Leadership at work

Lately I've been thinking about my career & whether I'd be happy doing what I'm doing for the next twenty years. At the moment, my answer is no.

My two top secret jobs before this were in positions of leadership & I lost most aspects of that coming in to this current job, which was a sacrifice I was willing to make because of the very unique nature of the work. However, I've been thinking that I could fit in well with a future career in a management role.

Before you get any ideas, I want to point out that I feel I am not ready just yet. I'm not interested in the glory or being enabled to be a 'control freak'. So that got me to thinking about what I could bring to the table & for that matter, what qualities I deem important for people in management positions.

In my tenure at 'top secret workplace', I've had two very dynamic managers. They are virtual opposites.

The first I met when I was 19 (god help him). I had just come from a pretty toxic work environment & been burned by managers in the past. To their credit though, I was a teenager & didn't know shit about how the world worked. I've come a long way in 5 years & I hope that most people can relate if they are to look back at what their workplace ethics & ideals were when they were a teenager as compared to a few years down the line... I'd like to think that I started as a naive, insecure, right-fighter & have worked to become more composed, strategic & open minded.

This first manager taught me trust, sound judgement & to take the high road. Whenever I wanted to make a pity party for myself, criminalize my opposition & act in anger, he encouraged & later expected me to not victimize myself, not try to rationalize other people's behavior & 'simmer-down' before I attempted to resolve a problem.

The second dynamic manager reads this blog so I can't go in to great detail about what a pain in the ass he is :)

In just a year I've learned from him that first impressions aren't all-encompassing. We worked together for six months before I noticed he ate lunch by himself & invited myself along to put him out of his misery.
I learned the unfair realities of workplace code. Working with someone two generations apart from your own & with nothing in common taught me about adversity & diversity.
It's actually a pretty amazing thing to be forced to remove yourself from the natural choice of spending your time with someone your own age & gender with similar values & opinions. I often think now about what workplaces could produce if they partnered up men & women, young & old new to the job & with seniority. What a nice contract of expertise & outsider's view, experience with fresh optimism.

In fleshing out my ideology on an ideal manager, I considered the following traits:

Ability to lose control:

I think that as people move up in management, their positions lose the ability to partake in the 'meat & potatoes' of their organization. They become further removed from the actual productions & everyday work. What's more, I think most workers would not expect that type of a manager to become directly involved in what they do. I think its important to surround yourself with a team that you can trust & doesn't need you to micromanage or breath down their back.

Not-so-Undercover-Boss:

 

A little bit of hypocrisy compared to my first point. Allow me to explain.
Although I'm sure most employees don't want management breathing down their back, it takes a level of humility (and a huge time commitment) to know what it's like to be in your people's shoes.
I've always been one to appreciate when my manager has worked their way in to their position from the ground up. I think its probably common to have more respect for someone who's 'paid their dues' & excelled enough to be promoted, both as a manager & a possible mentor.
It's inevitable though that some companies hire from the outside & some managers lead groups of people who's jobs they haven't done themselves. In cases like this I think employees can still respect their manager by acknowledging their education & experience. Ideally, its great for managers to 'stay connected' by arranging to shadow or 'temp' as their employee for a day. If this can't be accommodated, at least open & honest dialogues with employees on their successes & challenges, their time drains, new tasks, time dilemmas etc. How can you expect your people to be receptive to your advice?expectations/suggestions when you don't understand what it is that they do!

High Standards:

Maybe its just me, but I believe low standards are crippling.
If your boss tolerates half-assed work, crappy attitude, spotty adherence, how are you going to survive in a future career (possibly your dream job) when your new boss doesn't?
I've always had the motto in job interviews that I have higher expectations for myself than any job has had for me. I want my boss to be hard on me for the right reasons & take my work & my future seriously. I want any evaluations/ reviews to not just be seen as mandatory paperwork but to really talk about what we can both contribute to make me for successful at work. To me, someone who has high standards for me is invested in me. Good leaders help others imagine themselves in new ways.

Individual motivation:

A very wise lady once told me that her role as a leader was to be whatever the employee needed in order to be more successful.
Some people need to hear it straight, some need short-comings to be sugar-coated or 'sandwiched'. Some need to be trained verbally, some need to see it take place, some learn by doing. Some really need to know their managers on a personal level & some prefer curt, professional interactions.
It's a lot to ask of someone to alter their primal selves to help someone else, however I think If I was an owner or a CEO, this is what I would want & as an employee, I'd want that too. Win-win.

