Capital of Nasty Electronic Magazine
Volume VI, Issue 9, AD MMI
Monday, November 19, 2001
ISSN 1482-0471
-------------------------------------------

[04:24] <Jeff> The world is going to hate Canada when Episode 2 is 
released.
[04:25] <leandro> Why is that?
[04:25] <Jeff> Because the Anakin fuck is from round Toronto.
[04:25] <leandro> I feel the shame already.

-------------------------------------------

[03:52] <leandro> I just realized... I've been wearing my headphones 
till now, I keep putting them on and off if I move away from the 
computer and... the music stopped playing well over two hours ago.

-------------------------------------------

1.  Editorial
2.  The Man They Couldn't Hang
3.  CoN @ ze Moviez
4.  Jobs come and go
-------------------------------------------

This week's Golden Testicle award:

http://www.urinal.net/

`The best place to piss your time on the Internet'

-------------------------------------------

1. Editorial
By Leandro Asnaghi-Nicastro

So, today I was sleeping.

The phone rang.

My arm reaches from the bed to the phone, I pick it up.

"Hmmmyeah?"
"Hey" says a voice.
"Hey Jeff" I said.

I said 'Hey Jeff' because the voice sounded like Jeff's.  There are 
some things your brain attempts to do for you, even when you're half 
asleep.

"It's Chris"
"Oh, sorry.  Hi Chris"
"Hey. Is Gord there?"
"Gard?  No he left to get a bite to eat last I spoke to him"
"Oh.  Damn.  Can you take a message?  Ask him to call me?"
"Sure"
"Allright, thanks, bye"
"Bye".

I hung up.

I laid my head back on the pillow, but by now my brain was able to 
formulate more coherent thoughts, such as the most important one:

Just who the fuck is Chris?

It occurred to me only after hanging up that Chris wanted GORD not 
GARD.  I know of a Gard, but no Gords.  Gard is currently in Norway.  
I spoke to him on IRC right before he said he was going to get 
something to eat.  Kudos to my brain for making the best effort 
considering it's sad state.

I know only one Chris and that wasn't his voice.  And usually, since 
now that I moved I have a new number, all the wrong calls I get are 
for a Bill, not Gord.

Now, I used to get all sorts of amusing calls from various people or 
companies looking for the previous owners.  All were quite annoying 
since apparently the previous owners of the number owned money to 
the cable company, a wireless phone service and for one guy, the 
bank was looking for him.  But you know this, since you've all been 
reading my Editorials.  (But we both know that's not true).

But with Bill everyone is so nice.
"Hi!" the cheerful voice goes "Is Bill there?"
"No, I killed him and ate his liver"
"Allright, thanks", still so disturbingly cheerful.
And they hang up.

Due to popular request, Jason MacIsaac is back with one more of his 
Gretchen tales.  Also, the latest incarnation of the CoN website is
slowly taking shape.  You can see it at http://www.capnasty.org
Your feedback is appreciated.

Enjoy this belated issue.

-------------------------------------------

2.  The Man They Couldn't Hang
By Jason MacIsaac

In any business, in any industry, there always works one person who 
somehow, despite every excuse in the world, is never fired.  Despite 
having no reason to keep them.

And by no reason I mean no bloody reason at all.  The complete bimbo 
who can't find the entrance to the business but is sleeping with the 
boss has a reason.  The guy who accidentally let a customer drive 
away with an armoured truck full of money but is the district 
manager's nephew has a reason. These aren't good reasons, but they 
are reasons why the Hand of Death has not been laid on them.

Although this person has managed to alienate everybody he or she 
works with, has no friends in high places, and is given to 
detonating small nuclear warheads at inappropriate moments leaving 
others to clean up the mess, somehow, they always get away with it.  
They do not get fired.

In our case, it was a Head Cook, Salvador.  There are unconfirmed 
reports that he did have someone watching out for him at head 
office, but this was never verified to my knowledge.  What I did 
know is that he managed to thoroughly annoy everyone he came into 
contact with.  The only exception to this rule was the people he 
managed to make blood enemies with instead.  And he managed to make 
himself some pretty deadly enemies, including District Manager 
Georgie.

Sal made a stunningly impressive debut.  During the opening days of 
the new menu, Gretchen's was hosting a conference in the party room 
for the managers from all the various chains of Empire Restaurants.  
Basically, the who's who of managers and decision makers was there.  

He was an hour late for the start of his shift, which considering 
he's the kitchen manager, is pretty bad.  He also had to be called 
to be reminded to come into work.  

When Sal got there, things didn't get any better.  You see, 
Gretchen's was supposed to be providing meals for these guys.

