Attack of the Furniture Salesmen

There's an insidious, very frightening type of person that's hell-bent on getting in your face and taking away your freedoms! They'll lie, cheat, pester, harangue, and break down your will to get what they want. 

What? No, I'm not taking about politicians for once! Of course I mean furniture salesmen.

These extraordinarily heinous pests make today's politicians seem gallant in comparison (Well, not really, but aren't you guys sick of reading about "politicians?").

A couple of weeks ago, my wife and I set out to get a new love-seat. We have a problem in getting one that will work for both of us as I'm quite a bit taller than she is. But it turned out to be the least of our problems...

First stop was Fat Daddy's Furniture Warehouse! I've always been curious about Fat Daddy's. It's kinda in a seedy part of town and has always looked pretty damn seedy from the outside. Naturally, I wanted to check it out.

When we walked into the place, it was like walking into a freezer, much colder than outside in February! Soon a bundled up woman found us and asked if she could help us.

Well, they didn't have any reclining loveseats, but really I just wanted to get the hell outta there to warm up. On our way out, I said, "It's cold in here!"

The saleswoman said, "It's very cold! I have to sit on top of my space heater!"

In the car, my wife says, "There was no Fat. Nor was there a Daddy. Just a very, very cold lady."

Fat Daddy's proved to be disappointing, but compared to the rest of our encounters, we got off easy with the frozen saleswoman.

Next we stopped at Furniture Madness where Bernie raced up to us and presumptuously said, "What kind of mattress are you looking for?" (I guess I must've looked extremely tired.)

We told Bernie what we needed. Then came the salesmen "jokes." 

"If you sit in it, you've got to buy it. Just kidding!"

"You want it, it's yours. I'll hand deliver it today myself if I have to. Just kidding!"

"You sat in it twice, so that means you have to buy it. Just kidding!"

He kidded us right out of the store.

Next we went to Furniture Barn, a huge place with more salesmen cruising the floors than pieces of furniture. Like sharks, they'd swim toward us, the unwitting chum-like rubes, hoping to take a bite out of our wallets.

And I fell into one of their devious traps. We'd found an electronic reclining loveseat with more bells, whistles, gizmos, and lights on it than a starship enterprise captain's chair. For whatever reason, a series of blue lights ran under the chair and up and down the sides. While my wife was horrified, naturally I had to try it out.

We sat down, worked the controls. Fully reclined, I said, "Hey, this is pretty comfy."

"No," was my wife's response as she swiftly landed her seat and raced off to parts unknown. Leaving me stuck, fully reclined. I couldn't figure out how to set the device back to sitting position, thus making me easy pickings for the hungry salesmen. Even worse, I begrudgingly--and very emasculatingly--had to ask one of the sales guys for assistance. After that, I more or less ran for the doors.

(Note to furniture designers: it's probably not a great idea to have the electronic control buttons surrounding the drink holders. I told my wife, it'd last about one day until I spilled a beer on them.)

As the day progressed, the stores got worse, the salesmen even pushier. Soon the loveseats all started blending together, nothing more memorable than the last. Yet the worst place was one of our last stops.

Zagaraga's claimed to be having a "grand opening" with "everything slashed 80% or more!" or so stated the numerous signs up and down Shawnee Mission Parkway. Sounded too good to be true.

As soon as we stepped inside, a particularly heinous silver fox in a suit jumped on us, "Hello, I'm Art. And you are?" So taken aback by his rude effrontery, neither of us answered right away. So he pushed on even louder. "AND YOU ARE??"

"Annoyed" was the answer I wanted to give, but I didn't and ended up giving him my real name. Then he attacked my wife. (Later, my wife suggested we give fake names. I really, really wanted  a salesman to keep calling me "Hubert," but then worried we may have to come clean later if we bought something).

Art also lied to us. "I'm walking through the store and randomly slashing prices at 80% or more on furniture."

Well, one look at the crossed out prices told the real story. A crappy love seat doesn't cost $60 grand. Anyway, Art wouldn't leave us alone. He hounded us, told us to come with him, showed us crap we didn't want, followed us, bugged us, and kept shouting our names out in the store. Finally, he says, "Well, I'll let you take a look around, then I'll check in on you."

That lasted for all of thirty seconds. He dragged us immediately over to a hideous eyesore of a "loveseat" that wouldn't even fit in our TV room.

Under my breath, I said, "Let's get outta here."

As we made our hasty exit, Art caught us. "Hey, Stuart! Stuart! I didn't make that too painful for you, did I? Nothing I hate more than being jumped on by pushy salesmen."

Clearly, Art suffered from grand delusion.

