Does that say "Coach" or "Couch"?

Just a little note: I'm going to be gone over Thanksgiving-- expect a new post late next week.

There are times when, believe it or not, I only hear of an Overshare second-hand.

It would seem that all evidence is to the contrary, I know, but it's true. There are some things that Overshare simply elects to not tell me, and in those situations I usually find out about them through other sources. Often times in these circumstances, I will know that there is something that is being withheld from me, because I will hear her oversharing in the office next to mine, or talking loudly from her workspace, etc., but for some reason that I've yet to determine (It's over my head? She thinks I'm sick of hearing about it? Who knows?) she just chooses not to share particular stories with me.

[Witty Comeback: See, I always thought that she wouldn't tell you certain things in one of her bizarre attempts to make you jealous--like withholding sex from CTF while he was sleeping with Swedish Nanny, or something.]

One instance of this is actually one of my favorite stories, but to tell it properly I had to call upon my good friend Witty to recreate the scene for us.
In order to really appreciate this entry, we must first have a little background on Witty Comeback. She's a fashionista, hard-core. She can spot fake jewelry at fifty paces. She can walk a mile in four-inch heels and smile while doing it. She may have even coined the phrase, "It doesn't match; it goes."

Keep this in mind, because it makes this Much. More. Hysterical. What follows is Witty Comeback’s account of the infamous Coach Bag Incident, with just a few interjections of my own, because I can’t resist.

Overshare: Hey, Witty Comeback, look at what CTF bought for me!

Overshare holds up a very brightly colored handbag, covered in multi-colored Coach logos. It looked sort of like this one, but the handles were green.

[Anonymous: Maybe it’s just me, but I kind-of, sort-of hate that bag. Maybe it’s the association I have with Overshare’s purse now, I don’t know.]

Witty Comeback: Wow. Nice! Lemme see.
Overshare: Well, you can look, but you can't touch.

She walks over with the bag and, true to her word, holds it up for me to see but won't let me touch it. There was something...off...about that. And about the bag itself.

Overshare: CTF and I were in the Coach store on Saturday, and I was looking at this bag and I really liked it, and the saleswoman was really trying to sell me on it, but I mean, I wasn't going to buy it. So then CTF told me to go wait outside the store while he talked to the lady.
Witty Comeback: Come on, just lemme see.
Overshare: No, it's mine.

Like I was going to steal her toy. In the office.

Overshare: So then CTF came back outside and gave me the bag!
Witty Comeback, who owns several Coach bags herself: I just want to see how heavy it is. They're always heavy.
Overshare, handing over a bag crammed with stuff: Ok, but just for a second.

She puts the handles in my hand for less than 30 seconds, just long enough for me to heft it, but not long enough to bring up my other hand to touch it. Brief, to be sure, but I am an expert and that was NOT real leather those handles were made of.

Witty Comeback: Yeah, it's heavy.
Overshare: I wonder how much it was. I'm going to go online and look.

[Anonymous, interjecting: Wasn’t she IN the store with CTF, being harangued by the salesperson to buy it? Is she trying to say that she didn’t look at the price tag? Who does that? And does she think CTF used his masculine wiles to score a good deal? If so, how the heck would the Internet be able to tell her what he paid? Color me confused. Now back to Witty Comeback.]

So, of course, I turn around and go straight back to my desk to look myself. Because if there's one thing I know, it's that the manufacturers of fake bags often change just enough details of their bags not to get sued. And sure enough, the website delivered. Coach was selling that style bag, and it was selling bags in that color palette, but they weren't selling that particular bag in that particular color. So it was fake. Really curious to see what Overshare's reaction would be, I went into her office. I didn't say a word.

Overshare, looking online: They must not have it in stock anymore. But the other ones like this are $320. Wow. I can't believe he spent that much money on me.

Now, there's no way that she didn't know the bag was fake. Otherwise, she would have let me touch it. So I went into Anonymous Coworker’s office to discuss it, incredulous and trying to imagine....

