skullard, posts by tag: work - LiveJournal

A couple of weeks ago I bought some new boots for work because I have a job that can’t be done in Birkenstocks.  I trained for a Birkenstock job, I went to school for a Birkenstock job and I’m still paying off the student loans almost 20 years later now.  With a Birkenstock job?  No, with a boot job, and notice I distinctly said “Boot” with a T on the end.  If I could pay off my student loans with a boob job, I’d get the operation tomorrow and by the end of the week I’d be back in Birkenstocks, but out of work because I have a job that can’t be done in a bra, which is why I bought the boots.
 
After two weeks in these boots, I’m wondering if the bra wouldn’t have been more comfortable.  How long should it take to break in boots, and why should I have to “break in” anyway?  A lot of thing that require “breaking in” aren’t worth it in the long run.  Show business, bank vaults, your neighbor’s house when they’re on vacation because you heard the dad keeps a box of Hustlers in his closet.  I’m not proud of that, but when you’re twelve years old, those kind of rumors just can’t go unsubstantiated.  What I did, I did for Truth, and the truth is these boots are killing me.  My ankles, once sexy, are now red, raw and swollen with dead skin flaking off of them.  How am I supposed to feel sexy with ankles like that and no bra?  My shins look like I’ve been playing soccer with a bunch of spastic six-year-olds.  I know we’re not supposed to use the word “spastic” any more, but you have to admit it paints a pretty good word picture.  Being surrounded by a group of short, quivering spazzes kicking away mindlessly at your ankles with their cleated feet?  You’d do your best to avoid that kind of mob.  You’d cross the street if you saw them coming.  If you were on foot.  If you saw them when you were driving you might swerve onto the sidewalk and take a few of them out.  As a public service.  They can’t get to you when you’re in your car, and really, what kind of life do they have to look forward to?
 
Now, if you so much as smirked at the idea of running down those kids a second ago, you’re the type of person that thinks cruelty is funny, which means you probably designed these boots.  Or it was someone like you.  Or someone who likes you.  They don’t like me, or these boots wouldn’t hurt so much.  It’s hard not to think this is personal, like evil boot designers weren’t sitting around one day during a break from snipping off the limbs of cute, fuzzy hamsters to say, “You know what we should do?  Let’s make some really painful boots for that guy.”
 
“What guy?”
 
“The boobless guy.  You know, that guy?  With the hair?  Who did the thing?”
 
“You could be talking about any guy!”  But it couldn’t be just any guy because he said it was the guy with the hair, so we know he wasn’t talking about Stu, and that’s why I need to apologize.
 
Last week, for no good reason, I outed my friend Stu on the podcast as a bald person.  I was way out of line.  So, let me just say, Stu, I think you’re a great guy, and I’m sorry for saying you’re bald.  I think people should meet you, and get to know the kind of person you really are.  Before looking at your head.
 
Now, where’s my apology for these boots?  It’s not like I can return them, because I need them for work.  I have a wife and 67 Hello Kitties to support, not to mention student loans, so I need this thankless, pitiless, soul-shriveling and crippling job, and in order to do it, I need these boots.  Especially for the crippling part.  So I don’t want a refund, but an apology.  I want justice for my ankles.  And revenge isn’t justice.  Revenge would just be stabbing your boots with a hunting knife, and if anyone saw you doing that, they’d think you were nuts.  Especially if you’re still wearing them.  But even if you have them up on a table and your stabbing them, you’re going to seem kind of weird singing, “Stab your boots with a stab-stab-stabby-stab, stabby-stabby-stab-stab!”  Breaking into song is another thing the never turns out well, plus the whole thing just makes you look pathetic, and that’s not justice.  That’s a poor substitute, which is what I was after I got my teaching degree.  Sure, I thought I would walk into those schools and wow all the other teachers and administrators with my amazing teaching skill and my Birkenstocks.  And how well did that plan work out?  All it took was one classroom of spastic six-year-olds and I’m sitting here singing about stabbing my boots.
 
Some would say, “Awww, baby-waby gots some sore footies?  Suck it up, ya pussy!”  I don’t want to hear that kind of talk, which is why I don’t let my Mom listen to this podcast.  But if all this whining makes me a pussy, it doesn’t change the fact that I’m a pussy in painful boots, and you can’t tell me you didn’t see that coming.  I mean, really?  The puss in boots thing?  It’s just been sitting right here the entire time.  Like me.  And, I’m assuming, like you.  Unless you’re listening while you jog or walk around, in which case, let me give you this advice:  Proper footwear is very important.

