You forgot my birthday again, didn't you?

It's my birthday. I started the celebration early last night. I hung out on the patio of my local sports bar making fun of all the regulars that came in. My buddy and I try and tell ourselves that we aren't just like the regulars. Because we are just hanging out there to be ironic. My bartender thinks we act just like the two old guys from the Muppet's. I think she's right!

Boycott Burger King

I was 13 when I worked at the tomato factory. Despite being 13, or perhaps because I was underaged, my parents had no problem getting me a day's work on the last day of tomato canning. At the factory I worked on an assembly line. I stood over a conveyor belt picking out red tomatoes that were vine ripened, and placed them on another conveyor belt that shipped them off to get packaged right away. I was told to let the green tomatoes continue down the conveyor. At the end of the belt were large storage rooms where the tomatoes were gassed with poison which turned them red.

To this day I have an unnatural fear of being trapped in a large warehouse storage rooms full of tomatoes and the toxic gasses that would "kill ya if you breathed them in, so make sure you don't go inside where the tomatoes are if the the dial is switched on." Like Captain Kirk I know how I will die, alone, and surrounded by tomatoes.

I didn't die at the factory, but I got injured on my first and only day on the job. I cut my hand and it bled all over a few tomatoes. I still finished the day because working was the only way I was going to get paid. My mom placed a band-aid around my cut, and she told me I could take the day off if I wanted, but I wouldn't get paid. She said she wouldn't lie to the company for me. My brother and I were promised we could keep some of the money we make at the factory, so we could buy stuff at when we went to Disneyland. So I chose to take my damaged and bandaged hand back to the assembly line.


Like other migrant families wanting employment my family had to leave Florida and travel the country. To stay employed my parents had to follow the cycle of tomato picking. The cycle started with picking tomatoes in my step dad's home state of Floida and we followed the pickers to the second growing season in Georgia. And finally my family drove to Maryland for the processing of tomatoes. My step dad worked as a forklift operator in Maryland and my Mom worked in the warehouse as a shipper.

Despite the work and poverty, Maryland is full of happy memories for me. I discovered masturbation in a one room trailer no bigger than a Subaru while my parents worked and my little brother swan in the trailer park pool. For the first time in my sexual life I felt up on a non relative. It was an important moment for me, and must have been an important moment for the girl as well, because she asked me for my favorite shirt to mark the occasion and to remember me by. My brother, who had been making out with my gal's sister, eagerly complied with his suitors request. But I told my girl no. It was the first and only time I've ever stood up to a g/f. I guess I really liked my shirt. Afterwards I was glad I did not hand that shirt over, because my brother got in big trouble for giving away his t-shirt to a stranger.

That happy summer in Maryland Coca Cola introduced the world to new coke. But the convenience store run by the trailer park we lived in never received any shipments of the new coke. Instead the trailer park's store manager sold us his 4 month old supply of coke bottles for 50 cents a piece.

You may find this hard to believe, but the tiny trailer park convenience store had a library. All you had to do was bring in a copy of a used paperback and you could exchange it for someone else's book. I discovered my interest in incest with my new step sister wasn't shameful by reading V.C. Andrews' book, Flowers in the Attic. My new step sister thought I was "fox," and I got a peek at her chest, some of the finest breasts in the history of God.

I met the "librarian" on the first day we set up camp. She thought I was totally hot. She was right , look how cute I am in the picture at the top of the blog. I was 13 then. Tell me you could keep your hands off that. I don't think it was just my looks that got to this girl though. I think she was just really horny. I figured I had no chance with her, because she was 18, five years older than me. A real women. Turns out I was wrong, she would have slept with me, or anyone else, as she slept with my gross step daddy, who looks just like Charles Bukowski, on more than one occasion.

SO I must say, Maryland- good for getting the sex.
Tomato picking-dangerous and poorly paid work. But if you want to go to a theme park with my parents it's a lot better to go with your own money. We spend all day at the park and my parents refuse to buy drinks or food or silly hats and t-shirts.

I pride myself on knowing just what it's like to be a migrant worker. That's why I support the hard laborers of the tomato road. And that's why I have to Boycott the King. Unlike Taco Bell and McDonald's, his Royal Highness, refuses to pay 1 cent more directly to the hard working migrant farm workers.

