CHAPTER FOUR

All in all the ride to the country wasn't all for naught. I enjoyed the scenery even though my seat was basically, skin, bone and evil. Even when I was younger I processed things differently that others. My brothers were freaking out by then but I was as calm as a cucumber. Being hysterical never brought anything good to my table so then it made no sense to me. I don't think that to this day I have given myself time to freak out. Well, on the ride down my mother decided that she wanted to visit her father, this was our first taste of country dwelling, and it was a doozy I tell yah! The house was like three wooden jail cells stuck together, smelled like piss, old age and death, and the our grandfather was a man to behold. He had elephantiasis in his legs. "Elephantiasis refers to a parasitic infection that causes extreme swelling in the arms and legs. The disease is caused by the filarial worm, which is transmitted form human to human via the female mosquito when it takes a blood meal."

So that solved the origin of the urine smell. But they were lovely people, who believed any and everything can be solved with food and prayer. They made things there bearable. Coincidentally enough there was where we all ever petted a cat. Our father wasn't big on having'creatures' in the house, or around it. Our lives weren't built in a way where we had the chance in encountering a stray and petting or feeding it, we were carted to and from school, no dilly dallying for us. Anyway, after that we were dropped at the steps of our grandmother's. Carefully we made our way inside, clinging to each other because it seemed as if the entire village was packed inside that little box house, staring at the fresh meat. Not one of them said good night or smiled to make us feel at ease, they just went straight into making us feel like interlopers. While all that was going on the house our dutiful mother was outside yelling and screaming things like "I'm free, lord ah free!" and kissing the dirt ground. I can tell you that shit didn't last long though. Our life there consisted of sleeping on the floor with one chair cushion, no sheet to cover ourselves, being woken up at 4 in the morning to full the water barrels and bottles while everyone else slept, being fed food that can be described as 'natural disaster emergency rations' and not being able to go to school. I can't exactly tell you what my mother's plan was seeing as she didn't take any of our things, we were living like scavengers and oddly enough our relatives took pride in that. It was as if suffering us seemed to quell their anger and jealousy toward out father a little. My father once told me that he was going to just forget about us because we left with her, of course that's bullshit because WTF?! Our primary school teacher at the time at Febeau convinced him that the children shouldn't have to suffer over a squabble between parents so he came for us. Lesson number four was learnt that day: PRIDE IS FOREVER WHILE TRUST IS FLEETING. He came for us alright only to take my older two brothers and leave my younger brother  and I with a solid Screw You! Do you remember back in the 90's how in the Simpson's whenever they introduced the Jesus character he always had a back light? Yup, that was how we saw our father that day, like his appearance would solve everything.

We were enrolled in a nearby primary school because having four children doing nothing all day at home started to look bad and those people were all about appearances. Indian Walk Government Primary, the school that can give anyone a time trip. It was fully board and the classes were separated by the black boards.The school was a slower pace than what I was used to though so fitting in was a breeze, what tripped me up though was my second enemy/frienemy/crush/first love. He beat me at everything in class, that pissed me off to no end but gradually he started to grow on me. I never pursued him even though that class of kids stuck with each other for seven more years of our lives, I always knew in the back of my mind that I was leaving that place so no attachments. Yea I was military that way. When our father came, his face betrayed him for a minute when he saw the kind of pressure we were under but the minute he saw our mother that spite was back. The vipers didn't say a word in the background, when they had the most to say about my father. They reminded me of the sneaky girls in school who whispered behind your back but smiled in you face.

I can't remember exactly what he said to me when I was bawling my eyes out for him to take me with him, what I do remember though, and what would probably stick with me forever more is his last statement, "You have to stay with you mother because you are a girl." That one sentence dried up my tears faster than the Sahara sun. It was like they were gong that struck the bell, the wiper that made everything else clear to see, the fortune in the fortune cookie that gives you the willies. I was dumbstruck, made to stand still as he picked up what little my brothers had and began his trek to get them a taxi. My little brother was going on four so he didn't really understand what was going on, he was still attached to my mother boobs so he wasn't going anywhere away from those so I was truly alone. Nine year old me knew it the minute he walked off, it was every man for themselves.