Anyway, exhausted and sick of doing our due diligence, we circled back to Furniture Barn. Swallowing my pride from having to be rescued in one of their furniture traps, we bought a loveseat. Anything to be finished with the full-on attacks of these guys, even far worse than car salesmen.

Beware the furniture salesmen!

There's a whole lot to beware in my book, Dread and Breakfast. Okay, so none of it's as bad as furniture salesmen, but I'd have to say it's a close second.

The Crown Prince of Jerkdom

It's me, the crown prince of jerkdom!

Finally, I'm royalty!

Not too long ago, my wife was sleeping in incredibly late.

I went to roust her and she said--very groggily--"I keep waking up to a jerk."

Doh!

I said, "Well, I know I'm not Mr. Wonderful 24-7, but I generally am 23-7. Hmmph. You keep waking up to a jerk, indeed."

As she stared at me, waiting for wakefulness to spark, she finally said, "No, that's not what I said!"

(It's not the first time I've been called a jerk before.) "Well, what did you say?"

"I said, 'I keep waking up with a jerk.'"

Sooooo many crickets. Finally, I asked, "How is that any better?"

"You know...restlessness. I kept jerking my leg." Seeing as how I still didn't get it, she demonstrated a leg jerk.

"Ooooooooooohhhhhhh," I said.

Later the same day, she requested my aid in lifting a printer out of a box. With the job completed, she said, "I'm done with you now."

Stunned, I asked, "Is it because I'm a jerk?"

I tell you I get no respect.

Bada-boom!

While we're on the topic of really dumb comedy, nobody's dumber at comedy than lackluster stand-up comedian, Charlie Broadmoor (well, except for maybe me since I created him). Things go from crappy to sucktacular in a very quick and splatacular manner for poor Charlie when he accidentally heckles a demon during one of his routines. It's Demon with a Comb-Over available here!

 

Bubble Guts

I can always tell when my daughter's having a slow work day?

How?

Because I get the following text:

"Hey, Dad, have you ever heard of bubble guts?"

"No. What are they?"

"Look it up."

Sigh. So now she's got me hooked, an unwitting ally in her nefarious game. Just when I think I'm out, she draws me back in. As my fingers fly across the keyboard, I'm wondering what the elusive and mysterious "bubble guts" could be. What possible treasures of knowledge might it lead me to? Surely, for my daughter (and co-workers) to take time out of their busy work day to discuss bubble guts, it has to be something of such great import that it will lead to something to enrich my life! To improve the world!!!

Bring it on!

According to Ms. Wikipedia, bubble guts is a stomach rumble, also known as a bowel sound, peristaltic sound, abdominal sound, bubble gut or borborygmus, produced by movement of the contents of the gastro-intestinal tract as they are propelled through the small intestine.

Huh.

Furthermore, "the scientific name borborygmus is related to the 16th-century French word borborygme, itself from Latin." (Which doesn't tell me much except for borborygmus is taken very seriously by someone on Wikipedia and"bubble guts" is much easier to pronounce than "borborygmus.")

Okay. I now am aware of what bubble guts are. But honestly? I don't really feel my life is enriched all that much. And just why in the name of God did my daughter want me to look it up? And WHY were they discussing it at work?

She's not told me why, not yet, but I imagine the conversation went something like this:

"Oh, man, I've got bad bubble guts this morning," exclaims employee number one.

"What's bubble guts?" asks employee number two.

"I'm so glad you asked! Why, it's a stomach rumble, also known as a bowel sound, peristaltic sound, abdominal sound, bubble gut or borborygmus, bla, bla, bla..."

As I said, busy day at the work place.

But enough is enough. Why do we have an unpronounceable name for something that could just as easily be labeled as "gas?" And who gave it the "bubble guts" baby moniker? ("What's the matter, sweetums, has mommy's lil' baby gotums some bubble guts this morn-morn?") And not only is it taken seriously by the French, but dates back to Latin importance as well! That's a lotta high-falutin' involvement for gas!

Gah! Instead of enriching my life, it's just opened up a whole new world of mystery and unanswered questions.

I think I'll stick with "gas," thank you very much.

While I don't offer any books dealing with gas (and for that you should be very, very grateful), my character Zach (he of the Zach and Zora comical mystery series), is certainly full of hot air (see what I did there?). That is until he continually stumbles over dead bodies leading him into a world of trouble that only his sleuthing sister, Zora, can bail him out of. Check 'em out: Bad Day in a Banana Hammock and Murder by Massage. (More on the way soon!)

 

Chevy Chase Owes Me

The way I see it Chevy Chase owes me. In fact, he probably owes a lotta people. I mean he's never hurt me, not personally.

No, scratch that! He has hurt me personally and cost me financially.

Let's go ahead and jump into the Way-Back Machine for some perspective and background, shall we?

