Who's the Real Hard Worker Here: the Actual Worker or the Extortionist?

 

Walk in the Rain

The nighttime rainfall tapped against Cassandra Bride’s office window while she sipped her peppermint tea. Christmas lights strewn above her ceiling illuminated an otherwise dark atmosphere. She smiled while relaxing into her favorite office chair. Such a peaceful time of night. She should have been in bed with a Lilian Jackson Braun novel and a kitty. Deep inside, she knew this conversation had to take place and it couldn’t wait until a brighter morning.

She took one last sip of tea before there was a knock on her door. “Come in,” she said. Slogging through the office in a soaking wet hooded jacket was Jarrod Crews, a young man with short black hair and a Seether T-shirt underneath his rainwear. He removed his coat and hung it up on the rack in the corner, not even bothering to dry it off. His social skills were always a mess, so at least a drippy coat was forgivable.

“Sorry I’m late,” said Jarrod while taking a seat across from his acting teacher.

Cassandra laid her cup of tea on the desk and waved as if it was no big deal. “It’s not your fault, Jarrod. It’s wet out there. If I would have known you didn’t have a car, I would have dispatched another student to give you a ride. Any moment now we should start getting thunder storms.”

Jarrod’s eyes darted from side to side while he fidgeted with hangnails on his thumb. “So…do you want to tell me what this is all about?”

“Of course, of course I do. But first I want to thank you for agreeing to see me tonight in my office. I’m sorry you had to walk through a rainstorm, but this actually is a pretty important topic.” Cassandra cleared her throat and straightened the straps on her black dress before leaning forward with her hands supporting her chin.

“Am…am I in trouble?” asked Jarrod with a jittery voice, either from the cold weather outside or his own nervousness.

Cassandra breathed a deep sigh and hesitated before starting the necessary conversation. “Jarrod…is has come to my attention that you have some ulterior motives for signing up for my acting class. Like the rest of your classmates, you probably saw me in the made-for-TV movie My Gift to You, where I played a demonic seductress. The only difference is, you took your fandom a little too far. You can deny it all you want, but Mr. Crews…I believe the only reason you signed up for my class was so you could be close to me. You have no other classes in your schedule. This is your first quarter at Kelly University. The pieces are all there. You got caught…by me.”

Jarrod nearly jumped out of his skin when the first lightning bolt flashed outside. His breathing was labored, but for a far different reason than the combination electromancy and aeromancy going on. “Who told you all of this?”

“Your own mother, Jarrod. She called here the other day to have a chat with me about your…extracurricular activities. She read me passages from your diary. She logged onto your computer and found pictures that have no earthly business being there. Jarrod, this is not okay. I don’t feel safe around you anymore. You know where this is leading, right?” Tiny droplets welled up in the student’s eyes. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

Jarrod slapped his legs and gave a short, sorrowful laugh through his tears. “I mean…you’re not wrong. You caught me red-handed. So, that’s that, right? I should just go back to my dorm and pack my suitcase?”

Just as Jarrod stood up, Cassandra motioned with her hand for him to sit back down. “Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. Not just yet. There’s a lot more to discuss than just a simple expulsion.”

The student slowly sat back down and chewed on his fingertips while smiling sadly and shaking his head. “What else is there to discuss? You have everything you need. My own mother basically ratted me out to you.” Jarrod held his face in his hand and sobbed a little bit. “You’re getting way too much pleasure out of this, Mrs. Bride.”

“You’re wrong, Jarrod. There’s absolutely no joy in this for me. For all intents and purposes, you were a hardworking student who gave A+ performances when you needed to. This hurts me just as much as it hurts you.”

The crumbling student man-spread his legs and tucked his head down as he tried to find the resolve to continue this conversation. The wetness in his face, the redness in his cheeks, he was easy pickings for Cassandra Bride. She had to admit that he put on a hell of a performance, yet again.

“I’m not talking about you expelling me from school. That part I get,” blubbered Jarrod through heavy breaths. “But why did you have to go behind my back like that? You got my own mother to throw me under the bus. For what?”

