Mr Pop: Serial Murderer
May 22, 2000
Continued to muck around with Mr Marketing this week:
Me: Oh, could you sign my timesheet please?
Mr Marketing: Well, I’ll sign it… but if you think you’re getting paid, you’re mistaken.
Me: Well, I certainly believe that I’m getting paid.
Mr Marketing: You know, it’s good to have beliefs nowadays. They won’t necessarily take you very far in life, but there’s nothing at all wrong with beliefs.
Me: So you don’t believe in beliefs?
Mr Marketing: No, I don’t.
Me: Well, that’s a belief in itself.
Mr Marketing: Shut up. Now.
I really do talk far more than I work… not good.
I bought a Coke from the Coke machine at work but there was something a bit weird about it I couldn’t put my finger on. I realised eventually that the can just felt really… slimy. I realised it was covered in congealed Coke. I put two and two together and went back to look at the Coke machine. In the little tray where the Coke machine lands, a small of Coke was slowly buliding. I assume that a can of Coke had burst inside the machine - someone would’ve got an unpleasant surprise when they pressed the Coke button on the machine later that day…
Had more bad experiences with coin operated machines that evening at the train station, where I attempted to purchase a bag of chips from a food machine. If you’ve ever had experience with those food machines where the food sits on litle spiral shelves, and the spiral spins around when you put in your money, you’ll know the food can get stuck inside the machine sometimes. Every time you put your money in one of these machines you’re gambling for food. (Gambling for food… hmm, sounds like a Russian game show idea).
However, I’m not too fussed. I’m a big believer in Potato Chip Karma. I’ve gotten a free bag of chips from these machines before because the person before me got their food stuck in the machine, so it was simply my turn to give instead of recieve. (Well, it wasn’t really. Two skateboarder kids grabbed the machine and rocked it until the bag of chips fell into the bottom of the machine, and they made a point of standing near me and eating the chips with great relish).
I’m glad I don’t know all of the martial arts that Adam does, sometimes.
*****
I was really tired on Wednesday night and I couldn’t wait to get home. My head was absolutely pounding with a vicious headache. CityRail, of course, took it upon themselves that Wednesday would be the day they introduced Pointless Whistle People onto the train platforms at my train station. There are two of these people per train platform, and when a train arrives, they blow on their whistles really hard. They then whistle randomly three times while the train sits on the platform, then give a full, all-out whistle as the train departs. When you’re standing right next to one of the Pointless Whistle People it can escalate your migraine into previously uncharted territory.
On the way home, a guy fell asleep on me. I don’t mind it when people’s heads roll off their shoulder and land against mine, because the way they snort awake suddenly and realise what position they’re in amuses me. I must say however that I don’t appreciate the style of sleep this guy positioned himself in - put his hands up against my arm as if it were a pillow of some sort and made himself nice and comfortable as if I were a doona that had a sense of self-awareness.
*****
I love half-awake conversations. They’re the sort of conversations you have when you’ve just woken up with your partner in bed, or when you’re going to sleep and you’re halfway there. On Wednesday night, Adam and I were half asleep when I realised that we had nothing to eat for breakfast.
Me: Faaark.
Adam: Hhrrrr?
Me: There’s nothing to eat for breakfast, there’s no bread or cereal or nothing.
Adam: Ohh.
Me: Should’ve gone shopping.
Adam: Yeah. But it’s okay.
Me: Why, what will you eat?
Adam: Soup.
(five minutes pass and it eventually registers in my head that Adam is going to eat soup for breakfast)
Me: Hang on. You can’t have soup for breakfast.
Adam: I had two minute noodles the other day.
Me: Yeah, they actually didn’t smell too bad for that time of day.
Adam: They were delicious.
Me: I, in fact, craved some noodles.
Adam: There you go.
(five minutes pass)
Me: But soup?!
Adam: Why not?
Me: That’s just a fucked up idea.
Adam: Well, no need to be rude. I certainly won’t be sharing any with you.
Me: It’s got like, vegies and meat in it! When was the last time you sat down to steak and three veg for breakfast?
Adam: I’m having soup and you’re not.
Me: Don’t want any.
Adam: Anyway, I had soup for breakfast on the weekend.
Me: No you didn’t. You had it for lunch.
Adam: Yeah, but I got up at midday you see. Breakfast is the first meal of the day.
Me: No it’s not. You get up at midday and you eat lunch.
Adam: You’re wrong.
Me: No I’m not, soup boy.
(five minutes pass and we lie there shivering in the cold)
Me: It’s bloody cold.
Adam: (severely half-asleep) Mmmmrggyeh.
