Asshole Ghost, please guide the way

I guess if you're completely satisfied with your job, then you're completely stupid. I like all three of my gigs, but none of them are quite what I want to do.

Let's examine this in a potentially entertaining manner.

Radio

What do I do?: Write the news, then read the news.

Good part: I love to tease each story with comical introductions that do a tight-rope dance on what is considered "the line."

My tone makes people say "Maybe that news guy didn't know that what he just said had a hilarious double meaning. He sounded too serious to have actually meant for that to be funny. He must not know what he just said."

People who know me know that I know exactly what I just said.

Bad Part of Being a News Guy: It's not commentary. I would be so much better just taking calls and being up front about how funny I mean to be. There's still a line when you have an opinion show, but that line is moved way further to the funner-side than when you read the news. You get to lose your objectivity and get to say the fun stuff that people really tune to hear you say.

Newspaper:

Good Part: I love when the angle of the story hits me in the head and makes me write it. When I go to an assignment, I ask a lot of questions and I learn how to spell everyone's name, and I get a lot of information that I mostly won't use and I take a lot of pictures that my editor will mostly hate. Still, the story rarely appears to me while I'm on location. No, it happens hours or days after the story ended. I don't get to pick how I write it - it tells me. It's like the story is an asshole ghost who shows up when it finally feels like it and says, "All right, motherfucker! Here's the way I'm gonna be written: Start with this intro, plug these quotes in there, cut that shit out since it's boring and save that shit over there for the caption and when I feel like it I'll give you one hell of an ending - but then again, maybe I won't. Nah, I'm just kidding, I'll give you the ending, but you gotta meet me halfway and start typing what I just told you. And do it now before I disappear and you forget what I say, asshole. You'd be nothing without me!"

And whoever that asshole story-writing ghost is - he's right. I appreciate him. He does all the work. I'm just his secretary taking dictation and signing my name to it. Maybe he's broken me down, but I really do believe that without him, I'd be nothing. So when he finally shows up only to abuse me, I still am just glad he's there - because even though he'll abandon me again, he at least leaves my untalented ass with a story to tell.

Bad Part About Newspaper Reporting: I hate waiting on that asshole ghost to show up. One day he may change his mind. I also feel that I will never learn punctuation (So does my editor.) Finally, I don't feel reporting is my calling. No, I take that back. I always hope to do some reporting. It's actually fulfilling to tell a story - especially to tell a story truthfully, but still better than the other reporters at the same event who are also telling an also true, but somehow lamer story. (If that didn't make sense let me simplify: lots of stories happen at one event: the goal is to pick the best one that other reporters missed.) But I really feel I'd be a much better writer if they just let me write books with chapters like "If I Only I Was Asian, I Could Pull Some Great Pranks!" Remember that one? That's more fun to read than my Rotary Club meeting stories. Still, it is a challenge to sex-up the Rotary Club.

Delivering Pizza

1. The Good Part: (Yes, this is a shit job, but still it is one of my current jobs and it pays well enough to let me slowly work my two media jobs, so I'll cover it.) The good part about pizza delivery is that I spend 80 percent of my time driving around by myself getting paid to rock out and listen to talk radio. The only challenge of the job is to charm customers on the phone to keep them from cussing me out. I only do this so they won't get mad when I screw up their order on that primitive computer that I still can't understand.

The Bad Part of Being a Pizza Driver: I hate my friends seeing me. I also hate my friends trying to tip me money. I hate that people don't try to tip you in drugs and booze like they used to when I was a teenager. But I will say this: I'm glad that the women who order in my delivery area don't try to hit on me at the door. Why? Because I deliver in the ugly part of town, and my legs are too sore to have to run from those Attilas. Seriously, about 80% of the women that order in my area are dog-faced gremlins who want a comical diet coke to go with their meat-lovers. I'm just glad they aren't trying love my meat. Gotta run because Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld is on. I would love to host a television show like that. I've never spent a lot of time on camera though - not sure if I could conquer that one. I hope I get to one day find out. Shit, I haven't conquered any of these ones, yet. When am I gonna figure out which direction to go? Oh who gives a shit. I don't need to worry about that right now. Times are good, and I'm sure I should just wait around until another asshole ghost shows up to guide the way and tell me what to do.