Why City Buses Kick School Buses’ Butts: A Commentary On Mass Transit In America From A First-Grader’s Perspective



VS.

Unfortunately (or some would say fortunately) T’s mom and I are divorced, however our time with T is divided evenly, resulting in him spending every other weekend with me. Saturdays and Sundays can drag on quite a bit with him being trapped inside an apartment all day with only me to entertain him, as entertaining as I might be to a six year old child. It is often one of my biggest challenges every other weekend to find activities to entertain him. During one weekend sometime last year, an idea came upon me to let T experience the joy and wonderment of our city’s public transportation system, secretly in an attempt to just kill a few hours. In my hometown, public bus riding is not the regular occurrence it is in larger metropolitan areas where a portion of bus riders are professional men and women who simply want to avoid the stress of bumper to bumper traffic, and parking garages that are seriously depleted of available parking spaces. In my home town, the public transportation option is by and large reserved for those individuals of lower socioeconomic status who often cannot afford their own vehicles (those of you from my home town who are going to shower me with a cascade of boos and hisses for what you perceive as a stereotypical comment, can shut your dirty pie holes because you have evidently not come out of your ivory towers to actually experience riding a bus in our fare city, otherwise you would know that my comment is 90% accurate). Those of you who are out of town readers now have an explanation for that gasp of horror you hear coming from local home town readers who can’t believe I would chose to put my son and I in the position of carousing about town for several hours with the dregs of our local community (there, now you can all boo and hiss at me for making an intentionally inflammatory and degrading statement). Since that first ride over a year ago, we have spent several weekend days gallivanting about town on the city bus. What has actually amazed me is that T is always the one to bring up this activity. Initially, I did not really understand the attraction. Given the fact that he rides his school bus five days a week from his school to his after school program, I was simply puzzled by his affinity for the city bus. It was finally today, after he asked yet again to go for a ride on the city bus, that I attempted to put myself in the mindset of a first grade child (in maturational measurements, this was not much of a regression for me), and the whole love of the city bus became clear when it was viewed in comparison with his school bus. Sure, there is the fact that it is “something different” but I believe it is more than that. Although there are probably many more examples, the following are some of the major reasons why first grade children (or at least my first-grade child) like city buses so darn much:

 

#1 The differences are immediately noticeable as soon as the city bus stops at your curbside location. What small child is not enthralled with the hydraulic system that lowers the door of the bus to your level, negating the need to clamber inside like the high sitting school bus.  The city bus instead treats you like miniature royalty making your entrance as easy and painless as possible.

#2 Then there is the fee required. To the first grade child, any commoner can simply get on a school bus free of charge, but to ride in the upper echelons of motor coaches one must fork over some serious coinage (mind you, six quarters seems like a king’s ransom to a six year old).

#3 The next little slice of heaven comes in the form of seat selection. The ever developing elementary school mind comes to grips with the reality that they are not going to be seated by the bus driver in an act of totalitarian, iron-fisted rule, but instead they are going to be allowed to chose from a myriad of seating options. Sit on the side facing out the opposite window. Sure thing. Sit “traditional style” facing out the front window. Whatever your little heart desires. Even standing up, the ultimate taboo on the school bus, can be broken in what seems to be the Sodom and Gomorra of mass transportation. “Would I like to sit in the front today? Yes, yes I would. You know, I would like to move to an available seat in the back at the next stop. And I can, because I am the king!”

#4 What, I ask you, is one of the elementary school child’s favorite modes of transportation? That’s right, the good ol’ bicycle. There is no way the school is going to let you bring your greasy bicycle on board, but the shear giddiness exhibited by a child is immeasurable when they find out the city bus has a rack specifically attached to the front to transport their glorious two wheeled metal friend.

#5 The city bus offers a sense of absolute freedom that simply can’t be matched by the school bus. Judging on number of routes alone, the city bus offers a cornucopia of possible options that absolutely destroys the number of routes offered by any one school. Further, the child is not allowed to ride any school bus of their choosing so they can experience something different from their day to day grind. Bus #2 means you are on bus #2. You don’t just walk over and decide you are going to ride bus #7 today. The city bus, however, has no such restrictive practices, thereby opening up the greater metropolitan area for our little traveler’s exploration. (I know, a child is somewhat limited by what their parents will tolerate, but I allow my child to pick which bus route he wants to ride, thereby giving him the greatest sense of freedom).

#6 So much of a child’s life is beyond their control, including the stopping points along a school buses route. There is no choice in the matter. The bus driver stops at each point with absolutely no input from any of the sad little faces aboard. While the city bus does have definite stops, not all “stops” are necessarily stopped at, and what the elementary school-aged child soon gravitates towards is the all consuming power of the cord. From the perspective of these pint-sized power mongers, all it takes is one gentle tug, a red light flickers to life and the driver must obey their silent command. For the child, the power reversal between adult (not to mention an adult bus driver who normally has ultimate control over them on a school bus) and child results in an intoxicating blend of control and vengeance.

#7 The city bus is an opportunity to become acquainted with new and interesting individuals. Day after day, the child rides the school bus with the same children, and talking of only the latest and greatest toys and cartoons becomes tiresome from time to time. The child’s longing for varied experiences can be met by riding on the city bus and hearing a cacophony of those “special” adult-only words, and provides and opportunity to eavesdrop on great conversations like, “I am gonna whoop my kid's ass if he did not do his homework”, “I got so f'd up on meth last night” and “I told my boyfriend if he wanted to put it in there, he could go see a hooker.”

Ah, seeing things from the mindset of a young child has actually been quite an eye-opening experience. I think I may just stay here for a while.

