My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums

After work today I went for a run in the rain. I haven't reached gazelle status yet, but I'm able to run greater distances and with more bounce in my step than I was a week ago. I came home and enjoyed a garden salad with pieces of a chicken-chili-lime burger on top. And for a beverage I had a delicious smoothie. All that and I still feel like hurting myself. I'm kidding.

Ryan, the round mound of sound hates all the drivers and they hate him. They think he's lazy and bossy, and they're right on both counts. He thinks they're lazy and incompetent and should all be fired. He's right in a way, but his assessment of them is too harsh.

Last week, one of Gio's friends started working with us. His name is Larry and at the end of his second day, when Karen and I were sharing our thoughts about his work ethic, Ryan chimed in with his opinion, which went like this: "I think Larry is an amazing worker. Really. He's only been here two days and he puts everyone else to shame."

Karen and I shared a look and then I said to Ryan, "How is it you like this guy so much and hate everyone else who works out back?"

"Because Larry's the real deal and the rest of those guys are idiots."

Well, that was that. Karen opined that perhaps Ryan had a little crush on Larry, and Ryan didn't do too much in the way of telling her she was wrong. As far as I know, Ryan's straight, but when the shirt incident occurred, I began to wonder.

A day or two after Ryan's glowing appraisal of him, Larry approached me and asked me what was up with Ryan. I assumed he was referring to Ryan's laziness, because that's usually what people bring up when they speak to me about him. Instead, Larry told me that when he came in to work in the morning wearing his black Taylor Rental shirt for the first time, Ryan told him he looked really good in it. Hmmmm. And that wasn't the only time; Larry told me today that Ryan made another comment to him about how good he looked in the shirt a couple of days ago. Larry seems like a nice guy, but he's not feeling very good about being courted by a lazy, obese, booger eating, fingernail chomping, college student. And the shocking part of the story is that I'm jealous! Again, I kid. Or do I? Hmmmm.........