(Intermittent Transmission of a Wandering Mind)
-Logue
This is where dispatches from my ongoing peculiarities will appear.
Updates, artwork, mild revelations, and the occasional useful scrap. A space for thoughts to stretch, stammer, or shimmer. Expect stories, sketches, reflections, and the occasional something that isn’t quite sure what it is yet. Frequency may vary. Clarity is not guaranteed. Proceed gently. Do not tap the glass. The specimens may be watching you too.
Quit falling on my Knife!
As a person who as of late has access to cable television again, I have to state here that I fucking HATE Taco Bell commercials! The latest one being of a man in a giant test bunker testing nachos that have just been lowered to .99¢, and blowing out the windows by screaming "WOW!".....trying to proove that Taco Bell suffers no ill effect in the ever present "taste vs. cost" ratio theory we've all read so much about.
I just want to throw my coffee mug at the television!
I'm not being entirely fair to Taco Bell here. The truth of the matter is that I basically hate all commercials; actually, I hate all forms of advertising in general. I've always found it incredibly insulting when someone tries to cleverly "trick" me into thinking of their product first whenever I need (or think I need) a softdrink, new pair of shoes or adult diapers.
Many of my family believe that I should have gone into advertising due to my general disdain for the medium.....which makes no sense to me, seeing as I also have a hatred for the practice of putting babies on spikes, and no one has ever told me that I should pursue a career in that. I suppose it would come down to who offers the better benefits.
This brings me to one of my newest revulsions, the unnecessary drug campaign that has been flooding the airwaves and billboards for the past few years. Pills for weight loss, male enhancement (?), getting sleep, hair loss, being too tall, seeing unicorns, lycanthropy, fear of Alaskian Crabs, ect.
I recently was witness to the newest of these, a pill to combat RLS, or "Restless Leg Syndrome". Restless...Leg...Syndrome. Are you fucking kidding me?!
I'm guessing that this is just a new clever way to remarket Ambien or some other sleep aid, by trying to convince gullable folks that it could be their legs that are keeping them from getting sleep at night. Legs that feel more of a need to walk around and carry their host to the television to watch late night programing. I had no idea that lack of sleep could have such causes. This means that I actually suffered for over a year with SWSWENBSBAFANS....or "Sleeping With Someone Who Eats Nothing But Steamed Brocolli And Farts All Night Syndrome".....where was MY pill when I needed it?!
Maybe my family is right.....maybe this is my true calling. I'm sure I can come up with plenty of made-up conditions to sell people sugar pill placebos for. Grammaret, for Rachael and her typo symptoms. Graecusate, to help Bloomin' battle his being Greek condition. Clorox......for Clint.
And finally, Blogupril.....to help battle writing a pointless Blog on a whim,for myself.
I just want to throw my coffee mug at the television!
I'm not being entirely fair to Taco Bell here. The truth of the matter is that I basically hate all commercials; actually, I hate all forms of advertising in general. I've always found it incredibly insulting when someone tries to cleverly "trick" me into thinking of their product first whenever I need (or think I need) a softdrink, new pair of shoes or adult diapers.
Many of my family believe that I should have gone into advertising due to my general disdain for the medium.....which makes no sense to me, seeing as I also have a hatred for the practice of putting babies on spikes, and no one has ever told me that I should pursue a career in that. I suppose it would come down to who offers the better benefits.
This brings me to one of my newest revulsions, the unnecessary drug campaign that has been flooding the airwaves and billboards for the past few years. Pills for weight loss, male enhancement (?), getting sleep, hair loss, being too tall, seeing unicorns, lycanthropy, fear of Alaskian Crabs, ect.
I recently was witness to the newest of these, a pill to combat RLS, or "Restless Leg Syndrome". Restless...Leg...Syndrome. Are you fucking kidding me?!
I'm guessing that this is just a new clever way to remarket Ambien or some other sleep aid, by trying to convince gullable folks that it could be their legs that are keeping them from getting sleep at night. Legs that feel more of a need to walk around and carry their host to the television to watch late night programing. I had no idea that lack of sleep could have such causes. This means that I actually suffered for over a year with SWSWENBSBAFANS....or "Sleeping With Someone Who Eats Nothing But Steamed Brocolli And Farts All Night Syndrome".....where was MY pill when I needed it?!
Maybe my family is right.....maybe this is my true calling. I'm sure I can come up with plenty of made-up conditions to sell people sugar pill placebos for. Grammaret, for Rachael and her typo symptoms. Graecusate, to help Bloomin' battle his being Greek condition. Clorox......for Clint.
And finally, Blogupril.....to help battle writing a pointless Blog on a whim,for myself.