B*#ch Slapped By Flu Karma

The clock says 3:18 a.m. as I begin today’s…err….tonight’s…err…this morning’s blog. Although my eyes are straining to stay open, I feel compelled to make a written record of my missteps so I can review it in the future to avoid certain peril when similar circumstances arise. Let’s roll back the time machine to yesterday morning, at approximately 6:55 a.m. doing my normal routine getting T, my son, ready for school. I asked T what he wanted for breakfast, and in typical fashion, he ignored me. And in further typical fashion, I asked two more times, and was met with silence. I made my inquiry into his morning food selection a fourth time, having raised my voice to about a 7, which equates to moderately pissed off parent level. T evidentially sensed that I was getting perturbed by his non-responsiveness, and answered “I’m thinking.” The actual translation of what he had said is “I heard you the first three times, now leave me alone”, and while to a six-year old child, this may serves as an appropriate response, it only resulted in me becoming even more angered at him as it did not move me any closer to dispensing with the morning’s culinary task. T then began to complain that his throat was hurting. I really did not have time for this. We were already slightly behind schedule to get to school timely, and now a suspicious report of gullet-related discomfort. I tried to act like I had not heard him (engaging in a little juvenile tit for tat if you will for his non-cooperative behavior earlier), and told him we would be having French toast sticks for breakfast. T became adamant that he could not eat because his throat hurt, and he asked for a cough drop. I acquiesced to his request, and retrieved a piece of hardened, throat soothing elixir from the medicine cabinet, all the while eyeing the clock in the front room, now definitely being convinced I would not be getting to work on time after taking him to school. A few minutes later, I heard a crunching noise, and knew that T had completed the “sucking” phase of the lozenge. I presented T with a plate of hastily warmed up French toast sticks, told him to start eating, and quickly scampered off to my bedroom so as to not even give him the slightest opportunity to start clamoring about how his throat still hurt. T eventually ate three out of the four French toast sticks, and we actually made it to our destinations of work and school on time without any more complaints about his aching larynx. (eyes…getting…so…heavy…must…sleep. The remainder of this blog was penned some fifteen hours after I initially began it.)

After a stressful day of work, I picked up T from his after school program. On the way home, T exclaimed, “Good, tomorrow is Friday. That way I only have to go to school one more day.” There was no mention of his pained esophagus, and he asked to go the local gathering point of skateboarding juvenile delinquents otherwise knows as the nearest public park. After playing for 45 minutes, T had still not made mention of his sore throat, and I figured we were good as gold. After getting home, I made the rookie parent mistake of asking how his throat was feeling. T then went into what I believe to have been an Oscar-winning performance for his role as a tortured soul in “The Boy With the Excruciating Esophagus.” T began to whimper like a scared puppy and pointed to his throat to indicate the source of his discomfort. I asked several times over the next hour about what he wanted for dinner (and was having serious feelings of deja vu, likely stemming from the morning’s Breakfast Brawl 2011), however every idea I proposed for dinner was shot down with the same explanation that swallowing would hurt his throat. Realizing that our dinner-time dilemma had devolved into a seemingly frictionless non-stop merry-go-round of meal proposal and subsequent food denial, I told T that he should just take a bath, and maybe his throat would feel better. As T was in the bath, I talked to him about his homework for school that he needed to turn in the following day. T stated in an “it is so obvious you should know this” tone of voice, “I don’t think I will be going to school tomorrow because my throat hurts too bad.” My mental recording of my day immediately cued up to his comment when I picked him up from his after school program in which he commented about being required to go to school only one more day. It is probably due to the fact that in my profession I am surrounded by dishonest people (the clients, not the employees, although there are some sketchy employees) that I have become jaded about people’s honesty, and immediately concluded that my son was concocting a plan for getting out of school. As T finished up his bath, I even text messaged his mother alerting her to what I perceived to be his conniving ways.

