Say Kimchi

The Blueberry Man

2009-04-28T20:10:00.000-07:00

Here's a story I call:

The Blueberry Man (Kinda Like Rainman Without Wordplay)

Late one Saturday night my friend Chris and I were at Ralph’s in downtown Santa Barbara, getting even MORE beer for ourselves and the guests we were hosting at our house. The only checker they had working that late was a friend of mine named Howard (but I like to call him Howie because it shows more affinity). I make a point check out in his line every time I’m shopping because I feel we have a mutual appreciation for each other’s time, which is rare in the grocery industry. I appreciate hearing about his day because he’s a great storyteller, and like most great storytellers, he speaks from a uniquely hilarious perspective. Howie’s a rough-and-tumbler, no-nonsense, tough love kind of guy who, no doubt came from a miserable place in the middle of nowhere and somehow, after a long and rebellious streak that he dedicated to finding himself, he landed here without ever really getting there. However he was not your stereotypical hulking monster man, but an average middle-aged white guy with grey/white hair and average build who has to cover up old tattoos for his job and sports librarian glasses that he rests on the bridge of his nose. He uses these when he checks IDs, drawing the card to his stomach and straining to look far down enough to make out the date. I appreciate this among many other things about Howie.

On this particular night, Howie had already dealt with all kinds of drunkards who had been impatiently yelling crude remarks about this or that benign bullshit in line, and if there’s something Howie won’t tolerate, it’s profanity. I could tell he wasn’t in the mood for shenanigans, on the verge of going postal on everyone in the store. But Howie is a composed man; he keeps his cool in aisle six in all situations, as his job demands from him.

After picking out our cheap beer, we got in Howie’s line behind a woman with a cartful of groceries (why someone does that much shopping for one person in the middle of the night, I don’t know). Behind us followed a large man in what looked like a suit without the jacket. His shirt was half tucked in and he was carrying with him two whole empty tubs of blueberries and an open bag of cookies, which he was consuming at an alarming rate. What was this man doing eating tubs of blueberries in the lonely aisles of 2 AM Ralph’s only to finally rest on the decision to buy cookies, yes cookies, that’ll hit the spot? He certainly looked the part of a guy who doesn’t know what he wants, who therefore acts impulsively, proven by what happened next. He reached past us to put down his things as though they were weighing him down. We made small talk, whatever, blah blah about how the night was going, I don’t remember really. Then the blueberry man said something quietly to us about the looks of the woman in front of us. Stoned and confused, we nodded. He gestured as if to ask if he can go in front of us and, with cookies in his mouth mumbled, “I gotta pursue this.” This is the only direct quote in this story, as I thought it encapsulated the night’s experience. This blueberry man had consumed so much already and was now trying to consume this tiny woman! Chris and I exchanged an understood and stoney laugh, and then we didn’t say anything for a while. In fact, this whole time we didn’t say much because we felt compelled to listen to the malarkey around us like social scientists (I guess that’s not a metaphoric simile since those people actually exist).

When it came time for the woman to check out, it turned out her credit card was declined, and she had no other way to pay for her food but with a check. She got out her checkbook and started scribbling away, when Howie noticed something funny. All the numbers on the bottoms of all the checks were crossed out with a ball point pen. Unless you’re an idiot, you would never accept a check like this, she probably found it pilfering through someone’s trash at midnight and thought, “Score! I think I’ll go by a shit-ton of groceries with this,” and then spent the next hour picking out hundreds of dollars of food and beauty products only to face the grim truth. Sad, really. Blueberry man did nothing, which is odd because you’d think that he would by her groceries in exchange for sex, or at least think that that’s how it would go down. But he was either too cheap or knew it wouldn’t go down that way. She left to find her “other check book” in her car, and never came back.

Now, by this time, there were more people in line behind us. Three college-aged guys, one who seemed to be foreign because of his thick pan-European accent, and the other two who must have suckered him into hanging out with them so they could hear stories abut Amsterdam, were yelling, telling each other dumb stories about “some chick” or “this guy I know in LA” when Howie decided to lay the hammer down. He told them to cut the crap, told them he didn’t want to hear that kind of trash talk and if they had a problem with that, to take their business elsewhere. Two, who had better sense, were being understanding about it while the other non-foreigner continued in the same way, trying to exercise his eloquence in defiance. But there’s no defying Howie. Meanwhile, the blueberry man had finished his cookies and checked out, taking his empty blueberry tubs with him, which means we were finally checking out. But not with this shit going down, no, Howie needed to deal with these jokers first. They argued with him, coming back with the most unintelligent dribble, desperately offensive things that really meant nothing. I would have felt the need to defend Howie’s honor from them had I not understood he didn’t need my or anyone else’s help with these idiots and had thick enough skin to not lose sleep over it.

Somewhere in all this, a bum had come in and was waiting behind the Euro-trash talking college kids, looking concerned. He was the Shakespearean foil of this story. The unappreciated sage who seemed to know Howie even though Howie didn’t seem to know him. He was trying to make peace between them though none of them could hear him over their argument. It went on like this for a while, with one of the kids saying, “okay, yeah, we got it” only to have one of the others pipe up again. At this point Howie was pointing at them, sternly administering a “shut up” that made me shiver. Ultimately, he kicked them out. They were escorted by a security guard that Howie had waved over some five minutes earlier, his back-up man who took out the trash that came in. Now Howie could finally check us out, but before we left, he almost threw out the bum too. The bum was defending everyone, even the guys that had so tactlessly and rudely invaded his workspace. This guy was on everyone’s side, and just wanted to see everyone happy, but his nonpartisan defense was misinterpreted by Howie, who was in no mood for the situation to be drawn out longer than it already was. He listened to Howie and kept quiet. We all kept quiet until we left.

