Mayonnaise Monday

"Just another Mayonnaise Monday" --The Bangles

Man, that song says it all, doesn't it? I completely agree with those ladies... Monday is always the hardest day of the week for me, and I hate mayonnaise. A lot. So when they say that it's "just another Mayonnaise Monday," I know the pain of which they sing. Let me show you the quintessential Mayonnaise Monday, which happened to me three weeks ago.

I woke up at 8:17 AM, or approximately seventeen minutes after I was supposed to begin my shift. Sensing the world's impending doom of my not starting my route on time, I jumped into my ice cream truck and zoomed away. Now I've always thought, and maybe you'll back me up on this, that 8 AM is too early to be selling ice cream, but every time I bring this up to my boss, that vein in his forehead grows to twice its size, throbbing in Morse Code, "Just do your expletive deleted job!"

Now, usually I take the direct route, going from the senior's center and the shopping mall, over near the baboon-sloughing plant, and finally by the elementary school and the diet clinic, but on that day I decided to reverse my course, because I wanted to run a quick errand. I had to get my propane tanks filled so I could barbecue that night. Usually, it wouldn't be a problem getting the tanks filled at Ray's Propane at the end of my shift (his main store is next to the clinic), but he had tickets to the WWF Smackdown event in Shiloh and had to close the store by noon.

When I got to Ray's Propane, I plopped the tanks on the counter and asked for my usual: two tanks refilled. I get the two tanks filled because they both have a small leak in them, so the two tanks guarantee I'll have enough propane for the entire BBQ session. Ray said the same thing he always says to me, which is that he can replace the leaking tanks for free, but then I remind him that these are my lucky tanks and I thank him not to busy himself with the workings of my business again. I think he likes our witty repartee, because he always fills the tanks right up and tells me to get the expletive deleted out of his store. Ha ha, what a kidder.

I tossed the tanks in the back of my truck and began to drive off to begin my rounds. The diet clinic wasn't open for business yet, but I was able to sell a fudgesicle to a derelict for what I thought at the time was sixty cents (one of the "quarters" turned out to be a slug). But when I got near the elementary school part of town, that was when I realized Mayonnaise Monday was about to hit me square-on.

I guess the gas leak must have gotten to me a bit, because the next thing I know, I had driven through about twenty pylons and into a sinkhole as wide as the whole street. Luckily for me, I hadn't packed the ice cream sandwiches well, for they all shifted to the front and broke my fall against the windshield when I hit the bottom of the hole. As I crawled out of the truck, I was accosted my three of the rudest civil employees I had ever had the misfortune of running into. The biggest one, whose name patch said Mickey but who I decided should have been named Mean Guy at birth, asked me (in words so vulgar that I will not repeat them here) why I drove into the sinkhole and demanded that I move my truck now. Now, this "gentleman" had no right to talk to me in such a tone and I told him so in no uncertain terms, and he told me, "Either move your expletive deleted truck, or I will, you stupid expletive deleted!"

Well, I had had enough at this point and demanded his badge number or city employee number or some such identification. It was at this moment he pulled out the flare gun and shot one into the back of my truck. I would normally have called him a menace to civilized society on the spot, because a maniac that shoots flares into vehicles to solve problems is definitely a menace to something, but I remembered those leaking propane tanks. Now I've never been described as fast, although when I was fifteen I came in second place in the 20 yard dash at fat camp, but I took off toward the back of that truck with a speed that would make a cheetah proud. Well, maybe a cheetah that could stand to lose 30 pounds or so. Anyway, I got to the back doors and grabbed the handles right when the flare ignited the propane. The doors and I were shot backwards about half a block (don't worry... I was fine, except I was pretty sure I started the day with eyebrows) while the rest of the truck shot into the air about 200 feet before exploding, covering a quarter-mile area with twisted metal shrapnel and ice cream (or what my boss described as "free ice cream" to the security guard leading me off the premises of Speed-E Ice Cream, Inc. after I reported the incident).

After the explosion and the subsequent firing, I had the rest of the day to myself, so I walked back to my house. Once I got to the front door, I realized that my keyring was somewhere in the shrapnel-covered quarter-mile area near the elementary school, or wherever they towed the truck remains to. I knew this because they sure as sugar weren't in my pockets.

I also knew that both doors were locked up tighter than my Uncle Matthew, who is currently serving an 18-month sentence for writing a bad check to a nun. My only hope was to shimmy through the bathroom window, which I leave ajar for reasons that I will not divulge so as not to embarrass my roommate and his fiber-heavy diet. I climbed the side of the house with agility that must have reminded onlookers of an overweight cheetah that climbs houses. Once I had a hold of the window frame, I pushed my upper body through the opening until the upper body turned to the bigger lower body, and let's just say that my caboose didn't get through the tunnel.

Mayonnaise Monday was definitely in full effect now, as I rested on the windowsill with my big backside on the outside of the house. And let me add that I got really stuck in there, because I now couldn't even wiggle back out of the house. The wiggling did help to loosen my pants and undershorts to the point where they fell to my ankles, exposing the whitest half-acre of buttocks seen in public since the late great Junior Samples passed on to the Great Hee-Haw in the Sky.

It was at this time that my roommate got back home. Finally, I would be saved! I called to him and, after enduring approximately twenty minutes of laughter at my expense, asked for his help in getting me out of this window. He told me he had just what was needed, and I thought that meant some sort of tool that would extract me from my current situation. The "what was needed" turned out to be a "Where's The Beef?" bumper sticker that he affixed to my bare tush. Then, he charged onlookers a dollar to get their picture taken next to me.

When I noticed that my sobs and pleas were pointless, I decided to find the humor in the situation. It was funny, when you think about it and don't picture yourself as the butt of the joke, pun intended. I laughed and exclaimed, "It's like the Bangles say... just another Mayonnaise Monday!"

"Dude, you're so wrong," my roommate yelled back. "The Bangles are saying 'just another MANIC Monday!"

Boy, no matter how down you get, leave it to Mayonnaise Monday to find another way to kick you in the teeth.