After finishing up his bath, and getting his pajamas on, T came and snuggled up next to me on the couch. He then told me that his stomach now hurt. I told him that was probably because his nutrient deprived stomach was revolting against his stubbornness towards food, and was now beginning to growl at him. T started to have tears gather in the corner of his eyes as he whaled “I’m starving”, but then immediately followed this with the puzzling statement “I think I am going to throw up.” I hurried T into the bathroom, where he stood solemnly for the next minute or so in front of the toilet with nothing spewing violently from his mouth. I walked into my bedroom, and then heard him urinating into the toilet. He then yelled out, “I guess I just had to go pee. My stomach feels great now.” Oh, for the love of Pete’s sake I thought. I read T a story, put him in bed, and settled in on the couch for what I anticipated to be a relaxing evening of television viewing followed by a night of rejuvenating slumber. The rest of the evening was uneventful and stress free as anticipated, however it was sometime between 10:45 p.m. when I laid my head on my pillow and 2:15 a.m that the dastardly deities who maintain domain over the world’s diseases had decided that my heartless minimization of my child’s pain and scoffing at the possibility that he was ill had reached an unbearable level. It was during these hours that a viral attack had been unleashed on my child’s corporal being by these vindictive spirits in order to teach me a lesson. T came into my bedroom at 2:15 a.m. and reported that he had to go to the bathroom. The bathroom light sprung to life as he flipped the switch, but instead of hearing a stream of cascading urine echoing in the ceramic receptacle, my auditory senses were assaulted by the unmistakable guttural utterances that proceed the forceful ejection of undigested food particles mixed with gut juices. Poor little T’s stomach was really giving him the business, and I could do nothing but feel so sorry for him. After getting him cleaned up, we went into the living room and he curled up in a pitiful ball on the couch. T asked if I had any Sprite or Saltine crackers as we had used these items as all-important sustenance during his last bout of vomiting a few months earlier. I told him that we did not have either, so we got dressed up, and headed to the nearest all-night convenience store to purchase supplies.  I was in an old t-shirt, gym shorts and flip-flops, while Tyler was in his pajamas still.  We looked like the classic trailer park family you see at Wal-Mart at like 10:00 on a Thursday night.  The only difference is that we were on an emergency run, while I always get the feeling, based upon their leisurely pace, that the Wal-Mart family does this on a regular basis for entertainment. We entered the store, quickly picked up our needed items, and strolled up to the counter. Lo and behold there behind the counter was the same jackass who became famous in a past blog (You talkin' to me?) for treating me like an insignificant nuisance while he chatted away on his blue tooth. Tonight, Mr. Inconsiderate was auditorially au naturel, but even without his precious communication device glued to his head, he was just as rude as before. He did not verbally acknowledge us, but used the least energy possible and gave the same indifferent head nod he had used during my prior visit. I felt a little pity for the poor guy as I contemplated the possibility that he was not being rude, and rather that he was afflicted with WNS (Weak Neck Syndrome, formerly known as LANS or Lazy Ass Neck Syndrome until the ACLU filed suit against the medical community for using such a "...heartless and degrading label for a very serious condition.") The possibility of this horrible disease affecting this poor man quickly disintegrated when his head snapped around when a new customer entered the store. OK, so we were back at square one with him being a genuine a-hole. The transaction concluded with him mumbling our total at a barely audible level, and then failing to utter a simple thank you. As soon as T and I re-entered the apartment he vomited again in a plastic bowl that had been set out on the coffee table for the specific purpose of catching flying, chunky, foul-smelling debris so that he could avoid the long trek to the bathroom when nausea overcame him and to avoid the risk of the carpet becoming the victim of a regurgitated rain storm. The next two hours included T puking two more times, followed by a few episodes of unproductive retching, all the while passing the time watching the wonderful animated film, Despicable Me, whose title seemed so fitting for the situation.

T finally fell asleep on the couch around 4:45, and instead of risking waking him up by placing him in his bed, I retrieved my pillow and blanket from my bed, along with my alarm clock, and set up camp on the hard, unforgiving living room floor so as to be present in the event he woke up again and was unfamiliar with his surroundings. I spent the next 30-45 minutes struggling to find a comfortable position, and somehow managed to drift off to sleep for about 1 ½ hours before being startled awake by my blaring alarm clock which also woke up T, who was none to happy about being stirred from his short lived sleep. T eventually stayed home from school, and spent the day with his mom. I somehow struggled through the work day, my listless movements and sore back a nagging reminder of my arduous night. I promise from this day forth that in deference to the Germ Gods, I shall never again question the veracity of my child’s statements regarding the condition of his health! (let’s hope that insincere token promise keeps me from getting this nasty little bug)

****Blog Update (some 8 hours after originally posting):  My throat is starting to hurt.  Oh Germ Gods, I have offended you.  Please have mercy on me.  I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!

In Tough Times, Organizational Efficiency Is Our #17 Priority

Companies and organizations have always made attempts to keep their budgets in check, however the current economic struggles in most sectors has led to companies being especially mindful of their use of resources. The public sector, particularly local government, where I am currently employed, is no exception to this practice as we have faced many cuts to our funding resulting in both program and staffing losses. Our department is being faced with the challenge of “doing more with less.” Despite the need to become more efficient, I have recently observed behavior by staff engaging in inefficient office practices. In addition, the organization itself encourages minimal productivity by having ludicrous requirements of its staff. Although I encounter countless examples of these types of waste during any given month, the following are my two most recent experiences:

The Rubber Band Bandit

While assigning new cases to my workers today, I received a folder from another program that had been sent from another building. When a folder is sent from one building to another in our organization, a single piece of paper is attached to the folder noting the building destination and the intended recipient. I understand the need for this paper to stay attached to the folder, lest the folder be lost in mailroom limbo like some type of office supply orphan. The thing that got my dander up today was the fact that this solitary folder, and its accompanying routing slip, were attached with not only two paper clips, but seven rubber bands. When I saw this extensive elastic safeguard, I half expected the individual who sent this to have used a dab of rubber cement “just to be sure” that nothing came loose. This overuse of rubber bands was completely unacceptable and unnecessary. Not only did this individual waste their important time creating a web of stretchy plastic polymers, they completely cut into my valuable time as well as I was required to undo their stringy maze. Even worse, this maniacal master of inter-office folder routing warfare had used rubber bands that were so small they were stretched to their maximum tolerable level. Their already fragile appearance was made even more prominent by their crunchy texture indicating they had been in use for several years. My anxiety of being furiously snapped by these skin gouging rubber ribbons of destruction was overwhelming, resulting in me gingerly removing them from the folder at a snail’s pace with the trepidation of a cold fusion scientist handling a vial of uranium 235 dipped in hot hog snot.

Who Doesn’t Love A Well-Written Form?