“She didn’t throw you under the bus, Jarrod. She called me that day because she’s worried about you. Like I said, this isn’t just an open and shut case that can be solved with expulsion. Aside from your sexual obsession with me, there’s more than she told me about you.”

“Oh god,” stammered Jarrod as he chewed on his fingertips some more.

Taking a sip of hot tea, Cassandra said, “Your mother tells me that you have a hard time making new friends. She says you’re depressed and isolated all the time, so instead of forming real relationships, you hover around me and feed your fantasies that way. She tells me that it’s been a while since you’ve seen your therapist.”

“Okay, enough! Enough!” snapped Jarrod while holding his hands up defensively. Another lightning strike flashed in the sky, but he refused to be deterred. “I get it! I’m an emotional train wreck! And yes, I do have a hard time meeting new people. You know why? Because every time I think I have something, my mom and dad take it away from me when they move to a new place. And then what do I do? Start over? Take another chance? Bullshit!”

“You know, Jarrod, you can do something about that. You’re old enough to make your own decisions. If you don’t want to move around to different cities all the time, then you can just…”

“I can just what? Find my own place? Have you seen how much an apartment costs these days? Have you seen the job market lately? There’s nothing out there for me, unless you consider sleeping at a bus station and begging for handouts to be good living.”

Cassandra set her tea down again and wheeled her office chair towards a crumbling Jarrod Crews. She placed her hand on his shoulder and elicited an, “Oh god!” response from him.

“Listen,” she said. “I know it’s tough out there. When I left my acting career and became a teacher, I didn’t know anybody here at Kelly University. I was scared just as you are now. But ultimately, you have two choices. You can move back in with your parents and have financial security and love for as long as you need it…or you can swallow your pride and find potential roommates with the friends you make here. You can’t keep doing this to yourself, Jarrod. Either choice is a valid one, but when you make that decision, you need to reap all of the benefits that come with it. I get it. You need love. We all do.”

Jarrod wiped the tears from his eyes with his shirt sleeve and said, “I know you told me that we have a lot to discuss…but this is getting really fucking awkward, Mrs. Bride. I don’t want to be here anymore. I’m not even sure expulsion would be a bad thing for me. If it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll just grab my coat and fuck off forever.”

Just as Jarrod stood up to grab his coat, Cassandra offered, “Are you sure you don’t want a ride back to your dorm? Trust me, you don’t want to walk in the rain a second time tonight.”

The lonely student looked down at his shoes and sighed. “You know what? I think I prefer getting hit by lightning over having another awkward conversation with you, Mrs. Bride.”

An even louder thunderbolt shook the skies as well as Jarrod’s foundations as he jumped skittishly yet again. Cassandra asked, “Are you sure about that, Jarrod?”

He shrugged his shoulders and smiled sadly. “Well, you know what they say: you’re more likely to be killed by a terrorist than you are to be struck by lightning.”

Cassandra smiled amusedly. “No, no, no, Jarrod, you’ve got that bass ackwards. You’re more likely to be hit by lightning than you are to be killed by a terrorist.”

“…Really?....Oh…Well…What if it’s an incel terrorist?”

“Then your chances slightly increase, but that’s neither here nor there. The point is, I’d rather you allow me to give you a ride back to your dorm instead of getting rained on again.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but weren’t you the one who said you didn’t feel comfortable being around me?” asked Jarrod.

Cassandra sighed and tucked her head while her now ex-student put his jacket on and ventured outside in the pouring rain. “Was I too hard on him?” she asked herself. Not even the delicious flavor of her peppermint tea could relax her on this one. Everything that could have gone wrong in this “important conversation” did go wrong. She lost a great student, Jarrod lost an opportunity to open up, and everything got incredibly awkward. But Murphy’s Law didn’t stop there…

Another bolt of lightning tore up the sky, but this time the sounds of Jarrod wiggling and screaming echoed throughout the rainy weather. “Oh my god!” gasped Cassandra as she dropped her now shattered teacup on the floor. Even wearing high heels, she managed to bolt out of her office and lend her help to a now jittering Jarrod Crews.

