An Open Letter to Scurriers

An Open Letter to Scurriers-

I see you walking out of the grocery store. I’m traveling at a daunting 2 mph pace and waiting to pounce at any moment as I approach from over 100 yards away from you. My slightly saggy front bumper indicates that I hit something; maybe I hit a flat-topped, middle aged lady pushing her shopping cart somewhere between the HEB exit and her car, or maybe I was backing out of my driveway and cut my wheel to fast making my low profile bumper scrape against the curb. No one knows. Ultimately, you only have one option so that I might spare your life. You must wait for me to stop and give you my benevolent approval. I will waive my hand in a broad sweeping motion signifying I have decided to let you pass.  The only payment I want in return is for you to walk nervously across the street in front of me as you imitate a panicky squirrel, checking across your shoulder four or five times to see if I changed my mind and decided to run you over. Mwahahahaha!

Scurriers, you are right to be nervous. This world is full of monsters, and one day, one of us will run you over. It’s not a matter of if but when.

Sincerely,

The man who feels embarrassed because you hurry across the street so nervously – like you fear for your life. I mean, come on. Do you really think I’m just going to gun my car all of the sudden? Geez.

An Open Letter to Teens

Teenagers-

To start, will you take the earbuds out of your ear? You can listen to whatever crappy, empty, soulless music you’re listening to later. I mean, what’s your problem? You’re listening to it like it’s going away. The music will still be there when you come back to it later. That’s the beauty of an iPod – the music stays inside of it; they have a built in dam that keeps the music from seeping away. Also, if I see one more of you listening to your iPod at a restaurant while you’re eating dinner with your parents, I’m going to lose it. You can’t take them out for an hour to talk to your parents? I was a teenager once and I understand what it’s like to not be overly social with your parents, but listening to music while you eat is just disrespectful. If I see one of you doing that again, I’m going to walk over to your table, rip the earbuds from your ears, and put your Caesar Salad on top of your dipshit, Justin Beiber haircut – I will also stuff the rest of your food in mouth and politely bow to you parents. 

I don’t think that you get how anti-social it makes you all look. You can’t carry on a conversation without one? I see you all at school with one earbud in, trying to carry on a conversation with someone else who has one earbud in. Do you not see how freakin’ ridiculous this is? I doubt either of you can understand each other. One of you is trying to sell the other some crystal meth and the other is trying to coordinate a group burglary. Get on the same page people – these crimes won’t commit themselves! (Ok, I know not all kids are criminals, so here is a revised line for the good kids. One of you is trying to sell some magazine subscriptions to get enough money to join the big soap box derby and the other is trying to set up a carpool to go to Young life. Get on the same page people – these random acts of cuteness won’t just happen themselves!) 

Teens, lets rap. You don’t have to want to hang out with your parents, but they paid for that damn dinner. You at least owe them the courtesy of not talking to them while not listening to music. You can just stare down at your plate, answer the questions with monosyllabic grunts, and just continue to dress like an overall teen dipshit. No, no, no, don’t talk. Interjecting any of your own political beliefs into the conversation would be terrible because you don’t have any educated thoughts. You’ve been listening to your iPod in social studies. If the conversation turns to wearing your gym shorts 24/7 or UFC, you can pipe in. You’re just like Eliza Dootlittle the first time Henry Higgins brought her… er… oh yeah, iPod in English class, too. 

I hope you have a better sense of who you are now. At some point in your life, you will takes those earbuds out and probably reflect on your youth and feel slightly embarrassed. It’s ok – I was a jerk, too. I’m just trying to help you out. Just think about it. We’d love for you to join our little society here if you would just take the earbuds out first. Until those earbuds come out, you will be looked at with the intense fury of a thousand suns by the likes of me and everyone else who isn’t a teen.

Warm Regards,

Johnny Utah

P.S. Here's you, mouth agape and all:

What's the deal with cashiers?

I bought some compressor shorts today, and no, this post isn’t about how free and easy chafe-less running feels. I paid for my shorts with cash and was served with the usual paper and metal money sandwich, with a useless side of receipt. Is this taught to cashiers – part of their training is to hand out the receipt, followed by cash, and topped with change? Why do all three of these things need to be given to me at once in one open hand? Maybe if I carried around a burlap sack, I could just shove all of this crap in it. Whatever someone puts in my hand, I could just crumble up and jam it in. Unfortunately, I only have Crown Royal sacks, and those are for keeping pennies – house pennies, not out-and-about pennies! I mean, come on, imagine me walking around with a Crown Royal sack tied to my belt in public? I’d look like a damn fool. 

Think about the logic of this situation: the paper cash, change, and receipt come from the cashier already sorted. Why the hell would the cashier create this mess? It’s like a jigsaw puzzle: here’s what it should look like. Here’s a mess of pieces. Put it back together. Cashier, give me the paper money to put in my wallet, and then the change to put in my pocket. I want the receipt, too, so I can throw it in the trash on the way out. Also, half of the time this process turns into an explosion of paper and pennies. If the cashier and I aren’t in complete unison, the transaction ends with me splitting my pants because I have to bend over to look for that quarter that when AWOL. You know like I do, when I eventually find that allusive piece of change, I’m on all fours, looking under some lady’s cart, and it ends up being a damn penny. 

