I'm afraid I haven't any humorous antecdotes today. Just frustration and irritaion.
I've been wondering, recently more than usual, what the hell makes my soul so bloody valuable that every effing person from here to Timbuktu is trying to convert me to the path of Jesus. It's like people think they're going to get Brownie Points with God if they can conquer and convert the soul of one Super Mitten. I can't take two steps and spit without hitting a concerned, pious individual who's hell-bent on saving my everlasting soul from the stinging flames of eternal damnation's fires.
For the most part, I try to mind my own business where religion is concerned, keep my religious views and opinions to myself (one of the few subjects, for anyone who knows me, that I remain relatively mum about, unless asked directly). I *try* to be tolerant of others' views, though my patience wears thin, inevitably, when confronted with those wildly fanatical zealots who populate the area.
And it's fine, I feel, to let people know where you stand with regard to religion, politics, whatever. There's nothing better than a sound, intelligent conversation about religion. I love it. But the problem is, people tend (particularly, it seems, where I am concerned) to force-convert you without bothering to find out what you believe in the first place. And apparently I've had "I Worship Satan" tatooed on my forehead since I was five, because since then, my life as been one long string of attempts by concerned do-gooders to reform my troubled umbra.
But in this area (or perhaps in this world) one's religious fraternization, political affiliation, even one's sexual preference seems to be conditional. Who you're speaking to, talking about, looking at, or even thinking of governs which side of the fence you stand on at the moment. That alone is justification, in my book, to avoid jumping into the belly of the churning hypocritical, propaganda endorsing machine running local churches, schools, and perhaps most sadly, governmental organizations. Nevermind the fact that, last time I checked, the person who converts the most troubled souls doesn't get moved to the front of the cosmic/theologic queue at Heaven's Gate (or wherever).
Certainly, I would be ignorant to admonish all this and feign guiltlessness. I sin, like everyone. I'm as big a hypocrite as the next person. I have my vices. (And I love some of them...) And too much, probably, I wear them on my sleeve. Perhaps that's why I'm such an easy target for the "Fanatical Converters" of the world. Or maybe I've just been at the receiving end of an onslaught of conversion recently. Maybe everyone's trying to convert everyone. It's human nature, I 'spose, to try to "convert" those in your sightline toward your POV.
Regardless, I'm just babbling. God save the lunatics....
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Hoedowns, Barn-Raisings, & Bar Mitzvahs.
The power of advertising is strong.
Recently, a co-worker asked me to help craft a billboard ad for the local origination channel I produce to announce that his band was accepting bookings for, as he put it, "weddings, reunions, festivals, etc." However, I found this list far too diminutive and limiting to our vast and diverse audience. I asked him why he didn't include other local events on the list. Barbeques, for example. Bar mitzvahs? Hoedowns? For heavens sake, Barn-Raises, at least.
Funny though he found all of this, my co-worker simply refused to allow me to admit Bar Mitzvahs onto the list.
"Co-Worker," I admonished him, "you will certainly isolate the Jewish community of eastern Kentucky if you omit this important event from your list of possible gigs. Surely you see the danger in this?"
Surely, he did not. Bar Mitzvahs were, in fact, omitted. The final list read, "Local Band, Now Accepting Bookings for Reunions, Festivals, Fundraisers (and in small print), Hoedowns, BBQs, Weddings, and Barn Raises."
My glee increased exponentially to the funniness of the aforementioned list. However, as the days passed, my excitement was lessened as not a single effing person called to book the band. Were my days as a booking agent numbered?
Yet, today, a very stoned sounding man called me and said:
"Uh, yeee-aaaah. I saw this band on TV a-wantin' to play fer barn-raisins, er whutever..."
"You want to book the band, sir?"
"Uh, yesss'm, I do."
In the background I hear, "Ask'em about the hoedowns, too!"
Heee Haaaw! Success! Too much fun for words.
Also, on a side note, I would like to add an additional humorous antecdote about my mother.
When I came downstairs yesterday, I found Momma sitting on the couch, reading and eating an ice cream cone. Emboldened, apparently, by the rock'em, sock'em crime book in her hand, she turned to me and said, "If you go to the grocery store this weekend, don't you get me any of those sissy-ass ice cream cones!"
HA! I'd never really heard "sissy-ass" used to describe anything, but coming out of my mother's mouth, it was quite comical.
Recently, a co-worker asked me to help craft a billboard ad for the local origination channel I produce to announce that his band was accepting bookings for, as he put it, "weddings, reunions, festivals, etc." However, I found this list far too diminutive and limiting to our vast and diverse audience. I asked him why he didn't include other local events on the list. Barbeques, for example. Bar mitzvahs? Hoedowns? For heavens sake, Barn-Raises, at least.
