The Old Wooden Cross

5/15/06

In the spirit of the "Douche Bag of the Month" award, I would like to introduce the "Least Deserving Martyr" award for feats of extraordinary self-proclaimed sacrifice in the most minor, ass ways possible. Sometimes these could be well-known individuals, such as some cock-ass celebrity donating the proportional equivalent of $0.75 of their paycheck to send rancid applesauce to Indonesia, then crowing about it ad infinitum on television.

Or, as is in the case of todays winner, it could be this woman I sit next to at work who seems to not only believe that the rest of us give a shit about the fact that she woke up "at seven o'clock today because I was working so late last night at my other job (I work two jobs you know, oh yes,) that I just couldn't drag myself out of bed today and hit the snooze button three times and I" but also seems to feel that the nigh infinitesimally tiny (and quite possibly imaginary) contributions she makes to the day-to-day operations of our glorified-monkey jobs puts her next in line for Pope Shit of Turd Mountain.

It took me awhile to recognize that this broad had a martyr complex, and to be honest my brain didn't make the final connection until I heard her (despite the fact that I had my headphones on and had steadily been increasing the volume on my audiobook) expostulating wildly and at great length this morning over the fact that the other teams in our office dont clean the fridge properly when it's their week to do so. Apparently ours is the only department that cares enough about mundane, asinine bullshit enough to make a pristine refrigerator and lunchroom. The entire time this blowhard of a female was speaking about how "we" are the only ones who care, you could just tell she was itching to replace that little pronoun with "I."

From the subject of the fridge we moved northward to how "disgusting" the freezer is. First of all, the freezers are kind of dirty, sure, but to hear this woman tell it, she was going to have to mop out the site of the St. Valentines Day Massacre. I think she must have been on some kind of tirade-rolling high because she then went on for five minutes about how "I just know some of those microwave dinners have been in that freezer for two or three months, and I guess they dont go bad, but" That's not editing; she really just petered out there when this tower of logic realized there was no intelligent reason to justify either being annoyed by, or tossing out unopened frozen TV dinners. She doesn't even use the freezer for fuckssake!

We have to scan large quantities of documents at work. Nobody really likes doing it because you just have to stand there in front of the scanner, mindlessly watching it suck papers in, waiting for the time in which you can insert the next ream and wondering what kind of new and interesting tumors the green light that pours from it could be giving birth to within your organs. You can't walk off and leave it, because (and I'm not even kidding here) the system will log you out of the session if left idle for more than ten seconds, forcing you to spend about ten minutes getting back to your place while trying not to piss yourself because in the modern, pussified world you can't say "shit-fuck-cocksucking-whoremonger-machine!" at work.

Anyway, our Martyr of the Month, without missing a beat from her rally cry against filthy kitchen appliances, spontaneously decides to announce that she'll do the scanning today since "everyone else grumbles about grunt work and hates to do it. I mean it's easy and we're at work and getting paid for it so I dont see what the big deal is and I'll just do it myself."

I had to escape to the bathroom in an effort to tamp down the curious sensation of wanting to laugh raucously and strangle someone with rage at the same time. So fuck you, you crazy, imagined-sacrificing loony. If you say anything else today I doubt I'll be able to restrain myself from suggesting you just go ahead and bring in her big, wooden cross so we can nail you to it at times like this.

Lady who sits next to me and should really get a hobby or possibly laid, congratulations, you are the

Least Deserving Martyr of the Month!