words of wisdom cookies

i'm up for my last gig at the local job. i hate that i'll pick up a commute, but the antics of this past week were enough to remind me why i must pack it up and move on. i try to separate myself from dysfunction as much as possible, so i don't regress.

and last night, i worked with a kid i've grown to really enjoy working with. i laughed so much, to the point of actual giddiness, that he blurted out,

everyone thinks you're the worst, but it's really ---

thanks. is that a compliment or a putdown or both?

i laughed at that too though, because all i was asking anyone to do was their job. i swear you'd think i was running a labor camp.

and the kid goes and gets chinese food. so i have to get chinese. he'd at first talked me into pizza, but then that place was closed. he was decidedly bummed.

so after watching this kid eat his flaming hot lemon chicken, i decide this is the route for me. and go to the chinese joint i never knew was there.

when i return back to the store, it was the longest break i'd taken with him, he had a line. so i didn't look in my bag.

when i did, finally, get to sit down for a moment, no cookie. no fortune cookie. and i was bummed. what's the point of eating chinese if you don't get no cookie?

so the kid says,

they're not fortune cookies. they don't tell your fortune. they're words of wisdom cookies. and no, i won't get you one.

because i'd asked him repeatedly to go get one for me, and he repeatedly refused. he doesn't value the mystical aspects of the cookie, and so refused. (plus, we had a lot of work to do, and i was no help at all).

the thing is, you're not supposed to pick your own cookie. so i return with two cookie and say,

pick one,

thinking this is my way around that little caveat.

he says,

throw it up in the air,

and i ask,

so you can catch it with chopsticks?

which was just how we'd talk. goofy, fun.

so he catches his cookie midair and mine lands shattering on the ground. but broken fortune cookie, is just as delectable as whole fortune cookie.

he reads his, and it's quite good. mine sucked. figures. some crap about endurance equalling gold. (which is probably horribly profound)

and he chalks my dissatisfactory fortune with my irking the chinese.

i didn't pester the chinese,

he says.

neither did i. and i'm asking every customer and co-worker if it is even worth having chinese food with no cookie.

and the kid has never seen me talking about anything other than cleaning with such verve shall we say.

and i'm going to miss him. i told him, when he misses me to say,

oh mama!

because that's what i say, when i mess something up.

i had a nightmare (perhaps not so bad to the scale of nightmare, but i guess you'd call it a bad dream), where i messed everything up at the new job. i apparently had forgotten how to wash dishes, how to make a drink, how to use the register. (none of these take much skill).

and i woke, realizing the humor of the situation, and just said,

that's rediculous.

and now you're all caught up.

my last shift begins soon, and apparently i'm training the new guy. a model, they say. ah well. i bet he knows how to wash dishes.

peace. out.