CHAPTER THREE

When I woke up that morning, breakfast was on my mind. As it was every day I got off the bed because my mother had a knack for making the whole house smell like whatever she was cooking. That dreadful morning was no different, I could smell the bake she made on the baking stone, the eggs she scrambled and the sweet sweet cocoa tea she always made just right. In all my food haze I didn’t hear the arguing at first, the ridiculous cursing hit me when I stepped off the last step and appeared in the kitchen. First thing I noticed was that the television was on an obscenely high level. The noise was drowning and like a symphony of my coming doom and gloom. My brothers were just walking aimlessly around the house, my mother’s voice was getting at an insanely high pitch which only happens when she passes angry and skips right straight to pissed. I knew that angry wail because I was on the end of that wail so many times my heart always picked up pace to help with my fight or flight response in getting out of dodge or what ever instrument she was going to use to beat us senseless with for whatever stupid thing we did.

But this time it wasn’t us she was cursing and wailing at, it was my father who was looking at her with such contempt out of his good eye. Years before when my brothers and I were just dreams in his balls sack he got shot right above his right eye over some money some thieves was trying to take from him during a card game, leaving him with a Mexican drug lord face since he spends all day in the sun for his job. What kicked my heart rate up a notch was that he actually started to yell back at her. At the time that was the scariest thing I had ever seen or heard. My father never raised his voice, he was the epitome of calm, even when he caught us using our baby brother’s baby powder to skate on the ground or when we lit old newspapers on fire and threw it over by the neighbors just for shits and giggles. My brother’s and I couldn’t move as we stared at the two people we love the most in the world call each other names. The rest was a blur, all I remember is my mother taking a hold of my arm and tugging me all over the house as she changed me and my brother and threw clothes in bags at the same time. Ever the multi-tasker. When I finally came out of my shock we were sitting in front of the house, about nine bags of clothes around us and our father on the second floor looking down on us. The later and later it got the more agitated I got so I hopped up to go back inside and then the death grip was back on my arm.
‘Sit down here, I tell you to get up from dey!" she yelled at me.
That’s when I decided to stop waiting for her to come to her senses and let us go back inside and began to finally act like a child. I began to cry my eyes out. Utter waste of time because she didn’t bat an eye. About an hour passed again and I could have seen my brothers resolve in obeying our mother waning and they were getting ready to bolt when a car pulled up. They probably would have made it too.

As a child your imagination is something that could often run away with you and when you get older and you bring up the memory again you realize you must have been scared to death to have thought up something like that. What I am referring to in this situation is my grandmother. When the car pulled up in front of us, she was the one who unfolded herself from the passenger seat but what I saw was no elderly woman, I literally saw the bloody grim reaper. Trick of the light I said, it was getting dark was my excuse, I was hungry, I have used each excuse to rationalize what I saw. The black cloak, scythe and the rumbling in her chest when she spoke, "I have come for you."

I’m just playing, she didn’t say that, I can’t tell you what she said because I had a mini black out when she grabbed my hand and dragged me into the front seat with her and placed me on her lap. When I came to we were flying down the highway, my mother in the back still huffing and puffing and I’m leaning on the sharpest breast I have ever felt.

CHAPTER TWO

First year was calm for me after that, the bullying became a distant dream. So the terms passed in a blur with me striving and succeeding every time in coming first in my class. I literally lived for school work. What I didn’t know at the time was that showing so much enthusiasm for school was considered ‘not cool’. As I look back on it now I realize that my obsession with coming first all the time hindered me from making new friends, learning the lunch time games or destroying one object on school property. For me at the end of every term my teacher at that time usually held a class celebration of some sought and with me being so uncool and always misinformed on such things I thought that the end of my first year class party was a dress up sought of thing and waltzed into class in full six year old party gear. Bubble gum lip gloss, hair clips of every shape and color, jeans jumper, my cleanest sneaker and a friggin fluorescent pink jersey. I was so embarrassed I didn’t make eye contact with anyone for the entire day. What made it even more worse was that the teacher thought it a good idea to hand out gifts for doing such good work. When everyone was getting one gift and a peck on the cheek I got five plus a book about dinosaurs. I was the class nerd and teacher’s pet and didn’t even know it until then.