I walked into a convenience store on my route last week to find a new employee behind the counter.  The woman was taking the time-expired burgers and sandwiches out of the trash and stuffing them hurriedly into her purse.  The manager was on the other side of the store, and when she saw that I could see what she was doing, she gave me look that said, "Please don't say anything."  I didn't let on that I'd seen anything at all.  She got her purse put away under the counter in time before the manager made it back to front of the store.

I've lived in that space between where you start a job and when you actually start getting paid.  That can be a damned hard place.  With a family to feed, it's got to be even harder.

I've been back to that store a few times since then, and I haven't seen her working there.  She may just be working a different shift.  That's what I keep telling myself.

That "Please don't say anything" look.  I really want to shake that.

It's getting harder and harder to maintain my reputation as a jerkwad shithead asshole.  I mean, I've done so much to cultivate the image.  Why must all my effort be sabotaged?

I'll admit it doesn't help when I get all goo-goo over kitties and cop to getting weepy watching anime.  That deflates the douchebag facade a bit.  But this week I assisted an elderly woman in need, and I just can't forgive myself for such a blatant lapse.

Fuckin' Tuesday, the busiest fuckin' day of the whole fuckin' week, and as I'm quite literally running out of the nursing home where I made a delivery because I'm so fuckin' behind schedule, this fuckin' white haired crone in one of those fuckin' electric scooters is all tangled up in her fuckin' jacket and says, "Sir?  Sir, could you help me?"  Fuckin' bitch.  I'm goddamned fuckin' late for fuckin' everything and this fuckin' helpless hag can't put her jacket on right in the middle of the fuckin' sidewalk and has the goddamned gall to ask me for help.  Goddamn sonnuva bitch.

So I try and help her out.  I mean, she did call me "Sir," which is weird considering she's old enough to be my grandmother, which is to say she's old enough to be my dead grandmother, which is to say she's old enough to be dead.  But the problem is that this horrid old bat has a cast on her arm that's getting all stuck in the sleeve of her jacket (or should that be "mother fucking jacket"?).  She broke her arm giving a handjob to half-dead Mr. Peterson down the hall no doubt, the whore.  So I try to get the sleeve on over her fuckin' cast, but the elastic around the cuff of the sleeve won't open far enough to fit around the plaster, so it's a lost fuckin' cause.  Then she tells me, "But I have my coin purse in my sleeve.  I need my coin purse."  Fuckin' shit goddamn mother fuckin' ass bangin' shit shit.  She's got her coin purse up her fuckin' sleeve and she now she wants me to go in after it?  Is this opportunistic geriatric slut trying to get me to put my hands all over her?  I check the pocket of her fuckin' jacket and the coin purse is right there.  I take it out and fuckin' show it to her.  "Is this what you're looking for, Ma'am?"  Fuckin' lying fuck slut.  "Oh my, there it is.  Oh thank you.  Now, could you put my jacket over my shoulders?"  Mother fuckin' FUCK!  I'm goddamned fuckin' LATE as SHIT!  All said and done, I probably spent four or five minutes helping out the helpless old woman, that evil whore twat.  Finally I could get back to my real goddamn job, which is bringing a shitload of fuckin' packages to an endless series of assholes who don't even want want they fuckin' get.  Joy to the fuckin' world.

I also rescued another turtle in the road from being run over.  I may as well just shoot myself in the goddamned head.

Fuck it.  Here's a bunny.

Another tale of Walmart, where humanity struts its schtuff.

Yesterday in the Walmart bathroom someone left religious tracts on the top of all the urinals.  Why?  Because taking out your johnson and going with the flow puts a man in a spiritual mind set.  "Here's some thoughts about Jesus while you pee."  Granted, I'd rather someone leave me reading material rather than accost me in person about my eternal security while my junk is unsecured.  But the wonderful part of this story is that this is the third time this has happened.

