A Most Unwelcome Emission

Ladies and germs, if I may: this post is devoted to another in my ongoing, albeit seemingly random, public service announcements but I heard something today that absolutely has COMPELLED me to write. As you know I have been, for some time now, a purveyor of information that some may dismiss as nothing more than bathroom humor. Literally. To that I say: go fuck yourselves; this shit is fo real, yo! There's folks out there getting bombarded with the most heinous of offenses and frankly someone has to speak up and in some small way, alert the world that perps of this grotesque magnitude exist, indeed, walk amongst us.

Today a coworker came to me extremely distraught (understandably as you will learn) and proceeded to unload (pun intended) a most disturbing story. Said coworker (for what it's worth, a guy...since I've dissed the dirty ladies twice I figured I'd go ahead and spread the shame around) had just come from the men's room where he had encountered, no ENDURED, a horrific event that will most probably leave a permanent mental scar on this poor fellow.

There he was, standing at one of the urinals...doing your typically urinal kind of thing, when out of nowhere comes a very high-ranking MANAGER with whom this employee has extensive dealings. To put it bluntly, it's critical that my coworker maintain the proper sucking-up posture with this miscreant at all times. So, MANAGER saunters to the next urinal, whips out his dick and also begins to do a typically urinal kind of thing. Likewise he begins to engage my unwitting coworker in a conversation. Now, how many times do I have to repeat that TALKING IN THE STALL IS DISGUSTING!!! Unless you find yourself sliding irretrievably into a comatose puddle, it is NEVER APPROPRIATE TO ENGAGE FELLOW CRAPPERS OR PEE-ERS IN CONVERSATION OF ANY KIND!!! For one thing, there are times when breath is a precious commodity, such as when one is squeezing the equivalent of a ripe watermelon out of of one's ass, one needs to reserve ALL one's breath for that very arduous activity. The rare exception is again: help me, I think I'm dying in here or can you spare some toilet paper I'm completely out? And that's only if you're also out of those toilet seat covers, which, by the way, double nicely as toilet paper in a pinch. HAH! Pun intended. But seriously, THAT'S IT!!

Well, apparently this management moron was raised on another planet (as, sadly, so many of them seem to have been) because as soon as his golden stream began it's liquid descent he engaged my coworker in a very hearty conversation whose topic(s) demanded responses. My coworker, being a decent fellow, was understandably completely unnerved by the turn of events but, being the good, upwardly mobile young professional that he is, stammered out some appropriate answers and tried to finish up as quickly as possible. Everything was moving toward as decent a conclusion as could be expected when, like a thunderclap from Hades itself, and, without losing a syllable of his surely inane conversation, MANAGER lets out what has been described to me as the biggest, loudest, LONGEST fart you can imagine. Coworker went so far as to say "he really had to work to get it all out."

Shocking doesn't cover it. Appalled, deeply offended, intimidated and downright terrified begin to address how my poor, unwitting coworker felt. Where to turn? What to say? How to successfully hold one's breath while still trying to maintain the conversation that ABSURDLY was still ongoing once the ass trumpet had concluded it's horrific symphony.

I'm exhausted just writing this, so I can only imagine the trauma that my fellow laborer-in-arms felt, surely must STILL be feeling, to have been exposed to such an inhuman experience. Bewildered by how to proceed he simply finished as quickly as possible, zipped up and excused himself with some mumbled reference to being late for a meeting. He didn't even WASH HIS HANDS properly, so disoriented was he by what had just transpired.

Well, I offered him some Advil and what was left of my Diet Coke, after having given him full use of my Purell hand sanitizer. (Hey, I'm sympathetic, not a fucking saint, he DID say he didn't wash properly, Jeez). He accepted my ministrations and I told him he should seriously consider heading home early which I hope he did; an event like that needs longer than just an evening from which to recover.

To conclude and please spread the word: BATHROOMS ARE FOR ELIMINATING BODILY WASTES, they are NOT CHATROOMS! Do your fucking business and get the fuck out!! Nobody wants to fucking "catch up" with you in there; it's a godamn, fucking bathroom for crying out loud. And please, please, please, if you think that there's even a REMOTE chance that you're going to crack one off, get your sorry, lame, ignorant ass into a STALL!!! This is a civil society we're trying to live in here, either participate in good faith or log off the grid, motherfucker! (Log! HAH!)

Get A Clue Lame Ass

OK, so The ABIB is driving to work yesterday doing what she always does in the car on that route, listening to the DC all news radio channel. Yes, yes, I know it's probably not the best choice for such an angry bitch, and I know I should be listening to some nerve-soothing classical music but truthfully it puts me directly to sleep.

So here I am, not a morning person, and it's the morning, and here I am when I'd rather still be in bed, and I'm on my way to my insipid job, and it's October 31 in a presidential election year and I'm listening to an all-news radio station. I think you know where this is going. Already looking forward to my Pinky-provided DunkyDoo morning libations I hear this shit coming out of the car's squawk box:

"Polls show that a full 14% of American voters still say they are undecided four days before the election."

It's a miracle I didn't wreck the car into the nearest shabby Woodlawn, MD telephone pole. Or bus-waiting person. And in Woodlawn, MD there are many, many bus-waiters to choose from. The saying "I saw red" literally and quite suddenly made sense to me. ONE IN SEVEN AMERICAN VOTERS STILL SAY THEY'RE UNDECIDED ABOUT WHO TO VOTE FOR!! Motherfuckers can I get a witness!? What kind of a lame-ass, fucked-up, wishy-washy, pansy-ass R-FUCKING-TARD do you have to be to still be "undecided"? These two men (well, one's a man, anyway, the other is, I'm pretty sure, a reanimated corpse of a former man who died in an apparent horrible Jawbreaker accident of some kind) have been stating their political case in the public eye for close to TWO YEARS. PICK ONE, ASSHOLE!! It's not hard; you listen, you think, and you choose. Jesus Christ, I mean, five-year-olds at last night's Halloween candy fest in my neighborhood were able to make fucking choices among way more than two delectable options. Normally in five to ten seconds or fewer.

What a sorry life these losers must lead. I mean, how do they get through the day?

OMG, should I wear the brown pants or the black ones?
OMG, should I have the cereal or the hot oatmeal?
OMG, should I take the Beltway or the back roads?
OMG, should I bring my umbrella or my raincoat?

Holy Crap! Life has to be one, unending horror fest of indecision from the moment they wake:

OMG, should I crap in the upstairs or downstairs bathroom?

to the moment they close their eyes again at bedtime:

OMG, should I sleep on my back or my stomach?

But I feel zero pity for these fucking whack-jobs because I've met them, I wait behind them in everything from Pinky's DunkyDoo, drive-"thru" line to the local Walgreen's. They are infuriating and they are everywhere. Waiting in line, my lower back already starting to give me grief, arms juggling the 15 or fewer (unlike other shoppers I DO FUCKING READ SIGNS) items because I erroneously did NOT get a cart upon entering the store thinking - HAH! - that it would be a quick trip, I get up to one person more before I can check out and...and...OH HAPPY DAY...it's one of those 14% undecided motherfuckers who can barely make it out of bed in the morning without worrying about which foot to put on the ground first.

Oh, NO!! I didn't know there would be TWO kinds of micro-point ink pens available, I thought there was only one! Do you know which one is better because I did not expect to have to make a choice!

