When I'm Supposed to be Working

These are just some of the things that go through my mind when I’m supposed to be working. I mean, I’m grateful to have a paying job, but how much passion can one really have for the financial end of providing medical equipment? If I were to quantify the amount of passion that I have for my job, I’d actually have to owe passion to all of the rest of the people who do have passion for their jobs. Seriously, I don’t care about medical equipment. So when I’m sitting in my cubicle, keying CMNs or pretending to be knowledgeable about Medicare guidelines, what follows could be what I’m really thinking about. I wonder how Pediatric Specialists would feel if they knew what they’d really been paying me for.

“I think that having masculine and feminine letters at the end of names is a little superfluous, seeing as how actually being a man or a woman should unravel the gender mystery. And it’s not like having an “O” at the end of your name makes you more of a man. When was the last time you met a man named ‘Armando’ and didn’t automatically think he was gay? With a name like that, you might as well call yourself ‘Sugarbooty, the King of Balls In My Face’ and beat the rush of thrusting crotches that are going to come at you every time you find yourself in the gay part of town.”

“If your ideas about the measure of man are defined by whether or not he has any money, then you’re destined to go through life disappointed in the men that you meet. Most men out there aren’t rich or even financially comfortable. We have trouble paying our bills just like you do. Chances are, the man you’re with right now has eaten dog food or pawned his Playstation once or twice when his check came up short. Most of us can’t afford to pretend being ballers, which is why so many of us wear cubic zirconium and hollow chains. He’s pretending to have money just like you’re pretending to be able to fill out a D-cup without adding tissue. So ladies, never judge a man based on his bank statement or how much he’s willing to spend on you, because most of us are a drunken weekend in Vegas away from being put out on the street. Allowing a man’s financial state to guide your decisions regarding him is kind of like buying a car based on how many walls it can drive through before it explodes. It’s an impressive statistic, but that’s still a really stupid reason to buy a car.”

“Why do people keep naming their sons ‘Damian?’ It’s almost like these parents watched ‘The Omen’ and thought, ‘Well, MY Damian isn’t going to try and kill me,’ seven years before he’s chasing them out of the upstairs bedroom from behind the wheel of the family van. There’s no chance that your kid won’t have an anger management problem when you name him after the son of the Devil. The only person I ever met named Damian who wasn’t crazy had a stuttering problem, so if those are the choices you want to roll the dice with, good luck surviving his terrible twos. Hopefully, you’ll realize your mistake before he throws a toaster in the shower with you because you made him drink water instead of Kool-Aid. And don’t think that changing the spelling of the name is going to keep the forces of evil from invading the fleshbag you call your son. The Prince of Darkness cannot be fooled by your grammatical flourishes.”

“I was listening to music for non-retards when I heard that there was finally a song that proclaims ‘You are not the father!’ At last, the widely ignored ‘nigger’ segment of our society has been fully represented, because ‘Fry That Chicken’ didn’t fully probe the depths of niggerdom. Not since someone decided to make a song called ‘My Baby Daddy’ in an effort to make White America rethink letting us out of the back of the bus have I been so embarrassed. The previous generation didn’t get attacked with dogs and fire hoses so our generation could tear down the accomplishments of the Civil Rights Movement with ‘that baby don’t look like me.’ We could at least pretend like we have some dignity about us. I haven’t heard the song, because I don’t listen to radio stations that perpetuate the Coon Movement of the Early 21st Century (V103), but having been told about it by someone who did, I suddenly felt that men like Brother Martin and Brother Malcolm were wasted on people like us. And what bothered me the most was that the lady who told me about the song said that she thought of me as soon as she heard it. Did she know that I wasn’t going to be happy about it or was she secretly calling me a nigger to my face?”

“How many of us have ever seen a crackhead up close? I’m just asking because we all talk about crackheads like hanging out with one is an everyday experience. I don’t think I’ve ever knowingly spoken with a crackhead and if I had to put a number to it, I’d say I’ve seen as many crackheads as I’ve seen winged zombie armies. Yet we all claim to know the signs of crackish behavior, even though to try know what a crackhead looks like, it’s necessary to have actually spoken with one. Calling the homeless guy who’s laid out in the street during your lunch hour a crackhead is really just speculation until he offers to suck your dick with his ashy and blistered lips. I know that some of us know a person that we suspect is on something, because it’s not normal for a person to clean the tile behind the toilet with a toothbrush, but that doesn’t mean they’re crackheads. That’s clearly a meth addict.

But how do I really know that? I don’t know anyone who knows anyone who’s even seen crystal meth. But I do remember that commercial they used to show back in the 90s, where the girl is obsessively cleaning her bathroom because the met won’t let her stop. And between that and my theories that Springfield, OH is the city that crystal meth destroyed, I don’t really have any hard evidence about any of the effects that crystal meth or any other drug has. If it wasn’t for HBO specials telling me that drugs inevitably make you cast your heterosexual leanings aside in exchange for another rock, I wouldn’t know much about drugs at all, to be honest.”

“To people who still insist on telling wrestling fans that wrestling is fake: Seriously, you’re the one who looks pathetic and sad. Everyone knows the truth about wrestling. Everyone’s known for at least a decade, at the very least. Or were you the only person who didn’t see “Pro Wrestling’s Secrets Exposed,” “Beyond the Mat,” or four seasons of “Tough Enough?” And here you are, spreading old news like you made a major discovery. That’s real top notch reporting, there, Lois Lane. Hey, while you’re at it, why don’t you spread the word about the Berlin Wall, too?”

“Instead of working, I spent a half-hour listing every Wrestlemania match that I could think of. If I wasn’t already at work, I’d say that I needed to get a job.”

“If you’re going to go through the trouble of naming your child “Zaire,” why not just keep the spelling the same instead of assuming that your bastardized “Zyyear” somehow improves on the name and makes it unique. As if there’s been a run on the name “Zaire” in the thousand or so years that the name has been in existence and your want your kid to stand out from the crowd. If that’s the case, then say hello to my little girl, “Kanuhda Igipte.”

“The next time you have a child and the best name you can come up with is “Xztashya (an actual name),” just go ahead and buy your kid some hand cuffs or stripper heels, because all hope is lost. You would have been better off just naming your kid “Nigger” so white people won’t be forced to make assumptions. So little Xztashya, enjoy your life on the pole and/or in jail, and understand that your father, Xzaiah (her father’s actual name), who decided to continue the tradition of ignorance that has consumed your entire family (because they allowed this “Xz” nonsense to continue), was to blame for your being cursed with the kind of name that can only look good on a Burger King name tag.”

“I wonder if Alicia Keys ever gets sick of hearing her own songs.”

“I remember when I was a kid and toothbrushes were just a stiff, plastic stick in one of the primary colors with bristles so rough, I’d swear that they were peeling the enamel off of my teeth. A toothbrush back then was so rough that my gums bled every time I brushed. The cavity creeps didn’t stand a chance against brushes that could clean your toilet. But those days are gone. Nowadays, toothbrushes are soft like lotion-filled fairy clouds, designed to give me a rubdown in my mouth. Yeah, they’re prettier and flexible and gentler, with two or three of my favorite cartoon characters on it, but when I use one, it feels like I’m just moving the plaque around on my teeth. It’s like I’m using a tooth-sponge.”