'I think that we broke Brad!'

Right around the time that I had decided to move back to San Diego, I was stuck in a dead-end job literally in the ghetto just outside of Philadelphia. The problem is that I just couldn't immediately react on my new found epiphany to move back to San Diego. I had to tough this job out for at least 8-10 months to finance my move back. Nothing's worse than when you have to go to a job that you hate every single day. My commute consisted of fighting the Pennsylvania Turnpike for about 30 miles & then funneling my jeep through a small 2 lane highway into the hell on earth which is Levittstown.

Just past the Budweiser Brewery you could literaly see the property values plummet with each deterioratingly gutted hovel of housing projects. On the corner by the 7-11 each day stood a little old lady with a sign that said, 'End War Now!' which is a nice sentiment, but most days her sign was upside-down. I'd then round the corner to my building which was riddled with bullet-holes in certain parts(I'm not even exaggerating here. Some of the lower floor's walls looked like swiss-cheese!). Each morning I'd shake my head & mutter expletives to myself as I marched up the small steps to the gutted office that had exposed wires hanging from the walls & a large fucking hole that stored all of our electronic component inventory. That's right we sold old, rusty connectors lower than cost price. One morning there was even a hostage situation right across the street from our shitty building. I distinctly remember while taking my morning shit, hearing gunfire & I thought to myself, If I get shot & die on this tiolet, I'm going to haunt this fucking place!

Why did I take such a shit job??? For the money of course(We're all whores for money at certain points in our lives kiddies!)! I was offered a base salary higher than I'd ever previously earned with a promise of amazing leads because my newly hired colleagues & I were going to be the future of this shitty company once we moved into a new, safer building. Extending this offer to me was a shyster, Donald Trump wannabe of the highest order who I'm pretty sure after working with him for almost a year was a sociopath. The man would stomp over his grandmother to make an extra fucking buck(More of that in future posts!)& is the purest liar that I've ever encountered. There were 4 new hires all from a slighty less, but still extremely shitty safety products company; Myself, Jay, Greg & Brad.

This, let's just shorten it to JFH(Job From Hell) was all lies. The current employees were old curmudgeons who hated us & would incessantly work to make our lives a living hell while trying to get us fired. I hated every single one of those miserable bastards! When I'm thrown into these types of no-win situations, I have particular defense mechanisms that instantaneously kick in so that I can function like a human being & not burn the fucking building down; humour & passive-aggressive pranks. That's right, I fuck with people! And who do you ask fell victim to my vile, insidous machinations??? Poor, dear Brad! Brad apparently had ADD(Attention Deficit Disorder) & just didn't take the time to think about situations before he reacted & he was just gullible as all get out! Seriously, he fell face first into every trap that I would set up. It was sooo easy & soon I found myself planning more elaborate, drawn out pranks that had more of a long-term bang for your buck(Bear in mind this all started as a way for me to keep my sanity & cope in a fucked-up work environment & snowballed into a full-blown out Brad character study with my 2 cronies Greg & Jay actively participating! Seriously, by the time we all left this shitty company, I could have written a Master's Thesis on Brad,). Here's some of the highlights:

RATE MY POO

Brad never locked his computer when he went to lunch. Big mistake! One day I hopped onto his computer & saved the nastiest picture of overflowing shit from a tiolet that I found on the website ratemypoo.com(This is a real website. I just checked & it's still active!) where people take pictures of their shit & post them on this website & you can rate said shit picture on a scale of 1 to 10(Do people have too much time on their hands to make shit websites? Abso-fucking-lutely!). Now before you label me a fecal-philiac, I'll ahve you know one of my bastard buddies e-mailed me the site. If I had a doller for every time somebody said, 'This is weird, distgusting, & just pain wrong, but I bet you'd like it!' I'd be a millionaire! Anyhoo, I saved this nasty shit picture on his desktop as his screen saver. Flashforward 5 months later, a very distraught Brad hustles over to my desk.

'You sonovabitch I know that I was you!'

'Whatever do you mean Brad(Putting on my best innocent face.)?'

'I know that you put that shit picture on my computer as my screensaver!'

