sanity adrift

coming soon...

2009-03-17T06:36:00.000-05:00

We were gathered together for an office meeting after lunch. It's always been my suspicion that our boss calls these meetings after lunch in order to maximize the indigestion potential in his staff.

“As I'm sure you all know,” he began, “the economy is really bad out there, so we're all just going to have to buckle down.”

I sat, waiting for the natural progression of his speech which, I was positive, would be to inform all of us that we had to start selling more. Sales were down, we were slacking, and don't think for a minute that he wouldn't fire every single one of us. We had heard this speech several times before.

“This being said,” he continued, “I've decided to let go of the maintenance service that cleans the office each night. Instead, I'm assigning some of you to do these housekeeping duties.”
It's a small office with only six employees, and three of us, myself included, were added to his newly formed cleaning crew.

For the rest of the afternoon, our boss worked on a spreadsheet outlining his new cleaning schedule...time that he could have been spent selling, which could have increased sales and eliminated the need to create a cleaning schedule since the cleaning service could have been retained.

Once finished, he posted his schedule on the bulletin board next to the monthly sales chart. I saw that my Monday and Wednesday afternoons would be spent sweeping the carpets and my Tuesday and Thursday afternoons would consist of cleaning the bathrooms.

Later that day, wearing my yellow, rubber gloves, I stood over the toilet, gingerly poking the inside of the porcelain bowl with the toilet brush. The nature of my job was taking an alarming, and unfortunate turn...though I guessed that this fell under the 'other duties as described' section in my job description. At least I'm still receiving a paycheck, I told myself...puny as the check may be.

Once I had poked at the toilet enough to deem it 'clean', I checked to make sure that enough toilet paper remained in the dispenser to accommodate everyone's toilet paper needs. Our office's particular toilet paper dispenser is a NeverOut 3000, which is simply an impressive sounding name for a toilet paper dispenser that housed two rolls of toilet paper, one on top of the other.

As I checked the roll status of the NeverOut 3000, I began wondering where the number 3000 came from. Was this an attempt to make the cheap plastic casing sound futuristic? Doubtfully, I thought, because by the year 3000 I'm quite sure that pedestrian activities such as going to the bathroom will be a thing of the past. By then, I figured, bathrooms would consist of high powered laser beams shot toward our colon region and vaporizing all the excrement that had built up for the day, thus eliminating the need for any type of paper products, toilet or otherwise, in the bathrooms of the future.

And I couldn't imagine that this was the 3000th model of NeverOut toilet paper dispensers...because how hard would it be to simply design a dispenser that housed two rolls, one on top of the other? Even I, a lowly sales/bathroom cleaning associate, could have designed something like this...and I'm quite certain that it wouldn't have taken 3000 attempts. 25 or 30, perhaps, but not 3000.

At most, I thought, this might be the third generation of NeverOut toilet dispensers, but the NeverOut executives, fearing that a product called the NeverOut 3 didn't sound very impressive, decided to add a few zeros. A large number such as 3000, rather than 3, would ensure everybody that NeverOut only utilized the most up-to-date toilet paper technology available.

Which, as I stood in the middle of the office bathroom wearing my yellow, rubber gloves and contemplating our toilet paper dispenser, made perfect sense. Adding zeros to anything makes it sound more impressive and exciting! Would Thriller have been such a revered album if it had sold 45 copies instead of 45,000,000? Of course not. And, with another birthday coming up only a few short weeks away, I decided that I would employ this same logic.

So, coming this May, I am proud to introduce the new and improved Terry 3700!

home cooked holidays

2009-02-16T07:09:00.000-05:00

Amy decided that for Valentine's Day we should share a home-cooked meal rather than make reservations. “These fancy restaurants," she told me, "all raise their prices to take advantage of people on Valentine's Day."

I pointed out that the price of a Denny's Grand Slam Breakfast was the same on Valentine's Day as it was on any other day.

"We are not going to Denny's...and I for one refuse to fall prey to this type of blatant exploitation that nice restaurants employ,” she announced.

Though she really didn't mean 'I for one' but rather 'we for one'.

“Besides,” she continued, “I think it would be very romantic for the two of us to cook a meal together. It's very domestic, you know? They say that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, and if we're going to be together I want to make sure that you enjoy the type of things I can cook. So I'll come over to your place on Valentine's Day and bring all the ingredients that I'll need to make my eggplant parmesan.”

That Saturday, she arrived with a multitude of bags filled with pastas, sauces, and other foods that I had no idea even existed. She set all her bags down upon the counter, unpacked and, once ready to begin preparation of her masterpiece, looked over to me and asked where I kept my cooking ware.

I headed over to the far cabinet and pulled out a pot, a pan, and an old cookie sheet.

“Where do you keep all the others?” she asked.

“The other what?”

“All your other pots and pans...you do have other things to cook in, right?”

“Well, no,” I said. “I mean, I used to have a Tupperware bowl but it broke when I tried standing on it to change a light bulb. So this is now the entirety of my kitchen supply inventory.”

“You used a Tupperware bowl to change a light bulb?” she asked. “Why didn't you use a chair?”

“The bowl was right there...so instead of walking all the way over to the table to grab a chair and drag it into the kitchen, it just seemed...at the time, anyway...more practical. Besides, I thought that Tupperware was supposed to be unbreakable.”

She just rolled her eyes and stood thinking, with arms crossed, in the middle of my kitchen. Finally, she said, “I'm just not going to be able to make anything for us with one pot, one pan, and a cookie sheet. How in the world are you able to cook anything? What do you usually eat?”

So I revealed my culinary secret to her. Which is why, this Valentine's Day, we enjoyed a romantic dinner of Chinese take-out.

same old new year

2009-01-02T19:17:00.000-05:00

For the first time in years, I found myself entering into the New Year as a 'couple'. Not since before Dick Clark became so painful to watch as the ball descended upon Times Square had I been with someone to share the beginning of a New Year. And, while I wasn't expecting much more from 2009 than I had from 2008, at least I was reasonably certain that I would be entering this year with a kiss.

I've been dating Amy for a couple of months now and we have become quite comfortable with several rooms in her house. Wine had been poured in the kitchen, dinner had been eaten in the dining room, and television had been watched in the living room. But the bedroom was still unexplored territory. And, while driving home from the New Year's Eve party at my friend Jim's house, it was this unfamiliar room that I was thinking about.

Was I expected to drive myself home after dropping her off or was I going to be invited to spend the night? And, if an invitation was extended, would I be invited to share the bed with her or would I be sleeping on the couch? And, if I actually made it into the bedroom, would there be any additional bedroom related activities that I would be permitted to indulge in beyond just sleeping?

While pondering all of this from the driver's seat of my Ford, Amy cuddled up next to me and rested her head on my shoulder.

“So which side of the bed do you prefer sleeping on?” she asked, thus answering several of the questions that had been occupying my mind and had almost caused me to drive through a red light a few blocks back.

“Well, I can't really claim to being an all-right or all-left side of the bed sleeper,” I told her, “because I always choose the side that's closest to the alarm clock so that I have easy and immediate access to the snooze button.”

She yawned and said, “Well, I always sleep on the side farthest from the alarm clock so that I'm forced to wake up enough to walk over in order to reach the snooze button. So this is perfect.”

And as we drove the last few miles to her house, I dared to wonder if perhaps this was a sign as to how the new year would be. Perfect.

tasting impaired

2008-12-12T18:45:00.001-05:00

I've had a terrible cold for the past several days that has left me feeling very much like an aspirin bottle...head full of cotton and safety seals firmly attached over each nostril. So I've been taking a good bit of Day-Quil to get through each work day. Granted, I could simply take some personal time, but I'm strongly taking sick days when I'm sick. Any day-off should be enjoyed to the fullest...therefore, I'm saving all my sick days until I'm healthy enough to enjoy them.

The problem I've found with Day-Quil, however, is that while it provides breathing relief, I really only have about a half hour of optimal tasting time. Sadly, lunch is the high point of my working day, so the ability to taste is of the utmost importance.

After a couple of un-tastable lunches and some trial and error with my nasal medication, I discovered that if two capsules were taken at precisely nine o'clock in the morning, my taste window fell at the exact time of my lunch break. A nearby diner was serving their famous crab-melt sandwiches...with fries... as their lunch special today, and these crab-melt sandwiches are my all-time favorite from their wide array of lunch time delicacies and appears on the menu very infrequently. So it was essential that I be in prime-tasting form for lunch.

As the noon hour hit, I grabbed my coat and made a dash for the front door, but as I was about to exit into the parking lot, my boss Vince called me into his office. “With the holidays coming up, I've decided to give you one last chance to improve your sales for the year,” he told me. “Here's a flyer that I've typed up outlining some great holiday sales that we'll be offering along with a list of potential clients in the area.”

He handed me the flyer and a stack of papers that had been printed straight off of yellowpages.com for every business within a 50 mile radius of the office. A quick glance at the clock above his desk revealed that my optimal taste window was rapidly closing.

“Now,” he continued, “what I expect you to do for the next two weeks is send each of these places a flyer and follow up with a phone call three days later. This mass marketing blitz that I've designed for you is certain to bring in a few dozen extra sales.”

Time was quickly ticking off the clock and rather than try and point out the futility of junk mail in an attempt to generate sales, I said, “okay Vince...since this is my lunch break, I really should get going.”

“I'm trying to salvage your job here and all you're concerned with is your lunch?!” he fumed. “Sit Down! You can take your full hour when I'm finished!”

45 minutes later, I was given a reprieve and headed out the door to my car. With the slim window of time left, I sped down to the diner in the hopes of salvage a few bites of crab melt that I could actually taste.

I hurriedly placed my order, waited impatiently for the food to arrive and, once sitting on my plate steaming beneath my nose, took that long awaited bite. Chewing slowly, I realized that I had lost my opportunity. The food had no more taste than what I imagined styrofoam would probably taste like.

I nibbled on a few fries until, reluctantly, I gave up the charade and placed a few dollars onto the table...leaving the majority of my meal untouched. Leaving the diner, I decided to stop by at the supermarket near the office and buy an apple, figuring that as long as I couldn't taste anything I may as well eat something healthy for a change.

'This cold had better be gone soon,' I thought to myself. Because I can only withstand so much healthy eating, and soon there would be a multitude of Christmas cookies to indulge in...which was clearly going to require that my taste buds be in top form.

a soy-based bounty

2008-11-27T21:13:00.000-05:00

Years ago, my friend Jim worked at a fitness store. During this time, he was convinced that he had developed a health serum that was sure to keep all illnesses at bay. A co-worker felt a cold coming on and, at Jim's suggestion, she succumbed and tried his antidote. Soon afterwards, she threw up...thus nullifying any healing effects that may have resulted. Airborne hit the market shortly after Jim's failed attempt at developing a healing remedy, and he still holds them responsible for his non-millionaire status...completely ignoring the fact that his formula proved much more effective for promoting vomit rather than preventing illness.

He still keeps in touch with his vomit stricken co-worker and invited me along to her 'Orphan Thanksgiving Dinner'. Her circle of friends, all with family outside of the state, get together each year and celebrate Thanksgiving together. Jim is currently fighting with his older brother and refuses to attend any family function where he will be present. And, because my brother and sister were eating Thanksgiving dinner at their respective in-laws this year and my family was having a post-Thanksgiving dinner the following day, I accepted his invitation.

Once there, I quickly sought out a glass of wine and some appetizers while Jim caught up with old friends. A group of women were stationed near the wine bottles and, while pouring myself a generous portion of merlot, overheard one of them relating a story about her recent participation in a pro-abortion demonstration.

I imagined her to be of the hemp wearing, tree hugging, strict feminist variety and glanced up to see if my assessment was correct. I caught her eye and, appraising me briefly, she said, “Oh, and I suppose that you don't agree that a woman should have a say when it concerns her own body?”
Caught off guard, I stammered, “no, not at all. Tattoos, piercings, babies...hey, if it's your body feel free to run amok. I was just looking for the appetizers. Do you know if there's any of those little hot dog things? I've always loved those.”

She shot me a disgusted look and replied, “us vegans don't usually eat meat, seeing that it's murder and all.”

“It's not really murder,” I explained. “Well, I mean, I guess it is, but it's not like I personally murdered any of the animals in question...I'm just eating them. No sense in letting them go to waste.”

She just sat and glared at me. Clearly, while she felt that animals deserved to live, those sentiments didn't carry over to me. I quickly grabbed my wine and slunk silently away.
After the food had been situated on the dining room table and plates began to be passed around, I found out what vegans substitute for turkey...tofu. Or, to be more exact, a tofu, soy, and chickpea flour mixture, which is how our hostess described the bounty which she set before us. And here I had always thought that the term 'tofurkey' was nothing more than a joke.

Perhaps in response to the look on my face, the guy sitting next to me said, “don't worry, it tastes exactly like turkey. You'd never even guess that it's tofu.”

However, the tofu, soy, and chickpea flour turkey ended up tasting exactly as I feared it would...which is to say very un-turkeyish. And I could only conclude that the poor guy had gone so long without eating turkey that the true taste was nothing more than a distant memory.

I sat pushing the tofu turkey around on my plate and employed a 'hide it under the mash potatoes' technique in the attempt to disguise the fact that I had actually eaten very little.
I looked across the table at Jim and found that he was doing the same thing, mixing in his tofu with the wild rice instead of hiding it under the potatoes.

Later, as we were driving home, Jim said, “hey, I'm really sorry about that. I had no idea she was a vegan!”

“Don't worry about it,” I told him, as my stomach rumbled.

A convenience store was coming up as we drove down the road. Jim, apparently having the same thought as myself, pulled into the parking lot. Shortly after, we sat in the car eating our microwaved beef burritos and large soft drinks. We raised our styrofoam cups, toasting a meal that we could finally be thankful for.

dog dumping

2008-11-20T06:41:00.001-05:00

After her boyfriend broke up with her, Gwen decided that a vacation from men was in order. So rather than throwing herself back into the dating scene, she chose to get a dog. And, finding a no-kill animal shelter near the city, she was soon the proud owner of a black terrier with white paws. She named her dog Raya...after her favorite type of Ugg boot. After explaining the origin of the name, I asked, “what's an Ugg?” In response, she simply rolled her eyes and said that men are completely clueless.

Soon after arriving home, she made a trip to the local PetSmart where several toys, a collar, food and water dish, and a fashionable pink leash were all purchased. “Shopping is the best kind of break-up therapy,” she told me.

She called a few days later. “Raya ran away! Can you believe it? I give this mutt a home and this is the thanks I get? Boyfriends are bad enough but now I'm even getting dumped by dogs!”

“Well, in all honesty Gwen, your track record with pets isn't all that great,” I said. “Remember that tropical fish you bought? It was dead the very next morning because you forgot to plug in the fish tank heater.”

“Don't go bringing that up again,” she warned. “They should make those things with some kind of alarm or little light that goes on so you know when it's plugged in or not!”

I decided that this wasn't the best time to point out that in order for an alarm or light to work it would still probably have to be plugged in, so I kept quiet.

“And to make matters worse, a few hours later I get a call from the shelter. It turns out that Raya ran away from me and went back there! It's like adopting a kid only to have him run back to the orphanage! How's a girl supposed to get over this kind of rejection?” she asked. “Look, I don't mean to cut this short, but I'm heading out.”

“So you're going back down to the shelter to retrieve your dog?” I inquired.

“No. I told them that maybe it's better if they keep her. Besides, I'm sure these dogs all talk to each other and I can't imagine what kind of horrible rumors Raya has probably spread about me. So I'm sticking to my theory that shopping is the best kind of break-up therapy and am headed out to buy some new shoes. I'll talk to you later,” she said before hanging up.

She ended up buying a pair of Ugg boots...the same kind that she had named her dog after. “In memoriam,” she told me.

Because while she does poorly in dating and dogs, her track record in shoes is unmatched.

happiness is only a day away

2008-11-08T13:57:00.000-05:00

My friend Gwen’s foray into amateur psychology seems to occur each time she breaks up with whoever she happens to be dating at the time. So when the guy she had been seeing for three months ended their relationship, I knew that Gwen would once again be holding office hours.

Apparently, her latest boyfriend had shaved his head one day and told her that he needed to seek ‘redemption’ for his ‘past sins' and couldn’t see her anymore. When she asked what sins required a penance of self-induced baldness, he told her that she wouldn’t understand and that he needed to embark upon a ‘personal self-empowerment odyssey’ that had to be travelled alone.

A week later, she saw him with another woman whom she described as a ‘blonde tramp with excessive boobitude’. He had clearly found room for one other person on his personal odyssey. This led Gwen to empty her Carmel Latte onto his beige chinos. “So at least he’ll be that much damper while he continues down the path to enlightenment,’ she told me.

Since this outpouring of coffee beverages, she has devoted herself fully to all things of a self-improving nature…with the exception of her weekly dose of Desperate Housewives. Why Men Love Bitches, Women Who Love Too Much, and Breaking the Chain of Low Self-Esteem are all titles which have since appeared on her Amazon suggested reading list.

“Clearly he was an unbalanced individual,” she told me a few days later, once her drink-hurling desires began to subside. “You know, I think it’s entirely possible that he was a polaroid schizophrenic.”

“Gwen, don’t you mean a paranoid schizophrenic?”

“And I had always suspected that he was bipolar,’ she continued, ignoring my correction of her previous diagnosis.

Her recent binge on self-help psychology books has her analyzing everyone…not just ex-boyfriends. Her Pilates instructor has suddenly developed obsessive compulsive tendencies. Her co-worker projects a deep rooted self-loathing upon those around her. And her mother should really begin dealing with the guilt complex that she has been harboring.

I was talking to Gwen on the phone the other day, describing the newest bone-headed measure my boss has cooked up to increase sales, when she suddenly asked, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” I answered.

“No,” she said, “something is definitely wrong. I can hear it in your voice. You sound depressed. Look, I only want to help you before this develops into a full-blown manic depressive episode.”

“I highly doubt that any episodes are forth coming,” I countered.

“You spend too much time alone," she insisted. "When’s the last time you were on a date? You need to get out more often. Dr. Phil said on his show just the other day, ‘you won’t score any touchdowns if you’re sitting in the dugout’.”

“That’s baseball, Gwen, there are no dugouts in football. And anyway, I’m not in any dugout. It’s just a bit of a slump. Besides, I’ve been enjoying my alone time.”

“Look, the sports analogy isn’t what’s important here," she told me. "The fact is that all of your time lately is alone time. When did all this low self-esteem begin? When did it start?”

Listening to Gwen, it became very clear that overexposure to Dr. Phil had some very negative side effects. I sighed and, trying to humor her, said, “I don’t know…maybe it was that whole Atkins diet thing. I mean, you know how much I love bread…”

“Yes…and cookies, and muffins, and cake,” Gwen added.

“Yeah, yeah...well, as soon as carbohydrates became such a bad thing to eat, not only did my diet suddenly become that much worse but everything else seemed to follow suit. In fact, now that I think of it, nothing good has happened to me at all since this whole vilification of carbs. Rolls with dinner. Buns on hamburgers. Even pasta! Everything I enjoy eating makes me feel guilty. And if I can’t even be confident in the food I choose, how can I even begin to trust my judgment with members of the opposite sex?”

“This has to be one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard you say,” she told me. True, Gwen is no psychologist, but her bedside manner could certainly use some improvement. “How am I supposed to help you if won't even take this seriously? Maybe you should just stop eating so many stupid carbs. Who knows, maybe you'll be happier.”

Her diagnosis complete, she launched into a tirade about Angelina's twins that she had read in People magazine. While listening, I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a bagel. Sitting down at the table, I stared at it and began wondering if a cut-back in carbs could actually lead to a happier life. I took a bite as I mulled this over, figuring that happiness would have to wait until tomorrow.

from the congregation

2008-10-27T06:52:00.000-05:00

Whenever I attend church, I can always find her sitting in the third pew. Once spotted, my mind tends to sway toward very un-Christian like thoughts. She’s gorgeous and, sitting so near the pulpit, it becomes very hard to focus on what sermon is being preached on any particular Sunday. Good Samaritans. The parting of the Red Sea. Love thy neighbor. It’s impossible to pay attention…though she is clearly a neighbor that I could easily love.

The problem, however, is that her husband always occupies the spot next to her. Which, from what I gather during the fragmented sermons that have seeped into my consciousness, is in some type of violation of one of the commandments. So I am relegated to observational admiration only.

Week after week, they’re there in the third row, dressed in their Sunday finest, this woman and her husband. And I began to view her much like I would a television show, once a week in one hour installments, filling in the blanks as to how I imagined her ‘outside of church’ life to be. What type of shampoo did she use? What was her favorite flavor of ice cream? Did she wear toe socks on cold weekend mornings?

These were questions I pondered during each Sunday service…though I knew that I should have been doing more church-like things, such as listening to the sermon.

Then one week, she arrived alone to church. ‘Perhaps her husband is on a business trip,’ I thought to myself. The following week he was absent again, and the week after that as well. I began looking for clues. And while some people, I’m sure, attended church for things like praying and for seeking eternal salvation, my mission was to figure out what was going on with my crush-from-afar woman.

Having only one hour a week to observe, my detective options were limited and, thus, consisted of trying to sit close enough to her in order to see if a ring was still on her finger. This, I felt, was a plan that even Sherlock Holmes would be proud of.

Eventually, I was able to find a seat that provided an optimal view of her hand. By this time, her husband had been missing for several months. And after some creative neck craning, I confirmed that all fingers were ringless. Clearly, the marriage was over and she was unencumbered by things such as husbands and joint checking accounts. I now had a chance at becoming the future second husband of someone whose name I didn’t even know.

The problem, as I saw it, was how to actually meet her. Sure, I had seen her in church…but how was I going to somehow turn this into anything more substantial?

Should I try to coordinate my exit with hers, exclaiming, ‘Wow! I see that we both believe in the same God. What a coincidence! Would you like to get dinner one evening?’

Or perhaps I could plan on reaching for the holy water at the exact same moment as she did so that our hands touched with, hopefully, ensuing sparks.

But as I went through various other options as to how I could create some type of holy-hookup, I realized that nothing I had conjured was likely to bring about the desired results. I was going to need some type of divine intervention. Divine intervention that I knew would probably go to someone else…someone who actually paid attention during services.

body by dq

2008-10-06T06:30:00.000-05:00

Until I became an addict, I never realized just how available and easy it was to get a fix. Not an addiction in the cocaine or marijuana sense but, rather, to soft-serve ice cream.

A few months ago, while driving along, I passed by a Dairy Queen. It had been years since I last ate at a Dairy Queen, so I stopped with the intention of getting a small ice cream cone and soft drink. I had never been a large fan of soft serve ice cream, but felt that, with the economy in such bad shape, this was the least I could do to help stimulate it.

The colorful and tasty looking pictures on the menu board above the registers made me realize that a single, small cone simply wouldn’t suffice. So I ended up ordering a Blizzard…the Pecan Cluster one to be exact. And whether due to the pecans or the butterscotch syrup, I became a soft-serve ice cream convert. Ice cream that had previously been overlooked in favor of other, tastier, dessert choices now became an absolute necessity.

And it wasn’t until I became hooked on these Blizzards that I realized just how many Dairy Queens we have around the city. Previously, I would drive right by them, never even realizing that they were taking up retail space at the mall, and in the shopping plaza situated in between the Eckerd Drug and the Chinese dry cleaning place, and a mere half mile away from the public library.

Now I saw them everywhere I went. And every day as I passed one, I would suddenly find myself turning into the parking lot…justifying that a Blizzard was in order as a ‘reward’ for something that I had accomplished that day. For that sale I had made at the office. For letting that blue Chevy merge onto the highway in front of me. For only hitting the snooze button twice instead of my customary three times.

But as the rewards I tried concocting became more and more inane, I simply began telling myself that I ‘deserved' one and that ‘life was too short’. Because what could be more worthless than a life filled without M&M Blizzards? Or Butterfinger Blizzards? Or even the Oreo Blizzards, which aren't my first choice in achieving Blizzard bliss, but are still entirely acceptable as a last resort.

Near the end of summer, at perhaps the darkest hour of my ice cream addiction, my friend Jim returned from vacationing in Florida.

“You know,” he told me, “Florida is like a completely different world. The people down there are all so thin and good looking…at least compared to up here. Maybe it’s because the winters are so cold here in the North, and people spend half the year bundled up in bulky clothes...so they don’t worry too much about trying to stay thin. But down in Florida? You wouldn’t believe all the tanned, beautiful girls! And in bikinis year round! I definitely need to consider moving.”

That evening, as I stared into the mirror, I glanced upon the new waistline that Dairy Queen had given me and realized just how far away Florida really was.

why there's now less space in my closet

2008-09-15T20:30:00.001-05:00

After tossing and turning for an hour last night in bed, I reluctantly had to admit that sleep wasn’t going to visit me any time soon. Giving up on this prospect, I turned on the television and flipped past several infomercials...which I try not to watch when sleep deprived. Products that I know are worthless seem like absolute necessities when I’m unable to sleep.

Months prior, I had seen a commercial for the Vac-U-Bag, which promised organizational finesse and space saving genius all in one little package. By placing items in the patented PolyFlex bag and then sucking the air out, 20 stuffed animals could be reduced to the size of a throw pillow. Another bag, which had been filled with over 35 sweaters, was shrunk to the size of a dictionary and placed onto a bookshelf.

‘How have I survived without this thing?’ I had asked myself at the time. And two weeks later, the Vac-U-Bag ended up on my doorstep...followed by three easy installments of $29.95. Unfortunately, once it arrived I found that I didn't own anything that was worth shrinking. I stuck it in my closet with the knowledge that I now had the power of shrinkage at my disposal and could begin purchasing accessories like stuffed animals and sweaters without fear.

But stuffed animals and sweaters never found their way into my apartment, and the Vac-U-Bag remains in my closet underneath the Christmas decorations and a box containing my old tax returns.

So because of this judgment lapse when sleep deprived, I try to avoid late night infomercials, and as I flipped through the channels...carefully avoiding anything that even remotely looked infomercialish, I came upon an episode of Deadliest Animal Attacks.

One unlucky guy shared the story of how half of his face almost got bit off by a snake. 'Apparently pet snakes don't enjoy being kissed,' the snake face-biting guy said. The next segment showed guy out with his buddies, drinking beer and deep sea fishing. He hooked a shark and, determined to reel his catch in, was pulled over the side of the boat and almost got his leg bit off.

But, as I watched, I couldn't help but feel a bit cheated. The show was called 'Deadliest Animal Attacks', and I had yet to see one actual person die. Story after story resulted in one survivor after another.

I really didn't feel I was asking for much...just one little death. And while I like to think that I'm a humanitarian at heart and possess a great deal of empathy and concern for my fellow man, I didn't want to hear about the guy that survived the bear attack...tell me the story about the guy that didn't. Surely there's somebody out there that had his face bitten off by a snake and didn't survive. Couldn't he have been featured instead of that other guy?

All in all, I felt that while the show was clearly living up to the 'Attack' part of the title, it was lacking on the 'Deadly' part. Resigned to the fact that no animals were killing anybody in this particular episode, I switched the channel...to yet another infomercial.

I stared at the screen, transfixed as the host made beef jerky and banana chips for mere pennies with a handy little dehydrator...'the perfect kitchen appliance' he said. And while I've never been an great fan of banana chips or beef jerky, I sat there in complete awe.

'How have I survived without this thing?' I thought, as I reached for my phone.

smelling like a stranger

2008-08-29T17:22:00.001-05:00

While I don’t consider myself to be particularly loyal to any one brand, there are certain products I buy that only one specific brand will do. One of these things is deodorant. I’ve bought the same kind for so long that I’ve come to associate the scent of my deodorant as my scent. Coffee has a specific smell. Apple pie has a specific smell. And, thanks to Procter & Gamble, I have a specific smell.

Unfortunately, I am now experiencing a type of smell-identity crisis. For weeks, I have been unable to find my brand of deodorant in any store…and I’ve searched them all. From large chain drugstores to mom and pop grocery stores, I’m beginning to realize that my favorite deodorant is gone.

So I’ve been searching for a new brand. A new smell that I can associate with me. The old brand I bought had scents called ‘Fresh’ and ‘Sport’ and ‘Clean’, and these were smells that I could recognize. Who wouldn’t want to smell Fresh or Clean? And if I was going for a more athletic image one day, Sport was the perfect choice.

But when searching the deodorant shelf, instead of finding a Sport and Fresh scent, I found ones with perplexing names. Names like Phoenix and Clix. I had no idea how a Clix would smell…in fact, I wasn’t even sure what a Clix was. I was equally confused as to what a Phoenix would smell like. Burnt ash, perhaps? Unsure, I discretely pulled of the lid and took a whiff…though this didn’t help. Was Clix more ‘fresh’ smelling than Phoenix? And were either of them as fresh as my old ‘Fresh’ scent was?