The first time some unknown hand offered spiritual relief while I was seeking relief of another sort, sitting on top of the urinal was a Chick Tract.  If you've never seen Chick Tracts, they're the nastiest, most bullying form of evangelism.  They're basically mini comic books filled with scare tactics and guilt trips designed to speak to the lizard brain.  "Turn to God or burn in HELL!!!" is the basic gist of all of these.  But what they lack in subtlety, they make up for in targeting pop culture (did you know the Devil put Bewitched on television to turn people towards the occult?  I know, it's a dated reference, but so damn devious!).



The second time, there was a little slip of paper sitting on the urinal with purple print and a picture of a football helmet up in the corner.  This being Minnesota, I'm sure the intent was to make some poor schlub see it and think, "Hey, it's sumpin' 'bout the Vikings sittin' here on the terlit.  Imma gonna read this terlit Viking thing."  But the writing on the slip of paper with the Vikings colored helmet wasn't about football so much as it was about how the Jews were no longer the chosen people of God, and now the Christians have the title.  Talk about your bait and switch.  I feel kind of sorry for the poor peeing Vikings fan, who I'm going to go out on a limb and guess isn't Jewish to begin with, standing there wanting info on his team and getting an anti-semitic diatribe instead.  I can imagine him putting his uncircumsised member away in disgust and finding somewhere else to piss, like housewares.  But what I can't imagine is what this message actually wants to accomplish.  "Join our team!  We're better than those Christ-killers"?  Suppose a Jewish guy did walk into a Walmart bathroom in the upper midwest and read about how he wasn't one of the Chosen any more from something propped up against the automatic flusher.  Is it reasonable to assume he'd think, "Hmph, that's a good point.  Might as well drop the whole 'tradition and heritage' thing, find some Baptists to hang with and eat some shellfish."  Seems a bit of a stretch for me.  Then again, I don't claim to have a solid grasp on modern religious marketing.

The third time I found evangelical literature on my urinal, I didn't read it past identifying that it was yet another bird-shot attempt at saving the souls of the water-making public.  I actually just tossed it into the target area and kept doing what came naturally.  Now, I know that was a mean thing to do to the poor Walmart guy who has to come in and clean up later.  Who wants to fish a piss-soaked anything out of a public fixture?  But here's my rationalization: maybe if the people who work in the store have to deal with smelly messes like that, perhaps they'll find a way to keep whoever the nut is from leaving pamphlets for the rest of us to make smelly messes with.  Y'see, I'm trying to build a little incentive here.

And please don't accuse me of pissing on religion.  The guy, whoever he was, left the thing right there on the urinal.  What was I supposed to do, frame it?  Tossing it into the garbage would be the same as cleaning up after the guy.  I'm not in business of doing religious nuts favors.  I used to be, but I got fired from that job.  Three times, in fact.  I guess I wasn't cut out for it.  Poor, poor me.

I guess that's one thing I have to give those Mormon missionary dweebs credit for: they do their thing in person.  Where these door-to-door Mormons, with their Best Buy Geek Squad outfits and corporate nametags, get right up into spitting range and look you in the eye before wasting their breath, the potty-room pamphleteer just drops his message and scampers away, afraid to interact with the damned public he supposedly intends to save.  I wonder what those Mormon fucks, who give up whole years of their unreplaceable youth to be abused by jerks like me, would think of the "drop-and-leave" guy.  I'd hope they'd scoff at the skittish bastard, but you can't count on those clean cut, upstanding yawn-puppets to scoff with any real style.

I wonder if bathroom guy is the same guy who's been leaving the anti-choice cards laying around the mall all year.  Someone's been leaving these business-sized cards with a glossy picture of an aborted fetus next to a dime and the uplifting message "Abortion is murder."  They're left on the benches, the garbage cans, the planters, and I found one on top of the box holding the fire extinguisher . . . in case of emergency, I guess.  Again, you gotta admire these brave souls who believe so strongly in their convictions that they feel compelled to litter.  Again, you probably caught my sarcasm.  It ain't that hard.  I usually toss it underhand.

Rural deliveries are scary.  Last night, my last delivery of the day, was way out in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere.  It was literally 10 minutes off the main highway, then another 20 minutes on a county road, then four miles down a dirt road and take a left.  Why do people live way out in oblivion like that?  Is it so there's no one to hear the kids scream?  Let your toothless cousin play his banjo on the porch in peace?

I finally get to the address, and the driveway is another hundred yards of ruts in the grass.  I pull up next to this house, realizing there's nowhere to turn around, so I'm going to have to back my way out again, when the guy comes out for his package.