Humanize:

With the exception of those who want a curt & solely professional relationship with their bosses, I think most people appreciate when their superiors show vulnerability & let you know they are more than just their role.

I have a friend who's manager burst in to tears during a private meeting because she was under a lot of pressure which seemed seemed to change a lot for my friend's outlook on the situation (and mine when I heard it).
I ran storming in to my boss's office recently only to find him pressed up against a wall doing this incredibly feeble rotator stretch as he has injured his shoulder & been instructed by the physical therapist to do this grandma stretch. It made me so sad to think that as I ramble on & on about everything, he was in physical pain. Because I caught him in such a 'vulnerable' position, the tone of the conversation was completely changed.
No matter what people do or how much they make, I think we can all appreciate knowing they put their pants on one leg at a time.

Positive Reinforcement:

We live in a society so quick to criticize & complain but so rarely commends. We're at a point now where if you haven't heard any bad news about a company or a product, its probably the cat's pajamas!
I think we need to acknowledge when we are happy with someone's approach, speed, vision, productivity etc etc. Who doesn't like a little dose of positive in their day? Not only that, but I believe that giving praise is an essential humbling experience for those in power.
It's been suggested to me that company rewards or commendation programs aren't advisable because you will alienate your employees who aren't acknowledged. There are people who half-ass their way through work & are just so naturally talented or dispositioned to the work while others are giving 100% and don't actualize. There's also the argument of popularity contests. That being said I guess the best way to do it is to have private conversation with your people to see if they appreciate reward systems (monetary or otherwise) I think it's fair to say that in general, people appreciate being recognized.

Suck it up:

Management is not the right area for cowards, passive aggressives or the socially awkward. To get right to the nut of my point, I think there are a lot of situations where you just have to 'suck it up', pull up your panties & do what you need to do. Have the hard conversations. Scared leaders build a fort. Bold leaders blaze a trail.
Some employees aren't easy but that doesn't mean they aren't the perfect fit for the job. Employees priorities do not include making your life easier.

Optimism Vs.Realism:

I believe it is managements role to be a champion for change. It's easy to get in a routine of doing the same thing over & over (efficient or not) because that's what we know & that's what we're good at.
A good manager should be able to sell their people on change with their own optimism & knowledge.

On the flip side, & playing in to having good judgement, I think their role also demands that they act as an actuary in assessing risks & preparing for the worst case scenario.
I've been just about laughed out of meetings for attempting to be knowledgeable & 'uber-prepared' for outlandish worse case scenarios only to have those scenarios actualize a week later.
Be the devil's advocate.

Lastly, don't take no for an answer:

Don't go getting yourself in shit with this one!
Although managers are people, they still report to someone.
If you come in to a conversation with that someone educated, willing to compromise, with good intention's & the company's goal at heart, I don't feel the conversation should stop with a 'no' from your superior. Rules are meant to be broken if the suggestion is reasonable & accomodable. I have an annoying amount of experience with managers telling me "no", followed by "I'll think about it", followed by "maybe", followed by "ok just this once".

I'm sure I've missed a lot of traits that I take for granted.A respect for diversity, consistency, promoting a good work-life balance, generally not being an asshole? Any other big ones I've missed?

My post for today is I don't have enough time to post today

But I did want to share what I feel is the single, best blog post I have ever read.

It has had 12 million views & been shared half a million times & this is just not enough.

It is for people who feel they are victims.
It is for men who can't get a date & wonder why women don't want a 'nice guy' like them.
It's for people that immediately seek to discredit anyone that criticizes them.
It's for the keyboard warriors that have opinions on everything without having produced, tried or experienced for themselves.

It is basically Dr. Phil's new Life Code book (which I have read, and loved by the way), all rolled up in to a two page article without the consumer needing to read it in a Texas accent & all the Southern good ol' boy analogies.

I. LOVE. THIS:

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-harsh-truths-that-will-make-you-better-person/

Sexual harrassment/The LC incident

I hate cat-callers.

For my readers in other countries, Google defines this as "Make a whistle, shout or comment of a sexual nature to a woman passing by".

I am no longer the insecure little girl that takes the derogatory comments of a complete stranger, usually one that is not my age (or one who would interest me in any way) as a compliment.
I take a lot of pride in how I present myself. I do this for me & for my husband, not for you strange old men/horn dog kids.

