Let’s Give Em Something to Talk About

Whatever happened to discretion? In the past, we made public phone calls in enclosed glass booths. We didn’t talk to a doctor or a banker unless we were closed up inside their office. There were certain things that people just knew not to discuss in public, and most people made a concerted effort to keep their personal lives personal.

Today of course, this is no more. I constantly see people who answer a cell phone, then magically get transported to a place where they think they are alone. Is there some sort of signal that emits from the cell phone that blinds them into not seeing that there are people around, and usually in close proximity?

This is especially awkward if you are in a relatively small enclosed space with just one or two other people and someone engages in a call. Recently, I was at a place of business, working in a small back office, when the girl who works there answered a cell phone call. She could have easily stepped out to the vast open area of the store, or the even more vast open area of the outside world, but instead chose to have her conversation right then and there.

Maybe this wouldn’t be a big deal if she was talking to a customer, or business associate, or if it were a brief business call, but this of course was not the case. I tried not to listen in, not because I respected her privacy, but because I could care less about what she had to say. I couldn’t help but pick up on a few key phrases though. “I told that bitch not to ever go back to my trailer without Buddy or me being there. She ain’t nothing but a skank whore, and I’ll tell her to her face.” It continued for what seemed like an eternity, and rapidly got worse. “I know her stepdaddy molested her, but that ain’t no excuse for her shit.”

At this point, I think I was probably inadvertently staring at her, out of mere shock at her lack of common sense and discretion. What I actually thought was, ‘Maybe she wants me to join in to this discussion. Perhaps her deciding to have her conversation two feet away from me is an invitation for me to speak up.’ I should have, but before I could come up with something to say, “Well I gotta go, I’m at work and stuff. Bye.”, came from her face. And just as I was about to tell her to hang up the phone and call 1-800-JERRY-SPRINGER.

Then, I went to the bank, and after making a deposit, asked the teller if I could get my account balance. As she was walking away from the counter, the less than friendly woman then said, “Sure. It’s (balance) and 77 cents.” It was clearly loud enough for the whole bank to hear. Funny, I didn’t think it was public information. Guess it is at that bank. That’s why I call it Crapital One.

I could go on, but you get the idea. I don’t wanna know what you are talking on your cell phone about, and I don’t want YOU to know what I am doing. I would hope that most people should have enough going on in their lives to not have to share.

Lucky Number

I don’t understand the lottery. You buy a ticket for $1 and then have a chance to win millions, but at what odds? The odds of winning the Powerball multi-state lottery are 146,107,962 to 1. That means that out of 146,107,962 tickets sold 1 is the winner. One!! That’s it!

Would you give me a dollar if I told you to pick a number between 1 and 146,107,962 and if you guess correctly I will give you 200 million dollars? It’s the same thing! Of course, you would say that I probably wouldn’t be honest and that even if you guessed correctly, then I would lie and say that you didn’t.

So, continuing with that philosophy, if you wouldn’t trust me, who you don’t even know, why do you trust the government (who runs the lottery) with the same thing? You should know that government will screw you over if given the chance. There’s no way that I trust them, especially seeing what they do with our money.

Now, I admit that I have purchased a lottery ticket or two in the past. Did I think that I had a shot to win?? Maybe. I knew I had a better chance of getting struck by lightning, but figured it was only a buck. This makes me think, do people who get struck by lightning have a final thought before they die of, “Damn! I should have bought a lottery ticket instead!”

If I did play and win, I wouldn’t have enough money to buy what I want. No matter what the jackpot would be. I know you are probably thinking that I mean something intangible like happiness or world peace, but I’m not that nice. I am talking about a material thing, but the lottery has yet to have a big enough jackpot to cover it. What I would want to do would be to build my own highway system. It would go everywhere I wanted to, and I would be the only person who could drive on it. That way I could completely avoid all the traffic and the assholes who create it in this city. I could go on about this, but I think I have already posted an entry on that topic before.

Don't Stop Till You Get Enough

Now that I’m a father, I find myself paying more and more attention to people and their kids. Specifically, the interactions between them, and how they get along with each other. I think one of the worst sights I have seen is the ‘sports dad’ who stands on the sidelines during the sporting event and screams at his child as if they are competing for Olympic gold. It makes me want to grab them by the face and yell, “He is seven! There is no championship ring on the line here!! Let the boy just have fun.”

