If You Can't Say Something Nice...

I can’t do anything right. This weekend’s events have signaled yet another resounding failure etched into my permanent record.

I have been satisfied with, and even striven for, mediocrity in nearly every facet of my miserable life, but there is one task that I have attacked with a vengeance. I have poured every ounce of my energy into becoming an A-1 colossal asshole of immeasurable magnitude. But now I must concede to failure once again.

My morose mood was triggered when a gal friend of mine filled me in on a conversation she had with yet another gal friend of mine. Note that I call them gal friends. It has a disparaging and minimizing ring to it, as intended. It’s all part of my grand design to make sure that my funeral is highly anticipated yet poorly attended. The design needs some work, though, because the conversation went something like this:

"I haven’t seen Brad in a while. How’s he doing?"

"Oh, you know. Still trying to be an asshole."

"Yeah, he works at being a curmudgeon, but his bark is worse than his bite. He really has a big heart, you know."

This from a woman I have reduced to tears on more than one occasion, just for the sport of it. And all I get in return is her public commentary on my big heart? That’s slanderously cruel.

I was still reeling from the embarrassment of that failure when I checked my email this morning. I had a kind message awaiting me from my friend Nancy, a.k.a. Klevabich, a fellow blogger and one of the upwards of three readers of my cyberwaste. Nancy and I have never met, and we live 2,000 miles apart, but we frequent one another’s blog sites because we have no respect for ourselves. Nancy wrote to tell me that she had bust a gut over a couple of my recent cantankerous rantings. I was fine with that, since I take no responsibility for anything produced by my mouth or my typing finger. But she couldn’t let it go at that. No, she had to cast aspersions by adding, "something tells me you’re no crankier than the average person…and probably not all that much of a bastard either."

You see? They’re throwing stones from clear across the continent! Way to spoil the moment, Nancy.

These events don’t mark the first time I’ve fallen victim to such caustic, off-handed character assassination. When I turned 40 years of age, my wife-of-the-moment solicited eulogistic written comments from friends and family and other assorted idiots. She had the comments framed and hung them in the living room, thereby creating a wall of shame to remind me that I was a panty-waste.

One thoughtless bastard wrote, "Brad always has a big smile on his face and a laugh that comes from the heart." That bit of unwarranted criticism compelled me to compile a Christmas card list and take him off of it. Then I eliminated everybody else, too.

My younger sister leapt at the chance to disparage me. "On the outside he can appear so crabby and harsh, but there is a huge, soft heart on the inside. Ya can't help but love the guy."

Some gratitude. The only reason my parents had a third child was to apologize to society for the second child, who wasn’t working out too well. It only serves them right that the third child grew up a liar and a poor judge of character.

In her response to the same homework assignment, my Mom wrote that I have "a certain special charm." At least she knows I’m an asshole, even if she had to cloak that knowledge in mom-speak. Now if I could only impress that same sense of motherly intuition on those of you who lack the common decency to respect my bad intentions.

Now, my dad gets it. He knows I’m an asshole and he knows which side of the family I get it from. He has taken to wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with BRAD’S DAD when he’s working out at the gym. It’s my gym, too, so he’s well aware of the audience’s perspective. At first blush, the T-shirt could be construed as a proud paternal statement, but I know better. He’s just trying to pick a fight. A T-shirt with FREE CHARLES MANSON across the back would just be too easy.

Big heart, huge heart, soft heart. Goddamn it to Hell! What do I have to do to get through to you people? Rip my blackened heart out of my chest and beat you over the fuckin’ head with it?

You have forced my hand. I’m pulling out all stops and resorting to extreme measures. That’s right, I’m going to have to kill a guy.

And I’ll do that as soon as I find someone I trust to take care of my kitties while I’m in prison.

Are Those Melons Ripe?

I hadn’t seen her in a couple of months, but I crossed paths with her while exiting the neighborhood grocery store. Both of her.

"Whaddya think?" She threw her shoulders back and thrust ‘em at me. Big, honkin’, fake tits.