I'm not sure why I experience so much of it. It could be because I do a lot of walking, don't live in the suburbs, or because my hair makes me stand out.

http://groupthink.jezebel.com/hair-color-and-frequency-of-street-harassment-1368122487

I've been cat called by someone who couldn't look older than 12 & had to tell him I eat cocktail weenies his size for breakfast. DREAM BIG!
I've been cat called by a young guy in a group & stood before them to ask if they had balls enough to say to my face what they say to my back
And I've been cat called while walking my dog. IF that gentleman thought there was no risk in making vulgar comments to the girl carrying a dog-poo bag, he was wrong.

Yesterday in the early evening I stopped at the LC (Note to non-Manitoban readers, LC is the Liquor Commission) before heading home.
Per the norm the was a panhandler outside asking for change. Not per the norm, he also must have also felt, 'meh, I'm already being an asshole asking people for money, why don't I just ice the cake & yell derogatory remarks at young women'. So he proceeded to call me honey & yell after me about how my butt looked when I walked (good).

At that point, I had already decided that he should leave based on the pan-handling.
Why should I, as a customer trying to spend money on a business's private property, need to feel pressured to give out money to a serial panhandler? Maybe I over think things too much, but seriously, standing outside the LC is a dick move. You make people feel really bad & obligated to donate to your cause. It's not like we're going in to the LC to buy milky & bread or pampers for our babies. We're there for a 'luxury' item. Also kind of making a mockery of the relation between homelessness & addiction/substance abuse...

In the past I have approached LC security & let them know about panhandlers. They've always responded promptly & courteously & gotten the individuals to leave. I watched the security guard go outside & expected the same results once I saw the guard re-enter as I was in line with my purchases.

Unfortunately I was wrong. Possibly because the guard didn't do anything or possibly because the panhandler has blatant disregard for authority, he was still out there when I left & confronted me for 'telling on him'.

Me: "Of course, that's sexual harassment & it's illegal"
Skeezeball: "I just wanted to tell you that you're a beautiful woman. Why you gotta be like that?"
Me: "You're messing with the wrong girl"
Skeezeball: "Yeah, suck my dick"

I didn't want to suck his dick so I called police non-emergency as I walked away & was called by a constable within 15 minutes to give more detail.

But you know where the crime here really lies? I now feel bad.

I'm going over the scenario in my head analyzing whether I truly felt in danger or not, what that constable would be able to do & if they thought I overreacted. I even thought about the skeezeball & whether he was raised to believe that kind of talk was normal & thinks I am a prude.

I feel like people might wonder what I was wearing. And for the record, it is minus 30 (Celsius) outside & I am covered head to toe. But really, even if I was exposed, what makes this guy think he has the right to speak to me disrespectfully? As if showing skin (what measure of it I don't know) makes me some kind of a prostitute who should be objectified.

This brings up the 'slut shaming' conversation which merits a lot of thought.
As you may have guessed from other posts here, I tend to call a spade a spade & get coined as judgmental because of it (funny that I should be JUDGED as being judgmental).

Well, if forming a personal opinion on someone based on what they say & do is judgmental, then I guess I'm an asshole. Life is short & I value my time too much to spend it around people who disturb, infuriate or depress me. That's what work is for.
For that matter? I have no idea why society is so obsessed with this notion of 'Don't judge me!', In my opinion, the only situations where this is relevant is when you are being judged based on age, appearance, gender, sexuality etc (i.e. things that are out of your control). But everyday I hear more and more of this 'I do irresponsible things, don't judge me!', 'I act disrespectfully towards others, don't judge me!' it's lost it's very valuable message of being unbiased & is now a catchphrase for those that do not want to held accountable. A world without judgement, to me, sounds like a world where people do not have to be responsible for their actions...but I digress.

With this kind of mentality, it's tough to be both a feminist & a realist.
I've always felt that if you act & present yourself as a victim, you'll be treated like one. And although I feel that a woman should be able to wear whatever she wants, be out as late as she wants in whatever neighborhood she wants & that none of these points should ever be a reason for us to accept any sexual harassment (or worse) she endures, I still ask myself what I would teach my own daughter.

