In Response to "Intense Guy"

While I adore...ADORE...the car you selected for me, I think it should be publicly known that, for the safety of children and adults, I do not drive.

At work, before the tourists come, it's typical for us guides to take golf carts around and check for sticks, glass, etc. But it usually results in fun as we off-road it and chase geese around with the carts.

I have a license, but I hardly ever drive. I think the last time I drove a car was during my road test. However, I do drive the cart.

The first time I drove the golf cart, I may have crashed into a giant stone building. Also known as a church. I may have confused the gas with the break and sped UP while heading towards the giant stone building.

That cart has been messed up ever since. Sometimes the bosses complain about that cart, saying, "How come the four-seater doesn't turn right?!

I still haven't 'fessed up.

Oh well...

PS

WORD COUNT: 26,748!!!

Religion Mayhem...

A guide I work with wants to join a religion. She feels lonely and whatnot, and so she's looking to faith. Fine.

Catholicism? No. Judaism? No. Muslim? No.

She wants to join an underground pagan religion where she sacrifices chickens and shaves her head bald. And wears white for a year.

This might not be so bad if she didn't start the conversation with, "Tell me the truth. Does this sound like a cult to you..."

I highly recommended Buddhism. Sitting around, humming and meditating, can do some good. And, if she wants, she can still shave her head.

Hey, trying to save some chickens here.

__________________________________________________________________

Aside - This is my personal blog. I'm not concerned about being politically correct and using language that will make everyone feel happy and cuddly.

Retarded Brain

I had to leave work early because I thought I was going to collapse from tiredness.

My first clue was the ten minutes it took me to figure out a hole-puncher. I picked up the thing, stared, and started hitting it with my paper, thinking, "This creates holes in paper somehow..." Then I just kept pushing the lever, and I wasn't sure how to get the paper in there. Something in my brain just...didn't connect.

And then the visitors.

The building most of the visitors had to go to for some artist workshop was right there as soon as the visitors walk in. It's to their right. I got so confused and disoriented that I told the workshop visitors to take the free tram ride over to the southern end to get to the same building.

And it's like, ten feet from where we were all standing.

Then I told the visitors to hurry because the building would be torn down soon.

An hour later, I realized what huge amounts of misinformation I engaged in. So then I asked my boss if I could take the rest of the day off.

Bahhh...

Nooo...

I don't wanna go give tours tomorrow. I want to have orgasms.

Ahhh, this is the plight. Of life.

Most of the guides are leaving since the season is over. This is bad for a couple of reasons.

One guide who is leaving has been there forever, and I always go to him when I fuck up. So he's like my buffer. He has saved my ass on many occasions, and he very rarely gets angry with your stupidity, because he's very patient and god-like.

One guide is very clueless and confused. She's always freaking out and panicking for some reason. So...basically...she makes me look BETTER.

With both of these people gone...I'm just average.

Eeek. Help.

22,399 Word Count

Sometimes it's hard to juggle school and work and my own personal writing.

But then I'm walking past Bryant Park and see this poster. And then I know that all is well in the world.

Ohhhh holy hotness.

Although I wish his crotch wasn't so obviously stuffed. I mean, come on. It's really OK to have an average-sized penis. Let's put it this way: If that thing is real, I'm making sure it stays the hell away from me at all costs. That would be like the thickest schlong in the world.

Olympic God

I actually had an OK day today. Thinking about attractive men makes everything go by better. This girl I work with develops a new crush every week just to make things interesting. Safety guys, firemen, the emergency medical people, other tour guides, repeat visitors, artists who are throwing their exhibitions...

This gorgeous, OLYMPIC GOD walked by. I was talking to some woman about where the bathroom was or some shit. But we both stopped. Completely. And stared.

This man had his shirt WIDE open, revealing a perfect set of golden abs. It was like from the movie 300. He had 300-style abs. It's an adjective now.

We both stared until he had gone. And then I continued like nothing happened, and she started paying attention again. It was like we developed this understanding, this bond of appreciation...

and then I realized:

OH MY GOD. We're acting like MEN.

This guy was just hot enough to drag us down to that level.


So even as the economy crashes around me and houses are getting foreclosed and tuition goes up, I still have hope for the future. Because there are 300-style abs out there, and they're not purely digital.

Is it 1985?

I'm not going to lie - some atypical school and camp groups do come. Most of them are normal, but the normal ones are never the ones that stick with you. It's always that group that says, "fo' real???" at everything you say that you remember.

Or a group like this one.

