Andi’s Blog…or life according to the voices in my head…

It is true. I hate Jack in the Box. I am hard pressed to think of a worse fast food restaurant, yet somehow I still find myself eating there from time to time. This happened recently. I was rushing to get to an appointment, I was starving, and it was the only place to grab a quick bite to eat on the way. I guess the hunger must have temporarily blocked all memory of previous bad experiences at Jack in the Box.

I like a little light reading when I’m dining alone, usually in the form of the comics section of the paper. On this particular day I found myself without a newspaper or book, so I was forced to rely on the paper tray liner. I was expecting either nutritional facts about the food or some silly games and puzzles, but apparently that’s only McDonald’s tray liners.

Instead, I found Jack’s latest ad campaign for the “Jack Cash Card”. The headline reads “JACK CA$H CARD GREAT FOR GIVING” and then lists 52 holidays and occasions for which the Jack Cash Card (JCC) would be an appropriate gift. Most of them were bogus holidays, or at least non-gift-giving holidays: Save Your Hearing Day, Name Your Car Day, Stamp Day, President’s Day, Columbus Day, Arbor Day, etc. I’m not going to list them all, but I will point out a few and what message giving a JCC on this occasion would send.

Mother’s Day & Father’s Day – Don’t give your parents a JCC unless 1) you don’t like your parents, and then why waste $10 on a gift anyway, or 2) you have really crazy parents who LOVE Jack in the Box. If the latter should apply, then at the very least include flowers or some golf balls respectively. Interestingly there was a Father-In-Law Day listed, but no Mother-In-Law Day. Traditionally aren’t the mothers-in-law the most annoying? A JCC might be ok for that occasion.

There were a few professional appreciation days like Admin Professionals Day. I guess it might be an ok gift for those, but if you’re going to give your secretary a gift card to a fast food joint, why not a better one? National Nurses Day was listed and I guess that maybe Jack in the Box has better food than the hospital cafeteria, or at least not worse. This got me wondering about National Cardiologist Day (not on the list); a JCC could be a great gift for a cardiologist since this chain is arguably one of the institutions keeping cardiologists in business. In the employment arena, we also had Employee Appreciation Day – a JCC here says, “We appreciate all your hard work, but you’re not really moving up from here. Thanks for hanging around in this dead-end job so that we can profit from your sweat and tears!” and Promotion – I’m thinking they must be talking about the kind of promotion that comes with an improved title and more responsibility but no pay raise, “Congratulations on your promotion. We aren’t really paying you more, but have a crappy lunch on us!”

National Acts of Kindness Day – forcing someone to eat at Jack in the Box is not kind! Yo-Yo Day – never heard of it. Call me crazy, but wouldn’t a yo-yo be a better gift on this occasion?

The next set should be no brainers, but there are a lot of clueless guys around, so I felt I must include it. Anniversary, Valentine’s Day, and Wedding. DO NOT give your beloved a JCC on any of these occasions unless you are one of those losers who wants out but doesn’t have the guts to initiate the breakup and you’re trying to get her to break up with you. I’m also pretty certain that no couple has ever registered for their wedding at a fast food joint. I can’t think of a less appropriate occasion for a JCC gift, unless… Well, let’s say that you are totally opposed to the union…this may be a unique way to express your disapproval. If you don’t like the bride, give the groom a JCC and you’re basically saying, “In addition to her many other faults, I’m pretty sure she’s a horrible cook. Here’s a little something to keep you from starving.” If you don’t like the groom, then give a JCC to the bride and your sentiment comes across as, “He’s a self absorbed loser who will never take you out and will always be emotionally unavailable. When you finally discover that he’s banging his secretary and feel the need for some emotional binge eating this baby will be here for you.”

And finally, the holiday that inspired this entire post – Mortician’s Day. Ok, personally I have nothing against morticians. They are under appreciated and play an important role. It’s just that I can’t think about them without getting all creeped out. I could certainly never date a mortician; there’s no way he could passionately touch me with those hands without me thinking about where they’d been all day. Just the word mortician conjures up images of corpses on a cold slab and for that reason the word has no business being printed on a fast food paper tray liner. I don’t need those unappetizing images while I’m struggling to ingest already unappetizing food.

There was one perfect JCC occasion listed. “Hey, I got you a really great present because you mean so much to me…APRIL FOOL’S!”

I’ve been up to a little detective work this evening…

For several months, one of my neighbors has been playing music quite loud late into the night. Prior to Christmas, it wasn’t too bad as I could only hear it if I went out on the back porch. Shortly after Christmas, it got much worse, louder with more bass. Now I can hear it through the walls in my bedroom at night. Outside it sounds distant as if it’s being played outdoors about a block or so away. And it happens almost every night. I’m pretty tolerant about music and parties on the weekends, but every night?!

Last Wednesday night it was so bad that it kept me up for over an hour after I’d gone to bed. Then it woke me up again at 4am. I had been reluctant to call the police since I couldn’t pinpoint an exact address, but the wake up 2-1/2 hours prior to my alarm clock put me over the edge. I made the call and tried to describe the location I thought it was coming from. I dozed a little but never quite got back to sleep and the bass was still thumping into my room when my alarm finally did go off. I was annoyed and disappointed that the police had apparently done nothing about it. It went on again Thursday night, but since I went out for my birthday I was intoxicated enough to fall asleep that night without too much trouble.

There were a few blissfully silent nights and I thought that some other neighbor must have complained with an exact address. Then it started up again tonight around 7pm. After an hour of it, I decided to take a drive around my neighborhood to see if I could determine the location. It was barely audible on the front side of my house and between the sound of my car and the traffic on the nearest main road, my search didn’t yield any results. It was terribly frustrating, as if there was this magical annoying music that could only be heard in my backyard and my room!!! The cops must have thought I was crazy when I called in the noise complaint. I decided to walk around my neighborhood (alone at night, maybe not the brightest move) and I was able to determine that it was definitely coming from somewhere on the row of backyards behind my house between my street and the street behind us. I still couldn’t get a fix on it without sneaking into neighbor’s backyards, so I headed back to my house.

I decided to give it one more try and went into my backyard. I headed for the corner of our fence intending to stand up on the fence in the hopes that I could determine the house. It turns out that I didn’t have to do that. As I got closer to the fence it became abundantly clear that the noise was coming from the back room of my neighbor’s house, which by the way, is about 3 feet away from my bedroom wall. No wonder I can hear it in my room!

Problem solved, right? Wrong!!! This particular neighbor works nights, so he’s not at home and won’t be home until it’s time for me to get up for class in the morning. I don’t want to call the cops on my next-door neighbor and it wouldn’t do any good anyway, unless they were willing to flip his breaker… I actually considered doing that myself, but it’s raining and I have bad luck with electricity in general. No really, I get shocked all the time. There was the electric flyswatter, a light socket, the liquor cooler, the kegbox, and the neon “Open” sign when I worked at Texas Bar & Grill, and most recently, the treadmill at the gym shocked me no less than three times today! I guess I’ll just have to try to talk to him tomorrow when I get home from class. I hate that kind of confrontation, but I’m sure he’s not doing it to be a nuisance, just to keep his house safe (in theory) while he’s at work.