The infestation of these disfigurements in my town has reached epidemic proportions. Or should I say epidemic disproportion? What are the criteria for selecting the gauge of this torso artillery? Hat size? Are these women being told they will grow into them? Are plastic surgeons offering volume discounts? Supersize it for an extra buck?

Many of these women were fine looking specimens before the surgical devastation; they had lean, proportionate and athletic physiques. Now they look like Ferraris with ’63 Cadillac hood ornaments.

I doubt that the surgeons are providing live display models for inspection by their potential vanity-surgery customers. If the intended victims, and their unassuming significant others, were given the opportunity to "get the feel" of these things, plastic surgeons would take a hit to their wallets. Any guy with hands-on experience knows the cold, hard, lifeless nature of breast implants. Wifey is now a blow-up doll with PMS. And you can’t hose her off, deflate her, and put her in the closet until the next need arises.

I was drafted into action. The Psyche Assassinator centered his prey in the crosshairs and went to work. "Nice tits. Is it okay if I call them tits? Or are they reservoirs? Camelbacks? Sew-ins? Ballast? Back breakers? Bimbo bait? Saline sundaes with a nipple topping?

"It’s called breast enhancement."

"Wow. That’s a mouthful, so to speak. I prefer to conserve syllables and just call them tits. So, has the burdensome cloud of self-doubt given way to sunshine?"

Had I been intent on staring at her new appendages, I would have missed the confused look on her face. She was baffled by my allegory, which came as no surprise to me. She is probably also baffled by the board game Allegory, and clearly prefers to play Operation. I needed a visual aid. I reached into my grocery bag, pulled out a cucumber, and shoved it down the front of my shorts.

She was mortified. "Stop that! Get that out of there!"

"Since I had my genitalia enlarged to cartoonish proportions, my self-esteem has skyrocketed. There’s no thrill that matches the attention of gaping, giggling onlookers as their eyes are enviously riveted on my grotesquely enormous package."

Now she gets it. But she still doesn’t get it. All she understood was her embarrassment at my behavior, and I give her credit for that. Here we were, two adults with voting privileges and driver’s licenses, standing in front of the grocery store with mammoth external organs.

For purposes of agitation, I had to ask her the question I ask of all of my Barbie Doll acquaintances with store-bought blouse-fillers. "Why did you subject yourself to this voluntary physical mutilation?"

"Clothes."

Now I was confused. "You’re not going to wear clothes anymore?"

"No, asshole. Clothes look better on me now, and I get to buy new ones."

"Then it’s a good thing those puppies don’t wear shoes. It could take years to amass another 200 pair. And just who do you think will notice your new clothes? If people aren’t staring directly at your tits, they will nervously look you straight in the eye while pretending they don’t notice your tits. Either way, they will have no recollection of the clothes you were wearing."

I leaned in and looked her square in the eye, then dropped my hands to my knees, stooped over and stared at her bloated funbags. "They will recall that one tit is lower than the other and, by the way, so is one eye."

As she critically surveyed her image in the reflection of the store’s plate glass window, I continued the assault.

"You’d think the oversized rack would make your ass look smaller."

Whoa! Better step back out of left hook range. Perhaps this was an opportune time to change the subject. Nah.

"Have your daughters accepted the fact that mommy’s sense of self-worth resides in her tits?"

"My daughters are just fine with it. I explained to them that I had a medical procedure to correct the damage caused by nursing them when they were babies."

"Good idea. Blame it on the kids. Give their self-esteem a nudge. Have you started tit funds for them? Now that you have shown them that it’s not enough to be smart, funny and interesting, don’t you think it’s only fair that you give your children a fighting chance at a full and bulbous life?"

I guess the conversation was over, because she shook her head, turned on her heel and headed into the store. I removed the cucumber from my pants and returned to invisibility. She enjoyed no such luxury. Her surgical wounds weren’t yet healed, and I reveled in the glory of having inflicted upon her the festering wounds of self-consciousness. Tough. Maybe she should spend a few more dollars to drain the saline, then go to work on the injured soul that led her to do such a stupid thing in the first place. Invest a little time and effort in the smart, funny and interesting route. And maybe drop a few pounds from that double-D ass.

After that, the crooked eye thing won’t really be noticeable.