"The deal, according to “Minding Your Business” reporter Ali Velshi, has McDonald’s working with a company representing immigrant farm workers. Under the pact, McDonald’s would make sure an extra penny per pound would go directly to the workers – a 75-percent increase in the cost of a bucket of tomatoes. “This is directly tied to McDonald's saying they're going to pay for something that's going to help the end worker.”

The report took a decidedly pro-worker stand. “It is not easy being a tomato picker,” Velshi argued. Even with the deal, he complained it will take the “best tomato pickers up to the poverty line” and they will still have “no benefits, no overtime.”

Don't you fucking dare eat at Burger King or I will bite your face off!

Thanksgiving means I have to talk to you

If you come through my line I am required to speak to you, even though my Thanksgiving was uneventful and all you want to do is ask about me how my holiday went. I want to tell you that I only celebrate one religious holiday a year, my birthday. I want to tell you that I had to work this Thanksgiving just so you could buy all the dry ice and beer you need to celebrate, that most of my family is out of state this Thanksgiving, and all my friends had better things to do this year than invite me over for turkey dinner. So maybe I had the worst Thanksgiving ever and I 'd rather not talk about it. But you don't want to hear that. I'd like to stop pretending that my holiday was "pretty good," I want to tell you that I didn't even get the pathetic single friend "left over" plate from my friends who celebrated this Thanksgiving without me. I thought that shit was obligatory. I think my friends expect me to believe that they ate an entire bird, and that not a drop of stuffing was left. Bullshit.

Instead yesterday, a full two days after Thanksgiving and still needing my turkey day fix, I bought a pre-cooked rotisserie chicken from the deli of my grocery store. I made stuffing all by myself, and then I microwaved half a packet of dried mashed potatoes and covered them with store bought gravy. It was quite delicious, thank you. I bet you don't want to hear how I have nothing to be thankful for that I didn't make myself.

I am only talking to you because my boss told me that I have to. She was hovering over me as i was trying to leave today, she took my money drop and watched me listlessly scan the last few customers I had in line. I didn't want to talk to them, so I made no effort to pretend in front of her. I was pissed off, because I was already a good 25 minutes over my scheduled time to go home. And the only reason I got to leave at all was I looked over at my manager and gave her the "If you don't block my line off I will slit the throat of your first born son and drink his blood." She got the message and finally blocked me.

I rode the bike over to the library right after work to blog this story. Not because this is a particularly interesting story, but because I know you need to be on the inside of my inner mental life. I thought you'd like to hear that a second girl gave me a hug, that way you won't have to think I'm such a loser.

I'm on a roll. Lisa is the the second girl to hug me this week at work. She says she loves me, but then she called me old. She told me I looked just like another guy we work with. That dude is like 40, so I got depressed. Then she made fun of my pimple. I've had a pimple stuck on my nose for the last 6 weeks. It simply won't go away. It's so big the Astronomical Society has decided to rename my pimple, Pluto. They believe my pimple has a larger gravity constant than any object in the near Kupier belt. It's kinda cool that my pimple was named a 9th planet though. Kids look up me to me and want my autograph. People who come through my line feel obliged to ask about it. They wonder what how it's going and what my pimple is up to. "Does it mean you have 2 brains?" Lisa the hugging courtesy clerk asks. "Is that why you are so smart?" Yeah, that's right, Lisa. Which I guess is two more brains than you'll ever have."Why don't you just come over here and give me another hug?"

I get a hug from a girl

I'm a cashier. I spent yesterday and today checking out your groceries. Asking you for your value card. And trying to remember the difference between acorn squash and butternut squash.

Not much else has changed for me since I was moved from the customer service desk to cashier. But my sudden move to cashier has had benefits. I now get hugs from the hottest 17 year old bagger you've ever seen. I don't know why, or what I did to deserve it. But she walks up from behind me and says hello and then starts to awkwardly hug me.

Maybe she wasn't the awkward one. I was. I just stood there frozen the first time she hugged me. The second time I got a hug I was getting off work and she hugged me goodbye. I put my hand around her back on the second hug. She's so skinny I can feel her ribs. Feeling up on a 17 year old girl's skinny rib is as close to second base as I've come with a girl in 4 years.

Before her shift today I got another hug again. She surprised me this time by coming up from behind me and placing her arms around me. This time it really was awkward, as I have been farting all week. Not only have I been farting, but my ass has been smelling. My ass normally smells because I have to ride a bike to work every day after I take my morning dump. So today I decided to skip the morning shit and try holding my shit in all day. But my colon must be leaking, because I stank like shit all day anyway. I get a whiff of shit smell every time I turn around quickly, like when some strange, hugging hot chicks place their heads on the back of my neck and squeal at me.