How Kirk Douglas Freed the Potatoes.....
As I'm sure you all are aware, St. Patrick's Day (the Irish national holiday which celebrates the life of St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland) is just around the bend.....a day in which all the world is allowed to become Irish for a day (except for Canadians) due to the little known fact that St. Patrick was NOT Irish himself, but had been born in Britain and had his first tour of Ireland when he was abducted into slavery during his teens by Irish raiders. On a slightly related note, let me say here that I am also looking forward to Spartacus Day, when everybody can become Kirk Douglas for the day (except Canadians).
St. Patrick's Day has also become a very educational resource for many non Irish peoples, seeing as it had finally been successfully campaigned as a day to showcase Ireland and Irish culture. Just a few of the things we can learn about the Irish from this holiday is that everything is green, everyone is drunk, a woman is known as "lass", many Irish men like to embarassingly yell "Woooooooooo!" when there is even the very slightest chance that they might see a lass's breasts, many Irish like to wear green bowler hats and you can piss anywhere that you like.
This is all new to me. My earliest memories of St. Patrick's Day involves being pinched constantly due to the fact that I neglected to wear any green item that day.....probably because of my French descent, which prohibits me to be part of any other culture, but does allow me to ask those same cultures for help when my country is invaded by a large foriegn power or by a little girl armed with a sling-shot and a nasty disposition. But the fact of the matter is that I learned to wear green in order not only to avoid being pinched by my fellow smug classmates, but also to become one of said classmates and exercise my right to inflict pain on those who had yet to learn.
This brings me to my proposal for an update on this tradition, keeping in mind that it has been several decades at least for people to get in step. I propose that we no longer just pinch the offending parties, but beat them silly in the streets as examples. I believe that this will fit in easily with the drinking as well as with the bowler hats and public urinating.
All those in favor, wear green this Saturday....except for Canadians.
St. Patrick's Day has also become a very educational resource for many non Irish peoples, seeing as it had finally been successfully campaigned as a day to showcase Ireland and Irish culture. Just a few of the things we can learn about the Irish from this holiday is that everything is green, everyone is drunk, a woman is known as "lass", many Irish men like to embarassingly yell "Woooooooooo!" when there is even the very slightest chance that they might see a lass's breasts, many Irish like to wear green bowler hats and you can piss anywhere that you like.
This is all new to me. My earliest memories of St. Patrick's Day involves being pinched constantly due to the fact that I neglected to wear any green item that day.....probably because of my French descent, which prohibits me to be part of any other culture, but does allow me to ask those same cultures for help when my country is invaded by a large foriegn power or by a little girl armed with a sling-shot and a nasty disposition. But the fact of the matter is that I learned to wear green in order not only to avoid being pinched by my fellow smug classmates, but also to become one of said classmates and exercise my right to inflict pain on those who had yet to learn.
This brings me to my proposal for an update on this tradition, keeping in mind that it has been several decades at least for people to get in step. I propose that we no longer just pinch the offending parties, but beat them silly in the streets as examples. I believe that this will fit in easily with the drinking as well as with the bowler hats and public urinating.
All those in favor, wear green this Saturday....except for Canadians.
Gauging Time with Breakfast Cereals.....
For those of you who are unaware, it appears that Benjamin Frankiln did see his shadow this year when he rose from the dead, resulting in the three week advanced change in Daylight Saving Time. That means tonight at 2:00 am, your clock will need to be advanced one hour in order to screw you out of at least one hour of sleep, as well as giving college students all over the continent the excuse to stroll into work tomorrow an hour late and feign ignorance to the whole situation.
You might ask yourself how this unwonted practice even came to be, or you may ask yourself why Rice Krispies are so hard to sink.....but I will only attempt to answer the first. The reason is simple: it lowers energy consumption. That should have been obvious due to the fact that high energy consumption and it's effects were such a hot topic back in 1784. But think about it for a second and it will become clear that Rice Krispies are air filled puffs of rice that barely break the surface tension of the milk.
But returning the the process of energy saving, it should be obvious the effects of one more hour daylight has. That is one hour less that many Americans will spend lighting their homes with high powered police chopper spotlights. The savings should be clear! One more hour of daylight at the end of the nine to five work day will allow many God Fearing Americans to avoid returning home to planet choking light bulbs, allowing them that extra hour to drive to and fro in their SUVs to purchase items in energy conscious candle lit stores and restaraunts, as well as the comfort of knowing that if they do happen to stay out late enough that the sun has dipped below the horizon, they can still drive home under the warm glow of the countries energy efficient street lights that are there for them during ALL hours of the now longer night.
