How long can 2 smags go without internet in their apartment?

... Over 3 years!  That's how long!


So after moving into our new apartment from the one down the street, VznDSL was frustratingly unable to move our service from one to the other.  I collectively wasted over 15 hours of my life on hold or talking to someone from VznDSL (this is a conservative estimate).  In a silly act of defiance, Alex and I decided that we didn't need it anyways - living for the time being, off my Blackberry.  I'm still pretty impressed that we've gone this long without cable or internet.


But everything changes next week.  We've decided to get REAL internet service --- no more trying to steal wifi from neighbors, no more heading to Starbucks in emergencies, no more begging friends of friends in our neighborhood to use their computers (cuz really, that was awkward, even if James' friends are the nicest people in the world!).  We will be able to take work from HOME!  This is good -- because a true smag is connected in at least 3 different ways (my guess is (1) iPhone/BB; (2) High speed internet; (3) 2nd iPhone/BB...).  With the addition of #2, Alex and I will be connected in the proper smag way.  Well, I have an iPod touch instead of #3, but with wifi, I'll be able to dl apps to my heart's content! Congrats to US for finally getting internet!

All smags are interchangeable... right?

Since our last post, Alex has now started in a position at my organization. (I'll take the credit for tempting her with the perks and working environment of a place like this - and convincing her to overcome guilt of leaving her job relatively soon after starting to go somewhere she deserves, etc etc...) Despite my 4 month headstart at this place, and the fact that we look NOTHING alike, act nothing alike and have totally separate positions that rarely interface - we joked about having people confuse us since we're the two smags.  And all smags are interchangeable,... right? 

We'd actually made it almost a full month before it happened. Today in a staff meeting, for which I am responsible - meaning, I take the minutes, and set up the dial-in number for our remote access employees to call in to the meeting - the Director's assistant asked (in front of everyone) Alex if she had set up the dial-in.  It took me a full 5 seconds to understand what was going on.  I saw Alex's face get really confused, and then leaned forward and said... "Wait.  You mean me, right? (semi-awkward pause) Yes, I've set up the call but I don't think anyone has joined yet." 

And then everyone in the room that understood that she had just mixed up the two asian girls tried not to make eye contact. Hahaha.  It was bound to happen SOMEtime... 

Afraid of the iPod effect...

Since the advent of the iPod, I have dubbed the following phenomenon "The iPod Effect." It has two parts:
1. The inability to listen to any song in its entirety. - I once sat for a 40min car ride and did not ONCE hear a song for longer than 30 seconds each.  It's a musical adhd, of sorts.  The days of listening to cds straight through are completely gone. The aforementioned car ride was torturous... there had to be at least ONE song on that big iPod that he liked, right?  But that's apparently not the point.
2. The total wasting of time that could be otherwise engaged. - Particularly with the creation of fun, time-sucking apps for the iPod/iPhone, time spent on trains/in lines/after dinner/walking on the street/before bed... have all been taken up by playing things like Angry Birds, Sally's Spa and Cut the Rope.  The books I used to read on the train are now collecting dust; there is no urgency to find The Metro paper to take up the commuting time; no reflection on the day's tasks or zen meditation... heck! I wouldn't need to have any sort of human contact if there wasn't at least one person who loses their balance on the train. 


I recently received my FIRST EVER iPod (actually, it was my first ever Apple Product! Yeah I know.) for my birthday (thanks to the best friends ever!) and I was terrified that with my obsessive nature, I would immediately become all the things I resented (see above lists).  With the caveat that I've beaten all the free versions of Collapse, Angry Birds, ColorFill, etc... I am happy to claim that I think I've avoided at least SOME of the iPod Effect. 


