A List of Grievances

There are a few things that I don’t like about Wal-Mart. Don’t get me wrong. The place isn’t entirely bad. If I want to feel as rich as a filthy Rockefeller I go to Wal-Mart, where I can buy 1000 Christmas bulbs for 99 cents just so I can smash them with a baseball bat out in an empty parking lot somewhere. If I want to ride around in an electric shopping cart, I go to Wal-Mart, where all it takes is a couple of my roommates walking casts, and in no time I’m jetting around at 3 miles per hour and beeping when I back up. But there are some things that really cheese me when I go to Wal-Mart.

Old people in the express checkout line:
I go to the express checkout line because I want to get the hell out of Wal-Mart as fast as I possibly can. It never fails though. As I step up to the e.c. (express checkout) to buy my candy cigarettes and triple A batteries, the crypt keepers wife has beat me there. I don’t know how she did it, but I’m pretty sure she was there the last time too, maybe still working on the same order. This lady has 400 things in her cart. Apparently none of these items have a bar code because each item needs to be rung up separately by the one cashier who already hates his life, but does so even more now because he has to walk 10 feet over to the express c. to help this lady, who is still working on that same order since he started his shift 3 hours ago. Finally she finishes her order. She just has to pay and then I’m up. Swipe, Swipe, Debit, pin pin pin pin, no cash back, ok, receipt, gone! This shouldn’t be too hard right? Wrong! Old Mother Hubbard here starts writing out a flippin’ check. First she has to dig through her purse to find her check writing glasses. She finds those, but now she has to dig through her purse to find the case for her grocery shopping glasses. She finds that. Ok, so she writes her check. The next step for any normal person would be to rip it up and use your debit card, but this is not a normal person. As of last week, this lady purchased her first dial phone. For fifty years she had been using a classic rotary and now, on top of the understandable level of anxiety she is already experiencing from switching phones, she’s trying to conquer the express check out. I do feel a bit sorry for her. Things were simpler in her time. The grocers smiled. The bag boy was that nice young man from down the block, you know, the Thompson boy. Cigarettes didn’t cause cancer. Simpler times. Anyway, the disgruntled teenage cashier makes his way over to our checkout for the 80th time and sees that she wants to pay with a check. He consults the employee hand book then process the check. She’s done. I realize I left my wallet at home and curse the day I was born.

Employees complaining about working/ telling me they “only have 30 more minutes” then they’re out of here:
Dude I don’t want to hear it. I know you’re not proud of your job. I don’t care. I need you to do this job, and get paid crap for it, so I can buy my candy cigarettes and triple A batteries for 35 cents. And besides, making fake conversation with the Wal-Mart employees is hard enough, now you’ve gone ahead and made it even more awkward by getting all emotional on me. What do you want me to say? “Thirty minutes huh? When you get off we should totally hang out?” No. What I feel like saying is “Thirty minutes huh? You know, I would be just as happy if you never had to work and you were all replaced by express checkouts. At least then I would never have to talk to you.” It’s not that I don’t like them. It’s that I absolutely hate trying to carry on a fake conversation. I’m not really interested. There just isn’t much to say when you run into someone at Wal-Mart. Everyone is there for the same reason: cheap junk. The couple times I’ve run into people at Wal-Mart and maybe actually had something to say to them, (when I was driving around in a electric cart with walking casts on both of my legs, or when I was buying a puzzle at 2:30 on a Thursday morning) I still didn’t want to talk. Something about Wal-Mart just sucks the life out of you. I understand you, complaining employee. You hate this place and just want to get out of here as fast as you can, me too, that’s why I don’t want to talk to you.

