true story

owfice burn walked into a neighborhood bodega late the other night on her way back from the bar. owfice burn somehow miraculously recalled that she was running low on toilet paper and did the responsible adult thing by replenishing. she was handsomely rewarded by the good lord. she encountered an irate customer who standing up for his consumer rights (must have read office knights many customer complaint blogs). apparently he was sold an expired condom from the chinese immigrant shopkeep who's english was pretty much limited to "no refund fo you." owfice burn was first clutching her toilet paper, fearing that someone was going to get shot over this little dispute. then...the customer whips out his cell phone threatening, "if you don't facking give me my muny back i am facking cawling the cops!!" "no refund for you" owfice burn is watching this escalate with great interest. "HAllo, i would like to report an amergency,the amergency is located at..where you at?.."OK the emergency is at 5th and Garfield." "Yes i was sold an expiued condom." The stor is cawled: organic grocery. fruit. dot. vegetable. dot. beverages. dot ciggarettes dot" the man is now walking along reading every single item listed on the auning to the 911 operator." Owfice burn and the remaining customers in the shop comment quietly among themselves, "I don't think I would classify this as an emergency. you? no..You..No I am out of toilet paper. That is an emrgency.. i agree."
true story..though i did not stick around for the arrival of law enforcement.

A few Random thoughts

Why does predictive text pretend to not know profane words? You realize this was probably debated in a boardroom and some gross hypocrite dad ruled against it. If I want to curse at my friends it shouldn't take me 20 minutes to toggle through the letter choices to do so.

Adding no offense to the end of any statement makes it automatically offensive. Watch: I really don't like yogurt...no offense. Sounded rude didn't it?


Did the Tom Petty video for "Don't come around here no more" make you feel creepy? Made me feel creepy.

Some of the dogs in the city look like weird people.

People who say "touche" think they're really fancy.

What about when others refer to someone as being "really rich" that's kinda 80's don't cha think?

Anyone who refers to a person as being "oriental" is either not so intelligent or a senior citizen.

Do you feel shy immediately leaving a store when you realize that all their merchandise is out of your price range and pretend to browse for a few minutes as to not look cheap or dumb? I do.

Fun fact of the day: Office Knight's bed is a taco.

Weekend Edition: Ann Taylor Slut

Does everyone know what an "Ann Taylor Slut" is? Ok. If you don't, this is an important term to know if you live in the suburbs, the Upper East Side or go out to bars near Grand Central. An Ann Taylor slut is girl who goes out in essentially what most would call business casual. Usually the pants are khakis with a high rise, in some extreme cases they cover the navel. The top is often a twin set shell without it's cardigan twin. The shoes are definitely flat or have a small stacked heal, never stilletos and most likely not even a kitten heel. The slut part comes in after the tucked and ironed lass has had a few drinks. The more sophisticated Ann Taylor sluts will have a dirty martini or a cosmopolitan. But then there are those that are still trying to impress their business casual frat boy friends and order something like a Stella. After three or more drinks the pale (or shall we say, "office tanned") body starts to dance up a storm, wildly tossing her not so properly coiffed dry puff of hair. This is when it gets good. Office knight has witnessed a few late night moments involving Ann Taylor Sluts including someone's lovely loafers hanging out the window of a cab; another time one was overheard saying "Who turned on the AC?" referring to the cold air of the night. The Ann Taylor slut represents the soft spoken girl who works way too many hours hence the disproportionate amount of work clothes to "going out" clothes who sits quietly at her cube all day. I suggest going out with her because she'll party like a rock star and I'm guessing it's not to hard to get into them chinos.

The Damage is done!

I know everyone was anxiously awaiting the conclusion to my riveting tale about the controversial myspace friend request from my teen cousin and I actually have authentic content from both Office Knight (who is still asleep as far as the blog is concerned) and the teen cousin. In efforts to not bruise the highly malleable teen ego Office Knight (whose myspace profile is suitable for adolescent viewing) came to the rescue and sent this note below to try to smooth things over.

