Douche Squared

The guy on this phone message is awesome. I admittedly haven't been in the dating scene for a while....ever really, but I'm pretty sure I would be a fantastic catch if this is my competition. I'm not sure what the plural of douche is, douchi, douchon, douchod....but this guy goes way beyond singular doucheness...He is at least douche squared. Possibly even douche to the power of douche.

Lessons from a bounty hunter

I’ve mentioned that I used to work in a couple of auto parts store. I started out as a stock boy, delivery boy, and then moved on to counterman/manager/outside salesman over the course of about 8 years. We had some interesting people come through on a regular basis, but one of the most colorful had to be the guy known only as “The Bounty Hunter”.

1st encounter: I am in the back stock room doing inventory of the restock items, checking numbers and marking them off the list, when I am brutally attacked from behind. I’m 15 years old by the way. My arms are pulled back behind by back, handcuffs are slapped on them and I am torn over the back of the chair and dragged backwards kicking and trying to free myself. He drags me through the front of the store and out the front door and as I look up I see all of the countermen laughing. He stands me up outside and takes off the handcuffs and says “you have always got to be prepared for an attack. I could have had you in a car and gone forever, right in front of everyone, and you didn’t do a thing about it.” I had never met the guy before in my life. He says “I’m the bounty hunter”. The bounty hunter…not a bounty hunter..THE bounty hunter, and that is how he is known to everyone to this day, if he is still alive, that is.

He was older and had a weathered face, gristly looking dude, the kind of guy you would look at and say he is either homeless or a killer and most likely, both.

2^nd encounter: I am helping a customer at the front counter and he walks in the side door. The customer leaves and he walks up with a 12 gauge assault shotgun with a mounted flashlight and a shell tube that must hold at least 10 shells. He throws it on the counter and says “Have you ever seen a ‘Can’ gun before?” I say “A can gun?” He says “Yup, Mexi-can, Puertori-can, Afri-can.” Now, when a racist has a gun, maybe this isn’t the time to call him out, so I just giggle and say a little prayer that he does not attack me again.

3^rd encounter: Again, I’m helping someone at the counter. He doesn’t wait for the person to leave, but strolls up (he kinda had a limp) and as I turn my attention to the customer, he throws a leg up on the counter. A frikin’ leg. It is a prosthetic. He unstrapped the thing and threw it on the counter. One legged bastard got me again. He then tells me how he has been shot, stabbed, run over..”And those are just wounds from my Ex’s, hehehe.”

4^th and 5^th encounter: I mention to him that I wanted to find a switch blade knife, and did he know where I could find one. He pulled one out of his pocket and I admired it. Next time in, he threw me one and said, “you can have it”. It had a pink pearl handle, but still was awesome. I’m still not sure if that was another way for him to call me a girl, but I still have it 16 years later. He was now handing out illegal weapons to minors.

6^th encounter: I get bold and ask him what the toughest guy he ever took into custody was like. He says “I’ve taken some big guys but I’ll pick them any day over a woman. Women are mean and it may not hurt the same when they punch you, but they’ll run you over with their damn car. I’ve never had a guy try to run me over, but women will run you down, they want you dead.”

Sometime later: He came in fairly often, always with a wacky story and life advice for me. I’m not sure if he had already given all of this advice to the others and I was just a new kid, but he had information just for me. The most memorable was his mandate on sex. He said “Do you want to know the secret of keeping a woman happy in the bedroom?”

“I’m listening.”

“You take this to heart and you will be the best lover ANY woman has ever had.
When it comes to Sex, treat a whore like a queen and treat a queen like a whore.”

Who says you can’t get a life lesson from a one legged, racist, scarred and battered, bad-ass bounty hunter?

Just Friends?

So I was having a conversation a while back with my niece and a fundamental misunderstanding of relationships arose. She is 13. A few months later, I had the same conversation with my sisters. They are mid-20’s and 30+ in age, same delusion. Finally, I watched an episode of “Everyone Loves Raymond” and again this topic of misunderstanding arose. I am duty bound to inform the uninformed. Here goes. Ladies, we don’t want you as friends. There, I said it. It’s out there. Those of us of the heterosexual ilk have no business having “Just Friends” of the opposite sex. This is a universal law and no you are not an exception. Let me explain. One of the two friends ALWAYS wants more. Why don’t you people understand this? I know, this delusion can be on the male side too, but it predominantly seems to infect the brains of the gentler sex.

Side note: I am new to blogging and thought I would mention a phrase that will be commonly used yet based on the blog topic, refer to various groups of people that I neither understand nor comprehend…and they confuse me too. The perfunctory phrase is “You People”. I like it. It generalizes and seems to fire up people very quickly.

Back to the explanation: These “Just Friend” friendships can be summed up in 4 categories.

1. Guy is not attractive to Gal, she loves him as a friend. He says he feels the same. Deep down he craves her madly and will become suicidal if she mentions one more time how hot another guy is. (Reference: Ducky.)

2.Gal is not attractive to Guy. She secretly loves him. He doesn’t give her the time of day, but she thinks they have a great friendship and one day he will see past the festering goiter to the beauty within. (Reference: Every chick flick ever made, minus the bogus ending, and often minus the goiter. Only in Hollywood can Julia Roberts be considered for the role of the Quasimodoish “Just Friend”.)

3.Gal and Guy are not attractive to each other in the least. Never were friends, never will be. Moot scenario.

4 Gal and Guy are both attractive to one another, but they claim to be just friends. Great prospect. As future lovers their friendship will blossom. (Reference: The start of most long term relationships.)

Notice I used the word attractive, and not attracted. One infers an innate affinity towards the other where friendship is secondary in the mind of the attracted person. Attractive, on the other hand, means you are probably not auditioning for the role of Rocky in Cher’s newest film “The Mask II” but your reasonable looks allow a friendship to start without fear of infection or capture.

So far, I have only been referencing uncommitted, single people. A whole new world of misunderstanding is involved in those who are in committed relationships and but still tip toe across the fiery coals of maintaining friendships with the opposite sex. Do as you will, but recognize that the above rules still apply….and contribute greatly to the fantastic marital statistic of a nearly 60% failure rate. Women, it is much better to remain in ignorance of the prospects that are still out there. You made your choice, as ill-conceived as it was. Men, let’s be honest, you can’t do better, so stop trying. If you have a woman who is good to your children and lets you touch her on occasion, drop to your knees and thank The Almighty. You are a lucky man. If you are ignorant enough to say that you want nothing more than a friend who happens to be the opposite and you are perfectly happy with your companion, you are either lying or stupid. You might be lying to yourself as well, but you are a liar nonetheless, or mentally handicap. No offence to the mentally handicap.

Women, please don’t try to be one of the guys. Your breasts deny you the right….’cause we are going to look at them. Guys, don’t be the sensitive one to whom the girls can tell anything; you’ll spend weekends on W.O.W. and take lots of long showers.

It has never worked, and never will. You people try time and time again and it always falls back into the four categories I have described. So men, just live with the fact that you cannot and should not try to have women as friends if that is all that you want. Women, you can’t have men as just friends either.….and Mathew McConaughey, you can’t have either as friends because although I am 100% hetero, wow, you are a sexy man.