There was a group of about twenty-thirty students in a camp group a while ago. From the Bronx. And the biggest kid had something on his shoulder that I hadn't seen in a while.

A boom box.

A boom box.

I just have to say it one more time...

A boom box.

Is it 1985? Who carries a boom box over the shoulder in this day and age? And who the hell would bring one ON A TOUR??? On a spoken guided tour?

My fellow guide tried to ask the leaders of a the group for some cooperation. Nope. They thought it was perfectly fine. The boom box was acceptable to them.

Ugh. I need food.

Mobs of Children

School and camp groups love dressing their children in really bright colors...like bright pink or bright green. The most common one is bright yellow...probably because yellow doesn't indicate either gender like pink does.

It'll be a calm, calm day. All will be still. Birds chirp, squirrels copulate, women wearing huge high heels fall on their asses to provide a good laugh. A buff jogger will come by and make me stare. A fat jogger will come by and make me feel good about myself.

And then a massive yellow wall will descend upon me like a wave. With their questions. With their incessant demands for water fountains, bathrooms, and educational experiences. DESCEND

What's worse - the camp guides and teachers feel like tour guides are babysitters, and then they can just leave. This is legally not the case. You don't know how many teachers I've had to chase down yelling, "EXCUSE ME! EXCUSE ME! WE CANNOT ACT AS CARETAKERS!!!"

So about my book, ALEX.

Or, rather, Alexander(A), which is what it will be called.

I'm looking for a 40,000 - 50,000 word count. So far, I have a little over 18,000. I'm almost halfway there. As for the content - it's (roughly) a coming of age story. Of a transvestite.

It's more complicated than that, but I don't wanna give too much away.

:-D

What the hell?

I had a weird-ass visitor that I have to write about.

So this guy...just continuously kept rubbing his belly...while I was trying to give my tour. It was extremely distracting.

Not only was he obscenely rubbing his big, big belly...with that shirt dark from sweat stains...but he was also licking his lips and asking strange questions.

"What's the weather like in San Francisco?"






I wish I could kick people out.




I wish I was a really big, powerful man. Who could throw whole human beings.

Good news - broke 17,000 words today.

Stupid Questions

Commonly, I will be answering one question when someone comes up to me and asks the same exact question that I just answered. Which is fine if you really didn't hear it all.

But what really cooks my noodle is when two people (who didn't come together) are staring at me. One asks a question and the other waits:

Visitor 1: "Where is the tour?"
Me: "At the top of the hill."
Visitor 1: "OK. Thanks." (This part is optional. Half the time people simply walk away when I've answered their question.)

Now Visitor 2 steps forward.

Visitor 2: "Where's the tour?"

This happens more than it possibly should.

There is also this situation, which happens at least five times a day:

Visitor 1: "Where's the tour?"
Me: "At the top of the hill."
Visitor 1: "OK, so the tour is at the top of the hill, right?

NO. It's NOT. I just told you that to CONFUSE you.

Back to writing, Mila, just get back to writing...

Creepy Men

Tour guides have to deal with creepy men. And since you're a tour guide and you're basically being paid to talk to and be nice to people, they get more leeway than in real life. In real life, if you're taking pictures of me with your phone, your phone will soon be under a bus.

But when I'm at work, I kind of have to deal with it since photographing me is obviously allowed.

So when a guy comes up to me and says,

"Wow, you girl guides sure are hot. Prettier than Betty Boop."

I kind of have to deal with it.

But there is a line that cannot be crossed.

"Where do you live? It's OK to tell me - I'm a cop in Jamaica."

Yeah...see...that doesn't make sense.

Holdin' Stuff.

Security makes sure no alcohol gets through. Knives and shotguns are OK. But no booze.

This angers a lot of people. Enter the couple who brought a bottle of wine for dinner later on. Enter the recent graduate with a keg.

So if I'm in the bookstore, I get asked to hold wine a lot. Expensive wine. This is pretty typical, but I don't like to hold expensive shit because then I might be accountable for it later on. I usually say "no" when someone wants to put something behind the counter.

But right now I'm watching a watermelon for some lady.

She didn't want to bring her watermelon. And I figure hey, it's a watermelon. It's not some rare wine. Fine, I'll take it. And it's sitting there like a deformed baby leaning against a Civil War book.

And it's mocking me.

Word Count: 12,619

Tomorrow I have bookstore all day. Which means I'll get plenty of...

WRITING TIME!!!

