Do It Again

For some reason, I had the urge today to name this post after the title of one of my favorite songs. I have no idea where that idea came from, but it’s by the Beach Boys and I heard it yesterday while walking (and by walking I mean clutching my chest, gasping and struggling through every step – man, I love exercise!!). ‘Do It Again’ is a great song about a So Cal summer and it got me thinking that today is officially the beginning of summer. Woo Hoo. I love me some summer. Sorry, I was trying to be cool and hip there, but fear I didn’t pull it off. Seriously, I love Summer. I’m just sorry she doesn’t love me back. Again, sorry. My train of thought keeps derailing.

I have always enjoyed summer. From swimming or playing softball, to staying out until the sun went down or just not having to be in school, it was always such a fun time. Even today, just the scent of cocoa sun tan lotion takes me back. There were trips to beach, sun burns, too much chlorine in the eyes and my favorite summery side effect – not being able to breath because of all the smog in my lungs after taking in deep breaths before swimming all day. I swear there were some summer nights my friends and I were like the walking dead. We couldn’t see, our eyes were blood shot and burned, our skin was more charred than a cheap plate of ribs and we breathed worse than an asthmatic. I just wish I knew why we couldn’t get dates back then. Gosh, I miss it!

Of course things are much different today. As a working adult, (well I show up to work, the working part is still under HR investigation), summer is awfully different than it used to be. Now, summer just means I get to sit in the office and have the AC on (when it’s working) instead of the heater (when that is working). There are no windows in our department, but if we’re lucky, we see the sun shine through the doorway when someone opens it. Sadly, it doesn’t even excite us anymore. Oh, and it’s hotter when we leave the office and the sun is still up when I head home. Other than that, there is really no way of being able to tell that summer is upon us.

I thought I would attempt to change that yesterday. Knowing that today would be the Summer Solstice (Latin for ‘Hope you lost that weight buddy, summer’s here,’ I’m sure), I approached my boss about the proper way to honor this important day. Other countries apparently have big bashes to welcome summer, so why shouldn’t we? Now my boss is the type of guy who likes to be presented with a plan, so I took detailed time (in between looking for a new ringtone and figuring out how to take two lunches) to put my ideas in a neatly crafted PowerPoint presentation…on napkins, from the place we went for lunch #1.

I told my boss that we should all get to wear Hawaiian shirts and fake floral leis. I even offered to buy fake (or would it be imitation – imitation sounds fancier) bamboo to place throughout the office. My presentation even included a slide, I mean napkin, dedicated to appropriate Summer Solstice music. I choose Jimmy Buffett and The Beach Boys. Realizing how important eating is to the office, I also included the fee for roasting a whole pig in the parking lot. I made up the estimate for the fee because I have no idea where to find someone in our city who does whole hog and the 411 information phone line kept hanging up on me when I asked for the number for pigs on a spit. Wait a minute, I may have asked for the phone number for spit on a pig. Well heck that explains that.

I had already bought a limbo pole, little umbrellas for our drinks and arranged for the local home improvement store to haul in 15 tons of sand. At first the person that helped me with the order thought it might be a bit much, but I told her it can get windy here in the afternoons. She mumbled something about how she really didn’t care and kept using the phrase ‘we’re on commission.’ Oh well, at 10AM tomorrow they are delivering me my sand. Lastly, I made a bunch of volleyballs with faces on them like in ‘Castaway’ and copied down all the words to Elvis’ movie song ‘Do The Clam.’ This was going to be one gnarly beach bash, dude. Again, I probably just over did it with my ‘cool’ phrasing…sorry.

Confident in the presentation I had just made to my boss, I bowed, waited for him and my coworkers to applaud (which those ingrates never did) and took my seat. I could tell that my boss was extremely impressed with my efforts by the way he kept starting to say something and then stopped himself as if he needed to regain composure. Finally, he said ‘hell no, it’s our busiest time of year and Michael already used most of our petty cash budget last week for the ice cream he walked two miles for in 100 degree weather that all melted before he got back.’ He also added that he wished I would put that type of effort into my everyday responsibilities, but I’m pretty sure…kinda sure…all right, assuming, he was kidding. We were all asked to get back to work, so being the professional I am, I sat back down in my office and sang ‘Summertime Blues’ as loudly as I could. Yep, you guessed it, another 11am meeting at HR again. I volunteered to bring the donuts this time.

So, Happy Start of Summer to you, if you get to celebrate that sort of thing…