'Brad, I'd neeever do that to you.'

'C'mon man please show me how to fully take it off of my computer!!! I changed it 5 months ago, but every time that I turn my computer on & off, the shit picture pops up for about 10 seconds! Every time I show up in the morning I see shit! Every time I leave to go home I see shit! It's really gross man!'

'I'm sorry Brad, but I don't have any idea what you're talking about.'

'You're an asshole Biff(Yes I am!)'

Brad stormed off in a huff & it took him about another 3 weeks before he finally had the IT guy show him how to get the shit picture fully off of his computer.

THE SCHWARZENEGGER

Did you know that you can assign any type of mpeg that you want to incoming e-mails on your computer? Well you can! One afternoon I pulled up sound bytes from The Terminator movies. I settled on the line when, Arnold says in that famous thick Austrian Terminator voice, 'Fuck You Asshole!' I then assigned said sound byte to Brad's incoming e-mail & let Jay & Greg in on the fun. I cranked the volume on Brad's computer as high as it would go & then we all waited for him to get back from lunch. Brad came back & began making phone calls to customers. We proceeded to e-mail Brad like mad. All of a sudden in mid sales pitch, the office erupts with,

'FUCK YOU ASSHOLE! FUCK YOU ASSHOLE! FUCK YOU ASSHOLE!'

Then all you hear is Brad exclaiming,

'What??? No sir I didn't call you an asshole. I think that there's something wrong with my computer.'

Brad cupped his phone & screamed,

'You guys are assholes!!!'

It took him about a week to get that one fixed. I think that he unhooked his speakers. Smart move Brad!

But the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back would have to be what came to be known as:

THE WARREN SAPP

Brad was a diehard Eagles fan. Every team that the Eagles played, Brad just hated. How dare they even attempt to beat my precious Eagles & Troy Aikman from the Cowboys is a fag(His words not mine.)!!! Well the Buccaneers were coming into town & this was when Warren Sapp was still playing for them. All week Brad had been smack-talking Warren Sapp, droning on about how big of a cheap-shot artist he is & how he was going to get his ass kicked on Sunday. At this point Jay & Greg had already been actively participating in my shenanigans with Brad & they had a whopper of an idea. Jay started a bogus Buccaneers fansite & wote up a little rant about how the Buccaneers sucked & Warren Sapp was gay & signed Brad's name with his direct work line attached. We then told Brad about said site & showed him the webiste . As Brad was pulling this site up, Greg called Brad's work line from his cell phone outside & screamed into the phone,

'Hey you Brad mother-fucker! What's this shit I hear about you talking smack about my Buccaneers & Warren Sapp???'

Brad melted down & went complete apeshit screaming,

'You fucking assholes better take that my name & work number off of that site! That's so unprofessional! How am I supposed to do my job??? That's so not cool! AAAAAAAUUUUGGGHHHHH!!!'

As Brad ran out of the building screaming, Jay looked at me @ said,

'Oh shit! I think that we broke Brad!'

We caught up with Brad about half a block away & started to calm him down explaining that the webiste was bogus & it was taken down. We cut Brad alot of slack after the last prank & just concentrated on getting the hell out of JFH(Job From Hell).

I can't say for certain, but after 'The Warren Sapp incident' I could swear that Brad had a little tick when he'd talk to us. I was convinced that one morning he was going to come into our shitty office with a semi-automatic & kill all of us. I lost track of Brad after I moved back out to San Diego. Hopefully he hasn't killed anyone!

Pay Your Asshole Tax!!!

I have a dark gift. I can make you go from happy to pissed off in less than 10 seconds flat. I don't let this 'Hatchet-Man' come out of my psyche as often as I used to. To tell you the truth, I'm normally a pretty mellow guy. It's hard to pull off the 'Young Angry Man' bit when you're 36 fucking years old! It's actually quite sad. When I was younger, people used to say that I had only two gears, 1st & 5th. I was either so mellow that you'd swear that I was stoned all of the time or I was in fifth gear just going off like a manic, spastic sprinkler. Thankfully, as I became a little older(& some might speculate, a wee bit wiser!), I found 2nd, 3rd, & 4th gear to add a little balance to Mellow-Biff & Hatchet-Man(I'll bet you'd have never guessed that I'm a schizophrinic Gemini bastard!).

