The Clumsiest Day of My Life, So Far…6 min read

Important note: I saw a dingo on a recent trip to Frasier island (which will be the subject of my next post coincidently) and named it Lia.

Writing to you from a place where I saw “A stray Lia”,

Waking up yesterday, I thought to myself, as I try to do every morning: “Another beautiful sexy day for me to love. Can’t wait to bask in it’s company”. Well, let me tell you yesterday was a dirty strumpet and I never want to see her again.

It all started when I popped into work for my shift. Sidebar: I recently got a job at the restaurant directly across the street, The Caxton, as a waiter to accumulate some extra scratch… Yeah, thought I would try that word out. It’s not working. Don’t worry. I won’t use it again. Promise. What was I thinking…

In any case, I knew I was walking up a slippery slope when I was trying to get some knifes from a drawer to set up some tables when I managed to… How to put this… Pull the drawer out of its socket, making it plummet to the floor along with about a hundred clean knifes. BAH! I JUST POLISHED THESE LAST NIGHT! This may not seem like a major event to you… Big deal, right? A couple knifes on the floor… WRONG. At this restaurant, after the cutlery is washed, every single piece is hand polished and I absolutely despise having to dedicate my smooth, soothing touch to this activity. That’s right ladies… Oh man I’m creepy. Suffice to say I produced a good 20-30 minute chunk of polishing work.

But it doesn’t stop there. A footy team (don’t ask me what that is because I am all confused about sports here… All I ever see on TV is what I define as rugby yet I have never heard anyone utter the word rugby since I’ve been here) had reserved a part of the restaurant for a function and so we had to set up the restaurant to accommodate such an event; move tables, plastic plants, chairs, etc. Well, about halfway through the set up, my trustworthy pants abused the trust I had instilled in them by deciding to explode at the ass seam when I bent over to grab a plastic plant. Imagine the biggest rip you’ve ever had in your pants. Done? Good. Now double its length and you’re probably close to the size of the rip I had down the middle of the back of my pants. I’m really glad I decided not to go with the theme these plastic plants I was moving reminded me of: commando. So I took my break, after being laughed at by the staff, to run home and try to fix these pants and go back to work. Handy living across the street!

After about 15 minutes of trying to thread the needle with no avail, let’s just say my regular eloquent speech took a backseat to more raw emotional verbage. That’s right, verbage. Renn, my roommate, asked for a try and got it on the first try. WHY DO MY FINGERS HAVE THE DEXTERITY OF A LOAF OF BREAD TODAY?! It’s like trying to thread a needle with chopsticks… I then proceeded to sew up the pants and SOMEHOW, the needle broke in half…

…

Let’s be polite here. The pants were thrown with vigor. Renn offered to lend me another pair of pants. I accepted and went back to work taking a few deep breaths.

As I got there, the diner service was about to start and a few things were left to be done: amongst other things, filling up stations across the restaurant with cutlery. “Yeah, I’m up for it.” Carrying the cutlery bucket with these wooden pirate stubs I had for arms, I set it down on the corner station only to have it lose balance and fall to the floor along with half of its contents. I will spare mentioning the angst this created as it has been mentioned but by this point, I reached a mental state of frustration and disempowerment only equaled when you get kicked in the genitalia. I then heard someone in the vicinity remark: “That’s the second time you do that today.” Yes. Yes it is. I’m glad someone is keeping count. Maybe I can take a stab at the record.

The rest of the shift went fine, but was overshadowed by my kicked in the balls feeling. I got home a couple hours later, nobody was home. Thank god this day is over. I did not know at this point that it in fact wasn’t over. Seriously. I went to the cupboard to take out a bag of cookies I was aching for. It was sealed. I, like any normal person, grabbed onto each side of the bag and pulled to open it. The part that separates me from mere mortals is that my arms generate super strength that explode bags and sprinkle cookies all over the living room. I have never seen a firework filled with cookies but I’m pretty sure that the closest thing to it I’ll ever see. I was planning on going to bed, but that was the thing that did it. I JUST WANT A COOKIE! In anger, I found the closest cookie to me and smooshed it with my foot. THERE! TAKE THAT! I immediately realized that I had crushed a cookie with my foot and started laughing… Scrunch it all to hell, I’m going for a beer with the roommates.

On my second beer, I unconsciously decided that I would rather have it on the floor than in my belly. Those rakes I was using as arms and flailing about as I expressed myself about how defective and dysfunctional my day had been, caught my glass and the sweet golden liquid it was containing fell to a “pavmenty” death. THAT’S IT! Crummiest, most dissatisfactory, junkiest, substandard day that I can ever remember having.

Although looking back on it, it was a fine day in the grand scheme of things… I think what made it crappy was that the little things got to me.

Lessons reminded: Don’t sweat the small stuff. And it’s all small stuff. Also, never underestimate Murphy’s Law. Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.

Oh, and to be clear… I had a cookie off the floor. It was inevitable.

Thanks for reading,

Joey Jo Jo

Last Updated on December 22, 2020 by Joël Collin-Demers