More Bad People Stories:

Last year, around this time, I was working at Future Shop, selling headphones to the moderately wealthy. Life was fairly good, because I wasn't too bad at selling headphones to the moderately wealthy. In fact, I was pretty sure I was going to be kept on once the season ended, because I was making a couple hundred dollars of commission every day I worked there.

This translates into "a shitload of headphones", for those at home keeping score. And my technique was pretty simple, too - I'd just talk to the customer about music, find a band we both liked (easy peasy), and then loan the customer my awesome headphones and play him a song on my ipod. It worked like a charm... and my return rates were lower than most any other salesman in my department.

But then, at the end of the season, my hours were cut short and I was told I would not be permanently hired. Basically, they kicked me out the door.

I wasn't too bummed by this, because, well, it wasn't the best job in the world or anything. And also, they kicked me out the door just before people traditionally return christmas purchases, meaning I got to keep much more of my commission from boxing day sales than those that were kept on.

But I was perplexed, as a few of the people that were kept on made considerably less than me, including one guy who only made one or two sales during boxing day. This guy was allergic to making sales, and actually at one point started telling a random customer about Milton Berle's over-large penis because he got nervous during his sales pitch.

I wish I were making this up.

This begs the question. Why the hell did they keep that guy, and can me?

I found out a while later. Apparently, I was anti-semitic, and made several anti-semitic comments to a jewish co-worker. And, as far as these things go, this is entirely true. And my jewish co-worker was canned because he made anti-native comments to one of his co-workers.

That native co-worker? That would be me. I'm part native, and he knew it. And I knew he was jewish. See, one day, we were sitting in the break room, having our lunch and shooting the shit. We started swapping insults, that got progressively worse. We shared the same sense of humour, and we just let it go away. I told him that his nose was so goddamn huge because air was free. He told me that he locked his bicycle up so that it would force a chug such as myself to do an honest day's work rather than steal shit. I told him that if things had gone right, he'd be living in a ghetto in warsaw with a number tattooed across his forehead. He told me that if things had gone right, my blankets would still have small pox.

And so on, and so forth.

Yeah, harsh words, but if you were there, those words translated more into "hey, look at all this racist shit people say about our ethnic groups. Isn't that bullshit? Let's poke fun at that!"

Of course, whitey got involved, and decided that since we weren't insulted, she was going to have to step in and get insulted for us. She got so insulted, in fact, that she went to the managers and complained. After all, how dare two of us make inappropriate comments in a break room at a quiet level, out of ear shot of customers? How dare we make jokes?

So, I got canned, as did he.

Naturally, I went on welfare payments and stole her bike. I traded it to my new jew friend for some firewater and smoked salmon. He sold the bike at his cousin's brother's deli for far too much and spent the money on a nice brisket.

Apparently, neither of us learned anything from the incident. Which is as it should be.

I am bad people

I love making fun of people. Especially when they're in on the joke. Unfortunately, sometimes uninvolved witnesses don't understand it's all fake, and think I'm just being an asshole. I mean, I am an asshole, but I hate it when I blow my cover.

Observe.

DAVE: Hey! I'm working with Jean today!
JEAN: Hey Dave. It's gonna be a fun night,. We're going to rock this place.
DAVE: Jean, did you know that you're my second favourite person named 'Jean' to work in this deli?
JEAN: (Rolls eyes)
RANDOM CO-WORKER: "Second Favourite"? Dave, she's the only person named Jean that works here.
DAVE: I know. But she's just not 'number one' material, wouldn't you agree?
JEAN: I hate you, Dave.

See? It's funny. Two of the three of us had fun, pretending to hate each other. But the third person didn't get the joke... and went to the managers about my "attitude".

Another exchange between "jean" and I:

JEAN: Hey Dave. You know how Hitler died, right?
DAVE: Well, actually, he died of a cyan-
JEAN: Quit being a smartass for a second. Hitler died of a heart attack.
DAVE: No, he died of Cyan-
JEAN: Shut up. He died of a heart attack. You know, when he saw his gas bill?
DAVE: (Pause, and then) BWAAAA HAAA HAA HAAA!
JEAN: Thought you'd like that. We're bad people.
DAVE: Yeah. We are bad people. Don't know why I'm laughing... I just found out last month that my grandfather died in a concentration camp, after all.
JEAN: Oh my god. I'm so sorry. I can't believe I said that! I'm so so so sorry!
DAVE: Yeah.... he fell out of a guard tower.
JEAN: (Pause, and then) BWAAAAA HAAA HAA HAAA!
RANDOM CO-WORKER: You're both bad people.