There he laid convulsing violently with wide eyes and a foaming mouth. Now it was Cassandra Bride’s turn to lose a few tears as she held her hand to her mouth in shock. She knelt beside him and cradled his head in her lap. “I’m so sorry, Jarrod! I’m sorry!”

Even with a shivering body, Jarrod managed to form a complete and coherent sentence with a smile on his face. “So this is what it’s like to be held by somebody…I never knew that before…” Cold, miserable, and electrocuted, Jarrod’s head flopped over and his eyes rolled back in his head. Cassandra placed two fingers on his neck vein and felt no pulse surging through him, just electricity. He died taking a little piece of heaven with him before he went.

Cassandra teared up some more as she hugged Jarrod Crews’s lifeless skull. During her moment of apologetic cuddling, she noticed two wire prongs attached to his chest that led to a stun gun lying on the ground next to him. Scratched onto the weapon was a message as clear as the day that would come: “Incel Pride Worldwide”.

The actress’s sorrow turned into jaw-quivering fear at the revelation that her student was murdered. She could hear footsteps running away on the concrete sidewalk, but it was too dark to make out who they belonged to. By the time the perp was illuminated by the streetlamp, he had already turned a corner and hightailed it out of there.

What if there were more of them? Who else signed up for Cassandra Bride’s class under false pretenses? Was Jarrod Crews the only intended victim? What if…she was next? These thoughts raced violently through her head, which was now cradled in her own hands in a lame attempt to contain her fear. “I’ve got to get the hell out of here…I can’t stay anymore…”

Silent Warrior, Chapter 5

Tom Simpson had a strange feeling this would happen: sitting in the office next to his classroom with a cup of coffee glaring at the clock on his wall. Three o’clock turned into three-fifteen. Three fifteen turned into three-thirty. The teacher’s face scrunched downward as though he drank warm piss instead of hot coffee. “I knew it…” he silently groaned to himself. “I knew it!” He punctuated that sentence by throwing his coffee mug against the brick wall and watching the brown liquid drizzle down onto the carpet. He huffed and stomped out of his office without bothering to clean up the mess he made.

As Mr. Simpson stormed down the hallway with fists clenched and brows furrowed, several students (who actually showed up to their respective dentitions) tucked their faces away in fear. Some of them even swerved right past him in a big hurry to get their asses out of school. Mr. Simpson’s sniper sight zeroed in on the Principal’s office. He took a few deep, raspy breaths before fixing his shirt and throwing the door open.

An older black woman in a flower-patterned dress shirt and black slacks typed away at her computer before noticing Mr. Simpson standing furiously in her doorway. She gave him an awkward stare before asking, “Can I help you?”

“Yes, Miss Williams, you can.” Mr. Simpson took a seat next to the Principal and said, “Scott George was supposed to show up after school for detention at three o’clock sharp. It’s a half hour later and he still hasn’t shown!” Tom pounded Linda Williams’s desk and asked in a disturbingly calm voice, “What do you plan on doing about it?”

Miss Williams took her glasses off and folded her hands around her belly before leaning backwards in her chair, clearly no-selling Mr. Simpson’s silent rage. “While I don’t condone skipping out on detention, I also can’t condone you pounding your fist on my desk demanding things from me. Slow your role, Tom. Tell me exactly what happened and I’ll see what I can do about it.”

With animated body language and a silent voice, Mr. Simpson said, “Scott George has zero respect for my authority. He frequently back sasses me, he swears in class, and today was just the day where I’ve had enough of him. Can you blame me?”

“Ordinarily I wouldn’t,” said Miss Williams. “But this seems to be a pattern with you throughout your career. You push your students to their breaking point and wonder why they’re tipping over the edge. What I’m trying to say is, you’re not exactly the easiest teacher to get along with.”