This is addressed to the barely-awake, gum-chewing, minimum wage slave who is running the register and who literally looks like she could drop dead at any second. This is the person that "Ms 14%" is asking to help in this terrible, terrible decision. Minium wage slave could clearly not give a rat's ass and just shrugs. I'm doomed and I know it. My back, by now screaming at me to "SIT THE FUCK DOWN, BITCH!", is joined by my arms in the cacophany of ache that has become my lot in life at this moment. Killing this person in front of me becomes a real possibility in my mind but instead I offer, in as pleasant a voice as I can muster at this moment:

My husband buys the Rollerpoint ones and he really likes them.

I realize that the fake brightness in my voice is not fooling anyone. I feel murderous and I sound it. "Ms 14%" belies a certain shock at my tone and looks querulous:

Really? Because I was leaning toward the Bics. Hmmmm....has he bought many of them?

The rest is a blessed haze in my memory because, like when you break your arm or experience childbirth, the pain part kind of fades away. Suffice it to say that I've been up close and personal with this 14% of our fellow Americans and let me tell you, it's not a pretty picture. But I did get my petty revenge in a small, small way. As I finally lowered my big ass into the car and sighed a gush of relief that my back could finally shut up, I watched as 14%, Rollerpoints safely in the bag, spent a few seconds deciding if said bag should go into the front seat or the back and I had to smile to myself. Those Rollerpoints suck; shoulda gone with the Bics. Hope it won't come back as bad karma to bite me on Election Day. ON NOVEMBER 4th GET OUT AND VOTE!! GO OBAMA!!!!

And Layla, Too

Laylaaaaaaaa......you got my on my knees!

Every Now And Then

ABIB is overhearing "Dream On" from Aerosmith and every now and then the Angry Ass Bitch gets her good 'ol karaoke sing-along ass going!!!

DREAM ON!!
DREAM ON!!
DREAM ON!!
DREAM UNTIL YOUR DREAMS COME TRUE!!!

Truly, peeps, truly.

A First For The ABIB

OK, the ABIB, by nature, is a largely apolitical creature. It's not that I don't have my political point of view it's just that I normally don't make a habit of foisting it on others. Today, since I'm posting, is clearly somehow different. The New Yorker magazine has made what the ABIB considers to be one of the hugest miscalculations of judgment in publishing since the Dewey Beats Truman newspaper headline of a few years ago.

The cover of the latest New Yorker, as many of you have certainly read, will be composed of an illustration of Barack and Michelle Obamba dressed as a Muslim and an armed terrorist, in a traditional head scarf and giant-ass 'fro respectively. Now the ABIB is not one to normally cast aspersions on most any kind of humor but she has to draw the line at this one, only because she has so little faith in the intelligence of the American voting public. I mean, folks, if someone as fucking innocuous as Rachael Ray is raked over the coals by her sponsor Dunkin' Donuts for wearing such a scarf around HER NECK for Christ sake, don't you think MAYBE that a political figure cartooned with it AROUND HIS HEAD might be so scrutinized??

Barack and Michelle are fist-bumping in front of a fireplace wherein Old Glory is ablaze and above this kindling is a picture of Osama Bin Laden. Now, the ABIB is aware of political irony and she's able to grasp the whole concept of the New Yorker putting out there an image meant to be so ridiculously preposterous as to be "funny". The ABIB gets it. The ABIB's problem is that for the last eight years the American voting public has proven not once, but twice, that it's ability to judge right from wrong and ridiculous from sane and everything in between to be seriously, if not irreparably, broken.

The American voting public, let the ABIB remind you, has TWICE voted in the current administration. What a joy! What a trip! What a nation of IRRATIONAL NUDNICKS!!! Having said that, Dear New Yorker magazine, what makes you think that these same retards will "get" your smarmy little joke of a cover about Barack and Michelle? How irresponsible does American journalism need to get before we finally react and say: DUMB ASSES!!! THE AMERICAN VOTER GETS HIS/HER VISION/OPINION/WORLD VIEW FROM FOX TV!!!! They're probably looking at your fucking dumbass cover and thinking: "AHA!!!! JUST LIKE RUSH TOLD US!!!! HIS MIDDLE NAME AIN'T HUSSEIN FOR NOTHING, MOTHERFUCKERS!!!!"

New Yorker magazine if you're listening, which in your summerinthehamptonsormarthasvineyardorgodforbidcapecode world you're most likely NOT, WAKE THE FUCK UP AND TAKE STOCK OF YOUR JOB AS JOURNALISTS!!! The Fox-informed world of voters don't need any help to be stone cold idiots so STOP IT!!!!

Weebles Wobble But They Don't Fall Down...Or Ever Shut Up

I've mentioned in another post that I work in a typical cubicle farm whose bureaucratic culture supports a caste system the currency of which is privacy. All offices are inhabited by managers or quasi-managers who are sometimes called team leads, which itself laughably implies the whole "We're all in this together, right TEAM? Except of course that I get an office and get to CLOSE MY DOOR!" Well, as if constructed to add insult to injury, some of these prized oases of sanctuary from the teeming masses are located mere feet away from some poor sap's open-air hovel. I am, as you probably have guessed by now, one of those poor saps. My little home away from home from which I can hear, see and smell just about every human experience save perhaps a gangrenous limb, is a cube as they are affectionately known. Somehow cube is even worse than cubicle; it really brings home the whole notion of tiny confinement, like something out of an old episode of Star Trek where the crew were captured by a vastly more intelligent species with giant, pulsing heads to prove how smart they were, and held in a zoo where they all lived in their own, little clear plastic cube of imprisonment for the bemused public to view at their leisure. At least we aren't made to procreate. Well, at least not ALL of us, but that's another post.

Anyway, here I am, day after day, sitting and "working" and waiting for lunch to begin in my cube when right across the aisle, so close I can almost reach out touch the cheap doorjamb, is an office occupied by one of those quasi-managers. Decent enough guy, keeps to himself, bad jokes are present but blessedly few. So far so good, right? WRONG! On any given day this joker has a steady stream of VISITORS that do NOT share his penchant for quiet obscurity. They talk, they laugh, they "banter" (hateful word) and they basically DRIVE ME FUCKING CRAZY!!! One sap comes by at least four times a day to check in on "the market", as in "how's the market doin' BIG GUY?" And then proceeds to blather forth as if he's some kind of Harvard business school grad hedge fund manager and it's all I can do to keep myself from grabbing the ubiquitous coffee cup out of his hand and smashing it into his stupid little skull.

"How's the market doing now, DICKWEED? You see any answers to your investment questions floating around your head with all the little stars and birdies? How about this for an answer: SHUT THE FUCK UP!"

The ABIB is not the ABIB for nothing, folks. I am one Angry Ass Bitch and depending on the day of the month, the position of the planets and the general functionality of my digestion I can be downright eeevul. Anyway, this post did not promise to be about a coffee-cup toting, self-deluded dabbler in the market, but about WEEBLES!

So, of all the visitors that "Team Leader With Office" gets, the one who inspires the most outrageous combination of hatred, bewilderment and downright freak show curiousity level of interest has got to be, hands-down, the one I call The Weeble. I've described him to others a million times but just like you can't tell a man who's cold what it feels like to be warm, this freak of nature is just, plain undescribable. I will begin the the physical facts as I observe them:

Dude stands about 5'7" tall
Waist circumference: roughly 75 inches
Pants size worn: probably a 42" waist

Wait, ABIB, you cry out with dismay! How can this be? A waist of 75 inches and pants with a waistband of 42 inches! Even you, with your math phobia must see the mistake there! Not so, Doubting Thomases, not so. The Weeble wears his pants around his 42" ASS!!!!! The 75" belly is hanging out there like some kind of freakish, giant sandbar. I mean it is HUGE!!! The only way he doesn't fucking fall forward is by leaning way back when he walks and then waddling from side-to-side. Is it coming to you? Weebles WOBBLE, BUT THEY DON'T FALL DOWN!!!