This of course does not apply to those living in the Godless State of Indiana who apparently want to kill the planet by lighting their rooms in order to eat their tv dinners while watching Everybody Loves Raymond.
I for one not only support this despensible practice of time change, I welcome the three week advance with open armed enthusiasm for it's unarguably practical solutions to the debate on energy savings as well as helping solve the ongoing problem with lower travel costs, seeing how all American Airlines are now forced to spend billions to update their flight schedules to conform with the rest of the world's choice not to advance the time change three weeks early thereby passing on the non savings to you when you by a drastically higher flight ticket.
Join me next time when I talk to you about how the Easter Bunny saw it's shadow, returning Creationism back to the school text books and how that will hopefully lead to forced prayer.
You might ask yourself how this unwonted practice even came to be, or you may ask yourself why Rice Krispies are so hard to sink.....but I will only attempt to answer the first. The reason is simple: it lowers energy consumption. That should have been obvious due to the fact that high energy consumption and it's effects were such a hot topic back in 1784. But think about it for a second and it will become clear that Rice Krispies are air filled puffs of rice that barely break the surface tension of the milk.
But returning the the process of energy saving, it should be obvious the effects of one more hour daylight has. That is one hour less that many Americans will spend lighting their homes with high powered police chopper spotlights. The savings should be clear! One more hour of daylight at the end of the nine to five work day will allow many God Fearing Americans to avoid returning home to planet choking light bulbs, allowing them that extra hour to drive to and fro in their SUVs to purchase items in energy conscious candle lit stores and restaraunts, as well as the comfort of knowing that if they do happen to stay out late enough that the sun has dipped below the horizon, they can still drive home under the warm glow of the countries energy efficient street lights that are there for them during ALL hours of the now longer night.
This of course does not apply to those living in the Godless State of Indiana who apparently want to kill the planet by lighting their rooms in order to eat their tv dinners while watching Everybody Loves Raymond.
I for one not only support this despensible practice of time change, I welcome the three week advance with open armed enthusiasm for it's unarguably practical solutions to the debate on energy savings as well as helping solve the ongoing problem with lower travel costs, seeing how all American Airlines are now forced to spend billions to update their flight schedules to conform with the rest of the world's choice not to advance the time change three weeks early thereby passing on the non savings to you when you by a drastically higher flight ticket.
Join me next time when I talk to you about how the Easter Bunny saw it's shadow, returning Creationism back to the school text books and how that will hopefully lead to forced prayer.
The Night that David Died.....
Ok....by popular demand, or at least because Chad asked for it, I will now tell you of Dave who haunts the Kinko's.
First, a little background:
I worked for Kinko's for many years, the last several years of which, I worked alone on third shift. Now, Louisville at one time had six separate Kinko's stores (I had worked at five of these), my favorite being known as Louisville IV, which was the smallest of the six, and located just off of the University of Louisville campus. When I started working at this location, it was ranked last in the region, out of a number of 40 or 50 or the like. I had transfered there under the request of it's new manager and friend Max Foster. He hired all the right people, and within a few months, he brought that store from last to second in the region! How did the corporate office thank him and all of us? By making the decision to close the store and transfer the whole staff to Louisville III, which was the famed black hole Kinko's on Bardstown Road. Fucking retarded! But I digress.
So, our store closed and we moved to Bardstown Road and did our best there.
A little more background for you: I was sort of known as a "horror" within the staff at Kinko's....meaning, no one was safe from the practical jokes I might pull on my shift. As an example, our second shift color operator, Eric, had the habit of always leaving some uneaten or half eaten morsel behind the counter after his shift....and I had the habit of running whatever it was through the oversized laminator and then putting it right back where he left it. My favorite being the night he left an untouched McDonald's hamburger, still wrapped in it's paper. I unwrapped it and forced the hamburger through the laminator....which stretched it out to near ten feet of laminated Mickey D's goodness! I then trimmed it, rolled it up, rolled the wrapper around it and then rubber-banded it before putting it back for Eric to find. I think Eric grew to hate me.
But I never got the chance to mess with customers, because, let's face it, they were dangerous in the fact that their lack of humor could result in unemployment.
Like I said, I worked third shift alone....which meant that I really was alone for the most part from midnight to about six in the morning....give or take a few early morning walk-ins. But what I did seem to get a lot of, was phone calls. I hated late night phone calls due to the fact that 90% of them where people asking if we were open. Look, I answered the phone at three in the morning, it would be safe to assume that we were then open....especially considering that "Open 24 Hours" was just about the only REAL advertising that Kinko's ever did!!! (I remember a talk Max had to have with me when a customer complained that I had mentioned on the phone that actually we were only open 24 hours a week, being 4 hours a day)
Now, this particular incident took place several weeks after having moved from Louisville IV to Louisville III. The phone rang around one am, and I answered it.
"Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is Dave, how can I help you?"
Yes, I used the name "Dave". Somewhere along the line of my Kinko's career I aquired the habit of using different names when I answered the phone.....hell, even my name tag mimicked this practice, being "Mr. Fishy - After Hours Duplication Guru". Sometimes I chose simple false names, such as Dave or Betsy, and sometimes I made up off the wall phone responses, such as "Dr. Sneak" or "Larry the Head". I do remember once even answering the phone as a baked potato. "Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is a Baked Potato, how can I help you?" "Who is this?!" "Kinko's"......no one ever pursued it after that. I suppose they never really wanted to ask wether I said I was a baked potato.
Anyways, "Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is Dave, how can I help you?"
It was a run of the mill call, a woman asking if we were open and what kind of color copies we can do and if she were to bring them up there now could I copy them while she waits? Yes, I said....and that was it. She never showed up, which was not really uncommon. Many times people would call just for information and I'd never see them all night. So I thought nothing of it.
About an hour and a half, or so, later, the phone rang again.
"Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is Fisher, how can I help you?"
"Uh, I hope you can help me." I recognized the voice, it was the lady who called previously, when I answered as Dave. "I went to your store on Fourth Street, but it's not there anymore. Did it move somewhere?"
A little more background information for you.....something that our store had only learned ourselves earlier that week. When the store on Fourth Street closed, that is Louisville IV, someone had the stupid idea to have it's phone number automatically foward it's incoming calls straight to our store on Bardstown Road. No one had told us this. Which meant that sometimes people would try to call a closed store, and instead of getting a message explaining that the store was no longer there, they would get someone at our store, who had no way of knowing that this person never intended to call us. We started to get a lot of confused and angry customers. Kinko's was in the process of fixing this problem, but as far as this evening goes, they hadn't yet.
"No, it didn't. I'm sorry, but that store closed a few weeks ago."
"But, I called it before going there. I talked to someone. Are you sure it didn't move?"
I could NOT believe how lucky I was!! This woman originally called the closed store, drove there to find it gone, returned home or where ever and proceeded to call MY store instead of trying to call the closed store again!! This was the Great Deceiver handing me a gift while looking at me with a face that convied "Now don't mess this up."
"No miss. You must have accidentally dialed one of the other stores. Like I said, that store's been closed now for a few weeks."
"I'm sure I called that store. It's the only number I had for Kinko's. I had to look in the phone book to get your number."
"Well, I don't know what to tell you. That store hasn't moved, it closed, and the phones are turned off. If you tell me who it was you talked to, I can tell you which Kinko's it was that you called. Or you could tell me what you called about originally and I could try to help you." ....all I was saying in the back of my mind at this point was Please, please, please, please, please, please!!!
"I talked to a young man who said his name was David"
"Dave?!!" I'm dancing at this point! She took the bait!!
"Yes."
This is where I changed my tone to suspicious and annoyed, boardering on angry.
"Who is this?!"
"What?"
"This isn't funny! Who the hell is this?!"
"I don't know what you mean!" Her tone was rising defensively. I have to mention also that my friend Kevin, who frequently visited me on my shift, was standing not five feet away with both hands covering his mouth and looking at me with a horrified expression that translated into I can't believe you are doing this!
"This is really sick, and I don't appreciate it!" I said coldly and flatly.
"What is? I don't understand."
"You say you talked to Dave?"
"Yes, he said his name was David."
"Miss," I started in a tone that was as serious as I could manage, "I don't know who it was that you talked to, but it was NOT Dave. Dave was murdered in that store on his shift several weeks ago! That's why it's closed now!" Kevin was dying at this point, trying not to make a sound while he laughed into his hands. I had practically hurt myself trying to say that last line without even cracking a smile and giving myself away.
There was a long pause before I heard a quiet "Oooohhh....." followed by the click of the woman hanging up.
As far as I know, this woman never tried to call the other store and as a result was forwarded to ours again. I never heard about this again, meaning either the woman never discovered that I completely conned her and still believes that she spoke to a ghost, or she figured it out somehow later yet chose never to pursue it. And considering the amount of times Max had to give me "talks" about the stunts I would pull, I know I would have.
I think it's safe to assume that I'll be going to hell.