I continued to move down the aisle and found a deodorant that had an ‘Arctic Blast’ smell. While this made more sense to me than a Clix or Phoenix smelling deodorant did, I was still confused. Arctic Blast sounded more like a breath mint than a deodorant, and I was quite certain that I didn’t want my breath to smell the same way that my arm pits did.

In the end, I chose a deodorant with a scent called ‘Pulse’ because I thought it smelled most like my now defunct brand of deodorant, though I couldn’t be certain that this was true. Having sniffed so many varying brands of deodorant, my nasal passages had been over saturated and over deodorized, causing everything to begin smelling exactly alike.

The following day, fresh from my shower, I applied my new Pulse deodorant. Later that morning, while sitting in my cubicle at work, I lifted my cup of coffee to take a drink and thought I smelled someone within my sniff-zone…or close enough to detect a foreign smelling person. Not a stink-smell, but a different smell. I looked around to see who was standing nearby and saw that I was alone. I realized that the different smelling person I had gotten a whiff of was me.

Upon realizing this, I knew that I would be stopping after work to buy new deodorant. Because how could I live with myself when I smelled like a stranger?

revived archives

2008-08-23T20:59:00.003-05:00

Entry: October 21, 1993 from my ficticious diaries

I found myself sitting at a table in a dingy little restaurant near campus with a soft drink and burger sitting in front of me. Things were hazy as to how I ended up there.

The evening started off with a group of us heading out. A friend of a friend knew somebody in their Econ class who was having a huge, post-midterm party. I remember walking the few blocks to get there…several drinks…and then things became blurry.

Through my alcoholic haze, I could see my friend Jim over by the jukebox, most likely looking for the most annoying song contained within…which he would then select multiple times. His crowning glory was when he found an old Perry Como record in a biker bar’s jukebox a few months prior during the thick of summer. After a mere 15 seconds into the song Winter Wonderland, the bartender yanked the plug.

I turned my attention back to the burger sitting in front of me. Because the table was curiously tilting back and forth, I carefully reached across for the ketchup bottle. I lifted the bun off of my burger and saw that the positioning of the pickles on the patty made it look like my burger was staring up at me.

I poked at it. My mind wasn’t too sharp and thoughts were coming slowly, as if working their way through a thick layer of maple syrup. My burger lay flat upon the plate, staring up at me…and it looked as if it had something to say.

I slowly realized that this was ridiculous…the absurdity of this finally emerging through the molasses swamp that was flooding my brain. Burgers don’t have mouths, I thought, and therefore can’t speak. I was pleased with myself that, even in my current state, I was still able to conger such astute observations. So I carefully gave my burger a ketchup smile.

I placed the bun back on top and lifted the burger to take a bite when I heard someone say “psst.” I looked around to see who was trying to get my attention. Jim was still reviewing the song selections on the jukebox and all the other patrons seemed engaged in their own conversations, paying no mind to me.

“Psst…” I heard again, and glanced down at my burger. Was my meal trying to tell me something? It sure seemed like it was staring at me earlier with those large pickle eyes…and maybe now that it had a mouth it was trying to impart some important information.

“What is it?” I slurred. And as I slowly bent down, resting my ear upon the bun, I could have sworn that I heard my meal whisper these four tiny words to me.

No. Tequila. Ever. Again.

special days

2008-07-28T12:58:00.001-05:00

My nephew celebrated his fourth birthday yesterday. Presents with bright colored wrapping paper were stacked in the living room. Music streamed from the stereo speakers, a playlist created by my nephew which included all his favorite songs...Barbara Ann, by the Beach Boys, a few Sesame Street tunes, and a song by Miley Cyrus. Even at four, Miley songs seem to seep into one's head.

And my nephew was in total bliss. Wrapping paper got ripped off of the packages at tornado-like speed, and with each new toy his eyes simply got wider and wider. It was as if he had been deprived of toys for years. A previous toy-junkie that decided one day to take 12 steps backward and rediscover his one true vice.

My sister had baked a dinosaur-shaped cake for him, my nephew having formed a fascination with all things dinosaur. And the cake was devoured with the same enthusiasm that the toys were opened with. Flurries of sprinkles surrounded him as he licked the icing off of a rather large section of T-Rex's tail.

Later in the day, after most of the guests had departed, I sat with my sister and nephew around the kitchen table...my sister and I sipping stale coffee and my nephew enjoying yet another small slice of cake; a piece of T-Rex's nose this time.

He popped a small, blue sprinkle into his mouth...eating his sprinkles like a connoisseur, enjoying them one sprinkle at a time. He sat and became quite reflective, as if contemplating some of life's great mysteries.

“Mom,” he stated. “I think I'd like to have another birthday party tomorrow.”

“Honey, birthdays are very special days that only happen once a year,” she told him.

He seemed to think about this for a few seconds before responding. “Well tomorrow is a special day too.”

“Oh,” my sister asked, “and what day is tomorrow?”

“Monday!” he exclaimed.

“Dear, Mondays aren't special days,” she replied.

He looked crestfallen upon hearing this, but was soon absorbed in the remainder of his cake...seemingly having forgotten the unspecialness of Mondays.

My sister was right, of course. And sadly, he would learn soon enough that, rather than being special, Mondays were downright horrible days.

Although, if you could fill your Mondays with presents and cake, while it wouldn't completely erase their terribleness, it would certainly make them more bearable.

the start of my successful future

2008-07-23T08:46:00.000-05:00

After having read that successful people buy a new pair of shoes three or four times each year, I felt that my old pair should be retired. Sad as this was, having worn the same shoes for the past six years, I was certain that success wouldn’t find me until new shoes were obtained.

Having gone so long without purchasing shoes, I wasn’t even too sure where to get them. Did Wal-Mart sell shoes? Did Sears? Or should I just get a cheap pair of Buster Brown shoes…though I wasn’t certain that they even made shoes anymore. Who knew that shoe shopping would be so difficult?

In a shoe-induced fog, I ended up at Macy’s and was soon the proud owner of a new pair of black leather, oxford shoes. I had a sales call scheduled for the following day and this, I thought, would be the perfect opportunity to wear my new shoes and usher in my new age-of-success.

I arrived at my appointment early the next morning, clad in my new shoes. Vince, my boss, has determined that all of our big accounts will be handled by Lenny…our inept sales manager…which is why I was visiting a small little company in a seedy part of town. The company was housed in a decrepit building which was also home to an attorney and a fitness equipment supplier. According to a large banner attached to the chain link fence surrounding the parking lot, there were several units for lease inside the building, though I couldn’t imagine why any company would choose to make this their home.

I parked and headed toward the front door. As I walked underneath the awning, I felt a sharp pain in my right arm. I paused, curious as to why I had suddenly developed this malady. And as I stood pondering this, I felt two sharp, stinging pains in my left arm and one on my neck. Suddenly I became aware that several wasps were swarming around me and that a large hive sat directly above my head on the underside of the awning I had just passed underneath.

I started swatting madly with the brochures I was carrying as I made a mad dash to the front door. Once I was safely inside the lobby, I assessed the damage…which amounted to five wasp stings and a total of four colored brochures that had been dropped as I raced into the building.

Having never been stung by any wasps before, I had no idea if I was allergic to them and anxiously waited to see if I would swell up and stop breathing. As the elevator doors slid open, I stepped inside and pressed the button for the third floor, relieved to find that I could still breathe and wasn’t swelling up in size. This, I reasoned, was an incredibly painful way to find out that one is not allergic to wasp stings.

I exited onto the third floor and started off down the hall. Approaching the door, I took a deep breath, readying myself for the start of my newfound successful future, and walked inside.

The secretary looked up as I entered and, noticing the expanding welts on my arms and neck, said, “Good heavens! What happened to you?”

I explained my unfortunate encounter with the wasps. “You mean you entered on the Fourth Avenue side? Oh, we never use that entrance,” she told me. “When you leave, use the doors to the rear parking lot. I’m glad you told me about this, though, so I can alert maintenance. I’d hate for somebody that works in the building to get stung!”

Obviously for those of us non-building workers, getting stung was entirely acceptable.

“So what can I do for you?” she asked.

“I have an appointment with Mr. Walsh,” I told her.

“Well this just isn’t your lucky day now, is it?” she responded. “Mr. Walsh left an hour ago. He must have forgotten that he had a meeting scheduled for today.”

I left a business card with her and took the stairwell down to the rear entrance that she had recommended. I exited the building and crossed through a small grassy divide that was littered with fast food wrappers and empty bottles that ran along side the chain link fence, inside of which sat my car.

I opened my car door, started the engine, and rested my head against the steering wheel when I noticed the distinct odor of dog poop wafting in the air. Glancing down at my feet, I saw that a rather large dog dropping now decorated the bottom of my new leather oxford.

I stepped back outside and tried to scrape off as much poop as possible onto the asphalt parking lot. Glaring down at my shoes…shoes that certainly hadn’t provided any promise that success would be forthcoming…I said to them, “I hope you realize that this is all your fault.”

and somehow we stay in business

2008-07-17T08:39:00.000-05:00

We assembled in the conference room for a ‘working lunch’, which usually means that we the staff will get reamed out over free pizza and pop. As Vince, our boss, plopped four greasy slices onto a thin paper plate for himself he said, “While our sales have been sluggish and we really need to step it up, that’s not the point of the meeting today.”

Which was a surprise since every meeting we have always focuses on our sluggish sales and how we all need to start performing.

“No,” he continued, “today I wanted to take an opportunity to recognize ten years of outstanding service by a true superstar, our very own Lenny!”

The rest of us stopped in mid-bite and glanced at each other. Slowly, since we sensed that it was expected of us, we put our slices of pizza down and gave Lenny a very half-hearted smattering of applause.

Last year, in recognition of his ninth year of employment, Lenny had been promoted to Sales Manager, a position that didn’t exist prior to this. This year, he got a watch, on the back of which was inscribed, ‘10 years and counting!’

After being moved up in title to ‘Sales Manager’, I was demoted to a sales support position…meaning that Lenny began the manager of a sales staff that consisted of one…himself. Only recently have I been moved back into a full-time sales position. Stephanie, a recent college graduate, was hired to fill my old position as Lenny’s ‘support’ staff. Three others were hired before her and each quit after a week, meaning that I was continually being re-demoted. I wasn’t confident that she was going to remain with the company any longer than her predecessors had.

“Thanks Vince,” Lenny said as he slipped the watch around his wrist and hoisted his pants back up over the massive girth of his waist. “You know,” he told us, “everything I know about sales I learned from this man right here!”

“Tell them about that great sales call you had last week,” Vince said as he slapped Lenny on the back.

“Well, I’m at this company,” Lenny began, “and I give a great sales pitch and can tell that the guy is ready to buy. But then he says to me, ‘your product looks fine, but I just don’t have any money.”

“Which is a common objection,” Vince interjected. “But just listen to how Lenny handled it!”

“So I decided to play dumb and say to the guy, ‘No money? So you mean you’re going out of business?’ Of course they aren’t!” Lenny laughs. “So the guy admits that aren’t going out of business. There’s money, he tells me, but their budget is already spent for this year.”

“See how Lenny handled that?” Vince asked all of us seated around the table.

We all gave each other blank stares, unsure what Lenny had proved in his handling of the situation.

“So did they buy something?” Stephanie asked in a timid voice.

Having heard this same story from Lenny three times in the past week, I already knew the answer.

“No,” Lenny said. “But he assured me that next year they would.”

So by catching the guy in a lie…one which he told Lenny only as a nice way of saying, ‘we’re not interested’…Lenny extracted from him a promise to buy next year. Not that this does anyone any good this year. And I have a strong suspicion that they won’t be buying anything from Lenny next year either.

As I sat there with the beginnings of heartburn working its way through my chest…more from Lenny’s story than the pizza…I wondered how, with a teacher like Vince, our company hadn’t gone out of business long ago.

reality is simply too 'real'

2008-07-09T08:34:00.000-05:00

My friend Jim’s house is unremarkable in every way. It has only three rooms, the ceilings are all sagging, and the basement is constantly in varied states of dampness. In truth, the term ‘unremarkable’ is simply a nice way of saying ‘barely livable’. But for one night each year, Jim’s place becomes the spot where everyone wants to convene…because its location provides an exceptional view of the city’s fireworks each Fourth of July.

Granted, these are not downtown fireworks…majestic, booming displays of pyrotechnic genius…but rather suburban fireworks set off from the mall parking lot. But Jim’s fabulous view of the mall parking lot, which isn’t nearly as scenic during other times of the year, make his place the standard Fourth of July get-together spot. Plus, there’s not nearly as much traffic as there would be if heading downtown.

We spilled onto the street along with Jim’s neighbors, setting out lawn chairs and blankets, in preparation of the festivities. Kids ran from yard to yard, chasing each other with sparklers and trying to catch fireflies as we pulled out a few beers from a cooler and passed around a bag of pretzels.

As the sky grew darker, the first firework exploded in the evening air to the standard chorus of ‘oohs’ and a smattering of applause. Within minutes, however, a band of smoke had formed in the sky. You could see the flare shoot up, hear the boom, but could only witness the bottom portion of the resulting firework…leaving your imagination to fill in what the obscured top half looked like.

It was a humid night and I sat there wondering if this had something to do with the smog-like band that had settled directly over where the firework display was taking place. Nearby, I heard a young kid sum up this meteorological oddity, however, by saying, “Mom, this stinks! Fireworks look way cooler on computer games than they do out here!”

And as I sat watching the remainder of the show…the bottom portion of all the fireworks...I had to admit that the kid had a point.

Reality would be much better if it was created by computer programmers.

a darker shade of pasty white

2008-07-02T07:47:00.000-05:00

I've given up on any self-improvement activities that require actual exercise. So in an effort to achieve self-improvement with the least amount of work possible, I've decided to finally jump on the band wagon and try the tanning bed solution. Besides, I figured, darker colors are supposed to be slimming. So, even if I'm unable to get thinner in a 'real' sense, I could tan and appear thinner in a 'fake' sense. All in all, it seemed like a fool-proof plan...not considering the increased potential for skin cancer, that is.

With towel in hand, I headed out to a nearby tanning salon. I signed up for a 'summer six-pack special' of tanning bed time, feeling that a half-dozen 20 minute sessions would be more than enough to give me a tan dark enough to produce the slimming effects that I was looking for. And once my credit card was swiped, I headed toward an open room.

I closed the door, adjusted the fan, and found a radio station that I felt would be optimal toward my tan achievement. I undressed, briefly considering a full-body, commando style tan session, but decided to keep my skivvies in place. I wasn't sure what rays were going to be shot out toward me once inside the tanning bed, but felt that certain private areas would best be kept shielded from them...not that a thin layer of cotton would provide much protection, but it was better than nothing, I figured.

I carefully wiped down the tanning bed, set the timer, and settled in, ready to bake and emerge a nice shade of toasty brown. But as I lay there, I realized that I had completely forgotten to get those little plastic glasses that true tan-bedders wear. Would my eyes be safe, I wondered? Would they sizzle inside my head like little eggs in boiling water, leaving me with hard boiled eyeballs? Or would I gain some type of superhuman x-ray vision? Or was I perhaps being a bit over-dramatic? Was a 20 minute, one time tanning bed session enough to ruin my retinas? I doubted that it would, but made a mental note to buy some proper tanning eyewear before returning for the second session.

I settled back in but began to wonder if I had wiped off the tanning bed properly. I mean, potentially hundreds of people lay in this thing every week...many of which probably lay here naked. In the same bed that I was currently laying in. Here I was, laying in a tanning booth that many naked people had lain before me, and the only protection I had was a thin spray from a bottle found atop the paper towel dispenser. How much liquid was needed to properly kill all of these naked people germs that had been left behind, I wondered? And could I really trust that the stuff the tanning salon owners put into the bottle was adequate enough to kill all these naked person germs? Maybe they watered the stuff down to save on their tanning bed cleaner costs.

This thought worried me, and soon after I could feel all the millions of tiny bacteria from countless naked people crawling all over me...as if they had all been laying in wait for me to come in and begin construction on hundreds of little bacteria suburbs all over my body. My skin was crawling as I imagined them driving in their little bacteria cars to and from their little bacteria shopping malls. It was all simply too much to bear, so I jumped up from the tanning bed. The session had lasted all of 45 seconds.

I quickly toweled off all the bacteria, sending their economic boom into a sudden depression in the process, and glanced in the mirror to see if any results were visible from my first tanning bed experience. I still looked pretty pale, but with the proper amount of squinting I looked a slightly darker shade of pasty white. Not nearly enough, however, to produce a slimming effect.

And with tans now being out of the question, I now plan on purchasing several black T-shirts.

successful shoes

2008-06-17T10:02:00.001-05:00

I often find myself taking internet quizzes in my free time because they can provide valuable insights to one's personality. For example, I now know which Scooby-Doo character I am, what breakfast cereal I would be, and which Disney princess I am most compatible with.

The other day, I found myself taking a quiz entitled Are You Successful? It was explained that, by answering a few simple questions, you would be rated as to how closely your answers matched the responses given by successful people. And while I'm not currently successful, I felt that if I possessed these same traits then, surely, success may still find its way to me at some point in the future. Then I'd be able to include myself in the elite of success-dom. The upper class of success.

I breezed straight through the questions, after which I was told that I only scored a 10%. This put my 'success attribute quotient' squarely between that of a used styrofoam cup and a mollusk. This was disheartening since, according to the internet, I had virtually no chance of ever becoming successful. Still, I thought, the internet has been wrong before. That British lottery I supposedly won? Well, I'm still waiting for the check.

I stumbled upon an on-line article the other day called What Your Shoes Say About Success! This, I thought, was a chance at redemption. An opportunity to convince myself...and the internet...that I possess traits which will lead to a successful future. I wear shoes. I have shoes for both business and personal situations. What more could a successful person ask in a pair of shoes?

'Successful people', the article detailed, 'tend to buy three or four new pairs of shoes each year.' I looked over toward my front door where I had deposited my tennis shoes upon entering the apartment. These shoes, I realized, had been bought in 2002. That's six years of wearing the same sneakers. These shoes have seen the whole Britney cycle; from sexy Britney, to mommy Britney, to bald and crazy Britney. These shoes have seen the breakups of Brad and Jen and then Jen and Vince. So, unlike successful people who buy three or four pairs a year, I tend to buy one every decade or so.

Sadly, I had to admit that perhaps the internet knew what it was talking about. Simply, I'm not destined to be included in the upper class of success. Which means that I'm now looking for inclusion in the upper-middle class tier.

Now if I could only find an internet quiz for this.

insect evictions

2008-06-08T07:33:00.002-05:00

I took care of my wasp problem yesterday. For weeks now, I've noticed little hives on the underside of my balcony's overhang. Not one large hive, but several little ones...as if the wasps that inhabit them value their privacy. A thriving colony of studio apartments. And each time I had noticed them in the past, I thought, 'I really should take care of this wasp problem'. But after a few minutes, this thought would be forgotten and the wasp problem continued.

Yesterday evening, though, having walked out onto the balcony and re-remembering the growing wasp population, I decided to tackle it before forgetting it once again. Now, I'm not certain how professional wasp technicians get rid of wasps, but I grabbed a broom and began poking at the hives. I had waited until evening in the hopes of catching the wasps asleep. Once realizing that they were being evicted, I was counting on the fact that they would be groggy, giving me enough time to get back inside my apartment before they had the chance to mobilize a task force and unleash some primal, wasp variety of vengeance upon me.

But the tiny hives were all empty. Perhaps they were all out for the evening, a thought which depressed me since I was alone on a Saturday night relieving my balcony of wasp nests while the wasps were out on the town. Since when should wasps have more fun than humans? It simply didn't seem fair that these wasps would have a more active social life than I did. As I walked back into my apartment, I consoled myself with the fact that when these wasps came home for the evening, they would find themselves homeless while I would still have a home. One that I could return to...if only I ever had a reason to leave it.

in memoriam

2008-05-30T07:25:00.003-05:00

I was invited to a Memorial Day picnic. And, being one to rarely turn down an invitation to eat, I decided to attend. Knowing my talent in the culinary arts, I decided bring some store-bought potato salad instead of trying to create my own. Trust me...the other picnicking guests would be better off.

I brought the potato salad home and dumped it into a bowl, grabbing a wooden spoon for scooping, before heading off to the picnic. Granted, I could have left the food in its original container, but I like to give the illusion of competency in kitchen matters. This, despite the fact that there are no cooking skills entwined within my genes.

I returned home that evening with my empty bowl and spoon in hand. The store bought potato salad having proved edible enough for total consumption...which is more than could be said for anything that I would have made.

I found an empty spot in my dishwasher along side several days worth of dirty plates, turned the machine on, and went to take a shower.

Once squeaky clean and toweled off, I noticed an overpowering scent of burning wood. It's late May, so I couldn't imagine that someone in the apartment complex was using their fireplace...a fireplace that costs $100 more a month, which is why I reside in a non-fireplaced apartment.
I wrapped the towel around my waist and began investigating in earnest.

Soon, since I only have three rooms to examine, I found that the odor was emanating from the kitchen. The oven was off. Nothing was in the toaster. The microwave was empty. I opened the dish washer and a wave of smoke infused steam rose up around me. Odd, I thought, that my dishwasher smelled smoky...not smoking, exactly, just smoky.

I peered inside and saw that my one, lone, wooden spoon had somehow fallen off the rack and was now wedged underneath a thin circular piece of metal at the bottom of the appliance. The same spoon that, hours before, had been sitting in a bowl of potato salad.

Possessing very little mechanical knowledge and knowing nothing, in specific, of dish washers, I reached down to retrieve the spoon. I grabbed the spoon, inadvertently touching the metal pipe thing, and burned my finger. Having never realized that anything that hot could be found inside a dish washer, I was quite surprised. 'Wouldn't the water cascading around the dishes cool any hot metal? Apparently not,' I thought, as I held my finger under a cold stream of water from the faucet.

Once my finger was tended to, I returned to the spoon. Without the searing pain to avert my attention, I noticed that the spoon was smoldering, the wood of the handle that was lodged under the circular metal being blackened and completely seared.

Careful to keep all appendages away from the metal, I got the spoon out and ran it under the same cool stream that served my finger so well only moments before. Once satisfied that there were no glowing embers left, I tossed the charred spoon into the trashcan. 'My dear spoon,' I thought, 'you have served your picnic well.'

bless you

2008-05-22T19:58:00.003-05:00

I met my friends Gwen and Bill for dinner the other day. Bill's father is also a Bill, which makes him Bill II. And this is exactly how he signs his name. We always found this to be quite amusing, and for a while took to calling him Bill: The Sequel. Bill, however, never fully appreciated our wit. So we have since ceased calling him this...to his face. Behind his back, he's still Bill: The Sequel, or simply Seeq for short.

I've never understood the need for some men to give their first born male the same name as themselves. Women don't seem to have this obsession. Gwen is simply 'Gwen the first' with no history of Gwens preceding her. Despite this, however, we're both anxiously awaiting for Bill to someday get married and have a baby boy, thus completing the Trilogy of Bills.

We were midway through our meal when Gwen happened to sneeze. Which isn't necessarily a noteworthy event, except that Gwen is a marathon sneezer. Single sneezes don't suffice. Rather Gwen can shoot off round after round of sneezes with nary a pause.

She claims to have once fired off 13 consecutive sneezes...a personal best for her. On this night, she missed that mark by about three. And after the last sneeze commenced, Bill and I said a collective 'bless you'.

She stared at us, mouth agape, and incredulously asked, “Only one? I sneezed, like, 10 times and for that I get only one 'bless you'?”

I've known Gwen longer than Bill and am more familiar with her courtesy quirks. This being said, the correct response is always, “Gwen, I'm incredibly sorry for being such a thoughtless cad.”

Bill, however, chose to say, “What are you talking about? We said 'bless you' once you were finished. Did you expect us to give each individual sneeze its own bless you?”

At this point, I opted to keep my mouth shut. Bill opened the can of worms and he could very well try closing it himself. I may not agree with Gwen's sneeze etiquette, but I know when to keep my mouth shut and blend into the decorum.

“Of course,” she told him. “That's how bless yous work...one per sneeze.”

“That's ridiculous,” he continued. “You get one bless you per string of sneezes...that's it. It's like applause at a graduation. You're always asked to hold off on clapping until the final name is called. That's the way it works and that's the way it's always worked!”

I took a bite of my burger, planning on sitting back and enjoying the sneezing debate from a spectator's standpoint when I started to choke.

Gwen and Bill continued to argue as I coughed and hacked, oblivious to my lack of oxygen.

Eventually, the coughing ceased but the raging sneeze debate continued. My near death experience went completely unnoticed while more important things...saying 'bless you' after each sneeze...took precedence.

Gwen was clearly a sneeze sympathizer who blatantly discriminated against us oxygen deprived chokers.

Due to this, I'm planning on chewing more carefully in her presence. I simply can't trust that my life will be safe in her hands if future food gets stuck in my throat.

Plus, I'll be docking her five 'bless yous'.

thinking ahead

2008-05-08T12:49:00.001-05:00

Another birthday, and this year I'm entering the grisly underbelly years of my 30's. Gone are the days when I could appease myself with the knowledge that I was closer to my twenties than I was to my forties. It's rather depressing.

And I realize that my mid-life crisis years aren't too far off. But rather than wait for them, I've decided that I'm going to get them over with now. Once done with, I can sail off into my retirement years in blissful peace.

So the question I now have is what form my proactive mid-life crisis will take.

Those late teenage years seem to be where most mid-lifers revert to when going through their various crises. And flashy convertibles seem to be one common solution.

The problem with focusing on a sports cars, however, is that they require a good deal of money...money that I don't have. And even if I hold off on my mid-life crisis for a few years, I'm still not going to have the money. Unfortunately, this teenage fantasy is out.

Affairs seem to be another popular mid-life crisis indulgence. And, being single, I would greatly welcome an affair. But it's tough to have an affair when there's no relationship to be affairing on. I suppose I could lie and simply tell prospective affairers that I'm married, but what type of illicit romance would it be when it was based on a bunch of lies? Lying to your spouse is one thing. But lying about having a spouse that you're lying to simply doesn't make for a solid relationship on which to base an affair.

I ran through a list of other things that teenagers do to solve the crisis I was having about having a mid-life crisis; alienating parents, sulking and brooding, writing angst ridden poetry. Sadly, none of these are going to bring about a pleasurable mid-life crisis for me. I realized that I was going to have to go back even farther.

Which is why I plan on spending my mid-life crisis watching Saturday morning cartoons and eating a whole lot of candy.

a laugh track life

2008-04-30T22:35:00.000-05:00

I've decided that my life would be much better if it had a laugh track.

Much like a sitcom on television, I need audience participation to truly enhance my life. Which isn't to say that I want anyone actually watching me, though. Because unlike those TV shows that are taped in front of a live studio audience, I want to live in front of a taped studio audience.
I don't think that nearly enough people appreciate how funny I am, and a laugh track would help. This way, even if the people I'm around didn't get the joke, the laugh track would let them know that it was, in fact, incredibly funny. A laugh track would make my life perfect.

Of course, other audience sound effects would improve things too. Like when I come home at the end of the day. By simply adding a sound effect of people cheering...just like when Kramer walks through Jerry's door in Seinfeld, or when Norm enters the bar in Cheers...I'd feel much more welcome when walking into my empty apartment. And an 'oooohing' and 'aaaahhhing' of the audience whenever I'm on a date and about to go in for that first kiss would really help me out in the romance department. Yes, with these two small improvements, my life would be perfect.

Though, naturally, a catchy theme song would be nice too. Instead of plain, old me walking into a room, a theme song would really accentuate my presence and keep people remembering me long after I'm gone. How could someone possibly forget me if there was always an addictive little tune stuck in their heads? Yes, an audience laugh track and theme song are really the only things I need in order for life to be perfect.

But, then again, with all these improvements, my life might actually get syndicated. And I could really use the extra money. So a laugh track, theme song, and syndication money, are all I'd need for life to be absolutely perfect.

Of course, I could also use a corporate sponsor and maybe a hair stylist and a personal assistant, and...

letters of the alphabet that don't belong in a civilized world

2008-04-22T11:27:00.009-05:00

I was at the supermarket the other day waiting in the checkout line to purchase my weekly supply of microwavable foodstuffs…which is what passes for ‘cooking’ in my kitchen…when a guy with full cart and three kids got in place behind me.

The kids, all under the age of six, were in various states of what I could only guess was an extreme sugar rush. The youngest who was sitting in the cart’s child seat, was twisted around reaching for an open package of Oreos that was sitting just out of reach on top of the mountain of food in the cart.