I know this is different for women, but it’s similar. They don’t just shove it all in their purse, and if they do, they sort it out later. We need to all band together and specifically ask for the pieces of the transaction to be handed out separately. I, for one, will put my hand out, and when the cashier places whatever is first in my hand, I’ll quickly jerk my hand back and put it in its proper place. I’ll continue this until the transfer is complete. If this catches on, the cashiers will have something to talk about at their next cashier’s meeting. We have to act as a society, people. Do you want to be a spineless consumer? Let the Best Buys, HEBs, and KFCs of the world know: we will not be slightly inconvenienced!

Anti-Social Me!

An Open Letter to the Strangers at the Gym-

I will go to any length not to talk to you. It’s not that I think I’m better than you; I just don’t want to foster a friendship with you. I have nothing to add to the relationship. I promise. I don’t want to know how much you bench or your recipes for huge protein boosts. In fact, sometimes my mp3 player runs out of batteries and I leave my headphones in my ear to pretend that I’m still listening to music. I’ll mouth some words or maybe even tap my fingers to imaginary songs to give the illusion that I’m listening to something and act so in to it that you bothering me might get me out of this magical groove – a mental Shangri-La where lifting weights and music converge and exist as one. There are many aspects of life where I have zero patience, but this is not one of them. If the batteries run out, I’ll leave the ear buds in and tap and mouth to nothing for an hour and a half if need be. I’m that hardcore about not chatting. 

I will also do whatever it takes not to make eye contact with you. I’m an extremely secure guy, so don’t confuse my looking at the floor for shyness. I’m doing it not to talk to you. I can feel you looking at me in the mirror. You’re waiting. The moment our eyes meet, you’ll pounce. “How much weight ya got there?” Alas, this shall not happen. My eyes will stay ever transfixed on the floor – focused as if there is something going on down there. Unfortunately, there is nothing – unless you can imagine my desire to not talk to you as a tangible thing; in that case, there is something infinitely big: a Behemoth made of anti-social willpower. 

Once, I was so intent on keeping my eyes down that when I swung around to get a plate to put on the barbell I clocked my forehead on the next barbell over. I had a circular bruise on my forehead for two days. That circular bruise was a symbol of my need to not chit-chat.

Don’t take this the wrong way. I’m a nice guy and maybe if we were somewhere else, I would chat. Probably not though. I’d probably walk the long way to avoid you.

Sincerely,

Guy with a Turned Off Shuffle, Staring at the Ground, Rambling Non-Sense to Himself

An Open Letter to the People in and around my Neighborhood

An Open Letter to the People in and around my Neighborhood-

I think some of you may be taking advantage of the good people at Kroger’s grocery store. Don’t get me wrong – I’m with you. It happens to all of us. Sometimes when I go to the store, I’m too lazy to roll the shopping cart to the proper cart return area, and I’ll just leave it between my car and the car across from me. It’s not hurting anyone, and sooner or later someone who works there or another customer will bring it back to the front. My concern is I don’t think the Kroger’s workers will walk to your apartment to get the shopping cart back. I mean, it’s a pretty far walk and I think their jurisdiction ends at the parking lot. Believe me, I wish we could take shopping carts home too. I could totally use something that rolls to transport the clothes from the dryer to the bedroom. Or I could use it for firewood. How much easier would it be to just roll that bad buy up from the garage to the house? Alas, this isn’t a perfect world, you know? Those shopping carts belong to Bill Kroger. You can’t just leave them out front by that small tree next to the Mexican newspaper machine. 

Apartment dwellers who take the shopping cart home, you need to roll the cart back when you finish. I know what you’re thinking: I don’t have time for that! But, seriously, if you’re taking the cart home, you don’t have a car, right? If you don’t have a car, what the hell could you possibly be doing with your day? Like, you can’t go anywhere, so you must have free time. So, come on, let’s roll her back. 

People down the street who had a tipped over shopping cart on the small strip of grass next to their house for far too long, what are you doing? I’ve seen your cars, so why do you have a shopping cart in your yard? I’m not sure if you know this, but shopping carts aren’t generally used as decorations. In fact, most people would say it makes you look like a piece of crap. I know what you’re thinking: But I didn’t do it, some apartment dwellers must have left it! Well, guess what? They aren’t going to come back, get it and roll it to Kroger’s. It’s your job now. If you leave it there, these people will think it’s ok and your house will become the shopping buggy hub. We don’t need one in our neighborhood. There is a shopping buggy hub at Kroger’s already – it’s by the front where the automatic doors are located. 

Apartment dwellers and piece of crap at the end of the street, we can do a better job of making our community look better. I think we should begin with putting shopping carts back where they belong. Look, when I go to the store, I’ll make sure to cart my buggy back to the right shopping cart drop off place to practice what I preach. Deal?

Next, we can talk about cutting down the deflated, silver birthday balloon that’s been stuck in your tree for a year and half. One step at a time, right?

Sincerely,

The One Menacingly Staring at You through the Blinds of my House