Tags
fun with illiteracy, Tardsie's True-Ass Tales, vulgarity is the secret ingredient, Why am I so stupid?, Zed
By Tardsie
But Before We Stamp It Out Entirely, Maybe We Can Have Some Fun With It First.
As a lad, I used to hang out with a kid we’ll call Zed. Zed was a couple of years older than I was, but we’d met when we were both in the 8th grade. Zed was not a bright boy. In fact, he was a stone-cold moron, and the 8th and part of the 9th grades were the only times we were in school together, because Zed dropped out as soon as the law would allow.
Despite being a halfwit, Zed actually had some things going for him. For one, he was reasonably good-looking and had a–if not refined, then at least well-developed–sense of style. For whatever reason–back then, anyway–girls flocked to him, and Zed could boast a number of conquests before the rest of us had even reached second base.
And while Zed wasn’t exactly a mean guy, by being the youngest of our group and having the biggest mouth, it ended up that he’d pick on me from time to time. He was bigger and stronger than I was then, and there wasn’t much I could do but take it. For a while.
As a functionally retarded ninth-grade dropout, Zed’s career prospects were by no means overwhelming, and so when his mom finally made him apply at McDonald’s, it seemed Zed had found the job he was born to do. But first came the application. Sadly, as a consequence of his infrequent and attenuated schooling, Zed was virtually illiterate. Simple words like “cat,” “dog,” and his own name were within Zed’s oeuvre, but more complicated or polysyllabic words might as well have been Sanskrit to the boy. When Zed needed help filling out the application, apparently forgetting his regular abuse–or hoping I would, he turned to me for help.
Obviously, We're Not Too Worried About The Possibility That Zed Might Someday Read This Post.
“How do you spell employee?” Zed asked.
At first I was cautious. “E-M-P-L-O-Y-E-E,” I told him. I spelled a few words for him like this: “E-X-P-E-R-I-E-N-C-E,” “P-R-O-M-P-T,” “H-O-N-E-S-T.”
After a while, though, when I saw that Zed was writing exactly what I told him, the temptation for mischief became too great.
“How do you spell important?” Zed asked.
“Important?” I said, “That’s easy: “I-M-P-O-R-T-A-P-E-N-I-S-N-T.”
Fact: Employers Respect A Powerful Vocabulary.
Zed dutifully wrote it down. Several more followed. “F-R-I-E-N-C-O-C-K-D-L-Y,” “R-E-S-F-U-C-K-E-R-P-O-N-S-I-B-L-E,” “R-E-F-E-A-S-S-H-O-L-E-R-E-N-C-E-S,” and a whole lot more.
Fortunately, just after Zed turned the application in, I called the manager of McDonald’s and told him what I’d done. Zed got the job and we all had a great big laugh.
Maybe You're Not Using Them Right.
The above story is 100% true, except for the last paragraph. I never told anybody anything, and of course, Zed didn’t get that job.
Don't Fuck With TarPENISdsie!
Promethean Times 
Being a bit of a spelling Nazi, I could have oceans of fun with someone like that. It’s T-W-A-T-T-A-S-T-I-C!, R-E-D-I-C-K-U-L-O-U-S! My own son is a techie type person. He understands stuff that’s way over my head, such as advanced physics, mechanical engineering, advanced math, and how to rebuild a rotary engine, but he can’t spell correctly, at least not consistently, to save his life unless he’s using some sort of spell check program.
He left a message on my dry erase board awhile back: ” Those Who Live In Glass Houses Shoudint Masterbaite in the Daytime.” I almost missed the wisdom (and the humor) in that statement due to the spelling errors, which is a shame.
Well, it’s clear where the boy gets his warped wit, if not his spelling finesse. And it adds yet another reason that I’m glad I don’t live in a glass house.
In defense of your boy–and his entire idiot generation–they’ve come of age in the era of spell-check. Zed didn’t have that excuse. For him, it was just bad schoolin’.
Thanks for the comment!
That’s brilliant and he deserved it for being a bully and getting too much action. Times are bad when you cannot get a McJob.
Thanks, Elliot! In fairness, I should probably mention that I knew of only one other person who applied to that McDonalds and was actually rejected–me.
Clearly, they didn’t recognize my burger-flipping greatness.
I’m a spelling/ grammar nazi too, so I think the flagrant misspelling in that joke would ruin it for me pretty much completely. LOL
Me thinks your antics represented passive-aggressive behavior given Zed was getting some girlie action and you weren’t. Just saying…
By the way, I’m happy to report that I, too, will be using the word “penis” in my blog post tomorrow.
Well, thank you Dr. Joyce Brothers!
In all seriousness, yes, I was definitely resentful of Zed’s success with the ladies, which is why I included the information about his sexual prowess, which would otherwise be a superfluous detail, I think. As an adolescent and early teen, I was extremely insecure–and that’s saying quite a bit considering kids at that age. My mouth was a reflection of that. I leave it to you and other readers to judge whether anything has changed.
I was very envious of Zed when I first met him. He was better-traveled than I (his mom was from Europe), more sophisticated and, most galling of all, his aforementioned success with women. His mom was much more permissive than my own–I got drunk for the first time at his sixteenth birthday party; I was 13. I stayed in contact with him for many years, and thanks to Facebook am in limited contact with him now. Of course, our lives are very different than they were all those years ago.
I have more Zed stories.
Thanks, Carrie!
I await your penis-referencing post with bated breath. That doesn’t sound right…
Well, it is much more boring than Zed stories.
Carrie,
Peen.
Peen.
Peen.
Le Clown
Le Clown is so sophisticated.
Not as much as you’d think. Everything just sounds sounds a little more sophisticated when it’s said in Frogeaux.
Oui oui.
Golden story. Probably threw him off learning more about words. You practically doubled each one. I’m sure somewhere out there he’s flipping some kind of meat patty.
Thanks, ML!
And thanks also to the magic of Facebook, I’m actually in limited contact with Zed. He’d be happy to hear that you think so highly of his career prospects, because as it turns out, he’s chronically unemployed.
Hey at least he’s keeping consistent.
You really did that? lmao! I knew some ‘Zeds’ growing up.
I knew a guy like that once. He made it 12 hours before he ticked me off and I tied him to a tilt-a-whirl for the rest of the day.
I’m still not allowed at the carnival.
Reblogged this on Promethean Times and commented:
In which we do our part to combat illiteracy!
Hey, What goes around comes around. Zed sounds like he deserved what he got. So, he never figured out you were the reason why he didn’t get the McJob? Sounds like he hasn’t figured out much over the years.
As Bruce Willis says to his girlfriend in “Pulp Fiction,” “Zed’s dead, baby. Zed’s dead.”
He never figured it out, and although we’re still in nominal touch all these years later, I haven’t had the heart. Zed’s life turned out almost the way you’d expect it. I say ‘almost’ because he managed to find himself a good woman and have three kids by her. She’s the breadwinner, he’s the homemaker. And–I’ll be damned–he seems to do a good job of it.
Hmm, that sign about stupid people could cause so much more mischief if you but switch the second and third words around…. Adjective or verb…. Hmm….
That’s a good point! We don’t want ’em breeding, after all!
Served him right.
It did, because I’m sure he didn’t want that job anyway. Zed wasn’t a bad guy (and in fairness, I had a BIG mouth), but I won’t deny that it was a sweet revenge.