Gotcha!

I am convinced that Insomnia is the Universe's way of paying me back for some indiscretion that I have yet to commit--and I can only hope that, when I do, it is fucking worth it.

So, rather than letting the Universe sit smugly by while I get increasingly more irritated at my own inability to achieve a REM state, I will instead relate an entertaining conversation that took place earlier today.

I was at the new job, sitting around with a few other waitresses shooting the shit whilst waiting our turn to practice some special method of scooping ice cream. As often happens when a large number of people are all embarking on a new path of employment, we began swapping tales of previous jobs and the shit we'd had to endure while employed thereby.

The subject, predictably enough, turned to lecherous bosses.

"So I was temping at this hedge fund, right around the corner actually..." I began.

"Oh, which one?" Asked one of the other girls. We've all worked pretty much every job known to man.

"Brentwood Advisors, over on 66th." **

"Oh, okay, go on," she said, and I proceeded to share the story of a going away party that took place when I'd only been working there for a few weeks, where I happened to get far drunker than advisable with some of the younger guys from the firm, and how one of them, when he walked me down to get a taxi when I realized I was tanked, proceeded to stick his tongue down my throat. Twice. Meanwhile he had a girlfriend, who called him, like, 5 times a day, which I knew, because it was my job to answer his damned phones.

"What was his name?" The girl asked.

"Errr... Jason.... something. I don't remember his last name." I finished up my tale, describing the incredibly irate drunken email that I sent (to his work email address) when I got home, and the retracting email I sent the following morning saying that, in light of keeping things professional, perhaps it was best that we just forget the whole thing.

As the tale of awkwardness wound down, the girl who'd been asking all the questions smiled and said,

"I am now going to blow your mind with what a small world this is... His name is Jason Smith, and his girlfriend's name is Stacy. I know, because I worked there too."

Well let me tell you, my head damned near exploded as I struggled to control the surge of laughter that overtook me (not to mention the relief because for a moment I thought she was going to turn out to be either the girlfriend, or a close friend thereof).

As I got myself back under control, she proceeded to tell me that, when she'd first started temping there (a few years after me), she'd been shocked to see him because several years before that she'd answered his Causal Encounters ad on Craigslist (once again while he was with the same girlfriend, to whom he is now, incidentally, married)!

I must own that I was relieved to learn that the guy was simply a sleaze, and that I had done nothing to encourage him to molest my tonsils while I was hammered.

There is, however, a moral to be learned, which is this: Be careful what stories you tell in New York City, because no matter how big you think it is, everybody knows everybody.

It's like high school.

With cocaine.

Scary.

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** Names and locations have been changed to protect the guilty. And what passes for my reputation.