That’s Not My Name

The other day, I was standing at the counter at work with my colleague, the Wiccan healer. She had just returned from a two-week absence due to covid, and was quite anxious to know if my recent mammogram had, indeed, revealed the issues that she had predicted. They didn’t, as you’re aware if you read my last post, and she was bummed out over the whole thing, but brightened up when I told her I was pretty sure that there was an old cast iron fireplace in a back corner booth with a nasty aura. She was just about to go cleanse it and perform a smudging ceremony (no, she’s not Indigenous and actually uses an aerosol “smudging” spray that she gets from a Chinese importer), when the anti-masker/anti-vaxxer/Flat Earther who works on the third floor walked by the counter. And as he walked by, he looked at us, made a flappy gesture with his hand, and said this: YO YO BITCHES!

Now, I’ve been called many things in the workplace. For years when I was teaching, I was Mrs. Craig-Whytock. Then when I went to the secret agency, I was Suzanne, or Boss on occasion. I’ve been called Sweetheart, Hon, or Honey by those I know better than others, and currently, one of my employers tends to forget my name and calls me Susan. There was also the time that a student got really mad at me for kicking him out of summer school for being stoned and called me a f*cking *sshole. But never, I mean NOT ONCE, has a person I’ve worked with ever called me a b*tch (at least to my face). I stood there speechless, while the Wiccan laughed.

Me: Did he just call us “bitches”?
Wiccan: Yeah, haha. What a guy.
Me: I have no words.

Then, about an hour later, the same guy walked by us again, and this time, he mimed tipping his hat, and said, “M’Ladies” and I’ve never been so confused in my life, but I guess that’s par for the course when you work at a minimum wage job in customer service? And now I have to come up with a clever comeback that works for all occasions. I’m thinking about screaming, “Yass Queen, come through!!!” at him unless any of you have a better suggestion.

In other news, now that Kate’s cat Ilana is officially adopted into our household, I can finally share pictures of her with you. She’s two years old but tiny as a kitten, and absolutely adorable. She’s very affectionate and super-purr-y, especially if you give her treats, which I do all the time, and which she’s grown to expect, so now every time I go in Kate’s room, she comes running to ‘Nana’ and tries to climb up my leg to get a Frisky. Atlas doesn’t quite know what to make of her—his only experience of animals as small as Ilana is squirrels in the backyard, which he chases with gusto. Luckily, the squirrels can escape to the trees and Ilana has her cat tower. We currently have the house divided up with baby gates—hopefully, they’ll get used to each other soon.

43 thoughts on “That’s Not My Name”

  1. First, let my just gush over Iliana, seriously what a cutie pie. Did I spall her name right? She is totes adorbs!! Altas will warm up to her soon, you’ll see. As for your weird coworker, not talking about the Wiccan, he seems like he’s trying to find a way to fit in. This is an observation but maybe he wants y’all to start joking around with him. At least your coworker doesn’t wear her makeup somehow making it look like she has a beard.

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  4. Your wiccan colleague sounds like a hoot.
    And yeesh, you’ll have to work on your greetings for the flat-earther-non-vaxxer-anti-masker. Maybe your can just throw out slogans… “Yo, freedom to infect” or “Yo, don’t drink the (whatever), its loaded with bots” or “Yo, bit*ch! How’s it going?” Yeesh. Let me know how it goes.

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  5. What the heck? (re: your co-worker). That’s when I would actively file a complaint with the supervisor, and probably promptly find myself fired and then having to launch a lawsuit. Or just go home and eat ice cream and and annoy my kitties by taking over all their favourite seats. Ha!

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  6. “Your Millennial colloquialisms are ‘lit’, dawg! You’ve managed to tap into today’s youthful slang without having to incur the burden of its vacuous origin… or have you?”

    Talk about a pagan Overlord Queen of the Court. Potions of newt’s eyes, bat’s wings and puppy dog tails will soon follow. Atlas will rue the day.

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    • I would totally say that, but I doubt he’d understand anything but ‘lit’ dawg’ and assume I’m giving him a compliment! And yes, Ilana sits high on her kitty castle, well out of reach, thinking up ways to torment poor Atlas!

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  7. Makes me wonder about the wiccans healing powers – they didn’t protect her from covid. Glad she was wrong about her prediction for you. I think Atlas and Ilana will become friends. When we introduce new animals to ours we tell them “this is your baby” “You have to be nice to your baby’. Not sure why but it seems to work.

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  8. Ilana is utterly adorable and I find it hard to think about anything else looking at her and I hope she and Atlas will become friends as cats and dogs who live together often do.
    As for names it cracked me up in previous posts when you’d paraphrase a conversation and you’d say people referred to you as “Mydangblog”. I also think “Yass Queen, come through!!!” is hilarious and entirely appropriate.
    I’m also intrigued and slightly disappointed that your Wiccan coworker uses an aerosol for smudging and not sage or something like that. I used to take writing workshops with someone who’d burn sage at the beginning of each session and at home I’d burn a bit of sage when I sat down to write, mostly because it had a pleasant smell, but it also really helped put me in the mood. There’s nothing magical about sage, of course; it was just that because of the workshops my mind associated it with creative thinking.

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    • I love the smell of sage too—it’s very soothing. Almost as soothing as little Ilana purring next to me. You know, when she’s happy, she doesn’t meow—she makes a kind of chirruping sound that’s so sweet!

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  12. Quite a parade of colorful characters in your little corner of the world! I’m amused by the use of bitches—it’s the kind of thing one never _actually_ says to another, but might about another when telling a story animatedly. Like, “I was all, peace out, bitches,” but what I actually said was, “Have a good weekend, see you Monday.” Hee hee!

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  16. The cast of characters you describe at your new place of work, make me laugh! (Oh, jeez, I needed that!) Reminding me there’s still humor in the inanities of every day life.
    Oh, Atlas and Ilana…my old dog pretended that the cats did not exist. Even when my tiny tortie cat would rub her head against my dog’s chest. It was hilarious to see my stoic dog completely ignore any of the cats affection. Ilana is a beautiful cat.
    Glad to read you are being careful with the new situation.
    🐈‍⬛

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