“So what?!” squeaked Mr. Simpson. “Lots of people in the world have to put up with authority figures they don’t like. It’s a hard fact of life. Sometimes in this world, you have to get along with people who don’t necessarily have to get along with you. In this school, you get either an F or detention. In the job market, you get fired. Or if it’s a judicial situation, you go to jail. It’s not the most pleasant system of authority, but if we could all just democratically elect our own authority figures, we’d get nothing done. Haven’t you learned by now that democracy is dead?”

Miss Williams gave a closed-mouth chuckle, shook her head, and said, “So that’s what you’ve been teaching your students, huh? You’re a history teacher who tells his own kids that democracy is dead. Maybe that’s why they don’t want to hang around you anymore, because you suck the hope right out of them. I don’t know if you’re aware of this or not, but part of your role as a teacher is to guide your students to a better life. If you can’t do that, then you’re not a teacher.”

“But see, that’s the thing, Linda,” said Mr. Simpson while flailing his hands around. “The only people who I can guide to a better life are the ones who’re willing to meet me half way. This is the land of opportunity, not the land of milk and honey. Scott George doesn’t give a damn about earning anything from me, hence why he didn’t show up to detention this afternoon.”

Miss Williams typed on her keyboard and said, “Well, that’s funny, because judging from his other grades, he seems to be well on his way to the Promised Land. Look at my computer screen for a moment. Algebra: B+. Graphic novels studies: A-. General art class: A-. Physical education: A+. Chemistry: B-. Not bad so far, huh? But the one place where he struggles the most is US history, your class, where he’s currently sitting pretty at a C-.” She leaned back in her chair again and asked, “Tell me, Mr. Simpson: why is Scott George struggling one class and doing so well in the others? Is US history his weakness or are you just not helping him through his tough times?”

“I could have helped him through whatever he needed if he’d just show up for thirty minutes of detention,” said Mr. Simpson with folded arms. “He’d be getting his very own tutor session.”

“Don’t be a smart-ass, Tom, you know full well that’s a bunch of BS,” warned Miss Williams.

“Oh, so you’re going to use foul language too?” asked Mr. Simpson. “And I’m the bad influence on my students? That’s part of the reason why Scott was supposed to show up today. Oh sure, he gets detention for saying it here, but what if he said it front of a bunch of small children? Or churchgoers? Or his own boss, if he’s actually able to get a job once he’s out of school.”

“He’ll cross that bridge once he gets to it. In the meantime, you’d better stop worrying about the stuff that comes out of your students’ mouths or what they do when they’re not in school. Let’s not kid ourselves and pretend that these teenagers are just sitting around being squeaky clean. That’s not what life is about for these kids. The only thing you’re teaching them by holding Scott George hostage is how to resent tight-asses like you!”

Mr. Simpson pounded Miss Williams’s desk again and asked, “Are you going to do anything about him not showing up or are you just going to turn a blind eye to the bigger picture! He needs to be made an example of!”

Miss Williams’s temper exploded when she stood up, towered over Mr. Simpson, and belted, “I’ll deal with Scott George in my own damn way! I’ll have a talk with him first thing tomorrow morning! If it makes you happy, I’ll even leave a message on his house phone telling him to show up!” He continued her vengeful oratory with finger pointing at a stoic Mr. Simpson. “As far as you’re concerned, you’re leaning on the precipice of career suicide by talking to me that way! You don’t give the orders, I do! This is my school and you’re not going to disrespect me any further!”

Mr. Simpson smiled and shook his head before standing up to meet Miss Williams’s coffee brown eyes. “You’re angry, huh? Now you understand my frustration with people like Scott George. I’m glad we could reach an understanding.”

As Mr. Simpson patted Miss Williams’s shoulder, she shrugged him off and snapped, “Get your hands off of me and get the hell out of my office before I fire you!” The history teacher held his hands up defensively and strolled out of the office, shutting the door behind him. He could see through the glass door that the Principal plopped back down in her seat and rubbed her aching temples.

The teacher turned around and saw a semi-circle of wide-eyed students fixating their gazes upon him. Mr. Simpson threw his hands up and yelled, “Boogedy-boogedy-boo!”, causing the crowd to quickly disperse in several directions.