Another was hanging from the man’s arm, singing, over and over again at the top of her lungs, the chorus from some Fergie song. And the oldest daughter kept pulling the Oreo cookies out of reach from her younger sister in the cart, telling her that they would ‘ruin your dinner’.

The man looked frazzled, and I was glad no bridge was anywhere in the vicinity…for he surely would jumped without hesitation.

I turned to him and, in the spirit of understanding and empathy, said, “I imagine you have quite a few bottles of aspirin at home.”

He wearily looked at me and said, “eff you.”

‘Eff you?’ I thought.

‘Eff me?’

I was speechless…and besides, it was my turn to proceed up to the cashier. But what would the correct response have been other than paying for your groceries and leaving?

The whole thing bothered me, so as I pulled out of the parking lot, I called my friend Gwen.

After relating the story, she asked, “he just looked at you and said ‘eff you’ - as in f*** you?”

“I can't imagine what other 'F' word he would have been referring to,” I told her.

“That’s strange…the guy is probably deranged or something. And to say this around his kids? You did the right thing by just leaving.”

‘Yes,’ I thought. I did do the right thing. I’m the bigger man here.

But it still bothered me. And an hour later I called Gwen again.

“Should a deranged guy like this really be caring for children?” I asked her. “I mean, to say ‘eff you’ to a stranger at a grocery store really displays some antisocial tendencies, doesn’t it? Isn’t there some type of law against this sort of thing?”

Gwen sighed and said, “Look…you’re obsessing too much about this. Truthfully, you shouldn’t have said anything at all to him. Just forget about it, alright? It’s over. It’s done. Move on.”

‘Easy for her to say,’ I thought. She wasn’t told to ‘eff you’ while innocently waiting to pay for her groceries at the supermarket. What was happening to society when complete strangers were telling each other to ‘eff you’? The complete fabric of society dictated that people didn’t just randomly go around saying ‘eff you’ to other people. The world was clearly going to hell in a handbasket.

I called Gwen later that day to lament about the state of the world that we were living in.

“WILL YOU JUST SHUT UP ABOUT THIS ALREADY,” she told me. “You should have just minded your own business. Bottles of aspirin? It wasn’t even that funny. GET OVER IT!”

She clearly didn’t understand the male-bonding properties that exist in a simple bottle of aspirin. And what did she mean by ‘not funny’? The aspirin bottle remark was very funny, I thought. Is it my fault that my wry, observational humor was over her head?

I mulled over the incident all evening. Alright, so maybe the bottles of aspirin comment wasn’t that funny, but it’s not like I had a whole lot of time to come up with something better. Still, being told to ‘eff you’ seemed very harsh. I was merely sympathizing with the guy. Shouldn’t my compassion have been a welcomed relief?

Later, as I lay awake in bed, I was still thinking about the whole ordeal. ‘I imagine you have quite a few bottles of aspirin,’ I had said…to which he responded, ‘eff you’.

And then, in the slow-motion instant replay that was being broadcast in my brain, I noticed something that I had missed before. Wait a minute, I thought, rewinding and replaying the incident frame by frame in my mind. It wasn’t ‘eff you’ that he said, but ‘a few’.

Did he have bottles of aspirin at home? Of course he did…a few. He wasn’t some antisocial psychopath after all.

I sat up in bed and immediately called Gwen to let her know that all was right in the world.

She groggily answered the phone and I told her what I had just discovered.

“You see? There was nothing for me to worry about. I just misunderstood what the guy had said. Hey, I didn’t wake you up, did I?”

She was quiet for a moment, as if pondering my revelation. Then, in a small and groggy voice, I heard her response from the other end of the line.

"Eff you."

Paradise

2008-04-15T23:13:00.001-05:00

Like any city, mine contains seemingly tranquil areas such as Sunshine Village, Holiday Park, and Canterbury Woods. Perfect places in which to put down roots. Housing developments that promise years of unbridled joy and tranquility.

Though when driving through these communities, you quickly realize that life in Holiday Park is really no holiday. And there is no more sunshine in Sunshine Village than there is anywhere else in the city. As for Canterbury Forest, I question whether a mere twenty trees that line the street can truly constitute a ‘forest’.

Of all the wondrous sounding community names, though, the most flagrant offender of false advertising has to be Paradise Estates. Located on the outskirts of the city, Paradise Estates houses identical rows of box-like, split level homes.

Granted, when I think of ‘paradise’ split level subdivisions aren’t the first thing that pop into my mind…but who am I to define what constitutes paradise? Perhaps in years past people had a more relaxed definition of the term, grading paradise on a curve. So that instead of sunsets over the bay and the sound of the waves crashing upon the beach, identical plots of miniature lawns passed for ‘paradise’.

Far be it from me to tell anybody that their version of paradise is suckier than mine. However, fast forwarding years into the future, Paradise Estates has fallen victim to neglect. Paradise is actually quite an overstatement at this point in time. Low-Expectation Estates would be a much more accurate term…though, I’m quite certain, most Realtors would disagree.

So Paradise remains where it has always been, bookended by the Dairy Queen on Route 286 and the vacant lot that used to be home to a K-Mart store.

The once finely manicured lawns are now overgrown with weeds. The squat split-level houses are still squat and split, but now sit with peeling paint, missing shutters, and sagging roofs.

And one can’t help but feel that life in paradise just isn’t what it used to be.

technologically inefficient

2008-03-22T08:09:00.003-05:00

In an attempt to make his business more efficient, my boss has obtained Blackberrys for his sales staff...both of us.

I am now able to receive the multitude of pointless emails and directives he sends out at lightning-quick speed at all hours of the day. After work. In the middle of the night. And on weekends.

He sends these with such frequency that I can barely delete them all before another one appears in my inbox. The task is proving to be overwhelming.

Worse is the fact that now, with two cell phones, I find that available body space for storing both my personal and work phone is becoming sparse. True, the Blackberry came with a belt buckle holder, but on principle alone I refuse to wear any phone on my belt.

I have always found this to be incredibly pretentious. No one, in my opinion, is important enough that they need a phone attached to them so that they can be reached at a moments notice. Granted, a few select life-and-death doctors dealing with rare diseases that can kill in mere minutes are an exception...but no one is going to experience a dire sales related situation that will need my immediate attention.

So the Blackberry has been banished to one of my pockets. Though, now that I'm wearing two phones, I often find that buzzing and ringing will suddenly emanate from somewhere on my body, leaving me to feel like a walking call center.

And while the new Blackberry hasn't made my job more efficient, it does have its perks. Because now I can surf the internet from anywhere I want. And when bored with that, a game of Tetris is always right at my fingertips.

This is exactly what I was doing the other day. I had finished a sales call early and, postponing going back into the office, was drinking coffee and playing Tetris at Starbucks. As I was about to clear a row, my boss called.

I paused my game and answered the phone.

“Where are you at?!” he said by way of greeting.

“Just taking care of business,” I told him.

what hell probably feels like

2008-02-29T10:35:00.001-05:00

Three.

This is the number of sick/personal days that my boss Vince allows each employee to have for the entire year. Which means, you can get sick once every four months....thus they must be allotted very carefully.

So when I woke up this morning with a sore throat, headache, stuffed nose, and a body that ached everywhere with the exception of my teeth, I considered using one of these golden sick days.

But my sick day philosophy discourages me from using sick days when I'm sick. I'd much rather use them when I'm healthy because then I can actually enjoy them. If I'm going to stay home and be miserable, I figure that I may as well go into work.

Besides, I thought, surely after a hot shower I'll be feeling better.

But I didn't. After the shower, as I wiped a hole of condensation off the mirror, I looked into the reflection of my pale, red-rimmed eyes, and realized that I still felt lousy.

Maybe once I get on the road and get some coffee in me I'll feel better, I thought.

But I didn't. As I sat in traffic, unable to breathe through my nose and suffering from frequent coughing fits that drowned out my radio, I realized that I still felt absolutely terrible.

I got to work and, with the understanding that I wasn't going to be feeling better anytime soon, sat down and tried to work.

But worked proved to be hard...especially considering that my head felt like that bulb at the bottom of a thermometer on a frigid day when all the mercury settles into it. I may very well be near death, I thought. But having dragged myself this far, I refused to give in.

Work came in intermittent spurts. A little bit was done in between bouts of sneezing. A little more was done in between bouts of coughing. And a little bit more was done even though my cement laden head, burning eyes, and sandpaper coated throat were all threatening to turn against me. But I prevailed for what seemed like hours in this condition.

I glanced at the clock through teary eyes to see how much longer I had until lunch.

It was only 8:15.

the lint in my life

2008-02-22T08:45:00.003-05:00

I've always hated doing laundry. I hate washing clothes. I hate drying clothes. I hate ironing clothes. And if it were considered socially acceptable, I would never wash another garment and walk around in filthy, stinking attire for the rest of my clothes wearing days.

Unfortunately, I tend to enjoy human contact. Thus, I force myself to launder.

As a kid, the whole laundry process seemed quite fun...especially the drying portion. My mother would let me throw the sheet of fabric softener into the dryer which, at the time, I considered to be the most important aspect of the whole thing. And then she'd put me in charge of the Removal of the Lint...the thing that made laundry so intriguing.

I'd pull out the lint tray and carefully peel away that fuzzy concoction contained therein. And, unlike belly button lint or toe jam lint, the drying machine lint was perfectly clean...having just gone through the wash.

I'd marvel at the fluffy white mass in my hands, much like a miniature cumulus cloud which, depending on the amount of dark clothes that had been in the wash, had varying shades of gray...as if threatening rain was on the way.

Of course, I was only a kid and my attention span was limited. So the appeal of lint only lasted for a few seconds before I became bored with it, crumbled it into a ball, and tossed it into the trash. But for those few seconds, lint was possibly the coolest thing in the world.

And even now, removing lint is the highlight of my clothes washing chore...the only redeeming quality about the whole process.

Lately, though, I've been quite disappointed, because rather than the fluffy white/gray lint that I remember from my youth, the lint I get from my clothes nowadays is neither fluffy nor white. Rather, its quite flat and has a purple tint to it. Which is all the more confusing because I don't own any red or purple clothing.

Granted, I have one maroon bath towel, but this towel doesn't go through every wash cycle...and could one single towel taint the total lint production? I simply can't imagine that this one towel is solely to blame. So why is my lint lacking?

But each time I peel the lint off my lint tray, I'm left looking at a flat, purpley looking mess. It's not billowous or cottony at all...which I always thought was the natural state of lint.

I've always hated doing laundry. And now it's become even more unbearable, because even the lint isn't as exciting as it used to be.

the music is making me fat

2008-02-15T17:57:00.020-05:00

I decided that this 'healthy living' thing was long overdue. Lately, it seems that my gelatinous body complains about even the smallest amount of physical activity.

Some time on the tread mill, I reasoned, would reduce the huffing and puffing that occurs when I simply walk from the kitchen to the couch. Besides, my rent includes access to a gym...so it wasn't like this desire to improve my health would cost me anything. Because if there's one thing I'm frugal about, it's spending money to improve my health. Money should be spent on more important things like wide-screen televisions and ipods.

Having been so long absent from any type of exercise institution, I wasn't sure what the current fashion trends were, so I grabbed what I hoped would pass for appropriate gym attire...a ratty old t-shirt and shorts...and headed off.

I entered the gym and wandered over to the treadmills, ready to get myself into shape. I mentally pumped myself up on the car ride over, just in case my mind revolted and forced me to turn into the nearest fast food restaurant rather than submit itself to actual exercise.

I stepped onto the treadmill and started off at a slow jog, when the sound of the overhead speakers entered into my consciousness. The radio station that was being piped throughout the gym happened to be a local soft rock station...not one of my particular favorites, but nothing that I had any serious objections to...until I recognized what song was being played.

As I was jogging away, Celine Dion was singing the theme song to the film Titanic. And I quickly realized that a ballad professing endless love was not the best musical selection to encourage physical exertion. I felt like I was running in slow motion...my feet wanting to keep pace to the music rather than the pace of the belt moving swiftly beneath me. I fought through the pain however...which is what us true exercise enthusiasts do.

As Celine finished her song and another slow, saccharine dripping love song began, my brain began to win the 'stop jogging' argument.

'How can you possibly jog to all this soft rock?' it asked me...and I use the third person here because my brain was clearly acting of its own accord. 'It simply doesn't seem like real exercise when you're running with love songs playing in the background.'

My brain had a point, so I stopped jogging. To my benefit, though, I put in a whole .07 miles.

I decided to hit the weights instead. But when an Air Supply song started playing, I found that I just couldn't muster the strength to lift anything. Soft rock and pumping iron are diametrically opposed, I realized. Perhaps, had Einstein lived long enough, he would have come up with a mathematical equation to prove this...but even in the absence of hard evidence, I felt positive that this was one of those universal truths.

I gave up and left. My brain, having won the argument, forced me to turn into a McDonald's restaurant...to the victor goes the spoils.

Oddly enough, the same soft rock station that had been playing in the gym was also playing at McDonald's. And as I sat in front of my Big Mac and fries, I realized that while soft rock isn't conducive to exercise, it goes quite well with eating.

not even close

2008-02-12T19:56:00.000-05:00

Traffic was at a standstill this afternoon, and I was stuck in the middle of an endless sea of gleaming brake lights. Inwardly groaning, and flipping incessantly from radio station to radio station as if the dial could somehow magically accelerate the cars in front of me, I sadly had to conclude that I wouldn't be plopping myself down on the couch anytime in the near future.

I sat back in the driver's seat, frustrated but resigned to this fact...hoping that there would at least be a payoff several miles up the road. This isn't to say that I'm cold-hearted, however. I care just as much for humanity as the next person, and rarely do I take pleasure in other folk's misfortune...but when stuck in apocalyptic traffic such as this, I want to see that a spectacular wreck was the root cause of it all.

Not necessarily a death and dismemberment type of wreck...but a multiple vehicle, twisted metal one with lots of flashing police and ambulance lights suffices nicely. At least this way, all the waiting can be justified and a quick glance at mayhem that isn't mine, and, for me, this tends to be payment enough for having just been parked on the parkway for hours.

But when traffic is stopped for no apparent reason, this is when I become incensed and outraged...at the public transportation department, the original city planners (who felt that two lanes in each direction would suffice for years to come), and at the road itself (why the hell couldn't it aspire to be just a little bit wider!)

As I sat, I began to wonder when those Jetson-esque flying cars would finally be invented. I've never bought a new car right off the lot, but a Jetson car would surely be worth the price, I figured. With one of those babies, I could simply hover up above the ever-expanding row of traffic and glide myself home in mere minutes!

Of course, this theory only works if I'm the only one that actually owns a Jetson car. And the idea of inventing one crossed my mind, but the fact that I can barely make a grilled cheese sandwich let alone a hovering mass of glass and metal meant that my flying days were far in the future.

Still, the thought that I could escape the boredom of everyday life was intoxicating...to just leave the traffic far below and be free. Nothing would hold me back any longer. Wind whipping past me, I'd be able to leave gravity, bosses, deadlines, and worries behind. And for those few short minutes everything would seem possible...a better life just within my grasp.

But the cars surrounding me remained at a standstill and home was still miles away. And as I sat and stared out the window shield, I knew there was still a long way to go.

revived archives

2008-02-07T09:14:00.000-05:00

Entry: June 14, 1977 from my ficticious diaries

My mom's hair always looks really pretty and it smells good too and I know it's because she uses this goopy looking stuff that's in her bathroom. It comes in all these different colors like yellow and green and she told me that it's called 'gel'. It looks sorta like Jell-O that she makes for snacks sometimes, so I bet that this is what she means.

Grown-ups probably just don't add the 'O' at the end of the 'jell' cause its only how kids say it.

So I was sittin' and watchin' TV later on when our dog Snick comes walkin' into the room. He smelled real stinky and his fur looked kinda like someone tied it all in little knots or somethin'. I figured that he probably wanted to look nicer, and if Jell-O can make my mom's hair look pretty, I figured that it could probably do the same for Snick.

So I take him in the kitchen and open the fridge cause my mom had made some Jell-O and I take out a big scoop with my hand and started rubbing it into Snick's fur just like I seen my mom do in front of the bathroom mirror when she uses it in her hair.

I rubbed and rubbed but Snick's fur didn't look any better even though he did smell a little bit like cherries. I was tryin' to figure out what I was doin' wrong, since my mom's hair always looks so pretty but Snick's wasn't getting' any better, but she walked in and gave a sort of small scream.

She took the Jell-O away from me and asked what I thought I was doin', but she didn't give me a chance to answer and said never to put Jell-O in Snick's fur again and told me to go up to my bedroom. So I guess that Jell-O only works for people hair.

But there's got to be something for pets. So tomorrow I'm gonna try peanut butter instead.

unlucky in laptops

2008-01-13T08:49:00.000-05:00

“Have you heard about this one laptop per child thing?” my mom asked the other day.

“Isn't it something about donating money to get underprivileged kids a computer?”

“No...well maybe...but I think they want you to give them your old laptops,” she said. “It's terrible! Why would they be encouraging something like this?”

“I'm not even sure that they want anybody's old laptop...but even if they do, what's the harm in that?” I asked.

“I know all about these computers,” she explained. “These kids now a days, even if you erase your hard drive, they can go in and bring back everything! All your passwords and bank accounts...they could steal your whole identity! Not to mention all the porn that people download anymore. By giving them old laptops, all we're going to do is create a generation of identity thieves who will all be addicted to pornography!”

“Mom,” I tried to reason, “I'm sure that they would clean out the hard drives so nothing could be found. Why would you even be worried about this? You only use the computer to play solitaire.”

“I heard a report about it on 20/20. And besides, that's not true at all,” she responded. “I google and email all the time! I've gone digital!”

“You've gone digital?”

“Yes,” she said. “I used to do the New York Times crossword puzzle in the newspaper every morning, but now I do it on-line. I'm becoming very technologically savvy with all of these computer do-hickeys.”

My mom shifted gears and began relating a story about a distant cousin, but as I listened I couldn't help but feel sorry for the future kid that may one day inherit my mother's old computer. Because while all of his friends sit around stealing credit card numbers and watching pornography from the recovered hard drives of their donated laptops, the kid that got my mom's would be left trying to find a seven letter word for 'hapless'.

what would have been 300

2008-01-11T12:50:00.000-05:00

I hate it when people post about how many postings they've posted. It's a completely self indulgent activity. And can posting a post to say that you've posted another post actually count toward your total post count? I highly doubt that this would even be considered a legitimate post if a council of blog regulations existed.

Theoretically, had the internet been around when I was born, I could have posted something every day stating, 'this is my first post' and 'this is my 134th post' and by now have been up to over 9,000 posts. They'd all amount to nothing more than a bunch of worthless crap, but 9,000 is quite a big number.

And having just written something about the number of posts I've posted, I'm ashamed to even count this as a post at all. At best, it's maybe a tenth of a post...or perhaps a quarter post. But not a full-fledged post.

So here it is, my 299.25th post.

Though I'm not even sure what would constitute a record number of posts. Now in sports, numbers mean something. 700 home runs. 50 touchdown passes. 35 broken bones (Evel Knievel's record). Those are numbers you can pick up women with in a bar.

And really, why even bother counting if it can't somehow get you laid?

my punctuational crush

2008-01-10T22:05:00.000-05:00

I tend to use commas quite often when writing. And, after some reflection and soul searching, I have to admit that I think I might be in love.

Because of all the punctuation out there, none can compare to a comma. Periods signify an end and, for the most part, I don't care much for endings. Endings are always tinged with sadness. A period is sentence death, and even when you didn't particularly like the sentence you just read, death is still pretty much a bummer.

Sure you can reread the sentence, but it's never the same as that first time. You know what to expect. The excitement and thrill is gone. Sure, the familiarity is comforting, but it's been done before.

But with commas, you know that things aren't quite over yet. You and the sentence still have one more moment together. There's still time for you to be surprised or thrilled or intrigued. Things are going to go on...at least for a while. Which is also why I'm quite partial to the three periods in a row...a close cousin to the comma.

Of course, often you'll come to find that by prolonging the sentence your time was simply wasted. Nothing new was learned. It was a stupid sentence anyway, so why bother dragging it out? The relationship was over long before the comma.

But still, I love commas.

Exclamation points don't excite me. Too much emotional outpouring. It's tiring. And I find question marks to be rather whiny.

Colons signify that a list is coming, and I really don't care much for lists. And I just have never gotten the whole semicolon thing.

But with commas, there's still a chance for something to happen. I'm waiting for the day that some author realizes this and writes a whole book with nothing but commas. No periods. Just one long, never-ending whirlwind of a sentence. I would love that...unless the story sucked, that is. Then I'd probably be a little bit pissed.

But that's more the author's fault, so it's really not fair to blame the comma.

Basically, I, think, commas, are, great,

revived archives

2008-01-08T07:57:00.000-05:00

Entry: October 8, 1998 from my fictitious diary.

Woke up. Went to work. Came home from work.

Was hungry. Wanted an omelet. Went to the supermarket. Returned home.

Began cooking omelet.

Realized that I forgot to buy eggs. Went back out to the supermarket. Returned home again.

Made omelet.

Realized that I really didn't want an omelet. What I was really hungry for was a hamburger.

Threw the omelet away.

Went out to McDonald's and bought hamburger. Returned home again. Ate hamburger.

Realized that I hadn't wanted the hamburger. I had actually wanted an omelet all along. Briefly considered getting omelet out of trash and eating it. Knew that this was a dangerous path to a life of vagrancy and bumdom.

I left it in the garbage can.

So upset at having chosen the wrong dinner that I barely enjoyed this evening's episode of Friends.

a change to the left

2008-01-07T08:36:00.000-05:00

With the start of the new year, I felt the obligatory duty to make some type of attempt at change. I've long ago given up on the whole 'resolution' thing, determining that I simply don't have the resolve required for resolutions. But still, a plan, I reasoned, isn't really a resolution. It's simply a map toward a better life. And my life could clearly use some bettering.

So I began a mental checklist...lose weight, get in shape, pay off old debts, find true love. But after only a few items, I realized that everything listed would take a great deal of time and effort...the exact reason that I don't believe in resolutions in the first place. Things that require time and effort are difficult. And while I would surely welcome change, I'm not looking to increase my daily recommended dose of effort. So these items I changed from the 'change' category to the 'long term change' category, which basically means that they will again appear on next year's 'change' list.

I need something easy that will produce an automatic change, I thought to myself. And then, as if some higher power was listening, the answer came to me. Underpants!

My current underwear situation is stark. Most every pair I own is in the final stages of complete disintegration. Much like sawdust held tenuously together by one or two remaining threads. Now this, I felt, is a change that I could accomplish! And after a quick trip to my local underpants outlet, my new year was off to an excellent beginning.

Shortly after washing and wearing one of my new recruits, I started to question the whole notion of change.

Typically, I favor the boxer brief variety. Boxer shorts, I have found, don't provide the support that I ask for in a pair of underpants. Rather, it's like a bungee-jumping marathon is taking place in my shorts every time I start walking around. The boxer briefs tend to keep things nicely in their respective places without the geek-factor that's associated with the tighty-whiteys.

But as the day wore on in my new underpants, I noticed that things seemed to be off-center. More specifically, things felt quite left of center.

Things never felt off center in my old underpants, but these new ones clearly had a leftward point of view to them. And for the whole day, I remained off balance. The whole world had a different slant to it...a leftist slant. As I walked, I found myself leaning to the left. As I typed, I found that I was favoring the keys that my left hand could reach. Even my political views started leaning to the left.

True, I had accomplished a change...but this change just didn't feel right. It was simply too much of a change too quickly. I enjoyed my world view from the vantage point of my old underpants. Things had their place and actually stayed in their place in my previous underwear.

So, a week into the new year, I've foregone any notion of change. Maybe next year will be my year for improvement, but as for the rest of 2008, I'll be returning to the unchanged me.

At least until the final threads of my underwear snap.

a gift card says 'i'm single'

2007-12-27T10:16:00.000-05:00

As any single person understands, the holidays season can be a draining and depressing time of year. No mistletoe induced kisses. No cuddling up with someone next to a blazing fire. It's a cold, lonely time of year with only cups of hot chocolate to keep you warm.

But being a guy, I've found that my single-status pretty much excuses me from all holiday related responsibilities. I have married friends that, for several years running, have sent me the obligatory Christmas card. I have yet to send one in return...but I'm a guy. How can I be expected to keep an address book and accomplish a task that requires a great deal of organization such as this? It's simply impossible. Thus, year after year, my card giving friends overlook my lack of holiday mailings.

I've found that being a single guy also comes in handy during holiday parties. Because while others come armed with trays full of home-baked cookies, creamy dips, and tantalizing casseroles, I have never been expected to produce anything even nearing this caliber of cuisine. A bag of tortilla chips and my gourmet responsibilities are met.

And on those occasions that I forget to bring anything of an edible nature, people still tend to be quite understanding. 'He's single', they reason. 'Without a woman in his life, he's lucky that he even remembers to put a pair of pants on before he heads out the door!'

Granted, not everyone is equally impressed with my ability to put on pants. But those that shoot me sourly looks due to my foodless arrival nearly need a slight reminder that I'm at the party alone because I had nobody to invite. 'I'm single, for God's sake', the look on my face transmits. 'While you'll be spending your holiday with your lover, I'll be guzzling egg nog by myself. So don't complain that I didn't prepare any crab puffs for you to eat.'

Not that I could make a crab puff to save my life, but that's a piece of information my face doesn't give away.

And in the present department, gift cards are viewed as completely reasonable gifts for a single guy to give. How would I know what style of sweater is in this season? And I have no idea how to tell the difference between terrycloth and polyester...so I'm really not the person you want purchasing a set of bath towels for you.

Besides, even if I could find the perfect gift for one of my friends, how would I be expected to wrap it? I have just as much luck with Saran Wrap as I do wrapping paper, and the results are often quite similar. Instead of a nice looking package topped with a bow, I end up with a massive wad of red and green paper that has loose ends of tape sticking up in odd places.

This all adds up to a relatively stress free season. No casseroles or cookies to bake for office parties. No cards that need to be addressed and sent. And a quick trip to Starbucks for a few gift cards and my shopping is complete. I'm a single guy, thus I'm forgiven of these infractions.

So I'm lonely, but free of social niceties. Though I still think that baking a casserole every now and then would be worth finding someone to share it with.

parting gifts

2007-12-19T11:17:00.000-05:00

While most three year olds enjoy quality programming such as Sesame Street and the Teletubbies, my nephew has a deep fascination with game shows. Jeopardy holds his interest far more than Mister Rogers ever could. 'Where's the excitement in his neighborhood?' he must ask himself. Nobody is being told to 'Come on Down!' and certainly, no one in Mister Roger's neighborhood may leave the show with a brand new washer and dryer.

And while most toddlers would be traumatized by finding out that Santa doesn't exist, my nephew experienced much the same distress when Bob Barker left the Price is Right. He's still doesn't completely trust Drew Carey, but seems to be coming around.

So when I saw my nephew the other day and my sister told him, “Ask your Uncle how old he is,” I knew I was being set up for something. But, whatever she was planning, I figured that I'd go along with it...at the very least, I could always claim later that this was her Christmas present and return the slippers I had bought for her at Target and get my $9.99 back.

So I looked into the earnest face of my nephew and said, “I'm 35.”

His eyebrows arched and his eyes went wide. “You're not even a case on Deal or No Deal!” he exclaimed.

And in that moment, I realized that there's nothing like a three year old comparing you to cases on a game show to make you feel incredibly ancient.

“If it's any consolation,” my sister told me, “I'm not a case either. I got the same response the other day and thought I'd share it with you.”

“Gee, thanks a lot.”

“Look on the bright side,” she continued, “age is all relative to the game show you're watching. Sure, you're not a case on Deal or No Deal...but you know the big spinning wheel on The Price is Right? Well it goes up to a hundred, so in that respect you're actually quite young. And how about Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. You're a baby compared to that!”

Still, I couldn't help but feel that I'm no longer a Grand-Prize winner in the age game. No year's supply of Rice-A-Roni. Not even a home version of the game. Just a 'thanks for playing' and the knowledge that I need to start watching game shows with numbers much higher than my age.

All in all, I feel that this is a crappy parting gift.

biohazardous bathrooms

2007-11-30T12:05:00.001-05:00

While I don’t consider myself to be a slob, I’ve never thought of myself as a particularly neat person either. When the sun shines at a precise angle through my apartment window, you can clearly see that there’s a fine layer of dust covering my bookshelves and television stand. My bed sometimes goes several days without being made. And often, dishes sit much longer than they should in the sink.

