Inappropriate Friends are the Best Friends, Part 4

As I mentioned in the last video, I’ve developed a habit of cussing out my own body when it’s not responsive to my commands, which has vastly amused people. Here I am trying to get in to a car and my leg isn’t lifting quite high enough to clear the door, and I’m hissing “come onnnnnnnnnnn!!” Or pretty much every time I’m about to fall, I bark out “NO!” like…BAD DOG! NO FALLING! It’s like Jedi Mind tricking my hand into gaining the strength to turn the house key in the door by saying “doooo iiiiiiiiit”. It doesn’t work. But I swear it helps. Sort of.

J, ex-husband, power friend, and awesome dude came over last night to help me clean my kitchen a little. I assisted by staying out of his way, and cleaned up the foulness that my elderly cat had deposited NEXT to the litter box. J gracefully listened to me whining about how changing out pee pads and emptying the Litter Robot’s tray (SERIOUSLY THIS IS STILL THE BEST THING EVER, GUYS, GET A LITTER ROBOT) had me out of breath and sweating, gently reminding me that he TOTALLY could have done that for me, you know. He’s one of my best allies and I’m grateful we remained really good friends – I don’t get how someone can be in a relationship with someone else for ten years and then just never speak to them again because the romantic part didn’t work out. I’ve been close to him for a quarter of my life, we’ve been through some serious stuff, so yeah, I’m keeping him around. He’s important. Dude also gives me rides to work, so that’s a plus, and we provide each other with talk therapy all the time. I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that probably no one on this planet knows me better than he does.

He’s leaving from my place to go work out, and he’s burdened down with his gym bag, his street clothes, his keys, dude’s hands are completely full, and I exacerbate it by asking him to put the trash can outside the door for collection when he goes out cause now it’s full of litter and heavy. He complies without complaint, and rather than letting me get the door for him like a sane person, he struggles to open it with full hands AND step out of the way while opening it but there’s a stack of recycling in the way, and having a hell of a time. He hisses “OH COME ON” to himself to get the doorknob to turn.

“Careful,” I tell him, grinning, “you’re starting to sound like me.”

“I yell all the time,” he tells me dismissively as he walks outside, “only it’s usually at inanimate objects.” He pauses, and gets this really strange look on his face.

“…..What?”

He grins sheepishly and confesses, “I am a horrible person.”

“…And?”

“Well it occurred to me, you *could* say the same thing.”

We both bust up laughing. “Fuck you,” I tell him, and close the door.

He gets me.

LOLitics

A coworker is at the entrance of my cube, talking to me about politics. I hate politics, I don’t want to talk about it, I don’t want to think about it, and try to avoid them at all costs. I don’t watch the news, I don’t read news sites, I actively do not pay attention to any of that. I get more than enough from my facebook feed, thanks, and I have a policy even there of, “if your last five posts were all political, welcome to the Ignore List.”

Willful ignorance for the win, I guess? There’s that saying, “if you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention” and it’s true, but some of us have better things to do than be outraged all the damn time. I certainly have OPINIONS about a lot of things, don’t get me wrong, but seriously shut up. You’re not saving the world with your opinions on gun control or abortion or whatever the flavor of the month at 31 Outrages is. Terrible Situation is Terrible, but sitting in your office writing vitriolic screeds and stressing about it without DOING anything about it solves NOTHING.

Ranting in your facebook does one of two things: Alienate People Who Don’t Agree With You, or Preach To The Choir. You’re not changing anyone’s minds or calling anyone to action. You’re just yelling about TERRIBLE THING with no specific call to action and no change as result, and it is actively depressing/infuriating/frustrating to read this over and over and over. I don’t give a SHIT about an article about a protest or a war or a new policy or whatever, facebook is where I go to find out how the fuck you are doing. Where you AT the protest where the cops tear-gassed the protesters? No? Then WHY ARE YOU POSTING THIS. Are you seriously expecting to sway someone’s vote with your clever little infographic about gun control? Seriously? HAHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHHAHAHAHA oh man. That’s a good one. Ok but really you know you’re not, right? And you DID run that article through Snopes or FactCheck or PolitiFact or Hoax-Slayer or something before posting it, right? And not just shared it because it agreed with you before making sure it was true? No? Sigh. Okay. Yeah. This is why we can’t have nice things, people. Check your facts or better yet, just don’t post that. Post pictures of your cats. That’s important. That actually tells me about your life. I want to know how your breakfast was, not about some philandering politician or your stance on abortion or some insipid inspirational wabbajabba picture of a sunset with a misattributed quote.

I don’t give a shit about your politics, I often like you in SPITE of them.

There was a point to this. …Where was I.

Oh right. Coworker. Cube. He’s talking about the Republican party and the possibility of Trump as president and blah blah blah, and I find myself cheerfully saying, “You know sometimes, I’m GRATEFUL that I’m checking out early so I don’t have to DEAL with this shit.”

And he gets quiet.

And that is the end of THAT conversation.

I win.