HEY! So glad we're friends! So get this--I don't think you should add Office Doll and Office Raider as friends because some of their friends write them messages that I don't think your parents and your friends' parents would think are appropriate.
What is your updated email address? Office Raider and Office Doll want to send you email.

xoxox
Cousin Office Knight


Teen Cousin's Response

Me too.....i was thinking about going through all my email addresses to see if people i know have a myspace. I already requested them but if they write anything inappropriate i could just delete the message or something. (Teen cousin provides her email)

DOES ANYONE REALIZE WHAT THIS MEANS?? This means that teen cousin thought that Office Doll and I were going to leave HER inappropriate messages! Yes this makes a lot of sense: We cannot approve your friend request because if we do we will be unable to help ourselves from sending you lewd messages. Teen cousin's mother (our Aunt) has never really been a huge fan of any of us and I would venture to say that Teen Cousin's mother has been briefed on this exchange. It is almost certain at this point that we are never going to get invited to their house, somewhere in the middle of nowhere, because in teen cousin's mind her Office cousins have what appears to be no impulse control. Classic.


Peace out,
Office Raider

You should be ASHAMED of yourself!

A humbling realization was made yesterday: I'm inappropriate! Now, as we all know inappropriate is a relative term. The inappropriate I'm referring to is kind of like the grandmother's idea of inappropriate: pretty much anything you can think of that would be fun that doesn't involve producing something useful or worshipping the Lord. I've been inappropriate for as long as I can remember, thinking back to when I was just a wee Office Raider there was a particular event that started what has turned out to be a lifetime of inappropriateness to date. It was 1986 and little Office Raider with her budding penchant for music wanted to be Cyndi Lauper for Halloween. Office Raider's mom was quite crafty and made the young Office Raider the most wonderful Cyndi Lauper costume complete with the newspaper skirt and blue eye shadow. When Office Raider arrived to the kindergarten Halloween parade her mean, scary teacher thought the costume to be too suggestive for a 5 year old and was sent home. The rest of Halloween '86 was spent as a buttoned up pirate. Yes this is a true story.

Anyway, what spawned my dipping into the inappropriate archives was a friend request on myspace from my 14 year old cousin. I realized I couldn't accept her request due to the fact that numerous and possibly true conclusions could be drawn about me due to the content on my page. The last thing I need is my Dad to hear that any of the following could be potentially true:

1) Office Raider has a drinking problem: many of the comments left by my site's passerby's reference one time or another where my ability to walk, talk or remember something was impaired.
2) Office Raider fancies herself a sex symbol: For a brief moment I picked up a hobby that is now referred to as my stint as a "Non-Profit" model. This resulted in a collection of highly gratuitous images that now swivel in and out on a slide show on my myspace page.
3) Office Raider is maturing at a rate that is less than favorable: I'm on myspace in the first place!

Stay tuned on how Office Knight tried to save the day by explaining to the 14 year old cousin why we can't be "friends" on myspace. The response from my cousin is priceless and simultaneously raises concerns that her reading comprehension skills may be in need of some extra attention.

It's gone too far!

I witnessed first hand this weekend the grip that corporate America has on it's members. My other sister (not office Knight), we'll give her an honorary office title....Office Doll. Office Doll buys toys for a living. Office Doll and I go out together almost every weekend. It's down to a science at this point: Office Doll comes to my apartment, I make a few drinks with the infamous office raider heavy hand and we crank up the itunes, much to the chagrin of my neighbors. When Office Doll and I go out we try to leave the stress of the daily grind behind. Stressing about work or other boring things like 401k's has no place on the dance floor. For one evening a week, the palm pilots and spreadsheets are traded in for high heels and tank tops. Well this week Office Doll broke the rules and had a business inspired panic attack/hallucination! It was well past midnight and probably 4 redbull vodkas plus a few mystery shots later when the panic struck: Office Doll had herself convinced that her phone was sending texts messages to her boss! Hell bent on washing my stresses down with too many alcoholic concoctions I was in no position to reason with Office Doll and just started yelling...Here we are two blondes that look an awful lot a like in our little jeans and shoes screaming at each other in front of a line of awaiting clubgoers. Finally I thrusted my arm into the air to hail a cab yelling "We have to go home since your phone is sending unauthorized text messages to your boss!" The evening was a bust. Thank you John Doe of Widgets Inc.