Boxes that are mangled beyond recognition:
It never fails. If I need to buy something “important” from Wal-Mart, a fan, maybe a small camping grill, or a waffle iron, every box on the shelf appears to have been torn apart by wolverines then tapped back together by a troop of chimpanzees. You can never trust these packages. There’s always a crucial piece of the innards missing. It’s too easy to steal from Wal-Mart, that’s way. They don’t care. You can buy a waffle iron, take it home, rip apart the box, take out the waffle iron, stuff all the foam and plastic back into the box, take back the box filled with just foam and plastic, and they’ll give you your money back. Then I come along, wanting a waffle iron and what I end up getting is an empty box. I buy the mangled box because a) it’s the only choice I have and b) the guy up front tells me some lie about how this wasn’t a returned item it’s just shipped in a special way. It really flips my switch because now I have to make another trip back to Wal-Mart just to return this thing which means I’ll end up buying 25 dollars worth of crap because that’s what you do when you go to Wal-Mart. You intend on getting one little thing and you end up seeing the 5 dollar DVD section. You buy Rambo II. Then you buy some air freshener for your car. It’s only 87 cents. Then you sniff the scented candles for about a half an hour. After that you’re so high you can’t remember what you did, but when you get home the roof of your mouth is torn up from eating a box of sour IceBreakers and you’ve got a 3-pack of thong underwear you’re afraid to open.

The parking lots:
Parking lots are normally like a jungle; only the strong survive, but that sense of danger is heightened tenfold when you realize that 90% of the people in a Wal-Mart parking lot are NASCAR fans. So I’m driving down a lane. I know I’m going the right way because the “car butts” are point towards me. Then all of a sudden I’ve got Jeff Gordon in a Ford Windstar coming out of nowhere. He’s cutting through lanes, swerving around abandoned shopping carts. He doesn’t care which way the car butts are pointing. All J Gordon in a Ford Windstar sees is the white taillights of a car in slot meaning someone is about to pull out. And why is that all he sees? Because every inch of his rear and side windows are covered with NASCAR decals. He’s got a huge American flag flying from his antenna, he has a couple of those fake bullet holes slapped on the doors, and he’s even got gold ol’ Calvin pissin’ on a Chevy symbol too. So he slingshots off a Toyota Camry, clips the back tire of an Oldsmobile Auroa, sending it crashing into side wall, and takes the lead in the lane I’m in. What happens after all this excitement? We sit. Jeff Gordon in a Ford Windstar isn’t going anywhere until that car he saw, the car that started this all, backs out. But apparently someone in that car forgot to pick something up inside so the driver sits in the slot, geared in reverse, doesn’t take his foot off the break, and waits that way until that person gets back. We wait there 20 minutes. The person we’ve been waiting for finally returns with their waffle iron. I know what they’re plan for that waffle iron is. Bastards. Jeff Gordon in a Ford Windstar gets his precious spot. I circle around for a while. As I’m circling I come across another delay, same guy, different way of causing havoc in the parking lot. Jeff Gordon is no longer in a Ford Windstar now it’s Jeff Gordon walking down the middle of the lane. I pull up behind him. He has to know I’m there. He doesn’t stray from his set path down the middle of the lane. His wife is walking right next to him. I think she even looks back at me but she doesn’t budge. She doesn’t even tug on the sleeve of his 1985 letterman’s jacket to move him over. They eventually get inside and I eventually get my spot, but it’s back home, where I don’t have to deal with this mess.