I've tried to surreptitiously take pictures with my cell phone camera but I've never been able to catch the absolute ridiculous view that is afforded by an in-person peep at this moron. The most amazing power that he seems to possess is that he can somehow defy gravity with his belt. Those pants are literally, LITERALLY, fastened at the crack of his ass, if he has an ass, that is because what appears below the belt line is totally flat. I can't believe I admit that I actually looked! But again, it's like a car wreck YOU CAN'T NOT LOOK! So, how do his pants stay up? The ass is flat, the belly is of an otherworldly proportion and that single, little belt keeps those fucking khakis from just dropping down around his (almost surely) hairless little ankles.

I've told coworkers that for $100 I'd run up behind him one day (he's a real slow mover) and just give those pants a good yank and down they'd come. One good yank, that's all it would take. Probably not even a good yank; maybe even just a fucking strong tug would do it. So far no takers. Did I say that he's somewhere between 55 and death in age that he's sports a rockin' comb-over and wears Mr. Magoo glasses? I'm totally not making any of this up, not one iota of it. I work for the Federal government; unemployable wierdos of all types are our specialty. And frankly, they don't come much wierder than The Weeble.

He's married, recently in fact and I get to hear all about THAT TOO. Oh joy, I think as The Weeble finally wobbles out of the office inches from my chair, now I get to spend the afternoon alternating between mental pictures of Weeble and his Wife trying to find his surely tiny dick underneath all that belly (maybe after awhile with no light or air they just fall off?) and my own sick imaginings of how exactly that freak of nature wipes his ass. I mean, for sure he can't possibly reach it around that 75 inch hot air balloon encircling his waist. Unless, wait a minute, maybe, in addition to the anti-gravity belt The Weeble's found a way, like Marvel Comic's Mr. Fantastic, to stretch his arms waaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy around to the back and take care of business. The Weeble is a mystery, for sure, and as soon as I get a taker, those pants are coming off!

The Courtesy Flush – An Update (Risking Life and Limb)

Dear Reader, or on my more upbeat days: Readers, as the title of this post suggests, today I had an experience that serves to update one of my seminal blog posts: The Courtesy Flush. You may recall that the subject of that post was the decidedly unfriendly habit among many of my co-crappers here at work to continue to sit amid the fetid air of their business, allowing it waft poisonously into the air of everyone else in the bathroom, until they are totally and completely finished. Then and only then do they flush that horrific mess down. Unfortunately their stench remains for quite some time, almost like the hint of a perfume that lingers in the air after someone has walked by. ALMOST. Because, of course, in this case it lingers like a curse in the air, sometimes for nearly AN HOUR after the perp has left. Absolutely no hyperbole in that last statement. Almost an hour.

OK, so what I didn’t tell you back when I originally posted about the CF, is that, although many of my co-crappers fall guilty of this terrible sin, there is ONE among the many who truly inspired me to blog the original post. I call her “Mother Earth” (for reasons that will go unrevealed) and there is seriously something wrong with her bowels. I have never known Mother Earth to enter the restroom and not unleash the lower GI tract version of World War III. I have learned, through hard, hard experience, that once Mother Earth enters the bathroom, lose all hope ye who enter behind her. No pun intended. HAH! Anyway, not only does she go for a really, really, really long time, her movements are ALWAYS accompanied by unreal volumes of gas. Now I don’t have to tell you what happens to gas: IT RISES!! AND SPREADS!!!

Mother Earth ALWAYS fouls the bathroom for AT LEAST 45 minutes after she leaves. UNSPEAKABLE! I don’t dare to conjecture what kind of food (or not food) a person has to eat to create that DEFCON Level 4 of havoc inside their body. I’ve been trapped in there more times than I care to admit, finding myself the unwitting victim of that hellish expulsion, with nowhere to go and nothing to do but finish as quickly as possible and pray that the uncontrollable gags don’t reach the point of retching.

I feel like I’ve painted a picture for you. Good. Fast forward to this morning. A regular workday, not unlike any other, in the anonymous, grey federal building in which I work. For no discernable reason, word begins to spread among the workers on my floor, that security is evacuating the building. Pish Posh, I think, having heard no official announcement broadcast by the disembodied, flat voice of a barely literate GS3, over the tinny public address system: “Hello? May I have your attention please? There will be a presentation in honor of Huspanish Heritage Month this morning at 10:00 in the Auditorium. Please join us for an hour dedicated to celebrating the Huspanish life. Olee! Thank you.” None of that so I figure this is all just a bunch of bored employees trying to inject a glimmer of drama into their otherwise drab day. I continue “working”.

But the rumor won’t die and eventually the chorus of worker voices is joined by a few managers who intone in the self-important way that only managers can: “We should go”. Okey dokey! You don’t have to tell federal workers twice that it’s time to vacate the building. People begin streaming out in hordes, keys jangling (you never know when its going to stretch into an early lunch or, even better: a whole day). Unfortunately I had finished 24 ounces of coffee five minutes prior and really had to pee. I gathered my things and began to sullenly make my way against the tide of humanity headed for the stairwell, in the general direction of the bathroom.

“You’re going in the wrong direction!” a chorus of voices gaily reminds me. As if I’ve forgotten how to get out of the building.

“Yes, well, I have to go to the bathroom, I’ll be right down.” BUZZ OFF YOU NOSEY ASSHOLES WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM SOME KIND OF RETARD? is what I really want to say (I am the ABIB, after all) but refrain.

I’m almost to the corner, beyond which by a few feet is the bathroom, when a woman’s voice rings out directly behind me:

“I REALLY have to go to the bathroom!”

A cold chill runs down my spine and, as if in slo-mo, I pivot on one foot and look behind me directly into the face of MOTHER EARTH! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

What kind of luck do I have to have to be trying to beat this human crap bag into the bathroom so that I can take a fucking PISS and leave the building along with every other living thing? Right then I realize it: I’ll never make it. I’ll rush into the stall, sit down and start to go, but I’ve 24 ounces of coffee to get rid of along with the orange juice I drank at home before work, but MOTHER EARTH will already have her huge ass spread across one of the toilet seats groaning for its life and within a nanosecond will be eliminating what I can only guess (from the smell) is partially digested roadkill.

At that moment I turned on my heel and retraced my steps, barely registering her startled expression as I bump into her to rush past, heading to the next closest bathroom, at the other end of the building’s hallway. What if we’re being evacuated due to a noxious gas spewing through the vents? What if it’s a fire alarm that’s announcing the fast spread of an electrical fire through the walls? I don’t fucking care if it’s RADIOACTIVE KRYPTONITE, I ain’t going anywhere NEAR the evil domain now claimed by Mother Earth.

I made it to the other bathroom and did my business. By the time I came out the “emergency” was already over and my coworkers had begun to file back into the building with all the enthusiasm of a chain gang.

Yes, I took a risk. Yes it could have turned out badly. But I know for one thing: if I had gone where I was originally headed I may not have made it out at all. If you look at it that way, I took no risk at all.

