humour

#401: SIGHTING! Rasputin & the Hobbit

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#401: SIGHTING! Rasputin & the Hobbit

A few weeks ago, Mrs. LeBrain was feeling generous and treated me to a rare breakfast at McDonalds.  We don’t go very often, but our closest McDonalds has a “freestyle machine” allowing you to create any number of soft drink combinations, a really cool draw.  It was my buddy Craig who hyped the machine to me – “The closest thing we have to Cherry Coke Zero in Harperland,” he says.  Plus the egg McMuffin is only 290 calories; I know that because of the ad that runs endlessly every night on TV!

We sat down with our McMuffins and breakfast burritos, but as I was picking a table, something caught my eye.  It’s not often that I recognize my old Record Store customers in public, but how could I forget Rasputin and the Hobbit?

T-Rev and I shared the story of these two gross individuals in Part 276 of the original Record Store Tales.  “HH was known for her outrageous makeup,” I said.  She was also known for riding a bike in a short skirt, on her way to sell us some crappy dance CDs.  “The ‘Hobbit’ with ripped nylons and the short skirt with her ass hanging out…yuck!” remembered T-Rev.   Rasputin was the silent type.  He would merely nod yes or shake his head no, at whatever offer we had given them for their CDs.  I don’t know if I have ever heard him speak.

It was actually Rasputin (“Razzy” for short) I spotted first.  You just don’t forget a guy who looks like that.  Shaggy unkempt black beard, same with the hair.  It was him, which by process of elimination meant his companion was HH the Hobbit.  She has changed a bit, but not entirely.  The makeup and short skirts are gone, but she still possesses the gross-out factor.  When I sat down, her bare feet were in Razzy’s lap, right in the McDonalds.   It was like that train wreck that I couldn’t look away from.  I noticed Razzy was wearing dress shoes with no socks.  Just like the old days, Hobbit did all the talking.  Her voice was unmistakable.

I managed to get a couple pictures.  Not of her feet in his lap, but I did acquire photographic proof that Rasputin the Mad Monk, and HH the Hobbit, are still alive and well in Kitchener Ontario.

#391: Nicknames II

A sequel to Part 230: Nicknames.

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#391: Nicknames II

Every workplace has its nicknames. At my current job one of my nicknames is “Ernie” (as in Bert & Ernie, another guy is Bert). Another one is “Hermey” due to a perceived resemblance to one of Santa’s elves in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  My most well known nickname is of course LeBrain, which originated on the radio.  I solved one of Craig Fee’s 4 O’clock 4-Play on Dave FM in record time.  Craig said, “Check out the brain on Mike Ladano! Mike ‘LeBrain’!”  The name stuck.

Here is a second selection of favourite nicknames from the Record Store days and beyond!

  • Goggles Pizano – Taken from an episode of The Flintstones, this name was given to the store owner when he got some new glasses.
  • Lynie-Lynie-Boing-Boing – A term of endearment I used for one of our store managers named Lyne.
  • Seven – A nickname given to me by Jen’s best friend Lara. There’s a whole story about this one, a painful story!*
  • Time Traveler – This odd fellow ordered some CDs, and left a business phone number to contact him at during the days. When called, he always answered “Time travel.” I don’t know what that business was, we never asked, so we just called him “Time Traveler”!
  • Scottish Man – A Scottish man who sold CDs.
  • Cow Man – A name given to Wiseman, by Joe Big Nose (another nickname!) due to his sideburns which apparently gave him a cow-like appearance.
  • Snake Face/Cobra Commander – Similar to above. A nickname given to a staff member because apparently his hair gave him a cobra-like cowl.
  • LeCock – I was dubbed with this name by a frustrated Dave FM listener who failed to guess a 4-O’clock 4-Play!  Burn!

LECOCK *Saving this for its own installment.

#385: The Epic of the Garlic Sausage Apocalypse

STOPARRETPROCEED WITH CAUTION

SMOKED SAUSAGE

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#385: The Epic of the Garlic Sausage Apocalypse

I have been sitting on this story for five years. Now, the true tale can finally be told.