Government organizations are infamous for their use of forms for just about everything that a worker does, or even thinks about doing. The amount of paper products consumed by just one local government agency such as ours, with a staff of over 1,500 employees, is unfathomable. One of the most ridiculous forms we must use is called the Admin-580. On a bi-weekly basis, we submit our time sheets to receive our meager compensation for a job done at a splendidly mediocre level. I believe these could be submitted electronically, but the local government has decided they need a “hard copy” of everything for the auditors. I can see their point I guess. It is likely these computer thingies won’t catch on, and they will be very thankful they have the paper copies of time sheets from the last twenty three years that they have been keeping in a warehouse they have been paying umpteen dollars a year to lease. An Admin-580 must be attached to the time sheet for any extra time worked and/or time taken off (sick leave, vacation, ect.) The thing that makes this so absolutely ludicrous is that you write the time taken off on your time sheet as well. I have yet to grasp the necessity of this process. Why are we turning in an extra piece of paper that has the same thing written on it that is written on our time sheet? The other day, my boss’ clerk contacted me stating the auditors were reviewing my old time sheets and were missing one Admin-580 from December of 2009 when I had worked over-time. Never mind the fact that it is not my job to keep track of the forms (the supervisor is responsible for keeping all of the Admin-580’s in the worker’s personnel file that has become nine inches thick due to 87% of the content being old Admin-580’s), I was completely flabbergasted that they wanted such an old piece of paper, and even more irked that there were people being paid to track down inconsequential pieces of paper. If they were doubting that I really worked the over-time, did the fact that I wrote it down on both the time sheet and the 580 rather than just the time sheet make the claimed time any more credible. (the following is a liberal dramatization of a hypothetical investigation into misreporting of time worked) Investigator/Accountant/Over-Paid Busybody: “Uh yes, Madame Director, we believe Mr. Cool Ranter has claimed time which he did not work.” Director of Department: “And what irrefutable proof do you have?” Big Head Bean-Counter: “He did not submit an Admin-580 with his time sheet on which he claimed to have worked one hour of over-time. Everyone knows that someone who only writes their over-time on their time sheet is an obvious fabricator, and is seeking to defraud the county of an exorbitant amount of money. In this matter, a more than significant sum of $43.50. It is further common knowledge that someone who fills out both forms must be telling the truth, otherwise they would have not filled out both forms.” Director of Department: “Hang him!”

What is next in the barrage of pointless forms required by our agency? My best guess is the Bathroom Usage form. Forms will be labeled as BU-#1 or BU-#2 depending on your particular transaction. BU-#1 will require milliliters of liquid expelled and the approximate color of said liquid using a ten point gradation scale ranging from crystal clear to neon yellow posted in all bathrooms. For males, form must include number of shakes conducted following expulsion of said liquid. A reminder will be posted in all male bathrooms that more than 3 shakes constitutes public masturbation on county property, and depending on number of previous violations, violators will be subject to disciplinary action, up to and including, verbal warning, written reprimand and/or participation in a sexual offender counseling program (SOCP).  At the dsicretion of the therapist conducting the SOCP, the employee's parents and/or significant other/spouse will participate in counseling sessions to provide input as to the past and present nature and frequency of the offender's masturbatory behavior.*  Any male employee utilizing more than ten shakes during any single incident, or having more than 5 violations in a calendar year, will be considered a "gross violatior" and will be subject to immediate termination.  Upon immediate termination, a letter will be sent to the employee's parents, significant other/spouse, clergy leader of house of worship the offender attends (as applicable) and/or children detailing the employee's abhorent escapades resulting in their termination.*

BU-#2 will require an approximation of weight of waste product (no scales will be provided due to budget cut backs). If a reasonable approximate weight cannot be given, a three dimensional scale drawing will be allowed. Form must also include number of squares of toilet paper used. There will be a notation in all upper case letters on BU-#2 that any usage above seven squares must have supervisor approval prior to using said squares. Waste product evacuators must also state if they wiped front to back or back to front. This information will be used for statistical purposes only, however any female reporting a wiping pattern of back to front will be immediately referred to mandatory training provided by the Public Health Department regarding the unsanitary nature of this specific directional cleansing, and the possible health-related consequences. Both forms will also require employees to certify, under penalty of perjury, whether having used a toilet or urinal, that they were in full compliance with the “one-away” rule. Any non-adherence to the “one-away” rule must be fully explained in the space provided on the form, and must have the signature of two witnesses who can corroborate the employees inability to fully comply with said rule.

Males who are found to be excessive "shakers", females found to be incorrectly wiping or any individual violating the "one-away" rule will have their names and pictures placed on a "Wall of Shame" bulletin board outside of the cafeteria with the individual listed in the appropriate category, "Plays With Self", "Is Dirty" or "Does Not Understand The Concept Of Personal Space In The Bathroom Environment."*

Glad to see everyone is doing their best to maintain their efficiency during these tough times. Keep up the good work!

*Social Service Commission rule 11345.7(a) negates an employee's right to privacy and confidentiality in the above noted circumstances.

Return To The Butcher’s Den

I am going to be right up front and truthful from the get go. I got really pissed off today, so this post is going to be nothing more than a complete raving bitch fest hiding behind the thin, and excessively transparent, veil of an attempt at creative writing.  I had a follow-up appointment today at the dermatologist I visited a couple of months ago (Real Life Skin Flick).  During my visit I discovered that not only is this sick soul a master of physical torture as was my unfortunate experience during my last visit, but he is also able to deftly employ subtle techniques utilized by practioners of the ancient art of mind-F’ing someone.

I arrived promptly at my appointment time of 9:00, and found only three other people before me. I had a tremendous number of tasks to accomplish at work, and figured I should be in and out fairly quickly with a limited number of patients ahead of me. As the minutes past and 9:00 became 9:15, I began to get a little apprehensive about my belief that I would getting back to work in a short time frame. The only thing that distracted me this first fifteen minutes was this goofy looking guy that was occupying a chair on the opposite side of the room. Imagine Farrah Fawcett’s hair (yes, the famous 1970’s mane), Drew Carrey’s/Buddy Holley’s glasses and Theodore Roosevelt’s bushy, full-figured mustache. The look was topped off by cut-off corduroy shorts and 1993 Air Jordan high top basketball shoes (notice, I did not say 1990’s era-looking shoes. I think these were actually from 1993.)