Off in the distance, Mr. Simpson saw that another student glaring at him was his own daughter Adrienne, who had her arms folded and was leaning against the wall. Seeing his estranged flesh and blood in that mood brought a sinking feeling to his own heart. He let out a sigh and turned around to walk away.

“What am I doing?” he whispered to himself. He began to think there was a little bit of truth to what Miss Williams said, as much as it stung. Maybe that was why his wife divorced him and took Adrienne away. Maybe that was why he had a crappy car waiting for him in the parking lot. Maybe that was why he dined on TV dinners every night while watching the news alone.

He slapped himself in the head for thinking such “horrendous” thoughts. He knew he had to stand his ground if he was ever to get a victory against his own students. It was too late for him to win the war against his own wife and daughter. But the battle lines had already been drawn between himself at Scott George. If he had it his way, he’d bring back corporal punishment just for that one student. But now that he was fighting this war, he had to figure out what exactly he stood for. As a history teacher who taught various wars in his class, he needed to figure this out quickly. Otherwise, history would repeat itself over and over again.

Don't Tell Me Who to Love

“Mr. Hamlet, I’m only going to ask you this once and you’d better give me a meaningful answer…What the hell were you thinking when you started this relationship with Miss Peters?” College Principal Rich Lucas’s hands formed a pyramid on his desk as he posed the question to Keith Hamlet. Principal Lucas’s glasses-wearing eyes burned into Keith’s soul like a Molotov cocktail, yet the math teacher and his student Vikki Peters sat across from him in his office hand-in-hand like nothing was wrong.

“Normally, that would qualify as a rhetorical question,” said Keith as he straightened his tie and argyle sweater vest, seemingly the perfect picture of calmness. “But if you really want me to take it seriously, then here’s my answer. I was thinking the exact same thing when any other man falls in love with a woman. I pursued a relationship with Vikki here because she was the one for me, end of story. She’s a consenting adult, I’m a consenting adult, so I really don’t see what the problem is, Principal Lucas. In other words…” Keith leaned in closer and tensely whispered, “Don’t tell me who to love.”

Rich leaned his wrinkly face closer and said, “I’m not telling you who to love. I’m telling you to use some common sense. You took this job as a math teacher knowing full well what kind of influence you’d have over your own students. It’s not a matter of non-existent statutory rape. It’s a conflict of interest. You could very well show favoritism to Miss Peters knowing other students would suffer.”

“If you actually bothered to look at her grades,” said Keith. “You’d know that math is a subject she struggles with. She gets no favoritism from me just because we’re dating. She certainly didn’t date me because she’d thought she’d have an advantage.”

“I’d love nothing more than to believe that,” said Rich as he leaned back in his chair and interlaced his fingers behind his bald head. “But you knew the rules long before you took this job. This school forbids teacher-student relationships no matter what the age difference is. You broke the rules and now you’re about to lose your job because of it. I’m sorry, Mr. Hamlet, but I have no choice but to…”

“Wait!” shouted Vikki while holding her bare arm up in defense. Her long brown hair and lovely figure in the frilly blue dress she wore already made her hard to resist, but Keith’s heart beat faster upon watching his love come to his defense. She was no damsel despite what Rich thought; she was a badass metal armor-wearing knight. “You do this to him, Mr. Lucas. This job is all that he has left!” Not the best argument ever made, but the spirited delivery was what counted the most.

Rich chuckled with his mouth closed and said, “You’re right, Miss Peters. It is all he has left…aside from his wife, his children, a house, a dog, a car…whatever will he do without a lovely lady such as yourself?”

“I wasn’t going to tell you this, because quite frankly it’s none of your goddamn business,” said Keith. “But my wife divorced me long before I started dating Vikki. I know you can’t relate to something as complex as having a heart, Mr. Lucas, but hear me out. Being divorced is bad enough with the alimony payments and the bitter words exchanged in a courtroom. But the loneliness, the emptiness I felt afterwards, THAT was what made me lose focus of my job. I couldn’t concentrate, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat…but Vikki took my pain away. I’ve been doing great up until the point where you called the two of us to your office, Mr. Lucas.”

