Would You Tell Your Boss?

If you have ever read Wear Gloves and Protective Eyewear you may know that I like to talk a lot of shit. Or maybe I should say I talk about shit. Maybe you’ll remember We Have A Plunger Just In Case and Butt Plug Not Included. In the fine tradition of those great entries I bring you Would You Tell Your Boss?

I have an employee his name is Reyes. He is what we call an irrigator. His job responsibilities require that he work a lot by himself. We need to be able to trust him to keep busy and do an honest days work without much supervision. We have found that not to be the case with Reyes. He appears to be getting very little done, and what is done is done half-ass. (Half-ass would be a technical term we use in the golf business.)

I have made it known to Reyes that I’m not satisfied with his job performance. He said I had some sort of problem with him and complained to my new boss. Mistake. Now my boss holds him accountable for every minute he is on the golf course. Reyes is now freaked out that he is going to loose his job, he should be. He calls me and reports to me every little thing that he does. Things are better, but it has gotten a little extreme.

As I am driving to the clubhouse to get some lunch I come across Reyes driving back to the maintenance shop in a hurry. He pulls me over to talk.

Hey Tom I gotta go home.
What’s the matter?
I’ve got real bad diarrhea and I shit my pants.
Umm...really?
REALLY. I shit in my underwear a couple of hours ago so I threw them away. Now I’ve shit in my pants....
Stop stop stop, enough, don’t get out of your seat. Just go home. Call me tomorrow if you can’t come in. I’m going to lunch now. (Yum.)

Later that day while I was washing my hands in the bathroom. As I threw away the paper towel I noticed a pair of underwear in the trashcan. I was curious, but not that curious.

It Really Better Not Be A Tumor

I made a reference to the movie Kindergarten Cop in the title of a post a couple of weeks ago. I thought I might clear that up today. Sometimes I assume that everyone will know what I’m talking about when I drop a line from a movie. I don’t know why, but sometimes people will stare at me blankly when I say, Tito Puente's gonna be dead, and you're gonna say, "Oh, I've been listening to him for years, and I think he's fabulous."

At the same time that I had written that post, my wife was really sick. She was having a hard time standing up without getting dizzy and falling down. It was so bad that she couldn’t drive. I had to take time off of work to get her to the urgent care center.

The PA that looked after Sherri ran many tests. He couldn’t figure out what was wrong. Finally he said he wanted to do a CAT scan. He said she probably just has a virus, but wants to do this to make sure it is not something else.

We grab our paperwork and head out to the Lucy Curci Imaging Center. It was time for school to get out, so we had to pick up Alissa on the way. Austin would be home later.

Alissa was all questions on the way there. Why are both of you picking me up from school? What’s wrong with mommy? How long are we going to be? Can we have ice cream on the way home? It was all cute until I pulled into the parking lot and noticed that the Lucy Curci Imaging Center was really the Lucy Curci Cancer Center. Sherri noticed the look on my face and gave me that don’t say a word in front of the little girl look.

I am now waiting with Alissa in the lobby for Sherri to get her CAT scan. We are doing her home work, talking about her day in school, and I’m dying inside. My little girl has no idea what this CAT scan is for. What the hell are we going to do if the person that holds this family together has cancer? What’s Sherri going through in the other room?

Sherri comes out after about 15 minutes and we wait to hear from the technician. It didn’t take long, maybe 10 minutes. The technician says that we would have to go back to the urgent care center and discuss the results there. Give me a break. So we go back to the urgent care center.

Everything was fine, no tumor. But we still don’t know what is going on. The PA gives Sherri a prescription for motion sickness, and it has kind of helped. He thinks it is a virus and that it will pass.

Sherri is now experiencing some numbness and tingling in her arm. She has now seen our regular doctor and told him everything that has gone on for the last 2 weeks. He thinks that everything is probably related to a possible neck injury she sustained at work. We are now waiting for an MRI approval from her workman’s comp carrier.

All I can say is, “At least its not a tumaaa.” (my best Austrian accent)

Maybe That's Why We Don't Talk.

While doing my Mother’s Day shopping (for my wife) this week I saw a lot of great gift ideas. I spent a lot of time trying to decide what she would like the most. This is hard to do when there is a 7-year-old girl who wants to go home and play, instead of shopping for mommy with you.

I always try to pick something nicer than what Sherri would normally buy for herself, or something she wouldn’t normally buy for herself. I finally decided on a skirtini and a pair of shoes to match.

While driving home I thought about what I might get for my own mother for Mother’s Day. I don’t really talk to my mom much anymore, so I don’t put the kind of effort that I should into her gift. I know that sounds bad and I have come to realize that maybe some of my previous efforts at her Mother’s Day gifts may have contributed to our lack of communication.

Here are some examples.

I'm sure I saw some of this stuff in her bathroom. So when I saw it at the store I thought, "Hey, mom uses this stuff. I'm sure she would love getting some more for Mother's Day!"

OK, so mom has a little moustache, some sideburns, and ... a beard. No biggy. This Epilady thing takes care of all of that. I think it takes care of armpits, legs, and other hairy spots, if you know what I mean. She haaaad to think this was a great gift. The salesman said it actually feels good when you use it too!

When I was a kid, I KNOW I saw one of these in her bathroom. I remember asking what it was. She said it was a massager. I also remember it was boring looking and white. Now that I'm older and wiser, I thought it would be funny to remind her of that fine mother-son moment with something a little more colorful. I'm sure she was all laughs when the UPS man needed her to sign for the package.

It Better Not Be A Tumor

I don’t know how it is in other states, but in May the public schools in California do their standards testing. This is the way the government holds the school accountable for the job that it does. If you suck, you have to go to Arnold’s office and get a swat. Nobody wants a swat from The Terminator. For weeks now, the teachers at my son’s school have been preparing him for this test, in order to avoid a turbo butt blistering at the hands of Major Alan “Dutch” Schaefer.

Now that the testing has started, the kids are getting the “royal treatment”. Austin says that they get extra recesses; I think an extra 2 or 3. He is not being sent home with any homework. Also, the kids are getting healthy snacks provided by the school, because tests show that an empty tummy is not good to test with. Jeez, why don’t we do that everyday?

Austin was even sent home with instructions from the school on how they would like us to manage his nights during this period of time. You know, get to bed at a reasonable hour, feed him, no porno, and no weed, all the things that got me through school, denied!

I think the school district may have it all wrong. Maybe they should be offering incentives that the kids want, or stronger deterrents that would encourage America’s future to do better in school.

Here are some of my ideas.

Incentive (For the boys)- Internet access during recess with links to Miley Cyrus scandal pictures.

Incentive (For the girls)- Internet access during recess with links to Malathionman pictures.

Deterrent- Free copy of Bleak Future.