First thing you notice is the yachting cap.  Then the collection of leis, beads and a bicycle chain hanging around his neck.  Festive!  His scraggly beard is long enough that he can kinda ponytail it with a couple of colorful rubber bands.  The short, burly frame is covered in a beige dress shirt and beige pants, the pants being supported by both red/green suspenders and a belt, for that added bit of security.  Forgive me for not noticing his footwear, but I was a bit overwhelmed.

He seems confused in getting the package and examines it closely.  As he does, I notice he has the hook of a walking cane looped into the back of his belt.  Not the whole cane, mind you, just the hook.  The rest of the cane is missing and there's a mass of clear tape covering the stump.

I tell him, "There you go.  Have a great day," and get back to my truck.  As I start backing out, I see that he's holding his package, which was long and thin, against his shoulder like a soldier at shoulder arms.  He stands at attention like this as I make it back to the road.  I tried not to accelerate to quickly.

Notice I said, "Have a great day, " and not "You're a fuckin' nut!"  I have two reasons.  #1:  I don't get paid enough to make that kind of diagnosis.  #2:  I think he already suspects.  When you live that far off the beaten track, you're free to be whoever you please, I guess.

And that's why Skullard lives in the city.

The lady who called customer service about my rudeness was actually the second complaint I received over the last two weeks.  The first one came in a letter to my boss saying that although I've always provided courteous and reliable service for his company, he thinks I shouldn't be listening to headphones while I work.  It's unsafe and makes me look unprofessional.  And so, thanks to this person's letter, as of April 15th I no longer get to use my iPod at work.

Here's where I quibble.  Earbuds are not headphones.  Only having the earbud in one ear isn't unsafe, otherwise bluetooth earpieces would be illegal.  And a guy who's front office constantly looks like a recycling shed the day before pick-up shouldn't be commenting on what does and doesn't  look professional.

Two different people noticed I wasn't listening to anything this last week and asked why.  I told them I'd gotten in trouble because of a complaint that it made me look unprofessional.  Both said exactly the same thing:  "Asshole."  I couldn't argue.  One of them asked, "Who would do that?"

"It wouldn't be right for me to say.  By the way, shop Business Outfitters at 521 Aitkens St. for all of your office supply needs."

When my boss pulled me into the office to chew me out over this, I didn't deny anything, but I did ask if I could use a wireless earpiece if I could find one.  He said there's no company policy against it, but answer's still no.  A wireless earpiece would be both safe and look professional, but why take chances?  The man always has our backs, bless 'im.

As you might imagine, last week, which was a long week, seemed a damn sight longer.  Since I bought the iPod a couple of years ago, I'd found so many great podcasts and audio books to listen to, I'd be plugged in for anywhere from 7-9 hours a day while I worked.  It made the time go by, helped me keep up with what's going on in the world and kept me learning new things.  Everyone always assumed I was listening to music, but you can't listen to music in only one ear.  That's crazy talk!  Ya gotta respect the tunes, dude.  So I was listening to books, comedy, news and talk shows all day, every day.

Now, I listen to the engine of my truck.  I worry over stuff.  My mind wanders all over, and not always into cheerful places.  Sometimes I fixate over things I have no control over or conversations that never occurred.  I forgot how much I talk to myself.

Tuesday I tried to give my brain something to do, so I typed out one of my favorite quotes before work and tried to memorize it during the day.  That worked alright, but it was a little distracting checking the text to make sure I was getting it right while driving 65 down the highway.  I'm glad that's in my mind now to access any time I want, but that was Tuesday.  I couldn't think of anything else I wanted to memorize during the rest of the week.

Maybe I should memorize the book of Ecclesiastes.  The problem is, I'd be tempted to paraphrase it, and you can only say "Everything's bullshit" so many times before it gets old.

Of course, one of the big things sticking in my craw about all this is I miss these shows and don't  have the time to keep up with all of them like I used to.  Every so often I may get some time on the weekend to listen to This American Life or The Bugle, but there's no way I can fit what used to be 30-40 hours of listening a week into the odd moment on Saturday.

