Regarding the “White Man March”…

On March 15, 2014 By Luther M. SilerIn idiocyLeave a comment

Some of the pointing and laughing on the internet today has been rather hilarious.

God, do I miss Preacher.

I’m going back to bed: an anecdote

On March 8, 2014 By Luther M. SilerIn idiocy5 Comments

I’m pouring myself a cup of coffee. I need dairy, so I go to the fridge to get milk.

I not only grabbed sour cream instead of milk, I got so far as to grab a spoon from the drawer before I realized what the hell I was doing.

I may be about to have a long day.

Where do they find these idiots? A play in one act.

On November 1, 2013November 1, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn idiocyLeave a comment

The scene: OtherJob. It is cold and rainy outside, and getting darker by the moment. I am still sick and very bored, and the book I have brought to work with me is not very good. I am playing Temple Run on my iPad.

The phone rings.

ME: “OtherJob, how may I help you?”

IDIOT JACKASS WHOSE PHONE NUMBER AND NAME I COULD TOTALLY POST BUT I’M NOT GOING TO: “Yeah, how late is your driving range open?”

I glance outside. It is still cold and raining. And we don’t have a driving range.

ME: “We don’t have a driving range, sir.”

IJWPNANICTPBINGT, suddenly sounding very irritated: “What? Is this OtherJob?”

ME: “Yessir.”

IJWPNANICTPBINGT, ignoring my affirmative answer: “Well, do you have their number, then?”

Sound of teeth grinding. No, I don’t have the number of this place you made up, and why would I give it to you if I did? Who thinks the world works like this, where I can just call one business and have them give me the number of another business?

ME: “This *is* OtherJob, sir. You’ve dialed the right number. We don’t have a driving range.”

Literal, not-shitting-you sputtering sounds from the phone. This guy cannot believe my effrontery.

IJWPNANICTPBINGT: “My friend told me you had a nighttime driving range.”

ME: “We do not.”

IJWPNANICTPBINGT,angry: “You’re serious? You’re not fucking with me right now?”

ME, suddenly much less in the mood for this idiot: “Check Google Maps or something if you don’t believe me, sir. There’s no driving range and nowhere to put one.”

IJWPNANICTPBINGT: “Well, do you know where it is?”

ME: “No, sorry. I don’t know of anywhere around here that does that.” NOTE: This is true. I might not have told him if I had known, because I don’t like people swearing at me on the phone, but I truly don’t have the vaguest idea who he might be referring to. Plus it’s COLD AND RAINING, WHAT THE FUCK.

IJWPNANICTPBINGT, working his way into a huff again: “So my friend’s just lying to me, then, huh? That’s your story?”

ME: “Sir, we close at eight. You come on over. If you can find the driving range, you can play for free.”

The line goes dead.

Exeunt.

In which something entirely unexpected happens!

On October 18, 2013October 18, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn idiocy, Teaching4 Comments

Have you read yesterday’s post yet? Of course you have! You read everything I write, right? Sure. So you know all about the sexual harassment issues that blew up my third and fourth hour and then ate most of my prep.

Remember the bit at the beginning, the bit that I almost deleted on account of it was the Same Rant All Over Again and wasn’t entirely connected with the rest of the post? The bit about how bullying is a Huge Fucking Deal until the very second the kids are best friends again and then oh, wait, we were filing formal complaints on each other? Never mind.

Yeah, keep that shit in mind.

Today’s highlight involved confiscating a note from the threesome-wanting blowjob-denier in the first story, who threw the whole school into a tizzy and wasted several hours of the time of at least three different staff members by filing a formal complaint of bullying against two other students, one of whom was her ex-boyfriend and the other of whom was his best friend.

The note was passed through the second girl in the first story– the one who everyone was mad at because she supposedly started everything– to the non-ex-boyfriend, to be given to the ex-boyfriend.

Note that I barred the two boys from class today, hoping that a day without them would help to calm things down a bit.

The note was asking the ex-boyfriend to please please please take her back so that she didn’t have to give up on true love.

I took it to the counselor.

“I cannot deal with this without using words like idiot and moron, and I probably also cannot deal with this without pointing out in clear language to this young fool that this boy thinks of her as nothing but pussy. It is therefore your problem.”

I have nothing else to say about my day.

The more you know: Essential addendum

On September 17, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn Reviews1 Comment

Maybe an hour after eating the Arby’s Smokehouse Brisket Sandwich, you start sweating Arby’s Smokehouse Brisket Sandwich Sweat out of the pores of your nose, which is not a terribly pleasant experience. Note that the Arby’s Smokehouse Brisket Sandwich is not actually terribly oily (I’m blaming the gouda, for no damn good reason) so the Brisket Sweats I’ve been experiencing for the last couple of hours are both confusing and somewhat inexplicable.

Perhaps this is one of those rare “wash your face after eating” types of sandwiches.

Oh: fingers, also. My fingers smell like brisket. I swear I’m generally clean. It’s the sandwich.

Still tasty, though.

