The Plastic Lady

Time for more hauntings from the Ghosts of Jobs Past...

Many moons ago, while still working in Hades at the Company of No Hope, my good buddy Timo found out that Cruella de Ville was in the market for a new car, which would be thinly disguised, financially at least, as a company car. A company car in as much as she officially, technically “worked” for the company (at least she showed up occasionally and carried lots of bags to make her look busy) although she intended to use it exclusively for personal use and the Cobra could write it off as some business expense in his usual devious manner.

She had done this same thing the previous year for a new top of the range Ford SUV that she just had to have. This particular year’s coveted gold at the end of the rainbow had been a brand, spanking new Cadillac Escalade, which loosely translated meant that one of her fabulous “ladies who lunch” friends must have procured one from daddy or hubby and Cruella was starting to feel inferior. Of course she wanted hers to be bigger, better, newer and have features she wouldn’t ever dream of using but would be able to boast relentlessly about at the country club.

Maybe it would just look good sitting outside her Park Avenue apartment? Timo and I would pray continuously that the handbrake would fail one day, preferably while she was crossing in front of the car, toting her Bergdorf Goodman shopping bags full of dead animal pelts.

Timo, while researching the car, had found a great descripton relating to the Escalade, which was quite perfect.

“…a dichotomy of luxurious plushness and cheap materials.”

Now, it was actually referring to the car but man, it described Cruella, to a tee.

I mean if the woman had actual top line classy snobbery, she would have wanted something more flashy or that carried more weight in corporate circles like a Lexus. But no.

We giggled at the Escalade description for about half an hour, mainly because we were pretty easily pleased at the Company of No Hope since we were so deprived of anything resembling actual entertainment, but also because we were (and remain) very mean people.

You had to know Cruella to appreciate how apt that description was. Especially since her face, at this point, was 90% plastic, minimum. The part that moved anyway. Botox can be a bitch. Pretty soon the Botox wouldn’t matter because no one is going to notice your wrinkles when your eyes are practically vertically parallel to your (plastic) nose.

I couldn’t vouch for her boobs or ass but the nose job she had during the spell I worked for her was pretty severe. And apparently top secret. She didn’t even tell us assistants, except her one main assistant who was under strict orders not to spill the beans but who was coerced by the rest of us into at least giving us hints.

Cruella just told us she had a bad cold and wouldn't be coming in for a week or two.

Of course we all knew about the schnoz readjustment because we might have been overworked, delirious slaves but we were not stupid. Besides, you kind of got the gist after the seventeenth call from a plastic surgeon inquiring about her “progress” and a call from Cruella sounding like she was talking from inside the Lincoln Tunnel, asking us to buy a ton of “medical gauze that would be good for a nose wound.”

Even I knew that was a little extreme for a cold.