Appendix II- The Official Pregzilla FAQ: Part Deux

In answer to the incredible outpouring of nosy readers crying for additional information, for your schadenfruende pleasure….another FAQ!

1. What's the timeline here, or are you reporting them in real time? I’m gonna say that the best way to tell is to read the context of the chapter. Much of it has had a brief time to season, some of it is fresh, but absolutely NOTHING regarding Zilla is more than a year old. Boss and Pregzilla are just approaching their one year anniversary. Not of marriage. Of MEETING. Their wedding anniversary isn’t until mid-fall.

2.I am dying to know what kind of business this is. Really, I am. Please rephrase this in the form of a question. But I still won’t answer it. At least not precisely.:D

3.How old is this girl again? Emotionally, mentally or chronologically? She’s been on the earth for just shy of 26 years. I see a lot of reference to the age difference between Boss and Zilla but I don't recall hearing exactly what the difference is. Care to share? About 13 years. That may not sound like THAT much, but trust me… Although, to tell you the truth, I can’t put my finger on what WOULD be an acceptable age difference for either one of them.


4.And this chick is like a dang CHILD. Who cleans up after her?? Why Boss, naturally. It’s a very literal, “You made your bed and now you have to sleep in it,” dealie.

5.Did boss ever stop to think that the dream he had years ago about a "bride"... might NOT have actually been the "literal", marrying kind??? You’re kidding, right? Boss is probably the most literal person I’ve ever met. Literally. (And I hope this post isn't removed for overuse of the word "literal" and its forms.)

6. These questions may have been adequately answered in a previous chapter or FAQ, but just in case not: Do you think they will divorce? No, I really doubt it. On second thought, maybe doubt is too strong a word. Less than 30% chance? Is there any chance it isn't boss's baby? Pretty sure that Boss is the baker that put the bun in Zilla’s oven. Not an eyewitness or anything, thank God, but the explosive ovulation story was a pretty good clue. Can we start a pool to see how long the marriage lasts, or has Vegas already started one? Unless you’re very young, and not planning on touching any potential windfall until retirement, I’d suggest a less risky investment. Boss and Zilla are probably in it for the long haul. And a LONG haul it may prove to be.

7.Zilla must have worked before, right? Yes, as a salesgirl. In retail. Where I’m not persuaded her 80 words per minute ever came into play, except as a threat, perhaps. As in, “You certainly must appreciate me working here for minimum wage, because someone of my skill level could definitely leave you in my dust and go elsewhere for a job making a king’s salary.” Or something like that, right? Maybe she also had other jobs, but I haven’t caught wind of any.

8.Didn't you know? Babies pee, poop and puke! How could someone expect Princess 'Zilla to handle all those bodily fluids? Maybe she did the flour baby project in middle school, but if her resulting proficiency in parenting can be compared to the usefulness of the math skills she gained during that same time period, baby Speedway is in trouble. And flour doesn’t have bodily fluids anyway.

9.Just wait until her birth plan goes down the drain, or the baby gets colic or something. Whatever will she do? First, she’ll blame Boss for getting her into this mess. Then she’ll call her mother, who will make a commotion like she’s helping, but whose fragile health will prevent her from providing any real aid. Then Boss will rally his family, who will rush to his rescue, but from whom Zilla will recoil like they have rabies. Pretty sure she won’t call MEEEE (primarily because I've had so little experience), so I’m good.

10.What TV show was going to let Bridezilla sing?? Characteristically, I will refuse to name names on this one as well. In the interest of hilarity, however, if you’re good with a Google search and would like to attempt to hunt down this information on your own, I’d start with terms like “air-conditioned dog house” or “incarcerated televangelist.” That oughta point you in the right general direction. And taken into account with all the other details of this saga, it both fits right in and is screamingly funny.


11.Did you change the passwords BACK after the username and password fiasco?? To my personal accounts? Immediately. To the business accounts? I change those regularly too, as a matter of course. And I make sure Boss has a copy. But he never knows where it is, so technically, I’m still the only one with passwords.


12.So how does one go about cleaning up a spammer reputation to once again do business through emailings? You know, if you’d asked me that a year ago, I would have been able to walk you through the entire process. But that email list was a responsibility that Boss evidently entrusted to Zilla, or maybe something that they worked on together. I let THEM handle it. It was their mess. Thankfully, they didn’t ask for my input, as I might have given it to them. Somehow, they must have gotten it worked out with the email vendor. I didn’t ask, they didn’t tell.

13.Wow, how did you not kill...I mean, yell at her?! At the actual time, I think I was just more stunned than anything. It did, however, make me feel vindicated for every error and lapse in judgment since my first day of employment. They all kinda paled in comparison, ya know?

14.Did your teeth hurt from grinding them together in an attempt to not blurt out every comment going through your mind? Even before I had this cathartic outlet, I haven’t let myself get TOO worked up about all this. Boss and Zilla take themselves SOOOO very seriously, and I so DON’T. You must understand my personality, I mean, I just HAVE to see the humor. And with a joint like this, there’s a lot of humor to see!

15.Yikes! I am curious as well, how is/was this handled? (Meaning the trouble Zilla created on her first day at the office.) With kid gloves, obviously, because she is the future mother of the baby Speedway. I overheard that there are still plans for her to come aboard at some time in the nebulous future, because she has had a new office chair reserved for her. A whole chair.


16.Boss was LATE 1/2 hour because of Zilla being up? Oh my, I guess the meetings will be after lunch when the baby is born! There is no short answer to this question/statement, and the following is a mini-chapter in itself, but this is our typical scenario: Maybe you’re familiar with organizations who schedule their staff meetings to end before 9 am, so as not to cut into potential business calls??? Well, we’re not like that. At all.