First, a little background:
I worked for Kinko's for many years, the last several years of which, I worked alone on third shift. Now, Louisville at one time had six separate Kinko's stores (I had worked at five of these), my favorite being known as Louisville IV, which was the smallest of the six, and located just off of the University of Louisville campus. When I started working at this location, it was ranked last in the region, out of a number of 40 or 50 or the like. I had transfered there under the request of it's new manager and friend Max Foster. He hired all the right people, and within a few months, he brought that store from last to second in the region! How did the corporate office thank him and all of us? By making the decision to close the store and transfer the whole staff to Louisville III, which was the famed black hole Kinko's on Bardstown Road. Fucking retarded! But I digress.
So, our store closed and we moved to Bardstown Road and did our best there.
A little more background for you: I was sort of known as a "horror" within the staff at Kinko's....meaning, no one was safe from the practical jokes I might pull on my shift. As an example, our second shift color operator, Eric, had the habit of always leaving some uneaten or half eaten morsel behind the counter after his shift....and I had the habit of running whatever it was through the oversized laminator and then putting it right back where he left it. My favorite being the night he left an untouched McDonald's hamburger, still wrapped in it's paper. I unwrapped it and forced the hamburger through the laminator....which stretched it out to near ten feet of laminated Mickey D's goodness! I then trimmed it, rolled it up, rolled the wrapper around it and then rubber-banded it before putting it back for Eric to find. I think Eric grew to hate me.
But I never got the chance to mess with customers, because, let's face it, they were dangerous in the fact that their lack of humor could result in unemployment.
Like I said, I worked third shift alone....which meant that I really was alone for the most part from midnight to about six in the morning....give or take a few early morning walk-ins. But what I did seem to get a lot of, was phone calls. I hated late night phone calls due to the fact that 90% of them where people asking if we were open. Look, I answered the phone at three in the morning, it would be safe to assume that we were then open....especially considering that "Open 24 Hours" was just about the only REAL advertising that Kinko's ever did!!! (I remember a talk Max had to have with me when a customer complained that I had mentioned on the phone that actually we were only open 24 hours a week, being 4 hours a day)
Now, this particular incident took place several weeks after having moved from Louisville IV to Louisville III. The phone rang around one am, and I answered it.
"Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is Dave, how can I help you?"
Yes, I used the name "Dave". Somewhere along the line of my Kinko's career I aquired the habit of using different names when I answered the phone.....hell, even my name tag mimicked this practice, being "Mr. Fishy - After Hours Duplication Guru". Sometimes I chose simple false names, such as Dave or Betsy, and sometimes I made up off the wall phone responses, such as "Dr. Sneak" or "Larry the Head". I do remember once even answering the phone as a baked potato. "Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is a Baked Potato, how can I help you?" "Who is this?!" "Kinko's"......no one ever pursued it after that. I suppose they never really wanted to ask wether I said I was a baked potato.
Anyways, "Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is Dave, how can I help you?"
It was a run of the mill call, a woman asking if we were open and what kind of color copies we can do and if she were to bring them up there now could I copy them while she waits? Yes, I said....and that was it. She never showed up, which was not really uncommon. Many times people would call just for information and I'd never see them all night. So I thought nothing of it.
About an hour and a half, or so, later, the phone rang again.
"Thank you for calling Kinko's, this is Fisher, how can I help you?"
"Uh, I hope you can help me." I recognized the voice, it was the lady who called previously, when I answered as Dave. "I went to your store on Fourth Street, but it's not there anymore. Did it move somewhere?"
A little more background information for you.....something that our store had only learned ourselves earlier that week. When the store on Fourth Street closed, that is Louisville IV, someone had the stupid idea to have it's phone number automatically foward it's incoming calls straight to our store on Bardstown Road. No one had told us this. Which meant that sometimes people would try to call a closed store, and instead of getting a message explaining that the store was no longer there, they would get someone at our store, who had no way of knowing that this person never intended to call us. We started to get a lot of confused and angry customers. Kinko's was in the process of fixing this problem, but as far as this evening goes, they hadn't yet.
"No, it didn't. I'm sorry, but that store closed a few weeks ago."
"But, I called it before going there. I talked to someone. Are you sure it didn't move?"
I could NOT believe how lucky I was!! This woman originally called the closed store, drove there to find it gone, returned home or where ever and proceeded to call MY store instead of trying to call the closed store again!! This was the Great Deceiver handing me a gift while looking at me with a face that convied "Now don't mess this up."
"No miss. You must have accidentally dialed one of the other stores. Like I said, that store's been closed now for a few weeks."
"I'm sure I called that store. It's the only number I had for Kinko's. I had to look in the phone book to get your number."
"Well, I don't know what to tell you. That store hasn't moved, it closed, and the phones are turned off. If you tell me who it was you talked to, I can tell you which Kinko's it was that you called. Or you could tell me what you called about originally and I could try to help you." ....all I was saying in the back of my mind at this point was Please, please, please, please, please, please!!!
