This Stupid Pineapple is...

... Finally beginning to understand where pineapple juice comes from.

"Ohmygodohmygodohmygod!"

As mentioned Wednesday, today is Briane Pagel's Stupid Pineapple blogfest. Not only does he host the thing, he is giving out prizes - choosing to do so in a manner so hopelessly complicated that he might as well just give it to whomever he feels like. Anyhow, if you want to know who's entered and all that I'd recommend you check out his twitter feed, because I'm not sure if there is an official list anywhere. It's kind of like a secret blogfest I suppose.

Anyhow, without any further delay, my completely fictional account of a the stupid pineapple which again, is not based on a true story. This did not happen to me at work yesterday, as I am a human, not a pineapple.

The Stupid Pineapple lost my his headphones yesterday at work. Now, he hates having nice things because he hates worrying about and being stressed over his nice things. But one area he decided not to skimp on was his earphones. He plunked down a cool hundred bucks for some nice earbuds that block out most noise when they're in, and produce quality sound. He listens to them a lot. He loves them. They complete him.

Yesterday, just as The Stupid Pineapple was getting ready to go for a walk somewhere on my his lunch hour, he realized his headphones were missing. He checked under some loose papers at his desk. Nothing. He checked in his junk drawer at work. Nothing. He checked his coat pockets. Nothing.

He tried to recap his morning: He came in, he had been wearing them when he got to work, he took them off once he got there and had an impromptu cleaning session. after which he threw away his cleaning materials.

Wait, had he seen my his headphones since then? No, no he had not. He looked in his wastebasket only to find it entirely empty. The custodian had already been by and taken the trash. The bastard.

He ran around the floor looking for him for a few minutes until he found him. He asked to see the trash the custodian had just picked up. "Sorry dude, I just took it to the basement to be put in the dumpster."

Well, shit. He made his way all the way down to the basement with the custodian and found that the items had been put in the 'pre-dumpster.' That is a word he just made up to describe what it is, they dump all the collected trash in these giant bins to wait for someone later in the day to haul them out to the compacter on the loading dock. The trash wasn't in a real dumpster, but whatever. It's a giant thing full of trash.

He had the custodian show him the bag. How he could tell which one was his out of all those bags was beyond the Stupid Pineapple, as they all looked identical to him. But he was stupid, so he figured the custodian knew. He tore open the bag he was told contained his trash it, was one of those giant lawn bags and he couldn't get it untied, so he just ripped it apart. He dug in with gusto. He found not one, but TWO pair of headphones in the bag - neither of them were his though - and found lots of food, pasta, tomato sauce, mustard, tons of used kleenex, lots and lots of paperwork.

The paperwork gave it away, It was all from a different department than the stupid Pineapple worked in. "Hey," the Stupid Pineapple said, "Do you pick up trash from any other departments?"

"Nope, just yours."

Well, m#^%^#&$ker. He ripped open the wrong effen bag. All that dried snot and half eaten food he'd been diving through was the wrong bag. "Why don't you just go? I think I'll rummage through the trash alone now," the Stupid Pineapple said.

He left, and the Stupid Pineapple dug into another bag. This one was paydirt. It had oatmeal all over it, yummy. He was so glad it was lunch time. There were all sorts of other things, he found a pair of shoes, a really nice lunchbox, and some more snotty kleenex, it was flu season. No headphones though.

Eventually, he gave up. he went to the bathroom and scrubbed up like a doctor going to surgery. He washed and washed and washed. He leaned over the bathroom sink and stared at myself himself as he washed away the filth. He was trying to think of how he could tell his wife that those ridiculously expensive headphones that he just had to have were now lost forever when he noticed a small bulge in his front shirt pocket.

Oh, there they are.

Dumbass. He was a truly, deeply, stupid pineapple.

The end.

Anyhow, if anyone is curious as to what I had for dinner on Tuesday evening. You can find that by clicking...HERE.

Insecure Writers - February Edition

There are several things going on today that I’d like to mention.

First! I mentioned on Monday that if anyone managed to sit through all those videos I posted I’d make a big deal about it today. Well, congrats to Gail who patronized me by watching them all. She was too pooped to really have thoughts about it. But hey, she was like a marathoner that wouldn’t quit.Alex emailed me later and mentioned that he watched them all (and that doesn’t mean he watched his own five times either, I asked). But beyond that I’m not sure anyone else was able to hang in there for all of them.

If I missed anyone please let me know, I didn’t leave anyone out on purpose. Some of the comments were a little dodgy on the topic.

Second, the legal whiz, Briane Pagel, came up with an idea for what is perhaps the greatest blogfest ever devised. Where he got the idea is beyond me, because it’s amazing. On Friday you need to write something about a pineapple, you can read about it here, I’m not actually sure about the details, as the rules read much like a calculus final, but I figure that if I post something about pineapples the rest will take care of itself.

And I signed up for the A-Z blogging challenge in April, it’s pretty much the greatest blogfest ever devised… wait, why does that sound familiar to me? Regardless, I’m pretty sure it’s the biggest. The day after it went live it already had several hundred folks signed up. Look, April is going to be a lonely month if you don’t plan on being a part of it. So hop in and go with it. You can sign up here.

What else? Oh, today is Insecure Writers group – February edition. Thanks again to Alex J Cavanaugh for creating the group.

And I've got so many insecurities I’m afraid some of them even contradict one another. You know, like suffering from agoraphobia and claustrophobia at the same time. I’m the kind of person that wants to do everything, and I mean everything, myself. Which is why I always feel vaguely ashamed if I have to ask for someone’s help on anything I produce.

How far does that go? Well, let’s just say that I do my digital painting in photoshop – I feel like I’m cheating because I didn’t write the code myself. When I draw on a piece of paper I’m always wondering if I should have made the paper myself, from a tree that I grew from a seedling.

Sigh. I know, it’s a problem. Ironically, I love collaborative efforts, I only get that way about things that will only have my name on them and no one else’s. Am I the only one who struggles with this? Have I invented a  disorder? This rears its ugly head in me when I get editing or critiquing help from others as well. Like, if I put a period at the end of that sentence then all of a sudden it's not really my work anymore. I recognize that it's ridiculous, but that doesn't change how it feels to me.

Oh well, thanks everyone.