Normalish

Apparently my trips to deuce-ldorf are much easier than most people. I rarely spend more than a few minutes taking these trips. In comparison there are a number of people on the floor of my office building who have a difficult time checking their luggage.

There is this one guy who really sticks out though. He is The Angry Pooper. He unabashedly strains, grunts, and practically cries while stowing his carry-on. He must have a medical condition. I don’t necessarily mean that he has a condition which makes him do that, but more likely, he has created a medical issue from the violent encounters.

Oh, and it isn’t like I sneak into the bathroom either. So we also need to consider the fact that he knows someone is in there listening to him go to town.

I just don’t get it.

My wife recently had a couch delivered. Just as the truck was pulling up she asked my if she thought she needed to tip the delivery people. She thought that they were actual employees of the furniture company (as opposed to a 3rd-party carrier) and this made me err on the side of not tipping them. If they furniture doesn’t pay them enough, that isn’t our fault. It isn’t a profession like waiting tables where peope are actually paid less than minimum wage and truly rely on tips to make a living.

So, one of the guys comes to the door to ask that this is the correct house and where should they put the couch. We show them where we want it, and he leaves his clipboard on a chair of ours before going back outside to get the couch.

On his clipboard, clipped right at the top, were a stack of bills. This guy was blatantly trying to persuade us, even guilt us, into give them a tip. In fact, when you go to sign for the delivery, there are the stack of bills staring you in the face.

Not to mention, during the entire process I thought the guys were a little shady, and sort of playing up how heavy the couch was and what an inconvenience it was for them to move the couch 90 degrees.

My wife felt the same way, but there was a brief moment as they left when I saw her begin to reach into her pocket to pull out some cash. I was behind her, shaking my head wildly… “No, don’t do it!”

Luckily she didn’t. From the moment I saw the bills it was a lock - no tip for you smart guy.

He was likely to get one if he had just been genuine, nice, and didn’t front with that cash on his clipboard. When will people learn?

You are a guy. You are in a public restroom. You are alone. You’re standing at a urinal (one of the worst words in the world, btw) taking care of business. Before you are finished, you get an inkling that the urinal just isn’t going to cut it for this visit. You need to upgrade to a stall. I believe there are only 3 reasonable moves here:

• “The Conservative” - Finish, repackage, move.
• “The Liberal” - Finish, no repackaging, move.
• “The Independent” - Pause, no repackaging, move.

Of course, certain situations might call for you to immediately divorce your current party affiliation and become and independent. Or, in even more dire circumstances I suppose a “libertarian” (no pause, no repackaging, no moving) might be in order but that seems highly unlikely - although I have to admit I actually saw my young cousin throw down a “libertarian” once right before my very own eyes.

Anyway, forgetting about those special cases, what political affiliation are you?

I’m typically “liberal,” but have gone “independent” on occasion.