And while my apartment may not be ‘clean’, I consider it to be ‘clean-ready’. Namely, with a good ten minutes notice before company arrives I can give my apartment the illusion of clean. A quick swipe across the bookshelves, dishes moved from the sink to the dishwasher, and a quick straightening of the bed covers, and my apartment is nearly indistinguishable from an apartment that is kept in perpetual cleanliness.

It began to dawn on me, however, as I stood in the bathroom of my friend Randy's place, that perhaps my apartment wasn’t as nearly unclean as I thought. Beer consumption had prompted the trip into the bathroom and, once finished, I rolled up my sleeves to wash my hands. From my vantage point at the sink I noticed several little hairs littering the basin and a ring of shave scum with a large glob of toothpaste sitting inside.

In the mirror above the sink, I could see the reflection of the bathtub, the inside of which possessed a collection of greenish-gray mold…a color only achieved by the most ambitious of mold, and only after months of hard work.

An even greater assortment of dust and hairs, decorated the bathroom floor, reminding me of tumbleweeds, albeit these were hairy, dust-filled tumbleweeds.

I looked back into the streaked mirror above the sink and felt like a test subject inside a large Petri dish...much like all those caged animals awaiting their fate must feel like right before being injected and sprayed with different perfumes by the large cosmetic and pharmaceutical companies. I realized that I needed out of the bathroom as fast as possible.

I gritted my teeth and washed my hands, careful not to touch any porcelain in the process. I reached for a towel but stopped short when I realized that the towel hanging from the rack contained quite a few dried, pasty looking globs of an unidentifiable nature.

And as I stood there, hands dripping onto the bathroom floor, I found it odd that having just washed and cleaned, I could feel so incredibly dirty.

the disappearing sales trick

2007-11-20T22:20:00.001-05:00

A paperless office we are not.

Invoices, quotations, and other documents must all be copied in triplicate and stored in one of the many file cabinets that line the office walls. To keep with our paperful system, digitally shared calendars that can be accessed by the whole office are frowned upon. Rather, we are required to keep desk calendars. These huge butcher paper-esque sheets sit on our desk and all daily activities must be handwritten into the individual squares. I’ve often been reprimanded because while on the phone I have the tendency to doodle all over my desk calendar.

“How am I supposed to see what your week looks like when you have these ridiculous scribbles all over your desk calendar?!” my boss Vince has fumed at me on more than one occasion.

So when Lenny, our Sales Manager, scheduled a sales call last week, he diligently wrote the date on his desk calendar and stuck a Post-It Note on the cork board that sits above his desk as a reminder; Wednesday, November 19 at 10:00 am.

This was an extremely important sales call for Lenny…namely because he hasn’t sold anything for the past two months. Clearly my boss doesn’t promote based on merit.

“They’re looking to buy three or four Roland machines- which run about $50,000 each,” he said, puffing out his chest. “Vince is coming with me…and with both of us being All-Star salesmen, this is going to be a slam-dunk sale. Just like taking candy from a baby!” Lenny’s not only delusionally arrogant, but speaks in clichés as well.

He and Vince spent the first two hours on Monday morning strategizing for the meeting later in the week. Office strategy meetings typically consist of back slapping, role playing, and more back slapping.

The receptionist interrupted their meeting at 10:05. “Lenny,” she said, “I’ve got the people you’re supposed to be meeting with on Wednesday on the phone. They said that the meeting is for today and are upset that you’re not there yet.”

“That’s crazy,” Lenny told her. “The meeting is for Wednesday the 19th…I wrote it down on my calendar and everything.”

“Well that may be the problem,” she answered. “Today is the 19th. Wednesday is the 21st.”

The realization slowly sunk in and Lenny’s face went pale. He and Vince went into panic mode, dashing around the office and grabbing samples and product literature at random as they flew out the door.

40 minutes later they were back. The office manager was at the Xerox machine coping invoices for the month and I overheard her ask Vince how the meeting went.

“We ended up walking in 30 minutes late,” he grumbled. “We only had five minutes to give our pitch.”

“Did you and Lenny try to reschedule?”

“Yes, but they told us that this was the only free day that they had until January. But I’m sure that Lenny will work the old ‘Lenny Magic’ and close the deal.”

And as I sat at my desk, I wondered if he meant the same old ‘Lenny Magic’ that has resulted in zero sales for the past two months or if Lenny has learned some new magic that he has yet to demonstrate.

obsessively observing

2007-11-11T09:05:00.000-05:00

I had been surfing the internet a few weeks ago and ran across an article about the non-verbal communication of dating. Apparently, there’s quite a bit of body language that I’ve been missing. And with very little results in the dating department lately, I figured that a more scientific approach was just what I needed.

I’ve always been pretty observant, I reasoned. I’m pretty good at spotting toupees and, as a kid, I was always finding nickels and dimes on the sidewalk. Now I would just have to use my powers to improve my dating situation. I studied up, committing to memory all those little subconscious behaviors that we send out when we’re interested in somebody.

I was well prepared. And when I found out that a friend of a friend had a friend that wanted to meet somebody, I agreed to a blind date.

Before we had even sat down to order dinner, I was already on the lookout. One tell-tale sign, I had learned, was to notice what direction your date’s feet were pointed in…a slightly pigeon-toed position indicated that they were interested. Why this would be, I had no idea, but who was I to question the experts?

I discretely dropped my napkin several times to get a better look at my date’s feet. No pigeon-toes. Though, at one point in the evening, her right foot was slightly turned in toward her left. Did this indicate a slight attraction, I wondered? Perhaps the left side of her brain was in argument with the right over whether or not she was interested in me. By studying her feet, however, I learned nothing…though, considering the number of times I dropped my napkin on the floor, I probably looked incredibly clumsy.

More observation was needed, and I had also read that, when interested, your date will unconsciously touch and play with her hair. So when the foot thing turned up empty, my attention turned toward her head…but she didn’t make any hair touching movements at all. Though, there was a point before our appetizers came when she did begin stroking her hair…but I think that this was more because I had accidentally squirted some lemon juice on her. That’s the danger of ordering iced tea on a date, I suppose.

The article had also mentioned that when your date finds you attractive they blink more often. But how do you tell if someone you never met is blinking more than they normally do? She didn’t seem to be engaging in any excessive blinking, and I had no blink baseline to compare it with. By the end of the evening, I sadly had to admit that all of my observing revealed nothing.

We made our way out of the restaurant and, standing in the parking lot next to her blue Taurus, I figured it was time for a more direct approach. “I had a really nice time,” I told her, “and was wondering if you’d like to go out again sometime?”

“Sure,” she replied. “Give me a call this week.”

“I’ll talk to you soon,” I said. “Have a safe trip home, Lori.”

As I was driving home, I began dissecting the date…looking for all those little non-verbal behaviors that perhaps I had missed during the night. Did she touch my arm while she was speaking to me? How good was the eye contact? Did she spend more time smiling or more time with her arms folded across her chest?

And, as I sat at a red light, I realized that I had been so focused on trying to notice all these little signs, that I had let the more obvious things completely slip my mind.

Her name wasn’t Lori. It was Gina.

my fourth last chance

2007-10-04T21:20:00.001-05:00

I was called into a meeting with my boss at the end of the day. Before my rear had even touched the seat of the threadbare chair that sits opposite his desk, he had launched into a full fledged tirade.

“You haven’t had a sale all month! I don’t know how you expect to keep your job around here if you don’t start pulling your weight!”

“Vince,” I tried to reason, knowing full well that logic was foreign concept to him, “since you put this new ‘support plan’ into effect, my primary responsibility is to set up sales calls for Lenny…you’re not allowing me to sell anything, any longer.”

“I never meant that you stop selling!” he screamed, veins popping precariously from his temple. “What I meant was that you are expected to set Lenny’s schedule and then, and only then, are you permitted to schedule yourself a few sales calls!”

This is simply one, in a never-ending list, of shifting expectations that exist at the office. My boss constantly revises expectations and increases quotas for no apparent reason and expects that his mind will be read. He becomes enraged when this doesn’t happen and his newly revised goals and aren’t instantly met.

I realized that the ‘new’ plan, having just been implemented a few short weeks ago, was now the ‘old’ plan and that a ‘newly revised new plan’ was now in effect.

“So,” I asked, “I’m now expected to not only set up Lenny’s schedule, but my own as well…and what is my new quota, since I’m really only going to be able to schedule myself for half the number of sales calls as I was last year when I didn’t have to set Lenny’s appointments?”

“In this new position, you will be expected to increase your numbers from last year by ten percent,” he told me.

“Vince,” I asked, “how can you expect me to sell more when you’re demanding that I set up Lenny’s schedule? There’s no way I’ll be able to see as many clients as I did last year because the bulk of my time is spent trying to get Lenny out into the field, so I don’t see how…”

“You’re just going to have to buckle down!” he interrupted. “I’ve decided to give you one last chance at keeping your position here at the company.” I’m given ‘one last chance’ every few weeks and, by my count, I’m already up to my fourth or fifth ‘last chance’.

“Starting on Monday,” he continued, “I’ve decided to have you ride along with Lenny on a few of his sales calls so that you can learn how to sell better.” He turned toward his computer screen and began checking his email, pausing only to tell me to ‘shut the door on your way out.’

I left his office, unsure what Lenny was going to be able to ‘teach’ me. He had been promoted to Sales Manager about a month prior…though his actual sales were never any better than mine. And unless Lenny can teach me how to bend time and space, I fear that this newly, new revised plan is bound to fail.

This too will pass, however. Because in another two or three weeks I’ll be given a sixth ‘last chance’ when a newly new revised new plan will be implemented.

the anti-sales plan

2007-09-17T21:06:00.000-05:00

My boss called me into a meeting earlier today and, as I sat across the scuffed oak veneer desk from him, was greeted with the accusation, “You’re just not pulling your weight around here.”

I was caught off guard, but wasn’t completely unsurprised. Every meeting that my boss holds will, at some point, turn into a long winded diatribe about how you’re not doing your job well enough. It’s simply a question of what you’re doing wrong.

“I’m a bit confused how you’ve come to this conclusion, Vince,” I said. “I mean, I’ve hit my quota every month…usually producing well above my quota.”

“And you’re satisfied with that, are you?” He sneered, his face beginning to turn a shade of scarlet. “Well around here, that’s just not acceptable. You should be bringing in twice the number of orders that you have been.”

“But Vince,” I asked, “why bother having quotas if they don’t mean anything? If I don’t know what’s expected, then you can always claim I’m not doing well enough.”

“I’ve been in business 22 years!” Vince fumed, “and I know this market a hell of a lot better than you! So don’t you sit there and try to tell me what a salesperson is expected to sell!”

“Vince,” I tried to reason, “I’m not trying to tell you anything. I’m just saying that if I have a quota and I’m meeting that quota…”

“ENOUGH!” he shouted, cutting me off completely. “If you expect to remain employed here past the next month, then your sales are going to have to more than double overnight! And let me tell you something, I don’t see that happening. But I’ve come up with a plan to give you a second chance.”

“First off,” he continued, “I’ve promoted Lenny to Sales Manager.”

“So I’ll now be reporting to Lenny,” I said, trying hard to keep from laughing. Lenny has been with the company for several years, but remains incredibly unorganized and has proven, on more than one occasion, to be incapable of managing his time effectively. Add this to the fact that Lenny really doesn’t ‘sell’, but has just taken phone-in orders during his time at the company, and you’re left with a manager who really doesn’t know how to manage much of anything.

“No, I’m moving you into a support position, to help you develop into a better sales person,” he said. “And in this position, your primary responsibility will be to set up sales appointments for Lenny, because this is one area he’s never been too strong in…and being that he’s now my Sales Manager, this will help him increase his monthly sales.”

“So my job will now be to help Lenny sell, but I won’t actually be selling anything myself?”

“Correct. Getting Lenny out into the field is to be your top priority,” he told me. “Consider this a probation period. We’ll see how you’re doing in 90 days and at that point, I might consider letting you sell one or two products again.”

I sat there wondering how this new position was supposed to help me become a ‘better’ salesperson since I will no longer be selling anything…but experience had taught me not to ask. Any question that goes against Vince’s opinion results in a thirty minute chewing out session…and the current headache that had been building throughout the entire meeting couldn’t endure an extension of any kind.

So now Lenny is not only the Sales Manager, but the entire sales staff as well. And I just hope that he proves to be a good boss and employee, because the only person he’s going to be managing is himself.

life could be so much better

2007-08-14T21:06:00.000-05:00

I laid awake last night unable to fall asleep because of a dull, aching pain in my right calf…not my left, so much, but mainly my right. I wasn’t sure why the pain had localized in one leg and not the other. Was my right leg doing the bulk of the work, covering for a lazy left leg that was slacking throughout the whole day? I lay there pondering this, when suddenly I realized that I may be experiencing that ‘restless leg syndrome’ which I had been hearing about so much on television lately.

Clearly, I thought, medication was needed…and I wondered what all those poor people with restless legs did ten years ago, before the affliction was even identified. Those unfortunate souls were left thinking that their sore legs were simply due to muscle strain rather than restless leg syndrome and were never able to seek help. How they survived, I have no idea.

It’s fortunate, I felt, that we live in such a technologically advanced world where we can so easily identify medical disorders that have escaped detection for hundreds of years. And I began wondering just how many other yet-to-be-identified medical problems I had.

All this time I had thought I was reasonably healthy, and now I wasn’t so sure. I was certain that I was suffering from many undiscovered diseases, and could only hope that a cure would soon be discovered before the unfounded maladies killed me.

For instance, I thought, maybe it’s not just my legs that are restless, but perhaps I was suffering from restless brain syndrome too. I was laying there unable to sleep in part due to my leg, but even more so because my mind kept wandering. This restlessness of the brain was decreasing the quality of my life.

There’s other things, too. True, doctors have found cures for Athlete’s Foot and Tennis Elbow already, but what about all those other sport related problems. Granted, I’m not an athlete by anybody’s definition, but even I get aches and pains from physical exertion. Like computer solitaire. I’m quite certain that I’ve developed computer solitaire knuckle from all that mouse button pushing. How can I possibly be expected to live a fulfilling life when no treatment for this disorder exists?

Add these to the eye strain from watching my high definition TV, the butt fatigue from all that excessive couch sitting, and this irritable ear syndrome that I’ve developed from those little ear buds that came with my iPod, and it’s a wonder that I’m even still alive.

I just hope that the medical community will soon recognize and identify these serious disorders of mine and develop some drugs to cure them. Because how am I ever going to live a satisfying life without being properly medicated?

once they relax the standards for superhero membership, i'll be a shoo-in

2007-08-08T20:48:00.000-05:00

Our office picnic was held this past weekend and, despite the fact that I had no desire to see any of my co-workers outside of the office, I went. In truth, I don’t like most of these people too much and can barely stomach them during the 40 hours that I’m required to see them. Once you stop paying me to put up with them, my tolerance diminishes exponentially. But in an effort to appear as ‘part of the team’ I sucked it up, ate the dried out barbecue, and smiled.

The office picnic turned out much like I expected. Hot, dull, and painfully long. It more closely resembled a sixth workday rather than an actual picnic. But for all my efforts and forfeiture of half my weekend, I did get a fabulous consolation prize, namely three mosquito bites.

Not just normal mosquito bites, however, but huge, nipple-sized mosquito bites that I can only assume came from some genetically mutated insect that perhaps spent its larva phase in a nuclear substation.

And now, almost a week after the initial sucking of my blood took place, I still have this unholy mountainous trio of bites clustered on my ankle. The Bermuda Triangle of mosquito bites.

Of course, Spiderman was also bit by a radioactive insect, and he ended up developing superhuman strength and the ability to climb walls. Thus, I’m left wondering why I haven't started displaying any super powers of my own, especially considering that this mosquito was surely some type of radioactive infused bug.

Granted, I’m not sure what types of powers I would begin to inherit from a mosquito. A superhuman ability to buzz incessantly in wrongdoers ears? Annoying them to the point where they’re willing to turn themselves into the authorities simply to get away from me?

True, this would be perhaps the lamest super power in the history of superpowers, but add a cape to the mix and I still might pass as a second rate superhero…not on par with the likes of Superman or Spiderman, but surely good enough to earn some money by signing autographs at comic book conventions across the country. And really, this is all I ask for out of a super power...the ability to turn it into some type of money making venture.

And for the past few days, I’ve been testing to see whether any powers have yet developed…does my hand suddenly stick to the wall? Can I see through the closed office door by squinting really hard? Sadly, the answer is always ‘no’. Nothing has changed. I still remain the incredibly, un-super me.

Yet I keep hoping that I’m experiencing a delayed reaction in my superpower progression. Maybe these radioactive mosquito juices simply need a few more days to ferment in my blood stream. But, I’m beginning to seriously doubt that any superpowers will appear…unless you count the incredibly super itchy ankle that I’ve been experiencing for the past few days. Because if extreme itchiness can be considered a ‘superpower’, I might just qualify for hero status yet.

commemorating thirteen months of uninterrupted employment

2007-07-27T18:31:00.000-05:00

This July marks the thirteenth month of my employment. And while thirteen months at a job may sound like a trite thing to celebrate, these thirteen consecutive months make this the third longest job I have ever held. Frankly, due to the current climate around the office, I have grave doubts that many more months are forthcoming, but for now, this marks my third ever longest job. So please don’t think me presumptuous to give myself a brief pat on the back.

Finding a job when you have no truly valuable skills is not an easy task. Thus, prior to finding my current job, I took great artistic license in writing my resume.

Of course, having created a fictional history, I needed some fictional companies to have performed all of my fictional duties. I knew that I couldn’t simply list IBM or Microsoft as an employer, because a simple call to the Human Resources department would reveal that nobody had ever heard of me. And I knew that I couldn’t just make up a company, because a simple internet search would reveal that these companies never existed. I needed a company that was legitimate enough, but not too legitimate.

So I searched the internet for some potential pretend employers that would fit the bill…any bankrupt or out of business company would do nicely, I reasoned. A simple Google search later, I had a few companies…marketing agencies, advertising firms, and graphic design boutiques that were once thriving (or, at least, surviving) and had long since gone under. And, now out of business, no working phone numbers could connect to an office somewhere…an office that would have someone sitting in it that could refute what was on my resume.

So I was free to fill in the blanks, inserting any phone number that I wanted. And soon, my friends Jim and Gwen became past supervisors…I merely told them that if they ever received a call asking to confirm my employment with them, simply agree to everything that was asked and say that the company went under due to ‘unfortunate economic circumstances.’

I felt much better about my chances of landing a job knowing that Jim and Gwen would be confirming my employableness. I had instantly became a dynamic go-getter…a role that I felt sure I could play, if not permanently, at least throughout the duration of an interview.

Still, I kept my non-fiction resume handy as well...never knowing when an employer may have the need for an underwhelming job candidate. So, armed with two resumes, I flooded the internet.

I started to email resumes at lightning speed. I didn’t discriminate by job…every posting was applied to. Unfortunately, I didn’t discriminate by resume either…and after a few days of indiscriminate applying, I realized that the carefully drawn lines of which job postings got the ‘real me’ and which postings got the ‘fake me’ were quickly becoming blurred.

Consequently, when the first interview started was offered, I had no idea which ‘me’ should appear at the interview. Being that it was an advertising firm, I simply assumed that it was the fictional me who was being sought after. And while this made the real me, who remained interviewless, jealous, the paychecks would be shared by both the real and the pretend me’s, so neither saw the need to complain.

But after setting a date for my first interview, one for an Account Manager position, I realized that I had no idea what an actual advertiser does. More research was needed.

I scoured the yellow pages for advertising agencies and began calling. Posing as a college journalism major doing an article on the exciting world of advertising professionals, I got some guy named Greg to tell me everything I needed to know. How he landed the important Troyer Farms account, how he closed the Pepperidge Farm deal, and how he marketed Faygo Cola to local convenience stores…which earned him a promotion.

The interview didn’t go well. How could I have possibly known that BDI stood for Brand Development Index and not Big Dreadful Ideas? But I figured that even the most seasoned actors are bound to make a few mistakes on opening night.

Another interview was offered a few days later, this time for a sales position. Sales, however, fell into that gray category of ‘which resume was sent?’ I had no idea, since both real and fake versions would have been equally suited. I devised a plan to combat this…namely, wait for a clue from the person interviewing me.

As I sat across his scuffed, oak veneer desk, however, I began to see the fallacy of this plan…because after the small talk, he asked a very open-ended question. “So tell me a little bit about your past job history.”

Not knowing which resume I had sent, I had no idea how to answer the question.

Several seconds passed in which nothing was said. I was quickly crossing the line between ‘thoughtful pause’ and ‘potential mass-murderer silence’. I realized that if an answer didn’t pop out of my mouth quickly, I’d surely be mistaken for the latter.

“Well,” I stammered, “each of my past jobs have really given me a whole new set of skills, one building upon another.”

He just sat there, nodding slightly. Unsure whether he considered me to be an idiot or a sage, I was about to begin a rambling soliloquy on teamwork and hard work, or something generically related to work, when he saved me from a certain demise by saying, “let’s start with your past job as a teacher.”

Knowing that I had sent him the ‘real me’ resume, I breathed a sigh of relief, finished the interview without needing to decipher one single acronym, and three weeks later was offered the job.

The ‘real’ me had won the spot…and all the worry that my past jobs weren’t good enough or provided enough valued experience didn’t prove to be true at all. Obviously, he could see what an asset I would be.

And thirteen months later, I still believe that he hired me for me. Of course, I now see that he didn’t value my past experience at all. Rather, it was my lack of experience that caught his eye…because anyone with any actual experience in sales would clearly have seen that, between the commission structure and sales goals, they’d make more money selling insurance door-to-door.

Yes, my boss hired me based on my own merits…merits that spelled out ‘sucker’ all over my resume.

profits and prosecution

2007-06-03T20:42:00.000-05:00

Where I work, office meetings tend to contain about ten minutes worth of original content which is then re-phrased and repeated over and over for the next fifty minutes, occasionally broken up by random tangents. This is the formula for every meeting my boss holds. No agendas, no bullet points. Just a sprawling stream of consciousness, verbalized as fast as the thoughts pop into his head.

While this does sometimes lead to interesting stories…like the time he got drunk at a charity event and ended up puking in a bathroom stall right next to Jerome Bettis…more often it results in an extremely unproductive afternoon. An afternoon when sales are impossible to make because we’ve spent hours in a meeting listening to him complain about how not enough sales are being made.

This meeting was no different, and in between reprimands that we were all slacking and that our sales were stagnant, he suddenly stopped his diatribe and went off on an unexpected tangent.

“I’m sure you all remember Cara,” he announced. At this, all ears perked up. Cara’s name hadn’t been mentioned around the office since she was fired several months ago for pretending to be on sales calls while, in reality, she was sitting at home on her couch.

“Well,” he continued, “as it turns out, she’s suing me. Apparently, she thinks that I owe her back commission for the time that she worked here.”

He glanced at me and, clearly mistaking my look of surprise for one of concern, said, “now this is nothing that any of you need to worry about. The company will be just fine. I can guarantee that I don’t owe her any past commissions.”

And, of all the bullshit that he has spewed during the multitudes of meetings I’ve sat through, this I knew was the truth. I began imaging what my testimony would sound like if I was subpoenaed by Cara’s prosecution to help her case.

“Well, your honor, I have to admit that I really don’t think Cara was cheated out of any money. Besides the fact that she didn’t sell anything during her last two months of employment, our boss is incredibly cheap. The way his sales structure is set up, barely anybody earns a commission at all.”

“Don’t worry,” my boss told us again, snapping me out of my daydream. “Roy, a friend of mine who’s also an attorney, has helped me out in the past and he’s assured me that I have nothing to be concerned about.” He paused at this point and told us, “you know, I probably shouldn’t have said anything about this since it is a pending legal issue. So forget I mentioned it.”

And to be honest, I really don’t think my boss has too much to worry about. Because even without my testimony, I have a feeling that he and Roy have seen the inside of a courtroom many times before…and I have an even stronger feeling that it won’t be the last.

So while my boss doesn’t pay me much, it’s comforting to know that he’s keeping Roy in business.

hobophobic

2007-05-16T20:05:00.000-05:00

My friend Cindy called the other night. “I just saw that movie Running with Scissors and loved it! What a great film! That Augusten Burroughs is such a talented writer!”

I had just finished reading a book of his short stories and said to her, “I don’t know…I just don’t enjoy his stuff that much. I realize that the guy is a homosexual, but does every other paragraph have to be about giving some guy a blow job.”

“I can’t believe you!” she told me. “You are such a homophobe! The fact that you would judge his book on the basis of his sexual orientation is so closed minded!”

“Cindy, I have nothing against homosexuals. I don’t discriminate against them or beat them up when I see them. Truthfully, on the scale of things I’m worried about, I’m more scared that a homeless guy will attack me for not giving him my spare change than I am of gay people. I’m a hobophobe, not a homophobe. I just have no desire to read stories about guys having sex with other guys.”

Later that night, though, I started to wonder if I was in fact a homophobe. Did I harbor some unconscious hatred of homosexuals? Did I secretly wish them all harm? I decided to take inventory.

I really don’t know any gay people, so I turned my attention to gay celebrities. I’m sure that I’ve known some homosexuals, I just didn’t realize that they were homosexual at the time…so clearly this couldn’t be used as evidence of homophobia.

I made a mental checklist of gay stars, only to find that my pop cultural knowledge of gay Hollywood was lacking…though a few examples did come to mind. I’ve enjoyed several Kevin Spacey films, so that was a check in the non-homophobic column. However, I have never cared much for Elton John’s music. And I can’t stand Rosie O’Donnell, but this, I reasoned, was a personality issue, not a lesbian issue.

Still, I was only one for three in the pro-homo checklist. Was this an indication that I disliked gay people? And why couldn’t there be some type of internet quiz that I could take…10 easy multiple choice questions that would reveal my homophobia level.

But the more I thought about it, I realized that I couldn’t be homophobic…in fact, I wished there were even more homosexual guys on the planet. Because if most of the male population was gay, I’d probably start looking pretty good to the ladies…simply because I’d be one of the few men left that was still interested in them. Hopefully, if given the choice, a single woman would select me over a gay guy as a potential mate.

So it was settled. I was obviously not homophobic. I could rest easy knowing that I wasn’t anti-gay. Though I’m still a little bit scared that a hobo may one day kill me in my sleep.

the strip mall initiative

2007-05-10T07:43:00.001-05:00

“Business is all about the planning!”

This is the phrase that my boss repeats over and over again. And planning is all he ever does. Rather than making sales calls to increase profits, he plans. He calls each employee into his office everyday to hold meetings that can last for hours. Then, at the end of the day, he’ll hold an hour long all-staff meeting.

I’ve never seen him do any actual work, however. It’s all still in the planning stages.

Some of his past strategic inspirations included a plan to increase employee productivity; a plan that consisted of reducing everyone’s sick and personal days to three a year. Which means that I am only allowed to be ill once every four months, after which my pay will be docked.

He also developed a plan to increase profits. The plan called for a change in the commission structure of his sales force. People that used to make $650 in commissions now earn $100, thus increasing his profits.

Lately he has been brainstorming up a storm. And amid all the thunder and lightning, he has come up with yet another plan…this one designed to increase sales. Because, now that he’s bled the sales staff of commissions, the only way to make more money for himself is to get everyone selling even more…life isn’t cheap. And he’s got a beach house, a cabin by the lake, a boat, a wife, a girlfriend, and two cars to maintain.

He unveiled his latest plan during a 90 minute meeting earlier this week.

“In addition to the usual number of sales calls that you’re required to perform each week,” he announced, “I expect you to start using your time in between these calls better.”

“We’re now carrying a line of wide format printers that are perfect for marketing and visual communications. So while driving from one sales call to the next, it will now be mandatory that you stop in at a strip mall or shopping plaza and go door to door from one store to the next. I want you talking to the owner and selling them on these printers. Try focusing on the privately owned grocery stores, for example. Explain to them how these printers will be the perfect thing to help advertise weekly specials and for point of purchase displays by the cash register.”

“So starting next Monday,” he continued, “you will be required to stop in at a minimum of 15 stores each week. Naturally, there will be a new form that you’ll have to fill out so I can track your progress. This needs to be turned into me by Friday at 3:00 outlining each store you visited, the location and phone number of each store, and a brief summary of the meeting. I think that this will easily bring in two or three more sales each week.”

Perhaps we were all too tired and disillusioned, but no one had the heart to point out that a small ma and pop shop probably wouldn’t be very interested in purchasing a $5000 printer for displays that they receive for free from manufacturers such as Pepsi and Nabisco.

And when I begin stopping in at all these different stores, not only will I be leaving them with product literature, I’m going to start dropping off my resume as well.

heir to the throne

2007-04-26T21:05:00.000-05:00

My great-great grandfather started his own business back at the turn of the century… proof that, at some point in the past, entrepreneurial genes existed in my family. Genes that, unfortunately, have been so diluted over the generations that they fail to make any impressionable and lasting mark on our DNA.

