If I Started Stripping

Wowee, I hate my job today. To make up for some disappointing mid-year results, the Higher Ups in my company decided to have a little contest in an effort to boost our numbers. Long story short, the despicable fake salesy alternate personalities that some "higher members of staff" employ to talk to the rest of us wee folks is on overload. It’s borderline slutty. It’s like how strippers pretend they give a shit about your life so that you’ll pay for their rent or their nails or “school.”

One of said "higher members of staff" in particular is usually a hideous breed of soul-less asshole. In the several years he’s worked here, no one is really sure who he is in terms of personality, values, friends- -not that we all need to be best friends (or care), but there’s a general level of knowledge you gain about people just by the inevitable diffusion of working 9 hours a day in the wholly non-private discomfort of adjacent cubicles.

Anyway, this one is really an artist in the way he is able to manipulate perceived kindness for self-serving purposes. I mean, I’ve never heard a person consistently ask “how are you today?” in a way that is quintessentially rhetorical (and you are reassured of this fact when he interrupts your response with a new line of discussion that is of more interest)...so, you can imagine the confusion of all of us now that he’s Mary Fucking Poppins today- -skipping around the office, buying lunch and smiling. We’re all speculating why his mood has taken a bi-polar 180, and so far, “kicked a child” is the most convincing theory.

At the height of my disgust, I started entertaining (*cough* fantasizing) about events transpiring and me subsequently collecting unemployment. Sure, waving my middle fingers and smiling like a newly crowned Miss America as I was escorted out of the office would be great, but it’s the unceremonious $400/week aftermath that’s a bit desolate and uninviting.
My co-worker, "Jesse" suggested moonlighting at a local strip club to supplement the $400/week unemployment check (oh, dare to dream)- -to which I reminded him how I’m not really in “get naked in front of strangers for money” shape. Something about sitting on my ass 10 hours a day for the last 3 years that just hasn’t yielded any constructive physical improvements.





Then we started musing about what that would be like, in the event that a strip club owner had enough zest for humor that he would actually employ me, and we think it would go something like this: “Ladies and gentlemen, get your dollars ready for Emily….she is…..really nice. She’s also quite funny….Did I say “good personality” yet?” Maybe once, "assail your eyes" would accidentally slip out.

To help me with my janky nail middle finger salute, I've enlisted the help of Ms. Spears. She'll do just fine.