Of course, ‘sports dad’ is too wrapped up in the moment to realize this. Rather than think logically, he is constantly spewing out tips and suggestions like he’s on ESPN. Maybe he should swing by a mirror and notice that he isn’t exactly the model of a sports professional. The shadow of his ass shades the entire field, and he would go into cardiac arrest if he ran ten feet.

What this really is about is that ‘sports dad’ is trying to live vicariously through his son, and make up for the years he either didn’t play sports, or sucked at them. His regret and pent up frustration manifests itself into anger and rage toward the child. It’s really very sad.

I’m sure some may read this and think that I might be too harsh here. Of course you should encourage your kids to do well at everything they do, but there is a limit. If you don’t think that pushing your kids too hard screws them up for life, I have two words for you – Michael Jackson.

Talk Talk

At work, we have entered into our busiest time of the year, known as back to school. What this means is that the store is filled with high school and college aged kids who need to either buy new electronic supplies, or get existing things fixed. The computer services area is filled with young girls who have computer problems. As pleasant as that is on the eyes, it is equally as unpleasant on the ears. I think the store should start up a chart and take bets on which young girl will win the prize for the heaviest usage of the word “like”. In the spirit of this, I have come up with an algebraic formula for calculating stupidity.

S = (L * W) / 2

The S is of course the result (the stupidity number), the L the number of times “like” is used, the W the total number of other words, and then you divide by two. This formula is implemented after asking the person a binary question (hence the two). Ask them a yes/no question, then listen to the result (it may be painful), and calculate the stupidity number.

Sometimes, I want to look these individuals right in the eye and say to them very slowly, “Try telling me that again, but WITHOUT using the word “like”, AT ALL.” I imagine their eyes rolling back in their heads, then the whole body starts to violently tremble, then their head just explodes.

Moving on, an opposite, yet equally as painful experience is speaking with someone, anyone today who is doing technical phone support for a major computer company. You are unable to tell whether they are asking you a question or conducting a Hindu chant. Often times, the only intelligible word is their “American” name. What you get is 15 seconds of a prayer to the cow god, then the word “Bob”, followed by more chanting. The funny thing is though, on the rare occasion that you can make out what they are saying, what you hear is that they have a much better use of the language grammatically than the vast majority of Americans. Of course, they are molesting it phonetically, but I guess you just can’t get everything you want.

Fire, Smoke She Is A Rising

So, it is that time of year again. A time that I especially despise. Fireworks time. I hate fireworks. Actually, it isn’t the actual fireworks that I hate, it is the stupid people who come to possess them this time of year and then fire them off at will. If only there was a screening process utilized when you went to make a fireworks purchase.

“Hello, would you like to buy some fireworks today? Are you a complete dumbass with a total lack of regard for anyone else in the world? If so, I am unable to sell to you.”

Of course, it does not work this way. Any jackass with money can purchase enough fireworks to turn my otherwise quiet neighborhood into the Gaza strip. Most people have the common sense to wait until the actual holiday to shoot the fireworks, or if doing them before, at least do them before it gets too late into the night. But it is those select few ass monkeys who decide that 2AM is a good time to test out the new RocketBlast 8000 that make me so angry.

Here are my main general complaints about this issue. First, why do fireworks go on sale almost two weeks before the holiday? This isn’t a hurricane supply sale where you have to stock up ahead of time. Most of the business occurs the day before and day of the actual holiday. Why not restrict the sales to those days?? This would make it so that Bubba couldn’t buy 100 bottle rockets on the first Monday they go on sale and then shoot them off one at a time all night long.

Second, if anyone out there has even 80/80 vision, they can clearly see that our entire area is very dry. There are yards in my neighborhood that look like they have already been set on fire. The grass is entirely dead and the whole lawn looks like Wesley Snipe’s ass it is so brown. It would be nice to assume that the general population would be smart enough to avoid aiming flaming projectiles at such an area, but that would be one of those assumptions that illustrate the whole ass-u-me notion. Denham Springs has banned the sale of fireworks this holiday, due to this very reason. I think that pretty much illustrates my point of not trusting the “special ones” of the population to do the right thing.

Here in Ascension parish, there will be no such ban put in place. Fireworks are banned in Baton Rouge because it is a city and it has neighborhoods everywhere so it is deemed to dangerous. Prairieville is the same exact situation. There are more neighborhoods here than you can count. Of course, you can’t ban or do anything that involves Prairieville, because it isn’t a real place. Although there is something like 60,000 people living here now, we aren’t an incorporated place, no mayor, no town council even. The area is still being run as if it were still farmland 50 years ago. Maybe a renegade bottle rocket will set some local politician’s house up in flames, and then they will do something.