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A Retail St. Crispin’s Day Speech.

What’s they that wishes more employees? No, my fair Manager; if we are mark’d to work, we are enow to do our store loss; and if to work, the fewer employees, the greater share of honour. God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one employee more. If it be a sin to covet paychecks, we are the most offending souls alive.

No, faith, my manager, wish not one associate from another store. God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour as one employee more methinks would share from me for the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more! Rather proclaim it, through my host, that they which hath no stomach to this Holiday, let them depart. Their passport shall be made, and cookies for the trip put into their pocket. We would not work in that person’s company that fears their fellowship to work with us.

This day is call’d Black Friday. He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d, and rouse them at the name of Thanksgiving. They that shall live this day, and see old age, will yearly on the vigil feast their neighbours, And say “To-morrow is Black Friday.”Then will they strip their sleeve and show their scars, and say “These wounds I had on Black Friday.”

Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot, but they’ll remember, with advantages, what feats they did that day. This story shall the good man teach his son; and Black Friday shall ne’er go by, From this day to the ending of the world, but we in it shall be remembered! The front-register, the floor runner, the manager and assistant manager. Be in their flowing shopping bags freshly rememb’red.

We few, we happy few, we band of co-workers; for they to-day that sheds their blood with me shall be my co-worker; be they ne’er so vile, this day shall gentle their condition; and gentlemen in regular jobs now-a-bed shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here, and hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks that worked with us upon this Black Friday!

Why is 3 months of Christmas a Bad thing?

(oddly, I've made comment about Buddha Day before, but never actually reprinted the original thought experiment, so here it is)

Let me explain this for those of you who are Christian or live in primarily Christian areas as to why many non-Christians get fed up with Christmas and the forcing of Christmas upon us.

Let us imagine for a moment that you live in an alternate Universe where the Chinese used all those inventions that they came up with first and that Eastern Culture took over the world instead of Western Culture. Now let us imagine that there is a holiday at the end of December called Buddha Day. Now imagine that for two months solid, every store you went into, every ad circular, every commercial break on every TV and radio station had tons and tons of Buddha Day reminders. The Buddha Day music starts in mid November, the little red resin Buddha statues start being sold before Halloween, the big light up Buddhas start showing up before Thanksgiving. You start seeing Buddha Day things in August and the rumble becomes a huge blaring noise that just builds for four god damn months. By December you can't go out of your house without seeing all sorts of Buddha Day decorations and being told to "Be Peaceful, Buddha Day is coming" and even when they don't mention Buddha, you know that's what they mean. The thin man in the green robes who delivers cakes on Buddha Day Eve might be an old throw back and more commercial than religious, but you KNOW what day he's for. All the specials are for Buddha Day, all the commercials are for Buddha Day, all the "Holiday Editions" are always sold with traditional (if non-religious) Buddhist symbols on them.

And now here is the clincher, here is the part that gets you. No one knows a thing about Christmas or Christianity, in fact, they're kind of dismissive about it. You tell people you don't celebrate Buddha Day because you're Christian and they say things like "Oh, but you must do something for it, right? I mean, for the kids at least." Or they say things like "Oh, Christmas right, that's the one where Moses comes back from the dead after being drowned in the big flood right?" and then they change the subject about this great gift they got their brother for Buddha Day. Anytime you try to say "Merry Christmas"to someone they give you a dirty look like you're tying to corrupt their children with your evil Jesus thing, or they complain about these filthy minorities always having to have their own stupid minority holiday that's just a cheep rip off of Buddha day. No one outside your little community sells anything (and I mean ANYTHING) for Christmas, you can barely find a little statue of Jesus for the dashboard of the car outside of the "Jesustown" shops. You felt lucky in the mid 90s when multiculturalism was hip and a Nickelodeon show did one (1) special just for Christmas although you can't find it on DVD because Christmas isn't very popular.

Under this system, you might get a little sick of Buddha Day after a while, wouldn't you? I mean even people who celebrate complain about feeling worn down by it. It might even feel a little galling when you discover that half the Buddha Day celebrations are based on (you guessed it) Christmas celebrations that were in place before the Chinese took over Europe. For all their bitching about "The War On Buddha Day" its really been a war to squash the truth that Christians started this in the first place and are still out there. In fact you come to the conclusion that the whole "War on Buddha Day" is really an excuse to shove Buddha Day down your throat even more and to remind you that as a Christian you are a small minority in enemy territory. When anyone tries to be inclusive and says "Happy Holidays" instead of "Happy Buddha Day" small groups of religious loonies stir up a huge stink and act like Buddha Day is being erased from the calendar despite the fact that the one day holiday now covers fully a third of the year.