Venting the Spleen-O-Matic

For the umpteenth time I straight up HATE MY JESUS FREAK MOTHERFUCKING NEIGHBORS! This past weekend I finally went on the rage bender that these assholes have been provoking for the past four years. I screamed! I howled! I name-called 'til the cows came home. And it felt GOOD people; it felt SOOOOOOOOOOOOO good.

Likely for the past few days they've been alternately praying for my sad, heathen soul and plotting their blue collar revenge.

I'd say the hoopdee with no rear window, expired Pennsylvania license plates, and two kids that run wild in varying stages of undress are an excellent start. Good times, motherfuckers, good times.

Monkey Tits

OK, first: anyone that reads this post is going to, at some point in the future, thank me. Not unlike my post titled "The Courtesy Flush", I would put this post in the "public service" category. All in a day's work, people; I'm out there for YOU!

Anyway, by now you're likely wondering just what the fuck I'm talking about when I say "Monkey Tits". Ironically you've all seen them: normally on a gal quite a ways past the prime of her physical life, but not necessarily. Some of the fairer sex are cursed with Monkey Tits from day one. A Monkey Tit physique is one in which the boobs are triangularly shaped, usually no larger than a "B" cup, and basically point to the floor at all times. Now you're getting the picture right? Just in case you're not, flip over to Google and do an image search on: "monkey, female" or "ape, female". Trust me; it'll come clear to you.

Well far be it for me to chastise folks for something over which they have no control, which by now you're saying "That poor gal is BORN with Monkey Tits! There's nothing she can do about it! Back off, Angriest Bitch in Baltimore!" To that I say, loudly and proudly: "BULLFUCKINGSHIT!" Yes, she may be BORN with Monkey Tits but my sympathy goes out the fucking window when they, in all their hideous glory, assault my eyes. We're talking about the basic, common decency of hiding that big -ass butt crack, or getting that lazy eye looked at (or at least covered by a jaunty pirate eye patch), trimming that nostril hair and for the love of god tying down those fucking Monkey Tits! Ladies, any department store on EARTH has at least 250 bra styles to choose from, at least half of which are designed to COVER BOOB FLAWS! Use them! Get fitted! Give us a goddamn fucking break from those eyesores! Also: sorry to be the one to inform you, but Monkey Tits are anathema to clingy, jersey-type t-shirts so popular at this time of year. Repeat after me: hiding NOT flaunting is the key here!

Just yesterday I was unlucky enough to be visually accosted by one of the worst pair of Monkey Tits I have EVER seen. What's even more horrific is that IT WASN'T THE FIRST TIME! Oh, no, this particular gross offender displays her Monkey Tittage virtually daily! Picture if you dare, this image, forever burned into my retinas, that I know I'll be dreaming about for weeks to come. She's fat; never, ever a good combo with Monkey Tits, because those flat, triangular wedges just lay on the big ol' belly like some kind of pair of beached fish on a sandbar. So you've got the big belly, the (maybe) B-cup Monkey Tits, all wrapped up in a light-colored sleeveless (porker arms another post topic, no rest for the weary), rayon knit shell clinging to that giant belly and those hapless boobs for all that fabric was worth and stretched to within an inch of it's knitted life.

I happened upon that view and gasped, averting my eyes moments too late. The perp just stared at me with one lazy eye (didn't we TALK about this earlier) googling around like some kind of lonely last gumball in the glass jar. She greeted me with a wan smile and I breathed a half-hearted "hi" and sped past, bumping into the cubicle wall of the sad little person she was visiting. What a nightmarish situation THAT must have been...trapped...unable to politely extricate oneself...from a seemingly endless encounter with, with, AUGGHHHGGUUGHHHH MONKEY TITS!! Sorry...I just need to compose myself.

Ahem. So, let me just conclude with this thought: If you are Monkey Titted, and trust me, you know if you are, first accept my sincerest sympathy, then please, I beg you, for the love of all that's good and wholesome and pure in this life: KEEP THAT UGLY ASS SHIT TO YOURSELF!!

Re-Gifting: When You Care Enough to Send the Very Used

Just the other day it was the ABIB's birthday. Which birthday, you ask? It is of no concern. Those among you who get that reference know who you are. The ABIB received many jolly cards and wishes from family and friends, but she's writing this post to BITCH (Jesus, you're thinking, even on her fucking birthday?) about a particular birthday scandal. I'm talking about the regift. You know the drill: someone gets some heinous piece of shit for some commemorative day or another and, rather than taking the dreck directly to The Salvation Army (or the landfill), they stash it somewhere hoping it'll magically disappear.

Well it doesn't, of course and days turn to weeks and weeks to months and before they know it the monstrosity has been collecting dust and taking up precious gewgaw space for long enough. Its time to take action, thus the regift is born. Thinking the potential recipient to be some kind of freaking r-tard, the regifter assumes that nobody will be able to discern that their secondhand piece of shit is actually used because, well, it's WRAPPED isn't it? Sometimes well, sometimes badly, but the crap always arrives in wrapping paper, or a box with a bow or even, as in the case of the ABIB last week, in a gigantic birthday-festooned bag.

There I was, surrounded by my birthday haul, when a co-worker peeped around the cubicle corner and croaked: "It's your birthday?"

"Why, yes" the ABIB coolly replied, "as a matter of fact, it is."

"Wow....well, happy birthday!"

Little did I know that my birthday admission was about to lead to receipt of an utterly useless totchke that was FUCKING USED! Lo and behold, following lunch, the same co-worker appears back in my cubicle, this time in possession of a huge birthday gift bag. The giant bag was thrust upon me with an ear-to-ear grin that only later, in retrospect, I realized meant: HERE YA GO, SUCKER!!!

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!" the co-worker chirped loudly, "I hope you like it!"

The subtext being "Because I sure fucking didn't!!" The package inside the giant bag was badly wrapped in, I realized with a sinking feeling, wrapping paper that looked like it had seen better, or should I say NEWER, days. Peering into the cavern of a bag I pulled out the badly wrapped, ill-shaped package and a metal stand that looked oddly like those things that they sell in the grocery store to ripen bananas. Hmmm...I thought, this looks kind of scary.

I smiled weakly and began to tear at the haphazardly wrapped blob of a thing. What emerged was a stained glass bird-house-y kind of contraption with one side open and a small metal bowl perched on the inside.

"It's a candle-holder!" The regifter screeched. "Do you love it? I totally thought of you when I saw it AT THE STORE!" These last words were said a little too loudly and a little too brightly as if to convince herself that she didn't just haul this useless crap out of storage in her attic.

"Oh, a candle-holder. Cool. Hey, thanks so much!"

"You're welcome. Enjoy!"

With that she was gone and I was left with the most useless item I'd ever seen. Suddenly the banana ripener was looking pretty good. Just as I went to stash the whole mess under my desk I realized that there was something else rolling around inside the birthday bag. I reached in and felt what clearly was the tealight candle that was supposed to sit inside the glass birdhouse's metal bowl. I pulled it out and the regifter's fucking cover was completely blown: the candle had been burned down to a nub; there wasn't an iota of wax left inside.

The only thing more insulting than getting someone's unwanted regifted crap is when they don't even try to conceal it. Christ almighty, every fucking dollar store from here to Oregon carries bags of 50 tealight candles for a buck! At least give me a goddamn new two-cent candle! So there I was in proud possession of a yard sale reject that I would never in a million years use. As I looked at the junk I suddenly recalled this same co-worker, a couple of years earlier, bringing in a dress for me stashed in a plastic grocery bag.