Hey, I can't be surprised when a sucky job gets suckier.  Jobs like delivery don't tend to get "better" over time.  But I do admit I'm still a bit surprised that some guy, a guy I may have spoken with twice in the eight years I've done this job, took the initiative to play cop and wrote out a letter.  I'm sure he has no idea the extent to which he's fucked up my workday, but I have to imagine it gave him some satisfaction to send off something that allowed him to show how well he can judge other people.  I really would have thought he had better things to do.  And I get to keep showing up to this business every day, reliable and courteous, treating them like I always have regardless of how I feel fucked over.

So, what do I do about it?  Well, let's see if I can type out that quote from Tuesday from memory (I promise not to cheat).

Here is what you should do:
Love the Earth and Sun and the animals,
Despise riches,
Give alms to everyone that asks,
Stand up for the crazy and stupid,
Devote your income and labor to others,
Hate tyrants,
Argue not concerning God,
Have patience and indulgence toward the people,
Take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men,
Re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book,
Dismiss what offends your own soul,
And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

-Walt Whitman

I think that should be enough to keep me busy.


Edit - It's supposed to be "stupid and crazy", not the other way around.  Ah, well.

I shit you not.

Last week a new pick-up was added to my route, so I'm the "new guy" for these people.  When I went to pick up the packages on Monday this week, a part-timer was at the counter with a couple of customers.  I had to make a couple trips back and forth to get all the packages, walking around her each time.  Once I'd loaded up, I walked back in to get the billing paperwork.  I took the lady a few moments to acknowledge I was standing there, but when she did she asked, "And you need?"

Obviously I needed the paperwork, so I said, "I need the paperwork."

She huffs.  "I am in the middle of this right now, so you're just going to have to wait."

Snippy, but what the hell, she's got customers, I'll let her deal with them.  "I'll be back tomorrow," said I, and left.  I just filled out a missing paperwork form in the van and scooted to the next pick-up.

Tuesday, the lady who owns the place asks (kinda demands) why I couldn't have waited the day before.  She says it would have only taken the part-timer 2 minutes to run the paperwork.  "Honestly, I didn't have 2 minutes," I tell her.

"C'mon, you have two minutes."  This lady's clearly pissed and ready to lecture.  It's also clear she doesn't know my job.

"No, I didn't have 2 minutes.  And I don't have them now."  And I left, because as I said, I didn't have the time to argue.

While loading the next stop I get a call from customer service telling me pissed lady has filed a complaint.  Customer service deals with pissy people all the time, so once they got my side of things and found I'd filled out the correct paperwork at the time, we shared a chuckle at the people who love to waste our time.  No big whoop.  I figure it'll be awkward with these people for the next several months, then they'll either get over themselves or they won't.  I'm betting won't.

Skip to Thursday which was an absolute Hell-on-Earth Day.  200 miles, 98 stops, 254 packages delivered, 112 packages picked up, all done in 11.5 hours with two trips to the bathroom and a packet of saltines.  Ran my cute lil' tushy off, and it was just a nasty flavored day from word go.  The whole shop had got out late because of truck delays, the boss was yelling at everybody, no iPod to listen to, and I'd been having my eye strain headaches again so I buckled under and wore my glasses to work.  Kind of a "nothing going right" day.  But right there, at the new pick-up stop, I finally had a moment to smile about.  This is the "I shit you not" part.

The part-timer is working at the place when I pull up, and as soon as I start picking up the packages, she's starting to run the paperwork.  When I come back in for it, she hands it to me and asks, "Are you the new guy?"

"That's me."

"Are you always going to be here at this time?"

"I'm gonna try to be here earlier, usually, but I'm running behind today.  Very busy."

"Well, I'm sure you're going to work out better than the last guy."

"I'll do my best."

"He was very rude."

Rude?  The last guy to have this pick-up was Dick.  I've never heard anyone say anything negative about Dick (such a lovely sentence!).  I mean, I personally hate the guy, but I'm curious how he managed to piss off these people too.  "Sorry to hear that."

"Oh yeah, on Monday?  He says to me, 'I don't have time for you to run your paperwork.  I'm leaving.'  I told him it would only take a couple of minutes, but he said, 'I'm not waiting!'  And he walked out!"

Bless me, I couldn't believe it.  This lady was talking about me . . . to me.  It was everything I could do not to start grinning like an idiot.  "He did?"

"And the next day he comes back and argues with my boss, the woman who owns this place.  He says he doesn't have time for her either, and she's the owner.  You'd think he'd act better when talking to the owner of a business."  A healthy respect for the small business woman, apparently.

