If you're a regular reader—and if you are you should get out more often—you know each post usually has a large, relevant photo centered at the top.
But I felt, and I believe you will too, that no one needed to see this particular picture any larger than it is.
Just so you know, the photo isn't of the person I'll be talking about. Butt the action is (see what I did there?).
Because our agency has grown so fast, there are now more people than there is space for them all (still waiting for them to ask me for recommendations about who to tie the can to-don't get me started). Anyway, an individual at my agency, who doesn't have an actual desk or workspace to call his own, wanders around from desk to desk and person to person doing whatever the fuck it is he does there.
So get this: apparently while he was discussing business with someone at the agency, he was leaning on the end of their desk, with his elbows in front of him, and his low-riding blue-jeaned derriere sticking out in the aisle between desks.
And while that may have been a comfortable position for him to discuss business, it wasn't exactly the best view for the individual sitting at the desk directly behind him.
Little did they know the view was about to get a lot worse.
Apparently Mr. No Office had an itch to scratch. So, being cultured and part of polite society, he quickly excused himself, went to find some privacy in the men's room, and discreetly attended to the need.
I'm just messin' with you. He crammed his hand down his pants, under the waistband, and scratched his sweaty, unwashed ass for longer than anyone wanted to watch.
It's the kind of slick move legends are made of. It's also the kind of story that spreads like wildfire through an agency.
I share an office just down the way from where the ass-scratching incident occurred. With me in our one-window, no-view office are three roommates. One of them happens to be an extremely funny writer. Wait, I meant another extremely funny writer.
When the story of the ass scratching eventually made its way to our office, my fellow writer was mortified. She couldn't believe someone would do that kind of thing out in the open for everyone to see. I don't remember her exact words, but it was something to the effect of, "As if the job isn't hard enough, now I have to worry about seeing some ass-scratchin' nomad when I'm walking in the office."
BAM! My new favorite phrase was born.
If you know anything about me, you know I'll often take a phrase or joke I like, hang on to it like a rodeo rider and run it into the ground until people know I'm going to say it before I do. If you think I'm kidding, go back through my posts and see if you can count how many times you see the words "high school girlfriend."
True to form, every day since I heard it, I've been trying to work "ass scratchin' nomad" into my office conversation at least once a day.
So thank you to my writer roommate for a line I'm having immense fun with, and that cracks me up every time I think about it.
When we were discussing the event, someone said the moral of the story is if you're going to scratch an itch like that, maybe you ought to find a more discreet place to do it. But I think that's all wrong.
The moral of the story is don't shake hands with him.
