vituperation

If you live in the southeastern part of the USA, say east of Texas and south of Illinois, you may have heard a litany of profanities around 10:30 pm last night (central time).

That was me, breaking the pinky toe of my right foot. I’m sorry if I disturbed you.

I hereby call out and blame reader Sofia, who, on January 6, recommended I get a custom jigsaw puzzle. If I hadn’t gotten the cat picture puzzle, I wouldn’t have been putting the folding puzzle table away last night and therefore wouldn’t have rooked my foot into the bookcase that for reasons known only to it leapt into my path.

I’ve got my eye on you, reader Sofia.

Why yes, it did (does) hurt like a motherfucker.
Looks like a fat little sausage, don’t it?

“Hey, can you come back here a minute?” my co-worker called, his voice muffled by the walls and doors between us.

I pushed back from my desk and walked down the hall to his office. When I turned into the doorway I stopped short, surprised to see a little girl sitting on his couch, sucking a pacifier and flipping the pages of a magazine.

“I’m babysitting my granddaughter while my wife runs errands,” my co-worker said. He turned to her. “Can you say hello to Mr. Ugly?”

The girl glanced at me briefly and returned her attention to the magazine. I can’t say I blame her. Only my dad goes by “Mr.”

“Come look at this,” my co-worker said, pointing at his monitor. “It’s hilarious.”

I stepped into the office and walked face-first into a wall of stink so solid I thought for a moment that I might have broken my nose.

“Holy cow,” I said.

My co-worker grinned like an egg-suck dog. “It’s not me. She’s got gas.”

“I’ll say.” I pulled the collar of my t-shirt up around my face, covering my nose, and walked over to look at his monitor.

He clicked in his browser to start something playing. I blinked at the screen, trying to clear the tears. The stench crept up the inside of my shirt and assailed me once again. I didn’t want to risk breathing through my mouth because, well, that’s where my tastebuds are. Music began. Ah, Bob Rivers’ parody song, “Cheney’s Got a Gun”.

“I’ve seen it,” I said, edging toward the door. “It is funny. But I’m going back to my office now.”

“I understand,” he said.

I settled back into my chair and tried to get my mind refocused on load-balancing incoming cryptographic requests across an array of hardware devices via a single Linux message queue. Fascinating stuff, that.

“OH NO!” my co-worker cried.

“What?” I and another co-worker said in unison.

“She has to go potty. Number two.”

“Better take her to the bathroom,” my other co-worker said.

“She doesn’t go in the bathroom yet,” the first moaned. “She wears diapers. I knew this was going to happen!”

I stared at my screen, grinning at his predicament. There were a couple of low moans from his office, then silence for a few seconds.

“Come to papaw,” he said, his voice louder. “I need to change you.”

The little girl said something understandable only to her papaw.

“That’s right,” he said.

“You need to change her in your office,” I called, giggling. “Don’t be stinking up ours.”

“I’m doing it on the conference room table. You want to help?” I heard the smile in his voice.

“I don’t think so, Tim,” I said, doing my best Al Borland.

Rustling from the conference room, which is catercorner to my office. I could see movement out there through the crack between my office door and the door facing.

“Christina,” he called, but not loudly. Christina is the office manager, and was the only woman there at the time.

“Don’t be sexist,” I yelled. “Man up, and take care of it.”

I did not volunteer to help. More sounds of rustling drifted through my door.

“Oh God, papaw’s gonna puke!” he cried, in a high and warbling voice. “Oh, Lord. Oh, Jesus!”

I waited with bated breath. Papaw didn’t puke, contrary to his protestations. More rustling.

“Oh, Lord! Fred, come out here and help me!”

“No way. I love you, but not that much.”

Rustling.

“Is it stinky?” he asked the girl. “Are you proud of–”

He made a loud and throaty yaaaaaaaaarrrrr, much like a pirate, and I heard something wet and thick splatter on the glass top of the conference room table.

“Oh God,” he said. “Oh G-aaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrr.”

My memory grows a little fuzzy here because I had a sudden loss of oxygen to my brain from laughing so hard. Snapshots are all I have, really, images of him passing the door with paper towels, the sound of a Windex sprayer, the smell of the cheap Mexican TV dinner he had for lunch.

Some days it’s not just a job, it’s an adventure.