bruise – Stories That Are All True

Sometimes I can’t tell whether I’m a bad cook or a good one… and by that, I mean that I make delicious food, but my arms are covered up and down with burns and bruises. A lot of the burns look like cat scratches after a couple of days because most of them are from fryer baskets, and I know from past experience that I’ll be able to see the remnants for about five years. So are these badges of honor, the signs of my profession, or am I just incredibly clumsy? Wait. That’s not really a question. The answer is always going to be both.

The thing is, I don’t notice the brand new burns. Marks just mysteriously appear on my skin and yes, they do hurt once they’ve started scabbing over. But do I do anything about it? No, not really. If I think about it I’ll put on some Neosporin,™ but most of the time I just let them be and hope chicks dig scars, because I don’t have a choice. More than once I’ve been told I look like I belong to a biker gang, if bikers wore incredibly nerdy glasses and Dockers™ to work. My friend Scott gave me an invaluable tip- wear the black ones, because if you get bleach on them, you can fix it with a Sharpie.™ Words to live by, truly.

Last night was particularly difficult. My lead line cook was so sick that we closed the kitchen early, but before that, we were hit with about 50-75 tickets at once, and that may actually be an understatement. We were so submarined that I left the pub thinking I should find a new job, because I just wasn’t cut out for a restaurant this busy.

I walked in today and my lead line cook said, “you were a rock star last night. You busted ass.” My heart swelled inside my chest and all of the insecurity I felt on the ride home washed away. He said he even told the manager what a great job I did, and for a moment, I thought that cold medicine had affected his memory.

As soon as we were finished cooking, he left. One of the waitstaff was talking to us about how slammed we got, and my lead line cook said, “yeah… and Leslie shut this motherfucker down by herself!” Such pride and admiration in his voice was humbling as I doubled over laughing.

I then laughed quietly for another six hours.

It made up for the fact that today I’ve got whatever he’s got. I stopped at 7-Eleven on the way to work and got some cold medicine, because my Debra Winger voice is setting in.

I still haven’t heard anything from UMD, but I’m not worried. News will come when it comes.

I’m already a rock star.

I got feedback on the rough draft of my book review from my editor, and both agreed it was a piece of crap on the first pass (The first draft of everything is shit. -Ernest Hemingway). There was a specific format that they needed to follow, and in general, rule following gets you nowhere in my line of work. I wasn’t trying to be obstinate, of course. I just have a loose grip on what directions actually mean, because I often interpret them to be the exact opposite of what they actually mean…. which is why in formal writing I should never be trusted without an editor. It was actually pretty funny, because it didn’t occur to me until later that I was talking to a schoolteacher as I reread everything she sent over after the second draft.

1. Oh yes. So much better.

Thirty seconds later…

2. NOW I KNOW WHAT THE BOOK IS ABOUT.

I must’ve laughed for three solid minutes over that one. Sufficed to say, the review has been turned in, and the process for getting approved to be a professional takes about a week. Just for my own curiosity, I looked at some of the other paid reviews, and there were typos and grammatical errors in them… AND I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT THE BOOK WAS ABOUT. 😛 So, if their reviews are any indication, I’ll probably do ok. I don’t feel superior to any other writer out there, I just wanted to see what the gold standard was for this web site, and whether I was capable of that level.

If the review is scheduled for publication, one of the things that gets my reviewer score higher, and therefore, my rate per review, is sharing it. I’ll be posting it here, on my Facebook page, on Twitter, etc. Apparently, you can go right to the top of the list if you have 25,000 followers. I passed that long ago in terms of the number of times this web site has been read, including individual visitors. However, not all of them follow me via my author page or WordPress. I had a lot more followers when my web site was connected via my personal Facebook page, because I have so many friends. I thought it was better to separate everything out, but I still post a link on my personal page because it’s just easier for people to find me that way. I’ve also gotten a lot more readers through WordPress by tagging my entries, something I didn’t know was so incredibly important. It puts me higher in page rankings for a particular topic, rather than just being lost at sea among millions of excellent writers.

My heart is in my stomach waiting to see what will happen, so it was nice that I already had something planned for last night to get my mind off things. My friend Jaime met me at Sticky Fingers and took me to a mutual friend’s baby shower, and then came over to my house for a little bit to eat the cupcakes I’d bought earlier. Jaime is only the second friend that’s been to my house, and not because I don’t want my friends to come over- it’s just that since I take the Metro everywhere, there really hasn’t been a reason for people to come by. Prianka drove me home from the airport when I came in after my mother’s funeral, and now you have the grand total. I realized that I should have friends over more often, although Jaime is probably the only one that would actually want to come. This is because most of my friends live in Alexandria, and Jaime lives on the side of DC that’s closer to me. Because of the traffic, anywhere in VA is quite the hike…. much easier for us both to Metro and meet in DC, or I’ll take the Metro to Alexandria because I don’t get to hang out there very often. I was jazzed because the shower was held very close to my old neighborhood- even the same freeway exit!

My one #dumbassattack was that I spent so much time trying to secure the book I wanted to give the twins, only to rush out of the house without it…. even though I told myself to grab it at least fifty times and still forgot. I’ll just have to give it to them another time. Books keep.

In other news, I was wearing wool socks when I slipped down the stairs yesterday, and I thought I broke my ass. I, in fact, did not. After many rounds of Tylenol and ibuprofen, though, I am at least down to a small whimper when I sit. As I was getting into the bathtub, I also noticed that I am a hot mess back there- the biggest and best bruise I think I’ve ever achieved. #goals

I think that’s where we’ll stop for right now- if I think of anything else pressing, I’ll pick it back up later. Right now I just want some hot coffee and a bath. Maybe I will even drink the hot coffee while taking a bath…. something soothing inside and out for my poor little purple ass.