The Crappings Of The Office

Before:


After:


Okay, maybe that's not the best comparison -- seeing as how the second picture doesn't go all the way down to the floor. Let's try this over, shall we?

Before:


After:


That's getting better, though we've apparently grown a foot or three in the time it took for us to clean the room out. Curious. Ah well. That'll learn us to eat the little cakes we find lying around.

And now, for the piece de resistance (to which I simply cannot be bothered to add proper accent marks -- take that, froggies!).

Before:


After:

Viola! Wouldn't you love to have one of these in your home office? Even if you would never actually sleep in it or let anyone else actually sleep in it, because that would mean you couldn't write your home office off as a legitimate business expense, which of course it is?

I'm lying. I don't write off my office, although I probably could if it weren't for this:

Which ain't exactly stocked with office supplies, if you know what I'm sayin'. But even if I did have the room set up all official-like, I still probably wouldn't dare to write it off. I'm too much of a fraidy. I know they barely audit anybody anymore, but seriously, have we met? Of course I would be the one they come for. Besides, I only earn about eleven or twelve dollars in a good year anyway, I can certainly pay my buck-twenty dues.

("Buck-twenty," for those of you who weren't sixteen in central Massachusetts in 1985, means redneck -- but a specific kind of teenaged redneck boy. Trucker hats before Ashton thought they were ironic, farmers tans from actually working on a farm. Ditto workboots. Listens to Def Leppard and AC/DC, doesn't understand what Freddie means by Queen. Has perpetually dirty fingernails. Doesn't actually chew tobacco because it makes him sick, but carries the tin around in his back pocket to achieve that worn-out circle. Etymology of the phrase "buck-twenty" is unkown (mostly because I can't be bothered to look it up, but also because it's entirely possible that it was only ever used for one summer in one tiny town), however it is worth pointing out that the exact amount of the bottle deposit on a case of beer in the state of Massachusetts is $1.20. None of which has anything whatsoever to do with anything I'm talking about. When I said "buck-twenty" up there the first time I was just going for the ten percent, and then I went and got myself distracted on this little tractor trip down memory lane. So, where was I?)

Oh yeah -- doesn't it look all smooth and shiny-like in here?:

Purty...

Even if the brand-new, perfect closet is now a brand-new, perfect shrine to cat poop:

For the record, I would like to point out that those things off to the left aren't messes. One is my very efficient grocery-bag filing system and the other is--- EW! You can actually see the cat poop! Sorry, I'm just not a scooper. I figure if I was meant to be chasing stuck-up beasts with little shovels, I'd've started killing cheerleaders years ago.

I'd also like to point out that this is the third time I can think of that I've posted a photograph of poop. In fact, we haven't done this in a while, so let's have a CONTEST ALERT:

If you can tell me what the other two poop pictures were, I'll write a Very Special Poem in your honor. You don't have to tell me the post titles or dates (because searching archives is an execrable task) but, as you know, I'm happy to share the load. If the two poops are already guessed and you want to search for names and dates, I'm happy to take a swing at Number Two.

(Did somebody say something about teenaged boys?)