A tense silence was shared between all three occupants of the room before Rich Lucas burst into mocking laughter and slapped his desk with the palm of his hand. When asked what was so fucking hilarious, he said, “Jesus, Keith, you should have been a poet instead of a math teacher! That was pure gold! Maybe when I fire your ass, you can get a career writing songs for sour-faced rock bands!”

The horse laughter came to a quick end when Vikki shot up and barked, “Enough!” Rich peaked up at her like he was taking her more seriously than when she gave the weak defense earlier. “This is why I hate going to school,” she sobbed. “Aside from the stupid classes, you’ve also got ridiculous rules that don’t mean shit in the real world! We’re not doing any harm to each other or the other students by being together! Keith says I took his pain away? Well, he took mine away too! If he hadn’t come to me when he did, I’d probably be dead with a bloody wrist somewhere!”

Rich held his hands up defensively and said, “Calm down, Miss Peters. Have a seat.” After she complied with both of those requests, Rich leaned in closer and said, “I certainly didn’t mean anything by what I just said to your…boyfriend, for lack of a better term. I was just…you know…Are you sure you don’t want to major in poetry too, Miss Peters?” The obnoxious hee-haws and desk slapping continued, much to the tearful dismay of Vikki and the teeth grinding rage of Keith.

“Laugh all you want, you smelly little prick!” belted Keith as he stood up and pointed his index finger at his accuser.

The donkey gut-busting was replaced with a serious stare into Keith’s crumbling soul. “What did you call me, Mr. Hamlet? I’d choose my words carefully if I were you. You’re not only facing termination, but you’re also in danger of being blackballed from the educational community as a whole. No college is going to want a sexual predator on their campus. Say what you will about the Brock Turners of the world, but at least he never pretended to be a romantic lover boy like you, Mr. Hamlet!”

Keith’s dynamite veins pulsated throughout his body. His fists clenched and turned his knuckles bright white. His muscles tightened underneath his dress shirt and sweater vest. Visions of him punching the shit out of Rich Lucas danced in his head like wild flames. Oh, how he would have loved to turn this disgusting human being’s face into slime and sand. He was close to carrying out his fantasy when he flipped over Rich’s desk and caused him to scatter backwards into the corner while Vikki barricaded Keith with her arms.

Pointing his index finger like a colt forty-five ready to blow, Keith shouted, “I am sick and tired of you judging me like a common criminal! Who’s going to take YOUR job for saying stupid shit like that?! Who’s going to put YOU on the fucking chopping block?! If you want to take my job, go ahead and take it, but if I fucking fall, you’re going down with me!” Vikki managed to push Keith back a little further to calm him down slightly.

The loving gesture did nothing to mask the massive flood of saliva Rich Lucas gulped nor the quaking in his tan slacks-wearing legs. With a shivery voice, he said, “Save your empty threats, Mr. Hamlet. You can’t do a damn thing to me or my credibility.”

Vikki sat Keith down in his chair and rubbed his shoulders and head in a further attempt to calm him down. While she achieved that small goal, Keith’s rage still caused Rich’s balls to shrink even in silent mode. “if there’s one thing I’ve learned in divorce court, it’s that the truth doesn’t mean shit. Men will try to screw women and women will try to screw men. The winner of any court case isn’t about who’s right or who’s wrong. It’s about who has the most believable pile of happy horseshit. I’m not necessarily saying I’m going to lie in court to get one over on you. I’m just saying…my shit smells like a my girlfriend’s cologne while yours smells like a fucking cow pasture. I’ve plead my case to you and got nothing. What’ll happen when I plead my case to a state judge?”

Still convulsing in the corner, Rich threw his glasses to the floor and said, “You’re fired, Keith. I’ve heard all I want to hear from you and your mistress. Just do me a favor, Mr. Hamlet: when you show up in court, try not to flip over any tables like you did in my office. You see…I too know what it’s like to lose someone I love. I’ve been alive a long time and had six marriages. The judge isn’t going to like your anger. You’d better learn how to keep that under control without your woman present. But then again…you millennials aren’t exactly known for your wisdom!”

