Yearly Archives: 2013

How many times do I have to apologize?

Of course I’m sorry about those pizzas. I just … look, I apologized already. It’s something that I’ve admitted to, yes, OK, I’m not making any more excuses, right? Right. So it’s like, what else can I do? Besides apologize? It’s not like I didn’t pay for the pizzas. I paid for them. And then I ate them. Were those pizzas meant for someone else? Of course. Obviously. This is all yesterday’s news, you know, at a certain point, I fail to see the benefit in constantly rehashing all of this negativity, my faults, the stuff I’ve already admitted to. I admitted to all of it! And I said sorry. So yes.

Yes. But I paid for them. So let’s get past everything, OK? Past the pizzas, past me going outside and intercepting the delivery guy, look, I’m not proud. I’m ashamed. But it’s thanks to my family, my core of strength, you know, my support system. I can tell these people, look, I’ve made mistakes, and they’re like, look, we get it, not we get the whole buying people’s delivery and then eating it outside of their house, but we get it, like you’re a human being, and you’re sorry.

My wife. She shouldn’t have had to see me like that, at my worst. Those nights I’d come home, she’d have like her own pizza that she had delivered, she’d be, “Honey! Look, I got us some pizza!” and how could I really push any more pizza inside my stomach? But I would. I’d take a slice, you know eat a few bites. I’d be like, “I don’t know what it is honey, I’m just … I’m just not that hungry.”

And when she found out. It crushed her. It crushed us. I crushed us. But she forgave me. You know why she forgave me? Beside I asked for forgiveness. I said, honey, listen, I’m apologizing. I’ve made mistakes. But most importantly, I’ve learned from these mistakes. I’m still learning from the mistakes.

It’s a learning process. You don’t learn how to speak French overnight, right? You can’t stop doing drugs in one day. No, you’ve got to have supervision, you’ve got to make sure it’s not too drastic of a shock. So I’m learning, yes, but I’ve been completely open about my willingness to learn, my wanting to continue to still be at a learning place.

I can do this. But only with you by my side, my wife, my family, everybody. I need everybody behind me on this. And you know, there are so many people out there, so much negativity, do you know how hard it is for me? For my wife? And for me. We’ll be walking down the street and some guy comes up to me and he’s like, “You! It’s you! You know I ordered a dozen wings last night and there were only ten when I opened the box. You stealing wings?”

It’s just that, I can’t … I’m not … who’s to say who’s stealing what? I’m trying. I’m trying to figure out who’s wings I might have taken. I don’t necessarily think they were that guy’s wings, but would that have been right of me to say so right there? To that guy?

I always tip the delivery guys, mind you, you know if they have to come back to your place to deliver a second pizza, don’t get bent out of shape. I mean, yes, you should still tip him again for the second trip, but don’t feel bad about the first trip. Certainly don’t get angry with him. He could have buzzed, yeah, but that’s not his fault, he’s not checking IDs, he gets money, he leaves.

And think about, you know, this has been out there for a while, and so the delivery guys are bound to start recognizing me. And then it’s like, you know a month from now, nobody’s going to give me anything, regardless of how much money I’m forking over. Those boxes I left outside? Yes, again, I’m sorry, but I just thought that since cardboard recyclables were a Tuesday thing on my block that … yes, I get that now, different blocks, different days, different routes. I’m sorry about the mess, about those raccoons that tore the boxes up, I can’t imagine cleaning that up Wednesday morning would have been any fun. But it was just one day, so I’m sorry. So I’m saying sorry. Please, can we please get past this so I can stop saying sorry? Please?

Like I said, this is going to be something that just goes away by itself. I can’t see myself keeping up with this for much longer. It’s exhausting. And I mentioned the delivery guys recognizing my face, right? That’s got to happen sooner rather than later. I can’t keep this up forever. And sure, I suppose maybe I could give one guy like a hundred bucks, and he might still give me your food but …

Look, I’m sorry. I said sorry like a hundred times. This is really so not a big deal. We’ve got crooks out there, guns, drugs. Am I really the most pressing problem in this neighborhood? And no, it does not reflect my work in the community, at a city level. Come on, I’m still on the up and up. Remember how fired up we all got last year when I suggested we make all of those delivery guys wear those stupid vests? That was huge! Come on, just let me have this one thing, it’s not that bad of a thing, just stop paying attention to it. Still pay attention to me, but don’t pay attention to it. Because that’s it. It’s just that. Just the pizzas. And yes, maybe a couple of wings. And heroes. I’m sorry. That’s it. Thank you.