Me: Brrr.
Adam: Can… can you hold your breath please?
Me: What?
Adam: Hold your breath for ages until you go red.
Me: Why?
Adam: Because red equals warm.
Me: Um… no it doesn’t.
Adam: Just hold your breath and go red. I’m cold.
*****
We got threatened by our real estate agent this week that they’re going to kick us out in a month if we don’t pay our rent, so we thought we should. Mr Marketing Jnr at my work is in a similar but worse situation - him and his flatmate are getting kicked out of their flat soon.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Now that I’m in enormous debt, I can write a proper, authentic blues song.
Me: Go on then.
Mr Marketing Jnr: I got kicked out of home…
Me: (mouth guitar noises)
Mr Marketing Jnr: My girlfriend left me…
Me: (mouth guitar noises)
Mr Marketing Jnr: My car got stolen…
Me: (mouth guitar noises)
Mr Marketing Jnr: And… er…. um…
Me: … and I’m drunk…
Mr Marketing Jnr: (mega mouth banjo solo)
Speaking of people in major debt, I heard an MC Hammer song on the radio this week. May I make a comment on one portion of the lyrics from Mr Hammer’s song, ‘U Can’t Touch This’?
Why would I ever stop doing this
When others make records that just don’t hit?
Mr Hammer - I believe it was every other record you released after the ‘U Can’t Touch This’ single that didn’t hit. (Except for ‘Pray’, of course - the rap-gospel hit). I predict that rap-metal will soon evolve into rap-gospel-metal.
*****
On Thursday I got up extra-early, so I could get ready for work without having to rush. I was nice and calm, right up until I had one minute to leave the house to go catch the train. It was at this point I realised I’d forgotten to put on my belt and tie. I’m quite skilled in the art of Speed-Tying and Speed-Belting, as I tend to forget to wear these things quite frequently.
When I started full-time work last year, it was the first time I’d ever had to wear a suit and tie to work. My mum made it her mission to go and buy me shirts and ties and all those sorts of things, except every tie she bought me (bar one) were those really skinny, 80’s style ties. I’m still being forced to wear these skinny ties today because I tend not to go and buy ties a lot.
I was so half asleep on this day that I’d worn a really bad combination of clothes. I don’t pretend to know anything at all about fashion but one thing that has always stuck in my head since I was a kid is my mum’s mantra: ‘blue and green should never be seen’. Naturally, on this day I chose to defy my mother’s wisdom and wore green pants with a blue shirt, along with a skinny 80’s tie that somehow managed to combine blue and green stripes into the one tie in the worst way possible. The whole situation wasn’t helped when the mail girl in my office remarked:
Mail girl: So, is it your mission in life to wear as much blue and green together as possible?
Me: Didn’t you see the Australian Fashion Week parades the other week? It’s the height of fashion now.
Mail girl: (Appearing to be genuinely enlightened) Really? Wow.
I was hoping she’d turn up to work the next day in blue and green, but… she didn’t.
I’ve got some good news, too. Mr Marketing is impressed with my work and has taken me on for a 6 month contract! This is good, apparently most people start off in this organisation that way… and this is an organisation I really, really want to work for. After the 6 months my performance will be evaluated and they’ll see if they want to keep me on. I sure hope so.
I’ll be working with Jen from now on, it looks like. Jen is really funny… when I first met her I thought she didn’t like me but once you get to know her, you realise she’s one of the nicest people out.
Ever since Jen found out that Adam is a graphic designer and produces cartoons and graphics for a living, she’s been fascinated. She’s been bugging me to show him some of his cartoons. I was telling her about Adam’s work - they get treated really well there. In fact, they get free, unlimited soft drinks (and alcohol after hours).
Jen: (shrieking) HE GETS FREE COKE?
Me: Sure does.
Jen: Unlimited Coke?
Me: That’s right. This is Coke as in the soft drink we’re talking about, isn’t it?
Jen: Yeah. Christ, if I was him, I’d sue his company in ten years time when I’ve got no stomach lining left.
We concluded they give Adam free soft drink so he gets a creative ‘buzz’.
Jen, Mr Marketing Jnr and myself spent most of that morning debating hot topics like abortion, immigration and euthenasia. Because I’m such a bastard that I rarely give a crap unless something effects me directly (yes - I’m a real arsehole!), I often didn’t have very well thought out opinions on things.
Jen: So do you believe in euthenasia?
Me: Um… I believe there’s lots of people living in Asia.
Mr Marketing Jnr: (applauds wildly)
We also got onto the subject of how easily kids have access to porn on the web. We all realised we’d had the same porn-in-a-bush experiences as kids.
