So how was your holiday weekend with your friends and family? Hope it was a good one! My sister and I came home to celebrate Christmas with our parents, and decided to be a little more creative with our gift-giving this year. We don’t do the tree thing anymore because it’s a pain to deal with, so all the presents just go on a table we have in our sitting area. And when December 25th rolls around, we gather around to open up the packages. My sister and I get money nowadays so we don’t have presents on the table, but my dad makes up for it by giving us gag gifts. He will do things like wrap up our mail or a bunch of AARP brochures; that way, we at least get stuff to open, and have a few good laughs while we’re at it.

This year, my sister and I gave my dad a new laptop. He’s never had a new one before; all the laptops he’s ever used were hand-me-downs from my sister or me. But we didn’t put the laptop on the gift table this year. We decided to make a giant stocking and hide the laptop in the toe. And then we’d hide a fake gift at the mouth of the stocking–maybe wrap paper in some more paper or something. It was a brilliant idea, and we pulled it off brilliantly. We even made a second giant stocking for our mom because I suck at measuring fabric and bought way more than was needed. So now we have two 5-foot stockings to use in the future.

Spending Christmas with my family was definitely fun, but it wasn’t as fun as it should have been because something was nagging at me the entire time. I received an e-mail on the 23rd about a job interview for a legal analyst position with the state government. I’m not big on politics–I mean, I follow it, but not to the point where I could participate in any meaningful discussions about it. And I really hate it when people criticize me for being so indifferent. The argument is usually something like, “The government is not going to improve if we don’t make our voices heard, and in order to do that, we must educate ourselves on important political issues.” But to me, this idea of “improvement” is purely subjective, and no matter what, there will always be a group of people who are unhappy and dissatisfied with how the government is being run. I accept that reality, and have chosen to live my life by adjusting it according to changing political conditions. Perhaps this is just another credit to the “ignorance is bliss” creed, but so what? Some things have to be sacrificed in order to maintain one’s overall sanity, and for me, I’m choosing to sacrifice proficiency in politics.

But this attitude of mine is kind of at odds with the government legal analyst position. I honestly only applied because a job is a job, you know? Can’t really be picky about things like that right now, and plus, it’s always good to have something other than an unemployment gap on your resume.

So I’m going to have to do some really serious preparation for my upcoming interview. I can’t just go in and rely on my past experiences with interviews because that isn’t going to cut it. And I already know most of the questions are going to include something about politics and government–and it isn’t going to turn out well if I don’t come up with some creative BS beforehand.

Here are the likely scenarios of what would happen if I were to go in for an interview right now:

I.    Really Bad Question Deflection

II.    Regurgitating Crap I Happened to See on C-SPAN

III.    Escaping the Interview Using Self-Assification

And you know what’s really, really sad? I didn’t come up with these scenarios for entertainment purposes. These are all very, very much within the realm of possibility…

So my questions to you are: what types of questions should I expect to be asked at my interview, and how should I answer them? I’m especially lost with the “why do you want to work in politics” one right now.

The interview is on December 29th, so I’ll take anything and everything you can give me!

I’ve been waging war with my toilet for the past few weeks. I wanted to post something about it back when the fighting started, but that was because I naively believed the problems would end within a week, at most. But it’s been about two and a half weeks now, and Ultimate Flushing Championship 1–also known as “UFC 1: Sylvia versus Toilet”–is still going strong…to the point where it doesn’t look like the war is going to end any time soon.

So while I originally wanted to post this once the toilet issues were resolved–thus providing the story with a happy ending–I’ve decided to put up part of what I have because it’s already been 2 weeks since my last post. Yes, that means there is no happy ending as of now (not for me, at least), but taking 2 weeks to blog about a freaking toilet is just way too long.

…And to be completely honest, I’m already 20 pictures in and am starting to feel burned out over this whole topic. That, and I really don’t enjoy reliving past episodes of an ongoing nightmare. My dedication to self-deprecating blogs unfortunately does have its limits.

Anyway, here is a part of what I’ve been working on. Sorry for the long and unnecessary delay…

So this all started when my toilet began losing water. The level would slowly drop, and the toilet would then refill the bowl back up. This was a waste of water, and also very annoying because the toilet would make a hissing noise whenever it was refilling the bowl. It wasn’t pleasant to hear, especially when I was sleeping because sometimes the sound would somehow cause me to dream about the damn toilet.

I put in a maintenance request with the apartment manager, and a nice old man was sent over to fix the problem. Then again, I think he was the only person they could send over. There used to be a deaf guy who worked with him, but I think he moved away.

Oh well, whatever. The nice old man did some stuff, and the toilet’s water levels stopped dropping…and that meant no more hissing noises!

But with the elimination of one problem, it seemed another one was born. And it presented itself at a most inopportune moment…during the one time you need your toilet to definitely work.

After I purged myself of the questionably-sanitary taco, I tried to purge it from the toilet. But instead of flushing the waste away, only half of the stuff made it down the drain. The rest of it kind of just swirled around the bowl.

Like any normal person would do when staring at her own waste, I politely asked my toilet:

To which it replied:

Ass bag?! Can you believe it?! My own toilet had the nerve to call me an ass bag!

The stuff eventually flushed completely away, but it took, like, 3 additional attempts–and that’s just wrong. It wasn’t like I tried to hide a doodoo bomb under a bale of toilet paper or anything–and even if I had, my toilet would have been able to handle it. But that was before it turned into a porcelain b*tch.