Witty Comeback: Where did the lie begin? Did they go to the store, then walk down the street and buy the fake together? Did he just buy her the fake on the street and then she made up the story about going to the store to try to authenticate the bag to us? Did he give her the bag and try to pass it off as real? Why? I own real bags AND fakes, and I'll tell you which is which. Why the lying?
Anonymous: That's so weird. Just plain ODD.
Witty Comeback: And why, WHY if she knew the bag was fake, which she clearly did, did she practically instruct me to go check the website?
Anonymous: She must have wanted you to see the prices.
Witty Comeback: Oh my, she hadn't been to the website herself, and she thought it was such a good fake that the website would back her up! She is totally going to spend the next week talking about this bag and repeating the story just to convince me that it's real.

And sure enough, that's what she did. That bag didn't leave her side for days. She placed it prominently on a chair just inside the door of her office. She even took it to meetings. Within the building. It was unreal.

[Anonymous, interjecting again: I remember seeing her carry around that purse everywhere, and especially loved all the times when she'd set it on the conference table at meetings. Everyone else? We all had pads of papers, a cell phone here or there. And she never, not once, told me the story. To this day. She told everyone else (and that is not an exaggeration) but me. Nope. I get to hear about the consistency of poop, about sexual techniques, about Swedish Nanny, about everything else. But no Coach purse.]

We still didn't know what started the whole charade to begin with. But we were going to find out!

TSS Strikes Again!

You know, I’m just a girl, in the world… trying to just live her life, enjoy her work, and not deal with crazy people.

Why does this seem like a pipe dream?

Maybe because even if I didn’t have Overshare in my office telling me completely inappropriate, personal things (and that’s a BIG “if”) or Wyoming crawling into computer boxes, or Toolshed spamming me, I’d still have to deal with Tyrannical Sorority Sister.

One day, TSS sent out an all staff email. Now, as friends who have heard me fume about this before will tell you, I have a very specific and intense loathing of the All Staff Email. I find that there are very, very few things that in fact ALL STAFF need to have announced to them at the same time. Death. Bankruptcy. Christmas Party. Annual Meeting. I get that. But those All Staff Emails that are completely unnecessary, like “Hey everyone, even you folks in Denver, some idiot didn’t turn off his lights in the parking garage in Phoenix. Anyone know someone who drives a Black Honda Civic?” drive me around the bend. Take a moment and think about who really needs to see what you’re about to say and then send it to them, and only them. Capiche?

Rant Over.

So (and prepare yourselves to be shocked by this information,) TSS sent an All Staff Email requesting money.

This time the money was for Diabetes. Now, as I have not only family members but also close friends who suffer from this horrible disease (not to mention my beloved Elliot Yamin) I already donate to the American Diabetes Association. Part of me, when I saw her email explaining that she was joining her sorority in a Walk-A-Thon for ADA, I actually considered donating to the cause, because finally, she was asking for something that’s worth supporting.

But I forgot. Whether it was because my mind was trained at this point to conveniently “forget” all of the money requests that came my way from TSS or because I legitimately forgot, the world will never know. But apparently I was not the only person on staff to forget or “forget”, whichever the case may be, because a few weeks later (AFTER the actual walk-a-thon,) we received another All Staff Email.

And the contents were so truly horrifying, I have no option but to post it in its entirety here (emphasis is, indeed, hers):

“I know SOMEONE here wants to help me raise funds for the ADA! It's hard to believe that not one of my co-workers has given me a donation yet. It probably just slipped your minds, so I'm sending out one last reminder. I have until next Friday to turn in funds. Since Tuesday is payday that would be a good time to make a small donation. Please help by making out a check to the American Diabetes Association. Thank you in advance.”

Hot damn, is that not the worst thing you’ve ever seen? I don’t know what’s worse… the guilt trip, the not-even-trying-to-be-subtle reminder of our payday, the vaguely Mafia-esque “Thank you in advance”… it’s all just so creepy.

