(For Jill)
My boss Aaron was a 45-year-old frat boy who wore newsboy caps and ordered complete outfits from the Hollister catalog. In his facebook picture he was at a club surrounded by sweaty, skimpily dressed Jersey girls with a fog machine and lazers in the background.

I'd hear his personal phone conversations and have to hold back the vomit. Fridays were the worst; hearing him plan his summer sailing trips, "No other guys. Yah. Olga's bringing her friends. Yahaha! They're hot man. Straight from the old country. Ready to get dirty with American men. Hahaha!"

Gross. To add to the creepy-old-man factor Aaron was also eerily obsessed with all things Russian and "spoke" Russian incessantly.

"Aaron" I'd ask him, "I still need the credit card info for those house seats." (That you requested for some random woman with a Russian name.)
"Dah." He'd say. Then with a hopeful face he'd ask, "Do you know what that means?"
"Yes, it means yes." I replied every time.
He wanted so bad for me to respond "Dah, it means dah." But I got much more satisfaction from seeing his hopeful face always anticipating this would be the time I "got" it. But I'd continue to disappoint him and respond in English.

I sat at the front of the office and often had to act like the receptionist, a task I enjoyed because it allowed me to pretend I was a buxom blonde from the 60's in a plaid, full-skirted dress. One summer afternoon the door buzzed as I was finishing an email (work related I'm sure). I pressed the button to unlock the door and looked up to see the most hated woman in America.
Oksana Baiul.

Growing up I skipped past the horse stage and went straight to my pre-teen figure skating obsession at a premiere time. The Tonya Harding, Nancy Kerrigan fiasco was in full swing. And I, having long brown permed hair and giant horse teeth too big for my small body, was a devoted fan to Miss Kerrigan.

As soon as that skinny Ukranian walked through the door all those pathetic adolescent memories flooded back. Me passionately rollerblading in my driveway to Greensleeves, a pre-recorded song on my keyboard. Me combining old dance costumes and imagining they had sheer material with rhinestones covering my arms and chest. Me sitting in front of the TV, horrified that the gold medal went to anyone other than Nancy Kerrigan.

All the pent-up rage and wounds of devastation from 15 years earlier were torn open. Beat by a 16-year-old Ukrainian. The same 16-year-old Ukrainian who was standing before my desk at this very moment. She wasn't 16 anymore but she was still incredibly tiny, and obviously still Ukrainian.

"Hi." I managed to sputter out making a quick once-over to check if she was wearing the stolen Gold Medal.
"Hello. Is Aaron here?" She nearly sang in a high pitch.
"...Yaaah..." I exhaled and pointed to the second office directly across from my desk. She glided past me into Aaron's office.
The top half of the walls were conveniently glass and I could see him stand up and greet her with a kiss on his tip toes. Once they finally sat down out of my view I was free to make the biggest "WTF!" face in history.

A few minutes later they stepped out of the office hand in hand and as soon as the door latched shut I stood up and ran to my coworker's cubicles.

"Did you guys SEE who that was!?" I screeched in adolescent joy. Only Scott, the theatre-loving, crazy shirt wearing, flamboyant but non-gay guy felt my joy.

"I know right!" His eyes wide and his lips pursed.
We gossiped like the middle-schoolers we once were and fantasized about the wedding reception we may be able to attend. That evening I left work before Aaron and Oksana ever came back from lunch.

The next morning Scott and I had a meeting in Aaron's office. He was in the midst of yawning and saying how late he'd stayed at work last night while I tried to stop myself from thinking about what he'd actually been doing last night. My eyes were just beginning to glaze over when suddenly they focused on a large smudge on the glass wall above Aaron's desk.

It was...was it? Yah. It totally was. My mouth dropped open as I stared at the glass and made out a smudged footprint about the size of a small figure skater's. Someone had been laying on this desk on her back and that someone was a Gold Medalist.

I snatched my papers off the probably unwashed desk and set them in my lap. Aaron's cell phone rang and he answered it in front of us. Always the professional he continued to plan his weekend of drunken sex orgys as we waited patiently. While he perused through his outlook calendar I kicked Scott under the desk and nodded toward the footprint. He didn't understand what it was at first. But then I saw the evolution of understanding creep slowly across his face.

As soon as our meeting was over we sent emails back and forth planning to inspect the smudge on the glass as soon as Aaron left for lunch.
1pm on the dot came and I heard Aaron's office chair roll back away from his desk. My heart pounded with excitement and nervousness.
"Have a good lunch." I called awkwardly to him as he walked past my desk. And just like that the door shut and we were free to inspect the premises. I peered over the cubicle wall Scott and I shared. We glanced at the freshly closed door.