The Blog Is Going to Sleep for a Little While

Why, you ask? There are several reasons:

1. Office Knight will be joining a new office and must focus her magical talents on her new office duties
2. Owfice Burn is too busy shopping for sweatpants so that predators won't steal her away from us when she goes jogging
3. Office Raider is busy battling the forces of traffic darkness (remember, Office Raider's office has wheels, a transmission and a spare tire)
4. And besides, we all could've been killed recently by a batch of poison spinach. As a result, we need time to reflect on how fragile life is. Not to mention, I've been calling Popeye non-stop and haven't heard back yet. I'm totally worried about him. (and yes, this is the world's most awful joke).

When the blog comes back to life, we will send out an urgent bulletin. Then you will be able to experience the joy again of reading about our important lives.

Thank you for your faithful readership.

The Office Tan Management

DAMN!

It's finally happened! I've listed some of the perils of having an office on wheels previously such as injuring someone if I bump them with my office or being fined for not paying for my office to stay somewhere for a certain period of time. I've adjusted to these things and it is what it is. BUT one danger I haven't taken seriously enough is the fact that others can see me in my office pretty much at all times unless I get on the floor or something. By the way, if I'm on the floor in my office it probably means I've decided I'm in some kind of grave danger or I'm taking a secret, unauthorized nap. Anyway, I like to pump up the music in my office and we're not talking respectable, cool-people music like indie bands or classic rock, I'm talking like KTU guido anthems. Put on "It's Raning Men" or a new fave "SexyBack" by Justin Timberlake and I can't help but practically do the tootsie roll. Well...as I was walking into a meeting today I saw one of my customers miming what appeared to be someone driving a car, leaning back and dancing and I knew it, I knew it right away. As I approached the table he broke the news: "I saw you driving down 9th avenue groovin' in your car." I tried to play it off like I must have been joking with someone in the car but he wasn't having it, "You were alone," he said. Oh. I just let it go, my co-workers giggling with delight as they know about my propensity for really, really wrong music. That's it. So I got caught dancin' in my office, it was bound to happen. Have a great labor day y'all.

European Vacation

Office Knight and I are in the same family. I have an important story about our most recent family vacation, which was actually a year ago. I'm not gonna give you a play by play of the whole trip because that's boring rather I'll run down the list of the some of the most foolish moments in my entire life:

1. The fancy Peugeot rental is too small for all of us and our luggage and is a stick shift
2. Joanne (our other sister who works with toys) loses her luggage for about 2 hours
3. We get lost for about 3 hours
4. Office Raider offends all of Portugal by trying to use her Spanish to communicate
5. We almost roll into the ocean when trying to get up a 90 degree hill due to rusty stick driving skills
6. Office Raider whimpers as we almost roll into the ocean
7. Office Raider's mother tells her to shut up repeatedly and then kicks everyone out of the car
8. Office Raider's Father's retina becomes detached and can't join the family fun
9. Office Knight tries to pants office raider and gets smacked
10. It is concluded that violence may be a more effective strategy for conflict resolution
11. Ruby gets yelled for not informing Office Raider about an insect resting on her

At the conclusion of the journey to Portugal, I realized some major things about my travel preferences. I announced that my next adventure would be a well organized, highly commercial trip where everyone gets an itinerary and a hat.

