When Jill finished her Phys Ed and Business degrees, she opened up a yoga studio.
Business was good, plenty of young mothers and forty-somethings needing to lose a few pounds, or keep pounds away.
Then, Wii Fit and other cheaper options came out, followed by the recession.
She tried pilates classes, but those didn’t draw.
“Try a GroupOn,” said a friend.
Half-off coupons brought in a wave of signups to her studio.
Then… disaster.
First day, the room was filled with buccaneers.
One waved a printout in his good hand.
“Yarrr, I signed up fer Pirates classes!”
Damn you, Autocorrect!
Tag: commentary
The Rock
I bought her a drink, and she told me to go crawl back under the rock I crawled out from under.
I told her that I crawled out from under that rock long ago, and I was much younger and smaller back then. I don’t think I can fit under it.
And to tell you the truth, I’m not quite sure the rock is still there. For all I know, there’s a Starbucks there now.
So, I smiled.
She tossed the drink in my face.
The bartender tapped me on the shoulder. “Three’s your limit, pal. Hand me your keys.”
Dr. Vickers
Dr. Vickers told me there’s only three directions you can run:
To something.
Away from something.
And in circles.
Ten years of coming here, laying on this couch and telling him everything.
He takes a stack of notes from his desk drawer.
“Do you know what this is?” he asks.
I shake my head.
“It’s you,” he says.
He walks to his fireplace and tosses the notes on to the fire.
“You’ve been going in circles all this time. Now, you’re going to leave here.”
“Where will I go?” I ask.
“That’s your decision,” he says, and opens the door.
Buffalo
Long ago, I sang “Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam!”
Well, I fell behind on my payments and lost the place.
Yeah, I thought a home where the buffalo roamed would be great, but it turned out to be a real stinker.
There’s no phone lines out here. Can’t even make a lousy cell call.
No power, either, although with the skies not cloudy all day, I have solar panels and batteries that work pretty well.
Water? Nope. And the skies aren’t cloudy, so no rain.
And then there’s all the buffalo shit.
They can have it!
Cyber Monday
It’s Cyber Monday, and here at the server farm, we like to turn the lights off and watch the twinkling network switches flowing commerce through the datacenter.
It’s a beautiful thing when an online store gets their servers, databases, and load-balancers and firewalls tested and ready in time for the shopping rush.
And then there’s the others… the ones we told last year that they needed more memory or more processor power or a load-balancer.
Instead, they ignored our advice, and opted to go for more bitching instead.
Help! They’re losing business!
Good. Fuck the sonsabitches.
Penny unwise, thousands foolish.
When The Ghost Hits The Fan
If you run a common desk fan long enough, grimy gunk will accumulate on the blades.
Sure, a lot of it is dust, but the rest of it turns out to be chopped bits of ghost.
What? You thought that ghosts were person-shaped specters or flapping empty-eyed sheets floating in the air?
Well, I’m not sure about that. These bits and fragments are rather small, but I’ve collected up enough to take a guess.
What is it a ghost of? A person?
Actually, based on what I’ve got so far, I’d say it was a ghost of a dust bunny.
Potluck
It’s the holidays, but when you’re “essential staff” where I work, you don’t get those off.
Instead, you’re required to burn a paid day off or come in, which sucks, even when you get double pittance (oops, I mean double pay) for doing so.
So, we have potluck lunches, and everybody’s supposed to bring in a dish.
Nobody signed up, though, so the night before, management announced that participation was now mandatory.
Whatever, grumbled the team.
The next day, the break room was stacked high with the twenty last-minute tubs of potato salad they’d bought.
Who wants to order pizza?
Smash And Grab
My car was broken into.
Someone smashed the window and grabbed my backgammon set.
Why? It was only ten bucks at Wal-Mart. And they left my GPS, which is worth way more.
I mean, I understand leaving the radio. That’s bolted, secured, and a pain to steal. But taking a cheap backgammon case? Crazy.
The insurance company wants a police report. The police are busy and say “Use the app.”
I snap some photos, tap in a form, and email them.
A repair truck is dispatched. They fix the window and hand me a receipt.
I play backgammon online now.
Veterans
Ah, Veteran’s Day.
It’s important to remember and thank the people who have served.
Although, to tell you the truth, I don’t get Veteran’s Day off like I get Memorial Day off, so please forgive me if I’m not as thankful to you as your brothers-in-arms who gave their lives.
Yes, I’m still thankful, but… well… you know, right?
And as much as it bothers me to have my morning commute messed up by these parades, I’ll still wave the flag and salute you guys, and I won’t bitch about getting written up for being late.
Thank you, troops. Really.
Iron Fist
We live in a dictatorship.
The Great Leader rules the land with an iron fist.
Well, it’s actually a rather nice-looking prosthetic. Rather functional, too. He used to be medical technology engineer who worked with advanced robotics before he went into politics, but he still dabbles in the field now and then when the country’s running smoothly.
Which is rather often, even during disasters. We’re all quite well prepared for most circumstances, and don’t panic in a crisis.
Neighboring countries regularly beg for us to invade them and take them over, but we’re quite content to manage our own affairs.