"I talked to a young man who said his name was David"
"Dave?!!" I'm dancing at this point! She took the bait!!
"Yes."
This is where I changed my tone to suspicious and annoyed, boardering on angry.
"Who is this?!"
"What?"
"This isn't funny! Who the hell is this?!"
"I don't know what you mean!" Her tone was rising defensively. I have to mention also that my friend Kevin, who frequently visited me on my shift, was standing not five feet away with both hands covering his mouth and looking at me with a horrified expression that translated into I can't believe you are doing this!
"This is really sick, and I don't appreciate it!" I said coldly and flatly.
"What is? I don't understand."
"You say you talked to Dave?"
"Yes, he said his name was David."
"Miss," I started in a tone that was as serious as I could manage, "I don't know who it was that you talked to, but it was NOT Dave. Dave was murdered in that store on his shift several weeks ago! That's why it's closed now!" Kevin was dying at this point, trying not to make a sound while he laughed into his hands. I had practically hurt myself trying to say that last line without even cracking a smile and giving myself away.
There was a long pause before I heard a quiet "Oooohhh....." followed by the click of the woman hanging up.
As far as I know, this woman never tried to call the other store and as a result was forwarded to ours again. I never heard about this again, meaning either the woman never discovered that I completely conned her and still believes that she spoke to a ghost, or she figured it out somehow later yet chose never to pursue it. And considering the amount of times Max had to give me "talks" about the stunts I would pull, I know I would have.
I think it's safe to assume that I'll be going to hell.
We Would like to call Johovah to the Stand.......
While sitting in front of my laptop this morning, actually while writing another blog....apart from this, there came a visitor to the front door. Two visitors to be more exact, dressed in suits and carrying stacks of pamphlets. I noticed this right before I opened the door, and what I thought was "fuck". I thought this for a number of reasons, the first being that I realized that I was about to have another encounter with the Jehovah Witnesses. Second, I realized that they had already seen me approaching the door and the only way I thought I could escape at this point was to set myself on fire. Third, the door was half way opened before I thought of setting myself on fire, and the gasoline was all the way in the garage.
So, they introduced themselves and started on thier rehearsed speal, all the while looking towards me in hopes that I would invite them in.....which I had no plans to do. After about two or three sentences I finally found it in me to put a stop to it, by telling them both that I was an atheist and didn't care to hear anymore.
"That's a shame." One of them said immediately afterwards, also in a rehearsed fashion. "Can I ask you why that is?" To which I responded, "I just can't put faith in a Lord that gets sexually aroused by it's own poo." after which I closed the door on two slack-jawed, dumbfounded faces. Not the best response I know, but I had been caught off gaurd and all I really wanted was to cut them off in such a way that they wouldn't want to speak to me either. In that regard, I believe myself to have been successful.
But, the whole event has made me reflect on Jehovah Witnesses past, and of one incident in paticular, which I will share with you now:
At one point in college I shared a house with some friends on Rosewood Avenue, right off of Bardstown Road, which means nothing to you non Louisville folk. In any case, one morning Alec, Todd and myself were together in the front room playing Nintendo's Double Dragons, when I spotted a van moving slowly down our street. I pointed this out to my roommates, and we walked out on the front porch to see what the deal was. The van eventually came to a stop at the end of the street, and well dressed yougn men started filing out. Jehovah Witnesses!! Immediately we came up with a plan! Alec and Todd were to hide in the basement and act out a horrific torture session for our soon to be guest. I was elected to answer the door due to my ability to keep a straight face and think fast on my feet. We patiently awaited our victim....who, as it turned out, was a guy I worked with during my shifts at Kinko's. "Fuck", I thought, for a variety of reasons....the main being that this plan was never going to work due to the fact that I somewhat knew this guy. My roommates, on the other hand, had no way of knowing any of this, given thier vantage point in the basement, and promtly began with thier act upon hearing the doorbell. I have to say, I didn't expect them to be so loud! Alec and Todd both were banging things and Todd was screaming for both mercy and help. The volume was such that I could hear nothing else until I made the quick decision to step out onto the porch and close the door behind me.
Well, it was still on, I decided. So I did my best to act distracted and suspicious. He tried to make small talk with me, much like we did together at work. I tried to be short in my answers...every now and again looking back into the house through the glass door. I have to tell you this....the timing couldn't have been more spot on. At one point finally, he asked me what the sound was to which I responded, "What sound?" and at that second a power drill started up followed by Todd's blood curdling "Nooooooooooooooo!!!"
