Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Really?!?


Like many of you out there, I am employed by Baby Boomers. It's not my choice, but you know how they are...clinging by tooth and nail to the last vestiges of their authority like a nun with her virginity (OK, bad example, but you know what I mean). The trouble with this scenario is that most Gen X'ers and Millennials are actually quite logical creatures and Baby Boomers are, well, NOT.

Exhibit A: I was employed by one law firm (strike one, Baby Boomers, strike two, Lawyers...) where they said they offered "Casual Fridays" to their hard-working employees as some kind of inadequate compensation and morale booster. It didn't work, but that's a whole other story. Anyway, the rule was we could wear jeans, they just couldn't be...BLUE.

If that makes sense to you, you're a Baby Boomer. I mean, the assumption when you say 'jeans' is that they'll be blue. If they're black, red, white, or any other colour, then so be it, but logically, you would assume that allowing your employees to wear jeans to work on a Friday would inherently translate into said jeans being BLUE.

Exhibit B: I recently became eligible to take advantage of health benefits at the office where I currently work. These so-called benefits include eye exams, but they do not - DO NOT - include eyeglasses. Apparently, it hasn't occurred to my Baby Boomer employers and administrators of the health care plan that were I of the belief that I needed to get my eyes examined, that it might follow LOGICALLY that I would then need eyeglasses to correct any vision problems which might be discovered in said eye exam.

Health care plan, my eyeball. The plan is this: let's f**k with our employees' heads. Cheap-ass Baby Boomers.

Exhibit C: The Baby Boomer generation, for the most part, had the benefit of enjoying muscle cars when those cars were still relatively new models. One of their only worthwhile contributions, though the resultant hole in our Ozone Layer is a regrettable side effect of the consumption of fossil fuels necessary to enjoy such a pastime. Anyway... You were there when the muscle cars were king. And now that the muscle car has made a bit of a comeback in the new Mustangs, Vipers and for a limited time at least, the Corvette, you're buying them up again because, let's face it, you're the only ones who can afford such luxuries, ya money-grubbing Yuppies.

Trouble is, now you're too old for them and you don't even know it. This morning's commute to work I was privileged enough to see a Dodge Viper in front of me. A real thing of beauty to any car enthusiast. I expected the driver to be most in appreciation of this fine feat of automotive engineering but alas, I was wrong. I managed to keep up with Mr. Dodge Viper and immediately was able to assess that this car has fallen tragically into the wrong hands. Baby Boomer driver. What a waste. Not only was my 22-year-old 2.9L V6 able to keep up with this poor vehicle, I was...ohmigod I can barely bring myself to say this...I was able to PASS IT EFFORTLESSLY.

Were this a rare occurrence, I would think nothing of it, but it's not. If you have the money to buy a powerful vehicle like a Dodge Viper, then let it be known that if you let a rusted out, gutless, 2.9L V6 Bronco II (TWO!!!) pass you, the Muscle Car Gods will not be kind to you at all during the afterlife. In fact, you're not even worthy of a ritual sacrifice.

Baby Boomers, no amount of Viagra or Cialis will give you the balls you need to grow back in order to be worthy enough to drive such a vehicle. Just step aside now and save us the trouble of pushing you out of our way later.

For the record, my gutless 2.9L V6 Bronco II is simply a winter-beater. When I'm the age the Baby Boomers are now, you can be certain of one thing: I will, if I haven't wrapped it around a telephone pole by that time, be driving a kick-ass full-size Bronco and well, let's just say, if you hear it, GET THE HELL OUT OF THE WAY!

Exhibit C: The Baby Boomer Lawyer I work for...what can I say? Let's call him Humpty. One year he decides to imbibe a bit much and ends up making a fateful decision to fix his roof. The inevitable happened. I mean, even a drunk Baby Boomer would see it coming a mile away. But oh no, not Humpty. Anyway, yes, he fell off the roof and broke his hip. Does he immediately seek medical attention. Get real. Let's see if it'll heal on it's own, he says in his cataracted mind.

Long story short: Humpty got his hip replaced.

Following year, Humpty having not yet learned how to take care of his health (a Baby Boomer affliction - see my previous entries regarding their apparent addiction to all manner of medical services), suffers a heart attack and ends up getting open heart surgery. One would have thought this would be a wake-up call and then some and for anyone but a Baby Boomer, it would have been, but let's not forget which demographic into which Humpty falls.

This year, Humpty having once again NOT learned his lesson, suffers a stroke. Again, the wake-up call was apparently 'disconnected' and so he's back at work far too soon for anyone's liking but his own, but he's clearly NOT firing on all cylinders and even complained to me yesterday about having to mix his cold meds with his heart meds. Quite a cocktail.

You hear that sucking sound, Xers and Millennials? That's your health care running dry and guess who you have to thank for that.

So the moral of this little story is, if you can't take care of yourself, how the hell do you expect to take care of your car?

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Work Shmerk

Here's the primary difference between Baby Boomers and everyone else born since their Reign of Terror began:

The rest of us don't define ourselves by our jobs. They do. It's as simple as that. To them, flipping burgers at McDonald's would be a "Career". To us, it's a paycheque till we can find something better.

WE are totally not cool with the whole "sacrifice our lives in favour of the 60-70 hour workweek" thing. Neither are we cool with the idea of doing just that for what, 30 years (longer for us, thanks to your absorption of any government pension funds and health care we might have enjoyed had you lot not come along...thanks to the Boomers, we have to work longer just to make sure we can survive the retirement we will probably never get. Bitter? Oh...a TAD!) or so, only to wake up one day in our declining years wondering why our kids and spouses don't want anything to do with us. Wow. Can't imagine why, huh?

The conundrum is how it happened to you in the first place what with all your protests in the '60s about free love, freedom of this, freedom of that. Freedom isn't free, my friends. Turns out, you CAN'T have it all. For what you want most, there must be sacrifices made. In the case of many Baby Boomers, they've sacrificed entirely the wrong things.

Regardless, my point is this: while we may never successfully achieve the balance between work and life, we strive to find it. We don't perceive our jobs as the definition of who we are as people. You think St. Peter - or whomever is waiting for you on the other side of this life - really gives a fig how much money you made for your nameless, faceless corporation? At the end of that you get what, a gold watch, maybe a pat on the back, an empty house and loveless marriage. Awesome.

The way you gotta look at it is this: if you're doing it for money, then you're just whoring yourself out anyway. May as well spend the time and energy on what you REALLY love, and do only your mediocre best at work. You know. Just enough to say that you did something, but not enough where you're so tapped that you have nothing left for the really important things in your life. And while you're at it, try and get as much money as you can, i.e. match the dough with the ho.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Completely unrelated to anything heretofore said...

Just wanting to make the readers of this blog aware of a couple things...

First of all, much like the Scotland Homecoming going on this year, there's also a much smaller celebration going on in Brigus, Newfoundland, regarding a lesser known, but still important, anniversary:

Check it out:

http://www.bartlett2009.com/about.asp

But if you're more interested in checking out your Scottish roots and feel the pull of your ancestors, you can figure a way to get there from here:

http://www.cometoscotland.ca/