make 6 more stuffings)
* 6 Cupanoodles.

So that's about 41 meals left there, roughly speaking. That's doing pretty good! I am also really good at playing Scavenger Hunt in the house with food these days. Found a lot more nonalcoholic, fancy drinks in the back of the liquor cabinet that are actually drinkable (and then well, a bunch of weird little flavoring things that aren't...why do I have these?!) too. Even a s'mores kit thing, whatever that is? And I found some frozen bread in the back, yay.

I have also thought of a crazy idea for the cast party for something to do, though I don't know if anyone else would want to do it or not. (Lord knows suggesting "let's put on our own show!" got me a lot of silence with the Winters bunch.) I shall have to float the idea by and see. The idea is a semi-improvised-ish idea called "A Turn Around The Room:* Jane Austen in Quarantine." A group of ladies who lunch and drink over Zoom get the bright idea to attempt to role play/cosplay Jane Austen-ish life over Zoom because it's not like Jane Austen characters do a whole lot of physical action, any excuse to dress up, etc.** They debate whether or not they're going to re-enact the books and/or do something like "Austenland" or those Jane Austen live action role play events, and then one of them gets the bright idea that Gentlemen Callers need to be invited into the game....

* I remember reading in Pride and Prejudice that the ladies would "take a turn around the room" and I thought it was ridiculous then, and now I'm doing the same damn thing.
** Though of course, the quality of the cosplay depends on what people have in their wardrobes.

I figure that the conceit is that it's going to be bad Austen roleplay, both what with the issue of Zoom and whatever people have in their wardrobes, plus reality, etc. sneaking in.

* At least one female character should be super pedant-y about the whole thing and nitpicking and very rigidly follows Austen style/wardrobe.
* At least one female character should be at least somewhat limited in her Austen knowledge or be all, "I had to read Emma like, four times in school."
* At least one female character may be into the idea because they are normally a Renfaire person, may mix the two up.
* At least one female character should really be into the idea of Emma-style matchmaking.
* At least one female character should be trying, but keeps screwing up and mentioning modern things and the like.
* I have the idea that the character that says they should bring Gentlemen Callers into the game has a crush on someone and hence, has the idea. (Because well, reality sometimes writes a plot or at least inspires it.)

As for the Gentlemen Callers:
* At least one should be someone's husband who's been dragged into the game and has somewhat less enthusiasm on the concept.
* At least one should be SUPER into the idea of dressing up and role playing for ANYTHING. (Several fellows here may qualify.)
* One guy is the object of affection for the girl who got the idea to invite guys into the game. It should be ambiguous as to whether or not it's mutual, but both seem too tongue-tied to get anywhere, at least at first, which should motivate the matchmake-y one...

I confess I have ideas as to which folks in Social Distancing Virtual Readers Theater would be into these role ideas, but I'd have to see if I'm right and/or that they'd be into it?

Also not sure if I'd write scripts ahead of time or just have people act it out on the spot--that might be more fun. I'm not sure where to go with a plot beyond the crush plot/matchmaking, though.

Like, typical Jane Austen plots involve the following:
* People who seem to hit it off romantically at first and then it peters out (maybe)
* People who hate each other right off the bat and then grow into love (yes, should do)
* Dimwitted teenagers getting into dumb shit, maybe not do this with this cast
* Pushy mamas and abstracted papas (ditto, though I can think of one guy who might be good at an Austen papa).
* Secret engagements--not sure how that would work in this day and age, maybe skip
* Some kind of scandal! Wonder what would work for that?

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