The Hose

Evil

THANKSGIVING AND MY FAMILY (Part 2 of 2)

Over dinner, my dad and I had somewhat of an awkward conversation. Not that we were discussing an uncomfortable topic or anything… it's just that all our conversations are awkward. We are not a socially graceful crew. This reminds me of the time that I saw my dad hold his grandson (my nephew) for the first time. He looked so awkward that I thought to myself, "That man has never held a baby before." But then I realized that he had 3 kids himself and must have held at least one of us at least once, right?

When we do talk, my dad often surprises me with how much he actually knows or how utterly stupid he is. It's weird. There's usually no middle ground. He was at both ends of the spectrum over Thanksgiving dinner. It went something like this:

Dad: So how's your new job going?

Evil: It's good. Beats my last job by a lot.

Dad: What do you do there?

Evil: You know, sales.

Dad: You're selling advertising now?

Mind you, I work at a search engine company. I bet at least 99% of the people who have heard of it know it as a search engine company. Frankly, before I started working there, I hardly had a clue how they were making money. But for some reason, it appears that my dad is familiar with the company's business model. Crazy! Anyway, the conversation continues like this…

Evil: Well no. I don't personally sell anything. I work on sales strategy in general.

Dad: I see. Have you ever thought of getting a federal job?

Evil: What?

Dad: You know, work for the government. They're always looking for people to do networking or programming or whatever.

Now, what's this crap all about? I have a cushy sales strategy job at pre-IPO search engine company that's so hot it receives over 1000 resumes a day and my dad is suggesting that I try to get job coding HTML for the Housing and Urban Development website or something. As if we were still living in Confucian times (that's 500 BC to you westerners) and the most noble occupation in all of The Middle Kingdom is to serve as an official of the state.

All in all though, I'm glad I had Thanksgiving with family this year. In previous years, I've gone around telling people that I'm an orphan and guilt-tripping them into inviting me over for Thanksgiving dinner. Boy, I gotta say, those meals were great. But someone once told me, "You jackass, Thanksgiving is for family," He was right of course. Even though I had to spend time with my crazy uncles and my brilliant / retarded dad, I was glad I did it.