Once I tired of eyeballing this guy, my eyes wandered around the rest of the room. Up in the corner of the room they had a television playing different videos related to skin health topics, interspersed with messages from the doctor’s office. The first message that caught my attention was the doctor’s weekly schedule, “8:00-4:30 Monday through Thursday, closed Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Lunch 12:00-1:45”. Wow, now that is a pretty sweet set up. Made me wonder how he was able to see all his patients in a timely manner being closed three days and taking nearly a two hour lunch. Oh wait, he doesn’t. It was getting on to be 9:45, and I was really starting to get ticked. Another happy-time message on the screen said “Sometimes we run a little behind as we give each and every patients the extra attention they deserve. Rest assured when it is your turn you will receive this same level of attention.” So they already know they are going to totally mess up your day by being behind, but try and offer a pre-emptive excuse to cover up their inefficiency. “Um yes, my appointment was at 9:00, and it is now 9:45” “That’s fine and all sir, but if you noticed our wonderful television out front, you have already been forewarned about this delay, and therefore are not entitled to complain. Now please return to your hard-backed, uncomfortable chair.” It is probably not news to most that doctor’s offices run behind on their appointments 95% of the time, however what amazes me is the tolerance we show for this blatant disrespect for our time. For some reason, the fact that these individuals have gone to school for 8 years entitles them to overbook their appointment calendars, scheduling three patients every five minutes, and viewing their patients as nothing more than walking copays. This sort of behavior is tolerated at almost no other service provider and/or establishment. Could you imagine if people let this kind of nonsense go on without making a stink? “Yes, we have dinner reservations at 6:00 under Smithson.” “Yes, Mr. Smithson, the chef has tired of making his entrée’s for this hour and probably next hour as well, but we can certainly get you in, and eating, by 8:30.” “OK, that’s fine. We’ll just salivate and swallow for a while, making us feel like we are eating a satisfying meal.” “Can I offer you a complimentary mint while you are waiting.” Or how about the following exchange at a hotel: “Yes, I have a suite reserved.” “Of course you do, however so do 8 other individuals, while we only have six suites. We can let you have that in two days.” “Ok, great, we will just stay under the overpass for a couple of nights.” As the clock slowly inched towards 10:00, I became more and more angry. I again viewed the television in the corner, and noted the next wonderful message: “If you need to cancel your appointment, please do so within 24 hours, or you will be charged for the appointment.” Well, that seems fair, so long as for every ten minutes you are behind, you give the patient a 10% discount on the copay amount, and if you are not seen within an hour, your visit is free. Sort of a doctor’s “Domino’s Pizza Deal” equivalent. But my guess is they don’t do that, nor does any other doctor’s office (if you have are reading this, and your doctor offers this discount, please let me know where this is, as I would love to make a switch).

I was finally taken back into an examination room at 10:15, where I spent another one hour and fifteen minutes seething with fury. The doctor finally strolled into the room casual as anything, and verbally jabbed my overstressed mind by mumbling a barely audible apology that minimized my plight: “Sorry for the wait. We are running a few minutes behind.” Sure, I guess 135 minutes could be classified as a “few”, just as Heidi Fleiss ensured that the intimate needs of a “few” men were met. The final dissection of my already fragile psyche occurred when the doctor uttered, “So, what can we do for you today?” In my head, I exploded with “Hello, I am here for a follow up. I am not a new patient for the love of goodness sake. See that folder in your hand…they call that a medical chart. I hear some doctor’s actually use them to take notes, and refer to them for future visits so you know why the hell someone is in your office on any given day!” Instead, I sat in frozen silence for a moment, blood rushing to my head as the utter disdain for this doctor grew to an almost uncontrollable level, and my head throbbed with pain from the ire I felt for this man. The amazing thing is that during this moment of immense pain, I had an epiphany about the splendid nature of human biology. When we are babies, our most frequent experiences of anxiety or anger arise from a wet diaper or a nutrient engorged breast not being in the immediate vicinity of our desperate mouths, whose primary function at this stage of our infancy is to meet the needs of the tiny growling creature buried deep in our abdomen. Because our anxiety and anger is relatively mild, when compared to what we experience as an adult, it is completely tolerable for our skulls to not yet be fully formed. However, as we grow older, and the levels of our stress and anger become exponentially heightened, it is my belief that the pain you feel in your head during these intense moments is actually your head needing to explode to release said tension, and it is only due to the fact that our skulls have fully fused together that keeps our head from looking like Mount Saint Helens, sending bullets of brain matter through the air plastering the walls of your local doctor’s office. As I realized my head was not going to explode, and I regained my composure, I reminded the doctor why I was there, got my two minutes of “extra attention” that was advertised on the television, and made my way out of the office. As I exited the waiting room, there were a good fifteen to twenty people now waiting, and I fought the urge to say “He is just a few minutes behind.”

Thanks A Lot Barry! You Dirty Hamburger Nazi!