In the parking lot I wondered why we went through all that just to get more of what we didn’t need (beer). I felt like I’d consumed too many stimuli. Then I felt the blueberry man inside me telling me to pursue this, so I wrote it down. More of what we all don’t need (bad blog entries). Perhaps you’re wondering why you just went through all that. I sympathize, however, I won’t pay for your groceries in exchange for critical pleasure.

Stump Grinder

2009-04-24T19:02:00.000-07:00

So I wrote this article for the Independent, but it's kind of funny how it happened. I was looking for a job for what seemed like forever, and decided to hit up my friend who works as an editor there for some advice about writing jobs around town. Jokingly, I offered to write an article for the Independent about how I can't find a job. He thought this was a good idea, so that's what I did. It was never published, however, so I'm just going to put it here:

"After graduating from UCSB last December, I have been fruitlessly trying to join the workforce. I found myself asking why I worked so hard for four years to earn a once-hallowed piece of paper that no one seems to care I have. I’m not looking for a dream job, or even an entry-level job; I have been applying to even the dirtiest of menial service jobs.

My search began with Craigslist and newspaper classifieds. I sent over thirty emails a day to ads that vaguely and impersonally described some admin or restaurant job without any name or number and rarely got a response. With no way to follow up but to send more emails, there’s no way to get an edge in the competition. To top it off, half of the ads I responded to turned out to be internet scams. I would receive automated emails back asking for me to input my personal information onto a sketchy website that popped up more windows for similar web sites promising me some office job, or worse, some work-from-home job. To take out my frustration, I sent them angry emails, verbally wagging my finger.

Alas, upon finding an ad for a barista at Tuttini’s, I decided to drive there and apply in person. But when I got there, even though the ad had been posted for a few hours, the manager, Deborah Morin, was already out of applications. Morin had me write down my name, number, and brief description on a blank white scrap of paper. I returned twice more, and both times they hadn’t yet been able to sort through all the applications. She explained they had over 80 applicants and that it would take “over a week to set up appointments.” When I asked her if she thought this was because she went through Craigslist, she told me, “Yeah, it’s great, we wouldn’t have had more than twenty responses otherwise… but it’s hard to get through them all.” I told her she should hire me on the spot to spare herself the work, and she laughed. Great for her, irksome for me.

I became increasingly disheartened the more effort I put into job hunting. Employers have so many applicants that they only really consider those who have previous experience. With over 80 applicants in one day, who can blame them? After a few nights at the bars and some venting, I decided to check out UCSB’s Career Center.

Through advisor Joann Salvador, I learned that the Career Center advisors help you find a job, beef up your resume, or administer personality tests to see which industries are good for you. These services are not always free, however. It costs a student $15 to take the personality test and $60 if they want the “deluxe package” — personality test, meetings with an advisor, and a nice fancy printout of positions that match your results. In addition to coughing up extra dough, they cut you off three months after graduation. Then graduates pay per appointment through the alumni association. I have to wonder: with what money?

Santa Barbara offers only a few decent temp agencies. I picked Office Team based on its reputation with administrative employment. They had me come in to take the usual typing, data entry, Word and Excel tests designed to make sure you’re not an idiot. I was surprised yet skeptical to hear they already had something I could interview for the following week. When I got to the interview, there were ten other people from various agencies. All but one person were at least 30 years old, the oldest in his mid-fifties. I didn’t get the job because I arrived one minute late, but they probably needed it more.

Still on the hunt, I stumbled on an absurd Craigslist ad from a couple looking for someone who had a stump grinder to grind the stump in front of their house. I decided to respond via email, even without having the required equipment and had a little fun with it.

Subject: “I’ll grind your stump…”

Body: “…If I have to chew it out of the ground. I don’t have a stump grinder, but if you have a shovel and/or something like an ax, crowbar, or maybe even just a trowel, I’ll beat that stump so far into the ground they will need to hire someone to do the same job in China. Really, I’ll get it out somehow.

I’m a recent grad from UCSB trying to find a job, and it’s proving to be impossible. Everything either requires experience that I don’t have, or in this case, a stump grinder that I don’t have. So my plan is to convince people that I can still do their jobs even without having met their requirements: I am a reliable worker with strong limbs, have a decent amount of upper body strength with solid trunk support, have experience with manual labor, and am proficient in the use of many hand/gardening tools. I am attentive to detail and work well in teams or individually to get to the root of any problem. Grounded work ethic and ability to find creative solutions to tough problems. Passions include carving, staining, and sculpting wood. Down to earth. At least I gave you a laugh, so if you don’t want to hire me, I ask that you pay it forward and make someone else laugh.”

They never responded, but nevertheless I still cling to the idea that somewhere out there in the vast expanse of America’s workforce is a job meant for me. Until then, I suppose it’s fingers crossed."

Since writing this I have still not found a job.

The Objective Here

2009-04-23T16:34:00.000-07:00

Hello hello,

Half of this blog will be dedicated to food fascination, which means I will be sharing anecdotal stories that will almost always contain something strange, scary, or absurd about food. Cuz, let's face it, food is naturally fascinating. One of the most ancient rites in childhood mythology is the food fight. In this ancient ritual, we spontaneously become yelling giddy primal beasts, aimlessly throwing food into each other's faces. In fact, it would be interesting to think about when the first food fight ever occurred, or more importantly what started it. Or when the first person smashed a pie into someone's face, which is a similar phenomenon that's timelessly and instantly funny.

I.E.....

This man was champion of Wing Bowl 8

The other half of this blog is just going to be a lot of complaining, misguided or misplaced anger, unfair blaming of problems, pointing fingers, naming names, and callings out. But maybe I'll tackle more subjects as I'm feelin it. Thats it for now.