Naturally, by the time he came in and took charge, the food was very 
late.
And, badly cooked.

The chicken was raw on the inside, dead cold all around, but burnt 
on the outside (figure that one out). Well, people couldn't eat 
that, so he had to prepare something else.  While this was going on, 
plates sat on tables in front of the managers.  After time ticked 
by, people started picking gingerly at their burnt yet raw meals, 
having not eaten yet.  Hmm, food poisoning anyone?

Don't shed too big a tear for them though.  They were only managers, 
after all.  Nobody that I know of actually died from one of Sal's 
meals.  But it wasn't for his want of trying.

That incident in my mind is enough to give Sal the boot.  At the 
very least, there should have been a written warning.  But nobody 
ever gave Sal formal warnings. If they had, they probably could have 
disposed of him in three weeks.  In addition to his many minor 
mistakes, he was also sure to provide the Massive Mistake of the 
Week.  Give him a written warning each time, then after three 
mistakes, sayanora.  

As the Head Cook, it was Sal's responsibility to order in food.  It 
soon became apparent that a task that important shouldn't be left up 
to him.  I must confess, he didn't order the wrong things though, at 
least not right away.  This was because he forgot to do it the first 
couple of times.

And still, he kept his job.

He would not, or could not, do any kind of preparation work.  It 
always fell on the shift after his to do whatever work he missed.  
They had barely enough time to fill orders with the staff they had 
with things fully stocked, never mind without.  Still no warning.  
Still no job loss.

I can't remember if it was Sal or another kitchen manager, but one 
of them once defrosted our big storage freezers.  They did not 
remove the food first.

No warning.  No job loss.

Sal did once though invent cheap wing night.  Every restaurant in 
the city had a cheap wing night, except Gretchen's.  But after Sal 
thawed out 7 cases of chicken wings, it was decided finally that 
perhaps wings would go on sale before they spoiled.

Still, nothing happened.  By this time it was painfully clear that 
he could be depended on for nothing, so people stopped expecting 
things from him. And like most work environments, there is always a 
person who is officially in charge, and a person who is unofficially 
in charge.  The Unofficial person is the person who counts, because 
they're the ones in the trenches with the experience, and they know 
all the jobs inside in out.  The Official person is someone 
appointed to "supervise" this person, for reasons unclear.

Sal was officially in charge of the kitchen, but everyone realized 
that he was hopeless, and turned to one of the line cooks Thomas, 
who had no official power, but had all the power in the world.  The 
other staff listened to him over Sal, the servers came to him with 
their kitchen problems, because only Thomas could be counted on to 
get the job done.  

Thomas unofficially renamed April Fool's Day "Salvador Day."

So all Sal became good far was a few good laughs.  Everyone had a 
Sal story. Doctor O'Sullivan once told me about the time he had 
ruined toast.  As the old joke goes, he could probably make ice 
cream and burn it.  One new kitchen hire related a strange story of 
how during his job interview, Sal kept his eyes closed, even while 
he spoke.  It was rumored that Sal was a heavy drug user, and his 
mannerisms support this, though I know of no reliable proof.

But Sal did leave us eventually.  One morning he called and 
complained to Sandy that she caused him too much stress.  Sal should 
talk, because there's nothing like being a server pulling burnt yet 
raw chicken away from a table of screaming customers while the rest 
of your full section complains they've been waiting an hour for 
their burnt-raw chicken.  

That phone call was the last we ever heard of him.

It seems that people like Sal survive because nobody is willing to 
stand up and fire him, possibly worried about stepping on someone's 
toes.  Head Office did hire him, so that alone might have been 
worrisome.  If Head Office hand picks what they think is the person 
born for the job and you call them up and ask if they hired any 
kitchen managers that lived, you risk inferring that Head Office had 
to be stupid to hire him to begin with.

Instead, the Man They Couldn't Hang is shunted to useless, stupid 
jobs, but is kept safely out of the way.  Sure, it's redundant and a 
waste of labor, but better than telling head office that their 
Golden Boy can be outsmarted by the restaurant's Mighty-Vac, right?

We also had a woman they couldn't hang-an incompetent bitch queen. 
Surprisingly, head office hired her when she was pregnant.  
Apparently the father had headed for the hills, leaving her fiercely 
bitter, which she took out on everyone else.