Earlier this week I ran out to purchase a book that I'd been waiting for.  The iPod went completely untouched for 2 whole commutes as I tore through the book.  This book was a large hardcover book - not easy to tote around, and yet I still made it around with little inconvenience.  I'll admit I was depressed at the end of the book (I have to wait HOW LONG for the next one to come out?!?), but I was happy that I wasn't sure where my iPod was.  In times of better options, the mini-gaming console didn't control me.  I CAN use the commute to do other things, but I realized that it either has to be as effortless as playing Scramble 30 times, or something that I would give up a meal for.  Here's my conclusion: I think that if I can find another suitably exciting medium, I don't have to rely on my fun-yet-stupid apps to fill my time.  Maybe I can escape the iPod Effect relatively unscathed. 

Good smag / bad smag

Joe's Pub is a really great venue for shows--intimate but not cramped, great acoustics, nice stage layout--except for when it's really crowded and you end up having to stand crammed in and interspersed among other people's tables, or pressed up against the bar, as perpetually rushed and ragged looking waitresses bustle back and forth every few seconds. Like anywhere else in New York, it's the people that can transform this place into a living nightmare.

Last night, this bitchy smag standing next to my friend Joyce and I shouted, "Excuuuuuse me!" to Joyce and shot her a look that seemed to say, "Are you so stupid that you can't see how you are obviously, clearly in my way...move, now!" This girl then proceeded to position herself right in front of Joyce, at the exact angle so as to completely block my friend's view of the stage. Since she was a smag, it wasn't as bad as some of those super-tall guys who tend to frequent indie shows, whose height always clears out the 3-foot space directly behind them, but still... We both said "What the hell??" well within the girl's earshot.

Part of me thought, "hey, we're all smags here, can't we just get along?" but my baser instincts were more along the lines of, "this smag is going down" (not that I'd ever actually do or say anything, of course). The girl didn't budge an inch during the entire set, and her smaggy, 'me first' sense of entitlement put a small damper on the fun, until a little later that evening, when I got a $10 gin & tonic on the house for "being so polite". I only take this to mean that I didn't harass the bartender by treating her like she was deaf or had the mental capacity of a goldfish, or wave my arms around like an air traffic controller trying to flag her down, or stage whisper/hiss, "Why is this bartender ignoring me?" like the hefty white chick to my left. Instead, I patiently waited my turn, let the bartender attend to everyone else's drink needs first, then in the classic friendly-yet-demure smaggy way, calmly asked, "May I get a gin & tonic, please?" with an even smile, while looking her straight in the eye. And just like that, voila--having good manners has finally paid off! If nothing else, at least I can hope that I managed to balance out the bad smagginess in the room that night with some good smag karma.

In honor of racial slurs...

It's been a while since we've updated, so it took a reallllllly smaggy event to remind me to post.  A few smags and I were grabbing a drink at a really sketchy local bar down the street that I like to call "Anna's."  While walking back toward Smag #1's car, a few boys lounging by their car called out to us, "hey ladies... Hey Ladies!..."  and when we didn't turn around, one of them started yelling:


"I NEED A PEDICURE!..... I NEED A PEDICURE!.... I NEED A PEDICURE!...."


and all i could say in response (hopefully loud enough for them to hear) was, "wow. what @ssholes.  I bet he really does have gross feet." I mean, he wasn't even original!  I'm not sure why they do that -- clearly their lady-prospects were thin from the get-go.  Yelling weird offensive things (mostly that insult our intelligence) will do NOTHING to get girls.  In any case, it reminded me of the smaggy lines we've heard in our time in the city.  A selection of those lines follows:


- Of the straightup creepy variety: "Hey... hey... do you speak english?  ... do you need a greencard? ... just get in my van..."  (on 5th ave in front of Bergdorf's... and he actually had a van!  Needless to say, I did not react very calmly.)
- Of the 'other minorities hitting on smags' variety: [while walking in LES with another smag, a young guy from that 'hood is following us] "... DAMN girl... look at that BACK!... ni hao MA!"  (it is notable that "ni hao ma" means "how are you?" -- so I take it that this weird emphasis was meant to sound like the chinese for "how YOU doin'?")
- Of the joking/cockblocking variety: "So... what did you get on your SATs?"
- Of the 'young people need to figure out what's NOT offensive' variety: [while walking through Times Square at 3am - where all the uptown teenagers hangout, apparently] "CHICKEN CHOW MEIN!" (and grabs for smag friend's waist)


