A repost in honour of Father’s Say.

Dr. StrangeJob went to high school in the mid-seventies. Coincidently, that was the same time that marijuana became the recreational drug of choice for many in his age group. To suggest that the Doctor was a pothead would be a tenuous overstatement, but he does concede there were a number of purple haze high-school daze not totally accounted for. Yes, he inhaled.

Arriving home from school one day, he was confronted by his mother in an extreme state of agitation, waving a baggie of pot that she found in the laundry basket. To be fair, she may have been quite calm at the time. To be honest, since the Doctor was slightly buzzed, what he saw was more like the Tasmanian devil on crack gesticulating a baggie full of weed and pointing accusatorily.

He told her that it was not his pot, but to no avail. They decided to wait until his father arrived home from work to continue the conversation, but she assured the Doctor that there would be hell to pay.

The Doctor’s father was a welder at the local steel plant. He put in a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay, so he was both tired and startled when met at the door by his wife still waving the baggie of marijuana. His father was always quick on his feet, but the side-glance he gave to his son was most telling. Two things became abundantly clear: First, it was the father’s weed that was found in the laundry. Second, the father was about to be in bigger shit with his wife than his son could ever possibly be with his mother. The look on his face said it all, but what happened next surprised father, mother, and son.

The young Doctor, in an Oscar worthy performance, admitted the pot was his and took full responsibility for his actions. The father, in another Oscar worthy performance, provided a sternly worded sermon on the ills of drug use whilst handing out punishment that appeased his wife, but not overly chastised the son.

The father took the son aside a few days later and provided him with a learning script that he follows to this day: If you are being thrown out of town, then get in front and make it look like a parade in your honor. The Doctor was grounded for two weeks. The father, on the other hand, had to flush his weed down the toilet.

Happy Father’s Day. I am not sure where you are, but here’s hoping that you are happy and high.

Watch my standup version of this routine from 2016.

Follow Dr. Strangejob on Twitter at https://twitter.com/drstrangejob
Like Dr. StrangeJob on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/drstrangejob

Ok, I admit it, it was a poorly executed gag. My last post, The Dearth of Dr. StrangeJob, was the prelude for a joke with the punchline “Dr. StrangeJob: Borin’Again!”. Initially, I had no setup for the joke, all I had was the tagline. I just thought the phrase “Dr. StrangeJob: Borin’ Again!” would be a funny blog title. But a punchline requires an effective setup. That’s when I decided to write a faux obituary. If I was going to be borin’ again, an obvious pun on born again, then I needed something to be born again from.

I posted the fake obituary and purposely went dark for two weeks. The silence was meant to be part of the joke. Some readers assumed the obituary was my way of saying that Dr. StrangeJob was to be no more. I received emails and posts of condolences over the demise of Dr. StrangeJob, but not a single FREE T-shirt in the lot. As for my two-week self-mourning period, I don’t think anyone actually noticed that I had gone.

I did, however, get scolded for misspelling death as dearth and angels as angles. I guess I was too obscure again. The irony of my worst joke ever debacle is that I had also overlooked the need for content to include with this punchline blog. Oops!

So, here’s another confession. Although born of bureaucratic frustration, Dr. StrangeJob: Or How I Learned to Stop Raging and Embrace the Bull, was conceived as a social media training vehicle for another project. Dr. StrangeJob was a short-term learning exercise in branding that I would apply to a consulting business that I had been developing.

But something interesting happened in the theatre of life. Kurt Vonnegut once quipped that we are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. I now understand what he meant by that statement. Recently, I wrote a short screenplay that I will be discussing in a future blog. The film centers around a senior man who travels 40 years back in time to meet his younger self during a pivotal moment in his life. The scene is not autobiographical, but writing it required that I put myself back into my mindset at the age of 20. It was an enlightening experience.

Upon reflection, I realized that I was in the midst of a transformational experience. Perhaps it was the ageing process, the catharsis of writing, or the act of removing myself from a potentially toxic work environment, but I believe I am gradually returning to a truer self. An earlier self that had been diverted in the theatre of life while pretending to be a systems analyst, educator, and manager.

Maybe I have been born again. On the other hand, perhaps I’m just being boin’ again.

Dr. StrangeJob

Find Dr. StrangeJob on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/drstrangejob
Follow Dr. StrangeJob on Twitter at https://twitter.com/drstrangejob
Learn more about Dr. StrangeJob at www.drstrangejob.ca

After a long and courageous battle with incompetents, Dr. StrangeJob succumbed to the view that nepotism, cronyism, treachery, and incompetence will always overcome decency, humility, honesty, and competence. He has been passed over and is now living with the angles.

