Uni-Burn
When I arrived at the Spokane International Airport last week, there was supposed to be a company car waiting for me. An employee was supposed to be there to greet me and make sure I made it to my apartment. She eventually found me after I had been wandering around aimlessly for about 20 minutes looking for anyone with a company shirt on or a sign with my name on it. When she did finally figure out I was one of the two guys she was supposed to be looking for I got a bunch of attitude about how I should have been wearing a company shirt or had a sign to display so she could find me. Fuck me. I wasn't even given a name of who to look for.
As we were leaving the airport this woman informs me that the company doesn't have any available cars and I'd have to share one for a while with this other guy I had never met before. She gave the car to him, so I was to be at this guy's mercy for rides to work and elsewhere until who knew when. Junk. We drove across the city to an apartment complex that was a long way east from the downtown area. A manager at the apartment complex was supposed to be there waiting for us so we could get front door keys. No one was around. Now what the fuck was I supposed to do? No car, No front door keys. There wasn't even a note like "Sorry I'll be back by three" or something. I could tell I was off to a great start back at Bill and Dave's. There was nothing for us to do but stand around and wait.
I made small talk with the other new guy. He was a strange looking fellow. His side burns had been shaved into a pin stripe width of stubble that followed the edge of his jaw line all the way to his chin. It wasn't a beard or a goatee sort of look. He didn't have the burly mutton-chop side burns going, and I couldn't really figure out if he was trying for some modern Honest Abe sort of vibe. I'd never seen anything like it before so I started calling him Uni-Burn. He appears to have one long wrap around side burn growing on his face. A couple of hours later the apartment manager showed up and gave us our keys. What a relief.
Uni-burn and I went to the grocery store after we were able to get into our apartments. We didn't really know where we were in the city so we hopped in the company car and took it to the first large grocery store we saw. It was a Safeway. Upon entering the store the theme song to "The Odd Couple" television show should have been playing over the P.A. system. I was Felix, Uni-Burn was Oscar. Each of us had a shopping cart. Uni-Burn loaded his basket up with frozen pizzas, frozen cheeseburgers, tons of junk food treats, and bags of greasy potato chips. I went for fresh stuff to make some salads, pasta, good red wine, granola, and a bunch of assorted health food items. The only frozen thing I got was some raviolis. I was planning on doing some serious cooking that night and I could tell by our food selections me and Uni-Burn were as different as night and day. I wasn't planning on hanging out with this guy any more than I'd have to. The car thing was a huge problem.
Day after next we went and saw a new movie out in the theaters. Uni-Burn said it was going to be great, I didn't have much hope for it. He wanted to go see a film called "Independence Day". It looked really stupid to me. I watched it. It was in fact, really stupid. I was the only person in the packed theater who did think it was a steaming pile of dogshit. I didn't whoop and holler everytime a U.S. jet was plastered all across the screen. I didn't clap and high five the persons in the seats on either side of me when a goofy looking UFO was blowed up real good. I've never seen a crowd become so animated and gung-ho like I did that afternoon.
One of the things I kept thinking about over and over again during the film was, "Where are the F-16s? How come I haven't seen any F-15s yet? Why are there no SR-71s or B-52s in this film?" I was irked about it. I mean, all I saw was F-18s everywhere thick like locusts in the skies and one B-2 stealth bomber. I think. In this fantasy world of the near future did the U.S. Government only produce the F-18 Hornet in mass quantities? This left me watching the film in a perplexed state of mind. I have to assume the film's production team ran out of cash to fund the computer modeling and settled for just one kind of fighter aircraft. In conclusion, heavy doses of computer animation, bad acting, stupid plot, and a whole theater packed full of podunk hicks does not make for a good movie experience.
As we were leaving the airport this woman informs me that the company doesn't have any available cars and I'd have to share one for a while with this other guy I had never met before. She gave the car to him, so I was to be at this guy's mercy for rides to work and elsewhere until who knew when. Junk. We drove across the city to an apartment complex that was a long way east from the downtown area. A manager at the apartment complex was supposed to be there waiting for us so we could get front door keys. No one was around. Now what the fuck was I supposed to do? No car, No front door keys. There wasn't even a note like "Sorry I'll be back by three" or something. I could tell I was off to a great start back at Bill and Dave's. There was nothing for us to do but stand around and wait.
I made small talk with the other new guy. He was a strange looking fellow. His side burns had been shaved into a pin stripe width of stubble that followed the edge of his jaw line all the way to his chin. It wasn't a beard or a goatee sort of look. He didn't have the burly mutton-chop side burns going, and I couldn't really figure out if he was trying for some modern Honest Abe sort of vibe. I'd never seen anything like it before so I started calling him Uni-Burn. He appears to have one long wrap around side burn growing on his face. A couple of hours later the apartment manager showed up and gave us our keys. What a relief.
Uni-burn and I went to the grocery store after we were able to get into our apartments. We didn't really know where we were in the city so we hopped in the company car and took it to the first large grocery store we saw. It was a Safeway. Upon entering the store the theme song to "The Odd Couple" television show should have been playing over the P.A. system. I was Felix, Uni-Burn was Oscar. Each of us had a shopping cart. Uni-Burn loaded his basket up with frozen pizzas, frozen cheeseburgers, tons of junk food treats, and bags of greasy potato chips. I went for fresh stuff to make some salads, pasta, good red wine, granola, and a bunch of assorted health food items. The only frozen thing I got was some raviolis. I was planning on doing some serious cooking that night and I could tell by our food selections me and Uni-Burn were as different as night and day. I wasn't planning on hanging out with this guy any more than I'd have to. The car thing was a huge problem.
Day after next we went and saw a new movie out in the theaters. Uni-Burn said it was going to be great, I didn't have much hope for it. He wanted to go see a film called "Independence Day". It looked really stupid to me. I watched it. It was in fact, really stupid. I was the only person in the packed theater who did think it was a steaming pile of dogshit. I didn't whoop and holler everytime a U.S. jet was plastered all across the screen. I didn't clap and high five the persons in the seats on either side of me when a goofy looking UFO was blowed up real good. I've never seen a crowd become so animated and gung-ho like I did that afternoon.
One of the things I kept thinking about over and over again during the film was, "Where are the F-16s? How come I haven't seen any F-15s yet? Why are there no SR-71s or B-52s in this film?" I was irked about it. I mean, all I saw was F-18s everywhere thick like locusts in the skies and one B-2 stealth bomber. I think. In this fantasy world of the near future did the U.S. Government only produce the F-18 Hornet in mass quantities? This left me watching the film in a perplexed state of mind. I have to assume the film's production team ran out of cash to fund the computer modeling and settled for just one kind of fighter aircraft. In conclusion, heavy doses of computer animation, bad acting, stupid plot, and a whole theater packed full of podunk hicks does not make for a good movie experience.
posted by factory_peasant at 7:04 PM
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