When I say I'm surprised that head office hired her because she was 
pregnant, please don't misunderstand me.  Pregnancy is no reason not 
to hire a woman (incredible incompetence and the inability to manage 
is).  I'm just surprised that Empire did it.  Empire is not known 
for its humanitarian policies.  Here they have a woman they know 
they will have to replace briefly when she goes on maternity leave.  
She will immediately begin using the health plan.  She will cost 
money to orientate to the restaurant, then she goes on maternity 
leave, forcing them to hire/train someone else. Again, this is no 
excuse not to hire a woman, but can you see the temptation to hire 
someone else?  I just can't believe the same head office that was 
run by someone who once said "This is fuckin' Jewville" and wanted 
the female servers to wear lip gloss and earrings as part of the 
uniform was suddenly enlightened when faced with a pregnant woman.

If ever they missed a golden opportunity, it was their opportunity 
to get rid of her. They caught her stealing.  Red handed.  
Manipulated documents for proof.  Bang, bullseye, you're busted.  

Well, Head Office really let her have a blast of the ol' righteous 
indignation!  With Biblical Wrath, they (maybe you'd better sit down 
for this) sent her on maternity leave early.

Huh?  

That's what they did.  And by so doing, they actually really screwed 
themselves.  By the laws of Canada, when a woman goes on maternity 
leave, she is guaranteed a position and salary equal to the one she 
left.

Caught, beyond a shadow of doubt stealing, and still, they would not 
fire her.

It was at this point we began to wonder What exactly did you have to 
do to get fired at Gretchen's?  Cook up a customer's poodle and 
serve it to them on a sesame seed egg bun with a side of fries?  Gun 
down the customers and not clean up the blood?  Spill a sample of 
bubonic plague into the draft keg?

Getting no satisfactory answer to these questions, there was an even 
bigger lapse in our already less than rigid discipline, I can tell 
you.

It also lead to one of the great Gretchen's euphemisms.  "Has so and 
so been fired?"

"Nah, he's been sent on maternity leave."  

---
Jason MacIsaac unfortunately is a man they can hang.  But if given 
the choice of the method of his execution, he'd pick the firing 
squad. Fuck lethal injection.

-------------------------------------------

3.  CoN @ ze Moviez
Wid Jeff Wright

Howdy, howdy, howdy.  Getting right to it as I promised last issue, 
that I'd be brief with this installment:

Movie 1:
ZATOICHI: THE LIFE AND OPINION OF MASSEUR ICHI

The first of the Zatoichi films.  It's the bomb, yo!  He's blind, 
and he's quicker and more accurate than anyone with a sword.  He 
also enjoys the odd drink, and gamble.  I was watching a Zatoichi 
flic with Leo the other night, and told him that I think Zatoichi's 
my new hero.  Maybe.

Movie 2:
MONSTERS INC.

Pixar rules the day, yet again.  If you like the TOY STORY flics, 
and A BUGS LIFE (and who doesn't?), then rush out and see it now.  
It's a really funny and sweet film.

"Movie 3:
AMELIE

I talked about this last issue, but it's starting to get its 
release, so 
I'm just reminding you.  GO SEE IT!!!!!!  I must say however, upon a 
second 
viewing it has been knocked out of its spot as my favourite film of 
the 
year.  Go see it anyways.  It's a great film."

Movie 4:
THE WICKER MAN

I love, love, love this movie.  It's a nutty little flic that's 
attained a bit of a cult status from what I gather.  One reviewer 
called it ".the CITIZEN KANE of horror films.".  That's pretty 
funny.  So's the flic.  Go rent it.

Movie 5: 
THE BEYOND

Lucio Fulci directed this cool little Italian Horror film about the 
7 gates of Hell being opened.  Really good atmosphere and well 
handled gore.  If you dig atmospheric horror, check it out for sure.

That's it for now folks.  I saw THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE, but wasn't 
blown away by it.  I won't bad mouth the Coens though, so I'll say 
that it did have a lot of good stuff in it, but didn't work as a 
whole for me, and leave it at that.  

---
Jeff met Davinder's family today.  They were much nicer than 
Davinder is.  He doesn't know where she went wrong.  Leo?

-------------------------------------------

4.  Jobs come and go.
By Rev.Sean C. Rothstein-Jacobson

Jobs come and go.  By luck of the genetic draw I am a white, blonde, 
blue-eyed male who lives in America 2001 AD.  I'm not proud that 
this puts me in a position of choice, but it does.  When I need to 
quit a job on moral reasons, I have the ability to do so.  Don't 
think I don't know how lucky I am for that.

Anyway, you don't care, you just want to be entertained, so here is 
a few commonalities I have found from my work experience before we 
get to the actual stories. I hope this helps you avoid some of the 
crap I have had to go through to learn it.

1) Employers ALWAYS forget that they need to work for their 
employees as much as their employees work for them.

2) Managers are truly Man Agers- their job is to make sure the life 
is sucked out of you.

3) The clientele is at least as stupid as your CEO

4) The more the job physically requires of you, the less it will 
pay...