Well there was a succession of progressing events that lead to the rusty shackles loosening just enough so that old Mr. Hatchet-Man could wreak havic in sunny Souther California recently. I just want to let it be known that I'm not giving you lame excuses here to condone my behavior in the story that I'm about to tell you, it's just that I want you to understand where I was coming from with my bad behavior. Sometimes I feel shameful about my actions & eventually relent & apologoze, other times I just leave it hanging out there like an akward silence on a bad blind-date. Ok, here goes......

By all rights, I enjoy my new job(Yes, I am employed again, but I'm very much unemployed in many other facets of my life. Please see, 'Manic Introspection' for a futher explaination. 'Natch!). The one major complaint that I have with said new job would be the commute which is about 40 miles each way from Pacific Beach to Carlsbad(Yeah, yeah! I know what you're thinking, 'Fuck you Biff! I live on the east coast I we got 20 feet of snow this winter! You've got no right to complain! Well it's my blog, so if you don't like it, go read a blog about puppy dogs & ice-cream. If you do read a blog like that, I hope that you're lactose-intolerant & shit yourself!). Compund an 80 mile-round commute with some of the worst drivers on the face of the planet & you have a recipe for disaster! I left work & 40 minutes later as I finally exited off of Garnett into Pacific Beach I was fucking livid!

Oh wait, I forgot to tell you something!

-REWIND(Feel free to add your own sound-effects here!)-

I forgot to mention that I was smack-dab in the middle of a detox diet. Twice a year or so, I do this sort of thing. The rationale is kind of two-fold. When It comes to my own personal health & fitness, I'm a bit of a masochist(Hell, a few years ago, I was on this kick where I'd workout so hard that I'd end up making myself vomit. That calamity came to a screeching halt when I tore my right pectorial muscle. But I'm saving that story for a future blog post & yes it's even more painful than it fucking sounds!) & I have to stay thin because I'm a vain bastard & the type of women that I'm attracted to out here aren't usually 'chubby-chasers!' This detox diet was brutal. I wasn't consuming any sugar, coffee & almost zero carbohydrates. This fucking diet was for 5 weeks & let me tell you, 5 weeks without carbohydrates really messes with your mental state! Also, San Diego was going through a series of unusal weather patterns. It had been raining every weekend for the past 3 weekends! Since it rarely rains out here(I know woah is me! Rain!!!) & the drainage systems haven't been ugraded since the 40's, all of the nasty run-off finds it's way to the Pacific Ocean. Unless you like sinus-infections & hepatitis, you really should wait about 48 hours after a rainfall before surfing. You can see how this pretty much hara kiri's my weekend surfing plans! So if, 'All work & no play makes Jack a dull boy' & 'No tv & beer makes Homer go crazy' you can see how, 'No carbohydrates, coffee, & surf makes Biff downright homocidal!'

Ok we're caught up now.

-FASTFORWARD-

I am livid from the swerving bumper-car traffic on my 5 South commute home. I turn right to drive up Mt.Soledad Road. This is a back way into Pacific Beach where you can normally avoid the nasty Garnett Street rush-hour traffic. As the fates would have it, not today. Not today by a longshot! The traffic was backed up at least a quarter mile, so cars had to start lining up in the median between the yellow lines separating north & south traffic. I grudgingly took my spot in the median while silently hating & wishing colon cancer on the drivers in every single car in front of me. I immediately notice that the village-idiot in the car ahead of me has decided that he's too good to move his car into the median with the rest of us drones. What's worse, I can see that this jackass is texting away on his fucking phone(Which is illegal, while driving in the state of California by the way!). Then cars started to line up behind this asshole, completely snarling traffic. I literally could feel the steam coming out of my ears. 'Should I do it???' 'Reaaally, should I????'

Angel on my left shoulder:

'No Biff! Take the high road. That man might very well be an oblivious jerk, but do you really want to stoop to his level???"