The more you know

On September 17, 2013September 17, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn idiocy, Reviews, Teaching1 Comment

memphis-bbq-beautiful-ladies-closer

First, a brief public service announcement: the Arby’s Smokehouse Brisket Sandwich is… how do you say it? “Mad tasty, yo?” Is that right? I think that’s how the kids talk nowadays. What I mean to say is that I enjoyed eating it.

People who respond to this by suggesting that I should buy a smoker and make my own brisket and stop eating brisket from Arby’s are going to be alternately mocked, ignored, or set on fire, depending on my mood, just so you know. 🙂

(The young ladies in the picture to the right are not eating an Arby’s Smokehouse Brisket Sandwich; that appears to be some sort of cheeseburger. Hey, it’s what Google gave me. Blame Google. Not me.)

Public service announcement ends.

Apparently we have hit the point where all of the students who understand that I break up fights immediately and prejudicially have left the building, because I’ve broken up three in the gym so far this year, after going an entire school year without having to do it once. The one yesterday was particularly bad since the rest of the seventh and eighth grade girls behaved as if they were at a goddamned WWE match, causing me to hold every last one of their asses in the gym after dismissing everyone else and read them the riot act, including the phrase “I am sick of your shit.” While it might surprise you given my vocabulary in other situations, I don’t often swear (by which I mean, I almost never swear) in front of my kids, and when I do do it, it’s fully calculated and for effect one hundred percent of the time. “I am sick of this,” they wouldn’t have heard. I am sick of your shit made it into every teenage skull in the room. I dispelled another situation this morning before it escalated to the level of a fight, and I think I was able to do that mostly because of the tongue-lashing from yesterday.

Hopefully, tomorrow will slide by with little to no drama.

He said.

(An aside: I’ve been listening to Gnarls Barkley while writing this– I’m not a huge fan and don’t listen to the CD often, but it popped into my head the other day so it’s still up on iTunes. One of their songs begins with someone chanting “wake up wake up,” which reminded me that I really like Bone Thugz-n-Harmony, and now I’m listening to 1st of tha Month. Which kind of entertains me. Also: Your rent’s due, motherfucker.)

(A second aside: One of the tags on this post was suggested by WordPress, and I’m predicting this post gets twice as many views as normal because of it. See if you can guess which one!)

I think that’s about it so I’m going to close with a picture of Seth Greene and his wife, because HOW THE HELL IS THAT HIS WIFE.

In which I peeve your pets

On July 11, 2013July 11, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn idiocyLeave a comment

It was, basically, a perfect day. Not a cloudless sky, quite, but I like a few clouds in the sky for contrast. Sunny, low eighties all day, not humid, nice breeze. If there’s a way for South Bend to have a better day in July I can’t imagine what it might have been like.

I was at OtherJob, expecting a busy day, an expectation that was, more or less, fulfilled.

I had the following conversation one thousand times today:

Ring ring!

“<other job>, how may I help you?”

“Yeah, are you guys open?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, thanks!”

Click.

Lemme explain something, Internet. First of all, OtherJob is an outdoor family destination. If you can’t figure out that a place that does 70% of its business for the year in June, July and August is open at 4:00 PM on a Thursday on what will probably prove to be the nicest day of the year, you may in fact be too stupid to use the phone. Yes, you morons, we’re fucking open. Look outside! Of course we’re fucking open, what the hell is wrong with you?

But even. Sometimes shit happens, right? Maybe we lost power, or the sewer exploded again, or maybe everywhere else you’ve been to today has been inexplicably closed and you’re starting to wonder if there’s something wrong with the universe. Or you live forty miles away and you just want to be sure. That’s okay! I mean, you can probably safely jump to a conclusion on this one, but it’s okay!

Here is how that conversation should go, guys:

Ring ring!

“<other job>, how may I help you?”

“Oh, hi, I was just calling to make sure you guys were open.”

“Yep! We close at (time.)”

“Okay, thanks!”

Click.

Alternately, instead of admitting that you’d just called to make sure we were open, you could ask about closing time or the prices or something. Or just hang up! That’s actually okay too. Because, see, if we answered the fucking phone, it means that we’re open. We don’t pay employees to sit around in a closed building and answer the phone to tell people that we aren’t here. No one does that! It doesn’t make any goddamn sense! Seriously, what the hell did you think was going on here?

You goddamn idiot.

Sigh. Seriously, one thousand times today.

Now that I’m done griping about customers, lemme take a minute and thank a couple, because it was kinda rude for me to horn in on that couple’s private conversation at the picnic table just because I heard the words “bacon” and “peanut butter” in the same sentence, and when you explained that you were actually talking about a bacon peanut butter jalapeno burger, and where I could get such a wonderful-sounding thing, you became my very best friends for ever, and I wish I had gotten your names and addresses so that I can babysit your kids or something. Because holy shit bacon peanut butter jalapeno burger. Oh my god.

Dinner was good tonight, y’all.

Edit, maybe one minute after hitting “Publish”: I will say, however, that bacon peanut butter jalapeno burger farts are not something that I’m hoping to have as part of my life for the rest of the night. I really don’t want to sleep on the couch.