Some folks don’t like their mother-in-law. I do! I am very lucky to have a great, generous and fun mother-in-law. She’s also very proper and old fashioned, Mrs. LeBrain’s Mom, so sometimes she will be easily shocked. For example, she refuses to say the word “fart”, considering is as vulgar as another f-word. Instead she prefers the word “puup”. A word she used frequently during the night of the Garlic Sausage Apocalypse.

She had come to spend the weekend, visiting us in our little apartment. It might be small but it’s usually big enough for the three of us. Not on the weekend of the Garlic Sausage Apocalypse.

Jen and her mom went to the Kitchener farmer’s market that morning and picked up some goodies. The apple fritters there are excellent, especially when still warm, so they picked up two boxes of those. Fresh veggies, fresh meat, all natural unpasteurized local apple cider, and four huge links of smoked garlic sausage (about two pounds of meat, garlic and spices). It was, as they say, the proverbial successful trip. Much of the time they are sold out of that garlic sausage. I immediately tucked into a full link and called it lunch. I ate close to half a box of apple fritters and called that dessert.

By the end of the day, I had almost finished two links of delicious smoked kilbassa by myself. Jen and her mom were watching something on TV, but I was feeling a bit gassy to say the least. Given the contents of my stomach, fermenting and being transformed by bacteria into a lovely melange of methane, you could smell me every time I had to let one go. The farts were frequent and supercharged. Whatever pills we had in the house were not helping. And like I said earlier, it’s a small apartment.

The explosions were occurring approximately every five minutes. To me, all I could smell was the fondly remembered scent of garlic, pork and methane. All Jen and her mom could smell was rotting death-like fumes of evil. And they were all coming from my ass! Jen threatened to get on a bus and “buy a cork”. Of the two of them, Jen was definitely the most offended. “This is the last time we are bringing you garlic sausage I swear to God!” There was nothing I could do to stop it. Leaving the room to evacuate my colon of gas didn’t help; the mere act of getting up and moving was enough to squeeze one out. Faced with a lack of options (and starting to feel a little queezy myself) I called it an early night and went to bed.

SAUSAGE LEBRAIN

The next part of this story has been assembled from testimony by Jen and her mother.

Mrs. LeBrain and her mom watched television peacefully after I retired for the evening. I was asleep quickly, but the body continues to digest your food and expel gas even after you fall asleep. Whether your spouses believe you or not, people do fart in their sleep, and my ass quickly turned the bedroom into a chemistry lab gone awry.

A short while later, in the living room, Mrs. LeBrain’s Mom smelled something. Sniffing the air for a clue, she was repelled by the odour.

“Jennifer! Did you just puup?”

“No mom,” replied Jen, but picking up the scent as well. “I thought it was you but I didn’t want to say anything!”

“Then what is that gawd-forsaken smell??” queried her mom.

Jen knew but did not want to face the truth. “Oh God! It’s Mike!”

“Isn’t the bedroom door closed?” asked her mom.

“YES! Oh God. I have to sleep in there!”

Jen and her mom discussed the situation but agreed that there was only one couch large enough to comfortably sleep on. Her mom is very wise, and knew how to deal with the situation. “Just put some perfume on your arm,” she advised. “When you go to bed, just sleep with your arm near your nose, and that will help.” Good advice, but it was not enough to protect her from the stench.

When it was bed time for Jen, she took a deep breath, held it and entered the Den of Death.

SAUSAGE

I guess the old perfume on the arm trick worked in the long run, because she did fall asleep. Meanwhile, I was oblivious to all of this, happily dreaming of guitars and lightsabers.  When I woke up on Sunday morning, I had no idea that anything was amiss.

It only took me one second to realize something was very wrong.  The bedroom was filled with a heavy, pungent cloud.  It had penetrated every cubic inch of the room; it was inescapable.  It was also immediately identifiable as the scent of garlic, sausage, and my intestines.  And it was still being produced, I discovered, as I tooted once more upon leaving the bed.

I went about my morning business and settled into the computer room to check my email.  I was only appalled further when I ascertained that the entire house smelled of garlic sausage sphincters. It wasn’t as intense as the bedroom, but it was detectable in the air.

It may have been winter, but I cracked the window in the computer room and began the fumigation process.

