RATM – Bullet to the Head
This is a (mostly) wordless New Year’s Eve edition of Termination Tuesday.
I’ve made no bones about the fact that I find shooting guns – especially randomly and up in the air – an extremely ill-conceived method of celebrating something as inane as a number changing on a man-made calendar.
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M is for Milestone
… 997 … 998 … 999 … 1,000! Ready or not, here I come!
Hey, where did everyone go? You mean I’ve been all by myself this whole time? Wow. Who knew?
Yes, I’m as subtle as always. No doubt you can tell by now: This is my 1,000th blog post!
Yeah! Exciting, isn’t it? “M” is the Roman numeral for 1,000. I get it. Clever. Mildly. Erm, whatever. Okay, now what?
Humans sure do love counting things, don’t they? 1,000 posts? That’s almost as interesting as how many rotations around the sun you’ve lived.
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Of Gerbils and Men
Happy birthday to me!
Our G.R.I.P.E. scientists have been hard at work making another exciting gerbil discovery. But first, an update.
The gerbil code-named Farley is 22 years old, still lives at home, has never held down a real job for any significant period of time, has a medical marijuana card for his “sore back,” and was recently approved for food stamps.
Farley has had a few jobs in his four-year “career” since graduating high school (a rare feat amongst gerbils) but the outcome of his employment is always the same: He either quits or gets fired after an amazingly short period of time.
Farley was recently hired as a dishwasher at a local restaurant. Apparently the chef was not too impressed with Farley’s work ethic. One day the chef asked Farley to “pick up the pace.” Farley, not one to be known for a lack of self-expression, replied, “Get off my back.” Witty gerbil repartee!
The chef was not to be outdone. “I guess this is your last day.” Farley couldn’t agree fast enough. Yet another job burned through and in record time.
One thought struck me: When you are not responsible for your own food, clothing and shelter, an interaction like the one Farley the Ex-Dishwasher just had isn’t quite that impressive. It would be a lot more meaningful if he wasn’t living at home and his entire existence was on the line. That sort of mundane reality is something that is left for the rest of us non-gerbils to deal with. Take me, for example. When my boss whips it out and says, “Kneel down and get to work,” I don’t have much choice. My mommy isn’t going to feed me and tuck me in at night even if I lose my job. It’s either the job or nothing else. So I do what I gotta do to survive.
All good things must come to an end, and so it will probably be for Farley. Someday. Maybe. I say maybe because sometimes the universe can work in strange ways. Instead of ever having to learn responsibility Farley just might inherit everything from his parents and never have to work a day in his life. He’ll go from birth to death and never have to learn about the real human experience or any kind of responsibility. It might just happen. And if it does I’ll have to learn to live with it. Like my dad used to say, “Like isn’t fair. Who ever promised you that?”
On the other hand, if the shit does hit the fan and Farley someday has to sink or swim, I just pray to God that I get to be there to see it!
And now on to our discovery…
The Gerbil Birthday
This is a day set aside for someone who has lied to you, stolen from you, broken your stuff, treated you like shit and owes you lots of money. Even though the gerbil has avoided you like the plague (except when favors are needed of course) as the celebration day approaches the gerbil is suddenly around more often and on his best behavior. There is less anger and in your face angst and fewer “do you want to see me swinging from the end of rope!!!” comments. The day itself is celebrated by making the gerbil a special dinner, providing a celebratory dessert, and giving the gerbil gifts.
Starting today our scientists will be watching with the utmost interest to see how the gerbil’s behavior may unfold during the next few days. A quick revert to “gerbil normal” behavior is expected.
An offer you can’t refuse
A message from the Godfather
How do most people handle “invitations” from the boss for company events on your off-duty time?
The word “invitations” is quoted above, of course, because when my boss is involved, the matter might be phrased in such a way that attendance seems to be optional but really it’s not.
You … will … be … there. Or else.
My boss has a long history of making off-duty invitations that had better not be ignored. As always what he wants is of paramount importance.
One time he wanted an office Christmas party – on fucking Dec. 24th of all things – and he only provided a few days of notice! I told him – surprise surprise – that I already had plans with my family that afternoon. I wasn’t even lying. Imagine that! Families having plans on Christmas Eve? Who could ever foresee something like that! If only there was a way!
Long story short, we played a cat and mouse game that ended with him threatening my Christmas “bonus” if I didn’t attend. He flat out told me, “If you don’t go, you don’t get a bonus.”
I said, “Then that is the way it shall be, since I still got these plans, yo.”
That says a lot, doesn’t it? “I’m your employee. I won’t spend Christmas with you at your little tea party even if my yearly bonus hangs in the balance. Merry Go To Hell! Ho ho ho.”
As we all know, he turned every screw in his arsenal against me and I eventually capitulated – thus earning myself a legendary $50 gift card to Wal-Mart. Oh poop.
Another time it was an employee potluck on fight night. Yes, the boss just loves him some pugilistic delights. He does all the pay-per-view bullshit and will jizz in his pants over humans hurting each other. Again we respectfully declined, mainly because we don’t like hanging with the boss, our free time is precious to us, and we don’t fucking enjoy his sort of “entertainment.”
If you truly care about someone and invite them to an activity, you do so because you want to be nice and do something nice for them. It’s not about control and getting what you want. In that scenario when someone graciously declines you accept it without complaint. You might feel disappointed but you would probably recognize the fact that other people are human beings and not your personal Barbie and Ken dolls to play with.
Of course my boss doesn’t care, doesn’t see things that way, and is all about the control and squeals like a stuck pig until he gets his way. No matter the cost. You will show your neck to him for him to rip out with his bare teeth.
So that brings us to present day…
All of the employees have been “invited” to a “celebration” at a company dinner. It turns out that myself and one other employee have been with the company for five goat-fucking years. And that is something of significance that demands recognition – in the form of more torture during our off duty hours. Things that I would really appreciate, like a cash bonus, a paid day of, or even a gold Casio, are, of course, completely out of the question.
Incidentally that other employee threatened to quit today and un-RSVP from the party! LOLOL! Yeah, you might say morale is low around here. I plan to publish the results of my special employee job satisfaction survey soon. I’ll probably be done gathering data by tomorrow.
Anyway, I was studying the “invitation” and realized it just reeked of my boss’s special control stylings.Things like:
- NOTICE TO ALL EMPLOYEES.
- RSVP is required for reservation.
- RSVP ASAP
Sounds like something fun is in the horizon, eh??? 🙂
“Yes, boss! Right away, boss. Thank you, boss. May I have another, boss?”
Oh, and the kicker? They’ve picked the local shithole disgusting restaurant for this little shindig! Yep, someplace I really don’t care for at all. It’ll be a low-brow festival of pain and hog wallerin’. As usual it never occurs to him to think about what someone else might want and enjoy. Just decide for them. They’re probably too stupid to know, anyway. Thank God boss-man is here to save the day!
Maybe if I live through it and not kill anyone I’ll be able to report back later on how it went…
Shouts from the Abyss 
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