THANKS

On Being Sick

When I become sick I suffer from more than the common physical symptoms (i.e. body aches, fever, runny nose, and congestion). I suffer from symptoms that affect the way I function and in ways these symptoms can become far more dangerous. While I am sick there is a separation of my mind from my physical surroundings. I am no longer an active participant in the world, rather a distanced observer, from my own little planet. On this planet, the normal rules of society do not apply and every day little things are mesmerizing. Spoken words are heard without comprehension, written word is seen without understanding, and the motions of my body are performed without thought.
Let’s discuss some of the situations I found myself in yesterday in order to shed more light on these non-physical symptoms. During class my professor spoke to a room full of nearly 100 students. All I could do to keep from falling out of my chair and curling up into the fetal position on the floor was to stare at the yellow words and the purple background that was projected onto the professor’s face as he passed in front of the screen which displayed his power point presentation. There were brief glimpses of reality as I would, after long periods of zoning out, realize that I hadn’t listened to single word the professor said and if I were to be called on I would have nothing to say. As this horrific possibility passed through my head I came to believe that what would happen if I were to be called on would be a swift projectile vomit followed by a collapse to the ground on which I would then violently seize. These thoughts passed as I eventually slipped back into my detached state, staring, without comprehension, at the words on my professor’s face.
As I said before, when I’m sick my actions are performed without thought. It is amazing how much of a day I can get through without trouble solely based on 23 years of muscle memory. And even if things don’t fully work out there is usually little consequence, like when I spent about a minute turning my key in the wrong mail box without realizing why it wouldn’t open. All of that is fine and dandy, but things become more dangerous during this “distanced observer” phase when crucial rules are not processed. I mean here, the rules of the road.
Driving home from Hy-Vee, where I purchased a gallon of Tropicana orange juice, two boxes of Kleenex tissue with lotion, and some Alka-Seltzer cold tabs, determined to beat this cold, I noticed a bug on the inside of my driver’s side window. I became very concerned for this bug so I rolled down my window a crack as to free it from my stuffy truck. The bug crawled up the window, up over the top of the window, and sat there, just barely over the edge of the window. He was in a position that would surely cause him to be crushed if I rolled the window back up, something I wanted to do in order to stop the cold air from blowing against my chapped nose and sore throat. I couldn’t role it up though because of my overwhelming concern for this bug’s happiness. I started to think that rolling the window down was a bad idea. As I began to pick up speed I could see the wind blowing his tiny little wings back while he struggled to hold on. It worried me that he could blow away and become lost, so far from his home, which I had now decided was my truck. I talked to the bug, telling him to hold on. “All we have to do is make it to a stop light and I’ll pull you back in,” I said. That wouldn’t work. He was losing strength, I could tell. I stuck my finger out the crack, wrapping it down the other side of the window. He was supposed to climb onto my finger and I would pull him back in the truck to safety. Instead, I knocked him loose and he blew away. I felt like pulling over the truck and crying. Pull over. Truck. I was driving. For the first time in about three quarters of a mile, I realized that I had been driving. No one was yelling at me from the other lanes and I saw no flashing lights. Apparently I snuck by without causing a serious accident. Still, that bug was gone, and for the first time that day, I felt truly sick.
THANKS

A Jackass Move

When I’m at a bar or in any other crowded situation I always feel as if I’m in the way of everyone there. I try to make myself as small as possible by concaving my chest, sucking in my stomach, and keeping my arms pinned flat either to my sides or, by dropping my shoulders, in front of me. It’s really a depressing position to be in, and despite my intentions of avoiding contact with others, allowing them to freely move about, I end up getting bounced around like a pin ball. To further demonstrate this phenomenon, let me describe a reoccurring situation. I am walking through a crowed bar with my friends. Because space is limited, we are walking in a single file line, trying to stay as close as possible. Sooner or later we come across another group of friends doing the same thing. If their group is trying to cross the bar, and our group is in the way, creating a sort of T-bone situation, their group will inevitably cross in front of me, separating me from the rest of the group. I can only assume that they choose to cut in front me because of the essence of total submissiveness that I exuberate through my body language. These situations and others like it make me feel very uncomfortable in bars, but I have recently come to terms with that. I decided that crowed bars are just not the place for me, and that is ok. But despite this enlightenment I still find myself at these bars on occasion. This is when things can go bad, as they did this last Saturday.
I was hanging out with some friends at a local bar. As the bar began to pick up business I began to grow increasingly uncomfortable. Eventually I heard the bouncer tell the bartender that they had reached “one-in-one-out,” the pinnacle of crowed bar scenarios. I knew the night was about to take a turn for the worse. I could sense it in the air. All it would take was a simple twist of fate, and like a Greek tragedy things would feel just right before they all came crashing down. So it happened. I see a friend of mine, who I hadn’t seen since high school, come in the bar, I caught her eye and we were both surprised to see each other. We exchanged a quick hug and began to go into small talk. It couldn’t have been more than 10 seconds of conversation before it all came crashing down. I’m still not sure how it happened, but it did and that’s really all that matters. Maybe I didn’t have full control of my body because of the anxiety I was feeling in the bar, or maybe I was just excited to talk with her, but somehow, while moving my arms around when I was talking, I managed to elbow her in the face. Hard. A solid swing that connected my pointy elbow squarely to her mouth. I didn’t know what to do and she was not impressed. I’m not sure if her lip swelled up, but I would assume it did. That was it. Now I’d be surprised if she’d be happy to see me in another four years.
THANKS

A YouTube Link

Here's a link to a video I made and put up on the greatest webpage ever made. The "Typical Day" post was nice, I'll be the first to admit that, but it lacked something... visuals. So here you go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVrA6XathS8

So You Think You Can Dance?