There's a Plumber in all of us

I went to a really fine institution where I met my closest friend, we will call her Ruby (a derivative of her actual name coined by Office Knight). We proceeded to live together for all four years. We now both reside in the big (currently hot & smelly) big apple where we can continue to dote on our mundane accomplishments. Well this week there was a huge breakthrough at Ruby's residence. She has been complaining of unsatisfactory water pressure in her shower for over a year now and finally took the reigns and bought a shower head which would remedy the situation. I have to stress that low water pressure in a shower for anyone like myself or Ruby is a huge problem because we have big, poofy hair that takes hours to wash the shampoo out if the pressure isn't sufficient. We experienced this in a really, really unfortunate hotel in Jamaica. Anyway, she bought the shower head. Then she realized she needed needle nose pliers, which she referred to as "Needle Pliers." Well, in the big, smelly apple if you need "Needle Pliers" at 11:30pm someone's got 'em. So she went out and got the pliers to remove the vital piece from her shower that would let the new shower head function at it's best. The next morning I get a phone call from Ruby. She claims that when she turned on her shower she was "thrown against the wall." The visual of Ruby being slammed against the wall by her pseudo hydrant was really just too much. Thank goodness I was in my office on wheels where I could guffaw at my heart's content. She now will use her "needle pliers" to put the piece back.

Because We Ran Out of Ideas

We’ve been missing in action because, I, Office Knight have been at a very important health retreat and because we’ve run out of ideas for posting. It’s possible that we’ve already written on every topic that there is to write about. Sigh. It certainly is difficult being so deeply intellectual.

Last night, we had one last idea to write about. I was going to report on a riveting dream that I had in which I was put in charge of feeding farm animals. One of the cows told me that he was very hungry—famished, in fact. Upon closer inspection, I realized that he was lying and had plenty of food! Office Knight was deceived by a member of the bovine community.

To reiterate, it is agonizing to be so deeply intellectual. I opted not to post this engaging tale because Office Raider felt that it might detract from the high standards of journalism that we keep at officetan.com.

So no new content yet. However, if anyone has any special requests please feel free to post them in the comments or send an email. I could always revive one of my old fancy talents like reciting a Lee Press-On Nails commercial from 1986. Actually, I’d probably charge a fee for something like that.

Bones

I am pissed off at Hickory Farms. Yep, I am. I found another bone in my Hickory Farms andouille sausage. I want to write them a letter to tell them that I hate that they sold me sausages with bones but Office Raider tells me that I’m going to get “locked up” if I keep writing weird customer complaint letters. But what if I do it anyway? What if I write to Hickory Farms to tell them that I hate their boney sausages? How would I tell them?

Dear Hickory Farms,

Another day, another bone in one of my Hickory Farms sausages. Why do you sell me sausages with bones in them? Have I done something to make you think that I like sausages with bones in them? Because I don’t.

If I did want andouille sausages with bones in them, I would expect that I could select a package that would say, “includes bones” or “includes tasty bones” or “includes farm-fresh bones”, however you might say it. This package did not mention bones.

Please stop feeding me bones for dinner. As I said, I don’t like them.

Sincerely,

Office Knight

Everyone loves free stuff

As an office raider one of my many responsibilities is to deliver free branded items such as pens, pads, mints, little clocks etc etc. This is to remind the people in the office to utilize my important wares. Most of the time there are special receptionist guards that protect the office from too many raiders. These "guards" can always be swooned with a fancy pen or some hand sanitizer and I always found that a little too easy. I've seen people fight over some of the pens,making up sad stories about how they need one of these hot chachkes for their kid or something. I now understand. This past week I relieved myself from my office raiding duties to visit a land where the outrageous are even more outrageous and people wear high heals in the pool. One very special outrageous character who refers to himself and his clothing company as "Mr. Girth" gave me a free t-shirt... Between the free-ness of it and the caption that makes grown professionals behave like adolescents watching scrambled porn I was so excited that I reverted back to my fat-kid-in-a-pool style and wore it in the pool (no I wasn't wearing heals). The caption invited the most entertaining feedback such as I bet you do; Show me; Prove it and so on. Mind you the average age at this lovely function was probably over 30. Mr. Girth and his free t-shirts was adored like an office raider with a free pen that doubles as a memory stick...Except he was drifting around with a gaggle of well endowed strippers instead of receptionists. For the sake of sounding like a fortune cookie (which people fight over as well)...In business and in pleasure giving people something can give you much in return
www.mrgirth.com

