Šmartinska 106
K-Bar is the watering hole situated on the ground floor of the building the Slovenia Times has its office in. Šmartinska 106. The waitresses there are ungodly surly. Combine a teenager working at Wendy's with a post office window-sitter with an overweight person asked to walk in New York City and you might get close to the surliness of these young ladies--who by appearance and employment are none of those things. There was a new bartendrix today. She smiled, she asked what Jaka (my editor) and I were having, she made it, and then gave it to us immediately. I like it when people are nice. In fact I like it so much it usually has the effect of turning me into a niceness conduit. Just yesterday the receptionist thought she had offended me, because we had this transaction.
Me: Hi there. You don't happen to have change for a 1000, do you?
R: No, but you can go downstairs to the bar. They'll give change.
Me: No they won't. Those girls hate me.
R: Me too.
I went back to my desk. Jaka got a call from her saying she wanted to make certain that I understood the girls downstairs hated her too, and not that she hated me. In the English-speaking world, that would be a tad condescending, but here it was, to wit, nice. On a similar note, I met a girl named Bobo from North Carolina here in Ljubljana. She was detailing an occasion in which she was doing mission work in NYC. Usually this would have led me to run to the nearest church in order to slap Jesus off the cross--even though it's not Jesus' fault really. But, her argument was pretty convincing: churches like to help people, and if you don't get wrapped up in the preachy side of it, you can help people too. QED, yo. Unemployed people like sandwiches even if they don't like invisible superheroes. K-Bar is, in the parlance of one friend of mine, "dangerously close." But, extreme efforts require extreme release. Yesterday, as I sat eyeballs deep in articles to edit, I asked Jaka if he wanted to take a break and grab a beer. The little dickweed marketing turd who sits across from me interjects:
"The beer spectacular was two issues ago. You are a really bad influence."
Me: "To who? Hardline Muslims?"
Dickweed: "No, to hardworking people."
Me: "Great, because my work on bums is done."
And so Jaka and I went downstairs. I ruminated over my beer as to where this little shit got the stones up to act up. Dickweed is the same jack-off who a month ago when the paper had a sitdown to determine its special issue calendar said "You think you're the smartest person here, but you don't know anything." I know what it's like to be unbelievably quick-witted and possess the ability to dismantle someone's world in two sentences. (Putting on my best Shirley Temple gleam here.) And this guy must be smart; he was chosen as a "golden strawberry" when he graduated from college in London. Yeah, it's sounds like slang for herpes, but it just means that this guy supposedly has a bright future and Slovenian companies should "pick" him. Also, I understand the desire to impress yourself on your employers. You want to seem indispensable, so you don't end up laid off. I got it. But, I'm getting paid under the table at nearly base-level wages. I look at my job with Slo Times as volunteer work with beer money and Internet access. It seems to me a classic case of "choose your battles." One, I'm from the United States. I'm genetically a better capitalist. Two, I'm from New York City. I'm conditioned to kick your ass if I'm able to. Three, I don't want to get into a headlock with this prick. I'd rather he sat me down and said "Here's what we've done and it's not turning out the way we expected." Now that I think of it, if I'm feeling like a niceness conduit in the future, I might recommend Dickles take this tack with me next go-round. Contrast that with Jaka and Klemen (our designer) setting up a slingshot target course in the office. Which is rad galore. I scored a direct hit on one of the target's puds today. Tomorrow the paper goes to bed. Look for my as yet unwritten column by clicking the "Slovenia Times" link, then clicking "People."
Me: Hi there. You don't happen to have change for a 1000, do you?
R: No, but you can go downstairs to the bar. They'll give change.
Me: No they won't. Those girls hate me.
R: Me too.
I went back to my desk. Jaka got a call from her saying she wanted to make certain that I understood the girls downstairs hated her too, and not that she hated me. In the English-speaking world, that would be a tad condescending, but here it was, to wit, nice. On a similar note, I met a girl named Bobo from North Carolina here in Ljubljana. She was detailing an occasion in which she was doing mission work in NYC. Usually this would have led me to run to the nearest church in order to slap Jesus off the cross--even though it's not Jesus' fault really. But, her argument was pretty convincing: churches like to help people, and if you don't get wrapped up in the preachy side of it, you can help people too. QED, yo. Unemployed people like sandwiches even if they don't like invisible superheroes. K-Bar is, in the parlance of one friend of mine, "dangerously close." But, extreme efforts require extreme release. Yesterday, as I sat eyeballs deep in articles to edit, I asked Jaka if he wanted to take a break and grab a beer. The little dickweed marketing turd who sits across from me interjects:
"The beer spectacular was two issues ago. You are a really bad influence."
Me: "To who? Hardline Muslims?"
Dickweed: "No, to hardworking people."
Me: "Great, because my work on bums is done."
And so Jaka and I went downstairs. I ruminated over my beer as to where this little shit got the stones up to act up. Dickweed is the same jack-off who a month ago when the paper had a sitdown to determine its special issue calendar said "You think you're the smartest person here, but you don't know anything." I know what it's like to be unbelievably quick-witted and possess the ability to dismantle someone's world in two sentences. (Putting on my best Shirley Temple gleam here.) And this guy must be smart; he was chosen as a "golden strawberry" when he graduated from college in London. Yeah, it's sounds like slang for herpes, but it just means that this guy supposedly has a bright future and Slovenian companies should "pick" him. Also, I understand the desire to impress yourself on your employers. You want to seem indispensable, so you don't end up laid off. I got it. But, I'm getting paid under the table at nearly base-level wages. I look at my job with Slo Times as volunteer work with beer money and Internet access. It seems to me a classic case of "choose your battles." One, I'm from the United States. I'm genetically a better capitalist. Two, I'm from New York City. I'm conditioned to kick your ass if I'm able to. Three, I don't want to get into a headlock with this prick. I'd rather he sat me down and said "Here's what we've done and it's not turning out the way we expected." Now that I think of it, if I'm feeling like a niceness conduit in the future, I might recommend Dickles take this tack with me next go-round. Contrast that with Jaka and Klemen (our designer) setting up a slingshot target course in the office. Which is rad galore. I scored a direct hit on one of the target's puds today. Tomorrow the paper goes to bed. Look for my as yet unwritten column by clicking the "Slovenia Times" link, then clicking "People."
posted by J Wilson at Tuesday, September 13, 2005
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