Doughnut Guy — Dec. 17, 2022 - Johnny Boy Marketing

🧩 Today’s Puzzle Pieces 🧩
Glazed 🍩
Bingo! 🖥️
Disappearing Christians ⛪

I didn’t intend to bring doughnuts for my co-workers yesterday morning. It just sorta happened. How it happened and how it played out is a window into my weird mind.

First, an explanation: I have a card purchased from Boy The Younger that entitles me to a dozen free Krispy Kremes if I buy a dozen. The card has 10 such coupons attached to it. Though I could most definitely put away 240 Krispy Kremes on my own, as I wrote recently, if I’m not in a good place, the best thing for me to do is to do things for others.

The Krispy Kreme shop is not on my primary route to work. But I never head down that primary route without first checking the traffic on Google Maps. That habit has saved me from being caught in hours-long backups. Yesterday morning, it saved me from driving smack-dab into a 15-minute delay caused by what I’m sure is a typical Missourah Moron driver.

The Krispy Kreme shop most definitely is on my backup route to work. Well, Backup Route #1, anyway. I’ve got about five, which comes in handy in this state. That said, I still wasn’t thinking “Krispy Kreme” when I started my drive.

As I said, I’ve been in the Struggle Zone for much of the week, which, while not necessarily good for me, is quite good for people in my orbit. I tend to do things for others in an attempt to lift my sad-ass spirit from being so sad-ass. This week, I’ve left anonymous coffee gift cards around the office, gave bags of supplies for homeless people and brought flowers home for Wifey Poo. So about five miles short of the Krispy Kreme exit (my name for it, not the official name of the exit), I thought about the coupon card in my wallet.

But was the coupon card really in my wallet? No time better than when you’re traveling down the highway at 70 mph to check, right? The first search of the cavernous wasteland that is my wallet produced many interesting finds, including a membership card to a laser tag facility I haven’t been to in more than a year, a membership card to a shooting range I haven’t been to in at least three years and a receipt from my work trip to Florida last month, but no Krispy Kreme card.

“Oh well,” thought I. “It must be on my desk at home.”

On I drive.

“Wait. There’s no way that card’s at home. It has to be in my wallet,” thought I.

That sparked a more thorough search of my wallet, again, at 70 mph. There, tucked behind a long-forgotten Chick-fil-a free-fries gift card, I found what I was looking for. Bingo! We’re headed to Krispy Kreme!

Except what does that coupon actually say? If you’re thinking that it’s got to be small print on each coupon attached to this credit-card sized card, you’re right. My eyes are 48 years old. Without contacts, I can’t tell whether a person standing five feet in front of me is a human being or a lamp post. With contacts, it’s better, but lately, my vision of tiny print in dim lighting is starting to fade a bit. Fuck you, aging.

Not content with risking my life and the lives of innocent others trying to find the card, I now use my phone’s magnifying glass to attempt to enlarge the tiny print so I can be assured of what the coupon says. This, it seems, is a skill beyond my capacity, so I’m left thinking, “Well, hell, whatever the coupon says, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll just read the coupon when I get in line at Krispy Kreme.”

Except there is no line at Krispy Kreme, which seems to be to be a sign of Muricah’s decline. There was a time when the Krispy Kreme at 7:25 a.m. on a Thursday would have been around the building. But on this particular Thursday, there’s no one in line, and the drive-thru attendant is apparently very eager to talk with me.

“Welcome to Krispy Kreme. What can I get for you?” she says the millisecond after I stop at the menu with a speaker in it. Side note: I was telling Boy The Elder the other day that when I was really young, there were no drive-thrus. It blew his freaking mind.

“Um, I have a coupon for a dozen free glazed doughnuts if I buy a dozen glazed doughnuts. So that’s what I’d like to do.” I said.

“So how many doughnuts do you want?”

“I have a coupon for a dozen free glazed doughnuts if I buy a dozen glazed doughnuts. So that’s what I’d like to do,” I repeated.

“So you want two dozen glazed doughnuts?”

“Yes, indeed.”

“That’s 24 glazed doughnuts?”

At this point, I’m wondering if I’m being pranked, if the woman talking to me through the squawky speaker is having a brain incident, if she’s astounded by the thought that I want these doughnuts just for myself or if the definition of a dozen somehow became ambiguous overnight.

“Yes, 24 glazed doughnuts.”

Shockingly, when I hand over my torn-out coupon and my credit card, she hands me back 24 glazed doughnuts and wishes me a good day. I do the same for her, minus the doughnuts.

