I received the following e-mail yesterday from Wendell Wilkie High School’s perennial sophomore, Bubby Spadmen.

Hey Mr. C.,

They tell me it’s Spring and school will be over soon. I guess that’s right even though all the normal signs are missing, like warm weather and stuff. Anyway, I have to start getting ready for it so I can get a summer job – something that will prepare me for the future that never seems to get here.

That’s why I’m thinking I’d like to be an actuary.

All the lists of “best jobs” say the job of actuary is the bestest of the best. It’s got high pay and low stress, you can work regular hours in a comfortable place where they take good care of you. And there aren’t a lot of people in the field so it’s easy to get hired.

That sounds like the perfect job for me, even though I still don’t get what it is!

And in those “best job” articles when they go on to describe the work a lot of the writers say “no one understands what an actuary does …”, which is kind of odd because writers are supposed to be good at figuring things out. Some of them try to explain it in detail, but that’s when I kind of lose interest. I think it has to do with numbers or something, which is too bad because I was hoping it had to do with acting.

Anyway, if most people don’t know what the job is, I hope I might still be able to get one because I’m really good at pretending that I know what I’m doing. Here’s the secret – you try to look busy and don’t talk, unless it’s about the weather.

Will you give me a glowing reference letter if I need one? It would sure help, and if you could work the words “actuary”, “actually” or “actuality” in there, I think that could be the thing that gets me over the top.

My future is in your hands,
Bubby

I told Bubby I would write a recommendation letter for him, but I wouldn’t pretend that he has any skills he hasn’t got or drop in misleading words. But I also agreed I wouldn’t put the word “clueless” in there either, even though I desperately want to.

Describe a job you had that you didn’t know how to do.

Today’s post comes from Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty.

At Ease, Civilians!

Be at ease and be at rest. Calm down and stay relaxed, please. I’m here to remind you that in work and life, pacing is very, very important. The suddenly warm weather we’re having after prolonged exposure to a cold, snowy, inhospitable climate-from-Hell is very dangerous, because it will make people want to do all of their end-of-winter chores in one weekend.

For those people, I have one word:

Don’t.

Ladders, rakes, shovels and clippers can be useful tools, but if you overindulge they will turn on you and they will hurt you. Accept his fact: our spring has been delayed. Nothing is as it should be in the final days of April. I know at least one person who has vowed to finally take the Christmas lights down off the highest peaks of his house this weekend.

More power to him. It is good to tackle the most delayed chores first. But there is no way you can catch up to the season in a single weekend.

I know what happens to muscles that have been idle too long under the strain of sudden activity. I’ve spent my career warning people about our relentlessly brutal and indiscriminate friend, gravity. I’m here to sound the alarm for what I believe is a VDW – a Very Dangerous Weekend.

Take it easy, really. We’ve skipped over spring. It’s going to be a long summer. Pace yourself.

Yours in Safety, Always,

Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty

B.S.O.R. is always preaching excessive caution and pressuring us to lay back and do less, but this weekend he may have a point. A cooped-up people can become over-active under the influence of a long-anticipated and unfairly delayed warm-up.

What’s on your to-do list?

Today’s post comes from disgraced and disreputable former journalist Bud Buck.

The FAA announced today it will assess delay-blame on a minute-by-minute basis across the entire nationwide air traffic system so travelers do not waste time nursing their misdirected ire.

“I’m mad as hell,” said perpetually angry regional sales manager Aaron Shoelicker. “If I have to sit on the tarmac for an extra 20 minutes alongside some whiney infant who can’t stop blubbering about his need to get to Tampa for a noontime meeting, I want to know immediately who I can hate for being put in that situation.”

Shoelicker complained that during an especially lengthy airport delay earlier this month, he was allowed to spiral into a towering fit of rage only to find out later that the culprit was bad weather at his scheduled destination.

“I got wound up and had a monumental tantrum at the check-in desk. Later, when I found out the reason for the hold-up, I felt like an idiot because I was essentially shouting about Minnesota having a snowstorm.” he said. “Back in November I was begging for snow, so the irony is not lost on me.”

Simone Forage, another frequently ballistic flyer, admitted exhaustion from repeatedly launching herself into a series of spittle-soaked tirades in response to a recent spate of unattributed flight postponements and missed connections.

“I didn’t know who, exactly was behind all this,” she said, wistfully. “So I let the flight attendants have it, and everybody in first class got a piece of my mind too. If someone had simply explained that it was really the Republicans’ fault, I could have focused my ranting more efficiently.”

The FAA will closely measure degrees of travel-delay blame and will categorize it across a spectrum of responsibility that includes Democrats, Republicans, the President, Congress, Gays, Television, the NRA, Hollywood, Video Games, the Koch Brothers, Mario, Luigi, and the Kardashians. The results will be posted on large information boards at all major airports, and airline employees from the pilots to the gate agents will apportion blame for each delay at the time it is announced.

“We owe this to the traveling public,” explained Special Agent Foster Wellington of the Federal Spleen Administration. “Helping people fly off the handle productively allows us to conserve our National Bile Stockpile, which needs to be nurtured in case we encounter something that’s really worth getting all upset over.”

How do you manage your anger?

Dear Dr. Babooner,

I struggle with a harmless compulsion that many others despise. I’m upfront about it and have even sought help from a bike-to-your-location therapist (The Cycle Analyst), but still they roll their eyes and find someone else to talk to whenever I enter the room simply because I’m a pun worshipper.

My wife says I have taken this too far and have limited our options because I will only buy goods and services from pun-named outlets. Why is that so wrong? Pun-based businesses need customers too.

So what if my favorite Hawaiian resort is Here Today, Gone to Maui?
My preferred oceanside bar is Rum With a View.
My favorite bodega is Juan in a Million.
I buy my plants and Fronds of the Family.
I always get a cup of coffee at Pony Espresso.
I’ll stop for a bottle of wine at Life’s a Cabernet.
I shop for furniture at Coucho Marks.

There are plenty of shopping choices for me out there. I have a satisfying life and I don’t feel constrained at all. If anything, it’s a fulsome prison. But when I try to explain myself, she groans. And not in a good way.

Should I change my habits, or continue to stop at every pun shop I see?

Sincerely,
Mel Arky

I told Mel that going window shopping with him would be a pane in the glass. But that’s just one opinion.
What do you think, Dr. Babooner?

Last April we enjoyed an early, warm Spring, so naturally my expectations were raised for this year and I made it a point to get the patio furniture out as soon as possible.

A weekend of grilling burgers and eating potato salad in the great outdoors was certainly going to be possible before the end of April.

After all, if God didn’t mean for humans to sit on the deck, why did he invent beer coozies and all-weather swivel rockers?

I guess we have these things because they look so interesting and downright sculptural under eight inches of wet snow.

Describe an outdoor spot where you could sit for hours.