The business that he chose to embark on was lumber. And as time went by, the company proved to be quite profitable.

It passed down from generation to generation. Eventually, my dad found himself working for my grandfather and, it was assumed, that as the eldest grandson, I would one day take over the reins of the family empire. I was heir to the Southeastern Pennsylvania lumber fortune.

As a kid, I would occasionally take a trip down to the lumber yard with my dad when an emergency wood related call arose. While dad tended to business, I would sit in the high-backed leather chair behind the desk in the back office and spin myself around and around.

Once dizzy, I would open the top drawer and turn my attention to the variety of pens and highlighters contained therein. Taking each one out, I would precisely scribble upon notepad after notepad in what I imagined was an exact replica of cursive writing.

Once the pad was filled with red, black, and neon yellow squiggles, I would turn my attention to the calculator. Not a silent, solar-powered one, but a large beast of a machine with a roll of paper attached to the back from which a receipt would emerge.

I’d punch in numbers, taking comfort in the clack...whir, as the paper receipt grew longer with each stroke. The job seemed like a piece of cake. Which made it all the more confusing when my dad found a new job and quit.

To this day, dad remains tight lipped about his time working for my granddad, except to say that working for granddad, ‘was no picnic.’ Which I can understand, because it probably wouldn’t be a picnic working for my father either…having helped him in enough home improvement projects to say this with some certainty.

Eventually, my grandfather retired. I was still in high school at the time, much too young to head up an entire lumber operation, and thus the company was sold. The lumber empire ended up in the hands of strangers, though the empire was doomed…because, years later, Home Depot burst onto the scene and all the tiny lumber dynasties fell to the imposing, ruthless, corporate warlord.

Several years ago, my grandfather passed away. After his funeral, the family loaded up into the car and my dad decided we should take a ride to the building that used to be home to the old lumber yard as homage to my grandfather.

It was early evening on a rainy and dark day as we pulled into the parking lot where lumber seekers once came to get boards of freshly cut pine and oak. As the car came to a stop, we noticed a small neon sign in a blackened out window near the entrance of the building…a neon sign that promised, ‘Live Nude Girls’ inside.

As it turned out, the new tenants were selling things of a non-lumber variety. Gone was the sawdust and assortment of pens that I remembered from my youth, replaced with garter belts and sweaty dollar bills.

My dad did a quick U-Turn and sped out of the lot with my youngest brother, only 15 at the time, glued to the rear window…transfixed by the promise of illicit desires that the neon promised from behind that closed door.

Gone was the empire I was destined to inherit. Gone were the hopes and dreams that my great-great grandfather founded the business on 100 years before. But even so, it was comforting to know that the new owners were still giving their clients wood.

time to rebuild

2007-04-02T21:22:00.000-05:00

Loneliness. It’s a cocoon I’ve built around myself. And after so long, it begins to have a comfortable feel. I find that I don’t mind being alone. That I’m fine with my own thoughts. That I don’t need anyone to make me feel ‘complete’. And then with one fatal swoop, that whole thing is shattered.

The swoop’s name is Sharon.

Our date on Friday night has reminded me that, in fact, I am utterly and hopelessly alone.

Because I enjoyed my time with her. I drove home in a rose-colored haze of bliss. And throughout the rest of the weekend I kept wondering what she was doing, and thinking of how nice it would be to see her again. I had to admit the sad truth. The wall that I so carefully constructed, brick by brick, around my heart now had some major cracks in the foundation.

Following the proper date etiquette guidelines, I called her the very next day. There was no Sharon.

I called her again this evening. Still no Sharon.

And now my mind is a buzz with thoughts of ‘what did I do wrong?’ Did I order the wrong food, or wear the wrong outfit, or apply too much aftershave?

Were my amusing antidotes not so amusing? Was the kiss goodnight not one of my better kissing performances? What did I do that I shouldn’t have done? Or what didn’t I do that I should’ve done? Whatever the case, I just can’t help but think that the problem lies with me.

And, in my mind, it’s always me. I do, or don’t do, or say, or don’t say the one thing that would turn the me into an us. I keep rewinding and dissecting every little utterance and moment of that night, trying to find the exact moment when things fell apart. But no answers are ever revealed. Rather, I’m just left with an ache somewhere deep in my heart.

And it’s at times like this that I long for a return to that cocoon…the one I worked so hard to build. Because while it was lonely in there, at least it was safe.

how it is

2007-03-14T19:51:00.000-05:00

Lately, it seems as if everybody has been taking great pride in telling me ‘how it is.’

At lunch, a co-worker took notice of the cheeseburger I was eating and said, “you really need to start eating more healthy, because I’ve noticed that you’ve been gaining weight. Hey, I’m not going to blow sunshine up your butt…I always tell it like it is. That's just how I am.”

While out drinking with a friend a few weeks ago, I commented that the girl sitting across the bar from us was quite attractive. My friend looked at me and said, “you don’t have a chance. That girl is way out of your league. Look, sorry if you’re upset, but I’m just telling you how it is."

People nowadays take such pride in telling it ‘like it is.’ Their opinion is obviously important. And I clearly need help…help that only they can provide.

But strangely enough, I know I’ve gained a few pounds. I also know that my physical appearance isn’t in the same league as the Brad Pitts and George Clooneys of the world.

And I find that I don’t want people telling me ‘how it is’…or how they think ‘it is’…or that I need their help in seeing ‘how it is’.

And if you meet me someday, please don’t tell me 'how it is'.

I’d much rather you lie to me instead.

elephant smuggling interior decorators

2007-02-24T09:47:00.000-05:00

Another training session sent me out of town this past week, and with this trip, my total airplane experience in the past six months has eclipsed my total airplane experience during the first 34 years of my life.

I’ve actually been enjoying my time spent speeding through the sky…my only real complaint being that I can’t open the window, which would enable me to spit down upon all the cars and rooftops that we pass over.

I don’t even mind living the hotel room life. For someone that has never traveled to any far away destinations, places like Indiana and Minnesota seem exotic. And, when I try hard enough to ignore the cigarette burns in the carpeting and carefully rearrange the sheets so that the suspicious stains are nowhere near my head, I can almost image that I’m in a four star resort.

My first night this week started out exactly like this. Shoes were placed over the holes in the carpet. The sheets were precisely positioned so that nothing but clean, white linen was situated next to my head. And the drapes were drawn so that the neon glow announcing ‘Vacancy – Free HBO!’ would not burn through my eyelids and leave gaping holes in my retinas.

I was living the good life, right up until 4:30 the next morning. This was the moment that a loud, thunderous ‘bang’ sounded from the room directly above mine.

Jolted from the beach where Sarah Michelle Gellar and I were about to enjoy a glass of Chardonnay before skinny dipping in the ocean, I rolled over and closed my eyes…hoping to be transported back into the dream from which I had been yanked.

These hopes were dashed, however, when a succession of scraping noises erupted from above, followed closely by a series of bumps and footfalls cascading back and forth, from bathroom to bed and back again.

Was this person an elephant smuggler, transporting them across state lines to sell on the black market? Or perhaps this was an interior decorating student doing some late night cramming before the final exam? Curious as I was, I simply wanted sleep.

Unfortunately, neither sleep nor the answer was to come. 4:30 melted into 5:30, and 5:30 into 6:30 with the bangs, scrapes, and footsteps continuing at a constant rate.

Finally, at 6:45, the noise stopped as suddenly as it began…just in time for the alarm clock to announce the start of a new day.

After a quick shower, I wearily approached the front desk. Bleary eyed, I rang the little bell on the counter and was greeted by a well-rested looking morning attendant.

“Can I help you, sir?” she perkily asked.

“Please,” I begged, “can you give me a different room. I’m here for the remainder of the week, and the guy above me made so much noise that I couldn’t get any sleep.”

“Certainly,” she told me. “You know, we’ve had complaints about him from some of our other guests too. I’ll just put you in a room down at the end of the hall.”

In my weakened and fatigued mental state, I didn’t even wonder why, if other complaints were lodged, they continued to let this guy continue operating heavy equipment machinery in his second floor room. I was just glad to be out from under him.

Shortly afterward, with a large coffee in hand, I arrived at the training session minutes before the 8:00 start time. And as our presenter introduced herself, I could feel my eyelids drooping ever so slightly, until finally, amidst the lulling talk of projected sales revenue and key demographic targets, they shut completely.

At last, I had found peace.

on ice

2007-02-17T16:51:00.000-05:00

The snow that has all but crippled the Northeast has single handedly shut down schools, delayed the mail, and has caused otherwise profit seeking enterprises to put profits on hold…albeit for the short term.

There is no better evidence of this than the fact that all the local malls in the area delayed opening their doors last week by a full two hours. Two hours that forced all the ‘mall walking’ senior citizens to delay their morning routine, have a second bowl of fiber chocked cereal, and then find greener pastures on which to tread.

For me, however, the snow has caused headaches beyond lack of early bird shopping and walking. Because, due to the multiple inches of snow covering the highways, all of my sales calls for the past two weeks cancelled. And while it’s true that this lack of sales calls most certainly indicates a lack of sales, this was not my main grievance. Rather, this lack of appointments outside of the office meant that I was forced to stay inside the office.

An office with no windows. An office which has been serving as a Petri dish of viral growth for the past few months. An office that is drab, dingy, and depressing.

I relish setting sales calls because of the opportunity it provides to escape this otherwise miserable dungeon in which we store items to sell to companies...companies with amenities such as natural lighting and coffee that doesn’t closely resemble tepid sludge.

So when a company in an adjacent town actually kept the appointment we had previously set, I was in my car and down the road in a flash...fleeting goodbyes as I raced out the door, a trail of papers fluttering in my wake.

It was late morning as I pulled alongside a parking meter across the street from the small company I was heading into. I gathered my brochures and catalogs, slung my laptop over my shoulder, and grabbed my samples from the backseat. After carefully balancing everything with exact precision, much like a skilled waiter does when delivering eight drinks to a large table of diners, I headed across the street to the main entrance.

I had crossed the street and stepped over the curb when my foot fell upon a rather large patch of ice. What happened next was exactly what you would expect to happen when someone loaded down with multiple bags, briefcases, and papers steps onto an immense continent sized patch of ice…the result looking very much like something out of a Three Stooges movie, minus two stooges, of course.

My legs flew out from under me, the weight of my laptop wrenched my left shoulder, the samples and brochures which had previously been so carefully balanced went sprawling across the sidewalk, and I went down in a flourish, ripping a hole in the knee of my slacks as I landed.

As I lay flat on my back, I turned my head and noticed a miniature pair of Keds directly in front of me. Gazing upwards, I saw a small five year old child staring down at me, her mouth wide open with what I like to image was awe at my spectacular Olympian display of clumsiness.

Wanting to use this embarrassing predicament to impart some type of wisdom that I had gained from years of experience, I said, “Boy, this ice sure is slickery.”

Not 'slick', not 'slippery', but ‘slickery’. Not only did I fail to impart something deep and substantial, I didn’t even use the proper English.

I struggled to stand up, back aching and shoulder throbbing, quickly gathered what I could, and trudged off to my car.

And as I sit here, I can't help but think that I'm single-handedly corrupting the youth of today...one make-believe word at a time.

working stupid

2007-01-29T19:36:00.000-05:00

I met with my boss today in one of his weekly ‘Monday Morning Meetings’ which are held once every week...or whenever he remembers. Truthfully, I’m often overjoyed when his weekly meetings occur on a monthly, rather than weekly, basis.

The general topics discussed are usually things such as sales strategies (“why the hell aren’t you selling more?!”) and morale boosting (“do you like your job here? Then you better start selling more!”)

I took a seat directly across the particle board desk from my boss. “Look,” he began, “you’re just not working smart enough.”

“I don’t understand,” I responded. “I mean, I’ve been meeting all of my monthly goals. My paperwork is always done by the end of each week…and often times, I’m the last one to leave the office in the evening. I feel that my work ethic here has been impeccable.”

“No, no, your work ethic has been fine…it’s not how hard you’re working, but how smart you’re working.”

“So you think I’m working too hard?” I asked.

“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. You’re working hard enough, just not smart enough.”

I mulled this over for a minute, but being at a loss for words simply said, “Hmmmm.”

“You see,” he continued, “if you’d continue working just as hard, but do it in a smarter fashion, you’d get twice as many results as you’re currently getting.”

“So how do I start working smarter?”

“Smart work isn’t something that can be taught,” he told me. “It’s just something that you either have or don’t have.”

“So I’m not working smart now, and it’s not something that I’m going to learn, but you expect me to do it.”

“Exactly,” he answered, pleased that he had gotten through to me.

He swiveled around in his chair, turning his attention to his email…his subtle way of letting you know that the meeting was finished and that he had tired of you.

As I returned to my desk, my head was spinning with thoughts of hard work, and smart work, and how in the world I was going to learn all about working smartly. And working hardly. And doing both simultaneously.

I stared at my computer monitor in front of me. ‘Work smart’ I told myself…as if wishing it would cause it to happen. ‘Work hard.’ All I discovered was that it’s hard work trying to figure out what, exactly, my boss is ever trying to say…smart or not.

shiver me timbers

2007-01-01T11:12:00.000-05:00

I saw my sister over the holiday season, and while we were catching up over a cup of coffee, she called my two year old nephew into the kitchen.

“Tell your uncle what Santa says.”

My nephew looked up at me and, in the deepest and jolliest voice that his two-year old vocal chords could muster, said, “Ho Ho Ho, and a bottle of rum!”

My sister sat, wearily shaking her head while my nephew ran off to delve back into his newly acquired toys. “I don’t know where he got this from,” she said. “I keep telling him that pirates say ‘Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum’ not ‘Ho-ho-ho and a bottle of rum’. Santa just says ‘Ho ho ho’.”

“Well,” I reasoned, “he has reindeer instead of a parrot, a sleigh instead of a ship, and they both carry around bags of loot. I guess that I can see the similarity.”

“We’re talking about Santa!” she exclaimed. “The personification of Christmas! Good tidings, generosity, and spending time with your family! Not pillaging and raping! He’s only two years old and I’ve already ruined him!”

I tried consoling her by explaining that mistaking catchphrases didn’t indicate poor parenting skills. Rather, it simply pointed out the fact that more pop-cultural knowledge was needed…something that the television would certainly provide in the years to come.

“Why don’t you try talking to him,” my sister suggested.

I headed off to the family room where I found my nephew sitting at the base of a mountainous heap of toys. I sat down and while I had the best of intentions, I couldn’t think of anyway to adequately explain the Santa-Pirate conundrum that my sister found herself in.

Still, I hated to let a learning experience pass by. So after only a few short minutes, I had my nephew running around the house yelling, “Merry Christmas Ye Mateys!”

half-priced holidays

2006-12-25T09:02:00.000-05:00

My friend Randy has been dating a girl for the past three years. He’s broken up with her a few times in the past to ‘test the waters’ when a more attractive fish has swum by, but he always returns to the same old pond when those more attractive fish don’t take his bait.

He stopped by the other night, fresh from his last minute Christmas shopping spree at the local mall, and started pulling out the gifts that he planned on giving his girlfriend.

“Check this out,” he said, “I got her this little bracelet…what do you think?”

“I don’t know,” I told him. “It’s sure got a lot of little hearts on it. Is it gold?”

“Close enough…it’s gold plated. The best thing is that it only cost me $75! Ordinarily it’s $150, but I got it at half price! I also got her this watch. Pretty nice, huh? It’s even got a few glass diamonds in it. See?”

“Glass diamonds?” I asked. “Which are they, glass or diamonds?”

“I’m not real sure, but they’re shiny and the watch only cost me $50. It was on sale. Retail price of this thing is $199!”

“So for Christmas, you spent a total of $125 on the girl you’ve been dating for three years. And what is she getting you?.”

“Well, I know that she’s buying me an X-Box 360, and probably some sweaters and clothes. Oh, and one of those GPS devices. But she won’t actually know that I got these things on sale. Normally, they would have cost more. Besides, she’s going to love these compared with what I got her last year.”

“And what was that?”

“A coffee maker and a blender.”

“You know,” I said, “you’re going to have to kick it up a notch in the gift department because, you realize, that you’re going to end up marrying this girl.”

“Not necessarily.”

“Yes, necessarily. She’s invested three years in you. She’s not going to let you get away at this point.”

“Invested? You make it sound like she’s playing the stock market.”

“Yeah, well I just hope that she realizes that she’s not getting a Microsoft or Coca-Cola. You’re more like an Enron.”

“Enron or not,” he told me, “I just saved over $150! That’s a whole lot of beer, my friend, with a video game for my new X-Box thrown in!”

And really, what says Merry Christmas more than presents at discount prices?

how i got my job (commemorating six months of uninterrupted employment)

2006-12-17T21:09:00.000-05:00

When I lost my job several months ago, I followed the predictable pattern that most suddenly unemployed people follow…which is to panic. Once this subsided, however, I started the job search and quickly realized that my resume needed some serious dusting off.

I sat, pen in hand, and tried to start detailing my previous job. What were my daily duties? What did I accomplish during my time there? What honors did I receive? I scribbled down bits and pieces of the job which I thought would sound most impressive. And after nearly 90 minutes, I stopped to reflect on what had been written…the total of which filled only two paragraphs and contained a lot of ‘developed’s and ‘assisted’s. Puny verbs which wouldn’t lead to a high paying job.

These puny verbs, combined with the fact that my resume looked much like a tennis match being played out on a sheet of paper - jobs bouncing back and forth across the page year after year - didn’t add to my confidence that future employment would soon be knocking at my door.

I needed help and, in desperation, turned to the first thing I could think of…the trusty thesaurus. Within minutes, all the ‘developed’s became ‘proposed’ and all of my ‘assisted’s became ‘supported’. Though these changes still made my past job sound just as thin and unimportant as the job actually was.

So I turned to the internet and googled ‘resume examples’ to get some help in turning my pathetically described job description into something that sounded brilliant.

A few clicks later and I was reading through other billing associates’ resumes. These folks were obviously more inspired with the written word than I was proving to be. Some girl named Jean made filing sound like an activity that only a PhD student could accomplish! And a guy named Chuck waxed poetic about the art of invoicing! I tried putting these mini-masterpieces into my own words, but in the end, Chuck’s and Jean’s words were much better, so I just borrowed whole sentences from them.

While the actual resume was looking much better, I realized that past experience in a billing department wasn’t really going to help me get a job in marketing or advertising…jobs that I realized I would enjoy much more than billing. So I turned again to the internet to find some further help with my resume.

Having already borrowed (and I use this term because plagiarized is much too hard to spell) sentences from Jean and Chuck, I took the next step in the ‘imitation-is-the-greatest-form-of-flattery’ department and began borrowing whole paragraphs from people. While I never worked for Nabisco, Steve’s six years as a Brand Manager sounded very impressive…so I borrowed three of his six years, making myself an instantly polished Brand Manager too. And Yvonne had spent four years as the Creative Director for a small marketing firm. A cut and paste later, and I had reinvented myself as a Creative Director as well.

Soon after, I was reading the resume of one very impressive and experienced individual. It wasn’t until minutes later that I realized this individual was me.

free at last, free at last!

2006-12-09T11:05:00.000-05:00

I used to know a guy that refused to iron any clothes. The morning before work, he’d toss his outfit for the day into the dryer and, after 15 minutes on ‘tumble’, he’d pop them out, put them on - still warm and static clingy from doing laps around the inner sanctum of the machine - and presto, instant, hands-free ironing he would say.

I felt that he was incredibly lazy. Because as much as I hated ironing…a task which I still despise…I prided myself in my ironing effort. Skilled, I was not, but I always put forth effort.

True, most of my clothes had creases criss-crossing at odd angles throughout my shirts and pants. I could never seem to precisely line up the perfect creases on the clothes to match with my ironing. But still, I toiled above the hot, steam spewing iron, creating new creases slightly off-center of the existing creases, and told myself that I was accomplishing something.

My parents had always told me that doing things you didn’t want to do built character. And every time I picked up an iron, my character was being built exponentially. We’re talking Great Wall of China character.

But a love for ironing never developed. And the grid of creases that had characterized my wardrobe never diminished. Finally, I decided to give into temptation one day. As I pulled a pair of slacks out of my dryer, I looked at them and told myself that they really didn’t look too bad. So they went straight from dryer, to hanger, to closet.

Upon closer inspection, I realized that none of my clothes looked all that bad. Not nearly bad enough to warrant pulling out the ironing board and trying to tame my clothes with a hot iron. So they all went straight into the closet.

I had been a slave to ironing for years and now came an epiphany. I was free! My clothes look fine, and with a proper amount of squinting, they were virtually indistinguishable from freshly pressed clothes.

And I’m happy in my new ironless existence. I’ve shed the shackles of slavery. Never again will I let the man (or whoever else runs the electric iron division at Black and Decker) keep me down.

True, I may appear a little more wrinkled than you remember me, but I am wrinkled on my terms.

thanksgivings of the new millenium

2006-11-23T18:29:00.000-05:00

I drove by the local bowling alley on my way home from work the other day. The marquee alerted all passersby of the annual ‘bowl a turkey, win a turkey’ promotion that this particular establishment conducted each year. Their little way of encouraging holiday cheer in the bowling enthusiasts that frequented the lanes. Three strikes, and Thanksgiving dinner was assured.

As I continued on my way past, I realized that this Thursday would mark my seventh job in the past seven Thanksgivings. That’s a different job for each year since the new millennium began.

My friend Gwen called later that evening and I mentioned this revelation to her.

“You know,” she told me, “that’s going to look real bad to employers. You better hold onto this job for awhile.”

“I can’t help it if I have commitment issues when it comes to employment.”

“I think that it’s less a ‘commitment’ issue and more of an ‘employment’ issue,” she said.

And she may be right. I need to keep this job for next several Thanksgivings. If, for no other reason, to keep my resume under ten pages long.

cloudy with a chance of strain

2006-11-01T23:10:00.000-05:00

I needed to be in the office by 6:30 on Monday morning…a cruel way to start the week.

I finally dragged myself out of bed at 5:56…after several half-asleep snooze button stabs…and groggily made my way into the shower. Before six in the morning, no amount of hot water is going wake me up, and this morning proved to be no different.

I stumbled from the shower and popped open the lid to my contact case. Once both were firmly inserted into each corresponding eyeball, I briefly considered shaving but felt that it was much too early to trust myself with something as sharp as a razor blade. Clients be damned, I was going to be stubbled.

I began to slowly realize that nothing was coming into focus quite the way it should…as if the whole world had been covered with a thin layer of Vaseline. Normally I would have noticed this much quicker than I did, but my brain was still operating on a five second delay.

A few blinks later and the problem continued to persist. The need for coffee overcame my need for crisp sight, however, so I threw on some clothes, grabbed my keys and headed off. Surely, I felt, when my ocular system was ready to accept that no more sleep was forthcoming, it would readjust on its own.

Yet, it refused to give in. The whole ride to work was accomplished with great strain. My eyes refused to work properly. Tail-lights remained fuzzy. Oncoming headlights were all decorated with halos. And a large headache ensued.

By the time I arrived at work, I wasn’t in the best of spirits…clearly in need of an extension to the weekend. The coffee had begun to kick in and my brain had begun to thaw out, though, and this is when it occurred to me that I had stuck the contact from the little ‘L’ compartment of my contact case into my right eye, and vice versa.

Because, while both of my eyes are extremely bad, my left eye is even more extremely bad than my right. Meaning that while a person standing three feet away from me will look like a large beige-ish blob if viewed from my right eye, from my left they will be an even blobbier version in the same beige-ish color.

A quick trip to the men’s room and a quick contact switch later, the world was once again restored to its proper perspective. The cloudy vision was gone.

The headache, however, lasted the rest of the day.

death by her own design

2006-10-25T15:58:00.000-05:00

As a rule, I try to avoid office gossip. In truth, however, I try only to avoid spreading office gossip but whole-heartedly condone listening to it. With this being said, the following events from Monday, October 23 have been reconstructed from bits and pieces of overheard conversations around the office.

11:00 am: Cara, the other salesperson in the office, had two appointments scheduled for the day. She called in after her first meeting had ended and spoke to our receptionist. Things went ‘awesomely’ she reported, but was too busy to speak with the boss and promptly hung up.

11:05 am: The company that Cara just left called the office asking where she was. “She never showed up for the meeting,” they told our boss.

1:00 pm: Cara’s second sales call of the day is scheduled to begin.

1:10 pm: Our boss, now skeptical of Cara’s whereabouts, calls the company to see if she is actually there. The answer, he is told, is ‘no’. “She cancelled the appointment this morning.”

1:45 pm: Cara calls back into the office. “My second sales call today was awesome!” she tells our boss, who made it a point of answering the phone when she called. “I’m going to grab some lunch and will try to make it in later this afternoon,” she continued.

It was at about this point when our boss told Cara to ‘cut the shit’. “I know that you didn’t go to either appointment today. You better get into the office immediately.” Cara’s response was that her car broke down and that she had been too embarrassed to say anything earlier.

2:15 pm: Despite the broken down car, Cara makes it into the office surprisingly fast. She is quickly dragged into a meeting with our boss and the office manager.

2:25 pm: Her story has changed from 40 minutes earlier. The new and improved story involves a friend with personal problems who was at Cara’s house the night before. Cara stayed up all night consoling this friend and didn’t get any sleep.

“You’ve told me two completely different stories,” our boss is rumored to have said. “Which am I supposed to believe?”

2: 33 pm: It is unclear which story Cara asked him to believe. Some around the office say the former. Others, the latter. Still others think that a third story, involving alien abduction and mysterious crop circles surfaced. Whichever of these Cara stuck with, she broke into tears and said that ‘this will never happen again.’

2:34 pm: Cara was right, it will never happen again. She was fired. It has been reported by people who sit near the boss’s office, that Cara stormed out declaring how ‘unfair’ this was and how he would ‘be sorry’ for letting her go. Unfortunately, my boss does not value ‘pretend’ work.

2:35 pm: I become the top sales person in the company…by default, of course, yet who am I to deny the title?

american idle

2006-10-21T15:08:00.000-05:00

We had a luncheon staff meeting earlier this week, a mixture of food and business which inevitably led to heart burn. And, as if to add to the gastronomical distress, the food that was ordered consisted of greasy buffalo wings and even greasier pizza.

When the last slice of pizza was consumed and the final wing was eaten, we all settled in for the business portion of lunch…decreasing sales, decreasing morale, lack of team spirit and, in essence, what the hell was wrong with all of us?

As the meeting wound down, Cara looked at me and said, “You are such a fidgeter!”

Which is true, my hands are constantly in motion. During college, I always drew pictures of my professors and classmates in each and every notebook I owned. Pen caps get flicked and paper clips get linked together. And, right before Cara made her comment, I had been creating a work of art with my fork on the remaining buffalo wing sauce that was left on my plate. A masterpiece that, while getting me labeled as ‘fidgeter', would have been proclaimed ‘genius’ if done by someone like Andy Warhol.

“And you know how the saying goes,” Cara continued, “Idle hands, busy mind. Busy hands, idle mind.”

“Cara, what are you talking about? The saying goes, idle hands are the devil’s workshop,” I responded.

“Whatever,” she said, “you know what I’m trying to say.”

Which was also true. I knew exactly what she was trying to say…despite my ‘idle’ mind. But as I opened my mouth to respond, I saw that Cara had already turned her back on me and was busy talking to an overweight lady that works in the office.

“I love cooking and have some great low calorie recipes that you should try,” Cara was saying. As far as I knew, this lady had never expressed a concern about her weight. Complimenting herself while simultaneously insulting the person she’s talking to is very typical in Cara conversations.

And watching her reminded me of another non-existent old saying. Open mouth, empty head.

an overheard conversation - in three acts

2006-10-10T21:06:00.000-05:00

I was at the supermarket yesterday, waiting in line at one of those self-scanning stations. The guy ahead of me was scanning his groceries when his cell phone started ringing. He answered the phone and, unlike the hushed tones that some people use to speak on their cells, this man was an extremely loud cell phoner, speaking in a booming voice as if he was alone in his house rather than standing in the grocery store at 8:30 pm on a Monday night.

As he continued to scan, it became clear that the entire store would be audience to the call.

Act I: The Meeting

“Phil, how are you? I’m fine. Yeah, the flight back was great, but I just gotta tell you about what happened. You won’t believe it. I was sitting in the airport bar since I had about two hours to kill, and this lady comes up and sits next to me. We start talking, I buy her a drink, and before you know it, we’re both sitting there doing shots of tequila. So I slip off my wedding ring..."

