Show Your Newspaper Carrier A Little R-E-S-P-E-C-T And In Turn We Won't Pee On Your Paper

I'll never win the coveted Newspaper Carrier Of The Year Award, but that's okay with me, because revenge is sweeter than some crappy little trophy with my name scrawled across it. The photographer obviously used newspaper carrier stunt doubles, because, believe me, I've never seen anyone smiling like that down at the warehouse.

Some Houston Chronicle subscribers feel the need to whine, cry, and moan incessantly about their newspaper. You would think that people had actual lives outside of complaining about a home delivery service that they get for mere pennies a day, but no. Every day customers in the district call in to the complaint hotline using their snottiest voice, "I want my paper tied to the front door handle because I'm a laaaawwwwyer." WTH? Who cares if you're a doctor or a lawyer? Why do you have such low self-esteem that you need to lord your title over a little peon newspaper carrier? During Hurricane Rita last year, I promise this is true, people called in hysterical that they didn't get a paper. Ummm, Houston received dire predictions and an evacuation order to clear the city. Just north of here, people died, and had all their worldly possessions ripped away from them, and you're worried about a frickin disposable newspaper? This district has a lot of economically privileged people living in it and the constant barrage of asinine requests tend to reflect that. I swear some of them won't feel the warm glow of customer satisfaction until I march their paper right into their over-priced, under-insulated, mini mansions, and plop down at the kitchen table to read it to them and show them all the pretty pictures.

One particular guy on my route wins the 'A-Hole Of The Year' Award. Of course, the most demanding subscribers also never give a word of praise or thanks. They never give a tip at Christmas, and they never smile or wave cheerfully at you when you pass by. I started this route to help out with the bills when Papi went back to school a few years ago, and this butthead sobbed his little eyes out at the time that he absolutely HAD to have his paper by 5:00 A.M. That's a full 30 minutes before the allotted weekday delivery deadline of 5:30. So really, I made him a favour out of the kindness of my heart. Last October, a tornado touched down a mile from my route while I was still out throwing. The wind and the torrential rains proved severe enough to flood out the streets of the neighborhood, thus stranding me for about 30 minutes. Mr. A-Hole called in 6 times to complain that he hadn't gotten his paper at 5:00. Seriously. Okay, impassable streets, whirling tornadic activity, one sad and pathetic, dripping wet newspaper lady stuck in the middle of it all, and he's only worried about HIS newspaper? Where do people find this misguided sense of entitlement that they should have everything they want, when they want it, and damn everybody else? I began throwing his paper whenever I felt like as a form of protest, but he took his endless complaining to the boss of my boss. In a perfect world, they would have told him to screw off because he signed a contract that promised him 5:30 delivery and nothing more. We don't live in a perfect world, and they acquiesced to his demands.

I suppose that poor unfortunate souls like me, stuck in crappy circumstances because we depend on the money that our menial labor provides, just sucks up the negative and learns to bear it. However, I've started extracting revenge in small doses that satisfies the primal urge in me that wants to go and toilet paper his house and spray paint salacious things on his truck. I'm greeted every day by him standing outside scowling at me with his arms crossed. If it's 5:01, he impatiently taps his watch and shakes a disapproving finger at me. He requested sidewalk delivery. I make sure to throw it as far as possible from wherever he's standing so he has to move his mean azz to go and pick it up and feel the sting of inconvenience. It shows him that he's not the boss of me, no! I'm a wild flower of the night that can't be controlled by his dictatorial ways. The top of each bundled section gets rumpled and ripped, so I usually discard them because it really isn't fit for delivery. Well, it's fit enough for his delivery. I save them all especially for him in a neat little stack on the dashboard. I guess he made such a fuss about what time I delivered the paper, he doesn't want to hassle looking even more petty by whining about the actual physical condition. It's readable, I suppose, if you smooth out the wrinkles, and you don't mind shredded paper hanging off the corners. I get a sick sense of pleasure knowing I'm giving him the worst of the worst, bright and early, every single day.

I told my mom about all this. Understand, she's more demented than I will ever be. It just so happened that she was driving through the main thoroughfare in the neighborhood and she asked which house Mr.A-Hole lived in. I told her, and she started laughing really hard. Apparently, at that very moment, she felt the burning desire to gift his front yard with her Chik-Fil-A trash. Oh, she's so very bad. She now makes it a tradition to pass by his house and throw something whenever she's in the area. I love my mom.

Take heed and treat your newspaper carriers right or suffer the consequences!