Kids avoided me the first few days at the start of second year term. Nerds and the teacher’s pets were categorized as snitches back in the day so no one wanted to hang around the girl who would probably run screaming to the teacher if they decided to pull a prank or steal something from the stock room, which I wouldn’t have done if they had tried to get to know me better.

 So I was left alone to my own devices. Sitting in class practicing my penmanship or hanging out in the computer lab room playing tetris. Until I saw him one afternoon. Can’t remember his name now so let’s call him Melvin. Melvin was weird. Calling him creepy is too much so let’s go with weird. When you take time and look back on your school days you would see that you had that one kid in your class you only noticed for the first time when you had nothing else to do, nothing on your mind, no one in class and that person made a noise. When I first saw him he was sitting, hunched over his desk, turning something in his hand and mumbling to himself. I was immediately intrigued. The other kids had nothing about them that merited me being interested in hearing what they had to say ergo my friend dilemma, but this boy who apparently I went to pre-school with, just appeared before me and I couldn’t seem to stop staring. At first it was just an unstable sought of interest I had in him, things like, did he speak, did he eat, what was it he kept twirling and mumbling in his hand and why didn’t he leave his desk until home time? All those questions had kept twirling around my head while I had kept stealing glances at him in the corner back of the classroom during class time. So after about a week I decided it was time to take action. First I bribed the kid who usually sat next to him for his seat. That was hardest pack of marbles I ever had to give away, I felt like Gollum in the Lord of the Rings. 

The irony is though I never played marble pitch, I had just liked to cheat the other kids out of them and keep them at home like trophies. Anyway, after I took the seat it wasn’t enough though, even if I made him cry the need to hear his voice was over whelming so I started having one-sided conversations with him. With years of experience in talking to myself I knew he was no match for me so within a day he cracked and said, "Shut up, shut up, shut up," and went back to hunching over and staring at his desk. Triumphant and ecstatic are the words I will use to describe how I felt that day, something to cross off the book I had on him while observing.

Gradually I pulled him out of his bullet proof shell. Three words turned into sentences after a term and just as easily he turned into my friend other than a test subject and in our second term he magically became my boyfriend. You all must be saying "WTF!" by now because you want to know what a seven year old girl is doing with a boyfriend. Absolutely nothing. You all are thinking about the grown up definition of a boyfriend. A kid’s definition of a boyfriend in 1999 was a boy who would follow you all over the school at lunchtime, buy you snacks, fight through the mob to get you a box lunch with a big piece of chicken and climb the old woman’s plumb tree next to the school when she and her pit bull are out of sight. We were inseparable. But like all good things, it must come to an end. Ours came when I woke up one morning after finally getting my own room but I couldn’t sleep in it because I kept seeing shadows moving every time I took off the light, so I snuck into my parent’s room and proceeded to take over the bed. My mother decided my father was an idiot somewhere between that time and when she woke up and moved us to the country. This is where things get a little more exciting. 

That was sarcasm by the way.