The small talk continued, and he (I'm sorry I keep referring to him as "he", but I've honestly forgotten his name after all these years) started shifting to one side and then the other, trying to look past me into the house. I shifted with him trying to keep my eyes looking straight into his. The noises in the basement continued, with at one point Alec surfacing from the basement, drill in hand, pausing for a moment to look straight at our guest outside with me, then slowly walking into the kitchen at the back of the house. He return shortly with an axe instead of the drill. (where the axe came from, I still don't know.....I didn't even know we had one) and decended into the basement to the sounds of Todd's "No!! No!! Please don't do this!!!"
Soon, our guest blurted out, "Oh! Are you guys making a Haunted House?" seeing as it was mid October, not a bad assumption. "Hauted House? Yes! Sure....that's what we're doing. Why not?" I replied in my best trying to hide the truth voice.
Finally, our guest decided that he should go on. I retrieved Alec and Todd from the basement and we had a good laugh, even with the fact that our Witness turned out to be a coworker of mine, we had a little fun. Eventually, we returned to video gaming, with Alec leaving to make it to class. This is where we all expected the story to end. This is far from where it actually did ebd though, seeing as about a half an hour later, while Todd was playing the game and I was waiting for him to die so that I could take my turn, I spotted a slow moving Police Car on our street.
"There's a cop cruising our street." I said.
"Uh huh." Todd reponded.....more caught up in the game to care.
Soon, I saw two cops walking down the sidewalk together looking up at the addresses of the houses.
"There's cops walking a beat now!"
"Uh huh."
The cops stopped when they read our address and then turned to make thier way to our house.
"There's cops coming to our door!!"
"Fuck!", Todd said....to which I'm sure he had a variety of reasons. We both made a beeline to the front door to meet the cops. By the time that we opened it, they had already started making thier way to the side of the house and were looking into the basement window. Still, at this moment, it didn't really dawn on me why they were here or why they would be trying to look into the basement....that is, until after we greeted them and they followed with, "You boys have a basement here?"
Somehow, Todd and I made an unspoked mental connection that if were it to be put into words would come out to be something like, "TELL THEM NOTHING!!" We invited the cops in, showed them the basement, and denied any knowledge of any events as to the call they explained they received. It became clear that the cops figured out we had messed with some poor Witness, even with our poor lies, and eventually left.
Hell, NOW we had an even better story to tell everyone!! And this is where it really should have ended.....but it didn't.
That night I told the story to several of my friends, who I also worked with at Kinko's. Now, it was not known by many at work that I had already put my notice in and basically didn't work there anymore. So, Julie came up with the idea to spread the rumor around this Witness that I had been arrested for kidnapping and torture, and that's what happened to me. Eventually even going as far as to say that I went to prison, after I moved from Louisville to Iowa and there was no risk of him seeing me out and about. Of course, they never let on that they knew it was he who had made the call to the police, just that someone had called and the police had found someone beaten almost to death in our basement.
Great Fun!!! And this is where it should end, but it doesn't!
I spent a year in Iowa City before moving back to Louisville, and getting hired back to Kinko's shortly there-after. As I walked in on my first day back, there he was! He looked up and saw me, and I've never seen anyone turn so white. He couldn't even talk! He just starred at me in horror. Crissy, told me later that night that she told him that I was out of prison on probation and that Kinko's agreed to hire me back.
He never showed up for his next shift, or any others. He quit without saying a word.
Never, never could we have planned a better or longer lasting prank.
Which is why today I'm content with just telling the Witnesses the "Lord and poo" line.
So, they introduced themselves and started on thier rehearsed speal, all the while looking towards me in hopes that I would invite them in.....which I had no plans to do. After about two or three sentences I finally found it in me to put a stop to it, by telling them both that I was an atheist and didn't care to hear anymore.
"That's a shame." One of them said immediately afterwards, also in a rehearsed fashion. "Can I ask you why that is?" To which I responded, "I just can't put faith in a Lord that gets sexually aroused by it's own poo." after which I closed the door on two slack-jawed, dumbfounded faces. Not the best response I know, but I had been caught off gaurd and all I really wanted was to cut them off in such a way that they wouldn't want to speak to me either. In that regard, I believe myself to have been successful.