Really. I'm not sure what encourages people to do this.  This isn't even catcalling like most weirdo men do in the streets. It's a targeted harassment, just for fun (#2 wasn't so bad.  I'd have been flattered if we weren't on a dark street in a ghetto neighborhood) - although #1 was actually really dangerous and gross.  And I hope there weren't already immigrant asian women in his van after I/we cussed him out and stalked off.  Any ideas on why people do this?

Thank you notes from second-graders

In honor of tomorrow being the first day of school (well, today is the official first day for all you teachers), we have a very special post. I'm doing on behalf of Lydia, since she's too modest to post these herself. You may remember that a few months ago, before she landed her awesome job, Lydia spent a lot of time as an unofficial teacher's aide, helping Jenn with her second-grade class, down at P.S. 2 in Chinatown. "Miss Lydia," as the kids called her, chaperoned trips to movies, plays, libraries, zoos, South Street Seaport, the Brooklyn Bridge; helped out around the classroom with reading and math games and an after-school cooking class; and most memorably, assisted the kids with their weekly swimming lessons at the local Y--not just Jenn's class, but Lea's bilingual class, too.

We think it's great that learning to swim is part of the curriculum at Jenn's school, especially since growing up, our summers revolved around our town's pool and rec. park. As an avid swim team member, Lydia basically lived in her swimsuit for entire summers at a time (no, seriously...she *always* smelled like chlorine). I'm a far inferior swimmer myself, but I can get by--as in, not drown, which is always a useful skill. Sadly, based on our friends and people we've met here, Asian city kids seem to be an underrepresented sub-group in the swimming population at large. So, way to go, P.S. 2. Most importantly, though, Lydia came away from 'swim time' with some hilarious stories involving hydrophobic children and swim noodles, and a batch of the most amazing thank you notes we've ever seen. Here are a few of our favorites...

It almost looks like a poem, or some sort of chant. Love how it lapses into Chinese.

Hearts and butterflies were a recurring theme. Slight indecision near the end, but this one's very sweet.

This girl wants to make sure that Lydia knows exactly who this card is from.

Too adorable.

The last line says, "and can me swim and a not scared". And it's all thanks to Lydia. Aww...

This one depicts the girl giving Lydia her thank you note. Unintentionally post-modern...?

Nice of him to provide an either/or option.

Sometimes the simplest, most direct message is the best.

Innovative Yankee Cheers...

So another smag and I were at the Yankee game yesterday afternoon.  I've been to a fair share of Yankee games, and have done my fair share of cheers, but yesterday was a standout cheering day.  Besides the fact that the Yankees beat the A's 5-0, some middle-aged redneckish lookin' dude in the next section over (who was clearly trying to liven up the game a little bit) made up the following cheers (a sampling of the funny ones).  Imagine them in his rough carrying voice.  And imagine us saying, "what? what is he saying?" followed by a lot of laughing.


1. "When I say WHORE, you say HEY! Jor--Ge! Jor --Ge!"  (Jorge Posada, right before his homerun)
2. "When I say LANCE, you say ALOT! Lance-alot! Lance-alot!"  (Lance Berkman... we didn't get this one til it got to Lancelot ... which helped for his next cheer which went something like...)
3. "When I say SIR, you say LANCELOT! Sir--Lancelot! Sir--Lancelot!"  (funny to squeeze in the syllables there)


and my favorite...


4. "When I say VEGETABLE, you say GARDNER! Vegetable--Gardner! Vegetable--Gardner!" (Brett Gardner)

An Educated SMAG's Love-Hate Relationship with Youtube...

This cartoon sums up everything I hate about Youtube.  And most other online forums, really. Wish I wasn't so addicted to Youtube.  It would keep me from having to accidentally read these stupid comments.  Sometimes, if we stumble across a particularly good one, Alex and I will send it to each other to laugh at (and resent for their ignorance and lack of grammar skills).