Jen: We used to find Playboys at the bus stop, just thrown in this bush nearby. I mean, who goes and throws pornos in bushes? All us kids used to look at them though.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Hey, that’s strange. I found my first Playboy in a bush as a kid too!
Me: This is real weird. When I was doing my paper round as a kid, I came across a Playboy in a bush.
Has Playboy developed some sort of genetically modified tree that sprouts copies of Playboy or something?
Jen also noticed me writing with my left hand that day.
Jen: Ooh, you write with your left hand. You must be creative.
I have never believed in this statement. There’s so many ridiculous spin-offs of the ‘oh you’re creative’ remark. ‘Oooh, you’re left handed, you’re creative’. ‘Oooh, you’re gay, you’re creative’. ‘Oooh, you’re quadriplegic, you’re creative’. Etc etc etc.
It was about this time that Mr Marketing Jnr began an incredibly heartfelt acappella version of ‘The Guillotine Is Not My Lover’.
Me: So you’re a bit of a fan of Michael Jackson, eh?
Mr Marketing Jnr: I don’t mind his earlier stuff.
Me: I think my flatmate wants to BE Michael Jackson. (Note: to my workmates, Adam is strictly nothing more than a ‘flatmate’)
Jen: Does he touch kids like Michael Jackson?
Me: Not last time I checked.
Jen: I think Michael Jackson stopped touching children when he got married, so maybe if your flatmate is doing anything like that, he’ll stop when he gets married too.
Me: (biting my tongue) Yes, when he gets married.
Jen: Did you know the pope got married?
Mr Marketing Jnr: Bullshit!
Jen: No, seriously. I read a book on all the Popes, and this current Pope, there’s about five years missing from his life.
Me: So he went and got married in those five years? Was this recent?
Jen: Nah, this was ages ago, when he was really young. But apparently he went and got married.
Me: That’s pretty interesting.
Jen: It doesn’t really matter because this is the last Pope anyway.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Really?
Jen: Sure is - it was a prophecy of Nostradamus.
Me: Oh, don’t start. Nostradamus is the biggest load of crap. I think he was just a bad poet on acid.
Jen: No seriously!
Me: Bahhhhhhhhhhhh.
Later that morning:
Mr Marketing Jnr: Jen, could you go downstairs and give this package to despatch?
Jen: (flatly) No.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Oh, go on… please?
Jen: I said NO. I’m busy.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Oh, you and your world-is-about-to-end moods.
Jen: Well, it is! We should all be miserable!
On Thursday evening I was walking up to the service station to get some food, and I heard this really cool song. It was using a sample that sounded somewhere between vinyl scratching and cool drum beats. I then realised that it was actually someone trying to start their VW Beetle.
The petrol station near here currently has a promotion running, where you get a free voucher with every purchase you make. It’s a little surprise, you open up the bit of paper to find your voucher, but nine times out of ten it’s the ‘Get a loaf of Helga’s bread for only $2.40!’ voucher. (I believe Helga’s doesn’t cost much more than $2.40 anyway). It’s the rare vouchers like ‘Buy one Chupa Chup, get one free!’ that I get excited about.
However, I’d appreciate it if the petrol station had more realistic vouchers. In my case, they would read something like ‘Get out of one embarassing situation where you hold out your hand for change - and there isn’t any - free!’
After my parents’ last holiday, my dad could probably do with a voucher along the lines of ‘Reverse your car into one petrol pump and cause fatal damage - and get out of paying for it - for free!’
*****
Sometimes I just get random thoughts in my head, and these can happen at the worst possible times. While not wanting to go into details, the other night Adam and I were “intimate” (cough), but at the, er… “most important moment” (cough, cough) I got a vision of Billy Idol in my head. I can’t think of many worse things to have in your head at that important moment, but a peroxided, sneering Billy Idol is not a good thing.
*****
Sometimes my left eyebrow raises itself, and I can’t do anything about it. It’ll just stay raised for hours. I’ve got no idea of the physics behind this, but I noticed my left eyebrow was raised as I left to work on Friday, and it was still like it at lunchtime. Strange.
I also managed to sit next to the same big, fat, hairy man on the train for the third time in a row on Friday. I saw another guy on the train on Friday whose nipples were FAR too far apart. They were almost approaching the region where if he put his arms by his sides, the nipples would disappear.
*****
I noticed a sign in the Queen Victoria Building shopping centre on Friday that read ‘Thank you for not smoking at the Queen Victoria Building’. So it’s perfectly okay to smoke INSIDE the building, but you’re not allowed to stand outside and blow smoke AT the building.