When the right shower curtain rod comes along, you’ll know it

When the right shower curtain rod comes along, you’ll know it. You’ll just feel it. You can spend the rest of the week at Bed Bath & Beyond, going through every shower curtain rod in the store, finding employees, stopping them and saying, “Is this it? Are these all of the shower curtain rods that you guys sell? Because I was on the web site and there seemed to be much more of a selection, like a lot more rods. Is there anything else in the back? Can you go check? In the back?”

But why waste your breath? Why get so bent out of shape? Just pick one, any one, a placeholder, just get the simplest rod that they have. And then when you’re ready, when the right curtain rod is ready, it’s going to find you. You’re going to be out there, you might pass one of those boutique stores while you’re walking somewhere, the showroom will be so small, like they’ve tried to cram three bathrooms in the space of one bathroom, just stuff everywhere.

And there it’s going to be, you’ll see it, the shower curtain rod that you were meant to find, the one that, even before you moved into to your one bedroom, even before you finally decided, OK, I guess I can deal with this bathroom, I mean, it seems a little small considering what I’m paying in rent, but I can’t argue with the size of that bedroom, and so I guess if I can just make it look right, like if I can just find that right shower curtain rod, I think I could be happy here, this was the shower curtain rod that you dreamed about, something that just popped into your imagination, like you weren’t even sure that something like this existed.

Look, here it is, right here in this tiny, cozy bath goods store. And you’ll know, that’s it, you’ll get so excited, you’ll be like, “Oh my God! I cannot believe it. That’s it! That’s the one!” and you’ll start clapping, like you’ve grabbed the attention of the store’s only saleslady, not that you really needed to, it was just you and her in the shoppe, and so even if she wasn’t interested in selling you stuff, even if she was just pretending not to be paying attention to you browsing through the only three shower curtain rods in house, she’d still see you, hear everything you’re saying.

She won’t really know how to react to such unbridled enthusiasm. Part of her is thinking, OK, well, you’re certainly happy. I mean, this is quite the show of joy, euphoria even, and over what, a piece of hardware? It’s nice, yes, but this? Still clapping? She’s smiling though, she wants you to buy the shower curtain rod.

To be perfectly honest, business hasn’t been great, and this lady is desperate not to have another day with zero sales, she’d have to go home, her mom might call and be like, “So Suzy, how’s your little bathroom store coming along?” and Suzy’s like, “It’s great mom, thanks for asking, you know, we’re really creating a lot of buzz in the neighborhood.” Will she tell her mom about the shower curtain rod?

With all the excitement, everybody’s getting ahead of themselves, you, bobbing side to side, looking at the rod, holding the rod, and poor Suzy, she’s practically celebrating, take that mom! I told you it wasn’t a stupid idea to open a niche bathsellers in this part of town. This part of town is gentrifying pretty fast. Just look at all of these people peering in the windows, slowing their step to look at the display, coming inside to ask how to get to the artisanal muffin shop. It’s down the corner. But things are happening. This is happening.

Wait, seriously, fifty-five dollars? For a rod? It’s just that, you want to support local businesses, right? You can’t expect mom pop & Suzy shoppes to be able to compete with Bed Bath & Beyond, do you? You do know that they’re paying for shower curtain rods in bulk, right? They’re buying like trucks and trucks and trucks of the same shower curtain rod, and that’s good for the manufacturer, for distribution. Suzy’s got three shower curtain rods.

You’re saying, come on Suzy, you can’t go down any further? Come on Suzy. I love it, but fifty bucks? And Suzy’s smile is still … well, it’s still up, but the corners are shaking a little, she was already counting those fifty-five dollars, she considered getting the pencil sharpener ready so she could mark down the sale in that stupid leather bound binder she got at the craft small business goods store. And now she has to abruptly shift into sales mode and, let’s be honest, her voice is trembling, betraying the adrenaline still juicing through her system, she’s saying stuff like, “Well, yeah, it is a little pricey, but think of the quality. And the history of the … of the rod and the … it’s just really craft built.”