A fiery aura radiated off of Keith Hamlet and he didn’t give two shits if he was proving Rich Lucas right. The now former math teacher could feel his own blood singeing his skin like a vat of acid. His exploding heart could have been powerful enough to level Hiro-fucking-shima all over again. Every time Keith closed his eyes in an attempt to quell this anger, his eyelids felt like little skillets burning breakfast as well as the whole house. Anything Keith Hamlet could have done in this moment would have jeopardized his chances of keeping his teaching license. And then…

“So not only are you an asshole in general,” sobbed Vikki. “But you’re also a flaming ageist. You’re a bitter old man in a school full of young students. I bet that just eats you up inside. That probably won’t look good in the eyes of an impartial judge. You know, somebody who can apparently be more impartial than my boyfriend here!”

Rich Lucas ran out of verbal ammunition as evidenced by his quivering lips and slurred speech. Keith, on the other hand, had plenty to say if only through his actions. He wiped away Vikki’s tears with his thumb and shared a lengthy hug with her in front of a disgusted, yet defeated Principal Lucas. “Don’t worry, Vikki,” said Keith. “This asshole can take away a lot of things from us…but we’re not going down without firing the first shot. Look at him, he’s pathetic! He knows he’ll lose miserably, but he’s too jittery to put his words together and admit it!”

“I love you, Keith,” whispered Vikki.

“I love you too, Vikki.” The romantic couple shared a gentle tongue kiss in front of Rich, who turned his face into the corner in a failed attempt to avert his “innocent” eyes.

Computer Stiuation

***COMPUTER SITUATION***

Hey, everybody. I told some people on Good Reads and Face Book about my current computer situation, but I haven’t gone into full detail until now. So, ready or not, here it goes. Yesterday evening, I bought a new computer from Best Buy since my most recent one is nine years old and freezes too often for my tastes. I set up the new computer and do my usual things from downloading Google Chrome, downloading AVG Antivirus, and installing Microsoft Office 2003 (since it’s the only software that will read my backed up writing files).

So far, so good. And then I start ripping CD’s onto the new computer using Windows Media Player and that’s when everything turned to shit. Some CD’s were skipping even though they’re in mint condition and some CD’s have tracks that won’t rip at all (“Apex Predator” by Cavalera Conspiracy). And then when I want to use WMA or any other program for that matter, the computer freezes and goes to a black screen. Once I’m on the black screen, I’m not capable of doing anything, so I have to shut down the computer by hitting the power button.

The moral of the story: new computers shouldn’t freeze or act up in any way, shape, or form. Earlier today, we exchanged the recently bought freezing computer for a brand new one that hasn’t been set up yet. Chances are, the second computer will be better since two defective computers in one sitting is highly unlikely. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have a backup plan. And a backup plan to go with that backup plan. And a backup plan to go with that backup plan. And so on and so forth.

I’m currently using my parents’ downstairs computer to write this journal, but it’s not the same as having my own, which means a few things will be hindered until the new computer is set up and a-okay. I had to drop out of the WSS contest this week, so there won’t be a short story called “Ninja” in the near future, though I may write it after the contest is over and add it to Poison Tongue Tales 2: Warrior Spirit anyways. There also won’t be rock songs for the day on Face Book and there won’t be any other forms of creativity until the computer is ready to go. Technology frustrates me, yet I can’t do business without it. Reina once joked that I was in an abusive relationship with my old computer. I can’t say she’s wrong or that she’s not funny. Hehe!

If it seems like I’m not on the internet as often as I used to be, it’s because of everything I just explained in this blog entry. I will say this: one way or another, my creative career will continue. I will have a working computer and I will keep plugging away. It’s hard to maintain a gung-ho attitude about all of this given how angry I get at malfunctioning technology, but it may be my saving grace. Good manners don’t cost anything, never forget Pink Floyd lyrics.

　

***WRESTLING QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“I’ll believe a long-nosed Pinocchio before I believe anything Kevin Owens has to say.”

-Byron Saxton aka BS-