"Here", she had said back then, "I can't wear this anymore, it positively floats on me...way too big. I think it would look great on you, though!" At the time I marveled at her ability to leave out the "fat ass" part of "it would look great on you, though!" As in: "I can't wear this tent anymore, it's way too big for me, but you could probably squeeze your fat ass into it."

"Enjoy!"

So here I am, looking at a stained glass birdhouse that inexplicably houses a burning candle. As someone aptly noted: "How convienient: the bird flies in to lay an egg and gets cooked at the same time."

Whatever. It's just a matter of time before someone I can't stand has a birthday or an anniversary or Christmas and then my little regifted birdhouse will fly the coop and become someone else's hideous problem.

I'll tell you one thing, though: at least I'll put in a fresh tealight. I mean, really, it's called manners.

What's That? I CAN'T HEAR YOU!!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHHAHHHAHHHAHAHAHHA!!!!

MICHAEL!!!! THAT'S FUNNY!!!!

DID YOU SEE WHAT HE DID??? TOO FUNNY!!!! DO IT AGAIN! DO IT AGAIN! DO IT AGAIN!!!!!

I heard that all day today. Yep, it was them: The Jesus Syndicate out on their back porch with their godforsaken (wouldn't that be ironic?) pals laughing those loud guffaws that always mean that someone is forcing enjoyment. And why not? It was the anniversary of White Whale and Brunhilda: they of the endless brood of gremlins masquerading as human children. Probably time to fuck and pop out another homunculus in the name of the Almighty and his son.

"Be fruitful and multiply". Jesus Syndicate members know in their holier-than-thou black little hearts that not only did God himself intone those words but he meant them to go on forever and EVER. In spite of the fact that our little Garden of Eden is getting a little crowded, a little hot and just a tad pushed to its natural limits. "But not for us! Because we're HOLY! The Lord made the Garden of Eden FOR HIS CHILDREN to LOVE!!!!"

I'm sure He also meant for the Jesus Syndicate to keep crapping up the Earth with their giant smoky vehicles that are required since they're so scrupulous about the whole "fruitful and muliply" thing. Need those honking big-ass monsters just to haul your godly brood to the local grocery store. Or, certainly, to CHURCH. Hells yeah, expecially to church.

I've said in this blog that all religious zealots piss me off, but that Jesus freaks are probably the worst of the lot. Maybe that's because I fucking live next to Holy Water Central and have to be up close and personal with their freakish beliefs every fucking day of my life! I figure it's their cross to bear that they have to live next door to a filthy-mouthed cursing Jewess. What a trip! Here's what I do in the shower because I know that they can hear me loud and clear because I can hear their little demons crapping on their fucking potties day and night. Here's a typical daily shower script special delivery from me to them:

Don't be a fucker, go blow a trucker, kiss my ASS mother, mother, mother fucker!!!! Yo, bitches: Whassup in there motherfuckers? Having a fucking good day ya freaking a-holes?

And on it goes. Look, it's incredibly cathartic for me and it has the added benefit of potentially making their ears bleed. I know Brunhilda hears me because halfway through one of my ditties I generally hear her slam the bathroom door in what I can only imagine is Jesus Syndicate-worthy righteous indignation.

And so it goes: they piss me off with their constant, obnoxious, over-populated, incredibly selfish lives and every now and then I get a good one in. Hell, at a minimum I figure I give them something to pray about.

All together now:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!

Another Dunkin', Dunkin' Day

Hi there! Been a few days, but here we go. Different day, different Dunkin', roughly the same vaguely Indian/Pakistani owner/operators as the other one, the one that I drive through. This one I walked into and was greeted by the omnipresent, over-bright cheer- (and donut eating?) inducing music piped overhead in a constant stream of oafish, too-loud "music". I mean really, does ANYONE call "Yummy, Yummy, Yummy I've Got Love In My Tummy" music?

I walk in at precisely the same time as approximately five other customers. We approach the already formed line of three others in orderly, Dunkin' fashion. I immediately resound to the familiar cadence of my drive-"thru" Dunkin'. Namely, nearly incomprehensible English by way of over-dubbed Bollywood movies. There are four people behind the counter servicing the line in a dizzying fashion, talking over each other louder and louder in an attempt to be heard over the other voices, the shrill announcements of "Lite 98", and the voices of the customers. Some are ordering, some are talking on cell phones and some are (like me) standing in stunned silence waiting for our turn to enter this cacophanous fray. I'm already calculating which "worker" will be barking at me to, very soon now, place my order and quickly move to the side. You gotta get the fuck outta the way cause the next customer is already screaming in your ear in response to several urgent demands:

"What is ya ahda?"

"What did ya ahda?" Presumably a different person calculates what you owe and a third person,

"Cash? Credit?" takes your money.

Now I'm scared; there's only one person between me and the three-ring circus of this Bizarro World Dunkin'. I'm sincerely regretting having come in here.

"YOR ORDA?" He's yelling these word-ish syallables at me, now and I realize it's now or never.

"Large ice coffee."

"CREAMANDSUGA?" Painfully it sounds exactly the same cadence as the tinny voice that I now realize I've forsaken, betrayed and deeply long for as it daily comes out of the little Dunkin' squawk box in the drive "thru" line. Too late; forge ahead.

"No sugar, extra cream!" I yell brightly at his stone face. He rushes off as I shout: "I ALSO WANT A SANDWICH!"

Another worker, a woman this time, addresses me. Her face is stern to the point of being angry and I briefly imagine that the little red dot on her forward is positively glowing in parallel to her angry face:

"Sandwich? What kind? Egg and cheese and sausage?"

I'm deeply insulted that she has assumed that I'll have the biggest, fattest breakfast sandwich in the lineup just by looking at me and it makes me instantly surly.

"No. I'll have egg and cheese on an English muffin."

At just that moment the high-school age valley boy directly behind me gets waited on by worker number three and begins to shout in my ear the specifics of his two dozen donuts order.

"Ummmm, I'd like four of the glazed, two jellies, three with the sprinkles and three of those cruller-things."

"FOUR GLAZED, THREE JELLY, TWO SPRINKLE AND THREE WHAT?"

"THREE OF THEM CRULLER THINGS!!"

"OH, CRULLERS!"

The noise level at the front of this line has reached roughly the level of a revving Boeing 747. Now the woman behind me has to raise the volume of her ongoing cell phone call in order that her INCREDIBLY CRITICAL INFORMATION be heard at precisely this instant by whatever jackass is on the other end of her cell conversation.

"OH TOTALLY! REPORT CARDS CAME OUT YESTERDAY AND I WAS NOT HAPPY WITH ETHAN! WHAT? REPORT CARDS CAME OUT YESTERDAY! OH SHIT, HOLD ON!"

Now another worker was yelling at her wondering "CANIHEPYOU?" and I figured I was close to collapsing when my original guy arrives back in front of me with a large ice coffee that is as black as the ace of spades. Clearly he thought I ordered an ice coffee with no cream and extra sugar.

"I DIDN'T ORDER THAT! I ORDERED A LARGE ICE COFFEE WITH EXTRA CREAM AND NO SUGAR!"

He stops in his tracks and for one dizzying moment I truly believe he's going to fling that large, icy coffee directly at me. At that point it would probably be a relief. This place is an insane asylum. Instead he stomps off, clearly angry that I had wasted that .03 cents worth of perfectly good coffee and prepares me another one. I watched him the whole way to make sure he didn't add anything special to it, like his own spit.