When I was in the ninth grade one of my closest friends & I would walk home together until a point when we had to part ways to go to our respective neighborhoods.
One day after we had parted some monster grabbed my friend & sexually assaulted her until she had screamed & fought enough to scare him off.
Its cancer to the soul knowing that we were just blocks away from one another. I cried for hours when I got home that night & my grandma hugged me as if it was me that got violated by some sick pervert.
She said "I can't believe this is what your generation has to deal with. You can't even walk home safely from school". No, apparently we can't.

Unfortunately the answer is that I will teach my daughter to walk in groups. I'll sign her up for martial arts & I"ll teach her to keep a safe distance from people.
I'd like to think that I'll do all of this because my kid's life is too valuable to be used as a statement & her safety is the bottom line.

So that got me to thinking that most other parents probably feel the same way.
So if we continue to teach our daughters to be prepared for this kind of treatment, what is going to prompt a change in this societal norm?

This article spoke to me & is really worth the ten minutes to read it. It's our male children:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/carina-kolodny/the-conversation-you-must-have-with-your-sons_b_3764489.html

Excerpt:

"We live in a culture that puts victims on trial with questions like, "well, what were you wearing?" and "how much did you drink?" We live in a culture where a mother, concerned about raising sons who "act honorably," holds young women accountable for the way young men objectify them. We live in a culture where a judge hands down a 30-day sentence to a rapist because his 14-year-old victim was "older than her chronological age." We live in a culture that relegates not getting raped to women and girls instead of expecting and demanding boys and men to be responsible for not raping"

We need to raise better boys & not let this bullshit of 'boys will be boys' slide.
I don't know how easy it would be try to get boys & young men to put themselves in our shoes but I do know that most if not all boys have a woman in their life whom they love. Be it their mom, aunt, grandmother sister, whatever. I think they need to be taught young how they would feel if this were to happen to their sister so they can also grow in to men who take a stand so it doesn't happen to their daughters.

Another option: Spread this message via articles, videos, social media. We have so many platforms to spread messages in a way that really sticks. I feel that the more respected people in a boy's life who share & encourage this ideology, the more likely he'll be to catch on.

Finally, I thought about electing leaders that put women's issues at a forefront. Then I thought, world leaders tend to be men & as you can see with a lot of the republican arguments happening down south right now, they are men with absolutely no fucking concept of women's bodies:

So I think we need to elect women leaders, and become female leaders.

Lastly, when calling the cops doesn't feel right, I think we need to throw more dog shit.

The Christmas Grinch

As of last Christmas I've had the 'pleasure' living with & picking up after a Christmas Grinch.

This grinch expresses his grinchiness modestly by removing & hiding the gift tags from the gifts & majorly by completely destroying the Christmas tree while scattering/destroying the ornaments.
This is the grinch:

I am not quite sure what Chevy holds against the spirit of Christmas, or why he hates trees. If he could communicate, I'd ask him. Then we'd probably talk about his many tantrums & how it makes him feel.

He knows that mangling the tree is bad, so he would not do it in front of parents, but when parents are gone or asleep, he strikes.

I imagine it starts off innocently enough... "Oh, I'm a dumb little cat, there's something shiny in the living room, I must punch it with my paw".
Followed by "Oh, I'm having so much dumb little cat fun, I think I'm going to pull down this garland or this chain of beads.
Followed by "OH MY GOD I'M INTOXICATED BY POWER, I MUST TAKE A RUNNING LEAP & BUDDY-THE-ELF MOM & DAD'S TREE!!!" (At this point I assume the picture is emphasized with ravenous foam bubbling from Chevy's mouth & bulging veins in his stupid, little eyes.

And then, when he's come down from his meth-high of holiday-ruining, I imagine he goes to lay down or take shit or something. I come home, see the tree & find him here: Like a serial killer risking his freedom for a couple seconds of media glory.

My therapist says that I need to do one of two things (or a little of both).
A) Lock the cat up when he would be alone in the tree (IE 15 hours of the day) which would also mean that I have to lock him up in the basement with his litter box, with the orange cat who is an innocent bystander or:
B) Learn to let go & allow myself to have a mangled tree. This is not possible. I do not work my butt off to pay for a nice house, nice decorations & great gifts to have the Christmas beacon mindlessly destroyed by a scroogy crusader.

The last straw came this weekend.
Mr. Ford had convinced me at the therapist's office, that it we could make this work & locking the cats up wouldn't be a big deal.