Well, it appears that the fecal matter has begun to move in a circular motion in a declining direction over a lumpy mass in the earth’s crust (Transation: The shit has begun to roll downhill). I visited the Taco Bell nearest my abode, and the first results of the lawsuit filed against Taco Bell revealed their ugly heads during my visit. What the litigious lame ass who filed this ridiculous lawsuit regarding the exact amount of ground-up bovine meat products in use at Taco Bell evidently failed to realize is that this sort of frivolous action never impacts the company the way they intended, and any consequences from the court process are always passed along to the consumer. As I looked at the menu in the drive thru lane, I noticed that Taco Bell was now serving shrimp tacos. Sure, I was a little surprised at the prospect of being able to receive such fare at a fast food restaurant, but what really caught my eye was the large writing above the picture of the product that stated in colorful bold letters: “Made with 6 shrimp.” Thanks to Beef Counter Barry, Taco Bell now feels as if they have to spell out the amount of every ingredient that is contained in their food, lest some fanatical shrimp statistician rush down to the local courthouse and begin filing motions.

Where does it end Barry? Does next week’s menu grow in stature because each item must contain a listing of it’s component parts, along with exact measurements of each item : Bean Burrito- 7 inches in length. Contains 2 oz. Powdered beans, ½ oz. cheddar cheese, 1 oz. taco sauce, one flour tortilla and two unwashed employee hands rolling it. Or a month from now, am I going to come to the drive thru, and I can’t even tell what the hell is available to eat because the menu board is now 17 ft. tall, and contains not only the ingredients, but the name of the town where the food was packaged, the lot number of the field where the food was grown, the name of the guy that picked the food from the field and the number of bowel movements he has each week?

Thanks to Barry (who has obviously now adopted this moniker mostly due to the fact that I don’t give a flying F what his real name is.  Heck, I don't even know that he is a he for that matter.  To me, this person is simply a faceless and genderless entity that has unnecessarily laid siege to what is one of the finest American fast food establishments in existence, and as a byproduct has inflicted serious collateral damage by ruining my afternoon.  The name Barry is simply being used out of convenience and familiarity now....and because I don't really want to type out "The Lame Ass" every time I refer to him), a sign was posted on the drive thru menu that stated that sauce was available upon request. So now Taco Bell has to try and save money by not offering the sauce at the window in hopes that some people will forget to ask for it to recoup the cost of the exorbitant amount of ink that is needed to augment the menu. Barry, you are a real piece of work. Thanks to you, and your ass clown attorneys, I now have to remember to request taco sauce for my purchases, which I will have you know I forgot to do during this visit because I have spent my entire adult life being conditioned to expect that they will offer it to me. Needless to say, I was completely irate when I got home because I had to choke down my sauceless chicken burrito. I know as an adult, I need to buck up and remember the sauce, but you can’t expect someone to be exposed to Pavlovian conditioning for the better part of a lifetime, and then yank that security blanket away, without some serious mind bending repercussions (yes, I know it is called classical conditioning, not Pavlovian conditioning, but I am just trying to make the blog accessible to those people who were not psychology majors, and are most likely familiar with Pavlov.)

Your adventurous little foray into Big Boy Court has also apparently affected my ability to have a pleasant interaction with the staff. The lady who took my order was curt over the speaker, and uttered neither a “thank you” or “you’re welcome” after conducting my monetary exchange for culinary goods. Your lawsuit has likely affected customer experience with team members in one of three distinct ways (if not all three): 1) the increase in ink usage on the menu board necessitated the cost saving measure of reducing staff salaries, resulting in less pleasurable staff; 2) the increase in ink usage on the menu board necessitated the cost saving measure of cutting out all unnecessary verbal exchanges with customers, such as “How are you today?”, “Thank You”, “You’re Welcome”, “Have a good day”, and quite obviously “Would you like any sauce with that?” By virtually ignoring your customers, outside of taking the order and telling them their total, lines can move much more quickly, thereby increasing productivity and finally, 3) the entire fleet of team members has likely been jeered and berated, and even possibly physically accosted, by members of the fast food eating public as a result of your lawsuit, reducing them to a mass of unhappy, customer-phobic individuals. There was a probably a time when the female employee I encountered today had a song in her heart every time she stepped foot inside her happy home away from home, but now she had a look on her face that said, “The next guy who makes a crack about the beef is going to get a gordita shoved down his gullet.” Well, Barry, I hope you are happy. You have basically ruined my life, along with thousands of other single individuals, that rely upon Taco Bell for 85% of their daily sustenance, all because you couldn't be happy with a 79 cent partial beef taco, and now everybody is going to have to pay 8 bucks a piece for one because you want yours made from Kobi beef. I hope you are happy!

Who Writes This Stuff?

One of the necessary evils of our modern world is insurance. While insurance for medical and dental purposes is often worth the premium, it is insurance for large items like your home, and sometimes your car, that are like a 24 year old child living in his parents basement. It is that thing that is paid for month after month, knowing in all likelihood we will never get anything back from it. Don’t get me wrong, there is a definite comfort in knowing that major catastrophes will be covered, but the truth of the matter is that many people will go their whole lives paying untold amounts of money, and never make a single claim.

When I came home today to my apartment, I found a glossy piece of paper flapping in the wind with one corner affixed to my stairway railing with a piece of masking tape. I stripped the paper free, and carried it upstairs inside. The paper was an advertisement for renter’s insurance, which I currently do not have, but had been considering, as I had heard it was relatively inexpensive. The advertisement, which featured the small photo of a very decrepit local insurance agent (whose family was probably finally going to cash in on her life insurance policy ironically enough), opened by talking up that sense of comfort and security that I mentioned earlier. Excerpts from the beginning section read “You’ve rented a great place. We’ll make sure you don’t rent trouble” and “Chances are you have thousands of dollars worth of belongings in your apartment. That’s where your insurance provider comes in.” OK, I will admit it, they had me on the hook. I may not have very expensive items, but I have grown very attached to my “put it together yourself” $20 end tables, coffee table and bookshelves purchased from a local discount store, that are deserved of the protection this company was offering. Although this company had gotten me to take the initial bait, they failed miserably at reeling in their prize as I read further into the advertisement.