Act II: The Deception

"...one thing leads to another, and soon this woman is all over me. We're both pretty trashed by this time and I really have to pee, so I ask her to watch my briefcase and carry-on bags while I go to the bathroom. So she looks me straight in the eye and tells me to hurry because she's got a room at the airport hotel and maybe we could slip upstairs before my flight...no, I'm not shitting you! I'm dead serious man! So I take the fastest pee of my life and head back out to the bar, but when I get there she’s gone, and so are all of my bags..."

Act III: The Mess

"...so I throw some money down on the bar and go running out after her. And not 50 feet from the bar, I find her standing in the middle of the terminal puking all over my luggage! The stupid bitch barfed on my bags! I grabbed them and headed back to the john to rinse off as much of the puke as I could. It’s a good thing I bought her all those drinks, otherwise she would have made off with all my stuff."

As he finished up his story and began talking about the football scores from the day before, I looked down and studied my choice of grocery purchases; a box of granola bars, coffee, and a package of Winterfresh mints. I stood there thinking, ‘Boy, what a boring life I lead.’

I put the mints back on the shelf and replaced them with a pack of the ‘Hot & Fiery’ variety instead. Satisfied that life had become more exciting, I thought, ‘there, that’s better.’

phantom vibrations

2006-10-01T12:08:00.000-05:00

My typical packing procedure involves stuffing as many things into a bag as possible. And, as the training week came to a close in Minneapolis, I packed for the return flight in this very way.

Clothes, shoes, books, a bottle of aspirin, and other assorted knick-knacks that were accumulated during the week were all haphazardly stuffed into my suitcase. I struggled with the zipper for a full five minutes before I finally got the bag closed and, once finished, I stood back to admire my work…a suitcase with more lumps than any homemade gravy you’d ever seen.

The zipper was struggling against the sheer perversion of physics which I had just performed…surely no mere zipper could endure the amount of force pressing against it from all the crap that it was expected to contain, yet hold it did. All the way down the elevator, into the plane, and onto the luggage pick-up at the terminal once the flight was over.

Upon getting back home, I unzipped the suitcase and relieved its burden. My unpacking routine, being very similar to my packing routine, consisted of throwing these same (and now wrinkled) clothes into various drawers. The knickknacks were left in the suitcase and tossed into a closet, to be dealt with at a later date.

My packing and unpacking prowess was flawless, and remained flawless until I realized that my cell phone was nowhere to be found. I was certain that it got thrown into my bag at the hotel, though where it could have ended up once I got back home was completely beyond me.

In true sleuthing fashion, I grabbed my land-line phone, dialed my cell phone number, and proceeded to walk around the apartment, listening intently for a clue as to where my missing cell phone might be. This was made more difficult by the fact that I keep my cell phone on ‘vibrate’, having made an unfortunate choice in ring-tones several months back. Having spent $2 on this ring-tone, however, I refuse to replace it with a more normal sounding ring…because this would imply that I wasted $2, and I’ll be damned if I don’t get my monies worth out of the ring-tone that I purchased.

So I walked around for 20 minutes, dialing and redialing my cell phone, carefully listening for the faint sound of buzzing from somewhere within my apartment, all to no avail. Wherever my cell was hiding out, it clearly didn’t want to be found.

And the next day I went phoneless. I felt like a war veteran that lost a limb in battle. And just like these veterans who experience phantom pain in limbs that no longer exist, I kept experiencing phantom vibrations throughout the day, only to reach down and find that no phone was there.

This continued for several days…mysterious phantom buzzing from a phone that wasn’t there. I was positive that I was receiving, and missing, many important calls in my phone’s absence. That call to alert me to the fact that I had won a million dollars was missed. The call from Sarah Michelle Gellar telling me that she loved me was also missed.

It wasn’t until later in the week that the phone was found. Early one morning, as I groggily rooted around in my sock drawer for a clean pair to wear, I stumbled upon something that was neither soft nor sock-like. Confused as to what this hard object could be, I pulled it out and saw that it was my cell phone.

Apparently, in my unpacking frenzy, the phone got mixed and tossed in with the socks. Either that or my low-tech socks decided to wage war on the high-tech gadgets in my apartment by taking the cell phone hostage. Either way, the prodigal cell had returned home.

I plugged it in…for after several days on the lam it had no battery power left…and turned it on, ready to catch up on all those important messages which had been missed. Like a kid on Christmas morning, I was excitedly anticipating what these messages held. Sarah Michelle? Unclaimed fortunes? Six figure a year job offers?

I punched in my pass code and listened as the tinny, Verizon voice told me that I had four new messages. Three of which turned out to be some lady named Fran trying to get me to apply for an American Express card and one from Gary telling me that I could save 20% on a carpet cleaning.

In the future, my cell phone is going to have to fend for itself against the socks.

the skies may be friendly, but the ground...not so much

2006-09-18T20:40:00.000-05:00

I arrived in Minneapolis with my co-worker Cara - The same Cara who considers herself to have all the answers and who I generally dislike. I didn't have high hopes for the week.

These hopes plummeted even further when, that very Sunday evening, I tripped and took a spectacular fall...a definite 9 on a scale of 10 in the Olympics of falling. Unfortunately, as a result of my medal winning clumsiness, I was left with a severely battered looking face...a huge knot on my forehead, which would turn a sickly yellow-greenish hue by mid-week, and a chewing gum strip of lost skin running straight down the bridge of my nose.

On the bright side, however, Cara and I actually started hitting it off. Perhaps because we were in a strange city and knew nobody else or perhaps because we didn't have the whole 'work' thing to drive a wedge between us, I actually thought that perhaps some type of friendship would result. Even her abundant use of the phrases, "totally!", "that's awesome, man!" and "that's cool, man!" which usually made me cringe, weren’t even bothering me as much.

This glorious budding friendship lasted all the way through Tuesday night...two whole days. It was at this point when, after dinner, Cara returned to her typical Cara-ness.

"You know, man," she began, "I totally got you your job. Vince (our boss) brought me your resume to look over and asked what I thought...and I knew when I saw it that it was total bullshit, man. But I thought, 'you know, he seems okay', so I told Vince to hire you."

"Gee, thanks...I guess," I said. Because what, exactly, are you supposed to say to someone who lays claim to getting you your job. 'Great! Now that you're done with me, you can continue working on that cure for cancer and end to world hunger' perhaps. "My resume wasn't total bullshit, however...though, I admit, I lumped all my teaching experience together."

"I totally know that, man! I completely saw through what you were trying to do. That other lady who was up for the job had way more experience than you...but she had a limp. I think that's why Vince didn't hire her."

"Yeah, those limpers...what slackers they are."

She didn't appear to be listening, though. Once revved up, her mouth flows quite freely.
"And Vince is totally screwing me! He's always riding my ass! He never does that to you! I haven't even seen one commission check!" she fumed.

"Cara, you didn't sell anything all through August."

"Whatever...it's bullshit, man! Total bullshit! I'm so talking to Trudy (the district manager) and telling her about what Vince is doing to us!"

And out of all her manic ranting, that one word sent shivers down my spine...'us'. Because, while I agree that some things aren't ideal at the job, I also realize that no job is perfect. Besides, I tend to enjoy getting paychecks.

"Look, leave me out of this. Don't mention my name to Trudy or to Vince."

"I can't believe you! Well you may be alright with letting people screw you over, but I have balls, man! I'm telling Trudy everything that I think Vince is doing wrong...I think she'll be very interested. Besides, that thing I said in class today, Trudy told me that she wants to talk to me about using it in a marketing campaign."

"What thing was that?" I asked.

"You know, when I said that thing about ‘No School Left Behind’ playing off of the whole ‘No Child Left Behind’ thing. She loved it! I think they're going to offer me a job as a marketing manager. See, I've got ambition...you don't. You may be happy with a lowly job, but I have so much more potential than that. Well, I'm telling her all about Vince, and we'll just see who screws who!"

I simply stared at her, much the same way as you would stare at a train rapidly approaching a brick wall. You know what the end result will be, but are completely unable to stop the train from the impending impact. All you can do is sit back, watch, and pray that no shrapnel comes flying your way.

Because, while Trudy is a nice enough lady, there’s no way she’s going to side with Cara, who had been working for the company for less than six months, over Vince, the dealer who has been selling their product line for over 20 years.

I’m not even sure what Cara is hoping to achieve. Even if Trudy did take her side, the best case scenario is that the company would yank Vince’s right to be the exclusive dealer for their product and we'd both be out of a job.

As is the case with all train wrecks, nothing good is going to come from this one. And I have a sinking feeling that I'm going to get flattened in the process.

the friendly skies

2006-09-16T10:48:00.000-05:00

This past week was spent in Minnesota as a part of my 'new job' training. In my past jobs, I was corralled as a simple office monkey, never straying far from my cubicle or desk. For the first time in my multitude of jobs, I was scheduled to ship out to another city. And for the first time in 30 years, I flew.

I was four the last time I stepped foot onto a plane, headed to Boston with my parents to attend my Uncle's wedding. And while I don't remember much of the flight, I do recall that it was a positive experience, because as I stepped off the plane, the stewardess handed me a little plastic 'airline pilot' pin...a pin which I proudly wore all weekend, clear through the rehearsal dinner, wedding ceremony, and reception.

Air flight has changed since then, which I quickly found as my shaving cream and toothpaste were confiscated at the security terminal…though for some odd reason I was allowed to keep my razor. Once stripped of these things, I was declared 'safe'...I could slice someone with a razor blade but terrorist activities like soaping windows wouldn’t occur.

Shortly after my shaving and tooth brushing privileges were revoked, I was on the plane and in the air. It was smooth sailing until about an hour into the flight when the 'fasten seatbelts' sign lit up and the captain announced that we were entering into some turbulence.

"Just speed-bumps in the sky," I overheard a mother tell her screaming child, who, coincidentally, was sitting directly behind my seat. Unfortunately, the reassurance didn’t seem to work. The screaming continued.

The guy sitting next to me shifted in his seat and tried to settle in for a nap despite the turmoil behind us and the turbulence around us. Opening one eye, he glanced up at me and said, "Don't bother waking me if the plane goes down."

Deciding that I wasn't particularly fond of airline comedians, I answered, "what...and let you miss out on all the fun?"

And as the plane jostled and bounced through the air, for a brief moment I actually thought that perhaps we might go crashing down. And, for a few minutes at 34,000 feet above ground, I wondered if this flight might end up like a real life version of Lost (Wednesday nights at 9:00, this Fall on ABC).

I was pretty sure no undiscovered islands existed between Pennsylvania and Minnesota, though perhaps some little isle in one of the Great Lakes had escaped detection. In the end, it didn’t matter. The plane didn’t crash. The quest for undiscovered land masses in the Great Lakes continue…and the screaming from the kid behind me continued as well, all the way to Minneapolis.

When we finally landed, the two hour flight seemed to have lasted weeks and proved to be nowhere as positive as my first flight 30 years earlier. Especially considering that, as I stepped off the plane, no little plastic pilot airline wings pin was given to me this time around.

co-workers are best when they're not around

2006-09-06T06:16:00.000-05:00

Historically speaking, I haven’t had much luck with the whole ‘job’ and ‘career’ thing. Whether it’s the people I work with, the person I work for, or the job itself, at some point I become disillusioned and disinterested. From here, things go rapidly downhill, culminating in my departure. The only variable in this equation is whether my departure is my idea or theirs.

With this goal in mind, I plan on making a true effort in liking my co-workers, not hating my boss, and putting an end to all office related complaints.

This is proving to be more difficult than I imagined.

Take Cara, for example…the other sales rep at the company. She’s making it very hard to keep me from keeping with my ‘like your co-workers’ part of the plan. In truth, I desperately want to throw a stapler at her head. She started about a month before I did, having never sold anything before. Yet, apparently, having a start date 45 days prior to mine, entitles her to dispense advice freely.

“You’re not adding enough ‘sizzle’ to your phone calls, listen to me and you’ll see how it’s done,” she says.

“You would sell more if you developed more of a repartee with the customer, like I do. That’s why I was the top salesperson for the month of July,” she says.

“I used to make the same mistake that you’re making, but now I only call quality prospects,” she says.

“What’s a quality prospect? Isn’t a sale a sale? How in the world do you know who’s going to buy before you call them?” I asked her.

“You just don’t get it,” she replied.

And apparently I don’t. But, at the same time, while her sales totals were high in July, her sales totals for August were zero. That’s ‘zero’ as in nothing.

She has explained this massive drop in productivity in several different ways.

“I’ve been feeling sick,” she says.

“Clearly, companies just don’t have the free cash that they had last month to purchase things,” she says.

“We need a better marketing strategy than the one we currently have…that’s the problem! I have some great ideas to share with the boss that will totally increase my sales!” she says.

Her ideas, the best of which consisted of putting our company’s phone number on pens and passing them out to potential customers, have all been shot down by the boss.

Last week, I found her moping at her desk. I just don’t feel like making any sales calls today, she said. People tell me ‘no’, and I just can’t seem to pick myself back up. Later that day, she called our product manager at the corporate offices because she needed some ‘encouragement’.

And, though I’ve tried to like this girl and failed, a small part of me can’t help but feel bad for her.

Though a larger part of me is jumping with glee.

sometimes there's a reason

2006-08-27T21:25:00.000-05:00

I met a girl at a bar several weeks ago. We talked. We laughed. And at the end of the evening we exchanged numbers. A couple of days later, I called and left her a message. I never heard from her again. But I had more than enough to keep myself busy without worrying about a girl and a phone call that was never returned.

Among these new busy-keeping things were a new job and new job related procedures to be committed to memory. There was also a whole new set of people and personalities that needed to be learned…who to trust, who the office tattletale is, who do you stay away from until they have had their third cup of coffee.

And then there was Fred, the office nut-case. Fred worked in our shipping department until one day last week, when he was found sitting amidst dozens of half packed boxes and sobbing uncontrollably.

Once calmed enough to talk, Fred told us that he and his wife had been separated for several weeks and were currently in the process of getting a divorce. He was certain she was seeing other people and simply couldn’t bear the fact of her being with some other man. He told us that if he ever found her with someone, he would kill her, the guy she was with, and himself.

Homicidal tendencies not being conducive to his typical shipping duties, Fred was told by the boss to take the rest of the day off and go get some help.

Later that night, he was arrested for stalking his soon to be ex-wife…thus violating the protection order that she had put out against him a few weeks earlier. According to the newspaper article the following day, page six of the Local section, he was apprehended but somehow got away from the officers, running handcuffed into the woods.

Two days after he was found, still handcuffed, hiding out in his neighbor’s tool shed, I stumbled upon a cocktail napkin stuffed in a pocket of my jacket. And on this napkin was the number of the girl that I had met many weeks prior.

Experiencing a ‘what the hell’ moment, I decided that one last call was in order. So I dialed and, to my surprise, she picked up on the second ring.

After reacquainting…the bar, the conversation, exchanging numbers, never hearing from her since…she told me, “I really wanted to call you, I just had no idea how I would explain things.”

“Explain what things?” I asked.

“Well, I don’t know if you’ve been watching the news, but have you heard about that guy who was arrested the other day?”

“The shipping clerk, you mean?”

“Exactly,” she replied. “Well, that’s my husband. I had no idea how I would explain things…I really wanted to go out with you but have been scared that he’s going to do something crazy.”

“You mean like kill me, kill you, and then kill himself?” I answered, having just heard this same thing from her husband’s mouth not two days earlier.

“Exactly,” she said again. “I was pretty sure that if you ended up dead, I wouldn’t be getting asked out on a second date.”

“Well, death does tend to put a damper on things,” I agreed.

Shortly after, we said our goodbyes and her number was quickly discarded in the nearest trash can.

As the cocktail napkin came to rest upon an empty Wendy’s hamburger wrapper, I realized that sometimes there’s a good reason why you never get a return call from someone you meet in a bar.

of these things i fret

2006-07-31T19:58:00.000-05:00

I sit here typing from my new apartment. A move that had me boxing things for the past month…incredulous that anybody could amass so much crap in two short years. And now these boxes sit in varying states of unpackedness, the items from within being placed either in a spot which resembles a semblance of normalcy or simply strewn about the apartment, waiting in eager anticipation for a space that it can finally call home.

But even now that the move is finally over, the worries have not yet disappeared…the haphazard placement of all my stuff being only a minor thing to weigh on my mind.

Larger, is the fact that I will be paying two rents for the upcoming month. This, my new rent, and that, my old rent. But not only will I be paying my old rent, but the newly inflated, $75 more a month rent which caused me to move in the first place. And, if that isn’t enough, an additional $100 which is being charged because, by not signing a year’s lease at the old place, I’m considered a month-to-month renter, which comes at a higher price tag…namely, $100.

I gave 37 days notice…but apparently I needed to give 60. This, despite the fact that I was only told of the hefty rent increase 67 days before my lease was up, thus giving me a whole seven days to find a new place, sign a new lease (which couldn’t even happen until a credit check was run) and then give notice.

I pleaded my case to my old property manager (who, for the record is named Debbie Brisky…a lady that I consider to be a mega-cunt) but she rudely informed me that I was no one special and didn't deserve special treatment, and that she would in no way even entertain the thought of letting me out of my lease on only 37 days notice. Simply put, I’m screwed.

But even this isn’t the largest of my worries, because in the worry department, something this mundane (and costly) isn’t enough to keep me up at night.

Rather, my biggest fear is that I didn’t scrub and vacuum the floors well enough before I moved out and inadvertently left behind a strand of hair somewhere…maybe tucked behind the toilet, or stuck in between two carpet fibers in the corner of the dining area. A hair that, upon being discovered, will be used to clone me. Not just one clone, however, but an army of clones. A verifiable community of identical me’s.

Knowing myself, however, I’m certain that all these me’s won’t be used as an army to take over the world. Because, being me, I know that a cloned army of me’s wouldn’t even scare the poorest third world country. Likewise, my genetic code won’t be used to create a super-intelligent, super-beautiful race of super-humans.

Instead, my clones will probably be used as low wage workers, which will be sorely needed in the future with the new laws preventing illegal immigrants from entering the country and performing these low paying jobs that nobody wants.

And, much like the Chinese immigrants of the 1800’s who were put to work building the railways that would lead us Easterners out West, I will probably see my clones someday constructing the monorails and mag-levs of the future, working low skilled jobs for even lower wages.

And much like the elderly who look with longing reminiscence through photos of their much younger selves, I’ll glance at all the me's from my passing car and think, ‘I used to look like that?! No wonder I hardly ever got laid.’

everything is new again

2006-07-08T09:14:00.000-05:00

The lazy, endless days of my unemployment are long over, and I find that I am slowly readjusting to the routine of wake, work, and sleep once again. Granted, this new job isn’t a readjustment that my body is accepting whole-heartedly, but adjusting none the less.

And lately, there has been an onslaught of ‘newness’ which has been occurring. Four weeks ago, the job came into existence.

Three weeks ago I was informed by my landlord that my rent would be going up $75 a month. I’ve been a good tenant…I rarely complain, don’t throw wild orgies late into the night, and always pay my rent on time. So, when I asked why the steep increase in rent, I was told, “you should have known it was going up, with the cost increase of heat and all.”
I expected a hike in rent, not a cross country road trip. So I’m moving out at the end of the month into a new apartment.

Two weeks ago, I got a flat tire. I took my car to get it replaced, and was told that in addition to a new tire, there was an extra $1000 worth of work that needed to be done. When I asked if all these repairs were necessary, I was told, “well, if you don’t get them done, there’s a good possibility that you’ll be driving down the road, lose the ability to steer, and will most likely die.”

My car, which was rapidly nearing 160,000 miles, simply didn’t seem like a solid investment. So I cut my losses and bought a new car. Not a ‘new-new’ car, which implies a straight off the lot, never been driven car, but a ‘new to me’ car, which implies ‘used’ but sounds better if the word ‘new’ is thrown in there somewhere.

So within a month, new job, new apartment, new car. And I keep waiting for the complete ‘new’ transformation. That one morning I’ll wake up and the same old, regular me, will be gone and looking back at me from the mirror will be the ‘new’ debonair, dashing, and darkly handsome me. A brand new me, complete with warranty…that if I tire of the new tall, dark, and handsome me, I can trade it back in for the old model.

But each morning I find that I’m still always me. The old me. Despite the new car, new job, new apartment, there’s nothing really ‘new’ about me. And while I guess that there was nothing really wrong with the old me, I wouldn’t mind test driving an upgraded version of me…taller and more confident, with leather interior and a fully stocked mini-bar…at least for a little while.

tick...tick...tick

2006-06-20T19:43:00.000-05:00

My parents will soon be celebrating their 36th anniversary. They decided it was a good reason to take an extended trip away from home…which will be their first in almost 36 years.

This being said, a weekend away was a major outing for them both. But, it was decided, an outing was clearly in order. They were going to start traveling more and this would be the first of many exotic places that they would venture to. So an itinerary was formed and an exotic destination was chosen. Williamsport. Not the Bahamas. Not Italy. But Williamsport. The town which proudly claims to be the 19th century lumber capital of the world. Sadly, this is all the town can realistically brag about.

My parents started off early Thursday morning. I wasn’t expecting to hear from them again until Sunday night, which is when they were scheduled to return. To my surprise, however, I got a call from my mom later that same day.

“Well,” she told me once I had picked up the phone, “the trip is over!”

“What happened, mom? Why did you and dad leave so soon?”

“We were driving along on Route 70,” she explained, “when all of a sudden the car lost all power and started smoking! Your father pulled over to the side of the road, we called AAA, and then had to wait for over an hour for a tow truck!”

“Well,” she continued, “as you can imagine, these trucks were speeding by us going very fast, and there was barely any shoulder, so your father and I felt it was best to cross the highway, hop over the median strip, and wait on the opposite side of the road.”

“So you hopped over the median strip?” I asked, having a hard time imagining my mother running across a busy highway, leaping over the center divider, and racing to safety on the other side.

“Heavens no!” she exclaimed. “It was too high, so instead I crawled underneath it. But, later that night my head was itchy, and when I scratched it I found a tick! Can you believe it!? An actual tick! I was mortified! Obviously, it must have dropped on my head when I was crawling under the road divider.”

“Obviously,” I said.

“Don’t be coy,” she scolded. “Anyway, I got it out and your father tried to kill it…I’m not sure if you know this, but those little buggers are very hard to kill. Well, he finally crushed it and stuck it in a Ziplock bag and put it in the freezer.”

“Mom,” I asked, “why in the world did dad stick a dead tick in the freezer?”

“Because, I looked up ticks on the internet and read that they can cause Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. Your dad figured that it would be a good idea to keep the tick, just in case I caught it. That way, the doctors could use the tick to develop some type of antidote for me.”

“Mom, I really don’t think it’s necessary to keep the tick.”

“It’s better safe then sorry,” she reasoned. “But I just wanted you to know that it’s in a bag next to the yogurt. I just don’t want you to accidentally eat it by mistake.”

Which, I’m sure, was very thoughtful on some level. Though I can’t imagine what food she thinks I would mistake a tick for. A midget raisin, perhaps?

“I’m just glad that you and dad are both safe,” I said. “And I’m sorry that your trip turned out to be such a disaster. Did you two reschedule it?”

“No,” she told me, “the mechanic called and told us that the car was going to end up costing about $2000, so we cancelled the reservation. The trip money has now become the repair money. But that’s okay, really. We’re both perfectly happy just to stay home.”

Because when you get right down to it, a $2000 car repair bill and a Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever scare are a small price to pay to find that you’re content staying in your own little corner of the world.

they just don't make thieves like they used to

2006-06-12T20:10:00.000-05:00

Today, for the first time in over three months, I had to wake up early and head off to work. An actual job. For which I’ll receive an actual paycheck. This meant that yesterday was the last day that I could sleep in with unabashed recklessness. I had every intention of shamelessly taking advantage of this.

And my plan worked perfectly, right up until 6:15 in the morning. Because, according to the clock on my nightstand, it was at this exact moment that a car alarm began screeching from the parking lot of my apartment building.

This car alarm, however, was soon joined by two other car alarms…from cars that I can only suppose felt left out and decided to join in the fun. For the next several minutes, this trio of alarmingness created a cacophony of car chaos.

I feebly attempted to bury my head beneath the pillows, but to no avail. The automobile symphony was simply too loud to ignore. Besides, by this point I was wide awake.

Truth be told, nobody even blinks anymore when a car alarm goes off. When they were first invented years ago, I’m sure that people stopped, ran to the scene, and chased the car thief off long before the vehicle was stolen. But nowadays, nobody car, so frequent are the false alarms that these alarms are always alarming us about. It’s about time that the auto manufacturers do away with these things altogether.

Perhaps it was simply a strange atmospheric event that caused these alarms to go off. But, in the event that it was a really incompetent burglar, I wish that he would have shown a bit more persistence.

Hop in the car and drive away with the alarm blaring instead of setting off three and then fleeing the scene. What ever happened to pride in a job well done?

doomsday

2006-06-07T07:06:00.000-05:00

There I sat, crouched and cowering, in the corner of my apartment earlier this week. Because of all the evil-tinged omens surrounding the whole 06-06-06 date, I felt it best to stay as inconspicuous as possible. And while I don’t particularly view myself as a superstitious person, I generally feel that rather than risk any bad mojo from finding me, I’ll pretend to follow along…just in case.

So when the phone suddenly rang this past Tuesday, I carefully sidled over from my seat in the corner and contemplated whether I should answer. On the one hand, I thought, this call might a long lost uncle in desperate search of an heir to leave his fortune to, a fortune that would come in quite handy due to my current state of finances. Yet, on the other hand, the call might be from Satan himself, claiming my soul for an eternity of hellfire and torture.

In the end, the hopes…however small…of money won out and I answered.

To my surprise, the call turned out to be a job offer. And while I can’t help but think that getting a job on a day regarded as ‘evil’ can be a good thing, I accepted…once again, money winning out over potential cosmic harm to myself. Though, in an attempt to ward off bad spirits, immediately after accepting I knocked on wood, scrubbed myself in garlic (which is generally used to ward off vampires, I know, but you never know when one will pop up), and danced naked inside a protective circle of salt which I poured on my living room floor. I had seen the circle of salt thing on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, thus ensuring its accuracy, the dancing was an improvisation on my part…but seemed appropriate considering the circumstances.

All of which is how, this weekend, I find myself employed and due to start on Monday. Which happened not a moment too soon. Because as I danced in my protective circle of salt, I inadvertently stepped on a carpet tack…clearly confirming that evil things did befall me on that day. With any luck, though, my health insurance will begin in time to get a tetanus shot before my foot gets infected and needs to be amputated.

signs that you won't be getting the job

2006-06-03T21:46:00.000-05:00

Three months ago, I had an interview. Working on the assumption that persistence pays off in job hunting, I began a bi-weekly routine of calling this company to find out where they were in the hiring process.

I had the name and number of the HR person that interviewed me, and I was diligent in my communication efforts with her. Surely, I thought, this would show my dedication and desire to secure a position with them.

The first week I called, I got her voice mail and left a message. Two days later, she called back to inform me that they were still interviewing candidates. The second week of my ‘persistence pays-off plan’, I again left her a voice mail message. Four days after this call, she sent me an email explaining that no further developments had arisen concerning the position and that she would contact me when there was something new.

This didn’t discourage me however, and I placed a third call two weeks later. This time, however, I never heard back from her. No email. No phone call. So the very next week, I left another message and followed this with an email. Again, nothing.

By this point, I knew that I wasn’t getting the job and the company knew that I wasn’t getting the job. But I continued my calls because I wanted them to know that I knew that they knew that I wasn’t getting the job. And, at the very least, someone there was going to tell me ‘you won’t be getting this job’.

Granted, this process amounts to nothing more than a colossal waste of time. But seeing that I’m unemployed, I have nothing but time to waste.

Finally, after countless messages and emails that went unanswered, I opted for a different approach and called the main number and asked to speak with Gina in human resources.

“I’m sorry sir,” the receptionist told me, “Gina is no longer employed here. Let me connect you with her replacement.”

Gina, my inside connection, was gone. All that work and history I had built to show her just how much I wanted the job was all for nothing. But not to worry, I thought. Here’s a new HR person to begin anew with. A clean slate…I’ll just show her the same desire and commitment that I showed Gina.

Soon after, I was pleading my case to the ‘new’ Gina. I explained the interview, and the resume I sent in, and my numerous conversations with Gina.

I was put on hold while she checked her files, and a minute later she was back. “I’m sorry, but we have no record of you at all. I couldn’t find your resume nor could I find any notes or indication that you ever came in for an interview. Unfortunately, we have moved ahead in the process and have narrowed the pool down to three candidates, so you won’t be considered for this position. But if you’d like to email me your resume, I’ll be sure to keep it on file for six months.”