“Yeah,” you say, but are you really going to spend that much? On a rod? A pole? That Bed Bath & Beyond one isn’t that bad. It’s not great, no, but it’s not terrible. I told you, you’ll know when you find the right one. And you found it. But what about the right toaster? Or the right electronic toothbrush? You’re going to buy the rod and the toothbrush? And you think you’ll still have enough money left over for the nice soaps?

Just, it’s not going to be easy, and I know you’re going to want to try and find something small, inexpensive to buy, something to alleviate the guilt, something to stop Suzy from standing there, begging you, please, please give me fifty dollars. But it’s not worth it. Those hand towels might look nice, but they’re purely decorative, and where are you going to put decorative towels? Just get out, just, you don’t owe Suzy anything. Maybe she should’ve listened to her mother. But that’s not your problem, just say thank you and leave. Find a new way home from work. It’ll only be for another couple of months or so.

About that new guy at work

I’m always running my mouth, at home, on the Internet, at work. Especially at work. At the restaurant, it’s not like I’m even trying to get in anybody’s way, I just can’t help myself. I’ll see two or three people standing around doing what they’re doing and I have this compulsion to go over and start talking. And I don’t even have anything to say, not really, I’m just bored, I just want to hear the sound of my own voice, I just want some distraction from the mundane of the workday.

For example, maybe two people will be polishing silverware and I’ll walk up behind them and insert myself into whatever it is they’re doing. I’ll pretend like I’m in charge, like I’ll start giving critiques on what they’re doing, something like, “Ooh, hey guys, let’s make sure that when we’re polishing, we’re like really polishing, like let’s make an effort to really make sure that we’re getting each piece of silverware just really sparkling clean. Is that cool? I’m not saying you guys are doing a bad job. No, not a bad job. A great job? Well, definitely not a bad job. Let’s just constantly strive to focus on how we can improve, like how can we be doing this better more efficiently, stuff like that.”

Like one or two sentences in, one of them is sure to walk away, but I can’t stop myself. I just have to keep going. I have this natural ability to go on and on and on like that, without pause, for hours. I could have stood there talking about silverware for the rest of the shift. But like I said, I’ve gotten to the point at this job where people will see me start to open my mouth, and they’ll roll their eyes and look for some other direction in which they might escape.

And so it was getting rough there for a while, me, constantly in need of attention, everybody else, not wanting to give me any attention at all. I’d try to go a whole night without running my mouth, like maybe I might gain back the esteem of my colleagues, and then after a couple of weeks of acting like a regular employee, I could slowly start making long-winded jokes again. But I tried, and I couldn’t even get through one night.

It got to the point where I figured I’d exhausted the patience of pretty much everyone on the staff, and so I was just about ready to hand in my two-week’s notice, to move on to another job with a new group of coworkers. But then we got this new hire, a guy about my age. He made it through training no problem, and as he started his first few nights on the floor, I thought, well, maybe he’ll listen to me for a while, maybe I can joke around with the new guy without having to worry about him walking away mid-sentence.

So I went up to him one day while he was at the computer and I was like, “Hey man, I bet you can’t guess what number I’m thinking of.” I would do something like this pretty often. Even if whoever I asked wound up guessing correctly, I’d never admit it. I’d just keep saying, “Nope. Nope. Nope,” until it was painfully obvious that I was just wasting everybody’s time.

But this guy, as soon as I said, “Hey man, I bet you can’t guess what number …” he just blurts out, “Seven,” and he’s looking me right in the eye and I’m taken a little by surprise, I mean, it’s not like I was really trying to pick a number, I never do, but I guess yeah, seven kind of was in my head, like maybe just formulating that question, my mind picked out a number at random. I think. Or did he say seven so quickly that it caught me off guard? Like maybe he said seven and I started thinking about seven right away?

“Nope,” I told him, he was like, “Really,” the whole time looking at me right in the eye. Man, this guy was such a weirdo, always straight-faced. I mean, yeah, I spend probably a little too much time goofing around at work, but this guy, it’s like he’s a machine, an emotionless, soulless robot. And he just kept staring at me, this creepy gaze.