CHAPTER ONE

When you were four years old, what did you dream about? Me, I dreamt I could fly all the time. Typical, who hasn’t dreamt about flying in all their time on this earth? But have your dreams ever ended with you fighting crime with one super hero or another, night after night? For days I would wake up in the morning thinking I was going crazy because any four year old girl who has vivid dreams about beating The Batman’s Joker silly or snapping Sesame Street’s The Counts neck like a twig has to be two banana’s short of a fruit basket, right? Wrong, I was one more dream away from suggesting to my father that I might need therapy only to realise my brothers were enjoying late night cartoons on our room’s television while I slept. Back then we were like gremlins to our father so the entire second floor of our house was practically our bedroom/cage, mainly because anything electrical in the house we made our mission to take apart just for the fun of it, until he brought home an old television and told us if we fixed it we can keep it in our room. Challenge accepted. To this day I honestly cannot say what we did but a month later after a lot of electrical shocks and scotch tape we got it to show, hence the addiction my brothers developed for late nigh cartoons. 1997 in Trinidad and Tobago was the golden year for kids and cartoons. But in my house, local television was even more epic.
My parents were the go with flow kind of parents, you could basically do what you wanted once it wasn’t illegal or affected them in any way. My choices were limited because I am the only girl so I stuck to things like reading, going on scavenger hunts for my dolls (which my brothers hid or buried), watching a shit load of television, talking to myself and finding eventative ways to get my brothers in trouble. Half of the time I did it by snitching, being the only girl in a house full of three boys and my father’s favourite made my snitching tolerable. My brothers didn’t catch on to my mind games until.... hell I don’t think they know I still snitch on them to this day. But this is when I was at home, in the sanctuary of my den; pre-school was another story all together. Being two years younger than my second brother, Merven and three years younger than my older brother Mevin Jr, I attended pre-school on my own. My youngest brother Merve was only a year old so I had to fend for myself in the sea of sugar induced selfish idiots that populated my classroom. Temper tantrums, glue eating, crying, self inflicted injuries that resulted in more crying, no supervision whatsoever, teachers singling out kids and my most favourite nap time.
I, Merlene Dunbar, can proudly say that I hated pre-school with a passion. At that age such thoughts shouldn’t have even passed through my head, but it did. I used to beg my mother to find some way to help me skip straight to first year or be done with school altogether, but it didn’t happen though so I endured it to the bitter end, not making any friends, avoiding that one kid who always tried to burn things with a magnifying glass. Can’t remember when I finished though but I do remember when I started first year at the Febeau Government Primary School in the year 1998.

(taken in 2007)

Located right in the area where I lived, not much concern was given into people’s children safety since the school had no security and no fencing. In the front entrance there was a brick wall but on the other four corners to seal in the school there was nothing.  Just dirt, a tree on each side of the school building, a tiny box meant for the security guard and a little parlour on the other side of the school where some old guy usually sold just snacks and really bad preservatives. Lunchtime was war at his shop seeing as he was our only source of junk food on the compound. After a week I developed a system where I slid under kids legs because I was so short and then used whoever was in front to launch me onto the counter.
Not only that, I was red skinned, so much so that it immediately made me a target for the bigger girls. And when I say bigger girls I don’t mean in a higher standard, I mean these chicks were the same age as me which was around five or six years old, in the same class which was first year yet they looked like their parents gave them steroids to take everyday with their morning tea.

(this is what they looked like to me)

All six of them just gravitated towards each other that first day and formed a pack. My brothers were of no help when the giants (the girls) started following me around the one building on the compound that housed every facility in the school, calling me names. My brothers literally used to go in the other direction whenever they saw me verbally sparring with the giants in the schools court yard. Until one day they went too far and put a dead rat in my new book bag. That bag was the first official school object I had ever gotten that wasn’t a hand me down, and they desecrated it. Sitting at my seat in that hot dusty classroom staring blankly at the dead rat tucked nicely between the pages of my already worn down mathematics textbook, something with in me snapped, my mind just started whirling with violent ideas for me to get my revenge. Scenario after scenario, where I pushed each one of them into a bubbling volcano as they screamed “I’m sorry,” in their decent into the pits of hell where rats chased them forever and ever. But, it wasn’t meant to be because another more reasonable plan came to me when my brother walked past my classroom window. The plan was so deliciously evil I started chuckling like The Brain from Pinky and the Brain when he cooks up a really evil but half thought out plan.