Since he is the one that feeds the cats, he would make sure to coral them in to the basement during work & sleep hours for the rest of December. I would get more sleep from not being woken up in the middle of the night from crashing ornaments & he would get more sex (brilliant male logic at work...)

Reality is a little different out of the therapist's office because, as predicted, Mr. Ford went from 'Me play video games' to 'Now me sleep' & came to bed without corralling the cats in to the basement.

I first woke up to the sound of ornaments getting rolled around the hard wood floor.
I tried to option B. I negotiated with myself: Maybe it's just 1 ornament & the tree is completely fine, just go back to bed. By I knew it wasn't one ornament. It never is. So when I heard the springy sound of a tree branch being bent & then the tree being released in a catapult... that was it.

I stormed down from the second floor. Chevy, knowing that he was caught red-handed was already bolting down the basement stairs. Bob starred at me with wide eyes as if to say "WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON??? WHERE ARE THE ZOMBIES?!"

I grabbed Bob, too angry to even apologize to him for forcing him to suffer being locked downstairs with the evil do-er. All the while the dog at my heels insisting that she is the enforcer of the pack, jumping & charging the cats in an attempt to show me that she would punish them...for whatever they had done.
"I DON'T NEED YOUR HELP GOD DAMMIT" I squawked at the dog & told her to get back upstairs. Like the obedient dog she is, she then stretched at the foot of the stairs & pretended she didn't hear what I said.

I plopped the second cat at the basement landing where Chevy had already escaped to & slammed the door successfully condemning them to 400 square foot prison.

Rude wake-up call #1 could not have been complete without me returning back upstairs & darling Mr. Ford saying "whaaa...what happened?"

Wake-up #2-The cats playing me the song of their people from two flights down. At this point I thought, at least the tree is safe. I go back to sleep.

Wake-up #3-I hear a loud thud. Like the sound of a statue or another solid, unbreaking substance getting knocked over. The cats must have knocked something over in the basement, I reason to myself. At least the tree is safe I thought, I'll deal with the damage in the morning.

Wake-up #4-The sound of ornaments crashing.
What? Go away you crazy nightmare, I've already solved this problem.
But then I heard it again. I opened my eyes to make sure I wasn't in some sort of an inception half dream making up some crazy sounds in my head. Nope, another crash.
I remove myself from the bed, charge down the stairs & turn the light on. Lo & FREAKING behold. There's the cats.

I grabbed them both & head to the basement landing where I find the door still firmly closed. WHAT THE EFF HAVE YOU DONE YOU WIZARD CATS!!!??
After plopping them back down on the landing & checking the door handle again to ensure the knob firmly clicked shut, I headed back upstairs too tired to be able to conceptualise how they could have possibly teleported in to the living room.
Its on my way up that I notice the cast-iron furnace grate lying loosely across the floor.
You freaking mangy furballs demanded so incessantly to not be in the basement that you jumped on to a shelf from the basement & gained access to the furnace vent, Tom-Cruised through the vent system until you found a grate that you could use your scraggly little arms to push off the floor & re-enter yourself in to the civilised world of the living room. All for what? TO RESUME ATTACKING THE CHRISTMAS TREE! I moved a storage bench to position it on top of the cast iron vent prohibiting a stupid little cat from pushing it off.

Wake-up #5-The cats yet again sing me the song of their people. It is much louder this time. I refused to get up & give them the satisfaction of my presence this time but I can only imagine their songs were louder as they had tried to again scale the furnace venting & escape in to the living room only to find they scheme had been foiled.

Wake-up #6-Gurgling from a water main break on the street. have not been able to prove the cats' involvements.

Wake-up #7-Husband getting out of bed from a lovely night's rest. He will at some point insinuate that I am lazy & our relationship suffers because of the amount of naps I take when we could be spending time together. His sleep-monitoring bracelet will later indicate that he had a period of 'restlessness' in the wee hours of the morning.

Things only gingers understand

Listen, none of us came shooting out of the womb demanding to look like the Wendy's girl, but you play the hand you're dealt & hopefully you play it well. Hopefully it doesn't make you feel insecure or isolated. Hopefully you don't have to feel like you need to write a post to serve as a 'HALLELUJAH' for your ginger comrades & a bonk to the head to everyone else...

1. It's not the personality attached to the hair, it's the hair that forms the personality

Redheads make-up between one & two percent of the global population ranging from zero percent in some countries to our peak ten & twelve percent in Scotland & Ireland. One & two percent chance of anything is a terrible odd.
I hear a lot about this 'fiery redhead' personality, or my personal favorite, the 'crazy redhead' complex... People need to realize the monsters they are creating.

