That was the title of blog by Penny Lane a couple of weeks ago. I made a comment about that and was more or less challenged by her to put my pen where my mouth is (did I get that wrong?). However, at the time I was too busy being immersed in the Finnish partitive to do something about it …

I had had a truly terrible weekend so I was actually happy to go to work on Monday morning. To be honest the only reason for that was distraction and the fact that we were in the middle of a heatwave and the office was airconditioned, which my apartment wasn’t. The job itself was, to put it in my wife’s words, “a dead-end job fit only for losers”. Writing instruction manuals is difficult and demanding and very thankless. All that hard work first understanding things yourself and then expressing it in a clear way that anyone can understand, no matter how stupid, is never appreciated. I felt like I was at the bottom of a black pit with no way to get out of it. Being terminally shy and having a certain lack of self-confidence didn’t help either.

However, even the little joy of air conditioning was to be denied to me. In the heat it had given it last, hot, breath and decided to go to the cooler happy hunting grounds. I slogged on for some hours in the heat before coming to the conclusion that it was meaningless. I couldn’t get anything done. I went to the office of my immediate boss (that had working air-condition). By then I was rather worked up so I just burst in and out

- I’m too hot to write.

I was met by a double salvo of laughter. I still have no idea how it came that both my boss and the company CEO both interpreted my innocuous statement in the same incorrect way. Besides being hot I was NOT hot at all. My wife had on many occasions described me as a pathetic wimp with no fashion sense at all. Maybe she was right but who cares about what a instruction manual writer looks like? And I LIKED my old worn and baggy clothes and did NOT like to have my hair cut. So what?

Just to make things worse the CEO had just featured on a national tabloid’s list of the ten hottest single multimillionaires in the country. The contrast was just too much for them.

Fortunately the CEO took pity on me and not only sent me home to work from home but adding that I was free to do the work in the evening if I preferred. As a matter of fact he later that day announced the same offer to the entire office for all personnel that could work from home.

Not optimal but better than nothing. So I went home. Home to my hot, empty apartment. Much emptier than it had been on Friday. The weekend had been rather “interesting”. Saturday my wife had purged my closet of all clothes she had taken objection to. The clothes I was wearing had escaped only by being in the laundry basket. Most of Sunday she had listed, in detail, my shortcomings (starting with me being short). I see no reason to go into those details. Just to sum it up: I was no great he-man. Not like her gym coach who picked her up Sunday afternoon together with most of her stuff. I called her later that evening to tell her that she had forgotten some things. The only response was a derisive laughter and a statement that this only proved why she had to leave me. No, not a very good weekend at all.

Anyway, there I was, back in my hot apartment. Fortunately our condo has a small pool so that was where I headed. Or rather started to head when I remembered that my swimming trunks had been part of the Saturday massacre. The only swimwear in the apartment was my wife’s pink thong bikini. I was not going to wear that. Then I remembered that all the other people in the condo were young professionals who all worked and there was no children. Meaning the pool would be empty. And it was a HOT day. Whatthehell! I got into the bikini. For some reason I unthinkingly put on the top as well. I blame the heat. I did not feel comfortable in it but the heat and the prospect of cool water overrode the ride-up between my cheeks.

Getting into the pool was heavenly. I found a nice spot of shadow, stretched out on my front and put my head on my arms and dozed off. Life couldn’t be better. I needed that after the last few days.

- Hello Bob, you look very cute like that. Pink really is your colour.

Oh, oh I wasn’t alone. Mary, a neighbour, that I quite liked, was at home as well. Why? Well, don’t ask me. I never found out. At this point I should have freaked out. I didn’t. I suppose I had passed some point where I no longer cared.

- Oh, is it? I never knew.

Mary had expected to embarrass me but my reaction was much more fun. From that point she just went on like it was the most natural thing in the world to find her male neighbour with his buttock only to a very slight degree covered by a thong bikini (and wearing the top). As I said I was past caring and just followed the flow. Apparently I have great ass. Who knew?

I went back to the apartment before people returned from work. Working that evening went better than it had for a very long time. The next day I was down at the pool, in my pretty pink thong bikini. So was Mary. For whatever reason she was also at home for the week. That day Mary started instructing me. And without a manual! First was my hair. With care my shoulder-length hair became quite attractive rather than shaggy. A few dabs of make-up here and there softened my features. Wednesday was spent shopping. In airconditioned shops. I got myself a second bikini. A somewhat more covering one in case there’d be more people around. Mary insisted that my best feature was my legs so I got two short skirts. They went well with the new silk blouse. And the short flimsy summer dress was just what the weather required. I did all this without trying to hide that I’m male. Somehow Mary had triggered some deep hidden self-confidence and I just went into the shops and got what I wanted. Often asking for help which always was forthcoming from the bemused but professional staff. In one shop they even suggested that I get some appropriate underwear as well. Before that stockings, panties and bras had not figured in my imagination. In hindsight buying all that was a mistake given the temperature. Later though …

That evening I didn’t flee from the pool. With Mary and me taking my appearance (I was wearing the more covering bikini) as perfectly natural the others just took it in the stride.

By Friday two of the more better-looking single males in the condo started to jokingly (?) compete for may attention. All good clean fun. Too bad that I was informed that the air-conditioning at the office was working again and we were expected to turn up on Monday. I was devastated. And then I realized I wasn’t taking it so I sent an email to my boss stating that I wouldn’t come to the office on Monday. My performance at home was much better. It really was. Ever since I put on that pink thong bikini. The one that I no longer found uncomfortable at all. To my relief I late Sunday night got an email from my boss who grudgingly agreed to let me continue to work from home. YAAAY!

Monday morning I got my self an appointment at a salon. That’d really surprise Mary who I was going to meet for lunch. I had even got myself a new fancy daytime dress and some (low) heels. Coming back from the salon (where I had had “the works” done) and then poured myself into the fancy dress and even, despite the heat, slid sheer black stockings up my now hairless legs. I was ready to bowl Mary over when meeting her for lunch. A lunch I never got to.

As I was leaving the building I met the person I least wanted to meet. My CEO. Well, at least I surprised him. And delighted him. He had come to pick my brains. On short notice he’d been required to attend a meeting with a very important prospective customer and he was unsure about some technical details that most likely would come up at the meeting. Since most people was on vacation (partly due to the heat) I was the best person to cue him in. I HAD written the DEFINITIVE manual on that. Seeing me he scrapped that idea. I never wrote another instruction manual.

As I said I never made it to the lunch with Mary. Instead I found myself in the presence of powerful people worth millions of pounds. I thought the CEO had lost his mind when he introduced me as “Bob Miller. He is here to back me up on technical details”. I underestimated how smart he is. This unexpected move gave him an advantage from the start. I was thrown in at the deep end. I swam. It all went swimmingly (though without the thong bikini). I was smart. I was lucid. I was charming. Especially at the delicious luncheon. Despite knowing that I was “Bob” they fell under my feminine spell. They practically were drooling, though still concentrated enough to ask pertinent and penetrating questions. About the products, of course.

My CEO was happy. That is why I never wrote another instruction manual again. I'm too hot to write.

Instead I got a position fronting potential clients. A job that eventually led to a CXO position. I work intimately with my CEO. My very handsome and charming as well as smart CEO. I admit that I fell in love with him. Too bad he prefers hunks with brains that have trouble understanding even manuals that I have written.