“Oh crap. My gas tank is a quarter full,” I recognize as I pull away. This, in the past, wouldn’t have been a problem. I am a professional at driving a car until there is literally one drop of gas left. But that was causing me undue stress, so about a year ago, I made a pact with myself to start thinking about getting gas when the tank hit half full (or is it half empty?). That means I usually get gas before the gas light comes on.

Usually.

The Krispy Kreme shop is right next to some gas stations, and not only that, but right next to gas stations selling gas (duh) for about 20 cents a gallon cheaper than the one closest to my humble country abode. So I stop. I get gas. I pee (a cup of coffee and jug of water have already entered my system at this point in the day). And then I head to work.

Typically, I arrive at work between 7:30 and 7:45. No one checks up on me when I get to work. No one has ever said anything if I arrive at 8 or 7 or 8:15 or 9:30. There is a general awareness that, whatever time I arrive, I’m going to get my shit done and done well, so no one really is watching the clock for me.

But on this day, there’s this thought in the back of my mind that someone is going to be pissy with me because, according to Google Maps, I’m not supposed to arrive until 8:10. As I said, no one has ever been pissy with me for arriving at 8:10. No one has ever been pissy with anyone for arriving whenever they arrive, to the best of my knowledge. But in my mind, someone’s going to say something.

So I prepare a response: “Hey! I stopped to get the team doughnuts!” I say indignantly in my mind to the person who’s going to give me crap for being “late,” a person, I remind you, who doesn’t exist.

I arrive at work. There’s no one in the parking lot waiting to reprimand me, let alone a person in the parking lot with all the crap from my office boxed up and topped with a pink slip. So I calmly walk into the office — still on guard to give my retort should someone say something.

No one does.

Of course, I can’t just put the doughnuts out and let people find them. I type an email. “People of The Upstairs. I was driven off the road by an angry South Pole elf while I was driving to work today. When we stopped, he got out and told me that if I didn’t stop and get my colleagues doughnuts, I’d end up on Santa’s naughty list. Not only that, but the elf told me Santa would kidnap my dog. Thus, there are hot, fresh Krispy Kreme doughnuts on the table by the stairs.”

Anyway, people seemed to enjoy them. And that made me happy.

I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in saying that there’s a direct-proportion relationship between the amount of work that gets done at the workplace and the number of days left until the holiday season, by which I mean the Muricahn Christian holiday season. This isn’t to suggest I’m goofing off at work. I’m not. But if they are going to continue to pipe Christmas music through the office speakers and I’m forced to listen to freaking Mariah Carey hit those damn high notes over and over and over again, there has to be consequences.

Most workplaces recognize this. Mine does. They planned two weeks of events in the run-up to the new year. We’ve had a Christmas potluck lunch. We’ve had crazy sock day, which is pretty much every day for me. Yesterday was virtual Bingo day. Hell yes, I’m down for some virtual Bingo.

So were about 20 of my colleagues, apparently. We logged on at the appointed time and got ready for some hot Bingo action.

The first letter/number combo called was O-69. *Snicker.* But it’s a conservative workplace. Though I know at least half the people in the game are thinking exactly what I am thinking, no one says anything.

Things don’t start out to well for me. I don’t have any of the first four numbers called. But then I get on a roll. Suddenly, I have four X’s across the top and need just I-16 to win. Win what? I have no idea. Nothing has been said about any sort of prize. But still, my heart is pumping just a little bit faster. I have never won a game of Bingo in my life. I’m quite convinced I could be the only person in the game and somehow still would find a way to not win.

“I-16” the caller of the game types in the Teams chat.

“BINGO!” I type back.

My co-workers in the Upstairs give me shit. They’re still salty because I came out of the gate in the annual NFL pick-’em contest red hot and won four of the first five weeks. I currently have a three-game lead to win the overall title, and that a rookie is doing this is somewhat of an embarrassment to them, it seems. Or it’s just good-natured guy-ribbing, which I personally love. I can give it as well as I can take it and take it as well as I can give it.

We play two more games. I am one number away from winning each of those games, but it doesn’t happen. That’s OK. It feels good to have won Bingo once before I die.

Why You Shouldn’t Give a Knife to a Chicken

When good ole’ Q.F. was a bitty boy growing up in the hills of Northern California, I wasn’t allowed to own toy guns. Hippy Mom, she of the butt-length wavy blond hair and constant wearer of culturally appropriated moccasins, thought this would infuse me with peace, love and happiness. Instead, it infused me with devious…

Doughnut Guy — Dec. 17, 2022

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