But, the whole event has made me reflect on Jehovah Witnesses past, and of one incident in paticular, which I will share with you now:
At one point in college I shared a house with some friends on Rosewood Avenue, right off of Bardstown Road, which means nothing to you non Louisville folk. In any case, one morning Alec, Todd and myself were together in the front room playing Nintendo's Double Dragons, when I spotted a van moving slowly down our street. I pointed this out to my roommates, and we walked out on the front porch to see what the deal was. The van eventually came to a stop at the end of the street, and well dressed yougn men started filing out. Jehovah Witnesses!! Immediately we came up with a plan! Alec and Todd were to hide in the basement and act out a horrific torture session for our soon to be guest. I was elected to answer the door due to my ability to keep a straight face and think fast on my feet. We patiently awaited our victim....who, as it turned out, was a guy I worked with during my shifts at Kinko's. "Fuck", I thought, for a variety of reasons....the main being that this plan was never going to work due to the fact that I somewhat knew this guy. My roommates, on the other hand, had no way of knowing any of this, given thier vantage point in the basement, and promtly began with thier act upon hearing the doorbell. I have to say, I didn't expect them to be so loud! Alec and Todd both were banging things and Todd was screaming for both mercy and help. The volume was such that I could hear nothing else until I made the quick decision to step out onto the porch and close the door behind me.
Well, it was still on, I decided. So I did my best to act distracted and suspicious. He tried to make small talk with me, much like we did together at work. I tried to be short in my answers...every now and again looking back into the house through the glass door. I have to tell you this....the timing couldn't have been more spot on. At one point finally, he asked me what the sound was to which I responded, "What sound?" and at that second a power drill started up followed by Todd's blood curdling "Nooooooooooooooo!!!"
The small talk continued, and he (I'm sorry I keep referring to him as "he", but I've honestly forgotten his name after all these years) started shifting to one side and then the other, trying to look past me into the house. I shifted with him trying to keep my eyes looking straight into his. The noises in the basement continued, with at one point Alec surfacing from the basement, drill in hand, pausing for a moment to look straight at our guest outside with me, then slowly walking into the kitchen at the back of the house. He return shortly with an axe instead of the drill. (where the axe came from, I still don't know.....I didn't even know we had one) and decended into the basement to the sounds of Todd's "No!! No!! Please don't do this!!!"
Soon, our guest blurted out, "Oh! Are you guys making a Haunted House?" seeing as it was mid October, not a bad assumption. "Hauted House? Yes! Sure....that's what we're doing. Why not?" I replied in my best trying to hide the truth voice.
Finally, our guest decided that he should go on. I retrieved Alec and Todd from the basement and we had a good laugh, even with the fact that our Witness turned out to be a coworker of mine, we had a little fun. Eventually, we returned to video gaming, with Alec leaving to make it to class. This is where we all expected the story to end. This is far from where it actually did ebd though, seeing as about a half an hour later, while Todd was playing the game and I was waiting for him to die so that I could take my turn, I spotted a slow moving Police Car on our street.
"There's a cop cruising our street." I said.
"Uh huh." Todd reponded.....more caught up in the game to care.
Soon, I saw two cops walking down the sidewalk together looking up at the addresses of the houses.
"There's cops walking a beat now!"
"Uh huh."
The cops stopped when they read our address and then turned to make thier way to our house.
"There's cops coming to our door!!"
"Fuck!", Todd said....to which I'm sure he had a variety of reasons. We both made a beeline to the front door to meet the cops. By the time that we opened it, they had already started making thier way to the side of the house and were looking into the basement window. Still, at this moment, it didn't really dawn on me why they were here or why they would be trying to look into the basement....that is, until after we greeted them and they followed with, "You boys have a basement here?"
Somehow, Todd and I made an unspoked mental connection that if were it to be put into words would come out to be something like, "TELL THEM NOTHING!!" We invited the cops in, showed them the basement, and denied any knowledge of any events as to the call they explained they received. It became clear that the cops figured out we had messed with some poor Witness, even with our poor lies, and eventually left.
Hell, NOW we had an even better story to tell everyone!! And this is where it really should have ended.....but it didn't.
That night I told the story to several of my friends, who I also worked with at Kinko's. Now, it was not known by many at work that I had already put my notice in and basically didn't work there anymore. So, Julie came up with the idea to spread the rumor around this Witness that I had been arrested for kidnapping and torture, and that's what happened to me. Eventually even going as far as to say that I went to prison, after I moved from Louisville to Iowa and there was no risk of him seeing me out and about. Of course, they never let on that they knew it was he who had made the call to the police, just that someone had called and the police had found someone beaten almost to death in our basement.
Great Fun!!! And this is where it should end, but it doesn't!
I spent a year in Iowa City before moving back to Louisville, and getting hired back to Kinko's shortly there-after. As I walked in on my first day back, there he was! He looked up and saw me, and I've never seen anyone turn so white. He couldn't even talk! He just starred at me in horror. Crissy, told me later that night that she told him that I was out of prison on probation and that Kinko's agreed to hire me back.
He never showed up for his next shift, or any others. He quit without saying a word.
Never, never could we have planned a better or longer lasting prank.
Which is why today I'm content with just telling the Witnesses the "Lord and poo" line.