It's official.

As of today, these SMAG's have lived in the city for four years. It's crazy to think that we've now been out of college for the same amount of time as we actually spent there. Four years, man. Who could have predicted that the girl who I only knew as "that other Asian girl" up until the third grade, when Lydia dressed up as Ping for our library class project and I was Jemima Puddleduck, and we eyed each other suspiciously as we stood in line to give our presentations (Lydia dressed all in yellow, me in a shawl and bonnet, both of us with fake beaks strapped to our faces), would become my four-year roomie and one of my best friends?

We've been through a lot together these past 4 years, including:

- 2 apartments located within 2 blocks of each other, including 1 crazy uncle, 1 non-functioning kitchen, multiple creepy neighbors and asthmatic dogs, 1 pidgeon-infested/owl-guarded balcony and 1 pidgeon home invasion, followed by a floor-to-ceiling steam cleaning of our entire place

- 3 jobs apiece, and at least 3 certifiably insane bosses, total

- 2 boyfriends, half a dozen other persons of interest, and at least as many cringe-worthy pick-up lines (i.e., "hey shawwwwty" and "what's your SAT score?")

- 2 surprise parties, all the decorations we still haven't dismantled, plus at least 2 cake-ings (Lydia only), 1 involving a diaper

- 1 bottle-service birthday and all the rest at Cheap Shots, including an immeasurable quantity of free bday drinks

- one too many mostly Asian birthday parties of friends and friends-of-friends, with 1 occurrence of dancing near/around Governor Paterson and 'that really tall aide guy who was later arrested for assault'

- 2 run-ins with homeless men, resulting in what are now known as "The Corndog Incident" and "Happy Easter!...No, thanks."

- 2 roadtrips, plus 1 trip to D.C.

- 3 Secret Santa gift exchanges

- 3 Halloweens (surprisingly, I only wandered away and got lost once), 2 terrible costumes and several blackmail-worthy pics

- 1 especially memorable stay-in New Year's, with 2 bottles of champagne but only 1 person drinking them (hint: her name rhymes with 'chlamydia')

- countless concerts, BBQ's and Yankees/Mets/Rangers/Knicks games - most notably, 1 Mets game where they clinched the NL East, and 1 Yankee World Series win (ok, so we were at a bar for that second one, but it still counts!)

On a related note (this part goes waaaay back), I want to thank my fellow SMAG for introducing me to the SMAG-ier things in life, like hot pot, lychee jellies, Pocky's, bubble tea, Sanrio, cheesy photobooth pics, H.O.T., Gen X Cops, congee, DDR, cherng fun yuew don and for teaching me everything I ever needed to know about Koreans. I'll never forget sleepovers at your Chinese church, or playing in the orchestra for all those Chinese New Year celebrations. Or your badass grandma killing that garter snake with her dustpan by chopping it up into little pieces.

It's been real fun, HLM!

**Edit from Lydia: Al, you forgot: 1 evicted neighbor family who had a kid that was horrible at the saxophone; 1 World Series game (Game #4 - 2009) AT Yankee Stadium, watching them in Philly via jumbotron; 1 smelly refridgerator; a bajillion long black and dark brown hairs all over our cream carpet (cuz we shed like animals); 206 total netflixes; 4-7 new TV Series obsessions on DVD - including Veronica Mars, CSI:NY/Miami, Chuck, HIMYM, and Arrested Development; 5 lockouts - split between me and Alex; and probably a total of 5000 votes between the two of us for American Idol, SYTYCD and ABDC.