"Let's do this." Scott said officially.
We crept into Aaron's office and examined the foot-like smudge. It was clearly a right foot print. A small one. A woman's. I laid down and mimicked the position she must've been in to make such a mark. We laughed hysterically at her obvious flexibility. Both of our faces were up so close to the glass we that could see our breath on either side of the footprint.
"It's tiny." Scott cooed.
"I know. Size 6? 7 max." I replied.
"Definitely the foot of a dancer-"
BUZZZZ! We both jumped and raced back to our desks. My heart pounded as I fumbled for the button. I released the door and it slowly opened to reveal the petite Ukrainian Princess in question.
"Hi-llo." She said, walking towards Aaron's office.

"Oh, he just left." I told her as I stood.

"I thought we were meeting here. How long ago did he leave?"

A long pause followed as I finally realized I wasn't responding - I was staring at her right foot. When her words finally registered and I snapped myself out of my podiatry-obsessed trance,
"Oh...only a few minutes." I barely got the words out when Aaron burst through the door.

"Babe let's go, I was just taking a leak."

He held open the door and she pranced out in her high heeled sandals. The door closed slowly behind them and I whipped around to Scott still staring at the floor of the doorway where her feet had been.
"Those are 6's girl. Those are 6's."

Today I was working double duty background on Ugly Betty. First I stood behind Betty and Mark in a coffee shop in Times Square, and the second scene I was a cult member.

Days on set are always gruelingly long. Especially when you’re filming two scenes with wardrobe changes and hair and makeup touch-ups in between. I had been in holding (a dungeon-like place where there are never enough chairs used to stash the extras until they are called to set) for the last four hours straight. I had already finished my entire book, start to finish and was upset because now I had to talk to the boring people around me.

The best thing about being onset however is the abundance of free food. A constant buffet was set up just outside of our holding area. I had been up and down the stairs many times, filling my purse and pockets with each trip. There hadn’t been any new food put out in a while so I was at a table talking to an older overweight woman who drove 3 hours each way to be here and make $80 so she could become the next Jennifer Aniston - when I saw it! A woman walked triumphantly down the long orange staircase holding a plate of neatly rolled lunchmeats.

I gasped and excused myself from the constant ramblings of a woman who went after her dreams too late and dashed up the stairs when the P.A. stopped me and made an announcement, “Everyone to set! Everyone to set now!”

“Noooo!” I cried on the inside. “Not without my protein!” I rushed past everyone going in to set and made my way to the food table. There, on a shiny silver platter a seemingly endless pile of cut and rolled meat. I grabbed two handfuls and ran inside, taking giant steps and giant bites. I threw the last two turkey rolls in my mouth as I walked in to the brightly lit auditorium. Just then a hair person grabbed me. She smoothed down the top of my hair, sprayed and brushed her fingers through the ends.

“Ew.” She said with a horrified look as she stepped back and pulled something slimy out of my hair. At first I was confused too, but once I saw what she had found it all made sense.
“Oh, that’s ham.” I managed to tell her with my mouth still full. But somehow that didn’t make it any better. She placed it in my hand and walked off with disgust.
And no, I didn’t eat the hair ham, I threw it away. Aren't you proud!?

On Saturday I went out with this model guy I had met while filming Sex and the City 2. I'll call him Jeff, because that's his name.

Jeff is hot. Or at least I used to think so. I thought he was Italian because of his dark good looks and his accent. But it turns out he was born and raised in Pennsylvania and just doesn't enunciate very well. I guess when you're hot you can mumble all you want and people will nod and pretend you're interesting anyway.

We met for dinner in the East Village and right after we ordered he whipped out his phone and wanted to show me a picture. Nano-second predictions of what this picture could be ran through my head: Him kissing his teacup puppy? Him with Kim Kardashian? Or a shot of his ex-girlfriend who "looks just like me?"