One time a couple of days later, he’s standing around with a group of three or four other coworkers, they’re not doing anything, everybody’s checking their cell phones. I decide to walk over and start talking a bunch of nonsense, I say, “I’ll give anybody two hundred bucks if they can guess what song I’ve got stuck in my head.” It’s classic, because they can never prove it, I’ve got their attention, and even if they got it right, there’s no way I’m paying two hundred bucks.

But again, this new guy, he looks me right in the eye and he starts singing along with the exact song as it’s playing in my head. And I can’t make excuses for it this time, there’s no trying to justify whether or not who put what in who’s head. This is like, line for line, he’s in my head, I’m hearing this song, and he’s mouthing it out in real time. And that gaze is locked, I can’t pull myself away, I can’t turn the song off in my head, everything’s out of control. I’d like to freak out and run away, to say something, anything, but I’m frozen.

Finally the song ends, I can feel him let go of the mental lock, he stops singing, he just opens out his hand and says, “Pay up.”

Twenty minute blog post

I’ve got exactly twenty minutes to write up a blog post before I have to go to work. It’s a totally self-imposed deadline, and yeah, I did get up really late today, so I shouldn’t be complaining about time constraints. But I want to get something done, and unfortunately I don’t have the luxury of sitting around and waiting for a good idea to pop in my head.

See, I just wrote that, and it didn’t lead to anything. I finished that last sentence, and then I sat for a second, I looked at the clock, a minute passed by. Twenty minutes on the computer? If I’m not actively typing sentences, those twenty minutes are going to straight up evaporate. I’ll click over to my Internet browser just for a second, just to look at one thing, and the next time I look back, not only will those twenty minutes have disappeared, but the Internet will have stolen more time along with it. Like I’ll be late for work.

And I don’t even know what I do online. There’s nothing going on. There are only like three or four bullshit web sites that I’m clicking back and forth from. One link leads to another link leads to ten minutes gone, fifteen minutes, finally I get a hold of myself, I regain awareness of what I’m doing, of what I was trying to do, I’m looking at some really boring Internet article, I can’t even try to piece together how I got to what I’m doing, totally uninterested.

How are you supposed to get anything done with the Internet? I remember my brief career as a paralegal. It had to have been some cosmic joke, like let’s just get a bunch of young people, set them up with some computers in some nondescript office building somewhere and we won’t really tell them what they’re supposed to be doing. There were like eight of us in the room, and we were all just professional Internet surfers.

And I can do the Internet for a while, but like three, four hours, tops. That’s a lot of Internet, like I’m feeling drained after I’m on the Internet for that long. But back then? When I was getting paid to sit down for eight hours a day? That’s entirely way too much Internet. That’s when you’re surfing the Internet while at the same time actively hating the Internet. You completely exhaust any bits of worthwhile information from all of the top notch web sites, and then you look at the clock and you’ve still got four hours left.

Holy shit. So you wind up on those aggregate sites, just bullshit piled upon bullshit, everything in hyperlink form, all of those lists, thirty-two sure signs that you’re a human being, you click on number one, then you have to click for number two, everything that you read, nothing’s new, it’s all just labeled differently. And those secondary, tertiary web sites, they’ve all got really weird sidebar ads, like why is this web site offering me payday loans, offering me the chance to learn to become a mortician, do I want to meet interesting twenty-somethings from Uzbekistan?

Man, I complain about my job, I complain constantly about waiting tables, but whatever, at least I have to walk around. Take this over there. Do this and do that. Whatever, I’m moving my body. I remember one time as a paralegal I spent like a month mustering up the courage to march down to the attorney’s office and tell her, listen, boss, I’m not doing anything. What am I supposed to be doing? Give me something to do, please.

So she’s on her computer when I walk in, she doesn’t even look up, she’s like, “What is it?” I tell her my concerns but she’s mostly unresponsive. And that’s when I look in a little closer, her glasses, they’re reflecting her computer screen. I swear to Christ, she’s playing Scrabble. She’s sitting there doing exactly the same nonsense that all of us young people are doing down the hall. So what was the difference, besides her law degree? Her own office? She had to sit there for seventy hours a week and us just forty?

