AMERICAN STANDARD 3.8 Lpf / 1.0 gpf
by Brian McGuigan

I read this every morning between 5:23 and 5:28
while pissing before opening the gym.
I read it again around 6 and each half hour after
until 11:30 when I'm off the clock.
Pissing so often requires me to drink a lot of water,
but little else needs to be done around here.
Really I just sit for six hours and do nothing.
Well, I do sit. I guess that's something.

A mongoloid with a moderate understanding of language could handle the gig
or even an orangutan, if it didn't masturbate in front of patrons.
Orangutans are almost as smart as humans anyway and probably smarter than a 'tard.
They have opposable thumbs, so they can open doors,
count cash,
help the old ladies get the caps off their water bottles.

That's another thing I do,
help old ladies open their bottles or new headphones,
or pick up their old tissues and ripped up copies of Us and People.
No one here reads anything that canít be bought at a grocery store,
doesn't appear on a television screen,
or isnít part of the "For Dummies" series.

Ohhh and Dr. Phil.
They love Dr. Phil around here.
One old lady asked me what channel he was on
because she couldn't find it on our TV.
I didn't know and she looked at me like I smothered baby Jesus.
She said I should consider watching his show,
and I thought she should consider not working out.
Thirty minutes on a seated bike wasn't going to help her.
She could've gotten her heart rate up just as high
by sticking her head under water for a few minutes.
Besides, she was almost dead.
She might as well enjoy it while she can;
drinking whiskey,
watching soaps,
smoking Pall Malls,
the type of shit all grandmas do.

I'm supposed to greet people too,
but if you couldn't already tell, I've never been good at that.
In high school, they said I exhibited anti-social behavior
because I smoked pot,
cut class,
and cursed out the lunch lady.
Give me a guitar, and I'm on MTV.
Instead, I got a degree
and I'm here greeting fat asses before the sun's even up,
but plagiarizing all those papers made me smarter,
so I've broken down the greeting to four easy steps:

1) Good Morning
2) How's it going?
3) Alright.
4) Have a good work out.

If they try to talk to me further,
I usually just stare at them until they walk away in frustration.
Occasionally, I'll start signing
(I don't really know how to sign),
and they'll smile and talk loud and slow,
forgetting we just had a conversation
and I didn't have that Chewbacca voice most deaf people do.

But if I ever have trouble greeting,
a detailed explanation of the process can be found in the Front Desk Manual.
It has drawings of some smiling asshole waving behind the desk
and in a speech cloud he says "Hello there. How are you today?"
and then "I'm great. Have a fabulous work out."

I've never used this approach for several reasons:

1) I don't smile.
2) If I'm here, nothing is great.
3) Straight men don't say fabulous. Ever.

If they accurately depicted the employees,
perhaps even me,
the picture would be of some fucker with fuzz in his hair
a collar that should've been ironed,
sighing whenever someone walked in
because they'd interrupted his reading.

Like I said, they don't appreciate the classics around here;
Bukowski,
Carver,
Henry Miller.
I started reading them in college,
and here I am only a few years later
reading urinals,
pissing and reading

And it's only 5:27.

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