Imagine someone, growing up that, at best, identifies as one redhead in a classroom of ten & at worse as the only redhead in Bangkok.
Someone who has to lather on the sunscreen while their friends get sun-kissed skin while playing outside. Someone who is called a a 'carrot top' (because apparently it never stops being funny) daily. Now you tell me that someone like that is going to develop an average Joe personality...

Ginger people stick out like a sore thumb. In my top secret job I am one in about 2500 (rough guess) employees in my building. I hide in my office most of the time but expose my glorious self to the masses when I go the cafeteria for a coffee break in the morning. Whilst I walk around not having a clue who anyone else is, apparently everyone knows me, talks to me. sells me social tickets & girl guide cookies!!!! It is not cheap being a red head.
My point is gingers will never blend in with a crowd. They are reminded incessantly that they are different & I'm sure internally, there comes a point where you start to develop the personality to match & probably the fiestiness to retort to all those 'hilarious' ginger one-liners people think we red-heads hadn't heard before.
Just saying ex-boyfriends, if you're going to walk away from the relationship telling people that I lived up the the 'crazy readhead' persona, maybe you should look back at all the times you made the joke that gingers have no souls (AHAHAHAHA SOOOO FUNNY!).

2. You can't have the hair without the skin

On the other side of the spectrum, there are many women who genuinely love the hair colour & work it to its full hotness potential. When you think about how many red hair dyes there are in a drug store compared to how many actual red heads there are, there is clearly a market. Everyone wants to be a red head, no one wants to be a ginger.
I'm not even sure that there is such thing as a red-head that doesn't freckle. Either they're bathing in sunscreen (avoiding it) or their a brunette with a dye-job (faking it).

So don't give me this crap about how I should feel lucky to have it. And before you go saying how much you wish you could have the colour, know that the only chance you'd ever have of getting a tan would be getting so freckled that they would all morph together & cover your natural, pale skin. Oh, and go light yourself on fire & tell me how it feels to be a redhead with a sunburn.

Sigh. I don't know what popular culture has against pale skin. I think I must have been born in the wrong century, or maybe just on the wrong continent. Its funny how westerners want to have a baked, wrinkle invoking, leather-face appearing complex whilst the majority of the world desires pale skin for it's status message. We're fancy. You're pilgrims.

3. Lots of us can't even hide it, even if we wanted to

As previously mentioned, gingers can't tan. Unless you want to get skin cancer & try hyper-freckling, you're stuck with fake-bake. Unfortunately, I don't know of any fake tans that give a subtle but natural tint as they seem to be designed to just turn you in to a Dorito chip.

Hair on the other hand, is weird.
Did you know that red-heads rarely go grey? When they get around that age their hair typically lightens to a blond shade & then will lose pigment all together & go white. This anomaly goes further than that. Red hair is very fussy to traditional dies (if it will even take the dye at all).
I can vouch for this. For many years in high school I dyed my hair a dark purple/maroon colour even though being a brunette was not my first choice. My luscious locks will not take to blonde dye. That's after trying 3 different dye brands & finally throwing my hands up in the air & trying a bleach product to only get the slightest shade lightening. My hair stylist told me that my hair would have to first be professionally striped of the current colour before colouring a new one. No thanks.

4. PAIN

It has been scientifically proven that red-heads require more anaesthesia during surgeries & dental work. I am not sure if this means that they have a higher tolerance for the anesthesia or a lower pain tolerance but these studies are being expanded & also finding that red-heads bruise easier & in controlled experiments, claim to feel more pain than their non-ginger counterparts. This will be what I tell everyone as I sob at my next tattoo appointment.

5. The DNA

The ginger gene is a recessive gene where both parents (regardless of their own hair colours) must be a carrier. These are not betting odds. I like to think that ol' MaryAnne (blonde) & my dad (Brunette) won the genetic lottery with me :)
Unfortunately this gene can technically referred to as a 'mutation' & it has other effects... The mutation causes redheads to have better vitamin D creation/absorption for easier living in darker climates. The vitamin D adds to better bones. On the flip-side, it makes for worse skin. I'm genetically predispositioned to have crap skin. Wonderful.