Nope. This was better. "I used to do body building." He informed me and held up his Blackberry for me to see. There in the dimly lit restaurant glowed a picture of him in a bright blue Speedo, all greased up with neon orange skin. "Gross." Was my honest reaction.
"Oh wow." Was what I said.
"Here's me with the trophy." He continued. "I won. I always win. Because I always get what I want." He looked at me and added a cheesy wink. He was too entrhalled by his own image to notice me cringe.
"Please stop." I thought. "I don't know what you want from me but I can guarantee you're not going to get it."
But he didn't stop. He scrolled through photo after orange-skinned photo, "Here's me with a slutty trophy presenter."
"Oh wow. You have the same tan." I replied, which he took as a compliment.
"Here's a close-up of my ass." He laughed.
This was torture. He scrolled past some Myspace quality self portraits until he stopped again and got really excited as if he had forgotten these pictures existed, as if he didn't show them off whenever possible.
"Oh! This is me as a stripper! I got this cop uniform and..." The pictures progressed as one would imagine, from fully clothed officer to shirtless officer to guy wearing a G-string and an officer hat.

Why was I doing this to myself? I knew I wouldn't like Jeff when I first met him. He was dense, self-absorbed and boring. But I made myself say yes when he asked. It must have been the combination of the free food, his good looks and my need for some male attention that made me do it.
So what if all he talked about were vapid things - a majority of those things were about how beautiful I was, and that's something one doesn't usually get sick of hearing. But when he complemented me it didn't mean anything. I didn't care what he thought about me. I didn't want him to like me. At this point, I just wanted him to leave me alone. He seemed sincere, but at the same time I couldn't help feeling like he was just buttering me up, getting me nice and slippery so my pants would slide right off.

The more he spoke the less attractive he became. I can't stand being inefficient and I felt like this entire evening was a complete waste of time. I would have rather stayed home working and made myself a box of Mac n' Cheese with no milk or butter than be eating steak and asparagus looking at half-naked pictures of a guy I never wanted to go out with in the first place.

But if I had said no, and I had ended up eating noodles with cheese powder alone and working on a Saturday night I'm sure I would have been just as miserable.

I live in a ghetto building in Harlem near 125th street. If you are unfamiliar with what makes an apartment ghetto, please allow me to explain:

• The front door is always left open which allows strangers, homeless people, rapists and urinators to come and go as they please.
  
• My roommate and I are the only white people, and the only nonsmokers. The smoke seeps through our walls and our place reeks of smoke!
  
• People throw their trash into the hallway so they don't stink up their own apartment.
  
• It was built before elevators where invented and we live on the 5th floor.
  
• The apartment next to my bedroom blares the same music all afternoon every day, and it's horrible mexican/polka music.
  
• The apartment below my bedroom is a recording studio from 11pm-5am. The music is so loud my bed vibrates, which may sound fun, but really isn't.
• We each have one outlet in our bedroom and none in the bathroom.
• The wiring is so old we aren't allowed to have an AC.
  
• There's a dance club down the street that blares music every Saturday night from 4-4:30am.

Okay, I'm starting to get depressed so that's enough for now. The point is, none of this ever bothered me much. I liked my cheap rent and I liked living on the edge, "Will I be murdered on my way home tonight!?" It's so exciting, you never know! Until last Tuesday night at 1am. My bed was vibrating as usual. I was so tired and frustrated I stomped on the floor to let the person below know he was being an A-hole, so turn down the music! A few minutes later I was brushing my teeth when someone pounded forcefully on the door. I'm no genius but I know not to open my door in Harlem to an angry man banging at 1am. So I woke up Nora and she was brave enough to open the door (she had talked to the neighbor before and he seemed normal).

He proceeded to flip out on us. Yelling at me for stomping on his ceiling. We asked if he could keep it down after midnight. He told us we were "lil beeyotches" and "oh no, we di'int" tell him what to do. So naturally, I got pissed. He was the one being unreasonable and I was not going to lose this argument. But then he said, "You best shut chur mouth or I'm gonna send some'n after you an cut yer face!" He started to come inside our apartment and I forcefully kicked the door shut in his face. He left and turned the music up twice as loud until 3am.

So now I'm thinking of moving (mostly because my dad really wants me out of this neighborhood) and the signs to get out just keep slapping me in the face, such as this morning when I woke up to a faint rustling sound. MOUSE! Was my first thought, but after careful listening I followed the noise to a bag of granola on my dresser. I hadn't ziplocked the bag well enough and a giant cockroach had crawled inside, but couldn't get out.

Ewww. Not having the time or guts to deal with it I folded the top of the bag and put bobby pins to keep it shut. When I got back the roach was dead. Whoever said roaches could survive the apocalypse was mistaken. This guy couldn't even survive a bag of all natural fruit and nut granola for 1 day.

Check out all that wasted granola! I did get it for free from the Sex & the City 2 set, but heartbreaking non the less.