The best part of all? She didn’t EVEN WALK IN THE WALK-A-THON!! She was “sick” the actual day of the event (an excuse we’d heard many times before to explain several sudden absences at scheduled work events) and didn’t think it was in “her best interest” to participate.

Apparently, none of her coworkers thought it was in their best interest to give her money but that ain't stopping her from giving us all a very public shakedown.

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

My aunt once bought me a chalkboard that was shaped as a pig for my birthday. It was kind of like this, but not as classy. Have I mentioned that I was 16 at the time, and in no way had expressed any special interest in pigs? And the best part: the chalk wouldn't actually write on the pig.

Random gift giving can be the source of so much hilarity. Thanks, Auntie. I sure hope you didn’t spend $22 bucks on mine.

After it became apparent that Swedish Nanny would not only be leaving the country in short order but was also of the smothering girlfriend variety, CTF began showering Overshare with gifts.

Overshare: Hey! Look what CTF bought for me!

She was holding up a cage, of sorts… more like a clear plastic box filled with sand.

Anonymous: Sand?
Overshare: Don’t be stupid, why would he buy me sand?
Anonymous: What is it then?
Overshare, gleefully: A hermit crab!!

I seriously considered inserting a “CTF gave Overshare crabs” joke here, but it just seemed too easy.

Anonymous: Why?
Overshare: Why not?

That’s a good question—why wouldn’t a felon bouncer buy his non-girlfriend a hermit crab?

Overshare: He was so cute about it too—I was in the grocery store and he stayed in the car, but when I came back out with the beer, he had this!! Isn’t he adorable?
Anonymous: Sure.
Overshare: And then CTF gave me these puppy dog eyes and said ‘I guess I just really want to be a dad.’

Funny—I could have sworn he was.

Overshare: He’s kind of a deadbeat dad, though.
Anonymous, unable to resist: Didn’t we know that already?
Overshare, sarcastically: Oh, you're just sooo hysterical, aren't you?

I think I am, at least.

Step One: Remove Clothes

Amazing Adventures of Overshare just had its one-year anniversary. And by "just", I mean the beginning of October. To celebrate, we donned large-rimmed rhinestone sunglasses, a Baby Bjorn and drank a beer before having sex on a first date with a felon. Nothing else seemed appropriate, really.

If you read back over the posts, you’ll notice that I sometimes talk about the various methods for oversharing that Overshare employs. There’s the Ambush: she sneaks into your office without warning and just BAM! unleashes something you didn’t need to know. There’s the Emotional Uncoil: she walks into your office, crying, forcing you to ask what is wrong. There’s the Leading Question: “How was your weekend?” There’s Excited Utterance: Jockitch! There are tons of other tactics.

But my all-time favorite?? Charades.

Oh yes, my friends. Nothing compares to those times that Overshare decides to embellish her stories with a little physical action. I had a very unfortunate run-in with Charades before, as you may recall.

Overshare: So I bought one of those Cardio Strip Tease Videos are as a joke.
Anonymous: Oh. My. God.
Overshare: Yeah, so we were just sitting around last night and decided to try it out.
Anonymous: Who is “we?”

At the time of this story, my writing of this blog had already begun… and this has had the unfortunate effect of causing me to actually want more detail, in order to write a better post… do you see how I sacrifice for you?

Overshare: Wyoming and I.
Anonymous: [Says a silent prayer of thanks that this story doesn’t include CTF.]
Overshare: And oh my God, are they tougher than they look! Strippers must be the most in-shape people ever!
Anonymous: [Makes non-committal noise.]
Overshare: Yeah, seriously. The moves were like… uhh. Uhhh. Uhhhhhhhhhh.

[Proceeds to demonstrate with inappropriate noises.]

She demonstrated folks. DEMONSTRATED stripper moves, in my office, in the middle of the workday. And we’re not talking shy little approximations of the moves, oh no. We’re talking full on grunting, twisting, thrusting, dare I even say undulating. Undulating. There, I said it. And oh, it's true.

Overshare: I really think it's going to give me an advantage during sex.