I started a new job last week. To celebrate other women in the workplace, here are five amusing/impressive/strange TV scenes/episodes/moments that involve women and working, listed in order of when I last watched them, because damn it, I’m busy! There’s no time to be creative – I just started a new job!

Buffy, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Season 6, Episode 12 “Doublemeat Palace”
aka “The One Where Buffy and Spike Keep Bangin’”

Buffy’s job is to kill vampires and protect the world in general. Unlike Buffy’s ex, Angel, who has figured out how to charge people money for protection services, Buffy hasn’t yet figured out how to make any money. After a series of horrible events occur in season 5 and 6, Buffy becomes the sole provider for her younger sister Dawn, and as a result is totally broke. The only money-making job Buffy has ever had was as a server, so Buffy applies at a fast-food place. Antics ensue. A demon is eating employees. Buffy slays it. At the end of the episode, Buffy stays at the demeaning fast-food job, because she is now a woman with responsibilities.

All this talk about Buffy’s job was just a pretense to mention that she and Spike bang outside the Doublemeat building, and it is dirty in every sense of the word. A couple episodes ago, they banged for the first time, and this scene was house-wreckingly epic. It is quite possibly the first truly sexy scene ever in Buffy. I mention the outside-the-burger-shack quickie, even though over the course of the series, it’s a throwaway moment, because Buffy’s fling with Spike is in my opinion, the first totally adult, totally not kid friendly depiction of sex on Buffy. Spike has Buffy up against the greasy wall in an alley. The sex actually looks like sex, and it is dangerous, not just safe and boring (I’M LOOKING AT YOU, RILEY.) M’girl Buffy knows what to do while on the clock.

Inside Amy Schumer
sketch “the Nurses”, Season 2
aka “Everyone’s Aunt Kathy”

“The Nurses” isn’t a memorable scene in the grand scheme of things. It doesn’t have the same edge as many sketches on Inside Amy Schumer, but I laughed a lot. In it, Amy and friends play nurses on a panel talk-show, styled a la Dr. Oz. They answer questions in the most nurse-ly way possible, taking their time, giving “common sense” advice and sucking on oversized water bottles.

I enjoyed the scene so much because the whole time I was thinking, “I shouldn’t be laughing at this.” I’m fine with sex jokes and other “racy” what-have-you, but when they started making fun of nurses, I was actually concerned that nurses would be offended. But the stereotypes were eerily accurate. Nurses making you wait just to make you wait. Nurses giving out “advice” because they are “just as qualified as doctors.”

Peggy Olson, Mad Men
Episode 7, Season 7 “Waterloo”
aka “Peggy Pitches Perfectly”

More than enough has been written about “Waterloo” (we just discussed it on the blog last week) but it can’t be mentioned enough how hard Peggy killed it at the pitch for Burger Chef. Ya girl!

Cosima, Orphan Black
Episode 6, Season 2 “To Hound Nature in Her Wanderings”
aka “Cosima the Scientist Lets Her Feelings Slip”

With the other clones deep into fast-paced, run for your life hijinx, Cosima hunkers down into the science of the clone’s biology. Cosima’s story moves slower than the others, and often is ignored for an episode or two (to allow for more scenes of Sarah escaping and Helena eating, presumably.) As a result, Cosima’s character has had less screen time up until “To Hound Nature in Her Wanderings”, when fortunately, Cosima seems to be back in the mix.

In a video call with Sarah, Sarah tells Cosima that she knows Cosima is sick. Sarah asks her if she is going to be ok. Cosima lies and says she will. The important moment comes next, when Cosima says that she and Sarah and Alison need to come together, because they are stronger as a group. For a long string of episodes, the clones have been separated. In order to move forward, they need to come together. Cosima knows that her science can only go so far, as does Sarah’s unyielding resilience, as does Alison’s methodical forethought, as does Helena’s brutality. Being locked up in the lab, away from the high-paced clone antics, Cosima has perspective and the intuition to follow her hunches. Let’s all look forward to the clone-club getting back together.

Amy, Veep
Season 3, Episode 7 “Special Relationship”
aka “Amy Ignites a Bomb and Watches the Fuse Burn a la Wile E. Coyote”

I love that Amy is Selena’s new campaign manager. How many episodes will it be before someone backstabs her just as hard as Amy backstabs Dan? In “Special Relationship”, Amy leaks the information that Selena is bumpin’ uglies with her trainer, Ray. In a labyrinthine turn of events, which I will now try to explain, Amy anonymously leaks to Jonah, who is a terrible person and the administrator of a gossip blog; Jonah posts this gossip along with inflammatory quotes about fat people that Ray made on the internet; Ray speaks to the press and says a bunch more stupid stuff; Selena finds out then blames Dan because, in Selena’s opinion, Dan should have prevented it all before it happened.)

1. Good for Amy for realizing she just needed to create a shitstorm big enough, to dislodge Dan as campaign manager.
2. Poor Dan for not being able to prevent the unpreventable.
3. Good luck Amy at preventing the unpreventable.

If Veep has taught me anything, it’s that you need to be the person with enough power to weather any shit storm, and so far only the veep has that.

Here’s to hoping I can channel all these boss-ass-bitches in my new job.