Moral of the story? I only hang out with the fun people at work. And then get in shit.

Talk to me, Goose!

Lately, I've been in "training" mode. My goal is to walk the West Coast Trail next summer. For most people, this is a fairly ordinary goal, but because my Wilford Brimley style Diabeetus gets in the way, I've found I need to do a bit of preparation.

This preparation is taking the form of walking the Galloping Goose in a day, while carrying weight, and constantly testing my blood sugar to see how I can best handle myself on the real trail. It's been a lot of fun - get on the Goose in Victoria at around ten am, and then walk all the way down to Sooke.

Last week I did something like 35 km in around six hours, which is pretty damn good, in my professional opinion. That's like six kilometres an hour, which is... well, okay, it's not incredibly fast, but still.

Anyways, on the Goose, you see some interesting things. Beyond the wonderful views, you just see some weird and crazy stuff. For example:

• In a crosswalk in Metchosin, someone spray-painted a giant penis on the road. And I mean giant. And then drawn in the names of various people throughout the thing. I'm going to look at this as interpretive art, or perhaps some sort of political statement.


• On a bridge near Matheson lake, there's a bronzed paw print of a beloved dog, overlooking a dried creek bed.


• Also near Matheson lake, there's an empty field, with soccer nets on either side. It's in the middle of thick forest, with no trail to reach it that I can see, and no houses nearby. I think it's where the aliens go to practice for FIFA.


• Near Sooke, I found a pile of rocks near a bench, and saw the edges of a note sticking out from a tree. I thought it was some sort of geocaching spot. Nope. Opening the note, it read "Sitting here makes my pussy wet." it was signed "E.A.". That's right - apparently, people use the Goose as an exchange point for dirty letters. What a world we live in.


• There's a bridge in Langford that is lined with letters to a girl whose body was found dumped in the area last year. It always makes me feel kind of happy and sad all at once - but I wrote about this before.


• At the 26 km mark, someone scrawled in "halfway th" on the marker. This makes me laugh... because the trail is 55 km long. Someone didn't do the math well, and realized it halfway through their scrawling.

Moral of the story? Walk the goose when you have a day off. You'll see weird stuff, and have at least one odd adventure.

Weekly Haiku #67 - are you experienced?

our seattle boy's

guitar cries as a newborn

a prophet of sound

True Story:

DAVE: Um, hey there, boss.
BOSS: Hey Dave. What's up?
DAVE: I need to book a few nights off next month.
BOSS: Sure. What days?
DAVE: First is November 10th. I need everything past 5 pm off.
BOSS: Okay. Why?
DAVE: It's a Dan Mangan concert. He's kind of this folksy guy with a cool horns section and some great drummers.
BOSS: Alright. Concert. Gotcha. Next?
DAVE: Uh, November 11th? Night?
BOSS: Oh, okay. Why?
DAVE: Yukon Blonde.
BOSS: What?
DAVE: Yukon Blonde. They're a Canadian indie rock band.
BOSS: Never heard of them.
DAVE: They're from Kelowna. Think laid-back rock music, sort of like, say 54-40 if they had just come out now. Or maybe a less frenetic R.E.M.
BOSS: Uh... sure. November 11th... off. Gotcha. And the third?
DAVE: November 12th?
BOSS: No way.
DAVE: What?
BOSS: No way you're going to three concerts in a row.
DAVE: Um.
BOSS: Who is it this time?
DAVE: The Arkells.
BOSS: Oh, I've heard of them!
DAVE: Really? I haven't.
BOSS: They're on the radio.
DAVE: I don't listen to the radio. Not really.
BOSS: But you're going to their show.
DAVE: Yeah. Why?
BOSS: Dammit, Dave. I try to defend you when people call you a hipster behind your back, but you don't make it easy.