"Well, I'll do my best to surpass that guy," I said reassuringly.  I was heading out to the truck, behind schedule as I was, but wishing I could keep this session going.  How often do you get to hear what people really think of you?

"Oh, I'm sure we'll get along fine," she tells me, following me out the door.  "That guy was very rude.  But our old driver, Dick, you'll have a hard time surpassing him.  He was great.  Just do as well as him and you'll do fine."

"I'll be sure to tell Dick that," I called, getting into the truck and waving.  I drove off shaking my head, smiling like a goof.  The bitch didn't recognize me.  She thought I was some whole other guy.

The only difference between Monday and Thursday, of course, was that Thursday I was wearing my glasses.  How's that for a brilliant disguise.  Never mind all my work shirts have a name patch on them; put on glasses and who can tell it's me?  This is how Superman gets away with it.

Then again, you've probably thought to yourself, "I can't believe nobody can tell Superman is Clark Kent just because Kent wears glasses.  Only a total moron would fall for that."  Turns out, you were right.  Not only was the part-time lady a flat out liar, she couldn't tell who she was lying to.  Pulling out of that parking lot, I thought, "I was just talking to the world's dumbest cunt.  That just made my day!"

It's amazing the kind of thing that can cheer a guy up.

Half my truck today is filled with materials for the national standardised test going to the middle school. Another huge pile of frieght is boxes of zit cream. Coincidence?

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Obviously, the computer's back up and whirring along.  Glory be to the gods at Dell's customer service and glory be to me for shelling out the extra dough last year on that warranty.  There's a new video card installed and it didn't cost me a cent, which I'm not about to bitch about.  Every so often, you get what you pay for.  Them's the good times.

The guy who came over to install the card did give me a few moments of concern, the first of which is when he couldn't find a place to park in the lot out front.  I was looking out the window and could see him there in the middle of the lot, dialing his cell.  I picked up the phone and he asked me where to park.  I told him to just back up and park in front of my Honda in the corner.  Is it my fault that in following instructions he almost backed over one of my neighbors who was walking right behind his SUV?  Granted, Mr. Tech shoulda checked his mirrors a little better, but I have to lay some of the blame here at the neighbor's feet.  I never walk right behind a running vehicle, especially when I'm approaching from the blind spot.  "Make sure they see you," is one of the driving rules that's kept me alive (and scored me an $186.43 bonus check and award pin for seven years safe driving last Thursday, thankyouverymuch).  Whoever was more at fault, though, my neighbor gets to shouting at the guy, and after apologizing, the tech guy ends up getting defensive and eventually tells my neighbors to go to hell.  By the time he gets into the apartment, his mood is pretty much fixed.  Can't say as I blame him, but is this the guy whose hands I want inside my delicate machine?

The man was fast, I'll give him that, and in just a couple of seconds he'd flipped the thing on its side and had the cover off, chatting away about what assholes my neighbors are.  I change the subject and after a moment he notices my work uniform which I'm still stylishly wearing.  "Hey, you know Derwin?"  Derwin happens to be my boss, so I say yeah and it turns out these two were busboys at the same local restaurant back in high school thirty years ago.  "Say, is he still an insomniac?"

"He ain't snoozin' at work."

"Hey, does he work out at that gym on West 5th?"

"Not sure.  Maybe.  He did have a heart attack a few months ago."  All of a sudden, I'm my boss's social secretary.  I end up promising to tell Derwin, "Hi, from Paul from the Pickwick."

In seemingly less time than it should take, the cover's back on and he slides the computer back onto the desk, quickly hooking up all the cables.  "Alright, let's see how it goes now.  Okay, where's the 'on' on this thing."

This is the other thing that worried me.  Not just that he didn't know how to turn the machine on, but that I had to tell him, "The button's on the top, so we'll have to flip it back over."

"Oh hey, yeah!  Upside down, isn't it?"

Okay, the glossy top got scratched a bit, but that's no big deal.  That's where my Tick action figure stands anyway.  And regardless of the fact that Paul from the Pickwick  literally doesn't know which way is up, the computer lept to life and hasn't given us a spot of trouble since.  We're back in business, all thanks to the hit and run computer tech.

I'd say all told, he was in and out of here in less than 10 minutes.  I'm amazed at how quickly my paralyzed computer was healed.