The bottom half of the advertisement was titled “Top 3 Reasons to Buy insurance from Blah, Blah, Blah Company”. This section contained a three pronged attack that I can only assume was purposefully written to turn away business, or was written by the independent insurance agent who had evidently gone into insurance because she had failed miserably at her former career of marketing, and was too miserly to pay somebody to develop the ad for her.

Reason #1: Combined with another policy, it could pay for itself.

This is actually a solid reason, and they started out strong enough. They faltered at the end of the paragraph by trying to turn away customers by using the tried and true method of insulting the intelligence of the customer. The paragraph described that renter’s insurance was so reasonably priced that if you had another policy with the same company, say auto insurance, that the multi-policy discount you would receive on your car may save you enough to pay for the renter’s insurance policy. Great selling point! Good job! Kudos! So why did you have to go and ruin it by bolding the final portion of the last sentence “cover the entire cost of your renter’s policy”? Am I of such limited intellectual functioning that you have to draw arrows, put flashing neon and line up dancing girls in oversized headdresses all around the important part of the paragraph because without your assistance my infinitesimal brain would not be able to pick up on the main benefit of obtaining the policy.

Reason #2: Protection Beyond Your Dwelling

In the event that insinuating that your target audience is two sandwiches short of a picnic did not completely turn them away from your product, this section of the advertisement then went on to cite two unconvincing points that made me question the quality of the product. The first stated “Any property inside your car is most likely covered in the event of theft.” Most likely? What is that all about? For me, vague statements about the policy’s coverage which imply that conditions must be met to make a claim quickly relegate this company to status of shady enterprise. Why don’t they just go ahead and say what they mean, “Any property inside your car is covered in the event of theft provided the crime is committed by an albino dwarf eating a tuna fish sandwich who smashes in the vehicle’s window with a brick from the foundation of a 1920’s era Wyoming schoolhouse. All claims must be accompanied by a photo of the offender, sample of the sandwich to prove it was indeed tuna and not a chicken salad sandwich, and the name of the school that the brick came from along with an affidavit from the school’s first principal certifying the authenticity of the brick.” I am sure I am just being silly and overdramatic, and that it is much less complex than that. It is likely that what actually occurs is that your claim is submitted to a claims adjuster, who is an old-school Dungeons and Dragons aficionado, and simply rolls his twenty-side die on his desk. A 1, 2 or 12, and your claim is paid. Any other number, your claim is summarily denied. All appeals of denied claims are decided by a battle to the death with the Claims Manager (AKA The Dungeon Master) using only first level mage spells.

The second brilliant paragraph is warmly and accurately quoted as follows: “Liability coverage is included, so you may be protected from a lawsuit if, for example, a guest injures someone in an accident after being served drinks in your home.” So they decided to go with a repeat of the “you might be covered or you might not be covered but please, oh please, buy our crappy policy” approach. I began to wonder if this person worked for a casino in the past. “Oh yes, sir, you may win $25,000 in this game of chance, but the more likely scenario is that you will slowly, but surely, fritter away your child’s college tuition attempting to do so.” What irked me even more than the company’s evidently quivering stance on claim payments was the fact that a law even exists to hold a person responsible for the reckless behavior of another individual, and that because of this asinine law the insurance companies are in a position to try and scare you into buying this marginal policy. Why don’t they go ahead and enact another law that holds you personally responsible if, during a pleasant dinner party at your home, one guest gouges another guests eyes out with a steak knife, thereby allowing the insurance company to offer a Ginsu Guarantee policy rider for only an additional $4.99 a month.

Reason #3: We Take Out The Guesswork

Pardon my language, but triple WTF?!!!! I literally had to do a double take and read this title again. All your last section did was create guesswork about what your policy may or may not cover, and now we should rest assure that you have our best interest in the forefront of your two-sizes too big heart? Is this some kind of demented insurance adjuster’s Jedi mind trick? The final supposedly convincing statement was splashed on the page like it had been doused with an overflowing bucket of complete BS, “…to make sure you have all the coverage you need, and none of the coverage you don’t.” Like what coverage, the Ginsu Guarantee?

You Talking To Me? You Talking To Me? Uh, No. Apparently You’re Not.

Many of us have had the awkward experience of getting on an elevator with only one other person, and have that person begin to start talking, and from their statement, which appears to have come out of the middle of an already ongoing conversation, it is quite clear they aren’t talking to you. For a split moment you quickly jump to the conclusion that this person may be “different” in the mental stability sense, and whether you want to admit it or not, you involuntarily take a slight step back. Not really sure why this is. If this person is really in the midst of a psychotic break, and feels that slashing open your throat releasing an arcing rainbow of crimson in the air is the only way to quiet the voices in their head, do you really think the 8 inches of safety you created by the step back move has created an anti-psychotic force shield that will thwart this individuals potentially dastardly deed. Less than 1% of the time you really are riding with the Son of Sam (and hence probably are not reading this do to your unfortunate demise), however over 99% of the time you realize that the individual occupying the space with you is simply talking on a cellular phone headset. Although these headsets have been around for quite sometime, I am still surprised by the absolutely oblivious and irreverent type of behavior people engage in on these marvels of modern communication technology. Over the last two days, I had interesting experiences with two headset conversation holders.

