A past injustice came to haunt me last night. When I was sadly and a little nervously packing up my life from NYC to Baltimore, I was ecstatic when the movers arrived. I was useless after 5 straight days of packing and moving 800 lbs of clothes [back] to the thrift store, all done with a total lack of sleep from teary goodbye nights out. They didnt even yell at me that they had to move like a loose chandelier or stray curtain rod.

Scott reminded me last night that actually those clowns ripped off my old school Pentax camera my dad gave me ages ago. Worse, the lead mover asked to use my bathroom and ceremoniously took the stinkiest poop while we sat only a few feet away -- the furthest distance we could get in the 300 sq foot apartment. We were pressed against the back window. Who does that? I want my money back.

I just hit a work-low. I demand (or more likely beg for) crap from people all day and its starting to wear thin. On the people. Just now, I needed some artwork from an old archive, so I asked someone to email it to me. I almost hit send to forward it on to a client and realized the email copy he sent to me just didn't appear to display a whole lot of respect.

"I'm only sending you one version, so it had better work."

I actually went in and re-wrote his email to me with some cheery text to make it at least appear that I'm liked. That's low.

"This version ought to work best for the client. Thanks!"

Lo-hooser.

Acute.

This morning I watched a tall man with gray hair walk along the city sidewalk, large steamy coffee in one hand, breakast in another and a large work-bag over his shoulder. The wind blew hard against him and his warm coat collar was upturned. All at once he tripped and fell down hard on the sidewalk, all the way down on his shoulder-- coffee upside down, papers everywhere, breakfast goodies soaked through. A few seconds into it, he picked himself up, picked up what could be salvaged and hobbled off. A huge pool of still-steamy coffee stayed behind.

Things like that just get me. Sure, there's a lot worse things happening, but its witnessing the mundane, daily misshaps or hurt feelings that grab hold of me. Its just that they are so hideously human. Which makes me feel like I'm more like this character from a book I read a few years ago than I'd like to be. She was off-kilter, in that whenever she saw any sort of cruelty or sadness she's spiral into hysterics and would have to sing "Old Suzanna" over and over to pull herself out of it.

Maybe I need to remember that most people are like the woman described below. That makes it easier.

Spreading love.

Driving to work, this youngish woman in her dark "power suit" and sunglasses tried to cross in front of me near an intersection where I was slowing down. With the jaywalking pedestrian in mind, I braked, and then braked again, not sure if she was going to go forth or I was.

Shockingly, she snarled into my window: "Make up your mind, bitch." She crossed the street in front of me, cheezy heels clicking along the pavement.

I let it sink in for about 2 seconds, then rebutted by rolling down the window. Vrrrrrnnnnn. "You're ugly." I said in a freakishly calm voice.

I drove off.

Maybe I need pointers from the skillets on Elimidate.

Everything at work launched at the same time. A project cyclone.

Last Saturday, at last curled up on the couch, deadlines and meetings far removed from thought, the phone rang. My heart sank when I saw the caller ID. It was our two friends, our two generous friends who have had us over to their remote home countless times for dinners, boatrides, bonfires. They were excitedly preparing to drive into the city to go out with us for a fun dinner and some form of entertainment that we'd invited them to. Except that I'd completely forgotten. There were no plans. I scanned the doggy-tumbleweeds in the corners, papers everywhere, candles waxed to tables & counters. I looked in the mirror-- equally frightening. Moreover, what was this big "event" we invited them up for?

Our favorite restaurants were booked. It was too late to cook. I tornadoed the house clean while Scott called around for things to do. Long & short: we booked 4 tickets to see Louie Anderson at the Improv @ 9:00-- I couldn't stop laughing, the Family Feud guy? Not to mention the Improv is tucked in this pseudo-"club" outdoor mall with Tara Reid wanna-bes and neon signs. In an effort not to spend the whole night on frat row, dinner was booked at a restaurant I'd heard someone once say was good in nearby Little Italy. There was knock at the door, miraculously, we were ready.

After a drink at our house, we piled into our car and sat in abysmal inner harbor traffic. Not sure why, but I always feel I have to sell the city I am living in, so this was slightly annoying, not to mention we'd miss our reservations. They sat in the back politely commenting on how many people were out that night. We inched along.

After turning the car down a tiny Little Italy street, we shimmied out of the car for the valet. We walked in to find a dark, dark restaurant packed to the gills with furs, jewels and big hair. A faux fireplace illuminated an opulent bar, complete with a piano player and a Kathleen Turner (at present age) lookalike lounge singer. Fantastic.

Carrie couldn't understand why I was giggling so hard. This was the kind of place you'd take your prom date to dinner! Regal! After a while, the freakishly polite and gentle tuxedo-host (who must have been 14) led us up the narrow staircase to our table. I couldnt help but notice that it was already 8 and we were seated between two 25-tops. Chaos. Glasses, plates, special requests.

Finally, our very formal waitor came. I alerted him that we had to leave in 45 minutes, so he then suggested he immediately share with us the specials. He passed around 4 jumbo-sized menus and took a deep breath.

Standing slightly behind Carrie, he rattled off the first few appetizers, with elaborate descriptions of each. He kept on going. "Also, tonight we have..", a fifth, a sixth...I lost track. And we were still only on appetizers? Carrie started to get a crick in her neck and had to stop trying to face him. I didn't even know what he was talking about after a while. As soon as I thought he was through, he'd breathe in and parlay another. At last, he concluded the very long diatribe and I had to make up some excuse for why the two blonds were shaking uncontrollably. Totally rude, I know. But I've never heard anything like that before.

The one 25-top made toasts. Courses were served. The other table got drunk. I couldnt shake the Alice in Wonderland/prom-night feeling, sitting in the rococo chair with the enormous menu in the candlelight. Which I opened and my suspicions were confirmed: it cost a fortune.

Totally ignored by the half dozen super-stressed servers, the minutes passed. I did get to eek in a little wine and some bread for the table. At last, at 9:00, when we were to be at our fancy comedy routine, we were served enormous plates of food- Michael ordered a humongous plate of beef, I'd never seen anything so big. It was like a reality show: OK, you have 5 minutes to inhale 8 lbs of meat, and the kicker? Only using a butter knife. It happened. We barely spoke, we inhaled, paid the exhorbitant bill and raced off.

We circled up the garage lot to CRAZY PARTY MALL at least 10 times. I felt carsick. Boogied straight to the Improv door: locked. After 5-10 minutes of banging, someone showed up and whisked us to the crummy seats in the back. We'd missed all the opening acts, and caught maybe the second half of Louie's gig, which was downright hilarious. The kicker? After the show, on our way out we flung open the door into some drunken twenty year old losing his lunch-- er, 23 beers. I am not sure our friends will ever return. Cheers!