Nobody ever remembers Ted’s birthday.
Not even Ted.
You know how people say “Hey, when’s your birthday? It’s coming up soon, right?” as an icebreaker?
Nobody does that with Ted.
It’s not even on his driver’s license. Or birth certificate.
The subject just never comes up.
Ted doesn’t really mind that he’s never had a birthday party or cake.
He doesn’t like attention or a lot of noise.
And he really doesn’t like cake. Or ice cream.
Now, when it comes to party hats, well, he likes wearing those.
On his crotch. And nothing else.
Let’s not invite him, okay?
Tag: work
Elephescalator
The escalator was invented long before there was an electric motor capable of powering it.
Elephants were used to power the demonstration models, but nobody wanted a basement filled with those things. They’re big, smelly, and expensive to feed.
Plus, elephant poop.
This made the escalator a really hard sell for the inventor, because building owners weren’t willing to pay so much for a heavy, ugly staircase.
“One day, those steps will move!” the inventor would shout.
People thought he was drunk. Or overdoing the medicinal cocaine and heroin.
He rode the elephants home and sold them to the circus.
Crazy Driver
When the office moved to the North side of town, I didn’t own a car, so I commuted with coworkers who lived nearby.
One would stop at Whataburger every morning. I always ate breakfast at home, because we’d be late by a quarter hour, and get docked the cost of a Whataburger breakfast. I figured I broke even.
Another drove his wreck of a truck like a crazy man, weaving from lane to lane, and he’d shout ” Slow down, Mister Zoomy!” at anybody that would pass him.
Both were crazy.
But I was even crazier, riding with them willingly.
Hyphenate, Aspirate
For the longest time I thought that lowercase was spelled with a hyphen, but it’s actually spelled without one. And the preferred spelling is without a space between lower and case at all.
My mind reels. How long have I been doing this? When did I think that a hyphen was needed? Why didn’t spellcheck and autocorrect fix it all these years?
I open my custom dictionary, add the entry, and click Save.
What else have I misspelled all these years like some country bumpkin?
I shut down the laptop and write down a reminder on my notepad. In upper-case.
Clean Slate
If there are legal pads, are there illegal pads?
Yes. There are illegal pads.
Oh, they started off as legal pads, just like any other legal pad, but they were highly impressionable, and they got into ink. Bad ink. And bad contracts.
They say a prescription pad’s not to blame for a corrupt physician’s crimes, and I guess you could same for legal pads gone bad too, but given enough time, the evil rubs off on them.
No, there’s no hope for them, except put them into the recycling bin and maybe they’ll get another chance.
Or become toilet paper.
The Complainer
Fred is a complainer. All he ever does is complain.
“How are you, Fred?” are the four most dangerous words in the English language. And, if Fred spoke any other language, they’d be just as dangerous in that, too. Instead, he complains about people who speak other languages.
“Why must people speak these other languages? Are they hiding something from us?”
Then he changes the subject to something like the weather, his job, his health, or whatever is bothering him.
Then, one day, when asked how he’s doing, he said “Eh, I can’t complain.”
We called the ambulance for him.
The Cones
Usually, traffic cones are orange so you can see them at night. However, while I was walking back to the hotel, I saw a green traffic cone.
I picked it up and carried it back to the hotel, and I wore it as a hat for a selfie in the bathroom mirror.
I let it sleep on the other bed.
When I went down to the registration desk to check out, I left it in an elevator.
There are a lot of websites that sell traffic cones, but I don’t really want one now.
It’s just the moment, you know.
Just Google It
I don’t like to answer the same question twice, let alone a hundred times, so I tend to tell people to just Google something… I’ll say “Just Google it!”
If someone doesn’t know how to Google something, my answer won’t make any sense to them.
If someone is too busy to Google something themselves, then they are probably too impatient to listen to me and comprehend what I tell them.
If someone is too lazy to Google something themselves, then they’re probably too lazy to stop, drop, and roll when I drench them with gasoline and light them on fire.
Cables
I keep a recharging cord on my desk at work for my phone. I have another on my nightstand.
I keep a third one in my backpack so I have one with me all the time.
The cigarette lighter adapter came with a cord, too. So did the emergency recharging battery pack.
Pretty soon, I had hundreds of these cables. Too many cables to count. My cats were playing with these things, dragging them around. I can’t even eat spaghetti anymore because I end up biting into a cable.
Now if only I could remember where I left my phone.
Village of Idiots
Sappy has been the village idiot of Martinsdale for over forty years.
He’s the best village idiot that Martinsdale ever had, and Martinsdale has had a lot of good village idiots. Especially since the factory was built and began dumping all those chemicals upriver.
Folks from the government tested the water supply, and they gave those chemicals long funny names that nobody understands.
Sappy must have gotten a double dose of the stuff. He drools and howls and poops his pants better than anybody else.
The government threatens to close the Martinsdale factory. But we need the jobs.
Especially Sappy.