All this hugging must be a generational thing. All the girl baggers and teen cashiers at my store are all so sweet and cute. They talk to me and say hi. It's like being back in high school, only this time I am kinda popular. I don't mean captain of the football team popular, but I get invited to the parties, and I can sit at the cool kids lunch table. So I take back all the mean things I say about Generation Y, because I am really pissed at all the girls I went to high school with. You never said hello to me in the hallways. You couldn't bring yourself to acknowledge me except in the library, and only when no one was looking at us and you needed help with the card catalog.

So I don't need you old chicks anymore. I am going to buy all the courtesy clerks at my work a ton of alcohol. I'm gonna watch them get drunk and film themselves and put their silly self-conscious videos on you tube. That's me in the background waving at you. Red faced and drunk my beer belly and smelly ass stuck in a bean bag I can't get out of. Pass me another beer, dude.

Generation Y is Short for Whiney

One of the best things about my job is working with young people. I'm getting old. I'm 36 going on 37. It's nice to be around all that youth. It rubs off on you. Keeps you young. Not only do I work with young people, I also get paid like them. It usually takes them just a few days to figure this out. When the kids figure it out they start bossing me around. They tell me how to bag groceries like I wasn't a bagger back in 1988.

"I've never bossed around someone older than me before."

I get told that a lot. Along with "So, if you are 20 years older than me how come I make more money than you and you still have to ride a bike or the bus every where you go?" I have to punch people after I hear that. If you think I might be losing control of my impulses, you're right. I was told I had "lost control" after I screamed at my 20 something bartender that she was a "Misanthropic bitch for placing the needs of animals (i.e dogs) ahead of humans." I was kindly asked to leave the premises. I did, but not before describing in some detail the latent pathology inherent in her world view.

I was sent to training this week to become a cashier. Something about how customer service is not my forte I think. I hate customers. They ask for shit all the time. I don't like that. I wished I was born in Russia or France. The people in those cultures hate customer service. I find a certain civility in that.

So now I am to be cashier. I must learn produce codes. Green Bell Peppers are 4065, etc. I am stuck in what is essentially a repeat of my customer service training class. My class has three persons. Myself. A 17 year old who graduated from high school at 15 and who then spent the next two years smoking pot. And a portly wanna be drama fag Gen-Y'er.

Drama FAG found me at lunch break. I had hoped to scarf down a cheeseburger and read my paper unmolested before returning to work. Instead I looked up from my paper when I heard Drama Fag standing next to me. I wanted to avoid him because he has an extremely annoying habit.

He has this constant running dialogue under his breath describing his every reaction to any incoming stimuli. Being seated next to him during training was like being connected via USB directly into the RAM instruction set for his brain.

"I don't like being away from home. I'm not used to people not caring about what I say. At home I'm surrounded by people who care. I lost my bus pass, but you probably don't care."

"I know I don't." I had my own problems. I had lost my wallet the day before. When I tried to get a new I.D. I found out that my drivers license wasn't just suspended it was revoked. If I want to drive again I will need to get a psychologist to document to the state for me that "my drinking problem" does not interfere with my ability to drive. I think we all know how hard that is going to be. Also I just got an email that Charles Scwabb, despite my massive talents and impressive resume, didn't want to schedule an interview for me. "We have decided to pursue other candidates whose skills and experience more closely fit the position’s requirements. "

I guess that's why they chose to hire a friend of mine for the job opening, instead of me. He has exactly 3 weeks of work experience as a Blockbuster employee. So you can see how I can't compete with that. I won't be stock broker now. I won't be getting my Land Rover, or Porsche Cayenne. So I am not in the mood to hear about your lost bus pass.

I left him in the Jack in the Box. I tried ditching him with the excuse that I had to go look for my wallet. I thought I was safe when he went back inside to the training class. I decided to stop for ice cream before continuing my search for my lost wallet.I grabbed my chocolate Cold Stone Creamery ice cream and sat at a patio table outdoors. I was reading the paper, when the sun was suddenly shaded over.