Lydia's top 20 favorite albums

With the exception of a few random selections, my list will make up for the anti-smag list Alex just posted.  In the end, we average out in smagginess.  These are listed roughly in the order they impacted my LIFE (since clearly, I have "no musical taste") - if just favorites, BSB would be #1... I'm not ashamed!  Also, unlike Alex, I didn't restrict myself to any cutoff date, and I even included compilations.  Here goes:


1. Janet Jackson - "Rhythmnation" (1989) or "Janet" (1993) - it's a tie!
3. Beach Boys - "Pet Sounds" (1966)*
4. Backstreet Boys - "Millennium" (1999)
5. Chris Tomlin - "Arriving" (2004) <--- requisite twinkie-christian album
6. Original London Cast - "Crazy For You" Soundtrack" (1993?)
7. Kelly Clarkson - "Breakaway" (2004)
8. Missy Elliott - "Under Construction" (2002)
9. Alicia Keys - "As I Am" (2007)
10. Taylor Swift - "Fearless" (2009)
11. The Fray - "How to Save a Life" (2005)
12. Queen - "Greatest Hits" (1981)**
13. Shakira - "Donde Estan Los Ladrones" (1998)
14. Harry Connick, Jr. - "When My Heart Finds Christmas" (1993)
15. Chris Brown - "Chris Brown" (2005)
16. MIT Logarhythms - Natural Logs (2006)
17. Cheap Trick - "(Live) At Budokan" (1978)
18. Carrie Underwood - "Some Hearts" (2005)
19. Backstreet Boys - "Backstreet Boys" US release (1997)
20. Jay-Z/Linkin Park - Collision Course" (2004)


* Note: I was actually looking for a release that had the same songs from my favorite audio tape as a little kid - but I don't know if it exists - couldn't find it.  Will settle for "Pet Sounds" cuz it was pretty awesome anyways.  Otherwise it would be "Sounds of Summer - The Very Best of the Beach Boys" (2003) because that one really had every song.  It's a good road trip album.
** Note: no single album has encapsulated all of my favorite Queen songs just yet, but I have hope it'll come out soon.  All the Greatest Hits compilations come close, but the 1981 US release is the closest.  In an un-smaggy move, I've declared "Fat-Bottomed Girls" as my personal anthem.


I chose most of these albums for being the best sing-along type albums, but here are some other notes about my selections: Janet and Missy E helped me find my inner hiphop (which makes me wish I was more BFABB - go watch Step Up 3 if you have no idea what I'm talking about).  "If" was the first song I ever did a 'choreographed' dance to, and "Gossip Folks" was one of the audition songs when I made it into our dance group at school.  See? Big things.  #5, #7, #8, #11, #15, #16, and #18 really bring me back to college days and fun times, so I know they're albums that will stay on the list, even if not so deserving as time goes on.  (Also #15 is an MIT a capella group that I loved while in college, yes... very SMAG of me.) I also feel bad for still loving Chris Brown, but I will always love that first album. How's that for smag-iness? A mixture of pop and pop-hiphop and some old school rock... I think that sums it all up.

Alex's top 20 favorite albums

I've never done any of these 'favorite movies/music/books' lists before, and thought it might be fun (can you tell it's a slow day here at the office?). So...here's the list of my top 20 favorite albums.

For the record, musical taste is an area in which I deviate sharply from SMAG ideals, so the following is very atypical and should not be considered representative of SMAG's in general.

These rules apply:
- These are personal favorites, not necessarily what I'd consider to be 'the best'. The fact that there are probably a few musical misses here isn't nearly as important as the fact that they all still manage to evoke a visceral reaction in me, every time. I could pop any of these albums into my CD player right now and be as delighted to listen to it them as the first time I heard them.
- In addition to the nostalgia factor, every album was somehow significant in the development of my taste in music.
- I'm not including classical or hip hop here, and nothing that came out after 2005, with the exception of "Boxer," which is so amazing that I just had to break my own rule.
- These are roughly listed in the order in which I love them.
- I realize the content and format of this list makes me sound like a pretentious a-hole, and I really don't care.

Here goes...