So I was wrong in thinking that the company knew I wouldn’t be getting the job. As it turned out, the company didn’t even know who I was.

taking stock

2006-05-30T07:54:00.000-05:00

June will mark the fourth month of my unemployment. And in this time, I’ve done some soul searching. While I’d like to be able to say that I’ve figured out what career path I want to embark on and where my life is heading, nothing that meaningful has taken place. Rather, what I’ve discovered about myself is that I’ve gained a lot of weight and my socks all have holes in them…presumably from my now massively obese feet.

And these aren’t just normal sized holes. These are holes large enough for small children to stick their heads through. I put my socks on and my whole foot slips right through, making my socks more like garter belts. I don’t know when the sudden influx of holes began, but it is currently in full bloom and leaving a severe sock shortage in my wardrobe needs.

So a plan has been established. While I have no power over the hiring managers’ decisions to give me a job, my weight and socks are both things that I have control over.

And at least one of these goals, I’m certain that I can achieve.

great expectations at greatly inflated prices

2006-05-20T15:08:00.000-05:00

Jim, who has recently decided to embark on a new career selling gyros, also decided that it was time for a new relationship. He broke up with his girlfriend a few months ago and is currently in the process of ‘getting a new start’ on life.

The plan, to help with the new girlfriend portion of his ‘new startedness’ was to head down to a company called Great Expectations…a dating service…and have them do the majority of the leg work for him. Having nothing better to do, I decided to take a drive down with him.

We walked into the office, located in a swanky new office building in a part of town which is undergoing a ‘revitalization’…which generally means that the rent in these buildings is triple what the rent is in the buildings three blocks down the street...where we were met by Lisa, who told us that she was finishing up an appointment, but led us to the lobby and asked if we wanted something to drink.

We declined and Jim was given an application form to fill out. As Jim began writing down his pertinent information, I sat and listened to the music which was lofting throughout the lobby by speakers hidden somewhere from up above. The musical selections, which were comprised of non-stop love songs, were carefully selected to showcase just how single and lonely you must be if you’re sitting in the Great Expectations lobby. Thus, the mood was set early so as to prime unsuspecting clients into ‘relationship mode’. A state which could easily be remedied by Lisa and her trained staff of ‘dating specialists’, turning you from a schlubby single schmuck into a dating Don Juan.

Shortly after, Lisa was escorting us into her office. For fifteen minutes, she dropped the best sales pitch I’ve ever heard…I was left wondering how anybody met and fell in love without her help. Then Jim broached the subject of price.

“Well, normally I don’t discuss fees until someone is prepared to enroll with us,” Lisa said, “but depending on which package you choose, the price ranges between $3,000 and $6,000.”

As I picked my jaw up from off of the floor, positive that at a $6,000 price tag I’d be remaining single for quite a long time, Jim continued listening and asking questions as if this figure didn’t phase him in the least.

As our time wound down, Lisa stood, offered Jim her hand, and said, “I’ll be in touch to let you know what the next step is and about our different payment options.”

We left the building and, as we were headed to his car, I said to him, “I can’t believe you kept listening to her pitch after she told us how much this would cost…you’re not seriously considering this, are you?”

“Hell no, I’d never pay that much!” Jim told me. “I just stuck around because I wanted to stare at her breasts a little longer. What an amazing pair of tits she had!”

The exact same pair of tits that I’m sure convinced many other single men to fork over $6,000.

kellogg's giveth and kellogg's taketh away

2006-05-13T10:30:00.000-05:00

I found myself on the Kellogg’s website this past Thursday, filling out their on-line application in the hopes of getting a job. My birthday, having commenced just a few days before, left me thinking that this would be my year. 33 turned out to be not such a great age for me. But 34, I reasoned, would be my year. The year I get that great job and find that great girl. A year where everything comes up roses. A year that will go down in the history of great years.

This hope seemed to be confirmed when, after hitting the little ‘submit’ button on the Kellogg website, I was informed that a phone interview was being granted. Clearly, I had answered all of the pre-interview questions correctly and my skills and talents were easily recognized. I scheduled my interview time for the very next day.

Friday morning, I got the call. I answered, said ‘hello’ in my most professional voice, and prepared to amaze the Kellogg’s human resources department with tales of my success in business and my leadership skills. Stories that had been polished so as not just to amaze, but to entertain and illuminate as well. Stories that would leave them thinking, ‘how can we not offer this guy a job? He’s just that impressive!’

“Hello, this is Mindy calling from Kellogg’s,” the voice on the phone informed me, “I’m sorry to tell you, sir, that the interview confirmation you received on our website was a mistake. There seems to be a glitch in our system which granted you an interview in error. I’m calling to cancel that interview. Your credentials simply don’t warrant an interest from us at this time.”

And, in my most professional voice, I said, “Oh. I see.” Though I was thinking, “why don’t you take a fistful of Frosted Flakes and stuff them up your ass, Mindy.” But, as professional people know, these words are not conducive to professional business etiquette. Hopefully Mindy wasn’t a mind-reader.

As I hung up the phone, I was left hoping that perhaps there’s a one or two week margin of error before the start of my year…the year that’s supposed to bring me untold wealth and joy begin.

Because, God help me, I can’t endure another year like the past one.

old

2006-05-09T13:04:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I turned 34. Which means that the sunny-side of 30 is over for me. I have now officially entered those mid-30’s years…which means that 40 is looming closer than they were when I was still an early-thirty person. I’m getting old, and I’ve got the numbers to prove it.

My family always took trips to Ocean City when I was in junior high. One of the beach highlights was walking along the boardwalk and checking out the junior high girls that were also on vacation with their families. A few years after graduating from college I went back. Upon returning, however, I found that the women who were catching my eye all seemed to have babies. Mothers! With children! Instead of junior high girls, I was checking out young moms. I felt old.

Still being firmly rooted in my 20’s, however, I wasn’t too concerned. But as 30 came closer, more signs revealed that I wasn’t young anymore. At 28, I found myself teaching sixth grade. One day, I mentioned Bruce Springsteen and was met with blank stares and looks of confusion from the entire class. Not a single student knew who Bruce was. Springsteen. The Boss. The guy who was on top of the world back when I was in junior high was now just a footnote in history. An answer to a question in Trivial Pursuit the 80’s edition. I felt old.

When I turned 30, friends…in condolence…told me that ‘40 is the new 30’ and, because of this, 30 must be the new 20. But they were wrong. 30 is still 30, and is in a whole different ballpark from 20. As if to hammer this point home, no bouncer has asked me for I.D. since then.

But now at 34, it’s different. Instead of particular instances, all it takes is a quick glance in the mirror to make me feel old.

seeing the country, one gyro at a time

2006-05-06T15:17:00.000-05:00

It’s very similar to a hot dog vendor that you see on a street corner, but housed in a mobile RV…more closely resembling the nacho, ribs, and Philly steak and cheese sandwich vendors that can be found selling their wares at county fairs and church bazaars. And this large, white van which was offering “Tony’s Gyros” was parked right outside of Jim’s house as I pulled up to his front door yesterday.

Being that Jim is neither named ‘Tony’ nor likes gyros very much, I was confused as to where this thing came from and why it was now decorating his front yard.

“Please tell me that you were hungry and found a gyro place that delivers,” I asked him as he opened the door.

“No, man,” Jim replied, “this is my new business venture. I’m going to clean up!”

For as long as I’ve known Jim, he’s always been looking for a fast, money-making scheme. In college, he named his band ‘Free Beer’, and stuck up fliers around campus promoting their first show. “Free Beer from 11:00-12:00” the signs promised. The folks that filled the bar, however, upon finding out the free beer wasn’t the beverage but the band, became quite hostile…thus ending Jim’s career as a musician after 12 minutes.

A few years later, he bought hundreds of discount rings off of the internet. “I’m moving to Florida to start a toe ring company,” he told me one day. “Toe rings are the new belly-button rings! All I have to do is walk up and down the beach and sell them to people sunbathing…just like those guys that take your picture and for those key chains! I’ll make a fortune!”

After a few months, he found the toe ring business to be less than booming. And the few people who did purchase one tracked him down a week later and demanded their money back because Jim’s toe rings had left a curious turquoise ring around the toe that it had been placed on.

He returned to town and decided that the city needed a movie rental delivery service. His plan was simple…people would call him with the movie they wanted to watch and he would drive to Blockbuster, rent the movie and then charge his customers a dollar more than it had cost him. But with the increasing gas prices and the availability of movies on cable, Jim quickly found that he was losing more money than he was making.

Now, however, he felt that he finally found a goldmine.

“Jim, where in the world did you find this gyro-mobile?”

“At some estate sale,” he told me. “All I have to do is drive down to the Regatta or maybe some college campuses, and sell gyros all day! I might even take a few months and follow the Grateful Dead or Phish around the country, selling gyros to their fans at their concerts! It’s ingenious!”

“Do you even know how to make a gyro?” I asked.

“No, but how hard can it be. Besides, since you’re not working right now, I thought that maybe you’d like to help me out until you find a job. I’ll give you a percentage of the daily sales.”

And with no job and no prospects, it appears that I’ll be learning how to make gyros very soon and embarking on my new career as a professional gyro chef.

as the nest turns

2006-05-02T12:36:00.000-05:00

I read somewhere that dust is mostly made up of dead skin cells. And, judging from the amount of dust around my apartment, I have to conclude that I am either losing skin at an alarming rate, or that I really should dust more often than I do.

With this in mind, I decided that perhaps it was time to clean. Having no job, time wasn’t an issue…rather, it’s been motivation that has been holding me back. So today, I decided, I scrub.

Vacuuming, dusting, floor washing, and tub scrubbing all commenced. And, once finished, I even decided to tackle the windows. When things around my apartment were all agleam with cleanliness, I plopped down on the couch. And not five minutes after I plopped, a bird smacked head on into my newly washed window.

I watched it fly away, breathing easy that I wouldn’t be solely responsible for an increase in the bird mortality rate in the city, but I began to think that, surely, with the smacking that the bird just endured, some sort of bird concussion must have taken place. And, having seen enough afternoon soap operas to know what a concussion leads to, I knew what the future would hold for this bird.

This now concussed bird probably has amnesia, I reasoned, and most likely has a little wife bird with newly born baby bird off in a nest somewhere. Having completely forgotten who he is, this bird will probably find and fall in love and start a family with a different bird…completely unaware of the life he used to have.

His original bird wife will surely mourn the disappearance of her husband, but life will go on. Worms will have to be found. A little bird mouth will have to be fed. And someday, this little bird will inadvertently meet another little bird and fall in love. Of course, unbeknownst to him, the bird he is destined to fall in love with will be his step-sister, the daughter of his long lost father.

His father, having caught the bird flu, will have his memory return only moments before passing away…revealing to his daughter that she has a brother, the same brother that she has fallen madly in love with.

Torn and tearful, she will run off…perhaps to Cleveland…where she will find a nice pigeon to marry, but never forgetting the love of her life, her brother.

And one day, when her brother becomes rich and powerful in the bird world by amassing the most wealthy collection of colored string in town, she will return to claim her share of the fortune.

Naturally, her brother won’t want to forfeit any of his amazing string fortune. And it will be at this point that she reveals to him that he is really the father of her son, not the pigeon. Her baby bird…the heir to the colored string fortune.

Now reunited, this happy and complete bird family will fly off. And as they swoop down over a country road, I’ll probably be driving to an interview at the exact same moment…killing them instantly as they bounce off my windshield.

A sad end to a long saga. Of course, if I get a job offer from the interview, at least there will be a happy ending.

chopped liver

2006-04-30T22:01:00.000-05:00

Many years ago, two months before I started sixth grade, my family moved to a new town. As with any move, my old friends were left behind and inside jokes and secret handshakes were soon forgotten.

As the new kid in school, I sat helplessly and watched as the early fall birthdays rolled around. Invitations were passed around and I was excluded. Those little cards with the words “You’re Invited!” seemed like the golden ticket which simply remained out of reach…if only I were cooler, or funnier, or better looking. But I was not.

I was out at one of those trendy nightclubs (the kind that turn out to be much less trendy than you originally thought once you get there) with my friends Randy and Rick last night and realized that even now, years later, you never truly get to leave the sixth grade.

The pulsating bass from the near-deafening music that was being played makes this club one of the popular spots for bachelorette parties. The bridesmaids all surround the soon-to-be bride, who is clearly identifiable from the veil that she wears on her head, as their gaggle moves from one end of the club to the other.

I was standing with Rick while Randy was at the bar getting drinks, when a bridesmaid from the group left the pack and swooped down upon us. Her attention was focused on Rick and she giggled as she deftly handed him a little business card while moving in close to whisper something in his ear. As she talked, Rick smiled, set the card down upon a nearby table, and headed off across the dance floor with her.

Curious, I picked up the card and read that this was an invitation at a “last chance to dance” with the soon to be bride. And even though I was standing right next to Rick, the bridesmaid never even looked in my direction. I had unwittingly played the role of the invisible man…blending easily in with the tacky décor littering the wall behind me. Suddenly, I was back in sixth grade.

It’s not that I aspire to dance with brides, but that I’m not handsome enough, or rich enough, or powerful enough to be considered worthy a last dance. In a world full of Filet Mignon and T-Bone steaks, I remain Chopped Liver. As this bridesmaid scanned the potentials and carefully selected the best candidates, I wasn’t even given a second glance. Once again, I failed to make the cut.

I was left standing there feeling like the kid who wasn’t yet tall enough to ride the roller coaster at the amusement park…wondering if I would ever get the chance to experience the sudden rush from zipping downhill and through all those curving loops.

I’m beginning to fear that I may never get that ride.

downtown roadtrips

2006-04-25T11:15:00.000-05:00

I loathe downtown interviews. And since all downtown parking garages charge by the half-hour, with the price increasing exponentially every 30 minutes, I’m well aware of how costly it is to go beyond the 30 minute mark. The last time I interviewed with a company that was located downtown, I tried hard to keep things speeding along at a respectable pace. My answers were clipped and straight to the point. If a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ question was posed, this is the answer that it received…no explanation forthcoming.

Yet, despite my best efforts, this interview ended up lasting 34 minutes, which included a sprint out of the elevator and down two blocks to the parking garage. My penalty for those lost four minutes was $16, eight dollars more than if I had walked out of the interview just a few minutes earlier.

Yesterday, I had another downtown interview. I felt reasonably sure that gentle persuasion to meet at a neutral location, like the Starbucks right across the street from my apartment, would not be agreed to. So, because I desperately need a job, I agreed.

My friend Gwen had taken Monday off, and with ample persuasion I was able to convince her to drive me downtown. “Think of it as a mini-road trip,” I told her.

“Yeah, a mini-road trip that will cut into my Young and the Restless time and eat up gallons of gasoline from my tank,” she countered.

“But,” I continued, “this isn’t just an investment in my future, but in yours as well. Think of it as a human stock market, and you’re purchasing shares of me. As I succeed, you’ll get dividends.”

“So you’re telling me that I invested in a dog,” she said. “Because, though I’m not great at math, a percentage of zero still means that I’m getting screwed.”

In the end, she agreed to give me a lift. As I made my way around her car, I noticed a dead wasp sitting on her dashboard. This is the same wasp that has adorned her dash for two years now.

“Gwen, aren’t you ever going to throw that thing out?” I asked.

“I leave it there as a sign to the other wasps. A sign that says they’ll meet the same fate if they dare fly inside my vehicle.”

Knowing her fear of all things bug-like, I plucked the wasp from the dash and tossed it into the parking lot. Gwen responded by repeatedly stomping on the insect for several seconds.

“It’s been dead for two years,” I told her. “Extra death induced activities really aren’t going to increase its deadness.”

“Better safe than sorry,” she said. “The last thing I need is some zombie wasp coming back to life and deciding that it’s going to seek revenge and maybe eat my brain.”

We pulled out of the lot and I started to give Gwen directions. “Oh, yeah…I know exactly where that building is. We’ll take a short cut down Second Avenue,” she said with the confidence of a city street driving veteran. And while some people possess an internal sense of direction that would rival the best GPS system, it turns out that Gwen does not. Her knowledge of navigating the downtown area more closely resemble a torn map, shabbily taped together, with a wad of bubble gum cementing the whole East side of the city.

With my interview quickly approaching, Gwen had us lost somewhere in the Warehouse district of town, heading down the wrong way of a one way street.

“Let me just ask this guy for directions,” she said as she rolled down the window.

The wafting scent of raw fish from the market place we were (illegally) parked in front of drifted in through her window as she was told that the building we were searching for was on the other side of town. She got directions and, after two missed turns and running a red light, she dropped me off at the correct place.

Exactly 15 minutes late for my interview.

Needless to say, I’m not expecting a job offer from them anytime soon.

She picked me up in front of the building five short minutes later. “You know, this was really fun,” she told me. “We’re going to have to do this more often.”

And with my current luck at finding a job, she just might get her wish. But next time I’ll suggest that we leave two hours earlier.

breakfast of champions

2006-04-21T10:40:00.000-05:00

Pop-Tarts have been a staple in my life for the past several years. These little packets of sugary goodness have proved to be my breakfast of choice since the Summer of 2002.

My relationship with food tends to be somewhat obsessive. When I find something I like, I eat it very often. Everyday, this new food that I’m enamored with ends up as my lunch or breakfast…sometimes being both lunch and breakfast. This isn’t a new development, however. When I was just a kid, I went through my grilled cheese phase. This lasted from age five through age eight. Later, between my freshman and junior years in college, I went through my Wendy’s Cesar Side Salad phase. And, for a three month period during 2003, I abandoned my Pop-Tart addiction for Panera bagels.

And I eat these new favorite foods of mine until I am completely and utterly sick of them. The grilled cheeses, Caesar side salads, and bagels have all fallen off the charts completely. I have no desire to rekindle my relationship with these foods. Sadly, this is quickly happening with Pop-Tarts as well.

Having no job, Pop-Tarts prove to be my sole reason for waking up in the morning. The thought of that toasty little taste sensation is what pulls me out of bed. Should I feast on the Frosted Cinnamon, Hot Fudge Sundae, or the new Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough variety is my biggest concern each morning. But now, these breakfast treats just aren’t doing the trick anymore, and I’m not enjoying them nearly as much.

This morning, as I forced my way through my morning Pop-Tart, I had to admit that it just didn’t have the same appeal as it once did. I no longer look forward to that morning Pop-Tart. Rather, I find myself staying in bed longer and longer each morning thinking, ‘not Pop-Tarts again!’ And I’m lost. What food should I now turn to? What food will I look forward to each morning? What food will help me get out of bed, ready to face yet another day?

Being unemployed, people expect me to drink more. With no job to worry about, I can drink in the evenings knowing that if I oversleep, no harm is done. I can drink during lunch, knowing that I’m not in violation of any office policies, so no harm is done. However, I won’t drink before noon, because this might imply that my hobby has become a ‘problem’.

Of course, I could always pour beer into my Frosted Flakes instead of milk...which would not only motivate me to wake up each morning, but proves to be the perfect loophole in the ‘no drinking before noon’ rule as well.

The mornings may soon become just a bit sunnier once again.

martyrs wanted - apply within

2006-04-15T10:20:00.000-05:00

I had a second interview yesterday at a private school for a teaching position. And while I had promised myself that I was done teaching, the need for a job took precedence over actually choosing what the job would be. Who am I to dictate what I should do for a living? Pay me enough and I’ll gladly wear any job title you’d like to stick on me.

The first interview went well. I gave the right answers, asked the right questions, and nodded at the appropriate times. I played the role of ‘eager applicant’ very well. I was asked what my salary expectations were. And I gave what I felt was a reasonable answer. I know what it costs for me to live…and I’m familiar with living on very little.

I did a quick, mental calculation of bills, food, and the fact that gas increases by ten cents every week, then added a slim margin more on top of this. And by ‘slim’ I do mean slim. Not paper-thin, perhaps, but definitely no thicker than an individually wrapped slice of Kraft American Cheese. Enough money to account for minor emergencies, such as replacing a shoe lace if one would suddenly break but not nearly enough for anything more serious than this. And forget about actually stowing cash away in a savings account. Luckily, my savings account is quite used to deprivation.

I gave a number that I felt was small enough for a school to afford, yet large enough for me to survive on. “I think that is a reasonable request, one which we should be able to match,” I was told. I left the building with a time and date for a second interview.

In this, the second interview, I was to teach a sample lesson to some students of the school. And again, things went well. I was feeling confident that the job was a lock. Confident that I’d again have access to a steady paycheck, albeit a somewhat malnourished paycheck, but a paycheck none the less.

After the mock lesson, the director of the school led me back to her office. “I liked what you did with the students and I’m very pleased with everything I’ve seen. We do have a problem, however.”

Problem? I thought. What could possibly be the problem? Is it my khaki colored pants? I can just as easily wear blue. Did I park in another teacher’s spot? I’ll begin parking down the street. Do I clomp too loudly when walking up the stairs? I’ll tiptoe from now on. I was sure that no matter what the problem was, it could be easily remedied.

“You see,” she continued, “I know I had told you previously that I felt we could meet your salary demands, but I’ve decided that the teaching position will have a starting salary of $20,000. This is what I’m prepared to offer you. Keep in mind, however, that we all need to make sacrifices for the good of the students.”

Once again, a few quick mental calculations made it clear that with the salary they were offering, I would only be able to survive if a few cutbacks were made in my life style. Cutbacks that would include either food or rent. Possibly both.

Even more upsetting, was that she felt I should make a ‘sacrifice for the students’. Students that were not mine. Students that would never be mine for $20,000 a year. Students that surely weren’t worth sacrificing food and shelter for. Thus, the official job title was less ‘Teacher’ and more ‘Martyr’.

I declined. I stood. I left. And the job search continues.

brandi chastain knows sports

2006-04-13T14:55:00.000-05:00

Once Gwen got her clock situation situated and set them ahead so that she was following the ‘correct’ time, as opposed to ‘Gwen-Time’ which she was set to last Sunday, we rescheduled for dinner. I met her and my friend Randy the other night where we started off with several appetizers of the liquid variety.

“You know,” Randy told us, “this was one of the lowest watched Olympics this past year.” Randy, by typical male conversation standards, keeps up with all things ‘sports’ simply so he’ll always have something to discuss. ‘Football, baseball, even lacrosse…this way, no matter where I go, I’ll be able to talk to anybody I meet.’

“There’s just no pizzazz to the Olympics,” I said. “Now, remember a few years ago during the summer Olympics when Brandi Chastain pulled off her shirt after scoring the winning goal in women’s soccer. That’s what we need more of in women’s sports. It’s pure marketing genius!”

“What? Pulling her shirt off is marketing genius?” Gwen asked. “You can’t be serious! This is what it’s going to take to get guys to take women’s sports seriously? We have to strip down to our sports bras?”

“That would get me watching more women play sports,” Randy replied. “If those ice skaters would pull off their tops when they nailed a triple axle, I would start paying closer attention.”

“Exactly,” I agreed. “A slam dunk in the WNBA and someone’s shirt comes off. A nice drive on the LPGA tour and another shirt comes off. A clean landing on the uneven bars and off comes another shirt. No bowling, though. As a country, I feel that we need to draw the line somewhere.”

“Absolutely,” Randy agreed. “Bowlers should definitely remain clothed whenever possible. Beach volleyball, on the other hand, is a completely different story.”

“You guys are nothing but pigs,” Gwen told us. “What about us women? Why can’t guys pull off their shirts when they do something like hit a homerun in baseball, huh?”

“Believe me,” Randy told her, “with all those steroids in baseball, it’s never going to happen.”

“Why?” Gwen asked. “I’d be happy to see a bunch of half-naked ball players.”

“Have you seen Barry Bonds lately? Those steroids have made his head so huge, it would take him half an inning to get it through the neck hole of his shirt.”

“Randy’s right,” I said to Gwen. “His head looks like a pumpkin nowadays. Compare pictures of him now and when he used to be a Pirate. Normal sized head then, enormous pumpkin head now.”

Gwen rolled her eyes. “Yeah, you guys have it so tough! Forget about us women and all the unrealistic standards for beauty that we’re held to. You’re biggest concern is about getting a large head from steroids!”

“And shrunken balls,” I added, “but I’m glad that you’re beginning to gain a better understanding of how hard it is being a guy.”

It was at this point that she threw an ice cube from her Long Island Iced Tea at my head. Yet another thing that us men have to endure at the hands of the female population.

what's my line?

2006-04-07T11:00:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I interviewed for an advertising sales position at a local soft rock radio station. This is a station which I rarely listen to, not being a large fan of the whole ‘soft rock’ genre. Generally, one Celine Dion song per year is more than enough to satisfy my soft rock quotient.

But this particular station gets heavy air play in dentist offices throughout the city, having that ‘elevator music’ feel that is supposedly ‘soothing’ for those about to have their molars pulled. So I knew that there must be some demand for advertisers…if, for no other reason, so that toothpaste companies can alert people to new flavors and whitening factors associated with their brands.

I pulled into the parking lot, rode up the elevator to the third floor, and once entering the lobby, was instructed by the receptionist to fill out an in-house application. I sat on one of the threadbare chairs which were centered around a glass coffee table and began filling in the required information. While I sat, a Celine Dion song wafted through the lobby…thus fulfilling my soft rock requirements for the remainder of 2006.

Fifteen minutes later, I was sitting across from the sales manager. I have been on enough interviews that, not withstanding the occasional curveball, I can anticipate exactly what questions will be asked. Because, while I’m sure that the different sales managers I’ve interviewed with are all quite good at selling, they tend to be somewhat lazy in their interviewing techniques. Clearly, they have all read the same Interviewing 101 book.

And so the dance began. ‘Tell me about a time you had to deal with a difficult client,’ she asked. ‘Describe a time you went above and beyond the call of duty to ensure that a project deadline was met,’ she asked. ‘How do you go about organizing your day to make sure that nothing slips through the cracks,’ she asked. And, like an actor auditioning for a role, I had my lines memorized.

‘If I were sitting across from one of your co-workers, what are some adjectives they would use to describe you,’ she asked. My brain froze. The only co-worker that came to mind was Bettie Jo…and I knew exactly how Bettie Jo would describe me. Though these weren’t terms I cared to share during an interview.

The seconds ticked away in silence. I knew that a response was needed fast, yet I simply couldn’t think of any adjectives. Later, as I rode back down to the elevator to reach my car, words came to me in torrents. Responsible. Punctual. Hard-working. But at that moment, sitting in that corner office, nothing came to mind.

Finally, just to break the silence, I said the only word that I could think of “Fired. Oh, and asshole. Is that an adjective?”

“No,” the sales manager replied.

“Well then, asshole-ish,” I said. “Though, in my defense, I never really cared for most of my co-workers either.”

Staring at me from across her desk, she told me, “we’ll contact you if we’re interested in inviting you to the next round of interviews,” and then suddenly took a great interest in a sheet of paper upon her desk. No hand was offered for me to shake. No movement was made to open the door for me.

As I pulled out of the parking lot, telling myself that I really didn’t want to sell soft-rock advertising space in the first place, I decided that next time I would write down some impressive adjectives on my hand. Because this way, if I forgot my line, I would only have to fake a nose scratch and read my palm.

saving time

2006-04-04T21:54:00.000-05:00

My friend Gwen invited me to brunch this past Sunday. I’m not a ‘brunch’ type of person and generally dislike Bloody Marys, or any mixture of alcohol with celery for that matter, but agreed to meet her at 11:30.

There are certain things that you come to accept about the friends that you choose. And I’ve long since come to terms with the fact that Gwen is flighty. She claims that this ‘flighty-ness’ is a sign of genius. “It’s like Albert Einstein,” she’s told me before, “he was, like, super-smart, but was sort of scatter-brained. Like me, you know?”

And, like Einstein, they each have their own theory of relativity. Einstein’s being that time is relative and slows down as you near the speed of light and Gwen’s being that time is relative in the sense that, if she tells you she’ll meet you at 11:30 this might mean 11:30, 11:45, or possibly even 11:50.

However, by 12:00, I felt that a phone call was needed to find out just how relative a concept time was going to be on this day. Gwen answered the phone and I asked her where she was.

“What are you talking about,” Gwen said, “it’s not 11:30 yet.”

“Gwen, it’s already after noon. Did you forget about Daylight savings time?”

“Of course I didn’t forget,” she told me. “I set my clock back before I went to bed.”

“Back? Gwen, you’re supposed to set your clock ahead one hour in the spring.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she replied. “It’s called Daylight Savings time, you know, because we save an hour. We get that hour back.”

“No, Gwen,” I said, “the ‘savings’ part of Daylight Savings time has nothing to do with getting an hour back.”

“Well this is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard! Who’s the idiot that came up with this idea?” she asked. “Look, if we’re losing an hour, then it’s really more like Daylight Spending time, because I don’t see what we’re saving by doing this! And I set a fucking hair appointment an hour before we were supposed to meet! Now I’ve missed it! This totally sucks ass!”