Is it me or...

is this photo kind of pervy? CNN published this photo a few months ago for a story on the gas crisis. If I were a photo editor, I'd definitely pick the pervy-est photos even for boring stories like the gas crisis.

Jo Burnism: Rembuh to Hide in the Bushes!

Jo Burn and sister Cath and I recently got into a bit of a tangle over the appropriate safety precawtion to undertake when one experiences a flat tire in a “dangerous” neighborhood.

Jo: Hey listen, I read an e-mail letta that someone in the owfice sent me. Its impow-tant. A police officah sent it. It said you should neva stay in ya cah (car) if it breaks down, becaws that’s exactly where the murderuh’s ah gonna look.

Me: I don’t understand. If your car breaks down, and you’re in a bad neighborhood, where are you going to go that’s safer?? Why wouldn’t you just lock the door and call the tow truck or the police?

Jo: BECAWS…while ya sitting theah, cawlin…they’ll be watchin..and then they’ll bust through the winda, and do Gahd knows what!!!

Me: SOOOO, I don’t understand….where else are you going to go??

Jo: The BUSHES!! You hide in the bushes. The’ll neva know you’re thea. You make the phone cawl from the bushes.

Cath: (hands flailing) Fuhgetit Jo, I’m drivin on the damn flat tiuh (tire) till I find a ghas (gas) station. I don’t care if I ruin the damn cah (car) or tiah or whateva!!

Jo: (hands flailing even more) NONONONONO! CATH! What if you CAN’T drive the cah anymoa. Then you GOTTA hide in the bushes! Undastand??

Cath: Fuget the bushes!

Me: Yea, FUGET THE BUSHES!

--Owfice Burn

Q: What is a tanning salon accident?

A: Tanning salon accident is a term used to describe the conspicuous lobster-esque hue that results from laying below a set of UV ray emitting flash bulbs for a little too long. How do people get tanning salon accidents? One culprit is the junky $5 tanning bed in the back of your "mom & pop" gym’s menthol-scented locker room. The people that man that seldomly-santized capsule have very, very little interest in dissuading you from putting your pale-self in for 20 minutes to "prepare" you for your trip to the Carribean. Then there are your more "upscale" or commercial tanning salons. This is where you find yourself signing forms and giving your entire sun-exposure history to some 16 year-old with bigger tits than you. Then she wants to shove $45/oz tanning "primer" down your throat to help "ya culla develop and last longa." Anyway, my point? These places want to avoid tanning salon accidents at all costs to the point where you waive your right to bitch at them and blame them for your new borsht-like complexion. Then you have to compromise your integrity by "haggling" with teen-titty to get a few extra minutes normally reserved for your melanin-ly gifted folk by claiming you’ve never burned. This is for the overzealous, procrastinating "occasion" tanner. You’re meeting up with an ex for the first time that dumped you to "focus on his career;" You’re going to a wedding and you’ll be face to face with the guy you had a sloppy, drunken one-night stand, who happens to be one of the groomsmen… who you’ve not seen since you called him "cowboy" at 4am. These, my friends, are the worst cases of tanning salon accidents.

This Just In...

Someone named Juana accidentally poured a milkshake on Office Raider at a midtown Starbucks. Office Raider reports that her shirt is “soiled”. She might have to go home.

Everyone take a moment to pray for Office Raider’s shirt.

