A Good Day to Die

Chaos in Print

Did you ever feel like you were born a few centuries too late? Or too early? In my high school, there was a bit of a recurring joke about me. It finally came to my attention partway into grade 11. One day, in Math 20, the class strayed off topic and the discussion started about what we were all going to do after graduation. When the teacher asked me what my plans for the future were, a grade 12 student — I think his name was Dean — spoke up. “We all know what Mark’s going to do,” he said. “He’s heading off to Starfleet Academy!” The class erupted into laughter, but I couldn’t help but wish things were that simple. Head off to the Academy, and from there, to a position on some starship, exploring vast, uncharted worlds. Or even to have been born in the past, when I could have signed aboard Christopher Columbus’ expedition, and out across the sea to another vast, uncharted world. But no, I was born now. If I want to do some exploring, I have to take crazy, unwarranted risks. Like applying to one of these outfits that teaches English as a second language in Japan.
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The Cookie

Chaos in Print

It’s my break time, so I’m heading on up to the break room. It’s time for my normal routine, which is to stretch out on one of the benches and have a nap. I enter the break room to find that it’s in its normal, disheveled state. But, what is this? It appears that someone has left a chocolate chip cookie on the table. Oh, how I love chocolate chip cookies! Those little nuggets of chocolaty goodness nestled within the warm loving bosom of baked goods. I glance around. It appears that there is no one else in sight. I glance back at the cookie. There is no one else around. There is no note on the cookie saying, “This cookie belongs to someone. Do not eat it!” I am confronted with a moral dilemma: do I take the cookie, or leave it?
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I Really, Really Hate My Job, part 54

Chaos in Print

I still remember the exact moment when I began to hate working for Extra Foods. It was back in the fall of 2000, and I was still just a bag boy. It had been a really busy day, so busy that I worked straight through my break. My relief called in sick, so I was asked to stay an extra hour, and I did. It was literally 5 minutes to go before the end of my shift. A bag boy for the evening was finally found, and things had finally died down. With so little time left in my shift, I leaned up against one of the tills and “took a moment,” as one of my heroes on TV would say. At this point, the visiting regional manager came around the corner. He saw me leaning against the till, and stormed up to me. “We don’t pay people to stand around doing nothing,” he barked. “Get back to work or I’ll find you work!” Given the day I had just had, I didn’t take too kindly to his accusation that I was being lazy. So, I stood up straight, glared him in the eye, and, in a very loud voice, informed him of the day that I had just had, and as this was the closest I could take to a break, I was going to take it. After a moment of stunned silence, he just glared back and said, “I don’t like seeing people standing around. You should have taken your break. And I don’t like being spoken to that way.” I wanted to continue tearing a strip off of him, but I also wanted to keep my job. So, I gritted my teeth, and simply said, “Yes, sir.” That was when I started to hate my company.
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Fight or Flight

Chaos in Print

I am quite often amazed at the things that frighten us. One of my fears is spiders. I mean, what’s to be afraid of with a spider? They just crawl along, going about their business, and enjoying their little spider lives. They have no business with me. They’re just looking for their next meal. But yet, when one happens to cross my path, I scream like a little girl and go running in the other direction. Why? I’m obsessing on this right now because there were two very similar incidents in my past, and I behaved differently in each situation. Why did I have more reason to be afraid than in the other?
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