Tequilla- raised from the ashes

Ladies, Gentlemen and undecided,

It has been an age since I last put fingers to keyboard I know, and I would love to give an excuse like I have been volunteering in a third world country, without clean water or food, let alone a laptop connection, but in truth I just couldn’t be bothered. There, I’ve said it. However, following the urging of a blogging friend, I decided to raise Tequilla from the ashes and update all on The Mockingbird.

So much has happened since my last post that I don’t know where to begin. Firstly, I got myself a new job. I am now an assistant to the director of a high profile organisation. What that means is, I’m someone’s bitch and I effing love it. The Not for Profit world is indeed a funny one, and it’s taken me some time to embrace the utter twaddle of it all. You know, the political correctness, the lunacy and most of all the business jargon- a phenomenon that is totally unknown to me. All day long I hear talk of brown bag lunches, emergent environments, idea showers and big ticket items.

It’s completely unfathomable to me that this knob-end speak occurs in such a professional environment and sometimes I find myself staring at people with complete and absolute confusion.. Why would you replace ‘We screwed up here’ with ‘We wrongsided the demographic’ or ‘Let’s have a drink after work’ with ‘Shall we touch base offline’??? I have been here for almost two years (I had another role before applying for the one I now have), and still just cannot get to grips with what is referred to as ‘Management Speak’. Actually, I refuse to.

Other than that, I am totally on board with my new job, and have never been happier in work. My boss is great and I think she enjoys the fact that she has a gay assistant, and is seen throughout the organisation as someone who is really progressive and outside box thinking.

'Speak with my gay assistant about setting something up’
'You have a gay assistant? How unreservedly forward thinking’

I’m on more money than I have ever earned (although I am poorer than I have ever been- how does that work??) and I wake up every day looking forward to going to work, so really can’t complain.

I turned the big 30 in March of this year, so am now officially deceased in gays years. I now literally have the shelf life of a dairy product, and I’m staring to curdle. I am a dead homo fucking. Its odd turning 30, there really was a mind shift for me, and in the approach to it, a strange thing happened . I started thinking about the future. And not just the end of the week, but of years to come. I started thinking about the fact that I never have any money a week after payday and am under house arrest because I have been tearing the arse out of it for a week and spent all of my wages. So, last September I started to, wait for it, save money. In 3 months I put away £1500 and for the first time in my life I was able to hit the January sales. However, I wasn’t shopping for clothes, fragrances and skin care products. No, I was on the hunt for electricals. I bought myself a flat screen TV, a fridge and a washing machine. Finally, Tequilla had grown up. It was all about Cash ISA’s, pension plans, IBS and saving for a rainy day.

However, the thrill of saving quickly passed, and I am now back to my old ways, and am so poor at the moment I may have to nip down to the pawn shop this weekend with the Armani watch I got for my birthday, just to get enough cash to get me through to payday. Nobody can say that I do not give things a fair try. However, nobody could say that I stick to things either. I am like English weather, unpredictable, erratic and mostly disappointing.

Sadly I had to say goodbye to my cat Toby last week. He hasn’t died, he just drove me to the edge of my sanity. He was never happy, always whingeing to go out, when he was out he would howl to get in, even though the window was open for him, and I have never heard a cat make such a racket. My neighbour was always complaining because he was a nuisance, and it was getting really embarrassing. On top of that, was the fact that he kept using my entire flat as a littler box.

He ruined my floorboards, covers of my DVD box sets, my photography books and an entertainment unit (it eventually rust and buckled on account of how much he was urinating on it) so in despair I took him to the vet, who checks him for urinary problems. That test cost me £75. Nada. No problem with his urine. The cat is stressed they tell me. Why is he stressed, can’t he meet his deadlines at work? Does he have financial woes, and is the rise in utilities taking its toll on him? Anyhoo they advise me to buy this plug in thing called feliway, which is supposed to create a tranquil environment for stressed pussies. At £30 a pop for a months supply, I gave it three months. Didn’t work. This little furry thing was pushing me over the edge, and I thought to myself, if this were a man, I would have dumped him a long time ago.

The FINAL straw came last Tuesday when I woke up and there was no electricity. Now I don’t mess with electric, can just about switch on a plug, let alone change one, so called in an electrician, he fiddles with a few things, not me unfortunately cos this guy was Foxy with a capital ‘Fuck me now’. Anyway, asks me ‘Have you got a pet in here?’ and then proceeded to tell me that Toby had urinated into an extension cable, causing the electric to blow. Told me I was lucky that it hadn’t started an electrical fire and killed me. I think when it gets to the point where your pussy is endangering your life; it’s time for tough love. I resisted the urge of putting him, the ruined extension and a couple tins of Whiskers in a tied bag and floating it down the Thames and he is now residing with my Mum and her 3 other cats. If that doesn’t teach him a lesson, nothing will. It’s sad, but I just don’t know if my work will believe another ‘I can’t come in today, my cat tried to kill me again last night’.Only I could end up with the Anti-Cat.

So, turns out, even my relationships with animals are dysfunctional.