Public Service Announcement

This might come across as extremely judgmental...BUT it occurred to me when I was retrieving a friendster message from someone that wanted me to "holla back" that one should really think twice about ever contacting someone on the internet whose profile ONLY contains images of them taking pictures of themselves. Like the gross one where there's a big flash in the mirror and you can see some silly person posing in their boxers but you can't really see their face or the one where someone's neck looks all stretched out and you can see up their nose 'cause they're holding the camera out in front of them. The reason I say think twice is having only pictures of yourself taken by yourself is very odd considering it's not 1999 when digital cameras were like $900.00 and only one person per state had one. Everyone has digital cameras now so don't you think it's odd that there are no pictures of this person on a trip or maybe even at a bar...what about a wedding or something? Furthermore, why doesn't this person have anyone around to take a picture of them. Where are their friends? Do they not have any friends? Have they never gone anywhere? Or are they that, um, well icky that all the pictures of them on their vacations or at their graduations turned out really bad? Do you really want to be someone's guinea pig friend? --Office Raider

Thoughts from the Office

As I sit in my office cubicle, I find myself thinking of very important childhood memories like the time that I made a large fortune picking blueberries.

Every summer, I would visit grandparents Office Knight in Washington State. Besides having tons of soda and 2 large freezers full of ice cream, they had a blueberry patch. Picking blueberries rocked because Grandpa Office Knight would always put them in a bag, bring them to his church and sell them for a few dollars to a lucky parishioner. A few bucks here, a few bucks there and I was starting to feel like a very successful fruit vendor.

One day, Grandpa Office Knight informed me that he had received an order from his church friend for 20 pounds of blueberries! I knew that this was my chance to become a very wealthy child fruit vendor so I quickly took my silver bowl and headed to the blueberry patch.

Within a couple of hours I brought the silver bowl, now brimming with blueberries, to Grandpa Office Knight who promptly put them on the scale.

“2.5 pounds,” he said.

I quickly realized that my fruit vendor career was going to be extremely challenging so I begged my sister, Office sister, to join me out in the fields with the promise of large fortunes for both of us.

Off we went to begin filling our silver bowls. At first it was fine. We sang 80’s songs and talked about how we could negotiate a trip to establishments of culinary excellence like McDonald’s. As the time passed, tensions began to mount as we realized we had collected just a small fraction of the 20 lb order.

She claimed that I stepped on her toe on purpose (which I didn’t) and swiftly tossed her bowl of blueberries at my face—perhaps mimicking the mature pie-smashing antics of the Three Stooges. As the portrait of child serenity, I threw my bowl back at her. Now we had 0 pounds of blueberries. Grandparents Office Knight were called to intervene and quickly counseled us on our fruit picking obligations.

The next day, Office sister and I toiled again in the fields vowing not to lose our blueberry crop during heated discussions. Although we adhered to our plan, Office sister stepped on a banana slug in bare feet and in fright, threw our crop into the air. In thinking that perhaps she had been attacked by something very scary, I dropped my bowl and ran away.

My career as a fruit vendor was in serious jeopardy so Grandpa Office Knight stepped in and labored in the blueberry patches until the order was filled.

“How much will we make per pound,” I asked Grandpa Office Knight as he loaded the bags of blueberries into his car.

He muttered something about being a good Christian as he announced that he would be collecting 60 cents/lb or a total of twelve damn dollars.

This concludes today’s important office thoughts.

Owfice Moms

I love the idea that the office operates like a disfunctional family. it really does. i don't care how fancy and corporate you think your firm is. you still have annoying office siblings and there is ALWAYS a cranky but loving office mom. my office mom is cawled Lois. it's her job to bring "cheese an crackas" for everyone on tuesday morning's and "downuts and bagels" on thurdays. she sends out "remindah" e-mails scoldin' people for leaving dirty dishes in the sink "'cause it's disgustin'!!" or threatening, "claim what yuas in the fridge, 'cuz it's awl gettin' towsed out on friday!" She gets fed up when the owfice children act up, ask huh too many questions or leave their toys (aka staplers, binders, paper clips) strewn about the owfice.

--Owfice Burn