　
　

The TMI Guy

This is the guy on the elevator or in line at the supermarket/fast food restaurant who talks way too loud about personal matters. These conversations include such things as talking to his doctor about his herpes and accompanying anal leakage (remember that one small subconscious step you took away from the person you believed was mentally ill? When you hear the above conversation on the elevator with this guy, that 8 inch move away becomes Simon Says, “Take 3 giant steps backwards and try to get so close to the wall that you begin to share molecules”). This is also the character that has intimate conversations with his significant other who he self-reportedly is “…going to give it to.” If there is any question as to what “it” is, this less-than-subtle gentleman’s (term used extremely loosely) series of hip gyrations and pelvic thrusts while on the phone provide the audience all the information they need to determine the identity of the mystery noun that “it” refers to. As I got on the elevator yesterday, and pressed my desired floor, I heard the only other gentlemen on the elevator say, “Well, you better get your ass home right away today after school!“ I quickly figured out this was not a typical mentally ill person’s statement, and turned to notice an earpiece plastered to this guy’s melon. I could only hear muffled sounds coming from the other end, and then the guy exploded in a tirade, “I don’t give a shit what your stupid mother said. You are not going to that game. Your ass is grounded from that stunt you pulled last week.” Then there was more mumbling/crying/whining from the other end. And then again another exemplar of fine American family interaction, “You stupid dumbass. You’re just like your mother.” It was like watching an off-Broadway one-man show where the creative artist re-enacts his favorite episode of the Jerry Springer Show or Divorce Court, but you only get to hear one side of the story. Well, sir, this could not get any more awkward for me.  Why don't you dial up your priest next and do your phone confessional about your penchant for for latex body suits and being told what a bad boy you are.  After the man hung up on what I can only assume was now an emotionally obliterated teenager, I wanted to make at least a feeble attempt at diffusing the tension of the situation by saying something unoriginal like “Kids these days“, but realized this was not only something stupid you would have heard 30 or 40 years ago, but it would also likely incite this guy resulting in his rage turning on me. Or maybe I could have taken on the role of sick and twisted family therapist who motivates parents to destroy the fragile hearts of their children in the most efficient way possible.  "Nice work today, sir.  Nice work.  I really liked how you used curse words to break her down, and then drug in her mother for good measure although she is completly irrelevant to your conversation.  Now next time, what I'd like to see, is you ramp it up a bit on the explatives and drop a couple of F bombs.  Then, at the moment you sense her weakening and can tell that the first tear is forming in the corner of her eye, you go in for the emotional jugular with a move I like to call the Therapy Inducer.  You make the child feel overwhelming guilt about their very existence by saying that you rue the day they ever crawled forth from their mother's rotten uterus.   Now, I want you to practice that in the mirror seven times until you really believe it, and I will see you again next week."  Instead I decided to simply wait it out for my floor, and quickly made my way away from the tiny metal box of family hatred.

The Let Me Treat You Like A Bothersome Piece of Feculent Dog Matter Stuck To The Bottom Of My Very Expensive Shoe Guy

This is the individual who should be providing you with some type of service, but instead continues to talk on their headset despite your obvious presence. And in addition to rudely continuing their conversation, they consider your need for service to be as annoying and unmoving as a serf begging their liege for a scrap of food for their starving family. Today on my way home from visiting my mother (Note to self: pat yourself on the back for being such a good son), I stopped at a convenience store near my house. After picking out a large bag of fried chips and a king size candy bar, snacks sure to clog arteries, expand stomachs and cause all sort of serious maladies, I went to the counter and plopped down my “dinner” before the unsmiling male cashier. I offered up a stereotypically heterosexual male-to-male greeting of , “Hey, how’s it going?” Smiles, as I had sarcastically dubbed him in my mind, did not even give me a token verbal response such as, “Good, how ya’ doin’?” that normal social decorum would dictate, but instead responded with a nod that was completely void of any measurable level of effort and was of such insignificant bodily movement I wondered if it had been a tic in his head and neck area rather than an actual gesture of acknowledgement to what I had said. The cashier then rang up and bagged my purchases with the dexterity and speed of a strung out heroin addict. “I am off at 7:00”, he then said into the air of the convenience store, where his words mingled with the smell of body odor and old rotisserie hot dogs. It is at that time I realized Mr. Social Skills had a glowing piece of plastic on his ear. Despite being finished with the daunting task of bagging my whopping two products, the cashier clamored on with his unseen conversing partner, “Probably doing nothing tonight. Really want to go home and chill.” I thought to myself, “If you mean by doing nothing tonight, you mean not providing good customer service, you are spot on.” I barely resisted the urge to smart off and ask if he was busy next weekend, and maybe we could get together, and he could show me his whole repertoire of discourteous customer service techniques. As I stood there with an expectant look on my face awaiting my total, Captain Charisma then really turned up the a-hole meter by simply pointing to the screen with my total on it rather than vocalizing to me the actual cost of my over-priced items. I then decided to at least give him a little malicious customer behavior as payback for his non-existent customer service just so he would understood I was not pleased. I crumpled up my few bills and some change and laid it on the counter so he would have to put in some effort straightening it out and picking it up. Jerk face then had the nerve to shoot daggers at me like I am the worst customer ever. I should have reached over the counter and planted a perectly targeted 83 MPH backhand across  his “minimum wage earning, old hot dog peddling, porno magazine viewing while he is customer-free” face. As he was making change, he told the person on the other end, “Girl, I do want to see you. I am just tired.” I felt like ripping the thing out of the guys ear, and telling the girl on the other end that she is better off without this guy if he treats his significant others with the disrespect he shows to customers. But of course, I did none of that, but instead went home and stuffed my face.