*****
I discovered on Friday that Mr Marketing Jnr shared my enthusiasm for the band A Perfect Circle. The Mail Girl, however, didn’t. We were playing A Perfect Circle songs on Mr Marketing Jnr’s computer when she politely asked us through gritted teeth if we could listen to something else.
Me: How about if we switch the radio on, then?
Mr Marketing Jnr: Yeah, to Triple J.
Mail girl: What kind of music do they play? (Note: the Mail Girl is backpacking from the UK, so she doesn’t know these things)
Mr Marketing Jnr: Oh, I suppose you’d call it alternative or something.
Me: Alternative with novelty songs thrown in.
Mail girl: Oh, well that sounds nice. Let’s listen to that.
Me: (switches on Triple J - ‘Song 2′ by Blur is playing)
Mail girl: (sits in seat thoughtfully biting pen for two minutes before switching radio off)
Mr Marketing Jnr: Whaaaaat? Where’s the music?
Mail girl: That’s the worst music I’ve ever heard.
Me: But that’s Blur! You’re from the UK! You’re supposed to like Blur and Travis and Oasis and stuff!
My work’s toilets are the scariest toilets I’ve ever used. On Friday, when I entered the toilet cubicle… actually, before I go on, maybe there’s something you didn’t know about gay guys. They never use the urinals in men’s toilets - only the cubicles. Why? I have no idea, maybe it’s some sort of scared-of-showing-my-penis-to-other-men thing, but 95% of gay men use the cubicle rather than the urinal, even if it’s just for number ones.
As I was saying, I entered the cubicle, and as I was using the toilet, I noticed that water started to seep out from underneath the toilet, and began to puddle on the floor into the shape of a HAND. This could only have been creepier if it was blood seeping from underneath the toilet rather than water. The realistic shape of the hand freaked me out, so I flushed the toilet quickly and opened the cubicle door, when the toilet exploded and I jumped a mile high.
Well, it didn’t explode - I had the seat raised from the toilet because I was only.. er… doing number ones. The seat had crashed back down onto the toilet bowl and made a loud noise rather like an explosion.
By this stage my nerves were quite sensitive. I washed my hands and put them under the hand drier - it’s one of those hand driers you just wave your hands underneath for it to activate. I stood there for a while trying to get it to work, waving my hands around, and was just about to conclude it wasn’t working, when it exploded into life making an even larger racket than the toilet seat exploding. To make it worse, it shut off really quickly, then roared back into life again and I got another shock.
I opened the door to get out of the toilets as quick as possible and jumped again as I thought I saw an incredibly tall man towering over me on my right. It was actually a giant rolled up rug that didn’t appear human at all, but… toilets can be scary.
*****
Does anyone remember the board game Nightmare that was popular in the early 90’s? I’m not sure if it was released outside Australia, but that game used to really scare me shitless as a kid. If you’re not familiar with it, it was a regular board game, but you played a video tape along with it that had a timer on the screen, and were supposed to play it with the TV up loud and the lights down low. Every now and then this guy with a rug on his head (the ‘Gatekeeper’) bursts onto the TV screen in a loud exploding noise and mutters things like ‘You, about to roll the dice, miss a turn. Bwahahahaha!’
When Adam gets up early in the morning, he puts on this hooded top and it makes him look like the Gatekeeper. Actually, I’ve told a lie - Nightmare wasn’t my scariest childhood board game. The scariest board game I played in my childhood was Mr Pop. Mr Pop was this strange face-shaped piece of plastic with little holes in his face. You picked up a card that had a face on it, and you had to sort through all the face pieces (eyes, noses, beards, etc) and stick them into the holes on the face (Mr Pop). The idea was that you had to match the face on the card with the face on Mr Pop, but if you didn’t do it quick enough, his head sprang forward and all the face pieces went flying up in the air. This used to terrify me as a young child, especially the ticking noise Mr Pop made as he counted down until his face exploded.
If I were to be a serial killer, I’d take my childhood terror of Mr Pop and wreak revenge on society, by killing people, cutting off bits of their faces, then putting them on head-shaped pieces of plastic. Er… or maybe not.
*****
On Friday at work:
Jen: I’m going for a break now.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Ooh, I don’t know about that.
Jen: You can’t stop me.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Why should I let you go on a break?
Jen: Because I work so effeciently.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Hmm. Do you really, honestly, need to go for a break?
Jen: Yes.
Mr Marketing Jnr: Name one reason.
Jen: If you must know, my bladder is full.
Mr Marketing Jnr: That’ll do. Run along now.
*****
I was speaking to Mr Marketing about how I’m putting on a bit of weight (incidentally, I now officially have man boobs).
