The Slob BlogBecause slobs need love too!

MSNBC recently covered a story of two library books, returned 51 years late. The anonymous and obviously forgetful book-borrower, even included a $1,000 money order.

This story proves what I strongly believe, that slobs are just human.  Like everyone else, we make mistakes, and sooner or later, we feel guilty and want to make things right.  Often times, it is the guilt itself that KEEPS us from making it right.  We think that if we just cover our eyes and plug our eyes, the signs of our own stupidity will disappear.  They don’t.  Unfortunately, this story is starting to make ME feel guilty as, much like the slob in this story, I am no stranger to forgetfulness when it comes to library property.  I am pretty sure I still have a couple books on my shelf from the University Library from grad school.  I graduated like three years ago.  Maybe I should take a lesson from this guy and return them before I too, rack up a thousand dollar late fee.

My boyfriend and I love Disneyland, but big crowded theme parks full of children, rides, and distracting snacks can be challenging places for forgetful slobs like us.  A couple of years ago, the two of us went to Disneyland for the day, and my boyfriend lost his cell phone.  He was so upset, it almost ruined the rest of our day.  So this year, when he told me he wanted to bring along his new and very expensive, high-end digital voice recorder I bought him for the holidays, I felt it was my duty to stop him.  He didn’t listen to me of course.  As his girlfriend, my advice is automatically rendered useless.

But how do you lose something that’s attached to your body?  Long before I could take pleasure in telling him “I told you so,” I was was the one who left something behind.  We were getting onto the California Screamin’ roller coaster in California Adventure.  While stepping into the coaster cab, with the natural grace of a linebacker, my flip flop became separated from my foot and managed to fall between the cracks in the platform, landing somewhere ten feet below the track.

Luckily, my boyfriend had insisted on recording and narrating our entire day (not annoying at all!), so we have a complete audio record of the humiliating moment when I realized I’d lost a shoe.  Not wanting to admit what had happened, knowing my boyfriend would have no choice but to ruthlessly mock me for the rest of the day, I considered not mentioning it at all.  I pictured how I would look hobbling around the rest of the day in one shoe, and I came to the unfortunate conclusion that I probably wouldn’t be able to hide it.

“Oh my god,” I said “I dropped my flip flop.”  On the recording you can hear me pathetically asking the ride attendant if there’s any way to get things back from “down there.”  The poor guy rolled his eyes and sighed, “I’ll see what I can do while you’re on the ride.”  So in the minute and a half while we were on the coaster, he was going to climb down below the ride, locate my flip flop, and bring it back?  There’s no way.  It’s gone.

Amazingly, they WERE able to get my shoe back.  I couldn’t believe it, and I thought for a moment our troubles were over for the day.  Not so fast.  We decided to check out the new Toy Story Mania ride.  We were half way through our wait when I realized my camera was no longer around my neck.  Oh god, I had taken it off and put it in the seat pocket while on California Screamin’.  Did it have to be the same ride?  They’re going to think I’m like the guy from Memento, but far less mysterious and tatooey.  Worse yet, there was no good way to cut across the line to get out.  I had to retrace my steps through every single twist and turn repeating, “excuse me, pardon me, thank you,” over and over again, while not a single person stepped out of the way.  It was horrible.

When I got back to the coaster and  asked about my camera, a female ride attendant asked me what car we had been riding in.  Yeah, like I’m going to remember that.  I was on the cell phone with my boyfriend at the time, and instantly he shouted, “The red car!”  “How the hell did you know that?” I asked in shock.  “I took note of which car we were in on the digital recorder right before you dropped your shoe.”  “Thank you geek!”  I couldn’t believe it, I was saved again.  They had my camera.

You have to understand though, that these are two talented slobs you are talking about, and you’ve heard of the rule of three right?  Hours later, my boyfriend and I were on the parking tram, ready to use our very last ounce of energy to drive ourselves home.  He started patting his pants pockets, and instantly, I knew we were in trouble.  “It’s the recorder isn’t it?” I said.

We had to beg the tram driver to give us a solo ride back to the park.  We figured my boyfriend had taken the recorder out of his pocket to get to his wallet to pay for my end-of-the-night-coffee.  Very chivalrous, but clearly stupid.  Miraculously, when we returned to the coffee stand, the merchant was able to find the device and get it back to us.  Three losses in one day!  How do you even do that?  We had made it out unscathed, but generally shamed.

I guess we could take this experience as a sign that two forgetful slobs like us should never again step outside our front door, but what would be the fun in that?  As a natural slob, I’m a risk-taker, a gambler, and I say it’s not worth having cool things if you aren’t constantly terrified of losing them.

I was really on my game Wednesday morning.  Before even leaving the house, I realized that I had forgotten the laptop I would need to check work emails while on jury duty and stay generally in touch with the world.  (Not to mention keep me from dying from boredom while on long taxpayer-subsidized courthouse lunch break)

I am proud to say that I managed to coax myself out of bed and keep to my to go-workout-at-the-gym-before-leaving-for-court plan.  I had tossed everything I would need for the day into my gym bag in the trunk of my car.  Everything, that is, except for underwear…and a bra.  This was not good.  But of course, this is typical behavior for your average slob.  I have pairs upon pairs of mint condition tennis shoes I’ve purchased on days that I’ve forgotten to bring them to the gym.  Tennis shoes are rather important if you plan to work out, unless you’re willing to brave the treadmill in pumps.  ( I happen to be lucky.  My gym is located next door to a shoe store)

It is not, however, located next to a lingerie store.  And I’ll let you in on a little known secret about women.  Forgetting to bring underwear is not the worst thing in the world (nobody has to know…an it provides a lovely breeze), but a bra is absolutely indispensable.  That is, of course, unless you’ve been blessed with perky little AA mosquito bites.  Needless to say, that is not the case with me.