First I waited until the giants commandeered the court yard to play hop-scotch at lunch time. They did that like everyday yet no one challenged them, so that was my chance. My plan was to use the one thing little kids always had a hard time coping with in any facility in which they are surrounded by their peers, humiliation. I wanted to humiliate them to the point where I saw tears on someone’s face and the appearance of a stutter when their parents came to pick them up after school so that I could have felt better. My first target was, let’s call her Keisha because I never tried to learn their names. She was the leader, dark skinned, strong, had the shiniest forehead in the world and had a major crush on my brother Merven. Girls gravitated towards him and for the life of me I couldn’t understand why. But what they didn’t know was that he was a huge mama’s boy and lost his mind whenever someone touched his stuff. Ergo his power rangers pencil case our mother had bought him after he had one of his melt downs in the store, he loved that thing more than me so when he went running all over the school like primary school boys loved to do, I lifted it from his bag. Part one of the mission completed. Next I had to find some way to get it into Keisha’s hands the exact same moment my brother realised someone was in his bag, which I left sufficient evidence of seeing his stationary was all over the floor. Muahahahaha.....
Anyway, accosting Keisha during their hop scotch game was easy. Getting her to get angry and try something on me was the hard part. She might have been a bully but she was a professional one at that, she tortured without leaving physical evidence. The pencil case was my main mission in getting it into her muscular man hands but when I saw her jumping up and down on the court yard, reflecting light to out of space on her forehead the rage resurfaced and I went way off script. I took a swig of liquid courage (a dollar juice) and stomped off into the yard. When I reached face to face with her, I pushed her. Didn’t really do much considering I was the one who stumbled but that got her attention.
“Gyul, you crazy ah what!” she yelled.
At that point I realised I fucked up because in my revenge plan, getting the living tar beaten out of me if things didn’t work out was skimmed over in my rage. So seeing her nostrils flare was a clear sign I was about to die by size ten shoes to the chest in which caved in my ribs in turn puncturing my heart, an unseen force caused me to propelled the pencil case I had in my hand toward her, which she caught because duh... it was empty. The entire court yard erupted into laughter at my feeble attempt at survival, causing Keisha to prance around with the case waving it in my face when the sight of my very pissed off brother launched her across the court yard with a solid push came as a surprise. So was him jumping on top of her and grappling for the pencil case that for some reason she didn’t want to let go of. I just stood there fascinated with the events because one; my brother was stocky and strong for his age yet Keisha held on to the pencil case like a pit bull with a piece of steak meat and two; the fear of getting a concussion from getting slapped with Keisha's gorilla hands had locked up my knees. Results of the fight were inconclusive seeing as the school’s ninja security guard I had never laid eyes on before came and separated them. Through the process of the teachers and parents holing up in the office of the principal all evening not once was my name called also the giants never harassed me after that. They kind of just disbanded after witnessing the awesome powers of my unstable brother whom they thought I was going to sick on them. Keisha though turned into a lunch time stalker, where my brother went she went. It made my brother crazier for a while until my father had to come in school and have a chat with the principal about it. My school life was bully free for a while.

Sigh =3 .....

I kinda went on a mad rant the other day. It was like the only way to feel better was to write about it other than killing someone. I chose the latter because I and pretty sure I'm not gonna survive in jail. Anywho, everytime my family finds some way to mess with my head I go on a rant and then drown out the world with Disney and or glee songs, Lame right? But there is just something about doing my craft or reading while listing to the music, somewhat calming. If not Disney or glee songs its songs from musicals. I have heard just about all except 'Sound of Music', I can't seem to stand that movie.

"I'M GONNA PICK THE WORLD UP AND DROP IT ON IT'S FUCKING HEAD!"

It seems that my life is forever going to be filled with misses. since the ending of October of last year, I have been in this endless roller coaster of hospitals, drug stores and elderly homes. My mother had another stroke and low and behold I'm at it again with the constant running round. All because she believed herself to be super woman. Aren't parents suppose to care about their health coming down to the time of their life where their body isn't that of a spring chicken anymore?

There is this thing people in my family like to do all the time. They will come to me for advice or just someone to talk to, in instances I will give a little insight on what is the proper way to go about something or I would just say I don't know. But in the end they would trash my information in their brains and just do what strangers tell them just because what these people portray to them seem like a better faster way at achieving what they want than my slow and proper way. But as usual these type of fast fixes never last long and always end with someone being fucked! Not in a good way. What really 'grinds my gears' is that in the end they would make it full circle to come to me to complain about what happened to them and expect me to pull out my magic wand and some how fix it.