So the next day I again had maintenance come fix the toilet, and they sent the nice old man from before:

…and he was able to diagnose the problem.

After he left, I decided to have another chat with my toilet.

Somehow this post has turned into Japanese fetish porn…

I had the opportunity to test out the fixed toilet right then and there because I’d been holding my pee for the longest time (UTI alert!). I was afraid that it wouldn’t flush down by the time the nice old man arrived, and I didn’t want him to have to service my toilet under those disgusting conditions. Toilets are nasty enough.

And guess what? The toilet started flushing correctly! Just one push of the lever and my homemade sewage disappeared. Life was good again!

But, alas, that was just the calm before the storm because a few days later, the toilet started having flushing issues again.

In my mind, all toilet insults have something to do with ass. It makes sense, doesn’t it?

Again, I put in another maintenance request, and again, the nice old man showed up.

The man checked the toilet again, and didn’t see anything wrong with the water levels. He then flushed it.

And the water flushed completely!

This had to be a set-up! The toilet had not been working properly when I used it, but now that it had someone to impress, it suddenly decided to be the most obedient toilet in the world! Something wasn’t right! The toilet was setting me up!

That was when I realized the toilet wasn’t playing fair. And I didn’t that epiphany very well.

I feel so bad for the nice old man. He’s come over so many times to fix the toilet, and I’m constantly apologizing about it, but he just laughs and says he is happy to help the tenants. He admitted that the toilets in the apartment complex were cheap models that were often plagued with problems. To him, the best solution would be to replace all the units with more efficient models, but there was little he could do about that since the property managers were in charge of the facilities. The only thing he could do was try his best to fix the problems–or at least make them less problematic.

Since the time he replaced the valve until now, the nice old man has been back here 3 more times to check the toilet. Three. But at least he’s got some assistants now. I guess management hired a few more guys to help out…probably because my toilet problems kept the only member of their maintenance staff too busy to fulfill other service requests. I drew pictures of what happened during those other visits, but I think I will save them for when UFC 1 finally reaches an end…and I predict that will occur when (1) the toilet is fixed, (2) I move, or (3) I hammer the toilet to pieces so that management will have no choice but to give me a new one. I am leaning towards # 3 because I am still pissed about being called an “ass bag” and an “ass monger.”

You know how supermarkets have a bakery section where you can pick up already-made muffins and stuff? I know it’s way more convenient to buy baked goods there instead of making them yourself, but I think you might want to reconsider doing that after I tell you what I just went through.

I couldn’t sleep last night, so I decided to watch a few episodes of “Top Chef: Just Desserts.”

This turned out to be one of the worst ideas I’ve ever had because unlike most people who typically have just one sweet tooth, I unfortunately only have sweet teeth. That’s right: all of my teeth are sweet ones–in fact, I don’t even think my teeth are actually teeth. They’re really sugar cubes wedged into my gums.

Considering my love for all things sugary, using “Top Chef: Just Desserts” as a sleep aid failed within the first 5 minutes. Instead drifting off to the sights and sounds of cookies, cakes, and all types of chocolate confections being made, I found myself wide awake and desperately wanting a slice of chocolate cake…topped with a “Rice Krispies” treat…and 3 scoops of ice cream…and crushed “Whoppers” and “Butter Finger” bits…

Having only sweet teeth makes it extremely difficult for me to ignore cravings for things that have sugar and butter as their primary ingredients. And I knew that if I wanted to go to bed at some point, I was going to have to feed my face first.

But there was a problem…

Argh! All was lost!

…Or was it?

It was about 58 degrees that night, but I still got up and drove my ass down to the supermarket. And I believe the word you’re looking for here is “passionate,” not “pathetic.”

The place was pretty empty when I arrived. There were two or three employees putting things on the shelves, a nightshift manager working the cash register, and a few late-night shoppers making their ways through the aisles. As for me, I  grabbed a shopping cart and sprinted towards the bakery section at the other end of the store.

Just as I was putting together a mental checklist of all the things I wanted to get, a foul stench of really, really dirty armpits suddenly punched me in the nose.

It was a scraggly-ass transient!

Indeed, the source of the stank was a homeless guy who was walking towards the bakery section. And as much as I wanted to get my hands on some cookies and cake, he was so smelly that I decided to wait for him to walk out of the area before I ventured in.

While I waited, I watched the homeless man make his way towards a little display of chocolate chip cookies.

And to my horror, the Lord of the Flies opened up one of the plastic boxes!

And then he put his doodoo hands into the box, took out some cookies, and began eating them!

Once he was done eating, he closed the box back up–but it didn’t end there. After snapping the lid in place, he picked up the box and shook it!

I think he shifted the cookies around to keep people from noticing that a few were missing! And it totally worked because when he put the box back on the display table, it didn’t look like its contents had just been molested by a rotten homeless dude.

I watched this guy perform his routine through the entire bakery section: open up a box of pastries, eat a few, close the box, shake it up, then put it back for some unwitting customer to purchase later…a customer who was probably going to find himself stuck with explosive diarrhea or tapeworms.

The homeless man eventually left…and so did I, even though I didn’t buy anything. Seeing him use the supermarket as some dessert buffet totally killed my craving for sweet baked goods, as well as the possibility of me ever buying an already-made bakery item again. Are you kidding me? All I see now are boxes full of fly babies and armpitiness!