Wire - "Pink Flag" (1977)
Television - "Marquee Moon" (1977)
The Replacements - "Let It Be" (1984)
The Pixies - "Come on Pilgrim"/"Surfer Rosa"/"Doolittle" (Ok, I cheated here, but whatever)
Pavement - "Slanted and Enchanted" (1992)
Husker Du - "Zen Arcade" (1984)
Fugazi - "13 Songs" (1989)
The National - "Boxer" (2007)
Gang of Four - "Entertainment!" (1979)
Mission of Burma - "Signals, Calls and Marches" (1981)
Minor Threat - "Complete Discography" (1989)
Minutemen - "Double Nickels on the Dime" (1984)
At the Drive-In - "Relationship of Command" (2000)
Nirvana - "Nevermind" (1991)
Sonic Youth - "Daydream Nation" (1988)
Uncle Tupelo - "Still Feel Gone" (1991)
The Strokes - "Is This It?" (2001)
Sleater-Kinney - "The Woods" (2005)
Frank Black - "Teenager of the Year" (1994)
Sunny Day Real Estate - "The Rising Tide" (2000)

Ok, Lydia...your turn.

Jay X-Y-Z

As a SMAG in the city, life can feel a bit New York-centered, and it can be all too easy to forget that the entire world doesn't revolve around this place we call home. In these instances, having non-NYC-based friends provides a much-needed breath of fresh air, especially when it leads to conversations like the following, with a friend in the UK:

Joe: I met a random British guy in a Yankee hat the other day
I was like, "what's up with that?"
and guess where he got the idea?
Alex: Friends?
Joe: good guess
people get 90% of their ideas about American culture from that show
anyway, this guy saw the Yankee hat in a Jay-Z video
Alex: oh, wow
I'm glad that British men are taking their fashion cues from Jay-X
*Z
(not sure who Jay-X is)
Joe: Jay-Z's long-lost cousin
Alex: the anti-Jay-Z
Joe: If they find Jay-Y they could have a whole coordinate system

As a big nerd, I'm still laughing about the coordinate system thing. But more importantly, this proves that it wasn't just an empty boast. He really did make the Yankee hat more famous than a Yankee can (at least in the minds of certain impressionable British men).

Because 2010 is "The Year of the Concert"

Alex is pushing me to post, because she doesn't want to look like the only SMAG posting.  Or at least, isn't the ONLY one procrastinating.  It's part of being a SMAG - working reeeeeally hard and then going brain-dead for about 10 minutes while we recharge.  Anyways...,

Now, I have been told numerous times that I have no taste in music.  Sometimes, this wasn't said aloud, but I know it was at least thought.  I am a quintessential Z100 listening pop-rock-hiphop mainstream music-loving person; I love The Fray and Alicia Keys, own a few Taylor Swift cds, can't stop singing the new Flo Rida song, and feel bad about still loving Chris Brown.  My sister calls it being a "teenybopper" but I call it clubbing-preparation.

Anyways, since Jan 2010, Alex has purchased tickets for both of us to go to at least 10 concerts - all but one or two being bands or acts I'd never heard of.  We've hit up most of the major NYC venues now: Radio City, Bowery Ballroom, Williamsburg Music Hall, Terminal 5... and probably another one that I've forgotten already.  I find some interesting people enjoying these concerts: the normal hipster set, the whiter portion of the NYC SMAG set (the other half are staying with the bar/club scene), as well as the natural influx of younger generation peeps (<-- intentional) that now define "cool" as being "different" and being "different" means you have to like underground bands until they become "mainstream" and then it becomes "uncool" to support them anymore.  (you know who you are.)  Regardless of my non-affiliation with either group, I have loved the music at each of these concerts.  But I think Alex and I both agree that the best part of these concerts in the people-watching!  White-hipster-girl-dancing is the best thing to watch, second only to "Pearl the Landlord".  It's entertaining and hilarious without being creepy or gross.  They hop around like they're doing field hockey drills, flailing all limbs, not being self-concious, and having a great time.  It doesn't matter if they're alone or in a small pack, it's all the same!  If you haven't seen this genre of "dance" in person yet, you should go out and find some to watch.  Recommendation: Brooklyn will be the area with the highest chance of a hipster sighting.