6. Last but not least, EVERYONE thinks they're a redhead.

My hair is not particularly light, you would say that if the term red-head category didn't exist, I'm closer to being a brunet than I am to being a blonde. That doesn't mean I go proclaiming to the world that I'm a brunet. People would think I'm an idiot.

You have no idea how many conversations I've had with both blondes & brunettes about my hair colour & they suddenly sputter 'well my red hair is' yadda yadda yadda...

Girlfriend, you blind?
They have this notion that yep, if I say it out loud than it must be true, I'm a red head as well, or if I dissect my hair in just the right lighting, I'll due in a pinch.

BOLLOCKS!

Mr. Ford yesterday also decided to pluck one single strand of his beard hair out & after analysing it for 3 minutes, proclaimed to me that he has red beard hair...WHAT???? From looking at one hair, by itself in bad lighting, you draw this conclusion???

So now after the years of taunting & torment that we endure of being called a soulless carrot top, light brunettes think that as long as you look at them in direct sunlight, at the right angle, they can be one of us & bask in all the glory.

Get the eff outta here...

Strippers, the unanswered questions

So today, like always, I found myself thinking about strippers.

Just kidding, not like always, just like always when I am sick with a head cold & enjoying the remedies of cold & flu drugs.

They say that prostitution is the oldest profession. I don't know how they say that. It's not like you were there nor can you ask your great-great-great grandfather to the power of 20 how often he paid to sleep with a stranger. I'm also pretty sure man needed food more than he needed to get laid. This leads me to believe that we had hunters, harvesters & butchers long before we had prostitutes but alas... if we assume this is true then I'll bet stripping has been around almost as long. Or perhaps as long as dance has been around.

I went to my first strip club when I was 18. Since then I've been to a total of two clubs. The novelty has worn off & aside from seeing a 'touring' stripper that could actually make a career out of their dancing or gymnastic abilities anyway, I have no draw to view anymore. I have however, found myself asking three questions about my experiences, and since you're here anyway, you should know.

1. Strippers with no boobs. WHY?

I might be opening a big can of worms in a 'body shapes' & 'defining femininity/beauty' debate but hell, go ahead & paste your hate messages on my Facebook wall, I'M GOING THERE!

I grew up with many strong, independent & tough women in my life. Most notably MaryAnne who I'm sure could beat up the hulk.

The women had boobs, big ones. And bra sizes you couldn't buy at department stores & breast reduction surgeries.
When I was little I constantly felt like an isolated melon-head because I didn't have those boobs. I would demand bras I didn't need & my little cousins & I would fill them with socks or water balloons (or cantaloupes). It seemed like an eternity before I finally got boobs & could start to feel feminine.


All that said & done I still none-the-less grew up thinking that I had small boobs.
In my head, because the women in my family were so endowed, they were the norm & I was the mutant. I have no idea at what point I had seen enough of the public's boobs at Sherbrook pool or what age that it finally clicked in my head. I had been comparing myself to the minority & in fact,  I was normal & they were the weirdos. That sat well with me.

More to the point, perhaps it's just my bias towards voluptuous, curvy & endowed women, but girlfriend if you want to be someone who is paid to show off her lady-bits, you better actually have some good lady bits!

Maybe it's just me but dammit, why would a lady with a boyish figure think she'd qualify as a good stripper? And more so, WHO HIRED YOU & ARE THEY BLIND? People can play the 'good dancer' card all they want, but if you're a good dancer, there are plenty of Channing Tatum movies for you to dance in. A good dancer alone does not a stripper make.

In my mind when I go & pay good money at Solid Gold, I expect a Marilyn Munroe or a Ditta Von Tease. I suppose that is asking too much because you end up with Courtney Love & Ellen Page on a Krokodil binge.

I no longer scream internally "WHERE ARE YOU BOOBS?" or ask if they've gotten lost on the way to their boy-scout meeting. I just assume that she is saving up for her first pair.

You don't make a blind person a professional driver, you don't make an asthmatic a fire fighter. And if you enjoy going to a strip club to see girls with boyish figures, then I think you are wasting your money.

2. What would your stripper song be?

It would make me so happy if I got comments with the answer to this question.

I always knew mine would be 'Feel it' by Jakalope because I'm freaky like that.
You would not believe how many men I have asked this & gotten not a seconds hesitation with the answer. That makes me proud. Good for you mankind, you watched Magic Mike & now you feel empowered about your helicopter.