At the same instant he arrives back with my correct coffee order the woman who took my presumed-to-be-a-gluttonous-fatso sandwich order arrives back as well and their voices combine in a perfect storm of unintelligible noise. It's gibberish on speed.

"LARGECOFFEECREAMNOSUGAEGGCHEESEMUFFINANYTINGELSE?FIVEOTREE!"

The orders are still richocheting around my head like an angry swarm of bees as I throw my money on the counter and turn to escape from this loony bin of commerce. As I turn to go I see the line, now out the door, and briefly consider sticking around just to see if anyone's head explodes, but in the end decide it's safer to get the fuck out of there.

Tomorrow I'll be back in the drive-"thru" line at my very own wonderful little Dunkin', thankful for the blessed anonymity afforded when I don't have to leave my car and rub elbows with the great unwashed. Who knew that what lurked inside the actual store was a caffeine-fueled nuthouse of epic proportions? Either that or I accidentally stumbled on the portal to the parallel universe that exists in the tiny little droplets of blue water on the leaves of every tree that isn't green and...heyyyyyy...wait a minute....I think he DID put something special in my coffee!

You're Not Funny. Really.

You know that book that came out a few years ago: "He's Just Not That Into You"? It was aimed at lame-o retards who just couldn't get those obvious social signals that scream: "GET AWAY FROM ME YOU ANNOYING ASSHOLE!" Anyway, I've got a similar problem where I work except instead of not getting that some guy really, really doesn't like you, I'm saddled with, actually fucking SURROUNDED by, people who mistake cheesy popular "office sarcasm" for actual humor.

Let me give an example. Every day I have to walk past a cubicle that is papered on all vertical surfaces, with "office humor". You know, those pseudo-witty observations that the rest of us are supposed to "resonate" with (HATE THAT WORD), as we go about our work-a-day activities. Designed to give the average dolt a little lighthearted chuckle in his otherwise drab day, they (what a surprise!) PISS ME OFF!!

"I can please one person a day and today's not your day. Tomorrow's not looking too good, either!"

"I was down to my last good nerve and now you've plucked it!!!"

"I'm busy now. Can I ignore you some other time?!"

"I pretend to work, they pretend to pay me!"

"Tell me what you need and I'll tell you how to get along without it!!!!!"

Always ending in at least one exclamation point and often accompanied by a crudely drawn "cartoon" of someone fuming or screaming or jumping up and down or having a stroke or vomiting blood, or WHATEVER, these abominations, these freakish and twisted attempts at "humor" are one of the banes of my existence. See, they start in a good place: the ongoing expressions of impotent rage at the moronic automatons and idiotic situations that the average office worker encounters on any given day. But then they drop the ball by concluding with a "witty", "sarcastic" retort that defuses the perfectly wonderful little venom dart that they could have, that they all SHOULD have become. Here's some suggestions for how they could be vastly improved.

"I can please one person a day and today's not your day. Come back tomorrow you rat-faced, vile little turd so that I can insult you again with your own insignifcance!"

"I was down to my last good nerve and now you've plucked it. Isn't it time I killed you?!"

"I'm busy now, can I ignore you some other time? If not, can I slowly choke the life out of you with my bare hands?!"

"I pretend to work, they pretend to pay me. So now it's time for me to pretend to flatten the complex!"

"Tell me what you need and I'll tell you how to get along without it. NOW GET OUT OF HERE YOU FUCKING INSECT BEFORE I GO MEDIEVAL ON YOUR SKANKY ASS!!!!

See how much better, how much more authentic, how much more GENUINE I've made those pale, lame attempts at bitterness. Being bitter isn't some homespun, halfway-there gesture that almost makes the other person feel awful. Being bitter is a full-on assault, it's gumption times a thousand, it's owning up to that dark well of desperation that lurks just below the surface of us all, it's the red pill that takes you down the rabbit hole!! What? Random Matrix references are my specialty.

"Is it crazy in here or is it just me?"

Yes, ABIB, it's always just you.

Feels So Weird...

I just got got back from vacation so my rage-o-meter is pretty much on zero. Give it a couple of hours.

"The Ultimate Experience"

Those words are posted as an advertisement in the cafeteria in the complex where I work. The cafeteria where they are posted is managed by the Marriott Corporation, so we're told the food is really great, not that salty, fatty, over-priced slop that I see there every day. Anyway, I went down to the cafeteria this afternoon to get some ice water with lemon (only 22 cents!) when lo and behold I was captivated by a sign posted by the coffee service.

"The Ultimate Experience" the sign read in a nondescript, aiming-to-look casual font, and it was plastered all over the coffee urns like some kind of Marriott corporate fake-out. The Ultimate Experience? Excuse me? Should anyone DARE to take a cup of coffee and not be terrified that, in so doing, they were courting a growing depression that would eventually rob their life of any hope of joy and pretty much end it all? Because let's face it: after the ULTIMATE Experience it's pretty much all downhill.

Really, The ULTIMATE Experience? In a fucking cup of coffee? Well, shit, if I pour myself one of these magical suckers I might as well lay down and die immediately afterward. It will be, after all, The ULTIMATE Experience. Once I drink this coffee there will never be another experience in my life that will even approach this one since ULTIMATE is pretty much the tip top of anything.

ul - ti- mate (adjective) not to be improved upon or surpassed; greatest; unsurpassed

Greatest. Unsurpassed. Not to be improved upon. You better be fucking careful mofo, cause if you drink this coffee you will never, ever, in this life, approach this moment with anything even remotely resembling happiness or fulfillment or contentment. Finding "Mr. or Ms. Right"? Don't bother; you've already sipped The ULTIMATE. Having children? How could they ever hope to compare to The ULTIMATE, which you have, sadly, already experienced? They'll just be an ongoing and life sapping disappointment to you. Finding any happiness whatsoever through work or an avocation or just plain living? FORGET IT, MOTHERFUCKER! Been there; done that! You drank The ULTIMATE Experience, remember? Give it up!

Which is what brings me to the apex of this blog post: my burning hatred of the wholesale overuse of the English language in the name of the great god of commerce. THE BEST! THE BIGGEST! THE GREATEST! THE ULTIMATE! Is there no advertising executive with even one iota of shame when it comes to using superlatives to try shill for any product from flushable toilet wipes to a fucking cup of coffee?

Why not be more in line with reality? What's wrong with that? Instead of The ULTIMATE Experience why not: "Our hot, freshly brewed coffee. It'll wake you up!" Or: "Take a drink and get a jolt", or how about the simple, straightforward: "Our coffee: have some!"

I'm down with all the misplaced exclamation points, I mean I'm not a total curmudgeon. But for the love of all that is holy, please stop screaming at me about how your piddly ass product is going to be my motherfucking salvation!

I'm ULTIMATELY never going to buy it!

Thank You For Sharing Your Music With Me

Here in Baltimore we get about 3.5 truly nice weather days a year. It's either not cold enough for snow but cold enough for freezing rain or it's hovering around 100 degrees with humidity levels typical of the Amazon river basin.

Last Sunday was one of those 3.5 beautiful days with sunny skies, temperatures in the 60s and a gentle breeze. Now normally the ABIB is not an outdoor person. Normally just the thought of the outdoors gives the ABIB hives, but Sunday, for some reason was different. I was outside, enjoying the weather and cleaning out my car. I've probably mentioned that I live in a typical Baltimore rowhome community, which means that I, and everyone else in my neighborhood shares a wall with somebody. I'm monumentally unlucky enough to share both walls with somebodies. But one side in particular makes me regret daily my choice of real estate.