5) If you can stomach kissing ass you will have a future there

6) Owners rarely understand the reality of work and therefore have 
an almost limitless potential for banal power tripping (it reassures 
them that they still serve a purpose)

7) The more capable you appear, the more you will be asked to do 
things without additional pay

8) If you act like a dumb-shit, they will treat you like an equal 
(*Church of the SubGenius)

9) If you get involved with "office politics" you will be 
entertained but ultimately fucked over

10) Employees and Employers are an entirely different species- NEVER 
FORGET THIS or you may end up in lower management (the cocoon state 
between the two species)

11) Trust your co-workers only as far as you can throw them, you 
never know who is bound for management and you will regret being 
open with them when they achieve it.

12) A "chummy" boss is a demon in disguise. Treat them as if you 
were Hitler's coffee boy: don't piss him off, make pleasant small 
talk, but don't let him know you are a Jew either because he WILL 
put a bullet in your skull for it..

13) When you take work home with you, you should immediately quit.

14) Your extra efforts are NEVER appreciated.

15) You will never care as much as the owner. Do not feel bad when 
you have to lie about this.

16) One really spectacular display of skill at the right time can 
allow you months of slacking time at a job.

17) Lie to your boss, its for the best. Trust me: they don't want to 
know what you really think.

18) The only time one should EVER work late is for the opportunity 
to rob the place, all other instances are a waste of you terribly 
short life...

19) 1/3rd of your life is spent at work in a full time job. It is 
not worth spending that time miserable, as 1/3rd is spent asleep, 
leaving you with only 1/3rd actually appreciated and worth living 
(not counting to-and-from-work travel time, or work related stress 
that leaks into the "good 1/3rd"). QUIT ALL UNREMARKABLE OR 
MISERABLE JOBS IMMEDIATELY!

And

20) If you aren't afraid of becoming homeless there is no such thing 
as work stress.

I realize that by publishing these stories I become totally un-
hireable.  This is why you will know me as "REVSCRJ" and at most 
"Sean". Hell, I might work for you right now. I'm not stupid, 
despite the fact that all I really want out of a job is a reasonable 
and trustworthy staff, an understanding clientele, a product I can 
love, and intelligent owner it appears that this is a ridiculous set 
of parameters to ask for and thus I have left more jobs than 
girlfriends....


EMPLOYMENT HISTORY-

THE LIST:
1.  Worked in a Photo Place
2.  Made bagel sandwiches
3.  Worked in a state park cafeteria line
4.  Processed fish in Alaska
5.  Made coffee drinks in a poetry dive
6.  Made coffee drinks in a performance dive
7.  Made coffee drinks in a corporate dive
8.  Made coffee drinks in a hippie dive
9.  Made juice drinks for yuppies
10.  Inserted Sunday newspapers
11.  Was Art Director for a surf store chain
12.  Wrote Greeting cards
13.  Wrote the stock release memorandum for a greeting card house
14.  Condensed years worth of receipts for an overpriced lodge
15.  Canvassed door to door for OSPIRG
16.  Took and developed "old time" sepia photos of tourists on 
Cannery Row
17.  Waited tables in a deli/restaurant
18.  Washed dishes in a bar/restaurant
19.  Was a color copy specialist
20.  Ran graveyard shift at a satellite relay radio station
21.  Was a receiving clerk
22.  Was a dispatcher for a lettuce cooler
23.  Set up and ran lights for raves
24.  Was a house-man for a bed an breakfast
25.  Bussed tables for a chowder shop
26.  Co-Ran an open mic
27.  Bussed tabled in an Indian food restaurant
28.  Ran a maid service
29.  Roasted Coffee
30.  Developed photos in a strip mall
31.  Made sandwiches in a cafe/market
and
32.  Was a video editor.
Currently unemployed.

---
REVSCRJ is a writer/musician constantly on the verge of 
homelessness, he hopes that you enjoy his work or else his life has 
been in vain.  Contact REVSCRJ at revscrj@cloudfactory.org to lodge 
complaints, notify of lawsuits, or receive spiritual advice.

-------------------------------------------

CoN would not be possible without the great help of Scriba Org.

CoN: It means that there is a gun hidden behind the toilet in the 
2nd floor washroom.  He wants you to take it and put three bullets 
each in the two men seated at table five. You can get out by the 
fire escape.

Capital of Nasty Electronic Magazine    "media you can abuse"
In memory of Father Ross "Padre" Legere
Published every second Monday (or when we get around it)
Disclaimer: unintentionally offensive
Comments, queries and submissions are welcome

http://www.capnasty.org  ISSN 1482-0471

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