What of Jen and her mom? They did survive, although neither of them really know how they did it. The inner strength of those two women must have carried them through the night. In the morning, they implemented a two-year ban on buying garlic sausage. I can’t say that I disagreed with their ruling, in light of all the horrible evidence surrounding us!

Kenny Vs. Spenny episode season 4 ep. 2 – “Who Can Blow the Biggest Fart?” – a must see companion piece to my true and horrifying story.

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#384: The Messenger

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#384: The Messenger

I hate computer instant messenger services!  Actual conversation from the Record Store circa 2004-ish:

MSNBoss – “Mike, I’ve heard that you are using MSN Messenger at work against store policy.”

Me – “What?  No, that’s wrong.  I don’t even use MSN Messenger.”

Boss – “Are you calling the person who told me a liar?”

Me – “I guess so.  Who told you?”

Boss – “I’m not telling you that.  This your verbal warning.  If I hear about this again you’re getting a written warning.”

Me – “But that’s not fair, they’re wrong.  It wasn’t me!  I don’t even like MSN!”

Boss – “I don’t believe you. I think you are lying to me.  The other person has no reason to lie.”

So that one unfairly went on my record, and I maintain to this day that I HATED MSN MESSENGER!  If you’ve used it, you know what I’m talking about.  I had signed up for an account, but I found it to have no benefits and provided nothing but distraction.  Below, you will find an example of what it’s like to try and write (or do anything) with MSN Messenger on.

“It was a dark, stormy night on the coastline of the small uninhabited…” [MSN BEEP!] “…island.  The man wore a thin coat that did not protect him…” [BEEP!] [BEEP!] “…from the rain.  He dragged through the mud a large [BEEP!] canvas duffle bag that [BEEP!] was already soaked completely [BEEP!] through to its contents. The man shuffled onwards, awkwardly [BEEP!] pulling the load behind [BEEP!] him.  He grimaced as he readjusted his [BEEP!] GODDAMN THIS MSN I SWEAR TO GOD I WILL PUNCH THE MONITOR IF IT BEEPS ONE MORE DAMN TIME!”

I don’t remember who talked me into signing up for MSN in the first place, but it was probably some girl that I was interested in at the time.  Once set up, my computer signed me in automatically at every boot, because I never figured out how to disable it afterwards.  Indeed, our store tech guy couldn’t even disable it on our work computers.  He could hide it and prevent it from starting at setup, but he couldn’t completely delete it from Windows.  Thanks, Microsoft.  The only employee that I knew for certain used it at work was Spoogecakes, who left herself logged in one day after her shift!

I did use email at work (just like the same bosses did) against store policy.  But MSN?  Hell no!  The reason I know that is that I hate MSN Messenger to this day, just like I hate chickpeas or lentils!  I had one, just like all the cool kids, but the sound of that “MSN beep” is still enough to make me jump out of my chair.

I couldn’t make it all the way through this video.

#377: The Iron Age of Computing

OLD PC MONITOR

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#377: The Iron Age of Computing

In 1995, the year after I started at the Record Store, we opened our first used CD store that wasn’t run entirely by a cash register. For the first time, the store had a computer, and computerized inventory! We then expanded to a third store in 1996 (the one that I managed), and this time we were going to try something new – two computers! Imagine that? In 1996, having two computers in the same store seemed like a luxury! This way, one computer could act as a cash register, while the other one was used to look up and input new inventory. In theory!

Our software was written completely in-house. Today if you want to open up a retail store, you would buy a point of sale software (POS) system. Not us; ours was entirely home grown by one guy, the uncle of the owner! I believe it was a massive long term undertaking. Meanwhile, staff members input all of the inventory manually – thousands of items.

It’s really funny to look back on this period from today’s point of view. I was not very computer literate but I learned quick. I remember that networking the two computers was a nightmare. It took months for him to get it working with our software. Everything seemed so fragile. If you sneezed funny, you could freeze the computers. By comparison to today it felt like the stone ages. We had no email, no internet, and the actual machines were not what you’d call top of the line even for back then.