"Jesus Freaks Through the Wall" was the subject of one of my posts and they were out in force last Sunday, with all their Jesus freaky-ness in full, evil bloom. Religious zealots of any stripe make my blood boil. They of the self-righteous attitudes and holier-than-thou positions of pseudo superiority. But probably, for me, the worst of the lot are the Jesus freaks. Holy shit they piss me off! Sick fucking wierdos with their judgmental anti-gay, pro-life, I'm-going-to-heaven-and-you're-not crap. To quote a bad movie with one very good line: "Capital P, capital U, capital TRID."

There I was, minding my own business, cleaning out my car and enjoying the communal nature of the day, when suddenly the air was riven with the sounds of the most unspeakably insipid, vile despicable "music" I have ever heard. The spawn of the White Whale and Brunhilda had gotten into their GIGANTIC FORD EXPLORER and had turned the radio on full blast. To a Christian "pop" station. Big truck, big speakers, full blast.

"OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD!!! IN THE MORNING, IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT, IN THE LIGHT OF DAY, OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD!! AWESOME, AWESOME GOD, OUR GOD IS AN AWWWWWEEEESOME GOOOOOODDDDDD!!"

What the FUCK? WHAT THE HOLY FUCK?! Suddenly all that could be heard, which amazingly enough even drowned out the continuous blast of noise that had been their enormous family squawking and honking and screaming and yelling and basically poisoning the air with their ever-present cacophany of SOUNDs, suddenly all that could be heard was this nauseating treacle with it's freakishly bright voices informing everyone for sixteen blocks that THEIR GOD WAS AN AWESOME GOD!!!

First of all, assuming Jesus Christ exists and if so, that he enjoys hearing music all about himself, wouldn't one hope that, as a freaking DIETY, he would have better taste than "OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD"? Lord have mercy, it sounded like the fucking Wiggles, like Barney the Dinosaur. Wouldn't Jesus be just a little bit more discriminating about songs about him? Shit, most mortals would! I'm thinking that he'd want something a little bit, oh, I don't know, BIGGER? How about the Star Wars theme? Or Indiana Jones? Or even Spiderman for Christ sake! But OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD with the synthesizers and the snare drum and the too-happy chorus of voices? I don't think so, babe.

So there I was, cleaning rag in hand, glaring with my angry, Jewish eyes toward the offending crush of sound, willing them all to instantly DROP DEAD, when White Whale figured he'd allowed enough of the healing power of the music to wash over my heathen head and he ordered Peppermint Patty to turn off the radio. Suddenly I could hear the birds again, the soft "whoosh" of the breeze through the tree branches overhead, the muffled sounds of life in the Garth.

But then the demonic shriek of Brunhilda rang out from inside the house like the screaming of the Hound of Hell:

"JORDAN!!!! WHY ISN'T THE FLOOR VACCUMED?"
"PETER!!! TAKE OUT THE TRASH!"
"MICHAEL!!!! SIT ON YOUR POTTY!!!!"

I take it all back! Your God IS an awesome God! I swear! I swear! I'll listen to the music until I'm cross-eyed, I'll do anything you say just PLEASE SHUT THAT SUCCUBUS UP!!!

Lovely weather we're having, isn't it?

Get Your Fat Ass Out Of My Way!

The ABIB was raised by two very polite people. Most of their sensibilities in this area were transferred to me so when I get confronted with IMPOLITE people I'm tempted to kick their ignorant asses through the nearest portal. But I don't; I just seethe inwardly and then empty my spleen on this blog.

It happened today. There I was, walking through the lower lobby of my very populous office building, navigating POLITELY through and around the hoardes of other people in my way. It was further crowded by the presence of a vendor selling her sickeningly sweet handmade crap surfeit with little stuffed Easter bunnies, little dancing plush chicks and other hand-made gewgaws aimed directly at the Anne Geddes crowd. Makes the ABIB vaguely nauseous. Which is why you can imagine I was in a bit of a hurry to navigate my way through the horde and get to the cafeteria for my breakfast food. That and since I also pretty much hate most other people, just being around so many of them in one confined space gives me the heebie-jeebies. French philosopher Jean Paul Sartre had it right: "Hell is other people".

I was almost to my destination when smack dab in front of me and everyone else for that matter, was a conclave, a gathering, a fucking herd if you will, of about six big, fat women. Standing there. In the middle of the path. CHATTING!! Chatting and laughing as if they were standing out in a 17 acre meadow rather than directly in the way of anyone coming from or going to the cafeteria. Which, at 9:30 in the morning, as you can imagine is quite a lot of people. So, small space, only one way in and the same way out, with oodles of space anywhere ELSE in the lower lobby, these ignorant bitches decide to have themselves a little "catch up".

GURRRLLLLL, you did NOT just say that!
OH YES I DID!
LOOK OUT, ya'll! Sista 'bout to throw down!
AHHHHHHHHAAAAHHHAAAHHHAAAHHHAAAHHHAAAHHHAAAHHHAAAHHHAAA!!!
EEEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!

Oblivious to the huffing and puffing and evil sidelong glances all around them as people squeezed by on every side, these gals just kept on hollering and laughing and BLOCKING THE PATH. I wondered then if, just this once, it would be OK to step out of my learned behavior, risk shaming my deceased parents who I imagine to be occasionally peering down from heaven and let loose with decades of repressed rude behavior. I picture it going something like this:

Say what? He was NOT in that condition on your anniversary!
YO! FAT ASS BITCHES!! LISTEN UP! Everyone in this hallway has had to circumnavigate past your ignorant lazy asses while you stand in the MOST inconvienient place in this building right now. Why don't you all just take your big 'ol butts to the left, the right or straight ahead and finish your conversation in such a way that not everyone but YOU is inconvienienced? OK? I think I speak for everyone here when I say that WE DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR PERSONAL LIVES! MOOOOOOVVVVVEEEE!!!!

Their heads would swivel on their fat necks in shock, at first not really understanding what was happening. A thunderclap of silence as everyone else stopped dead in their tracks since what was about to go down must surely result in someone's imminent demise. Then, outburst relieved, I would stride past, my stiff-necked indignation on display to the outpouring of applause and cheers of everyone else who wanted to do what I did but were, like me, raised to be polite.

SNAP! The ABIB wakes up from this lovely daydream and, with a passive aggressive scowl on her face, sidles past the oblivious buffalo herd as best she can, just like everyone else. Damn my good upbringing!

American Idolatry

OK, the ABIB is an American Idol fan hook, line and sinker. I get all wrapped up in the tryouts and the inexplicable auditions of some of the freakiest, scariest folks on the planet and then I get all carried away with the top 24 and then the top 12 and so on.

But I have to say that, even as a fan, I'm getting a little tired of having to listen to barely warmed-over copycats who have no original style and aren't called on it. For example, this year's batch has a guy who looks and sounds EXACTLY like Justin Timberlake. Now what's really crazy is that, in the ABIB's opinion, Justin Timberlake is a sucky-ass wigger who just a few short years ago used to be in a boy band. Yeah, Justin, we all remember 'Nsync. But now he's throwin' down like a regular thug from da hood. Please, he was in the fucking Mickey Mouse Club.

So here on this year's AI we have a Justin wannabe for Christ sake. I don't even want JUSTIN to be JUSTIN, let alone have one of my Idol top 12s trying to be him. And the thing that amazes me is that nobody calls him on it. God forbid anyone should try and cover a popular singer and present even the whiff of similarity. The judges enter into a chorus of "KARAOKE!" "I'm not gettin' you dawg; where's YOUR sound?", and the positive kiss of death from Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm: "Well...you LOOK adorable!" If you can't please even Paula you might as well go the fuck home.

