A Pigeon Flew into My Head

March 2, 2008

Breaking news: Sanja is a pothead.

Yes, from the same source that broke the news of the impending and ill- fated John/Paris Hilton
merger, I now bring you the news that Sanja is on the ganja. I didn't see this coming. Last week
Sanja got a group together to go see her friends perform live music on the Lower East Side, and she was
after pot the whole time (Side note: the first performer was an elderly man singing a lively song titled
"Can't Get It Up Blues." This is not a joke. The song included the line: "It's a beautiful day but it won't come
out to play.") As you can imagine this was a classy joint.

Sanja came with her husband. Yes, husband. Many of you offered up that Sanja may be trying to
seduce me, but Sanja is off the market. I'm sure this is upsetting news for many of you, but try not to take
it too hard. Incidentally, her husband Ben is a Jack Black/Seth Rogen hybrid. This I did not expect. Ben
had a jolly disposition, probably from all the pot.

Now, a respite for Sanja. Let me pause, instead, to reflect on the state of my own life. This reflection
was precipitated by the fact that a pigeon flew straight into my head the other day. We didn't run
into each other...no, the bird took flight but a few feet from me and missed his mark (which was presumably
the sky) and hurled his dirty pigeon body right into my hair. Which got me to thinking about my life.

I am 28 and I live in the common room of a college dorm. I sleep in a twin bed. I was pirating Internet
from an unknown neighbor but they just password protected the connection, so now I have no Internet at
home. My DVD player only plays movies in black and white (an odd phenomenon that I can't make heads or
tails of). Oh, and I have bunny ears on my TV instead of cable. Yes, it's all true. Try to contain your
envy. Actually, you might not be able to contain your envy when you hear the rest. I live in my parents'
basement when I'm not living in student housing (on "frat row" nonetheless). I was so stressed at work
the other day that I was happy, thrilled actually, when I got a splinter, as this diversion was far
preferable to my work tasks. When splinters are seen as a blessing, things have gone terribly astray. And
to top it all off, I am unpaid and living in one of the most expensive cities in the world. So the pigeon
flying into my head seemed fitting, giving the other conditions of my life as they currently stand.

I am not the only one who is miserable. Bill, the teenager and one of my favorite co-workers, was so
bored the other day that he started lighting his shoes on fire in the studio. This is not a lie. I don't
think that John would approve of this, since John does not approve of even benign behaviors which do not
involve flames. I like that Bill.

But back to Sanja. Last week brought a further supply of strangely cryptic comments directed toward me which
I could not decipher. Cryptic comments and winks. I casually mentioned to Sanja that I think James "the
foreman" is nice, to which Sanja winked and said "things are not as they appear." To which I looked at
her blankly. Sanja seems to think that she and I are in on some information that I, at the least, am
decidedly not.

I did learn that during her first week Sanja was told by John's right-hand man Chris the following pearl of
wisdom: "While you're here, don't think." This was apparently in response to Sanja doing some thinking in
the studio that led her astray. I will be sure not to make that mistake! Sanja does make some mistakes
though. And by some I mean tons of them. A week ago Sunday (when I had the pleasure of working from 9-4
with a very hostile John) John pulls me aside and tells me that he's going to need me to check all of
Sanja's accounting on his receipts. He says: "She's good, but she makes a lot of mistakes." Which I
assumed was just John being rude. Turns out that in this case the man has a point. You may recall that
Sanja and I have been assigned to the ongoing task of receipts for weeks on end, and have been dividing this
task up fairly evenly. Problematically, I am coming to find, Sanja has not tallied ANY of the pages
correctly. Ok, a few here and there, but in the sea of hundreds of pages of numbers there is scarcely a
page that has been done properly. Hence my job to "check" the work. Which, in this case, means re-do
every single page. I don't really understand how things went so astray. I am not good at math at all,
but we are not doing advanced calculations here. We are tallying receipts. Now, I will say that this task
has proved much harder than one would think, factoring in exchange rates, handwritten notes, etc. But
seriously, I think Sanja was high the entire time she had hold of the books. They are a disaster, and since
Friday was Sanja's last day (sad but true) the ax is going to come down on me. (Side note: Sanja and I have
come across some receipts from what appears to be a lap dance establishment in Asia, called "Cica Cica
Boom." We're not sure where exactly those should be filed).

Sanja has been on thin ice for awhile. Apparently, before I began working Sanja told John that she was
going to India for three weeks and would be missing work. So it was unfortunate for Sanja when a good
friend of Joan's saw Sanja making a presentation at a photo event in NYC later that week.
(Note to Sanja: do not be blatantly visible in the NYC photography community when you are supposed to
be in your homeland). Anyway, Joan mentioned this off-hand to another employee, who (unexpectedly) ran
directly to John with the news. John did not like this. In fact, he disliked it so much that he
demanded that Joan give him the phone number of the friend who had the Sanja sighting. Joan
absolutely did not want to give up the information, but was basically forced into it at gunpoint. Well
there was no gun but you get the point. The long and short of it was that, because our studio is insane,
this girl was called, the Sanja sighting confirmed, and Sanja was told by John that she comes from a bad
family, presumably on account of her lies. Only people from bad families tell lies, clearly. Since
that time things have been precarious between Sanja and John.

And then there's Derek. Derek is an intern we acquired and lost during the course of one splendid week.
Derek had a fully developed mustache, which is always becoming on a man of 24. Derek looked something like
Kevin Kline, and also a little like Mary-Kate Olsen (he looked NOTHING like Ashley).
And although you did not get to learn anything about Derek due to his short time
at the studio, I think you will like his parting words, conveyed via text message (rather than the
standard letter of resignation): "There's only so long you can take it up the *ss!"
And that's true Derek, there only is just so long.

Liz

p.s. As you may have noticed, sometimes I like to leave you with headlines that I find entertaining.
Here is one such headline:
"Teenager uses truck to save granddad from bull."
You might be on the verge of forgetting about the time when you saved your granddad from cattle, and
then you see a headline like this and it all comes flooding back to you.

And finally, this attention grabber: "Jill Scott talks about bra problems."
Talk to me, Jill.