How can I lose five pounds by Wednesday apart from having a massive shit?
I’m serious. I’m going to be standing up there and making a speech in front of thirty five people and I couldn’t even fit into my work bra this morning. Five pounds won’t make me any happier, five pounds won’t make me any better at public speaking, but it will give me cheekbones and everyone’s more likely to take advice from someone with cheekbones: that’s just evolution!
What’s that Chinese thing that your sister did… those herbal teas that smelt of the forest floor? I tried laxatives once, but I took too many and I was in the chemists the very next day begging for mercy!
I am petrified of speaking in public – but I don’t know why. At first, I’m fine. I’m calm. I know what I am going to say. I’m prepared. And then suddenly…I’m introduced: it’s time, time to speak, talk-time and I’m weak and I lose it. I lose it. I lose it every time. There’s only thirty five people, but it seems like a swarm and I can’t stop my brain from chanting: no more, quit, stop, go, stop-it, quit-it, run to your Peugeot and be free, RUN TO YOUR PEUGEOT 208 AND BE FREE! All those peepers set on me and my golden complexion now white stone. Hands rattle in their pockets, mouth hollow, no moisture, no words, just a dry dead sound full of complimentary biscuits that have crumbled into angst. And Peter in Accounts won’t think I’m hot anymore and Dominique on reception won’t frank my mail anymore and David in HR won’t put aside my jar of peanut butter like he always does, and I’ll get over-looked and ignored, maybe even sacked and discarded like a worn out pair of shoes and I’ll have to open that fucking bakery in Halifax back-up bullshit plan, and spend even more time with Mark, making holes in doughnuts that I can’t even eat because I don’t do carbs, and I know this is insanity on a Titanic scale but, if I could just shrink by an inch or two, and lose those five pounds and take up less space and have my very own set of model’s cheekbones…by Wednesday…then…maybe, just maybe then…I could speak in public.
Oh, I’ve just thought…why don’t you do it? What do you think? Oh go on.