Well, it's creepy NOW...

My mother passed along a anecdote indicating that the firefighters at Mocha Creek think that I am very pretty, likely to bear children easily, charming, and obedient. Somewhat unfortunately, I was also found to be wicked smart. I took this with an equitable roll of my shoulders, and then followed Señor C around for the next couple of days prattling "Mocha Creek thinks I'm pretty."

But really, I know not to take workplace evaluations of my personality too seriously. When I work fire, I'm pleasant and present, I smile at people when they talk to me (even over the phone and the radio), and generally put the skills picked up from a summer as a receptionist to good use. The above rundown of my persona is mere confirmation that my trickery is effective.

This is in sharp contrast to my little boss. She has the emotional intelligence of a goldfish with Asperger's, is feminist like a hard glittery thing, and hates babies. I have three little anecdotes for you.

We were learning radio check-in. The man training us stayed a bit after, and began to talk about his toddler and how he'd be missing the boy's third birthday. (Fire eats lives) I felt a bit stiff when I asked more questions about the kid, but when he pulled out his cell I oooed and awwed appropriately. Thanks for the training, Mom! Then little boss pulled out her cell, and asked if we wanted to see pictures of her baby. She proceeded to scroll through fifteen plus pictures of her dog.

One of the Fish dudes mentioned that he was hoping to get laid off early this year so that he could spend the first few weeks of his new child's life at home, being sleep deprived. Little boss blurted out:
"Is your wife pregnant AGAIN?" He recovered nicely- (He may just know her better than I do.)
"Yes, haven't you seen her? She's HUGE!." He grimaced in fear. "Radiant though. Radiant."
"GOD. Is this THREE?"
"Um, two?"
"Oh, I guess two's acceptable."

It was late one night, working radio, and we were with our Fire Patron. He's a sweet, gruff man, very like a partially shaved bear in appearance and temperament. He's also quite conservative, and has some number of sons that is greater than two. He dotes on us, solves our perpetual fuck-ups, and calls us his daughters.

I don't think this is the kind of man you should go on an anti-breeder rant around.

My quasi minion and my little boss affirmed that they had no desire to reproduce. Little boss elaborated, throwing about a few pejorative terms about the reproductively blessed, the chronologically impaired, and people who ignored the replacement rate for humanity. Wishing to defuse the work-inappropriate levels of uncomfortable, I blurted;
"Well, if y'all aren't gonna use your replacement rate child credits, I'll take them." Oh yeah, I'm smooth. I'm really used to being the soothing influence, you can tell.

Follow up: Last week I found that Other Creek Fire was discussing my offer to bear the children my coworkers would not. Someone turned to little boss's consort and asked him just how that would go down. Bastard blushed, then told his girlfriend.

God, I love small towns.