Dr. StrangeJob forced himself on the world on February 27, 2015 with the following simple but pathetic prophetic tweet: This is what happens when the Peter Principle collides with Kurt Vonnegut and Stanley Kubrick. Since that humble beginning, he unleashed a wrath of blogs, tweets, and Facebook comments the likes of which the world has never seen. In fact, at last count, very few have seen. To be honest, without the prudent use of the “refresh” key, even fewer have actually seen.

In search of a home with transparency, he found little solace in a city of opacity. In life, he sought to bring light to the dearth of competence in local politics. In passing, he hopes to safeguard his legacy in the annals of the literary world, rather than becoming a mere footnote in the anals of satirical literature.

In recovery, he fought against incompetence but had to do it stunned.

As a recovering incompetent, he lived his life one gaffe at a time, cherishing the comfort and support received from fellow travesties in Incompetents Anonymous, the world’s first 12+1 self-help group. Throughout life, he sought through pen and mediation to thwart those that ruled through fear and intimidation. In passing, he hopes the heroes he leaves behind will continue to shed light on inequality by continuing to fight the good fight.

In typical Incompetents Anonymous fashion, no arrangements were made for his passing. As in life, in passing he raised just enough stink to force authorities to address the issue. In life, he often found himself on the wrong side of a burnt bridge, and so, in passing, he has also been burnt. A special thank you goes to the kind folks at “Garbage Haul and Burn” for their expeditated service.

He leaves behind friends in the IA Fellowship, enemies in local politics, and survivors in spirit in CBLA-InComps. A celebration of his strife may take place for those touched by his satirical pen, but he expects no societies of social justice to be created in his name.

Like his social media sites, there will be no visitations. In lieu of donations, feel free to send free t-shirts here, Facebook likes here, or Twitter followers here. Online condolences may be made at www.drstrangejob.ca.

Dr. StrangeJob

In the name of the blog, of the Twitterverse, and of the worldly web. – Blessing of Dr. StrangeJob

Find Dr. StrangeJob on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/drstrangejob
Follow Dr. StrangeJob on Twitter at https://twitter.com/drstrangejob
Learn more about Dr. StrangeJob at www.drstrangejob.ca

That police man said, “Mister Cool, if you ain’t drunk, then you’re a fool.”
I said, “If that’s against the law, then tell me why I never saw a man locked in that jail of yours who wasn’t just as lowdown poor as me?” – Kris Kristofferson

Listening to The Best of all Possible Worlds by Kris Kristofferson always reminds me of an old friend and the night we received free lodgings courtesy of the local police constabulary. Although we were both in an illegal state of mind at the time, I believe it was the song, actually me paraphrasing the song to a police officer, that resulted in our overnight stay in the drunk tank.

D.J. and I were having a few at his place and ran out of mix and munchies. We should have called it a night, but we foolheartedly decided to take our last drinks, plus a few doobies, for a walk to the corner store for pop and snacks. On route, we stopped at a nearby park for a break but stayed until we finished our drinks and joints. At that point, we decided to call it a night and head back to his place to crash.

When we left the park, we were met by two police cars with blaring sirens and flashing lights. Apparently, the police had been watching us and had decided that the two puny long-haired kids having a toke in the park were being a menace to society. Fortunately, being the conscientious young men we were at the time, we had carefully placed our empty bottles in a garbage bin and had also ensured that any remnants of marijuana were in us rather than on us. As a result, the ensuing police search found nothing that could be construed as evidence of juvenile delinquency.

We almost talked ourselves out of the situation, but then I decided to do my worst ever Kristofferson imitation by asking if they had anything better to do than pick on a couple of hippie kids having a bit of fun. That was when someone turned out the lights, and we wound up in jail to spend the night.

But this post is not about youthful discretions or lost glory days. This post is about prejudice, inequality, discrimination, and profiling. It’s also about the sad realisation that our societal prejudices of yesteryear are still with us today.

I recently discovered that Kristofferson had been asked to change the words of his song when it was recorded in 1969. The verse, I never saw a man locked in that jail of yours who wasn’t just as lowdown poor as me, was originally written as I never saw a man locked in that jail of yours who wasn’t neither black or poor as me. That was then, and this is now: The poor are getting poorer and non-whites are being carded, hated, and misunderstood. In 1969, Kristofferson was talking about the prejudices of the time. In 2017, we continue down the road of hate.

I may have lost touch with my friend D.J. and my days of youthful discretion are only distant memories, but the lyrics of Kristofferson’s song still hold true. We are not where we should be, but I am still dreaming for the best of all possible worlds.

March 21, 2017
International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination

Dr. StrangeJob

Find Dr. StrangeJob on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/drstrangejob
Follow Dr. StrangeJob on Twitter at https://twitter.com/drstrangejob
Learn more about Dr. StrangeJob at www.drstrangejob.ca