Long time no post.....

Hey, folks! Sorry again for the extremely slow updating of the blog. I finally found a way to access the internet from my apartment, so now I have no excuse for my lack of updates. I will do my best from now on.

So as you know, I work part-time at a movie theatre on the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica. I can't even begin to tell you all of the weird things that happen to me there, so I'll just give you the highlights. There are four basic positions at the theatre, and everyone is trained in each position: ticket-taker, usher, concessions, and box office. Since I just started, I usually get placed as ticket-taker and usher. The front door is always open, and I stand just inside it, so I get to people-watch all day. Most of the ridiculous things I'll describe happened to me while I was at the door.



-A customer walks in, and as he walks by I notice the back of his shirt, which states "While you were reading this, I farted!" (exclamation point included)

-An older gentleman walks past, and I nod to him and he nods back. Suddenly he stops and walks up to me. He says, and I qoute: "Hey, Junior. How's it going? You know, there are two types of men in the world: attractive men and normal men. Attractive men can pretty much do what they want. They have no restraints. But us normal men don't get that luxury. We wallow. You're lucky enough to be an attractive man. Enjoy it." And then he walks off.

-Some crazy guy runs up to me, stops suddenly and shouts "erp!" like a bicycle hitting its breaks, and runs away backwards.

-A gray-haired, pudgy, middle-aged man wearing a short-sleeved button-up shirt is talking to the employee out front who is changing the marquis. I thought his shirt was emblazoned with orange and yellow fire until I get closer and realize the design is actually the Dragonball-Z characters in their Super-sayan forms. He tells me that I have the "hair" for comedy and suggests I work at the comedy club down the street.

-A quadriplegic man approaches in his breath-controlled wheelchair wearing intricate Halloween makeup. He rolls right past me into the theatre lobby and starts talking to me. I feel horrible because I can't understand what he's saying, but I think I have the gist. I want to make sure, though, so I ask him to repeat himself a few times. He gets frustrated and starts to smack his head against the control in front of him. This gesture finally confirms it: he's asking me to help him remove his makeup. There's nothing I can do, though, so I tell him that I can't because I'm working. He gets really pissed and asks me again to help him. This just makes me feel even guiltier when I again tell him I can't help. He finally leaves, but not until I'm certain I'm going to hell for just doing my job.



So the above events all occurred while I was at door. Tonight I was usher, who cleans out the theatres and bathrooms. Ten minutes before my shift ends, I start to check the bathrooms. I finally get to the men's bathroom downstairs, and when I push open the door, a powerful wave of nausea hits me. The stench of feces smacks me square in the face, and a sense of dark foreboding overcomes me. I think desperately think "someone just forgot to flush, that's it, they just forgot to flush," hoping beyond hope that it's nothing worse. Again, this is ten minutes before I get to leave. Like the token black guy in a horror movie, I slowly push open the first stall, and, seeing nothing, I step nervously to the second stall. Again, nothing. I go down the row until I reach the final stall. Here I pause and take a deep breath, realizing that a terrifying monster is waiting just beyond the door to rip me limb from limb.

As the door swings open, I stagger back and nearly puke. Someone has literally shit all over the toilet and floor. Soiled toilet paper dangles down from the full bowl like entrails spilling out. Whoever did it gave a 20% effort of cleaning up the mess, but instead of helping simply spread the mess further over the floor. The bastard didn't even flush the toilet.

So here's the situation: human excrement is all over the floor as well as the toilet. My OCD is whirling at full tilt. I'm frozen in place with my breath coming almost as fast as my heart is beating. And the only thing in my head is "FUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCK" repeating over and over again. I finally regain control of my body and tiptoe around the mess, flush the toilet with my foot, and run like hell out of the bathroom before I have to see if the toilet is clogged.

I approach a friend and co-worker and whisper to him what happened. He suggests I wait it out, since the janitor comes every night to clean up. Long story short, I feel bad about it but leave the mess for someone else. I can't handle that kind of horribleness. I clock out and leave as fast as possible to avoid getting called by my manager to clean it up. God. I still feel nauseous.