Common problems we used to run into back in the day:

  • Backing the memory up. We started with a disc drive, then a tape drive, and finally a second hard drive. It used to take so long to back up our inventory every night (particularly in the tape days) that we just stopped doing it. Nobody was going to stay an hour late (unpaid) to watch this thing backup and make sure it didn’t crash. No way!
  • Inventory would disappear, or just be inaccessible. Nothing like coming in on a weekend morning to find out you can’t access the inventory! This happened due to one file that used to regularly corrupt. If a customer came in with a big box of CDs to sell, we had no choice but to run up and down along the shelves to see if we had copies of them. Couldn’t look them up any other way.
  • Running slooooow. Unfortunately customers used to take this out on the staff. I remember one of our staff, a really sweet girl named Caitlin, had just started and she was dealing with a really nasty woman. At that moment the computer decided to take a siesta. Caitlin said to the woman, “I’m sorry, my computer is running really slow.” The woman responded, “Well do something about it because I am running really fast.” Thanks for the understanding, lady.
  • We discovered that you could not input CDs on two computers at once. They would conflict with each other and give you an error.

Every few years, one of the computers would be replaced. Not with a new one, but usually with another old one that was still superior to whatever we were running. Then a year or two after that, the other computer would be replaced, and we’d keep upgrading like that without ever really running anything brand new.  But we made it work. Rivals would have loved to get their hands on our software, or our master CD pricing catalogue. The master catalogue was painstakingly inputted by just one individual. A hell of a lot of typing and hard work!*

We did the best we could with what we had available at the time. It’s absolutely incredible how much the technology has changed. My cellphone today has more computing power than our first point of sale system. Where did the time go?

*The inputting of the master catalog indirectly triggered my first experience with workplace bullying, something I have been hesitant to speak out about.  Even though it was many years ago, it’s not a good memory.  The story has been written, but it remains in the draft stage and will remain there for the time being.

#375: VH Predictions FAIL!

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#375: VH Predictions FAIL!

I like to think I’m such a know-it-all. Higher-than-thou, my musical knowledge trumps yours, etc. However when I’m wrong (it happens frequently), sometimes I’m colossally wrong.  Below is an example of me being completely, 100% totally wrong.  Although I’m glad I was.  When the Van Halen reunion with David Lee Roth was announced, I believed it would not last long.  I took the time to write out this list below.  With the live album coming, and the hot rumours of another tour, this is a great time to showcase one of my most colossal failures as a clairvoyant.

VH

Date: 2007/02/08 07:10

TOP TEN REASONS WHY THE =VH= VAN HALEN REUNION TOUR WILL GO DOWN IN FLAMES

10. Wolfgang Van Halen on bass means that there are three Van Halens in the band vs. one Lee Roth. David will feel outnumbered at every turn.

9. Wolfgang Van Halen, a 15 year old kid, is an untested property. Will it sound like the same band without the very recognizable Michael Anthony on bass?

8. No new songs, no new album, just another greatest hits (the third and most obvious rip off for your money). [NOTE: at the time Van Halen were planning to release a “best of DLR-era” CD, which was thankfully cancelled.]

7. David Lee Roth’s voice has been utterly destroyed since about 1991.

6. Eddie Van Halen is but a shadow of the man he once was. A raging alcoholic surrounded by yes-men, his guitar playing hasn’t touched upon brilliance in almost a decade. Throw his 15 year old son into the alcoholic tour and you have recipe for disaster.

5. Roth and the VH brothers haven’t gotten along in decades. The fact that the brothers recently attempted–and failed at–a reunion with Sammy Hagar before this indicates that this is a last-ditch effort to save the band. Not exactly the kind of motive to make a reunion happen.

4. Roth will say and do what he wants, much to the chagrin of the ultra-controlling VH brothers.

3. Alex VH’s spinal problems, while not heavily discussed, are probably only getting worse with time.

2. 40 dates isn’t much of a tour for a band of this stature.

1. Classic VH = Edward Van Halen, Alex Van Halen, David Lee Roth, and Michael Anthony. Without Anthony, this is not classic Van Halen. This is in effect the fourth version of the band. VH-IV, if you like. That isn’t what I wanted to see on tour this summer.

I am glad to be have been proven wrong on this one. Van Halen has defied the odds and my predictions. I couldn’t be happier about it.