As I’ve said before, being a slob is both my blessing and my curse, so I knew there was still a chance I could save myself from certain humiliation.  My car’s trunk, back seat, and any and all satchels, boxes, and purses therein offer, at any one time, a virtual smorgasbord of random items, some of which may be used or clean underwear and bras.

I double checked my gym bag for provisions, and eureka!  Miraculously, there was a random pair of undies floating around and available for use.  And even better…they were clean!  Yay!  Now I wouldn’t feel like an undercover hooker, permanently open for business, but I was still sans bra.

I immediately tried to block out the images of Flopsy and Topsy bouncing around freely to the delight of every bailiff, lawyer, and traffic violator at the LA Metropolitan Courthouse.  There would really be no way to fake it unless I was willing to walk around with my arms crossed like an old school rapper all day.   I couldn’t even bank on my usually procedure of purchasing a new one.  The only bra I could buy at the gym would be a hot pink spandex sports bra which would stick out under my v-neck sweater, making me look like I were about to leap out of the jury box and pump out a few aerobic high kicks at any moment.

I closed the trunk and began my defeated walk toward the gym, trying to figure out how I could manage to squeeze in a trip to Target before I was due at court.  Then a memory struck me like a splinter that stops you in your tracks while performing sashays across a wood floor.  I had this strange feeling that I had an extra bra inexplicably hidden in the book bag I use to hold blog research materials. (What? You didn’t know that writing this takes thorough research?)  To my exuberant surprise, I was right!

I snatched up my reward and walked proudly toward the gym, feeling thankful that my cluttered, slovenly ways had saved me once again.  Oh and by the way, my boobs looked fabulous all morning.  Thanks for asking!

Despite what you may have been led to believe throughout your life, being organized is not natural.  At least, it is not any more natural than being a slob.  Nature has literally thousands examples of creatures that disregard the need to organize themselves.

Dogs are notoriously disorganized.  They take their favorite things like bones, chew toys, and your best sneakers, and they burry them for safekeeping.  Then what happens?  They forget where they put them every time.  Every dog owner has had to laugh at least once while watching his or her dog frantically sniffing around the yard for that one toy they’ve been missing for weeks.  Then, of course, we break into tears when the dog digs up our now mud-encrusted Prada pumps.  But, that’s not the point.  The point is that dogs are completely disorganized and they get along just fine.

It is entirely possible that you think of the word “slob” as a negative thing.  Most of us do.  But for the purposes of this blog, it is important to have a positive term with which to refer to my disorganized brothers and sisters.  Mostly, because it’s annoying to continuously say, “Very disorganized person,” or “Messy Late Guy Most People Don’t Like.”  There has to be a term that is simple, that the disorganized population can embrace and own with pride.  In The Slob Blog, the word “Slob” is no longer meant as an insult.  A Slob is a disorganized, late, procrastinating, forgetful, and wonderful person who is proud of his or her way of life.

Last night I forgot a whole bag of groceries at the supermarket.  I didn’t realize this until I had, of course, already unloaded all the other groceries and stashed away all the grocery bags.  So before I could head back to reclaim my lost satchel, I’d have to locate my receipt.  Oh god!

I searched every single plastic baggy in my kitty-litter-baggy-bin to no avail.  I called up the store and mentioned that when I got home, one of my grocery bags was “missing”.  This basically implied that it was their fault, and that they had somehow forgotten to give it to me.  The implication wasn’t entirely accidental and I almost feel bad about passing along the blame…ALMOST.   

I finally found the receipt in my purse, tucked neatly in my wallet.  What the hell was it doing there?  Eventually I drove back to the store and was reunited with my turkey bacon and ground turkey. (I was in a turkey mood…what?)

As naturally disorganized and forgetful slobs, it’s important to accept the fact that grocery shopping isn’t always going to be the easiest task. Here are some of the common problems you might encounter:

• It’s more than likely that you will go to the store and shop for an hour, only to forget to buy the one thing you went there for.  This item will probably be toilet paper, so don’t panic, there are plenty of other household items that can do the trick until you’re able to get back to the store.  I like to use my credit card bills.
• Don’t be surprised if you finish checking out at the register only to realize that your wallet is unexpectedly missing.   As you realize that you left it in your car, your gym back, or at work, don’t let embarrassment and shame take over.  Simply look the clerk in the eye, take an impatient stance, and say something like, “What? Oh, you still use money here?  That’s so ten years ago.”  As you walk out, throw your hands up in the air in exasperation.  If you’re not feeling this solution you can always just fake senility, or simple hide your face in your shirt and run…FAST!    
• I am a big fan of making lists and I bet you are too.  They are such a great way of avoiding doing actual things.  That said, you probably wont be able to find your shopping list by the time you get to the store.  Definitely pour your entire purse out onto the floor of the frozen foods aisle before you start to stress.  It’s probably in there somewhere.  If not, simply buy one item for each letter of the alphabet.  That’s a great way to make sure you have your bases covered, and really, you can never have enough quinces, zuchinni, and xylitol.
• I not too fond of using grocery carts, because I hate having to put them away after loading up my trunk.  I usually just carry the groceries around in my arms.  This means that it’s very important for slobs like us to keep up our weight training routines, and it’s not a bad idea to take up juggling.  It’s also very important to have a response in mind for when the store employee asks you how you dropped and broke a jar of pickles, a bottle of vinegar, and full carton of eggs all at the same time.  I live in California, so I think a very localized earthquake is always a reasonable explanation.
• Finally, coupons.  Don’t bother.  You’re never going to remember that you have them when you’re actually at the store, so if you really love clipping bits of paper that much, you’d be better off taking up decoupage or joining a scrap-booking club.