The next morning, when I extend Paul's greeting to Derwin, my boss asks, "Oh yeah?  Where'd ya run inta him?"

"He came to my house and fixed my computer."

"What's he doin' these days."

"Fixing computers.  He asked me if you're still  an insomniac."

"Huh.  He's a nice guy."

"Not a safe driver, though.  I'm gonna load my van."

"Hey, if you see him again . . ."

I know for a fact that one of these guys has a pretty good knowledge of computers.  Perhaps Pickwick Paul can get Derwin on Facebook and I can stop being the go-between.  Maybe they'll meet at the gym on West 5th.  Maybe they'll exchange phone numbers.  Maybe they'll go to the Pickwick some weekend for brunch.  I don't give a fuck.  I'm just so damned grateful to have my computer back.

Computer, you who enables my iTunes, downloads my anime and reads my lj, I adore you.  Consider your warranty extended, and what ever software you desire, it's yours.

I have to confess something.  I have a very mild form of dyslexia.  Not anything drastic enough to count as a legitimate disability, mind you, so I have no excuse for spelling mistakes.  But I am just dyslexic enough to think the vending machines are judging me.

On my way out of the grocery store, I shove three quarters into the spankin' new Dr. Pepper machine.  The digital read out on one side of the machine is being helpful by updating my total as each coin drops, then tells me to "MAKE A SELECTION".  When I hit the Dr. Pepper button, the read out says, "NOW DISPENSING", but I'm only half looking at it, so for a moment I could swear it reads "HOW DISAPPOINTING".  In the few seconds it takes my mind to catch up enough to wonder if I just misread something, the read out has moved on to "THANK YOU", and I have no idea if it's being snide or not.

You're choosing Dr. Pepper?  Really?  How disappointing.  For some reason I had you pegged for an Orange Crush guy.  I thought you'd be different.  Ah well, that's what I get for hoping.  Take your Pepper and go.  Oh yeah, and "THANK YOU", sheep.

The Maximum Overdrive scene above notwithstanding, the more likely reason for misreading the machine is a projection of my own self-disappointment.  I really am ashamed of myself for an incident of clearly inappropriate behavior this week.  So, in the interest of full disclosure, I will make a second confession.  I, a 41 year old man and your humble servant, gave another grown adult a high-five.

There's a guy on my route who I've always suspected I could be friendly with in another life.  The first time I delivered to the guy he was wearing a Buckaroo Banzai t-shirt, which is quite the fashion statement in the Upper Midwest.  Then, sometime last year, he noticed my iPod and asked me what I was listening to.  When I told him I was listening to Marc Maron, he smiled and said, "The WTF podcast or one of his albums?"  Clearly the guy isn't any more from around these parts than I am.  So, we get to chatting about podcasts and giving each other recommendations whenever we run into each other, which is kinda nice.  But last Wednesday we're swapping podcasts and talking about how Comedy Death Ray can be pretty hit or miss when he brings up the old Firesign Theater albums.  "Now I wish I could find some stuff like that," he says with a pitying look in his eye, "but that's probably a bit before your time."

I felt spit on.  "Don't crush that dwarf, hand me the pliers?  We're all bozos on this bus?  The hell ya talkin' 'bout, 'before my time'?"

Of course, now he lights up like he's found a lost brother and sticks his hand out for a high-five.  I can't believe I'm in this situation, but I've got no time to really think.  If it were just a case of "leaving a brother hangin'", I'd like to think I'd have raised a brow and mocked, but I don't want to squash this sudden blossoming hope I see in the guy.  I know what it's like to live and move among the skull-fucked deer hunting, ice fishing, hockey playing Palin people and wonder if there's anyone among them who's even heard of MST3K.  I, at least, get to come home every night to my Trekkie wife who can cosplay and trade LOST theories with me.  Who does this guy have?  All I can say for sure is there's a man who used to listen to leShow before it got pulled from the local station standing in front of me with his hand out, looking desperately for assurance that he's not totally alone.  So I smacked palms with the guy.

Now I feel like a yutz.  Charitable intentions aside, some guy raises his hand and I have to smack it?  Where are we, the Special Olympics?  Where's my medal?  I don't remember signing this social contract, but there I was high-fiving like a seventh grader making the free-throw in gym class.  Whatever manhood I had is now gone.

The Dr. Pepper machine was right.  Ba-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a!

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