Would you believe they portray me as the villain when I give them the middle finger?
Lets go through the list now shall we: first we have my father, granted he came from practically nothing to a retired labourer who can sit at home comfortably watching football, but that doesn't explain this annoying habit of including me in shit that goes on with him and my brothers and mother. I have seen them fuck with his head on so many occasions and then come back easily like nothing they just said or did didn't happen, and he lets them. But if I so much as say something he doesn't agree with its total war between us. My mother is a total hypocrite who believes I was born to be her nanny and caretaker so she could do whatever the fuck she wants with me on the side lines with a wash cloth and a bucket to clean up her destruction and vomit. My eldest brother might have alziemers seeing as he only remembers people when he wants something, my second brother is probably having a mental breakdown and my younger is a talented little shit just the laziest human being on this entire earth.

This is what I have to deal with people, humans who get to enjoy life while I'm stuck with battling depression, an anorexic bank account and school. My craft business is suffering, I havn't been able to create or draw something in months, my legendary patience has become one of epic status seeing as I havn't snapped and shived someone yet. As of this moment I'm so wound up the safest thing for me to do is write away on my little blog I have been avoiding for a while. Everything I typed seems like a chore, like I'm lying. I feel like a failure who is slowly getting older, running out of time to achieve something that would finally make me happy.

My friends tell me I just need to be in a relationship. WTF! How do I say this without sounding like a total man hater, how the fuck is a man going to help me make more money, pay for a elderly home for my bed ridden mother, do a shit load of class assignments and make my crafts to sell? Isn't being in a relationship going to mean I have to make time to be with that person? Be interested in whatever stupid party he wants to go to every week? Try decoding what he is saying because I have no idea what the new slang words are? These things don't just happen with certain guys anymore, they all come with instruction manuals now. It's fucking exhausting. Don't get me wrong its not always the men at fault, its mostly me.

What I'm trying to say in all this rambling is that every month I seem to get by by the skin of my teeth and I over it. I done running behind my mother when she doesn't even listen to a word I say, I'm done being the sister who tries to help but is ignored because I not a ass to do all the work, I'm done being the daughter who checks up on a father who only shows appreciation with old talk. FUCK IT!

After today I'm going to have to live off of cup soup and water after paying the elderly home fees but at least I'm not going to feel like I like I'm failing by not dropping everything I'm doing to take care of everyone else again.

Oh yea, FUCK DEPRESSION TOO.

Books of the week! (I'm back!)

Most of you will know these young talented women from television and youtube.

 

MIS-ADVENTURES OF A AWKWARD BLACK GIRL

By Issa Rae

" In the bestselling tradition of Sloan Crosley’s I Was Told There’d Be Cake and Mindy Kaling’s Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, a collection of humorous essays on what it’s like to be unabashedly awkward in a world that regards introverts as hapless misfits, and black as cool.

My name is “J” and I’m awkward—and black. Someone once told me those were the two worst things anyone could be. That someone was right. Where do I start?

Being an introvert in a world that glorifies cool isn’t easy. But when Issa Rae, the creator of the Shorty Award–winning hit series “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl,” is that introvert—whether she’s navigating love, work, friendships, or “rapping”—it sure is entertaining. Now, in this debut collection of essays written in her witty and self-deprecating voice, Rae covers everything from cybersexing in the early days of the Internet to deflecting unsolicited comments on weight gain, from navigating the perils of eating out alone and public displays of affection to learning to accept yourself—natural hair and all.

A reflection on her own unique experiences as a cyber pioneer yet universally appealing, The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl is a book no one—awkward or cool, black, white, or other—will want to miss." GOODREADS

I first came into contact with this amazing woman through youtube, her web series 'The Mis-adventures of a Awkward Black Girl' had just started on it second season. I was forever a fan after the first episode. It was hilarious, down to earth and just plain awkward. I get the feeling that she was genuinely an awkward person and it was like looking at my life play out on the screen.  Every episode I was like, 'That is so true', 'That happened to me too'. 

