The Eagle Poster incident

Before I moved to California I had a pretty cushy gig. I had essentially carved a niche for myself doing anything vaguely related to Marketing or Advertising, in addition to hiring and training new employees.

But we only had about 100 employees, so our Marketing and Advertising needs were pretty minimal. I had a lot of free time, to say the least, and my boss knew it so he would send me on various errands or find bizarre tasks since I wasn't doing much else anyway. I couldn't complain because, like I said, I had a cushy gig, and my boss was cool as hell so I didn't mind occasionally having to tile his kitchen floor* or something equally weird.

One day, I got a call at my desk.

"You know those motivational posters?"

"Sure."

"Make me one with an eagle on it that says, 'Take that which comes against you and use it to lift you higher.'"

"...Oh...okay."

"Don't print it or anything, I just want to have it on file in case we need it."

*click*

Seriously. Just like that, I had a new task at hand. So I spent the rest of the day looking for just the right eagle knowing full well that we would never spend the money on printing this bizarre idea and that in all honesty my boss would probably have forgotten about it by tomorrow.

But oh, the magic I worked was truly awe-inspiring.





*For real. I tiled his kitchen floor.

Push the Button ONCE!!!

Being that i am the Arbiter of Voracious Testicles, I am going to use some of that proverbial cojones to blog not about Bob. Well, not specifically. I am quite sure in his pursuit of immeasurable wealth by trampling pions, pawns, and minions, Bob has in fact been the culprit of the crime of which I shall now finally speak.... of.

PUBLIC NOTICE TO ALL:
The button at the cross-walk does NOT give you control of the intersection! Pushing it incessantly for 3 minutes will not make the little white light man appear any faster. The button's sole purpose is to alert the system that a pedestrian is present and requires a turn next signal cycle. No matter how many times you jam your greasy little round finger in that small yellow indentation at the middle of the button, you do not have the power to speed up the process.

And its not just the uneducated masses of LA who believe they have the earth-shattering power to control not only their stoplight but the six others that it is connected to, but highly educated people in mildly successful positions are also perpetrators. I was walking to lunch with a co-worker who must have pushed the button 67 times while waiting 30 seconds for the light to change. I said, "why are you doing that? That is annoying. And its not going to do anything." He says, "It's a nervous habit." I say, "What the fuck does that mean? What if i have a nervous habit of punching you in the chest every 5 seconds? Does that validate my action as anything less than complete ignorance and disrespect?"

I Think not. Good Day.

Putting a Bob in his place.

During my stint at the Midwestern-based, family-owned video store we had a steady string of new management coming in, disappearing, and hastily being replaced. Far be it from me to judge their recruitment strategy, but they had an issue with turnover.

So before we had Ol' Jim B. we had Jeremy S., a small, lean, metro-looking guy as our District Manager. The girls called him "Ken," as in "Barbie &..." I didn't mind Jeremy because he hardly ever came to our store; I think we were pretty far from his home base. When he did come, he was pretty quiet and didn't bother me much. So really he was Aces as far as I was concerned.

One guy in our store didn't like Jeremy, though. Cliff was a big, tall loudmouth transplanted from Atlanta, GA to the Midwest. He was a 6'2 red-haired white guy who talked like Method Man and was always running his mouth about something. This guy had a story for every single minute of his life, and all of them were bullshit. Still, they were good stories and he was pretty fun to work with so Cliff and I were pals. He had blown up at his store manager two towns over and had been transferred to us.

For some reason though, Cliff didn't like Jeremy. And part of his dislike centered on Jeremy's alleged proficiency at karate or judo or something. It smelled of bullshit, but maybe that's because no one ever knew exactly what martial art he was supposed to be studying. But he would brag about "competitions" and "tournaments" and things.

- I'd like to stop right here and give you a word of advice. If you're going to start an ornate and intricate lie about some weird pass-time that you have, make it believable. Even Bruce Lee wins a karate fight with some bruises and scratches. You can't show up perfectly manicured and completely unscathed claiming to have just one some sort of fighting tournament. -

Cliff was ex-Army (well, he claimed to be, but his Army knowledge was more synonymous with "I read a lot of websites" than "I went through Basic Training") and I guess at some point Jeremy had made a joke about taking him down as some sort of test of might.

Cliff never let it go. Every time Jeremy was in our store he badgered him about wanting to spar or just straight up fight to prove his mettle. Jeremy was pretty good about laughing it off and deflecting, but one day I guess Cliff got under his skin.

"And what if we DO fight, Cliff?" Do you really think you'll beat me? I train every day."