But this guy saunters out on stage with the day old stubble and the wigger Marine buzzcut and proceeds to fucking IMITATE Justin Timbergag. The same intonation, the same key range, the same godforsaken endless melisma. Its enough to make a fan PUKE! But the judges smile and heap praise on this KARAOKE MACHINE like it was absolutely the first time they'd ever heard this "original" sound. One of them even cited the way the contestant "reminded" him of Justin Timberfuck. Reminded him? Yeah, like Saturday reminds you of the day after Friday.

It's a real pain in the ass, but I keep watching because I'm a ho for the Idol and it gives me someone to rant and rave at outside of this blog, which is good because I generally have enough unexpressed rage built up after the average work day to fuel a moon launch.

So, bring it on Justina: you keep sounding like a warmed-over version of a really bad singer and I'll keep screaming at my TV and entertaining the neighbors. Or not.

Happy Edibles

At one time in her past the ABIB was a vegetarian. I had sworn off all animal flesh for a period of several years. What broke my resolve you ask? That well-worn meat eaters fiesta of gluttony: Thanksgiving. Yep, a few years back at a traditional family Thanksgiving meal that slice of holiday turkey on my seat neighbor's plate suddenly became irresistible and I took a piece. It was all downhill from there.

Now, I'm not sure if other fallen vegetarians suffer from the same periodic self-loathing that I do, but at random intervals I'm afflicted with a sense of profound failure. As I sit in the McDonald's line waiting to claim my fish sandwich I wonder: how did it come to this? But by god, I have to believe that it's not only the neurotic, guilt-ridden ex-veges like me that have a problem with the topic of this post.

By Happy Edibles what I mean is the need for humans in the advertising trade to anthropomorphize food. Why, just today while driving to work I saw, not once but twice, a truck with a picture of three smiling dead things. The tableau was creepy and inappropriate and just plain wrong: on the left a vaguely human looking cartoon cow positively beaming with joy, on the right a chicken with roughly the same amount of happiness emating from two twinkly eyes and a beak upturned in an open-mouthed clearly toothless smile, and in the center, with his two gigantic claw arms draped across the shoulders of the other two a red (boiled to death!) lobster with a bizarre set of humanish eyes and a nose. A NOSE! Now, quite apart from the physical impossibility of that since lobsters in their natural state live under water, the notion that humans are actually comforted by the happy faces of something that they are about to devour is just plain ghoulish. Its like something out of Night of the Living Dead. Christ, I felt like I needed to take a shower.

Then, when I got to work I reached into my lunch bag (the ABIB is nothing if not thrifty) and got out a fresh banana for a nice mid-morning snack. Lo and behold, there on the lovely yellow background of the banana peel was a Dole sticker that had a banana with a human face wearing a fucking baseball cap with a tee-shirt labeled "Bobby Banana". "Bobby Banana" was smiling (again with the uber-happiness theme) and cradling a RABBIT in his arms? What the fucking hell is THAT all about? Now my bananas are named, they wear clothing and are pet owners! Is nothing sacred? I mean, it's bad enough when they try to freak me out of eating meat thinking about those cheerful faces and the implied camaraderie of the lobster claws about the shoulder thing, but now the fruits, too? I have to make a decision if I'm going to eat "Bobby Banana" and leave that poor little bunny a homeless, banana-less orphan?

It's all too much; I'm going to back to bed and when I get up it's nothing but bread and water for me. Hopefully my loaf of wheatbread won't have sprung its own personality by then.

The Courtesy Flush

Let me begin this entry with a definition:

Ladylike, adjective: 1. like a lady; 2. befitting a lady: in a ladylike manner; Also, well bred, well mannered, courteous.

K? I work in an office. I am a female and there are, by my rough estimation, a hundred or so other females with whom I share a public toilet. Now its not like we all have to squat on the same can, there's a few of them in there, but the room that houses them is your typical communal space. Nothing but little stall doors and AIR separates me from the other few gals who, at any given time during the work day, are sitting on the can doing their business.

It's never, ever pleasant for me (and I'm guessing for most women) to use a public restroom. The variance of discomfort ranges from "let's get this over with as quickly as possible" to "Oh, fuck, no! I'll fucking HOLD it". The former is what I feel about my work bathroom the latter, any given gas station restroom. But somewhere along the way the rule book that I (and blessedly a few others) got was somehow not transmitted to the remainder of those BITCHES I am forced to share crap space with. I'm talking about the Courtesy Flush.

We all know that when you gotta go you gotta go and with the coffee and popcorn and other unspeakably horrible-smelling shit that wafts from the (also communal) microwave and that presumably people actually EAT, the ladies that share my crapper gotta go kind of alot. At any given time you can be sitting in a stall, minding your own business when out of the stall just a few feet (maybe INCHES!) away, come the unmistakable sounds of a big dump. I really don't think I need to detail them here; they're pretty much universal in the human species.

I'm stuck there, because, unfortunately, I, too, am mid-dump, and I begin to panic and to sweat and to say a silent prayer to the god of good manners, that this biotch got the memo: At all times we utilize the COURTESY FLUSH! The Courtesy Flush is just that: it's the courteous way to think of others who, through no fault of their own save the bad timing of their own digestion, are stuck seated so near to you that if there were no wall you could embrace. The Courtesy Flush is a flush that you exercise with each emanation from your bowels. Some goes into the crapper? Flush that sucker away! A few seconds later another blast? Flush, flush, flush! The secret of the correct use of the Courtesy Flush is speed. A hairtrigger flushing response is the ideal way to save your coworkers from the horrific situation of being engulfed within a brown cloud of the stench of your crap.

For those of you who have not gotten it yet, what the Courtesy Flush does is, to the extent possible, clear the air of the SMELL of your dump. It's not foolproof; some stink still persists, if say, there was fart action along with the dump action. But that smell, being considerably smaller, is largely contained to the stall. But, Christ Almighty, it's a far cry from the monstrously unthinking, self-centered hos who insist on sitting, flush-less until they are completely and totally cleaned out! HEY! Just because you are enjoying the aroma of your own brand doesn't mean the rest of us are! Don't the choking sounds and the moaning coming from ALL AROUND YOU give you a clue? FLUSH THAT SHIT AWAY, HO!

I've even heard vocalizations coming from other stalls (and maybe even have uttered one myself). They sound almost involuntary: "Oh MY GOD!", "LORD HAVE MERCY!" "Gagggggacckkkk". But does the perp get the message? Nope. She persists on sitting in silence, awash in that unspeakable stench, as the rest of us gag and retch and struggle to get finished as quickly as possible so that we can escape that odorous Hell.

I think that toilets should be rigged with automatic odor sensors that trigger a response whenever one of those lazy bitches refuses to do right by the rest of us. As the stall fills with her stink and the flush handle remains idle, a recorded voice should be tripped on that says loudly and repeatedly in a shaming way: "YOU ARE A STINKY LADY! YOU ARE A STINKY LADY!" followed by the flash of a tiny camera mounted in the stall door that snaps a pic of the ignoramus. Then, once a week, those pics get posted on the bathroom "Wall of Shame" for all to see and identify. So the payment we'd get is a good laugh as we stagger out the door. Considering what that place smells like on any given day I'd hardly call it even but it'd be a start.