Mr Marketing: Well, you need to go to the gym. One day you’ll be a super-fit man like me! (flexes muscles)
Me: Hmm. I don’t want to take it over the top.
Mr Marketing: If you want to get fit you have to take it really seriously.
Me: Well, not too seriously.
Mr Marketing: Your loss. (flexes again, and jumps around)
Me: What’s all this? Do you do Tai Bo or something?
Mr Marketing: Actually, yes. I do Tai Bo.
Me: HAHAHAHAHAHA!
Mr Marketing: I’ve got a set of Tai Bo DVD’s.
Me: HAAAAAAHAAAAAAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
*****
On Friday I got a proper security pass at work, now that I’ve been confirmed to work there for at least six more months. I pulled a goofball face when they took my first photo, but they send I couldn’t use that. They said ‘just smile’, so I did, and everyone laughed. Then the security guy said ‘Okay, well, don’t do goofball faces anymore okay?’ The thing was, I wasn’t doing a goofball photo the second time. It was my real smile.
The third photo was a rather detailed picture of my neck. The fourth one was fine, but when they processed the card they spelt my name wrong, so I had to get another one made.
One of the automatic opening doors at work was broken on Friday. It opened at a far slower rate than normal, which was causing people to walk straight into it all day. I was asking the security guys if they had any good security camera footage of people crashing into the doors… apparently they did.
*****
On Friday I was talking about my previous jobs with Mr Marketing Jnr. I was talking mostly about my job at a uni last year, when the Mail Girl overheard me and thought I used to actually study at this uni, rather than work at it.
Me: It wasn’t a bad job, there were lots of courses I learnt about too.
Mail Girl: What’s this? Did you do a course at uni?
Mr Marketing Jnr: Well, obviously she’s done a diploma at uni… a diploma of EAVESDROPPING!
Me: I didn’t actually do a course at uni, I used to work at one.
Mail Girl: Oh, I thought so. Just checking.
Mr Marketing Jnr: She must have PASSED WITH HONOURS…
Me: Why, did you do a course in the UK?
Mail Girl: (doesn’t answer, continues her work)
Me: (repeats question) Did you do a course back at home?
Mail Girl: (no answer)
Me: Hmm, guess she must have deferred her eavesdropping diploma, then.
I’ve noticed people will put their feet up on seats at work. This is cool, at my last job I wasn’t allowed to do this at all. The worst feet-on-couch-phobia person I’ve met was a friend-of-a-friend I stayed with last year on a holiday to Sydney. It was a really nice apartment, but it was stressed to me by his flatmate that you DO NOT PUT YOUR FEET ON THE COUCH OR COFFEE TABLE WHILE HE’S AROUND. Apparently it was okay to do this while he wasn’t around, but if he caught you doing it, he’d come close to passing out.
I totally forgot about the couch rule. The couch phobia man arrived home from his work one night and I had one foot up on the couch and the other on the coffee table. He walked in, then took about three steps back and looked at me in horror as if I’d just thrown a brick at his head.
I wasn’t allowed to sit on the couch after that. (He was gay. Could you guess?)
*****
The most effective way for me to annoy Adam at the moment is to sing Eskimo Joe’s song ‘Turn Up Your Stereo’. That Pepsi ad they’re in really shits him (they basically just sing their song Turn Up Your Stereo). Whenever Adam sees the ad on TV, he sings along, but using his own words:
Fuck off
Fuck off
Fuck off my television
We saw an ad on TV yesterday for the Make A Wish foundation for kids. I believe that this organisation uses its donations to make the wishes of children come true.
Adam: I should ring up the Make A Wish people.
Me: Why, what’s your wish?
Adam: I’d like a million dollars.
Me: I think you’ve got to be a kid. And be really sick.
Adam: Well, if that’s not discrimination, then I don’t know what is.
Me: They usually only give small gifts, anyway. I think.
Adam: Like what?
Me: Like… oh, a trip to the zoo or something.
Adam: A million’s not a lot to ask. If everyone in Australia contributed five cents, then I’d have a million dollars.
Me: You’d have a lot more than a million dollars.
Adam: (bangs fist down) Well THERE YOU BLOODY GO!
Me: Then again, not everyone in Australia has five cents spare to give you.
Adam: Five cents isn’t a lot of money.
Me: To some people it is. The kind of people that count down to every last cent.
Adam: Nah, even homeless people could donate to me.
Me: Homeless people most of all can’t afford to donate five cents to you.
Adam: What do homeless people do all day? Walk around asking for money. I’m sure they can find some spare to give to me.