It’s unfortunate that Einstein isn’t still alive to commiserate with Gwen. Geniuses need to stick together, you know?

blacklisted

2006-03-29T22:32:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago, I had an interview at a company and was promptly sent a rejection letter. Interview on Monday, rejection letter by Wednesday. I can only assume that no sooner had I left the interviewing room than a letter was being drafted to inform me of the company’s non-interest in me.

Two weeks later, as I was engaging in my Sunday ritual of scouring through the Sunday classified ads, I came across the exact same posting for the exact same position which I had applied to and been rejected for by this exact same company. Granted, I’ve come to realize that my talents and skill level are mediocre at best, but my mediocre talents could have more than accomplished what this job entailed.

So under the guise of trying to improve my ‘future interviewing performance’, I called the lady who had interviewed, and rejected me. She answered, and I mentioned how I had interviewed, been rejected, and then saw the posting for the job re-run that Sunday.

“I was wondering what I could do to improve my interviewing skills,” I asked. Though what I meant was, ‘what the hell are you looking for and why was I not good enough?’

In a rather cold and curt tone, she told me, “I’m not at liberty to discuss this with you.”

And I found her comment rather cryptic. She could have easily blown me off by saying that it was ‘lack of experience’, or ‘lack of education’, or a ‘lack of anything’ really, but to say that she ‘wasn’t at liberty to discuss this’ sounded like their decision not to hire me was of national security and was thus labeled ‘top secret’.

It sounded fishy, and I suspected that perhaps I was receiving a bad-mouthing from my ex-employer. I realize that doing this to a former employee is technically against the law, but I feel quite certain that it happens all the time. So I called my ex-employer to verify my own employment. My thinking was that I would catch them red-handed in dragging my name through the mud and sue them for millions of dollars, thus making the need to actually ‘get a job’ moot. Granted, my plan was poorly constructed past the ‘calling them’ phase, but I was sure that it would flesh itself out as the call progressed.

So grabbing my old Walkman tape recorder in order to clumsily record the call, I began dialing. True, the Walkman hadn’t been used in over fifteen years, but it was a Sony. And knowing the good work ethic of our friends overseas in Japan, I was confident in the quality tape recorder that I’m sure they produced.

But, upon calling, all I got out of our human resources clerk was the confirmation of my job title and dates of employment. I even tried leading her into saying bad things about me. I’ve watched enough Law and Order on television to know that in a court of law this would constitute entrapment, but I figured that I could erase that part of the tape later on. But even with all my subtle leading of the witness, I couldn’t squeeze a bad report about myself out of her. Still, I felt that the whole thing smelled like a cover-up.

Obviously, there was a conspiracy at work here. There must be some ancient and secret society of HR personnel, I reasoned. Clearly, I had been blacklisted and my name was placed upon a ‘do not hire’ list that was shared by members of this society. If only I knew the secret handshake or code word that was needed to gain entry into the underbelly of the human resources field, I could find out what terrible things were being said about me and why my name was on this list. Because how can someone find a job when you’re viewed as an enemy by the entire human resources profession?

It was like something out of the movies, and I envisioned a younger Harrison Ford, playing the role of me…granted, in real life I more closely resemble one of those Hobbits from Lord of the Rings, but being that this was my fantasy, I got to do the casting. Harrison would uncover mystery after mystery to slowly unravel the secrets of this sinister HR sect. Finally, after risking life and death, he would gain access to the inner sanctum, retrieve the scroll upon which was written the names of all the un-hirables. And, set against a crescendo of music, he would pull out a pencil and erase my name from the list. Thus ending the evil, tyrannical conspiracy to keep me from getting a job.

As for now, though, I still feel like I’m being blacklisted.

unemployments anonymous

2006-03-24T11:45:00.000-05:00

I received a letter from the unemployment office telling me that I had been selected to participate in their re-employment assistance program, or RAP, the cutesy acronym that the program was referred to throughout the body of the text. The letter went on to say that, while my participation in this program was not mandatory, there was a good possibility that my unemployment checks would stop if I failed to show up. So, motivated both by the promise of a new job and the fear that my unemployment checks would be yanked, I headed off for their little RAP session this morning.

Chuck was waiting for us, the unemployed, as we filed into a windowless room with rows of computers stretching from the main door to the back wall.

“Just grab a seat,” Chuck told us. “As you’ll see on your screen, we’ve been working in conjunction with the local careerlink offices and have developed a search engine in which you can locate employers that are hiring in the area. Now, if you simply click in the upper left-hand corner on the ‘job seekers’ button, you’ll find that we have over 1,300 jobs listed in our database. The goal, of course, being to help you find gainful employment.”

Following Chuck’s instructions, I clicked on the button and, true to his word, 1,300 jobs were found. Upon closer inspection of the jobs that needed filled, however, I soon found that the majority of these jobs were ‘counter help’ positions that paid ‘competitive wages’…which, I felt quite sure, was simply a fancy way of saying that there were openings for retail workers at $7 per hour. Thus, while employment could be secured, my definition of ‘gainful employment’ was quite different from Chuck’s.

Not bothering to apply for any of the ‘competitive wage’ positions, I began glancing through some of the various flyers that were handed out as we walked into the room. On one was information regarding weekly ‘job club’ meetings that were offered at the unemployment office. As Chuck made his way through the aisles, I stopped him and asked what, exactly, a job club was.

“Well,” Chuck told me, “our job clubs are a chance for people to network. You may not realize this, but networking is a very valuable resource in securing a job.”

“But Chuck,” I asked, “aren’t most of the people in this club unemployed? How is networking with someone that doesn’t have a job going to help me get a job?”

“These people all know other people. And you never know which one of these connections that someone else has may help lead you into a job,” Chuck reasoned.

“Uh-huh…but if these people actually had connections like that, don’t you think they’d use that connection to get a job for themselves? Meaning that they wouldn’t be unemployed and wouldn’t be attending the job club in the first place, thus making the whole networking idea moot.”

“Look,” he told me, “it’s the skill of networking that’s important. You may have to attend several job club meetings, but the skill you learn from participating is what will ultimately help you find a job.”

And with that, he disgustedly walked off and left me thinking that a ‘job club’ meeting sounded more like a support group than something that would benefit you in the form of a paycheck. And with any support group, the first step is admitting that you have a problem.

Hello. My name is Terry. And I am unemployed.

does buzz lightyear even have a penis?

2006-03-22T23:00:00.000-05:00

With the abundance of free time that I now have since the whole job loss thing, I decided to catch up with my friend Cindy, who I haven’t talked to in several months.

Cindy is married to a psychologist and has a young son. Being married to a psychologist, she has become very intrigued by the study of human behavior. Freud, Skinner, and Piaget have become her new idols…a spot that, in her younger days, were reserved for David Cassidy, John Travolta, and Leif Garrett.

And with her interest in all things psychological, her son has become an unwitting test subject that provides countless hours of study. Lately, Cindy has been looking for subconscious meaning in the drawings of her five year old boy. Taped to every wall from her kitchen to the family room and leading up the stairway to the second floor are pictures that her son has drawn. And every single picture depicts Buzz Lightyear in some type of action pose.

“He’s really been into that Toy Story movie lately,” Cindy offered as explanation to the plethora of Buzzes buzzing around on each and every drawing. “I’m a little concerned however,” she continued, “because, if you look, most every Buzz has a pointy penis sticking out from between his legs. I’m wondering if perhaps this manifestation of penis as a spear means that he views his penis as a ‘weapon’. I think that perhaps he’s equating his penis as a signifier for power, and I worry that this may lead to him thinking of women as ‘lesser beings’ later in life.”

I looked at a few of the pictures on the wall. Although I’m no psychologist, nor am I married to a psychologist, I formed my own theory on the whole ‘pointy penis’ dilemma that Cindy was so worried would corrupt her boy.

“Cindy, I’m pretty sure that all these pointy lines between Buzz’s legs are just the flame from his jet pack that he uses to fly around with,” I told her.

“Oh yeah, that theory makes sense too. So you think I might be reading too much into his drawings?” she asked.

“Perhaps just a bit,” I responded. Though I cringe to think of how this poor kid is going to be analyzed when he’s caught looking through his first Playboy magazine.

preparing for battle

2006-03-17T13:43:00.000-05:00

In the week leading up to the release from my job, the grapevine was rampant with stories concerning Debra…an employee who had been ‘released’ two weeks prior. As rumor had it, Debra was fighting the company in order to collect unemployment.

“They deny everybody unemployment,” Barry said. And at two years with the company, making him one of the most senior employees there, I figured that he should know. He had seen many people come and go, thus adding a certain sense of finality to his statement.

In retrospect, I guess I should have seen this conversation as a sign of foreshadowing. That I too, would soon be the topic of conversation around the office. But at the time, I paid it little attention. My life has remained void of allegories, iambic pentameters, and all other literary devices, so I didn’t even think twice that this unemployment conversation at the office would be foreshadowing anything that might relate to me. Though, now that I have found literary devices at work in my life, I will surely start looking for some kind of happy ending…preferably one that involves a large beanstalk and a golden egg laying bird of some type.

Once I was terminated and sat in the parking lot with my box of desk items sitting next to me on the passenger seat, I could only think of Debra’s dilemma and steeled myself for the inevitable battle that I knew would be coming.

Sure enough, a letter came from the unemployment office the other day. I had filed over a week ago, but instead of a check, I opened the envelope to the words, ‘FINAL DETERMINATION’. Being that these words were all in capital letters, I new that they couldn’t signify anything good, because you never receive documents with words in large lettering from government offices that mean something good will be coming your way.

I skimmed through and saw, in bold letters, ‘the final date to appeal is March 24!’ And, just like capital letters on official government mailings, nothing good ever comes from bold lettering either.

I read through the appeal process, and quickly filled out an on-line appeal form. Sitting back, reasonably sure that I had enough evidence to support my case, I prepared for the lengthy trial that would surely ensue. Granted, I’ve never been to any unemployment hearings before, but if there’s one thing that television has taught me, all hearings take place in a court, generally with a cantankerous judge, and enough lawyers to fill a Carnival Cruise ship.

The very next day, I received an email from the unemployment office folks. I clicked on it to see what date my hearing was set for and read, ‘Sir, since we found in your favor and that you are eligible to receive unemployment compensation, there is no reason for you to appeal the decision.’

I more closely read through the letter they had sent the day before and saw that this was true. All of which means that skimming official government related documents isn’t nearly as good as reading these same documents.

I’m just hoping that there isn’t a stupidly clause which they can use to deny my claim.

pounding the pavement once again

2006-03-11T14:27:00.000-05:00

With a swift, self induced kick to my own butt, I’ve forced myself out of the doldrums. This means that the bed had to be made, my razor actually had to make a few swipes across my face, and the bills had to get paid…most importantly the cable bill. Priorities, of course.

I also came to the conclusion that work had to be found very fast. And with this thought in mind, I did something that I had promised myself I’d never do. Namely, I seriously considered a job selling insurance.

An email alerted me to an information session being held one afternoon to join the wonderful ranks at Liberty Mutual, thus I pulled out a sport coat and, with resume in hand, headed off.

And now that I’m thinking of becoming a death preparation peddler, I figure that perhaps I could combine selling life insurance and death plots…the two jobs that continually seek my services by sending an email a day to my inbox. I’m already working on my sales pitch, “Gee Mr. Smith, since you’re going to die one day don’t you want your family to be taken care of? This life insurance will do the trick. And you may as well get a cemetery plot as well, since it would be a shame to have your kids end up dumping your body in a ditch somewhere and use the insurance money to fly off to the Bahamas or something.”

I arrived and found a seat among the fifteen other attendees…never realizing just how many people want to sell insurance. John Jackson, our information session presenter, waxed poetic about what a great company and satisfying job it would be if we were deemed worthy enough to become a part of the Liberty Mutual team. We then entered into the written portion of the information session.

“Just some simple scenarios about the sales process we’d like you to answer,” John told us.

The questions, which included ‘How do you close?’ and ‘What sales techniques do you use to seal the deal?’ forced me to start spewing massive amounts of bull shit across the paper. Having never actually ‘sold’ anything for a living, I could only speculate as to how I would ‘close’ and what techniques may or may not work well for me in ‘sealing’ any deals.

I was, however, sitting next to a guy with alligator shoes and slicked back hair. ‘Here’, I thought, ‘is a guy that clearly must know something about selling.’ So, craning my neck ever so slightly, I tried to glimpse his answers to the questions that were posed.

And as I was midway through reading his response to the question, ‘How would you convince a reluctant customer to purchase something?’, I heard someone clearing their throat from behind me. The throat clearer being, none other, than Mr. Jackson himself.

“Just a little crick in my neck,” I muttered, than feebly started rubbing where I thought the phantom crick would look most convincing.

John Jackson simply gave a disgusted snort and continued walking up the aisle.

Having just been caught cheating on my pre-employment questionnaire, I was quite certain that a career at Liberty Mutual was not going to be forthcoming. I slipped out during the break and threw the questionnaire in the trash can by the main entrance, wondering if Nationwide was as picky about sharing answers as Liberty Mutual seemed to be.

the state of things

2006-03-08T10:54:00.000-05:00

My bed hasn’t been made for several days now. I haven’t changed out of the sweatpants I’ve been wearing. And bills that are now overdue litter my kitchen table. Plus, I could really use a shave. Yet I have no motivation to accomplish anything.

I tell myself, however, that as long as things inside my apartment are in a better state than things outside in the hallway, I must be doing well. Because for the past several weeks, the management of my apartment complex has been in phase 18 of their ‘renovation project’, otherwise known as, ‘our plan to double your rent project’.

First we had the elevators updated, then the mailboxes got replaced, the parking lot was repaved, we got new windows, and now the hallways are being stripped of the wallpaper (circa 1962) and are being prepped for paint.

Thus, once you exit out my front door, you’re met with spackled holes, an overpowering scent of fresh paint, and a haze of dust from the sanding which has been going on all week…a dust which frequently sets off the fire alarms. In addition to this, the hallway carpeting is now decorated with multiple paint splotches and many scraps of ripped off wallpaper.

All of which culminates in making my apartment building look like the most overpriced slum residence in the city.

And as long as things remain in better condition inside my apartment as opposed to outside, I can continue telling myself that I’m doing alright. That I’m holding things together. Though I fully expect this illusion to come crashing down around me very soon…such as when things like my phone service and electricity are shut off.

And every day for the past week, I’ve been telling myself that ‘tomorrow will be different. Tomorrow is when I’ll straighten up, fly right, and do all those other clichéd things which will mean that I’m getting my life back on track.’ This hasn’t happened yet. And it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen today.

But tomorrow…that’s when I’ll start pulling things together.

when it rains, it pours

2006-03-04T17:10:00.000-05:00

Pam and I celebrated our four month anniversary the other night, and I knew that something was up the minute I walked through the door and gave her a hug. Usually, Pam is a great hugger…a woman who is truly skilled in the art of hugging. Her body just tends to melt, conforming to each and every curve on your body. Yesterday, however, her hug more resembled what I imagine hugging a mannequin would be like.

And it’s at times like these that I wish I had some type of superpower. X-ray vision, super strength, or the ability to read minds. Something to clue me in to what’s going on and give me the power to solve it, thus making everything all right.

Unfortunately, I have no superpowers.

It was during dinner that I found out the reason for the bad hello hug. Pam’s ex-boyfriend, Sam or Sal or something, had called her earlier in the week. They had dated for five years, and had been apart for four months when I started dating her. Now, he wanted to reconcile.

“He said he still loved me and that he missed me,” Pam said. “I really like you, but I’m very confused right now. I need some time away from you so that I can sort things out…it’s nothing you’ve done, though. You’re a great guy and will make someone very happy someday.”

This was my consolation prize. I may not have Pam, but I get to retain the title of ‘great guy’. Though I realize that four months can’t compete with five years, and nothing short of a suddenly undiscovered superpower would change this. If I could fly like Superman and reverse time, I might have a chance. If I had rubber arms, like that guy from the Fantastic Four, and could strangle her ex while remaining seated at the table, there might be hope. But no powers of flight or rubber limbs emerged.

In the course of two weeks, I’ve lost both the job and the girl.

And I sit here hoping for better days. Hoping that they’ll get here fast. And hoping that maybe I’ll develop a superpower…one that will help me win the girl, earn money, and save the world.

And if not a superpower, I’ll gladly settle for a secret Batcave. Because at least then I’ll have somewhere to go and sulk.

there's no such thing as a free lunch

2006-03-01T14:20:00.000-05:00

I’ve had a Panera Bread ‘buy seven, get one free’ card in my wallet for the last few months. I’ve worked hard on getting this little card filled and, as this clearly shows, I strive to complete goals and am a motivated individual (which is how I justify putting these two items on my newly updated resume.)

And now that the card is filled, I’ve got a free meal coming…which is perfect since ‘free’ clearly fits into my new, now unemployed, budget. So card in hand, I headed to Panera to cash in on some food.

I scanned the sandwich selection on the menu board above the registers, opted for the Garden Veggie sandwich on Ciabatta bread, and headed toward the cashier. I gave her my order, handed her my fully punched Panera Card, and stood back to bask in my accomplishment of eating so many Panera sandwiches that I was now getting one for free. Finally, an accomplishment that I could take pride in, because while I may not have luck with jobs, this surely shows that I can eat quite well.

The girl at the register took my card, glanced at it, and tossed it into the trash.

“Sorry sir,” she told me as she pulled out a new card and began punching holes in it, “that card is expired. I’ll transfer your purchases from that one onto this new card.”

“Do I really need a new card?” I asked her. “I’m still going to have enough punches to get a free sandwich, so why waste another card?”

“Oh no,” she said. “On the old card you needed seven purchases for a free sandwich. On the new cards, you’ll need ten.”

Frustrated, I took the card. “And what happens when this card expires? Am I going to be given another new card only to find out that instead of ten purchases I’ll need 15?”

The girl behind the register just chuckled and said, “don’t be silly, sir. When this card expires, we’ll just throw it out.”

And, as I pulled out the last few remaining dollars from my wallet, I realized that it would cost me a lot more money in order to get a free sandwich.

boy, was i wrong

2006-02-23T23:18:00.000-05:00

Actually, I was one out of two in the ‘wrong’ department. I was correct in my guess that I would be the one taking the blame for last Friday’s contract breech fiasco, because this is exactly what happened. It was as if I, personally, kidnapped our AWOL inventory clerk Lori, stuffed her in a trunk, and dropped her to the bottom of a river somewhere, thus causing the orders not to get shipped on time.

I was wrong, however, in the assumption that my job would be safe…being that I was the sole billing associate. Because, as it turned out, my job was much less safe than I suspected. So much less safe, in fact, that I no longer have a job. And I am once again unemployed.

I was called into the director’s office on Tuesday afternoon, where he and my boss Kelly were both seated. I sat down in the chair closest to the door, my preferred seating space in case a quick exit is ever needed, and was greeted with ‘I don’t feel that we’re a good fit for you’, from Kelly.

Automatically, I knew things were going to head downhill fast from here. Because this statement is the business world counterpart of the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ break up line when dating someone you can no longer stand the sight of.

“What, exactly, are you saying?” I asked Kelly… knowing full well what she was saying, but wanting her to actually say it.

“I simply don’t think that we’re what you’re looking for in a company,” she said. As if, by letting me go they were doing me a favor. Obviously, they were so very concerned for me that they wanted me to find a company that ‘fit’ me better. Of course, the fact that I would no longer have any benefits or income didn’t seem to weigh into their consideration for my well being.

“Effective immediately, your employment here has been terminated,” she continued.

“Kelly, I think that, at the very least, I deserve some type of explanation as to why I’m being let go,” I said.

“I’m not going to debate this with you! I’ve had several complaints from co-workers about you and don’t feel that you fit in with the team we’ve assembled here,” she countered.

And with this, it became clear why I was finished. The reason was Bettie Jo.

Bettie Jo is constantly in varying states of miserableness and doesn’t like anyone…but the fact that she once held the position that I was currently employed in (or had been currently employed in) caused a special hate for me that the other employees of the company hadn’t yet achieved.

Bettie Jo is also the office tattletale. She is also very close friends with my boss Kelly. Over lunch in the employee break room, they could often be found sitting, huddled over their Bacon Cheeseburgers from Wendy’s, whispering fervently. I had suspected that Bettie Jo had been campaigning to get rid of me for awhile, and now it seems that I had my proof. Of course, as I sat in the office, shock slowly setting in, I realized that this proof had come too late.

“Bettie Jo will be taking over your duties for the time being while I search for your replacement. You have ten minutes to collect your things and leave the building,” Kelly told me.

As I stuffed my scant personal belongings into a cardboard box that I found near the copier machine, I began wondering which restaurant might have the best selection of food to in their dumpsters for dinner…because money has now become a non-renewable resource for me.

Prior to accepting this job, I had only one other company show any interest in hiring me. And now, things are so bleak, that I may need to start seriously considering a career as a cemetery plot salesman.

visionaries don't keep their eyes closed

2006-02-19T21:30:00.000-05:00

Some companies are run by visionaries. People who can read the upcoming trends and act on those trends before they approach. Men and women who can lead their business in the right direction and ensure success for years to come. Unfortunately, the company I work for is not one of these companies.

The unwritten philosophy of the company I work for is ‘ignore the problem as long as possible.’ In short, they see the bomb coming from miles away, watch as the bomb falls to the ground, continue to watch the resulting explosion and destruction, and then run around with buckets of water trying desperately to extinguish the many fires that have sprung up.

Lori, our inventory clerk, has been gone for almost a month now. The people in charge have known this, but have conveniently decided to forget that there is no longer an inventory clerk working at the company…until this past week. This is when, finally forced to accept that Lori is not going to return, they had to face the fact that many of their contracts with clients are not going to be filled on time. Friday was spent with the head-honchos running around trying desperately to fill in the gaps…gaps which have long since become craters.

Kelly, my boss, was among those running around in a state of panic. And, in another act of exquisite bad timing and short sightedness, Friday was also the day that Kelly arranged to interview several applicants. The billing department, which has consisted solely of me since I began working here over seven months ago, is supposed to be a two person operation. This is the position that Kelly was interviewing for on Friday.

The first two applicants never showed up, perhaps receiving some type of sign from God that no sane person would actually choose to work here.

The third person arrived at two o’clock. Kelly briefly introduced herself, threw an application to him and instructed him to take a seat in an empty office, the same office that is supposed to be home to my co-working billing associate, while he filled it out.

An hour and a half later, I walked by the front desk and asked our receptionist Sondra if Kelly was done interviewing the applicant. Sondra, who was in the middle of painting her nails a shade of red that apples can only dream of achieving, paused and said, “Kelly has been in meetings all afternoon. That guy she was supposed to interview walked out about ten minutes ago.”

I stopped by the empty office, and sure enough, it was still just as empty as it always has been. The guy’s application sat on the desk. And on top of his application was one of Kelly’s business cards, ripped in half.

My guess is that the position isn’t going to be filled anytime soon. Which is probably a good thing, because if the number one motto of the company is ‘ignore the problem as long as possible’ a close second is ‘blame someone else when things go wrong.’

And because I’m low man on the totem pole, I’m fully expecting that Monday morning will start with me taking the blame for Friday’s problems. Honestly, I’m less worried about being blamed and more interested in how the higher ups will try to connect the dots to prove that I’m the one who’s at fault.

But, at the rate Kelly is going in the hiring process, I’ll most likely remain the only billing associate. So my job is safe for the near future, or until Kelly remembers to actually interview the people that she’s scheduled interviews with.

cooking outside my comfort zone

2006-02-15T20:08:00.000-05:00

Pam had placed me on relationship probation following a poor Christmas gift performance that consisted of a Lava Bun foot warmer. The status of which, she had decided, would be re-evaluated after Valentine's Day. And, in an effort to improve my ranking, I opted for treating her to a home cooked meal.

Up until now, my cooking skills have mainly consisted of delicacies such as ham and cheese sandwiches on Wonder Bread and the occasional bowl of cereal. After careful consideration, I decided to try cooking outside of my comfort zone and found a recipe for crab cakes.

And while my cooking skills remain under-developed, I tend to read quite well. Therefore, I reasoned, the process would be simple. Read the directions. Follow the directions. And behold! A glorious meal would be created.

Upon arriving home from the supermarket, I assembled the ingredients on the counter and began the whole cooking process. I opened the can of crab meat and tore open the package of seasoning superbly well. I mixed and stirred the ingredients like a world class chef. All that was left was the actual caking of the crab.

I scooped up a mushy glob of the crab mixture and began packing it down into a perfect little patty sized piece of crab heaven. I dropped it into the skillet, waited the instructed five minutes which the package told me was the ideal browning time, and scooped it up for the final flip. But somewhere in mid-flip my perfectly formed patty deteriorated quickly, and I was left with a multitude of mini-patties sizzling in the pan.

I quickly grabbed a spoon and tried to reassemble my broken crab cake by pushing them into one another. And while the chunks of crab skittled around in the frying pan, much like a miniaturized game of hockey taking place on my stove, they failed to congeal into one larger sized cake. I pleaded with them to no avail. They were stubborn little crab chunks that were decidedly against cohabitation.

My dream of a Valentine’s Day meal of crab cakes was quickly evaporating. So, in an effort to salvage my attempt to impress Pam, I threw the rest of the crab in the pan and, cakes be damned, decided we were now having scramble crab for dinner.

An hour later, the salad was tossed, the veggies were steaming, and the wine was chilled. I had just lit the candles and rearranged a single rose on the table when Pam arrived. I took her coat, poured her a glass of Chardonnay, and we sat down to eat.

Once our salads were finished, I rose from the table to bring about the main course, which looked quite like scrambled eggs without the eggs. Pam gave me a curious look as I walked back into the dining room and served her dinner.

“I thought you said we were having crab cakes,” she asked.

“No,” I told her, “there will be no caking of crabs tonight. Instead, I have chosen to prepare un-caked crabs…which I believe is all the rage in Portugal, or one of those over seas places.”

Despite the lack of confidence that my reassurance evoked in her, the crab wasn’t too bad. Luckily, the dessert I had prepared, which was an array of Godiva chocolates, was truly the high point of the night.

And I fully take credit for preparing this dessert since I was the one who had to rip off that tricky cellophane wrapper around the box. Because, I discovered, this is the type of cooking that I do best at.

the sheep has returned to the flock

2006-02-11T13:12:00.000-05:00

I’ve tried hard to hold firm to my recent decision to pack my lunch instead of eating out every day. Along with this, I’ve tried hard to convince myself that the South Beach Diet variety of microwavable meals I purchased were just as satisfying as a greasy burger and fries would have been.

This lasted for two days when, unable to fool myself into thinking that the reheated food contained therein was actually good, I gave up on the whole South Beach lifestyle. I’m beginning to understand the concept of ‘diet’ meals. You choose not to eat rather than endure the horrible tasting food, which is like dieting by default.

The very next day, I decided to make my own lunch…ham and cheese on Wonder Bread…which pretty much exhausted my knowledge of food preparation. The finishing touch to this culinary creation was the brown paper bag which, with a flourish, I threw the sandwich into.

After driving to work, my sandwich was then deposited in the employee lunchroom refrigerator…a communal area that I had yet to experience. I opened the door, prepared to toss my lunch bag onto one of the shelves, and realized that lunch space real estate is perhaps even more valuable than finding a prime parking spot in the office lot.

No empty shelf space was visible, every square inch being packed with containers of various shapes and sizes. I was forced to do some rearranging and realized that what was housed within the office refrigerator was a museum of 21st century foodstuff products. I ended up clearing a small spot in between a bottle of Paul Newman’s Ranch Dressing (which expired on 3/03) and a Tupperware container that had Frank’s half-eaten lunch sealed inside…which was odd because Frank left the company six months ago.

In my expedition for a few inches of clear shelf space, I also came across a bottle of Red Hot, a banana that had long since gone from yellow to brown and was now well into the decomposition process, and moldy dregs of a yogart container which had long since been forgotten about.

My small little spot suited me just fine until noon when I noticed that an odd green liquid had dripped all over my brown paper bag. Upon closer inspection, I realized that on the shelf directly above my bag was a pickle jar which had been knocked over on its side. A jar from which, now in a supine position, a trickle of pickle juice had leaked onto my lunch.

Extracting my soggy bag from the refrigerator, I was forced to admit that my experiment with lunch packing was over. I pitched the now pickled ham and cheese sandwich into the trash and headed out to my car.

I drove down the street and, upon seeing those glorious golden arches…much like the gates to heaven must look to the recently departed…I knew that I had been converted back to fast foodism. I once was lost, but now am found.