Some gentlemen of a certain age read this zine, so let me ask a delicate question: Does your pee come out wrong, like mine does?

When I urinate standing up, from my vantage point it seems to be coming out on target, but about 10% of the time a side-spurt is also coming out, usually to the right side, and splashing onto my pants. I can't see it, though — my belly blocks my view — so I don't know it until I'm done peeing, and discover my pants are wet.

This has happened often enough, I now wear black britches instead of gray when I'm not at home, almost pervy-straddle any public urinal I'm using, and I'm considering carrying a small funnel in my backpack.

♦ ♦ ♦

I'd missed my bus, and it's a route that runs only twice hourly, leaving me with an unexpected half-hour. That's when fish'n'chips occurred to me. Just a few blocks from the bus stop, there's an Ivar's, the local chain that sells excellent fish'n'chips at painfully high prices.

My bus was due in (checks watch) 27 minutes. Would that be enough time to walk to Ivar's, place my order, eat my food, and get back to the bus stop? Fast food for lunch, but it would have to actually be fast.

It took four minutes to walk to Ivar's, and then three minutes waiting in line to order.

"Large fish'n'chips," I said, "and a Diet Coke. For here."

"Is that for here or to go?"

"Here," I said again. Three or four precious seconds, wasted...

An employee took my money and handed me an empty cup. Oh, so this is one of those places where you gotta pour your own drink...

Then I saw that they have a newfangled mix-your-own-Coke machine, with a thousand different flavor combinations — and I frickin' hate those machines. Only one customer at a time can pour, and there's always only one machine, so it's always slow, and people don't know how to use it or they want to experiment, so it's always sticky, and anyway, who really needs a chocolate-orange-strawberry-vanilla Coke?

I was third in line to use the drink machine. Time ticked on, as somebody's grandmother studied the screen and then slowly pushed several buttons, making her way through the maze of soda options.

Next was a high school kid who wanted, apparently, one ounce of everything all mixed together. He tasted his concoction, didn't like it, and poured it out, then filled his cup with 10 something elses instead. He took a taste of that, dumped it again, pushed more buttons, and finally walked away with a cup of disgusting.

At last it was my turn at the machine. Eighteen minutes remained, but this should be quick, right? Diet Coke is not a complicated pour, but — Diet Coke wasn't listed on the screen. I went back to the "home page" and poked through the endless selections again, but still found no option for Diet Coke, or diet anything. The word "diet" wasn't there.

Maybe it's silly, because I am profoundly fat and not particularly losing weight, but I don't like the taste of syrupy fake-sugary sodas, and I was not going to drink a full-power soda. I poked through the selections a third time, disbelieving. How could they have so many options, and none of them are diet? Ain't this America, damn it?

I harrumphed back to the counter, where there was only one employee, but she was talking to another customer. Sixteen minutes remained. I knocked on the counter three times and shouted, "Yo!"

Luckily, a manager emerged, or at least he was someone who looked like an adult and was wearing a necktie. He said, "Yes, sir?"

"Diet Coke. Diet anything. The machine has no diet drinks."

"Oh," he said, but it sounded like a knowledgeable "oh," not a stupid "oh," and he added, "Just a minute." Then he disappeared. The clock ticked on.

After an agonizingly long minute, he returned, and we walked to the machine. He started punching at its buttons. Watching over his shoulder, it became clear that this was not merely a drink machine — it was a computer. He was pushing buttons quicker than I could follow along, reprogramming its soda software.

"71," a pimply boy voice shouted from behind the counter, and that was me — order number 71. With thirteen minutes remaining, my fish'n'chips was ready. I walked to the counter, took my meal from Mr Pimples, even said "Thank you," and returned to the pop machine. Mr Manager was still poking at its buttons, and I was no longer first in line.

I needed four minutes to get back to the bus stop, so in reality I had just nine minutes to eat my steaming hot cod and potatoes, but no Diet Coke to slosh it around with. Manager man was still punching buttons on the machine, but then he said, "Now we should have Diet Coke, but the machine needs to reboot first."

Twelve minutes to go, I was second in line for a Diet Coke that needed to reboot. Then the manager said, "Crap," as an error message flashed on the screen. The reboot had failed.

When I'd gotten my fish'n'chips at the counter, though, I'd noticed that behind the cash register was a cooler with a glass window, and behind that window many cans of pop were visible. Ah, of course — if I'd ordered my meal "to go" instead of for "here" they would've sold me a can of pop instead of making me wait for this malfunctioning machine.

Back to the counter I walked, but the girl who'd taken my order was taking someone else's order, the kid who'd handed me my food was gone, manager man was still hovering over the machine, there was no-one else, and time was running out.

"Fuck it," I muttered under my breath, as I lifted the gateway, and walked behind the counter.

"Hey, you can't—" someone said, but the hell I can't. I slid the fridge's glass door open, grabbed a can of whatever cheap generic diet cola they sell at the drive-thru, came back to the dining room, and walked toward the next machine, the device that squirts out ketchup and tartar sauce. It's not computerized, so it simply worked.

Ten minutes remained, of which four would be needed to walk to my bus stop. As I headed for a table, passing the manager, who was still struggling with the drink machine, he saw the can on my tray and said, "Did you pay for that?"

Which had to be the dumbest question of a dumb afternoon.

"I paid for that," I said, pointing at the soda machine with my middle finger, "so it seems like a fair trade."

With speedy chewing and quick swallows, I inhaled a large order of hot, greasy fish'n'chips washed away with a can of pop in less than six minutes, but it was food so fast there was no joy in it. Then without even clearing my table or tossing my trash, I walked briskly, and made it to the bus stop with 40 seconds to spare.

It didn't matter, though. The bus was ten minutes late anyway.

♦ ♦ ♦

And now, my internet history from this morning…

♦ ♦ ♦

Florida Guv DeSantis signs bill removing Disney's 'special' tax and regulatory advantages

Love it, but DeSantis as always doesn't know what he's doing.

♦ ♦ ♦

Neil Diamond sang "Sweet Caroline" when and where it was needed

♦ ♦ ♦

Biden quits the COVID fight

♦ ♦ ♦

I opened the world’s largest penis museum

♦ ♦ ♦

One-word newscast, because it's the same news every time...

• climate

• cops • cops • cops

• QAnonsense

• Republicans • Republicans

♦ ♦ ♦

Mystery links — Like life itself, there’s no knowing where you’re going:

—①—

—②—

—③—

♦ ♦ ♦

When I was young, the notion of space travel fascinated me. Now I'm just glad we're not seeking out new life and new civilizations. Everything humans touch turns to disaster, and in practice the "prime directive" is to destroy anything, everything, if it adds 0.7¢ to the bottom line. The real Star Trek would be interplanetary obliteration.

♦ ♦ ♦

The End

• Kathryn Hays

4/24/2022
Tip 'o the hat to All Hat No Cattle, Linden Arden, ye olde AVA, BoingBoing, Breakfast at Ralf's, Captain Hampockets, CaptCreate's Log, John the Basket, LiarTownUSA, Meme City, National Zero, Ran Prieur, Voenix Rising, and anyone else whose work I've stolen without saying thanks.
Extra special thanks to Becky Jo, Name Withheld, Dave S., and always Stephanie...
Cranky Old Man