When I heard she was writing a book the fan girl in me came out. I stalked its publishing day so hard if it was a person I would be in prison right now. When I heard she got picked up by HBO I felt proud, we don't even know each other and I was cheesing and applauding for her like I knew her from way back. I introduced her show to my friends and now we are basically the Issa Rae fan club based in Trinidad and Tobago. 

When I had finally recieved the book I treated each page like spun gold. It took me a month to finish. Books usually get read in a day by me, that is to tell you how I wanted to drag it out just for the hell of it. Her book is an amazing read and I believe that the fact that I watched her show before reading the book made it so. If I could meet her face to face I would tell her the god honest truth that she is my idol and I wish her the best in every endeavor she pursues in the future. 

On to the other amazing woman who has made my week day enjoyable. 

Also through Youtube this sarcastic woman was introduced to me. The trailer for her show 'The Mindy Project' was in my to watch section. It was a bitch trying to find the show on DVD but when I did, I bought every single CD. I laugh the hardest when I'm watching her show. Everything that comes out of her mouth is pure hysteria. 

"Mindy is a skilled OB/GYN and shares a practice with a few other doctors, none of whom make life any easier for her. JEREMY REED (British writer/comedian Ed Weeks) is the walking definition of total bad news. He not only shares a practice with Mindy, but sometimes her bed as well - despite her best efforts to resist. He is funny, self-absorbed and super sexy. In contrast, DANNY CASTELLANO (Chris Messina, "Damages") is a hothead and guys' guy who has a habit of stealing Mindy's patients. Danny criticizes her for everything, including her struggling love life and her lack of professionalism - even though it's obvious to everyone except Mindy that he secretly admires her work. His blue-collar childhood gives him a big chip on his shoulder, but he is a dedicated physician, which Mindy can't stand to admit because he's always getting on her case.
Rounding out the office staff are the receptionists - BETSY PUTCH (Zoe Jarman, "Huge"), young, earnest and easily excitable, who thinks the world of Mindy and is always trying to impress her; and SHAUNA DICANIO (newcomer Dana DeLorenzo), a self-assured Jersey Girl who is indifferent to Mindy, always knows where the cool party is and carries a poorly concealed torch for Danny.
Mindy is in constant communication with her beloved best friend from college, GWEN GRANDY (Anna Camp, "The Good Wife"), who also happens to be the governor's daughter. Gwen is a hilarious, sometimes too-blunt friend, and secretly a former carefree party girl (which only Mindy seems to remember). Although Gwen is now happily married to a financial analyst, with a six-year-old daughter, this lawyer-turned-Pilates mom remains squarely in Mindy's corner.
As Mindy attempts to get her career off the ground and meet a guy who passes her red flag test (no drug habits, no skinny jeans and no secret families, among others), only time will tell if she gets her romantic comedy ending."

"Mindy Kaling has lived many lives: the obedient child of immigrant professionals, a timid chubster afraid of her own bike, a Ben Affleck–impersonating Off-Broadway performer and playwright, and, finally, a comedy writer and actress prone to starting fights with her friends and coworkers with the sentence “Can I just say one last thing about this, and then I swear I’ll shut up about it?”

Perhaps you want to know what Mindy thinks makes a great best friend (someone who will fill your prescription in the middle of the night), or what makes a great guy (one who is aware of all elderly people in any room at any time and acts accordingly), or what is the perfect amount of fame (so famous you can never get convicted of murder in a court of law), or how to maintain a trim figure (you will not find that information in these pages). If so, you’ve come to the right book, mostly!

In Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, Mindy invites readers on a tour of her life and her unscientific observations on romance, friendship, and Hollywood, with several conveniently placed stopping points for you to run errands and make phone calls. Mindy Kaling really is just a Girl Next Door—not so much literally anywhere in the continental United States, but definitely if you live in India or Sri Lanka" GOODREADS

This book is the only one I have read so far, it was so good I can't find it. Someone took it. Pure comedy, thats all I can say.