Seventy hours of Internet a week, I don’t know if I could take it. I’d have to get into some really niche web sites. Anyway, my twenty minutes are up. I should get up earlier tomorrow.

I’m not here to judge anybody

I’m not here to judge anybody. Except for that guy sitting up front with the big cowboy hat. Hey pardner, we don’t wear cowboy hats around these parts. And even where they do, how is that at all acceptable? Like you don’t think anybody wants to see what’s going on up front? Maybe you could’ve taken a seat in the back? I’m just putting it out there, take a look around, nobody else is wearing anything even close to as big as what you’ve got on your head.

And again, I don’t want to judge, but what’s the point of a cowboy hat? You know, besides the dramatic increase in perceived head size. Maybe, take it off inside? It just seems like it would be a nice gesture, again, I don’t want to harp on it here, but front seat? Cowboy hat? Come on man, that’s just rude. Aren’t southern people supposed to be known for their good manners? Because I can’t think of anything less polite than still not having the decency to move, or at least take your hat off, after me going on and on about not being able to see.

It’s fine, it’s just, I hope you don’t mind complaining, the sound of me complaining during the whole movie. Or plastic crinkling or popcorn being chewed. You want to play passive aggressive? Yeah, well, I’m playing aggressive aggressive. How much did that thing cost, like two hundred bucks? Do you have to get it professionally cleaned? It just comes off as silly. You look silly, you look like a big silly cowboy going to the movies and sitting right up front.

Hey, maybe if you sat all the way in the back, your hot could block the projector, and then nobody would be able to see anything. This is a free country, right? I’m just saying that maybe you could get in the way of everybody’s movie experience if you wear an even bigger cowboy hat, right? Like what is that, a ten gallon hat? Maybe go for the twenty, fifty, do they make hundred gallon cowboy hats?

You could get one so big that it envelops your whole body, OK, and then you’d be sitting inside the cowboy hat, and it would still be big enough to block everybody else’s view. And then you could poke a little hole in the back, you’d take a seat right in front of the projector, like I was talking about before, and there you go, problem solved, now it’s your movie, now it’s projecting only on the movie screen that you’ve got set up on the inside of your oversized hat.

No you be quiet, ma’am. If Yosemite Sam over here is allowed to come to theater and impose his big hat on everybody else, then I’m allowed to sit here and talk and complain and put way too much popcorn in my mouth and start showering the back of this guy’s cowboy hat with little half-chewed up pieces of popcorn.

What’s wrong Hoss? You got a problem? That’s pretty annoying right? Having to keep brushing off the sides of that hat? Keep scooping out all of those little popcorn bits from the sides? And what the hell’s a guy like you doing at a movie like this anyway? John Wayne’s not in this movie. This isn’t a Clint Eastwood production. Why don’t you go and see if there aren’t any other movies that might more suit …

Ow! What the hell man? You can’t just flick me like that! Way to take it to the next level buddy. Yeah, well, you’re not allowed to hit me. It was a hit. You touched me, man, you crossed the line. Yeah well, just take off the hat. Bro, just take off the hat. Just, just take off …

There you go. Oh … Oh my God. What is that? A goiter? What do you have like an iodine deficiency? Hey man, I’m really sorry. Yeah, put the hat back on, that looks incredibly … just … I’m just … Oh God, some things you can’t unsee. I’m really sorry pardner. That was really uncalled for, on my part. I can’t believe you held your shit together so well, considering all the verbal harassment I was, I was just, man, and to think I only got off with a flick. A little flick. And all that popcorn, it’s all stuck in the material. Yeah, Jesus man, I’m really sorry, I …

No you shut up ma’am! I’m trying to apologize here! Did you see that guy’s head? Well just chill out, all right? This movie sucks anyway, you just know they’re both going to die in like half an hour. No, I didn’t spoil anything, I’m just guessing. I’m just, this whole trope isn’t that original, just sit down. You want some popcorn? Sir? I’m talking to you now, sir. Again, I’m really sorry, just have some popcorn, just, just take the whole bag, I’m … Jesus.