"Jeremy. If we fight, I will kill you."

"What?"

"I. Will. Kill. You."

Jeremy didn't get it yet, and thought this was some macho hyperbole as to just how badly Cliff would beat him in a match. In actuality, Cliff was openly threatening to murder our District Manager. I was intrigued.

"There's no way, Cliff. You don't even know martial arts."

"I don't need to. Jeremy, if we're going to spar for points, you'll win. You know all that shit and I don't know any of it."

"Well then-"

"But when you say you could kick my ass in a fight I have to prove you wrong. And if I fight I'm not going to fight for points and I'm not going to use technique. I'm going to pick up that computer over there and smash it over your head. Then I'm going to choke you to death. Because that's what fighting is, Jeremy. Fighting is trying to disable or destroy your opponent before they can do the same to you. No points."

That last bit might've been from a movie, because it was way too eloquent for Cliff to have come up with on the spot like that.

Regardless, Jeremy was stunned. Completely speechless. He muttered a half-hearted "Yeah, whatever" mostly under his breath and went back to a very important clipboard he was holding. Cliff and I went back to restocking movies.

Later that day when Jeremy had left I bought Cliff dinner. I remember telling him he was my hero.

Ol' Jim B.

The first time I realized I was face to face with a Bob happened when I was 19 and working in a video store. It was a family-owned video store, based in the Midwest and spanning seven states and 300-some stores. I remember when I got the job there I was pumped (even though I had to shave my fledgling goatee as it was too "intimidating"). I was pumped because it was a regular paycheck after several months of being unemployed and it would get my dad off my ass.

I have to say as far as shitty college jobs go, video store is a pretty damn good one. Yeah you give up a lot of your weekends, but you can sleep all day when you're not working a day shift and the bizarre cast of weirdos who would venture in mixed with the few local hotties and cool regulars made it worthwhile. Plus for most of my time there I was the only male employee in a store full of women. Some of them were hot. Some of them were not. Most of the people there were pretty cool though and I still have three excellent friends from that place.

Anyway, one thing I noticed almost immediately was that everyone above the rank of "clerk" in this company was absolutely guzzling the Kool-Aid. I mean these people were nigh-fanatical in their dedication to, what seemed like to me, a low-rent Blockbuster knock-off. During my interview (and the first two months of my tenure) I was bombarded with hints at more responsibility and a slight raise. They eventually trusted me with a key to the store and started wafting "Management" in front of my face, as if I would drop out of college to run a fucking video store. Turns out I would drop out for much less, but whatever.

Jim B was our new District Manager, and he was the typical megalomaniacal mid-level manager. He had read "What Color is Your Parachute?" or "Who Moved My Cheese?" or whatever the bullshit empty company-speak manual of the day was and figured that's all he needed to survive. Unlike me, Jim had seen the golden glow of management as a tantalizing lure, and had dropped out of Veterinarian School to accomplish it. So at one point, young Jim had really wanted to help animals and make a difference. He had probably had a dearly-loved pet or loved watching Animal Planet or something to nurture this affinity for the wild kingdom. Then college-aged Jim must've decided that animals were not worth all the bullshit studying when he could be getting wasted every night at 2 am after closing a video store, so he bolted.

He loved his job, and he loved the fact that some of the more impressionable kids at his stores looked up to him as if he knew what was going on in life. He would often take me outside the store while he was visiting and deliver some bizarre motivational speech. When we worked together he would take all the closers to the bar near his house so he could school us in pool (he had his own cue!) and buy us a round of drinks to make everyone feel special.

Once after dragging me to one of these bar nights he invited me back to his place, "Just to chill man. No work bullshit. Just two guys hangin' out. Cool?" My spider-sense was humming pretty strongly but I went along with it.

His girlfriend locked us out. There we were, both drunk, with Jim arguing through the door with his girlfriend to let him in. It might have had something to do with the fact that he was doing this every night, or the fact that he had a contest with another District Manager to see who could fuck the most female store employees, but I doubt the girlfriend knew anything about that wager. She was pissed and not having us.

"Please, do not embarrass me like this in front of an employee," he muttered to the front door. Even in his moment of shame I was just an employee. Sure he'd call me "bro" and "pal" and "bud," but when push came to shove I was still just a peon.

I told Jim I had to run anyway and wished him good luck in gaining entrance to his house. I stumbled to my car and drove it around the block very slowly so as to avoid hitting anything, parked in front of a house, and slept it off. It wouldn't be my last encounter with bizarre Jim B, but it put me on notice that the guy was a fuckin' creep show and I'd have to watch out for him.