As much as there are classics & songs that people will recognize (from Magic Mike) I think your stripper song should really say something about you.
If you are not from the country, don't kid yourself, 'Save a horse, ride a cowboy' is not the stripper song for you. Here are some more ideas for you.

Shaketramp - Mariana's trench

I wanna love you - Akon
Rockstar - Nickleback
I kissed a girl - Katy Perry
Toxic - Britney Spears
Bad Girlfriend - Theory of a deadman
Bad Things - Jace Everett
Bass down low - Dev
Cinema - Skrillex/Electroman
Give me novacaine - Green Day
My humps - Black Eyed Peas

3. Where are the lesbians?

I went to a strip bar on Ellice that can't seem to pick a name & stick to it. At said strip club, they had a raffle for an extra long, super sweaty, extra-sultry lap dance & strippers were selling tickets to the cheap men who weren't going to just pay for the lap dance to begin with. One of said men was my husband.
Not to be outdone by Mr. Ford's stellar generosity towards the working mom's fundraiser, I offered to purchase some of said tickets as well to 'support' the cause. The stripper flatly refused my offer saying "No, I'm not going to make you buy any".

Well EXCUUUUUUSE ME! I guess I'm not worthy of a lap dance because... because what???

Then I got to thinking about it, I've never seen what I would think to be a lesbian in a strip bar.
Now please don't go on saying that I'm stereotyping the outward appearance of lesbians & that there were probably some but I assumed their straight.

I think that most people have a general sense for that type of thing by observing appearances, physical cues, eye contact, tendencies etc & I think I have a great sense of whether someone is gay or straight & I have never seen a lesbian in a strip club. Why is that? Is that not an ideal place to meet a (normally) attractive, sexually open minded woman? Fill me in ladies!

Conclusion:

Go away cats this post was supposed to be about strippers not about you!

Mr. Ford speaks

Greetings fellow bloglodytes from around the world, including Venezuela and The Philippines. I am the mysterious Mr. Ford and will first need to set the record straight. All stories about me in this blog up to date are all heavily exaggerated for entertainment value.  I am actually super smart, funny, responsible, nice-smelling and cool. However, the picture of me eating chicken wings with sauce all over my face is 100% legitimate.

When she isn’t crouching or hiding, our favourite ginger is often watching one of her favourite shows, Sex and the City.  

Since I spend a lot of time with her, I am subjected to watching the show with her. I’d like to think that I’m part of a large group of men that have to put up with Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte.  Of course, I could be wrong and will get weird looks in the locker room at the gym from now on but when I’m sitting there watching SATC with the wife, I think of all of the other guys being subjected to the same treatment and don’t feel so bad.  For the guys out there, it’s like when you’re at Victoria’s Secret and you see another guy standing beside a fitting room, also holding a purse, and you give them a nod of sympathy as if to say “Good job, soldier. We’re in this together.”  

  

Now, at first, I was pretty opposed to the idea of watching such a dumb, girly show and put up a pretty big fight for the remote. Over time, the fight became a civilized protest, which slowly became a disapproving groan, which eventually became a question about whether the episode was before, during or after Charlotte’s marriage to Trey McDougal.

Since I used to complain a lot about watching Sex and the City, the wife LOVES to point out any moment when I appear to be enjoying the show or if I fail to stifle a laugh.  I’m only human!  Even Sarah-Jessica Parker is funny sometimes even if you need to sit through a day-long SATC marathon on Cosmo TV. 

Considering the name of the show, there are maybe one or two instances of sex in each episode, if that.  False advertising?  I’m getting a whole lot more “City” than “Sex”. 

This show also seems to follow the same pattern that most shows fall into. The main characters aren’t devastatingly good looking but every week they have guys tripping over one another to talk to them and possibly bring the episode rating to 18+. The weirdest thing is that it actually works a lot of the time!!! These are adult, human females and they’re agreeing to have sex with adult, human males.  Sorry, HBO, but you’ve lost me with your bizarre fantasies.  That’s just not how things go down.

There are a few reality shows on Playboy TV where they get a few guys and a few girls together in a house with the goal of them having sex in some form or another and even then it doesn’t happen most of the time. The realest part of SATC is when the 4 middle-aged women go out to lunch and discuss their fears of dying alone and not being able to find a good man in New York because the good ones are either married or gay. 

 

“My name is Abdul…. Like Paula.”