Mitchell Surprenant

I’ll say one thing about my job: I like going. I really do. I don’t get paid the most money, and I’ve got to deal with a good number of terrible people, but I like going to work.

I like that I get a paycheck every two weeks because I go and do the best that I can.

When I go to work, I try to keep the politics to a minimum. I have discussions on and off with other photo techs and some of the managers, but I’m VERY careful to keep my mouth shut around customers. In God’s town, you’re red, or you’re a commie.

Working in a drug store, the customers talk about this health care reform bill a lot. I went back to the pharmacy, and heard a woman complain about the huge price she was paying for her prescription drugs, “but I still don’t support this whole health care bill.”

I bit my tongue. Didn’t say a word to her. I could have used that opportunity to be an informed citizen and asked her why she opposed this bill if it would force the insurance companies to lower their costs. But I didn’t. Because like my job.

Then, there was today.

But first, some back story: Walgreens is “promising” flu shots for anyone who comes in from 10am to 4pm, and they plug that it’s covered by Medicare part B, and may be covered by your insurance.

Well, to promote it, we’re offering the employee discount on purchases (15%) to anyone who gets the shot.

A woman in clearly poor health came up to my counter, buying Ramen noodles, some laxative and Altoids. She got excited when she saw the 15% coupon, and asked how she could get the discount. When I explained, she sighed the biggest sigh I’ve ever heard. “I don’t have insurance…” she sadly mumbled as she opened her wallet to pay full price.

Right there. I knew I could have converted her and her close circle of friends to support at least the public option. But I didn’t say a word. I bit my tongue. Because I like my job.

:-/

Go ahead, keep your kids home from Obama’s speech today. Clearly, you’ll be sending a message to, uh… the school district.

You sent your political message, though. You made your point.

But you’d better start watching your kids’ internet usage. Because all the kids with regular (read: normal) parents are going to be talking about how cool it was to see the president tell them to stay in school. Your kids will probably just watch it later on YouTube, or MySpace, Facebook, Twitter or hell, lets still make believe that people go to DailyMotion.

But you made your point. You kept your kids from that socialist, fascist Obama while they were in school, right? You made a difference, didn’t you?

There’s probably a good chance you’re going to want to keep the TV off for a few days, too. Even your beloved Fox News will be covering the faux outrage and replaying the damning video evidence.

Your kids are probably going to be teenagers at some point. Your kids will probably rebel against you, and remember that you made them stay home during some speech that, had you not said anything, probably would have been forgotten in less than a year. Heck, they may even start supporting *gasp* LIBERAL and PROGRESSIVE causes.

But you made your political point. You kept your kids from being indoctrinated with those socialist agendas such as, “Stay in school,” “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps,” and that terrible, awful socialist doctrine, “create the next Google, or eBay.”

You made this out to be a bigger issue than ever. Your children are going to see this message whether you like it or not.

I was absolutely floored by a customer today.
He had come in to get some pictures printed. As with most customers, he wanted a quick quote of what it would cost him.

“Uh… Thirteen… times…,” as I fussed with the calculator, “$5.07, not including sales tax.” That’s something I always say, just because I’m too lazy to figure out 5% of non-food and 2% of food and add it to the total.

“Ah,” the old man smiled, “that’s the Obama tax.”

Quick on my feet, I defended, “Actually, that’s the Virginia state tax. Been that way for years.” I smiled in hopes that he was joking. He didn’t smile back.

“Pretty soon, there’ll be an Obama tax,” he warned.

Then it struck me– this guy actually believed that Obama could get away with a huge increase in state sales taxes. At this point I imagined Obama in the White House, picking random states and numbers, laughing evilly the whole time.

“A ha ha ha, 10 percent Obama tax for Oklahoma. 1 percent Obama tax for Ohio.”

The concept of an Obama tax is frighteningly hilarious and hilariously frightening.

In this town, I think it’s safe to be a conservative and maybe a conserva-Dem. I want to be neither.

I’ve been a Chicago (and South Suburbs) kid since the better half of 1993. Moving to Virginia was a big culture shock. There were different laws, different people, different companies and different convictions.

Every once in a while, I get a shot in the arm that I’m not in Chicago, and that I’m south of the Mason-Dixon line.

But I’ve lived in Lynchburg (the town that Jerry Falwell built) for almost 3 months now. It’s starting to grow on me that this is where I live now– this is where my life is going to happen.

I’ve noticed a significant number of vanity plates in the Lynchburg area. I’ve tried to find out why they are so much more common than in Chicago. Until I find a satisfactory answer, I will post some of the best ones here.

But clearly it can’t happen too quickly. I’ve been lazy as of late in following up on any state department application or test after my initial interest in March. Damnit, I will eventually.

That said, a customer reminded me of a strong point of mine today– my voice. Every once in a while, when I meet a new customer at Walgreens, they’ll comment on how professional my voice sounds, or how I should go in to broadcasting. Believe me, if it were that easy, I would do it. Subsequently, if there are any radio executives or people in “the biz” with some insider knowledge, please, let me know.

I wonder if the state department has any jobs for broadcast journalism majors with booming voices…

Well, here it is. It’s the brand new and improved mitchsurp.com. There are considerably fewer photos, but I do expect that to change soon.

The overhaul was long overdue, mainly because of my resume. If there was a specific feature you really liked on my old site, I can put it back up really quickly– you just have to let me know.

In the meantime, why don’t you check out one of the already-established websites that I host? The links are on the right, and I know some of them are interesting, but most are in a constant state of construction.

Anyway, I promise more blog posts and thoughts as this rolls out… I just wanted to get away from the empty page and see if this posted to both Facebook and Twitter.

Love you all lots!

-Mitch