Weekly Haiku #66 - Phantom Cyclist

one man. two seat bike.

alone... pedalling for two

empty spokes revolve

Ew. Just.... ew.

I'm walking down the street, near Mayfair mall, listening to the new Dan Mangan album, when I look down and see a picture, obviously cut out of a polaroid.

It's small, but it's a woman's face. Curious, I bend over and look a little closer. This is when I realize it's a picture of a woman's face, engaged in oral sex. The entire bottom half of her face is obscured, and I won't go into too many details on that account. She didn't seem entirely thrilled to be doing what she was doing. Ugh.

Okay, so a few things icked me out about this. One, is that someone actually cut this picture out of a polaroid. I can't understand why, because this would be the focal point of the photo (right?) and if you wanted to destroy the photo, you'd destroy the whole thing, and if you wanted to keep the photo, again, same thing. This isn't like a breakup photo, where you cut out an ex's face.

Or is it?

Second, someone was carrying this photo around with them. For what purpose, I have no clue, but it's not one I want to think of.

Naturally, I took the photo, tore it up into a couple of pieces (hard to do with a polaroid, but I managed using a key) and chucked into a garbage can. Unfortunately, the whole affair put an icky taste in my mouth, if you'll pardon the expression, all things considered.

Sometimes, Victoria surprises even me.

How to Annoy Dave:

I work with some very "interesting" people. This is a conversation I had a few days with a co-worker, pretty much verbatim. He was talking about crappy movies, and the conversation went from there:

DAVE: Um, I don't really watch too many movies these days. I mostly read.
CO-WORKER: I'm reading a good series right now.
DAVE (Not really interested): Oh?
CO-WORKER: I'm reading the Earth's Children series. It's good.
DAVE: I've never heard of them.
CO-WORKER: The first book is called "Clan of the Cave Bear". It's -
DAVE: Oh, right. I've heard of that. It's by that girl-
CO-WORKER: Her name is Jean Auel. The first book is Clan of the Cave Bear. It was written in 1980. The second book is called The Valley of Horses. It was written in 1982. The third book is called The Mammoth Hunters. It was written in 1985. The fourth is called The Plains of Passage. It was written in 1990. The fifth book is called The Shelters of Stone. It was written in 2002. The sixth book is called The Land of Painted Caves. It was written in 2011.
DAVE: Um. Wow. That sounds like, uh, quite the production run.
CO-WORKER: Yes.
DAVE: Um.
CO-WORKER: The story starts with a young cro-magnon woman, named Ayla, who is split with her tribe. She doesn't eat for a week, and nearly dies of exposure, but she is able to stay hydrated during this time. She comes along a tribe of neanderthals, who adopt her. They don't seem to use language, but (this continues for a few minutes that felt like hours, where he goes into Neanderthal custom and whatnot before I interrupt)
DAVE: Oh, wow. So, it's someone's story about what neanderthals were like.
CO-WORKER: Yes.
DAVE: It's funny, though. A lot of those theories no longer work - there are different theories on neanderthals than there were years ago.
CO-WORKER: Oh, it's just fiction. Everyone knows cavemen didn't exist.
DAVE: Wait, what?
CO-WORKER: I don't believe in Evolution.
DAVE: Ah. I see.

He then proceeded to try and sell me herbal vitamins that he pimps on the side, in an Amway-esque pyramid scheme, and told me he had stuff that would help fix up my diabetes. I told him I only bought herbal vitamins from people who believed we descended from apes. Stony silence ruled my workplace.

And no, I don't feel bad mocking someone with obvious mental issues. Not one iota.

Who Knew?

Hey! You know what's rough? Working 70 hour work weeks.

You know else is rough? Trying to work 70 hour work weeks, and trying to find interesting things to write about while doing so.

So... yeah. It's been a while, eh? Nothing of interest has really been happening on my end, save for some surgery recovery (yeowch) and getting my diabetes working for me instead of against me. Beyond that... yeah. Life's been good, if a little hectic.

Anyways. Posts are resuming, but don't expect a daily post for the next while, at least. I'm just not nearly interesting enough for anything like that.

Who knew?