However, my writing will be interrupted constantly by this one harrowing question:

WHERE IS THE STATUE OF LIBERTY FERRY?!

Foreigners just walk in and say, "Stat-ooo leee-bear-teee???"

It is apparently the question that drives every single burning heart.

I don't mind answering the question. A lot of people come a long way to see the bitch. But I DO mind when people try to steal my maps.

Since the question is asked about once every minute (sometimes more), I have a small map of lower Manhattan with my building circled with your typical "YOU ARE HERE" over the bookstore I'm in and a dotted arrow going towards Castle Clinton, which is where you get tickets to see her. (In all honesty, the STATEN ISLAND FERRY is better. It's a free boat ride and you go right by the statue. I tell tourists this as much as possible because I don't like when people spend money.)

Now, I only have one of these little maps, and I never let anyone hold it, and I kind of keep it really close to me when I tell people where to go. But so many people try to MOLEST my piece of paper. They want it. They gotta have it. Problem is, I only have one copy, and there are about a billion other people with the same exact question.

Then people complain that we don't print maps.

We are a tourist site! Why would I create a bunch of maps on how to LEAVE my tourist spot to get to ANOTHER? I still want, you know, a job! That would be like Coca-Cola giving out coupons for Pepsi and then giving you a map to the Pepsi-Cola plant.

12,619 words. Keep reaching for that rainbow, Mila.

Be Nice...

Here is what tour guides do to mean, mean visitors:

1. Direct you to the bathrooms that we know are dirty
2. Tell you about the worst or most expensive programs
3. Say, "We're out of those" when we really have a stash of product X beneath the counter
4. Recommend the food cart that we know is infested with roaches and will give you indigestion

If you come up to me and demand a map, and then complain about the one I give you, or maybe complain that tours should be given more often, or maybe you don't like the fact that you can't bring your dog, well then, guess what - I'm going to guide you to the facility with the toilets that spray your asshole with a strange orange juice when you flush...yeah, the one where the sinks don't work until you hit it for a while, and then it sprays hot water everywhere.

You will then be so petrified that you will be tested for HIV.


Like on your face.

You've heard of being nice to the waiters, yes? Well be nice to the tour guides.

Confederate Confusion

Sometimes all the tour guides dress up like Civil War soldiers. We even have rifle muskets from the time period that we carry around. One of the guides...let's call him Corey, dresses as a Confederate.

About a week ago, Corey was dressing in his Confederate uniform. He had his rifle musket leaning against his locker while he tied his shoe.

As Corey was down there, Jacob (name also changed) went into the bathroom to do his business. He startled Corey, who jumped up and bumped into his rifle musket. The damn thing then fell on Corey's head.

Corey suffered a concussion and had to be taken to the hospital. An ambulance was called for him. WHILE HE WAS DRESSED AS A CONFEDERATE.

My boss feared that the gun might go off or explode or something, so the fire department was also called.

While Corey was in the hospital, he called his roommate just to tell him what had happened. But Corey didn't explain it very well. He simply said, "I'm in the hospital...I got hit in the head with a gun." The roommate didn't know what was going on, and so he assumed that Corey got pistol-whipped by some gangster.

The Moral: The next time you dress as a Confederate soldier, lean your rifle musket against a wall.

I really, really wanted to see the look on the doctor's face as Corey was rolled in to the ER while wearing that sad sack.

Fliers and Signs

A lot of my time is pointlessly wasted in:
1. Making fliers and signs
2. Laminating fliers and signs
3. Taping up fliers and signs

And all these fliers and signs contain the following:
1. When the tours begin
2. Where the tours begin
3. How long the tours are
4. Arrows pointing to the direction of the tour

And, of course, most of the questions I personally receive aren't about history at all:
1. Where is the bathroom?
2. Where can I get water?
3. Do you have a map?
4. Can I have a map?
5. Why can't I have a map?
6. What about the map that YOU have?


I would like to make one last and final flier and post it everywhere. It will not contain any pictures, cute boxes, or exclamation points. There will be no promises and no arrows. My new and improved flier will say:

ALL QUESTIONS CAN BE ANSWERED BY SIMPLY WALKING AROUND AND USING COMMON SENSE

Of course, sometimes I get some strange questions. Those are always entertaining.

"What is your nationality?"
"What is your phone number?"
"Where do you live?"
"Can you tell my son that you met Yogi Bear?"
"How old were you when you realized you wanted to do this with your life?"

With my LIFE? Are you serious???

First day of school tomorrow. Have to finish a scholarship essay, but I'm putting it off.