TV REVIEW: Top Gear – Bolivia Special (2009)

“Sticking to the code of the Top Gear brotherhood, I left James and Richard behind.” — Jeremy Clarkson

TOP GEAR – Bolivia Special (2009 BBC, 76 minutes)

I wanted to review an episode of Top Gear that had something to do with music, which isn’t hard since so many rock and pop stars from Ronnie Wood to Ed Sheeran have been on the show.  My favourite recurring Top Gear gag involved tormenting Richard Hammond with Genesis music, whom he despises.  Specially, the song “I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe)” from Selling England by the Pound is frequently played as torture. I chose the Top Gear Bolivia special to review as it is especially funny, breathtaking and interesting through its entire length. I realized though, that the Genesis gag was not used in this special, thus negating any real music connection in this review (aside from James May’s nickname “Ted Nugent”).  So, here is the Genesis track, and I’ll review the episode anyway!

Skip to about 1:30 to hear Hammond’s “favourite” part

The challenge: Each man must purchase a car for less than £3,500, sight unseen, from a local Bolivian website.  They are advised to buy four-wheel-drive vehicles, to take them from a river in the middle of the Amazon, to Chile and the Pacific coast. It is a 1000 mile journey through jungle, desert, and bad roads.  The most dangerous road in the world, in fact — the infamous Death Road.

Jeremy Clarkson chose a Range Rover classic, Richard Hammond a Toyota Land Cruiser, and James May a Suzuki.  They are sent to the start point of the journey by boat, but the cars have not yet arrived.  The three are like fish completely out of water.  James May is not an outdoorsman, Hammond is afraid of insects, and Jeremy is allergic to hard labour.  They are, according to Clarkson, “the three worst explorers in history”, and they have been dumped on a riverbank in the middle of nowhere.

May:  “Since we didn’t know what to do, we sat down, and did nothing.”

The cars are sent to them by barge, with no apparent way to offload them to land.  Immediately it’s obvious that the guys may have bought lemons.  May’s car isn’t in the advertised colour, but worse, has no air in the tires.  Clarkson’s doesn’t have the engine it was advertised to have, leaving him with a less powerful 3.5L.  Hammond’s Toyota has been customized by hand into a convertible!

The Range Rover scores an early victory, when they use it to pull Jeremy out of the mud that he was standing (and sinking) in.  Much to everyone’s delight, the car actually started!  It is the Toyota that fails to start, an embarrassing beginning for the diminutive Hammond.  The following day, they figure out how to get the vehicles off the barge, on the ground, and running more or less properly, but it’s good fun watching them learn by trial and error!  It takes three days of hacking and slashing with machetes through the jungle, just to get to a road.  Clarkson is pleased to have bought “the only 1980’s Range Rover in the world, that works.”  Though he can’t say the same for any of his gauges.

Hammond on the other hand says that he has “bought the only malfunctioning Land Cruiser in the world.”  He has no brakes, and no gauges.  May’s Suzuki is small but sturdy.  Through it all, the three are always entertaining, picking on one another and always looking for an advantage.  They are quick to mock the Range Rover when it is first to break down (a piece of bamboo through the fan, destroying it).  Clarkson will have none of criticism, calling the Range Rover “the hero of the day”, and rightly pointing out that it was the Rover that got the other two off the barge.

Clarkson: “We passed the time by bickering, until the engine cooled down.”

Breaking down, getting stuck, it’s all in a day’s pay for the Top Gear three.  Through it the audience at home gets to see the innards of the Amazon in sparkling hi-def.  The jungle is beautiful, vibrant, and dangerous.  Roads come to sudden ends, rivers appear in the middle of nowhere, and the insects are always biting.  Mishaps are constant.  Clarkson accidentally sets fire to Hammond’s soft top while cutting vents in his own hood to keep his engine cool.

The biggest visual spectacle is the infamous Death Road, on the way to La Paz.  This road, which claims hundreds of lives every year, is best described as a little notch carved into the side of a cliff face.  And it’s the only highway between the Amazon and the major hub of La Paz, which means sometimes cars have to pass each other on this one-lane strip of dirt.  Breathtaking, terrifying…and James May is deathly afraid of heights.