We USED to have our meetings scheduled to begin AT 9 am, sharp. Sadly, because several of our employees, including Boss, had immense trouble making it in that early, we usually ended up actually starting the meeting at around 10 am.

Boss got the bright idea that he’d like to turn over a new leaf and give us all a time management makeover. Did he decide that we should choose a meeting time that wouldn’t conflict with normal business hours, so that we could always hit the ground running and get as much accomplished each day as possible? Nope.

Did he at least demand that everyone be in the building and ready to go by 8:30 or 8:45 am on staff meeting days, so that our gatherings could commence on the dot at 9 am? Guess again.

He opted instead to CHANGE the meeting time to 10 am, since that’s when we always met by default anyway. So that our organization would look like we had it all together and were meeting ON TIME. Only Boss made the mistake of making an announcement to that effect. No remarkable proclamation, just a simple, “Hey, instead of 9, we’ll be changing the time of our staff meetings to 10 am from now on.”

Therefore, the employees who used to arrive for our 9 am meeting at 10 am have stepped it up, and currently arrive for our 10 am meeting by 11 am. Not surprisingly, when most folks are walking through the door at 11 am, they just GOT THERE, for Pete’s sakes, and aren’t yet ready to rush right in and sit down for a MEETING, so they unload their gear, chat with their co-workers, fire up their computers, check their email, grab a refreshing beverage… So the meetings typically begin at a time somewhat before noon. Also not surprisingly, there’s no time limit on these puppies, so they end when they end. Just in time for me to head home, usually.

But since I’ve been there for at least 2.5 hours before everyone else got there anyway, I’m able to keep up with my work. Oh, so to answer your question: See, we typically don’t HAVE lunch on staff meeting days. You know, because the meeting runs right THROUGH lunchtime. I guess if the meeting started AFTER lunch, we might eat. Or maybe I should suggest that we hold an organizational-wide fast on staff meeting days until we can be on TIME for something?

But since we already ARE, technically, fasting on those days, I’m not sure what good it would do. Didn’t realize you’d asked such a loaded question, did you?

17.I guess poor spelling runs in the Famalee, too, eh? Without any ignominy whatsoever. I mean the stinkin misspelled word can be staring them ALL in the FACE and they’ll never even pick up on it. There was a mass email sent out this past weekend, announcing an important organizational event. The NAME of our business was misspelled in the subject line of the email. HOW DOES THAT EVEN HAPPEN??? And how do you not NOTICE it if it does?????

I still remember an olden missive of organizational gratitude that offered heartfelt thanks to Chik-o-fil. CHIK-O-FIL!!!! (Say that out loud, please.) When you are proofreading what you’ve typed out, doesn’t your brain screech to a grinding halt when you read over that?? Don’t you giggle, hit the delete button and then carefully retype “Chick-Fil-A”??? Clearly not.

18.Does your organization have a Board of Directors that needs answering to? Yes and no. Yes, there is a Board of Directors, but no, they evidently don’t need answering to. For my part, I ensure that everything financially is completely above reproach, and that’s my bag. Seriously, I would resign if there was any type of impropriety. There ain’t. There’s just some very loveable flakes. And nuts. Heck, there’s a whole case of granola.

19.It is the dang baby pool and infant accoutrements in the meeting room that does me. Is he serious? Since the half dozen fluffy tapestry-like set of archangel pillows Zilla piled in Boss’ office before the wedding didn’t make their way OUT of the office until just this month, I’m not looking for these items to sprout wings and fly away any time soon.

Is it not a place of business? Since when do conference rooms come with a swing and a changing table???? Something tells me they aren’t considered PERMANENT, but based on the longevity of the aforementioned pillows in Boss’ office, temporary can last quite awhile.

There has been a facility-wide cleanup and renovation in process for about a month now. Our new VP is pretty aggressive in his efforts to effect professional-looking change to our offices. He’d done a pretty good job up to now, securing us some new furniture, getting shed of some of the shabby fixtures I had tried in vain many moons ago to cause to disappear; after all his recent efforts, I imagine he about FLIPPED when he saw the conference room looking like an infant day care. And I’m not sure when VP’s neat organizational flow chart on the white board was replaced with Boss & Zilla’s baby birthdate poll. Maybe VP has given up, flipped out, and joined the dark side.

20.We gotta have our Zilla fixes, you know? So I’m coming to understand… Who would have guessed? I can’t believe you guys really are liking this stuff!!

Of course, to be honest, I guess if I wasn't writing it, I’d be reading it, too. (Which to me, sounds scarily similar to “I’m always either asleep or awake,” so I’ll step away from that sentence.)

But I'm thinking if the whole non-profit bookkeeping thing doesn’t pan out for me, maybe I could have something to fall back on?

21.If this morphs into a book/movie along the lines of Devil Wears Prada, will you invite all your fishie friends to the premiere? Absolutely. Front row seats.

22.Could you imagine if they read any of this??? ? Wow. Yeah, the thought has crossed my mind. But it is such good therapy to have a creative outlet for this madness, it’s worth the calculated risk.
Oh, on second thought it sounds like they are probably so unaware they could read these stories word for word and never even suspect it's themselves. Speaking of word for word, that is almost exactly what my DH said.


23.Can we have a babyname contest? Oh, LETS!!! Who wants to start the post? Do we know the future name of the babezilla? In the true spirit of literary foreshadowing, there WILL be a future Pregzilla chapter on this VERY subject. Stay tuned...