Funny though he found all of this, my co-worker simply refused to allow me to admit Bar Mitzvahs onto the list.
"Co-Worker," I admonished him, "you will certainly isolate the Jewish community of eastern Kentucky if you omit this important event from your list of possible gigs. Surely you see the danger in this?"
Surely, he did not. Bar Mitzvahs were, in fact, omitted. The final list read, "Local Band, Now Accepting Bookings for Reunions, Festivals, Fundraisers (and in small print), Hoedowns, BBQs, Weddings, and Barn Raises."
My glee increased exponentially to the funniness of the aforementioned list. However, as the days passed, my excitement was lessened as not a single effing person called to book the band. Were my days as a booking agent numbered?
Yet, today, a very stoned sounding man called me and said:
"Uh, yeee-aaaah. I saw this band on TV a-wantin' to play fer barn-raisins, er whutever..."
"You want to book the band, sir?"
"Uh, yesss'm, I do."
In the background I hear, "Ask'em about the hoedowns, too!"
Heee Haaaw! Success! Too much fun for words.
Also, on a side note, I would like to add an additional humorous antecdote about my mother.
When I came downstairs yesterday, I found Momma sitting on the couch, reading and eating an ice cream cone. Emboldened, apparently, by the rock'em, sock'em crime book in her hand, she turned to me and said, "If you go to the grocery store this weekend, don't you get me any of those sissy-ass ice cream cones!"
HA! I'd never really heard "sissy-ass" used to describe anything, but coming out of my mother's mouth, it was quite comical.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Renovations...
If there is a crazy person within a three hundred mile radius of where I work, chances are, I'll deal with them at some time or another. On a daily basis, I'm inundated with all manner of psychoses and butchers of the English language. It bothered and disturbed me (briefly) that just about everyone who calls the office is out of their blinking mind. I would never have dreamed that so many individuals desirous of selling their lawn care equipment (or whatever miscellaneous accoutrements are enqueued today) could be so nutty.
If one man isn't daily calling to harrass me about putting on his personal and profound profession of love to his married girlfriend --you know, enduring love, the kind that lasts "always and forever"-- then I simply can't call it a normal day at work. I've wondered, more than a few times, if eveyrone on earth is crazy - or maybe it's just me. Possibly. Probably both. But with zonked out women calling in to tell me that I just don't understand drug use until I've stuck needles in my arms and had bloody noses from all the coke I've done (which is her rationale for needing to be on television), I'm beginning to think that perhaps everyone else is nuts, not just me.
My tirade was set off today by an incident that had me in tears laughing. A man called to tell me that he needed to "renovate a house for a week for his parents." "Renovate?" I asked.
"Yeah," he anwered. "They're comin' to town next week and they need a place to stay, so we're lookin' for a place they can renovate."
Meanwhile, in the background, I hear a woman, presumabley the man's wife, hissing, "Rent, RENT, the word is RENT!"
To which the man I'm speaking with covers the mouthpiece and hisses back,
"I KNOW it's rent! What do you think renovate MEANS?"
BAAAAHHH! I haven't had that good of a laugh for about three months. Children.
I decided that henceforth, all such zany instances shall be recorded, if not simply for that fact that one day I'll put all this junk in a book and will need to remember it, but also because it's just fucking funny....
If one man isn't daily calling to harrass me about putting on his personal and profound profession of love to his married girlfriend --you know, enduring love, the kind that lasts "always and forever"-- then I simply can't call it a normal day at work. I've wondered, more than a few times, if eveyrone on earth is crazy - or maybe it's just me. Possibly. Probably both. But with zonked out women calling in to tell me that I just don't understand drug use until I've stuck needles in my arms and had bloody noses from all the coke I've done (which is her rationale for needing to be on television), I'm beginning to think that perhaps everyone else is nuts, not just me.
My tirade was set off today by an incident that had me in tears laughing. A man called to tell me that he needed to "renovate a house for a week for his parents." "Renovate?" I asked.
"Yeah," he anwered. "They're comin' to town next week and they need a place to stay, so we're lookin' for a place they can renovate."
Meanwhile, in the background, I hear a woman, presumabley the man's wife, hissing, "Rent, RENT, the word is RENT!"
To which the man I'm speaking with covers the mouthpiece and hisses back,
"I KNOW it's rent! What do you think renovate MEANS?"
BAAAAHHH! I haven't had that good of a laugh for about three months. Children.
I decided that henceforth, all such zany instances shall be recorded, if not simply for that fact that one day I'll put all this junk in a book and will need to remember it, but also because it's just fucking funny....
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