As per usual, the men customize their vehicles, when they finally hit La Paz intact.  They must prepare for a desert journey through one of the driest places on earth — where it has never rained, and nothing can survive.  (“Richard Hammond was the smallest living organism for miles.” — Clarkson.) For desert traction, Clarkson and Hammond raise their vehicles and install larger tires, but this does not turn out to be the advantage they hoped for.  May, meanwhile just repaired his car (a faulty alternator) rather than change it.  But they can’t handle the lack of oxygen at 16,000 feet above sea level and are forced to turn back, and take a longer route to the Pan-America highway.  The Toyota suffers numerous breakdowns, while the Range Rover, “the world’s most unreliable car,” is the most reliable.  As for the challenge, it remains gripping right to the end.  It could have been anyone’s race.

In the end, I think Jeremy Clarkson said it best:

“It is incredible to think that these cheap cars, bought unseen on the internet, had crossed the Amazon rainforest. They’d scaled the most dangerous road in the world, and they’d still been working when their drivers had broken down in the Andes.”

5/5 stars

#370: “I use that bucket for everything now!”

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RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#370: “I use that bucket for everything now!”

Am I ever glad that I started journaling 10 or 15 years ago. Most of what I recorded is nonsense that I can barely relate to, but every once in a while I stumble across relevant entries from the Record Store. Just a glimpse of Record Store life — the bad times, the good times, and a laugh or two!

Date: 2004/06/01 16:57

God I’m tired. I slept well but work has been non-stop since I got here. I hate that kind of day, you need to breathe some times! And Matt is late, so I can’t eat my lunch. I am having a Bad Retail Day. Everything and everybody is making things worse.

Date: 2004/07/30 12:47

BENAROYAI am expecting the new Pearl Jam to arrive today (late).  [That would have been Live at Benaroya Hall, released officially on July 27.]  I can’t wait to hear it.  Two discs of unplugged Pearl Jam?  Count me in.   The best “grunge” bands weren’t “grunge” at all.  What’s so grungy about Pearl Jam?  Nothing.  They are just good rock rooted in the 70’s and in the willingness to try anything once.  Hence, Eddie Vedder doing drunken covers of ridiculous stuff onstage.  I love it.

Date: 2004/07/30 16:15

An actual conversation at work today between myself and the accountant Jonathan.  We were talking about staying in hotels on the road:

Me:  I like to steal bars of soap and shampoos from hotels.  I mean, I’m paying like $120 for my room, I want some goddamn soap!

J:  I hear ya, man.

Me:  Last time I even stole the little tea packets.  Like, fuck, I want tea!  Coffee, too.

J:  I stole the bucket that you put the ice in.

Me:  Really?

J:  Shit yeah.  I use that bucket for everything now!

Date: 2004/09/30 21:32

Doing a bank run to get change for the register and do deposits.  On the way to the bank, this one kid asked me to buy a candy bar today.  I told him I had no money.  Then he asked me again on the way back from the bank.  I told him I still had no money.  Then he went into my store and asked me to buy a candy bar.  I told him I still had no money!

Just one more drop in the bucket.

#362: Lávate las manos!

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#362: Lávate las manos! (Wash your hands!)

What is the prime rule of retail? Some sources say it’s an employee’s presentation, from language to punctuality to appearance. A knowledgeable staff is absolutely important, and even trumps friendliness. Friendliness without knowledge in a retail environment doesn’t help the customer. Customer service is clearly important, as is leading by example, which I tried to do myself. Other sources say convenience is king. An online presence is a must, but in brick and mortar stores, what truly is the one prime, cardinal rule of retail?

I say it’s a simple one. Wash your hands!

Research suggests that in the United States, 22 million days of work are lost per year just by common illnesses spread in the conventional ways. When a sick employee does manage to make it into work, their productivity is reduced due to lack of energy and focus. They risk spreading the illness further, and also disgusting potential customers with their coughing and sneezing.

It’s easy enough to reduce the spread just by making sure your employees are washing their hands. According to the CDC, “Handwashing is like a ‘do-it-yourself’ vaccine—it involves five simple and effective steps (Wet, Lather, Scrub, Rinse, Dry) that you can take to reduce the spread of diarrheal and respiratory illness so you can stay healthy. Regular handwashing, particularly before and after certain activities, is one of the best ways to remove germs, avoid getting sick, and prevent the spread of germs to others.” By “certain activities”, I can tell you that buying used CDs off the public certainly qualified. At the Record Store, we had a bottle of hand sanitizer at the register, so I could quickly scrub up if there was no time to hit the washroom.

