Still Cranky After a Week-long Absence, So I Thought I'd Write Something

God hath given you one face and you make yourselves another.
                                                                                                     -Hamlet  (3.1)


Our church wants to put together a directory with pictures of all the people who attend services. They’ve been asking all attendees to schedule a photography session at the church. I wouldn’t have bothered, but the Boss wants me to play nice with others, something that I just don’t do so well. We scheduled an appointment. The Mom & Pop business taking the pictures prints one free directory for each family that gets a picture taken (additional directories are $10 each), and then tries to sell portrait packages. Those packages are incredibly expensive. The woman selling the packages assumed that we were buyers. She never bothered to ask us if we wanted to purchase pictures. We sat down to pick the pose for the directory, but she started writing and processing an order that we were not going to place. It was odd. Of course, she started the entire process by explaining how they printed the directories for free, as if we had an obligation to purchase their product, and then acted completely surprised when I told her that we weren’t buying. She almost looked offended. Guilt is simply not an effective sales technique. At least, not with me. I’m a fairly unsympathetic bastard where salesmen are concerned, which is why the Boss looked at me and asked, “What do you think?” She knew I’d say “no, thank you,” and she wouldn’t have to. We have good teamwork on stuff like that. One of the selling points of this business was their touch-up services. They are quite adept at removing all character from a person’s face, making their customers look plastic. Wrinkles give people character. Ladies, crow’s feet and laugh lines are sexy. Stop trying to cover them. In one of their sample photos, they removed a drooping eye lid from a grandmotherly woman and created a face that simply was not in the original photograph. I don’t know how the subject of the photograph felt about the finished product, but if their prices didn’t guarantee that I didn’t buy anything, their touch-up services did.



"Do not lie in a ditch, and say God help me; use the lawful tools He hath lent thee."
                                                                                         - English Proverb

The Subway in our Wal*mart is 30 feet from the store’s produce section, so you can imagine my surprise when I went into the shop for a sandwich and was told by a young kid behind the counter that they were completely out of lettuce. How difficult would it have been for him to run over, buy a head of lettuce, wash it, chop it, and put it on a sandwich? There’s probably some law somewhere preventing him from taking that initiative, if he thought of it at all. It would have taken a dollar from the till, but brought in much more in sales. I briefly thought about buying a head of lettuce, handing it to the kid, and saying, “Here’s some lettuce. Now, making my f---ing sandwich.” Instead, I played nice, bit my tongue, and simply left. Honestly, playing well with others is boring.



"You are drunk Sir Winston, you are disgustingly drunk."
"Yes, Mrs. Braddock, I am drunk. But you, Mrs. Braddock, are ugly and disgustingly fat. But, tomorrow morning I, Winston Churchill, will be sober.”
                                                                                           – Winston Churchill

I’m in mourning. I’ve had a loss in my life. Mayonnaise. My foot-long turkey breast on Italian bread was boring without mayonnaise. It made the long drive from Wal*mart to a different Subway quite disappointing. Last week, I returned to Weight Watchers after a year-long absence and a return of all the weight I previously lost. When my pants stopped fitting I knew I had to either lose the weight or buy more clothes. I opted for the former. I told my new meeting leader that I didn’t want to hear any insults directed towards men in general, towards me, or towards my weight loss. I wanted genuine assistance during those weeks where weight loss doesn’t go so well, not mocking ridicule. If she could play by those rules, we’d get along fine. This woman was a bit taken back both by the story I told her about my previous meeting leader and my blunt, direct manner; but, she agreed. I lost 5.5 pounds this past week, and put back on my favorite pair of cargo shorts without playing origami with my belly fat . Apparently, the difference between a size 38 and a size 40 (in pants) is the difference between weighing 243 and 238, but I have an overwhelming desire dive naked into a vat of mayonnaise and swim around for awhile. I’ll play nice, and keep the pictures private.