#2

Ohgodohgodohgaaaawd!!! I'm gonna snap, I'm gonna!! Very, very soon, I'm going to launch myself over the cubicle wall with a primal shout and murder the people on the other side. Then I'm going to prop them up, make them appear as life-like as possible....AND THEN KILL THEM AGAIN!

It is The Blowhard's birthday today. I've written of him before. He's the one who talks constantly, at top volume, and has convinced himself he knows EVERYTHING about ANY subject. He's more than happy to extend his dazzling array of knowledge to anyone within hearing range. He is the creator of the word colLOBorate.

The Blowhard has a lackey, we'll call her Smokey. She is the embodiment of two of my pet peeves: grown women who talk like babies, and people who posess grating, phlegmy smoker's laughs. Do you know this laugh? When heard only occasionally, it may be mistaken for a hearty, throaty chuckle. When heard all the time, as Smokey's is by anyone unfortunate enough to occupy the same building as her, one quickly comes to know it for what it truly is. A chunky, grating, wheezy, emphysemic, lungchunkful hacking CACKLE. From hell. She utters this godforsaken sound throughout the day. I'll often be sitting here at my workstation, typing my fingers to the bone (okay..so most of the time I'm typing in my diary, but still..), only to have my little work trance broken by an earsplitting "BLEEHEHEHEGHHECHHEGHHEHEHEHEH*HACK,GAG*HAWHAWHARRRHARRRRHEH!!!!!" from over the wall. It's very disconcerting.

So, as I said, it's Blowhard's birthday. Smokey has decided to make the day festive by blowing one of those birthday tooters everytime she hears the word "birthday". So anytime a passerby tells Blowhard to have a happy birthday, it's punctuated by a loud "PHWAAAANK!!!!!" of the tooter. The tooter has been tooted approximately ten thousand times so far today, and the day is young. Earlier, Smokey and other workers in that area sang "Happy Birthday" to him. Not once. Not twice. Four times. And not the plain old traditional version. No. Not for Blowhard. He was given the "Happy Birthday, Cha-cha-cha..." version that most people are only subjected to when they've been unfortunate enough to be in a Mexican resturant on their birthday. Four times. Did I mention they sang it four times? It went like this: "Happy birthday, cha-cha-cha...PHWAAAANKK!...blehehehehhaarr*hack*hehehuh..to YOU, happy BIRTHDAY to YOOOOU, cha-cha-cha....PHHWWAAAANNK!!!!...". You can imagine the rest. Much spittle-flecked laughter and toots accompanied the ballad. When Smokey isn't tooting the tooter, she's working on her big project for the day. The project is Packing a Box. It's taken the entire day and fifty rolls of packing tape so far. I know because I hear EVERY strip of tape she riiiiippps off. RRRAAAAATTTTTCCCCCCCCHHHHHH!!!!! You know who I really feel sorry for, though? The janitor. He's the one who is going to have to clean up the mess. I'm sure it wasn't in his job description to have to clean up a twice-dead woman with a party tooter protruding from a very uncomfortable place.

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