It's almost September, and Alex has something like 5 more concerts for us to go to this month.  Plenty of opportunities to watch white-hipster-girl-dancing!  On with 2010: The Year of the Concert!

Classic Lydia moments

(I'll expand this later...)

- One thing we've realized after 4 years of living in NYC, is that drinking in any city other than New York always seems ridiculously cheap by comparison. After all 5 of us took advantage of an unbelievable 2-for-$4 beer special at a dive bar in Baltimore, and were on our way to check out other bars in Federal Hill:

Lydia: "How does that go again? 'Beer before liquor...' Oh, crap, I forget. No, wait...'Beer before liquor, we gon' be aite.' That's the new one!"

- The most efficient way for a SMAG to get from the city to the country/upstate for a weekend visit is to take Metro North. Being perpetually on Asian time, however, we have a lot of near-misses with train schedules. Whereas I'm more inclined to take my sweet time, make a half-hearted attempt to catch my train but eventually give up and just hop on the next one instead, Lydia will always hustle her ass off, which usually ends up paying dividends. Case in point, I got this text from her a few minutes after a successful but particularly close call:

"hahaha! Sucka! I JUST made the train. But a bunch of tourists musta thought that Usain Bolt shrank and turned Asian. I friggin' TORE through Grand Central!"

- Lydia's favorite be-all, end-all way to close down any sports argument and preclude further debate:

"Blackspeed ALWAYS wins."

- Alex: "Realistically, I have a better chance with Robinson Cano than you have with Joe Mauer, since at least Cano is in New York."
Lydia: "True, also since Cano is kinda a whore and Mauer would rather ride a lawnmower than anything else...Oooooh, I totally didn't mean 'ride' like thaaaat."

Our neighbors tell it like it is.

Posted in our building's elevator last night:

Priceless workplace moments

It should be noted that save for one white male coworker, I am the only non-black employee out of the 14 in our program.

Psychiatrist's interview with a client:
Doc: "How old are you, Mr. X?"
Client: [thinks long and hard...pregnant pause] "I'm in my fifties..."
Doc: "Okaaay...Well then, can you tell me what's today's date?"
Client: "Nah, man. I don't keep up with that sh*t."

Male coworker: "Do you like African food?"
Female coworker: "Nah, I don't even like African men."

Female coworker discussing her racial preferences for dating: "Girl, right now I'm not feelin' those light-skinned guys. 'Tis the season to be findin' me a dark chocolate brotha."

One female coworker to another, trying to entice a client to come into the office for a mandatory face-to-face meeting: "You tell that n**** that I'm wearin' jean cut-off shorts and a tight t-shirt and a push-up bra."

Female coworker #1: "You like your steak medium-rare?"
Female coworker #2: "Nah, I don't like that sh*t vampire style."
Male coworker: "I like mine medium-rare."
Female coworker #1: "Well, that be the savage in you, with the blood all drippin' out and sh*t...Besides, the Old Testament say we shouldn't be eatin' the flesh of animals."
Male coworker: "I like my steak and that's my testament, and it may just be a motherf*cking revelation."

One of my female coworkers was singing terribly, more like warbling, and another woman says, "Ooh girl, you'd better not be singin' like that. Right now I'd be pullin' out my hair if it wasn't sewn into my head."

Discussion between my boss and a case worker, regarding a client:
Boss: "Do you think that he and that chick had a sexual relationship?"
Coworker: "Hell yeah, he's way too attached to her to NOT be hittin' that."
Boss: "Isn't she gay, though?"
Coworker: "Bi, apparently."
Boss: "And didn't she rob him of like $275.00?"
Coworker: "Well, you know...every relationship has its ups and downs."

Coworker: "I done locked myself out of the office when I came into work this Saturday. I left my damn keys right on my desk, and no one around to help me get back in."
Boss: "Dang. Wait, so how did you get back in?"
Coworker: "I done picked the lock."
Boss: "I guess our clients taught you well."