Devil on my right shoulder:

'Fuck him! He's an asshole that needs to be taught a lesson!'

Angel:

'Biff don't do it!' You'll be home in 10 minutes. Why don't you go take a nice walk on the beach & forget about this?'

Devil:

'Just imagine that guy is sexting your-ex fiancee & let him have it! Hatchet-Man rides again!!!!'

FUCK IT!

I pull my car up into the space where Mr. Oblivious should have been & completely block him out. Mr. Oblivious suddenly becomes perturbed & rolls down his wondow & shouts at me,

'Hey buddy! Why in the hell did you take my spot! Let me in there!'

I look him square in the eye & say,

'It's called the 'Asshole-Tax' & you're paying it right now with interest!

Mr. Oblivious says,

'You're the asshole, asshole!'

I retort,

'Is that the best comeback that you can think of??? You're an asshole, asshole? How's about this? SHUT THE FUCK UP! ROLL UP YOUR FUCKING WINDOW & DRIVE UP THE FUCKING HILL SO THAT YOU STOP BLOCKING TRAFFIC OR SO HELP ME GOD, I WILL GET OUT OF MY CAR, RIP YOUR FACE OFF & FUCKING EAT IT!!!!!!!!!!'

Mr. Oblivious took my subtle advice & drove away. It's probably a good thing that he did as well because I come from a long line of angry Irishmen who have all dragged people out of cars for doing much less(I wish I was exaggerating in that last sentence, but unfortunately I'm not!).

As I drove to the supermarket to pick up some asparagus, broccoli & chicken breasts(I told you that I'm a healthy mother-fucker!) my anger began to subside, but Hatchet-Man wasn't completely re-shackled yet. I was strolling though the parking lot towards the entrance, when I came upon a girl-scout troop selling girl-scout cookies. I don't like girl-scout cookies because they are entirely too tasty(I seriously believe that herion might be a key ingedient!) & with every box that you finish(Because you can't ever eat just fucking one!), you lose a little-bit of your soul! These girl-scouts were aggressive & annoying. When I have a shopping agenda, I normally don't like to deviate from said agenda. So any attempt to peddle your wares in my general direction is usually met with a healthy does of sarcasm & distain.

C'mon mister buy some cookies! They'll make you feel real good!'

Angel on my left shoulder:

'Oh shit! Biff they're little girl-scouts, do not say it! I mean it! Do you realize how many karma points you're going to burn with this stunt???'

Devil on my right shoulder:

'Oh yes! Say it! Say it! Hatchet-Man cometh!'

FUCK IT

'I'm sorry I don't purchase girl-scout cookies becasue they make you fat.'

Angel:

'I've got to find a new gig!'

Devil:

'Hatchet-Man round two! Ding, ding ding!'

One of the girl-scout's mothers approaches me & says,

'What do you mean girl-scout cookies make you fat???'

I retort,

'Think about it. There's really no nutritinal value in that box. I'd be better of eating a twinkie.'

Girl-Scout Mom,

'What's wrong with you asshole???'

I say,

'What's wrong with me? You're the 'Obesity-Merchant' getting into people's faces, trying to make them feel bad & purchase your precious cookies! Plus you just cursed in front of all of these little girl-scouts. Now young ladies, should you kiss your mommy if she swears??'

Suprisingly most of them said, 'No.'

'Well did you hear that? From the mouths of babes. I do believe that my work here is finished!'

'GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE!!!'

'Thank you very little, don't mind if I do!'

Driving home, with a bit of a smirk on my face I contemplated, Did I cross a line? Well yes, I fractured the shit out of it! Certain situations tend to bring out certain aspects of my personality. Sometimes you get the best of me & other times the worst(Thankfully in my older age, it's mostly the good.) Mr. Hatchet-Man was finally shackled back up as I entered my beach bungalow & turned on the television. One of those awful commercial with the sad Sara McLaughlin song playing in the background & the montage of abused dogs was playing. Oh God no! I hate these commcercials! The dogs just keep staring at you! I frantically began pounding on my remote to change the channel, but the batteries were dead! I'm paying the 'Asshole-Tax!!!'