For those of you who know me now as Kevin the man, I would like to share with you a bit of my dark and chilling past, a part of my life I call Kevin the Junior High-teen. It may shock many of you who have recently met me and have been swept off your feet by my charm and grace, but I, like many of you, was once an awkward pimply confidence lacking teenager. Before I could drive, I would stomp through the snow with my two left feet to the local junior high school where my voice cracked when called on in class and where talking to girls without sweating was harder than physical education. One experience in particular has seared a memory so troubling into my brain that I am just now, nearly 10 years later, overcoming its effects.
My first Junior High dance was going to be the most amazing night of my life. Nate and I prepared for this night since 6th grade when we had heard that “junior high chicks were hot and would put out”. (At this time we didn’t know what “put out” meant but we had heard older kids say it and thought it was cool.) This attitude and hope would carry with us throughout our educational years. As 9th graders we were eager to meet all the hot high school ladies who were no doubt just as excited to meet us, and as seniors we couldn’t wait to peruse about the scandalous college women we were bound to run into at all kinds of “Animal House-esq” parities the next year. So, the night of our first junior high dance I pulled out all the stops. Wearing my buttoned up short sleeved plaid shirt that my mom bought me from American Eagle and my best and lightest colored khaki shorts I made my way over to Nate’s. There we would cover every inch of ourselves with Tommy Hilfiger cologne. The ladies would love us. After Nate’s mom dropped us off at the school and she was out of site, I unbuttoned my American Eagle shirt and exposed the cutoff-t I had underneath. Sorry girls, resistance is futile. As the event progressed we saw some of the older kids dancing in a rather provocative manner. Now I had heard rumors of something called “grinding” but had never imagined it would look so awesome. A mess of hips and legs swirled around me. In my head I could hear Patrick Swayze telling me not to be afraid and to try this new kind of “dirty dancing”, but I was too scared. This was all too new and I had to wait it out. Slowly, one by one, my more outgoing friends found themselves on the dance floor with girls, grinding, and eventually it was just me, against the wall drowning my sorrows in a paper cup of Mt. Dew. I never wanted anything more in my whole life than to dance with someone like the 9th graders were. Finally, a girl friend of mine approached me, my heart raced along with the fast beat of the song. She asked me if I wanted to dance. It didn’t take much thinking; Swayze rang out in my mind. “Nobody buts baby in a corner”, and I walked onto the floor with her. With interlocking legs we began to dance, like the 9th graders were. I was so proud of myself for getting out on that floor and glad that I could help make the night of this special girl a little brighter by sharing some good old fashion dirty dancing with her. It was not me that was controlling my body, it was the music. My friend and I danced for what was apparently no more than 10 seconds before she stopped, took a step back and said to me, “you’re joking right?” Now it dawned on me what I had been doing during our short dance together. I was, to put it nicely, humping her leg, just moving my pelvis back and forth to the beat. I learned that night that that is not how you dance. I told her that I was joking. I wasn’t. I forced a laugh and walked away. Watching the older kids dance was a mess. I couldn’t tell what the hell they were doing and I was just trying my best. After that night I refused to dance for about 5 years. Even in college I would pass up opportunities to hang out with my friends and to spend time with crushes if I knew there was a chance that a dance floor would be involved.
This is not a tragedy though. This is a triumph. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, over the past couple years I have learned to overcome my fear of dancing only to share with the world some of the sickest moves ever seen. I now can dance in a crowded bar without fear of being laughed at, not just because I am confident that I am one of the best dancers this side of the muddy Miss but more importantly because I don’t care what the others think. All I need is a hot track and 2 square feet of floor and I will teach you a valuable lesson: Don’t take yourself so seriously.
THANKS.

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