HE stood next to my outdoor table for 20 minutes. I never said a word to him, but I learned from his Gary Shandling voice overs that he thought it was hot outside and his neck itched. I never offered him a seat at my table and he never asked if he could join me. He simply stood a foot away from me merrily texting away to his girlfriend. He seemed content just knowing he was near human contact. I assume his helicopter mom was keeping track of him from the GPS function on his phone. He took several pictures of me as I ate. The chocolate ice cream stains down my shirt amused him. He wants to be my best friend.

I want to vomit on him after I learn he has been working as a video store clerk for 3 months.
"Blockbuster?" I ask. "You should be a stock broker. Get your series 49." I tell him. He smiles back at me. "Thanks. I'll think about it."

Gout's got me down, but at least I wasn't born with 8 legs

I stand at work all day. At some point my foot began to hurt yesterday. I have no idea why. It began to hurt quite badly. If I was a girl I would have cried. It began to hurt right in the middle of one of those dreaded Western Union transactions.

"I'll need a local address for you sir."

"No, you don't."

Ok. I argued a little bit more with the guy. I told him that it was the policy of this store, not Western Union for him to leave a local address. But my fourth toe felt like it had bone cancer.

My ex-roomie has the Gout. He drinks way too much. I drink way too much. I can't think of any other reason, (other than the Bone Cancer) that my foot should hurt. I must have the Gout too. I have to stop drinking. If I stop drinking I will soon have to kill most of the people I meet in my customer service line. That's ok/I am getting moved to cashier anyway.

So I've got gout or bone cancer. My foot has swollen to three times it size. I can feel the restricted flow of blood in my little toe. Each individual red blood cell squeezing into my foot snaps my attention away from the really interesting things in life. Like an 8 legged girl. Born in India. (Where else?) 8 legs. That's like twice as many as a human quadruped. And Vladimir Putin covets all 8 of her legs. Icky! Vladdy, stay away form her you sicko.

My online activity consits of adopting Kerry Howley, not watching kiddie porn. Kerry might be famous, but I own her butt on Google.

I went to the library today to blog about my favorite adoptee Kerry Howley. I felt I needed to justify to some new readers* why I cyber stalk E-list** celebrities. I need to justify my stalking because I don't want certain readers to know exactly how creepy I really am.

Speaking of creepy, I know getting the word out about Kerry Howley through my blog is difficult. In no small part to the good folks at Google, who deemed it proper to lower my page rank a while back. I figured a lower page ranking would preclude me from furthering the career of any of the near celebrities I choose. I was wrong. If you Google "Kerry Howley" you will find my post ranks fifth. Dear Kerry, I own you now. At least on Google. I suppose you will now have to start answering my e-mails. And you will probably have to make me head of your fan club or something.

But today's problem with blogging had nothing to do with my lowered page rank and everything to do with the "robbery" of a cell phone I witnessed at the public library computer station I am working at. After the robbery a security guard tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to put my computer on " lock down" and "follow him upstairs."

Two cute girls, their jaws wide open and eyes bugged out, watched me all the way out the door. I am sure they were convinced I must have been viewing kiddie porn. But it just ain't true. I never view kiddie porn in public. That's just stupid, your just asking to get caught by viewing your porn in public! My "crime" was noticing that a rather large chested woman had walked off with a cell phone that wasn't hers. Now the cops are chasing after the largest chested thief in history, and I will have to go upstairs to view a lineup and make an I.D.

I used to work at this library and so my former boss and workmates saw me getting escorted upstairs by a park ranger. They must have assumed I had finally decided to use the Internet to look up how to blow up Hoover dam or something. I don't need the Internets for bomb planning. I have a friend who can teach me things like that. He was in the Army. And he might be half-crazy, but blowing up Hoover Dam would be child's play for him.

After making the I.D. I walked back to the computer to finish this post. A little later the park ranger returns. This time he shouts at me that "a police officer is coming to speak to you." Nice. No way these 18 year old girls are going to sleep with me now. You may want to ask me what does all this trouble creating this post have to do with blogging about the awesome Kerry Howley. Nothing at all. And you have no one to blame for that, but the Fascist Police State we live in.

***

UPDATE

The cops found the cell phone in her back pack. Once the kid got his phone back he decided not to press charges. All this CSI investigation for nothing. Only now I have to watch out for huge breasted women who type MySpace messages at the public library. I think I've created an enemy.

UPDATE II

Never ask a cop how to spell Fascist just because blogger's spell check is down. They get upset.


*The price you pay for following him through reading my blog is ...well...reading my blog.
** Kerry, I don't think you are E-list. You are totally an A-lister in my book!