Okay, everyone: breathe. I know that some of you are not thrilled about the results of the election, but I am certainly not here to discuss my political views. What I will say, is I have lived through eight years of a Hugo Chavez “presidency,” and trust me, nothing here can get worse than that.
But I know my role. You don’t come to “Bad Luck Joe” (which if you actually read this, bless you) to talk about the serious things in life. You come here to laugh and point your finger at me. I’m a comedic relief and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I think we are due for a good chuckle, so here is a rapid fire round of bad luck:
One time as a child I tried to grab my ball when it went under the shelf in my living room. We had a mouse problem in the house, so we put a lot of super glue traps under the shelves to catch those rodents. We didn’t catch many, but one of the traps did stick to my hair when I was reaching for my ball. We had to shave half my head to get the glue out of my hair, so I was pretty much 2007 Britney Spears before it was cool.
I had a miniature foosball table, and for some reason, my curiosity led me to wonder if I could stick the ball up my nose. We had to call the ambulance to get the ball out of my nose. Perfect fit, to be fair.
I went to the school championship game with my soccer team (in Venezuela that’s a pretty neat thing). The game ended up with a penalty shootout. I ran up and ‘Charlie Browned’ the ball, whiffing the round bastard; we lost the championship.
While I was still struggling to grasp the English language, a girl told me she had a crush on me (stop laughing, that’s not the joke). Only knowing the literal meaning of crush in English, I ran for my life thinking I was about to literally be smashed by this elementary school student. Such a shame, Emily could have been the one.
Not really bad luck, but I ate “Cowboy Maccaroni” in the cafeteria on a dare. It had expired cheese on it; I got food poisoning.
Senior year of high school we had an assembly where we walked in a line past our teachers so we could hug and thank them. It was dark in the auditorium since a video was playing. I thought I saw my old newspaper advisor, who said she would be there to say goodbye to us after she changed schools that year. I ran up to someone who looked very similar to her and was about to give her a hug. It wasn’t her, but it was too late not to commit to the hug. She was very sweet, though; her perfumed hug smelled like strawberries.
Speaking of misidentifying people, just this year I thought I saw Criterion Managing Editor Alec Williams at The Point. I walked up and slapped him on the back to say “hi.” It wasn’t him. Found out days later the guy was in my biology class. He noticed me in class, and it was a very intense eye contact moment.
There you have it, some quick laughable moments in my life. Whatever you do, don’t forget to smile and love one another. And if you ever need to laugh at someone else’s misery, I have got your back.