I have seen some gross, disgusting substances on CDs that I and my staff have handled. That doesn’t even include the invisible germs that were on a lot of them! Sticky CDs and CD cases were quite common. When I first started out, I caught hell from the boss because I didn’t want to buy a box of CDs from a guy who had very few discs without yucky, sticky CD cases! Most of the time, we couldn’t identify the goo, although we were fairly certain that some had been covered with semen before. (Needless to say, we passed on the semen CD, no complaints from bosses that time.)

The most disturbing health risk that I witnessed was covering the in-demand box set called Good Vibrations: Thirty Years of the Beach Boys. It was covered in blood – still wet, as the guy selling it to us was actually bleeding from his hands at that moment! The staff guy who was handling the set, Jason, quietly announced, “I have to go and wash my hands – they are covered with blood.” The customer then laughed and said, “Yah, that’s me. But don’t worry, I ain’t got AIDS or nothin’.”

With hindsight, I seemed to be sick all the time. Handling all that dirty money and those filthy CDs, it was almost impossible to keep my hands clean. All it takes is one itchy eye to rub without thinking, and BAM! You’ve got a virus! At the Record Store I suffered from all sorts of ailments, as did we all. I also felt a certain amount of pressure to show up for work even when I was under the weather, so I tended to work through it.

I would give the same advice to customers and staff alike: There is only one prime rule of retail. If you want to stop spreading all those filthy germs, lávate las fucking manos!

LAVATE

#355: “The man’s hot piss warmed my freezing cold hands”

RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale
#355: “The man’s hot piss warmed my freezing cold hands”

Once upon a time, in a Record Store not far away, there was a manager named Joe. Some people call him “Big Nose”. Some people just call him Joe. Two things about Joe you must understand: 1) Joe doesn’t give a crap about what anybody thinks, and 2) Joe doesn’t really know boundaries. Joe is the one who told me he had a crush on my mom. Joe is the one who introduced me to the Open Door Piss. I like Joe, don’t get me wrong.  He was pretty much the only one at the Record Store that I could confide in towards the end.  He is trustworthy, 100%.  A solid individual.  He was the best support I could have had.  But I’d be lying to you if I didn’t tell you that Joe is different from just about everybody you know.

The Tale goes like this:

Joe and Uncle Meat were driving from Waterloo to Windsor, to go and visit Tom who was attending teacher’s college there.  It was December, and a cold one it was.  By this time, Tom sold his own branch of the Record Store, so he could continue his education and become a teacher.  Joe and Meat were travelling in Joe’s old beat up piece of shit.  It was the quintessential “old man car”.  It was huge, ancient, and nothing worked.  I’m amazed it made to Windsor and back, honestly.  One of the features that no longer functioned was the heat, which is a pretty darned important thing during a Canadian December.

Sometime during the three hour tour, Joe had to piss.  Pulling off highway 401 to pee isn’t Joe’s style.  Instead, he re-invented the piss jug, but with a large Tim Horton’s coffee cup.  After relieving himself in said cup, he passed it to Meat!

Meat, all this time, was freezing his ass off in the passenger side.  His hands and fingers in particular were as frigid as icicles.  Although being passed a cup of piss in most situations isn’t a position you want to be in, this time it wasn’t so bad.  The cup “felt like a hot double double in my hands,” says Meat.  Still warm with Joe’s body heat, the piss-cup helped Meat regain some of the sensation in his digits.  “What’s the greatest gift you can give?  The warmth from inside of you.  The man’s hot piss warmed my freezing cold hands,” according to Uncle Meat.

After warming his fingers, Meat rolled down the window.  He carefully prepared the cup for ejection.  He managed to throw it while only getting a surprisingly “minimal amount of piss” on his arm.

Neither Uncle Meat nor I condone littering, but sometimes life hands you a warm cup of piss, and you have no choice in the matter!

PISS CUP