Our first stop is October 11, 1975, a Saturday night. Being unpopular as a kid meant I spent a LOT of time visiting with my one true faithful friend, the TV. I just left the TV on the NBC affiliate and let it ride (remember, this is back in the days of three--count 'em--three(!) TV stations, possibly four if the weather cooperated). Suddenly, a show came on that was unlike anything I'd ever witnessed before. There was a whole new and fresh vibe, a young person's comedy full of sarcasm and underlying anger. They showed commercials that had me stumped whether they were real or not. No canned laughter (which I'm still stunned that several shows still use today; Hello, CBS!). And best of all, they sometimes broke through the fourth wall to address that they were in a skit, something Green Acres would never attempt.

Hello, comedy that spoke to me; Goodbye, Hee-Haw and all the old fogey comedy it represented! I worshiped at the altar of Saturday Night Live.

And anchoring it all was a strangely smart alecky, deadpan, lanky comedian named Chevy Chase.

I was all in.

Well, Chase didn't last long on Saturday Night Live. At the beginning of the second season, he bolted for Ginormous-Mega-Movie-Super-Stardom, aka, "Big Head Syndrome." The writing was on the wall. If only my young naive self had been aware enough to read it and pay heed.

I championed Chase. No matter where he went, I followed. I'd brag to family and school acquaintances that he was the funniest guy working in entertainment and to catch his newest vehicle. Without seeing it first, that's how much I believed in him.

In 1977, he spat up a TV special. It guest-starred Tim Conway and Dr. Joyce Brothers. I thought, "Wait a minute...what happened to the new-fangled cutting edge satire? These are...my grandma's guest stars!" Chevy made "funny faces" while wearing mime make-up and sticking his tongue out. Ha ha. It took him all of a year to sell out to The Man. Mortified, the next day I made the rounds apologizing to everyone to whom I recommended this epic disaster.

But I thought it was a one off! A bad day for Chevy! Undeterred, I continued to follow his career.

First we had Foul Play, a "rom com" with Goldie Hawn. While this is considered to be one of his "better" movies, I felt ripped off and left with a feeling of "meh-ness." Chase wasn't even acting, just coasting at best.

A year or so later, I found out he was starring in Oh, Heavenly Dog. Alongside "Benji (Now, again, for you whippersnappers, Benji was a dog that starred in several family films. Don't ask me why.)" But I thought, surely he'll make it into a subversive satire. Again, I dragged a buddy off to the theater. It was a short-lived friendship.

Now I hear some of you shouting, "Hey, what about National Lampoon's Vacation, Caddyshack, and Fletch?" Well...Vacation has some good stuff in it, but is uneven; Caddyshack was woefully stupid and childish (my date liked it if that tells you anything about her), and Fletch was...insufferable. Kinda like how I was beginning to feel about Chevy Chase.

I mean, really, can one base a movie career on smirking, shameless mugging and smarminess?

Yet, call me a half-glass full kinda guy, I followed Chevy through Under the Rainbow (Fun fact! The diminutive co-stars in this rotten comedy about the making of Wizard of Oz had a non-stop Bacchanalian orgy going on behind the scenes! The more you know!), Modern Problems (Not a single laugh to be grasped), Deal of the Century (No, God, why me?), European Vacation (Wake me when it's over!), Spies Like Us (THIS is a movie?), and the list goes on and on.

I drew the line at Follow That Bird, the heartwarming tale of a giant, intellectually-challenged, baby-man-bird getting lost far from home.

Enough was enough. I'd thrown down a small fortune banking on Chase's "talents" at the box office, lost many friends over the cinematic atrocities I'd dragged them to, and had many, many one-date-onlies due to his crimes against moviedom.

He owes me. Big time.

But it doesn't stop with me. Apparently, Chase is quite the jackass, alienating coworkers left and right. That's why they killed him off on the TV show, Community. He'd publicly bashed the show, saying he didn't think it was funny. This coming from the man who thinks mugging and buck teeth are a laugh riot.

In a recent interview, Chase said "I don't give a crap about how I've acted on shows. I am who I am."

There you have it in a nutshell. As I grew up suffering through Chase's "output," it slowly dawned on me that he didn't "give a crap" about what he churned out, thinking so little of his audience that he'd put out anything for a buck. 

I guess there's kinda a happy ending. Because of his jackass reputation, Chase went into straight-to-video pablum (the "Eric Roberts of Comedy") to hardly finding any work.

He still owes me. Anyone else? How about a class action suit?

While we're on the topic of "comedy" and substandard practitioners of the genre, have you heard the one about middling (at best) stand-up comic, Charlie Broadmoor, and how he displayed the poor judgement to heckle a demon in his audience? No? Well, here's your chance! Demon With a Comb-Over available here!