UNEMPLOYED

Balboa Press

Contents

Chapter 1. Desperation........................................................1Chapter 2. On-the-Job Training................................................10Chapter 3. Good Vibrations....................................................17Chapter 4. Disappointment and Embarrassment...................................20Chapter 5. Good News, Bad News................................................24Chapter 6. Taking Off Like a Shot.............................................26Chapter 7. Nasty Grams!.......................................................28Chapter 8. Monster Taxes......................................................30Chapter 9. Stupid and Incompetent.............................................32Chapter 10. Shock and Loathing................................................38Chapter 11. Exhaustion and Comfort Food.......................................42Chapter 12. Losing It.........................................................46Chapter 13. Sweet Relief......................................................50Chapter 14. My Dogs Are Barking...............................................53Chapter 15. Everything I Didn't Want..........................................56Chapter 16. Adapting to Changes...............................................61Chapter 17. Cha Cha Cha Changes...............................................67Chapter 18. Management by Freak-Out...........................................71Chapter 19. The Scales of Justice.............................................77Chapter 20. Betrayed..........................................................83Chapter 21. Taking the Plunge.................................................87Chapter 22. Pretty Please With Sugar on Top and a Cherry!.....................91Chapter 23. Final Nastiness...................................................94Chapter 24. Desperation Part Deux.............................................97Chapter 25. Rebirth...........................................................100Chapter 26. Put Me in, Coach..................................................103Chapter 27. Coincidence? I Think Not..........................................107

Chapter One

Everything that surrounds you right now in your life, including the things you're complaining about, you've attracted. Now I know at first blush that's going to be something that you hate to hear. You're going to immediately say, "I didn't attract the car accident. I didn't attract this particular client who gives me a hard time. I didn't particularly attract the debt." And I'm here to be a little bit in your face and to say yes, you did attract it. This is one of the hardest concepts to get, but once you've accepted it, it's life transforming. The Secret

I crack open one eye as the early morning light filters through the mini blinds in a prism of color that makes me squint in pain. As I adjust to the light, my eyes open and I look around to try to figure out what day of the week it is. Funny how that isn't automatic anymore. I scan the familiar landscape of my bedroom and see the celery-green walls and the white billowy curtains that are supposed to give the feeling of Jamaica on a warm summer evening. Instead of feeling Jamaica, my eyes scan to the top of the curtain rod and I see all of the accumulated dust. Funny, I didn't know dust bunnies had wings. Still lying down, I can see the top of my dresser with all of The Spouse's clutter, like loose change, bank receipts, pens, and oddly, a candle on one side and my jewelry box on the other. Above the dresser is a floral swag of purple and yellow flowers that's hanging awkwardly by a thread. You see, my cat, Eli Manning, likes to stand on my jewelry box and bat at the swag with his paw. No matter how many times I fix it, Eli Manning will yank it down, so now it's permanently crooked because, frankly, I gave up. I turn over on my side and look at the alarm clock. It's 6:12 a.m.

I sit up and put my feet on the green Oriental rug. I can see the floor by the dresser. The Spouse's shoes sitting there tell me beyond a shadow of a doubt that it's a weekday. The Spouse puts his shoes in the closet on Friday in favor of wearing sneakers all weekend, so it's definitely one of those rotten weekdays. The sight of those shoes makes my shoulders slump and I groan. I know I'm going to be alone all day, and it's depressing. I swing my legs back onto the bed and under the covers. There's no reason to get up at 6:12 a.m.

The truth of the matter is, I'm unemployed.

The Spouse is reaching for his alarm clock as it blasts the news at a decibel level even my mother-in-law would be able to hear. The clock says 6:47 a.m., but it's really 6:35. "Why don't you reset the time so it's accurate?" I ask him, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes.

"Because I like to do the math to figure out what time it is; it helps to wake me up."

"But if you wake up at 6:35 every morning and every morning it says 6:47, is there really a whole lot of calculating to do?" I ask, not really expecting an answer. The Spouse gets out of bed and heads to the bathroom across the hall.

Still not needing to get out of bed yet because my date with Regis & Kelly is hours away, I just curl up and close my eyes for a while. As I lay there, I'm really not thinking, but I find myself anticipating the next things that will happen. Right on cue, my dogs, Lily and Riley, and my cat, Eli Manning, get up from their respective places at the foot of the bed and snuggle themselves all around me. Both of my dogs are fairly large, about seventy pounds. Lily's a light brown and white smooth collie, and Riley's a calico-colored, long-haired border collie/golden lab mix. Eli Manning is a large black Burmese/Angora cat with a white chin, Which explains why I named him after the New York Giants Quarterback. Anyway, with my beasts all cuddled up with me, I can hear The Spouse turn on the radio in the bathroom, which means one thing: He's finished "reading" for now and has moved on to the more productive part of his morning ritual, although he would beg to differ which one was the more productive. While The Spouse showers, I hear the water splashing at predictable times and then all of a sudden I think, "Here comes the nose blow," and right on cue, there's the elephant-like blow. Luckily his farts aren't as predictable. Off goes the radio, the door opens, and The Spouse comes back into the bedroom.

Oh God. Now he's going to towel off his back.

Done.

Rubs his head with a towel.

Done.

I know his routine too well! Argh!

I jump out of bed at the horror of knowing exactly what's going to happen next. I grab my fluffy blue robe with the torn pocket, put on my slippers, and take a look at myself in the mirror. I recognize the stuff on the top of my head as hair, but it's going to take a major reorganization effort to make it look like hair.

On the trip downstairs, the dogs and Eli Manning go barreling past me. This is our morning ritual where the two dogs and Eli Manning, who thinks he's a dog, go running down the stairs past me in the style of the running of the bulls in Pamplona. They bark at each other, and jump on each other, and basically carry on like three nuts, and, yes, Eli Manning would bark if he could. I look at them and it occurs to me they...