With all this in mind, don't you think you might get a little hyper-sensitive about Buddha Day?

Maybe those who celebrate Buddha Day should confine it to December, at the very least?

I mean, I like Buddha Day, but I also like Christmas, Hanukkah, Dogbert Day, Yule, Kwanzaa, and all the other early winter holidays as well.

Respect for others and an understanding that not everyone celebrates Buddha Day would be nice at this time of year when we're supposed to love our fellow humans.

Let's not let Buddha Day take over and destroy all the other holidays, okay?

Red

Brothers and Sisters - Chapter One: A Ruined Lunch

Brothers and Sisters

A Tale of The Weirdo

 

 

Chapter One

A Ruined Lunch

 

 

March 27^th, 2003

12:21 p.m.

 

            The world can be said to be a watched place. We are all observers of our fellow beings and are also the observed. Some of us are active observers, some passive. There are times when we must go from being one to being the other. Most often we begin as a passive observer and then involve ourselves, becoming active.

 

            A small child dressed in a pink raincoat watched the world, and two men in particular. She had been doing a lot of watching lately passively observing. She was very careful about not being seen, taking great care not to be noticed by anyone. She had been spying for some time, on a certain group of people for reasons of her own. What reasons a small child of about four could have to observe this group can be anyone’s guess. She wasn’t the only one watching of course, there were people watching the people who were watching other people.

 

No one was watching her though, despite the attractive blonde hair and adorable blue eyes. She was the sort of child who caught people’s eyes, and held their attention. She was a serious looking child, but a beautiful one as well. She was on a mission of observation one might say, at least for the moment. It was as if she were watching so as to better be caught up with a story, a story she would soon be engaged in. To be truthful that is exactly why she was watching. It is up to you’re humble narrator to interpret from her accounts as well as the accounts of others to put together this tale.

 

            It was a decidedly gloomy day, by most people’s standards anyway. If the last few years had taught people any thing, it was that people had differing opinions on things. There were people who felt differently on things as simple as weather, and complex as the role of a scared people to kill thousands of peasants in another country. If you were the sort of person who found an over cast day gloomy then this would be a gloomy day to you. The thick, heavy clouds looked like long coils of cotton, laid out by some forgotten god for a long forgotten purpose. There was a threat of rain in the air, which would be made good by nightfall. The temperature was no longer hovering below the freezing point of water, but there was still a chill in the air. Spring had begun, but had not quite gotten into the full swing of things yet. Snow still lay in patches on the ground where it had been piled up by plows in early February, now formed into compact mounds of ice.

 

            People were moving about, despite the cold nip in the air. It was lunchtime after all and there was lunch to be had. The fact that this was Saturday didn’t diminish the fact that even in this business district people had to eat. After all, despite reassurances of turning the corner, the economy did not currently favor the worker. The worker, who could be compelled to work on a Saturday, would have to comply. So they walked to get their lunches from the only places that were open any more. Faces slightly ruddy, their breath only just visible in the air.

 

Some of the people thought it a gloomy day, but perhaps surprisingly there were just as many people who liked this sort of day. This is an oft-rejected fact because the sort of person who prefers sunshine tends to express their views loudly while those who like rainy days and cloudy afternoons are less explosively expressive. The sort of person who likes the cold is naturally less bombastic and there fore less annoying and less disposed to express opinions in the loud obnoxious way. These people will just quietly shake their heads and mark the sun lovers down as the fools they were. As we said before, people may disagree about a great many things. What could be agreed upon though, was that a nice bowl of hot soup would go down an absolute treat.

 

            There were two men sitting at a table, at an out door café. The café still deemed the weather a little too unfashionable to have wait staff brave the fifty-two degree weather, but these men didn’t mind. They took their soup and went out side to take table in the open air. It was colder out there but there was also the freedom to watch a greater part of the world go by. One had a ceramic bowl of chicken noodle soup, which was steaming from the heat. The other man because of certain characteristic, had chili served in a large sour dough roll that had been hollowed out. The chili did not actually steam because the crown of the sour dough roll had been placed like a lid over it. A few wisps of steam escaped once they were outside and even a little heat showed.

Pile of Wood