Dear Santa,
God made it pretty clear that he gave up on me, so you're my last resort.
I used to pray solely for a new job. Any job. We're talking a return to my high school gig at the Disney Store quarreling over holiday-themed Beanie Babies with obese cat-sweater women and rebuffing the advances of repressed grandfathers.
So, yeah, you're my last hope. I've tried quitting my job (twice). And I've attempted everything short of kidnapping the owners to get fired.
But it seems God in all his infinite glory has decided to keep me in this hell hole, shoveling chips and salsa into the mouths of the ghetto, the gawdy, the trashy, the tubby, the cheap and the cheesy.
So in lieu of what I do want for Christmas this year, would it be too much to simply tell you what I don't want for Christmas?
NO MORE CHATTY CUSTOMERS
Santa, I'm not what you'd call a warm person. I have the patience of Kirstie Alley in a donut shop, and sometimes I drive just so I can rehearse my road rage rants. I have a very busy schedule at work. In between gossiping with my co-workers and shirking my side work, I have a flask to think of. How can I possibly be bothered to engage in idle prattle with the McJohnsons from Ft. Jesus, Texas? It's their first time in LA and they want suggestions on where to eat? There's an app for that.
NO MORE PDA
I'm thrilled that Tina and T'Shawn found true love while doing police-enforced community service together, but I do wish they'd consummate this winning partnership elsewhere, like in a motel parking lot or an above-ground swimming pool. Watching them grope and groan makes me wish I'd been born without genitals. It dulls my faith in humanity. And it makes me hate Christmas and all other 364 days.
NO MORE HOLLYWOOD D-LISTERS
I am no more impressed with Jessica Simpson or Kim Kardashian than with the random homeless man who screams "Shit on the sun" outside my bedroom window each morning. In fact, I find the latter far more endearing, and unlike the former two, I'll actually give him my money. Santa, I'm not what you'd call a complimentary person. "I've seen better" is usually my default answer when someone asks for an opinion on his/her appearance. So to be forced to fawn over someone whose biggest achievement is using her breasts to endorse Midori seems unfair.
NO MORE KIDS
Listen well, Santa. If you elect to grant only one Christmas wish for the rest of my life - aside from bestowing upon me countless millions of dollars or a life-time team of servants - please let it be that I may exist in a world where everyone enters the world already 26 years old (minus my adorable nieces and nephew, and a few of my friends' kids). I don't find them cute. I don't feel some long-repressed paternal instinct to feign interest in their drawings or stories. I mean, seriously? A customer's five-year-old draws a picture of Buzz Lightyear that more closely resembles Lori Petty, and I'm supposed to act impressed? Fuck that. Give me the crayons; I'll show you Buzz Lightyear.
NO MORE ARMENIANS
I know, I know. It's not kind to single out any particular race, religion or sexual orientation (I came *this* close to asking for no more lesbians, but I love Ellen, Portia and Justin Bieber). But seriously, I think God let Satan take over the drawing board when he made Armenians. They're rude, they're bossy, and they hiss when they demand more vodka and Red Bull. Besides, I can think of 1,000 truly offensive terms that I'd rather be called than "Bro." And I don't know what they're packing into those cigarettes they so liberally smoke in my face, but they smell as if they were packed with dog shit covered in fish remnants and burnt hair.
NO MORE ELDERLY
Santa, I'm not what you'd call an affectionate person. Don't get me wrong; I think the elderly are perfectly cute when they're seated far away from everyone at a Christmas party and my interaction is limited to three minutes of discussing the Oklahoma City snow storm of 1986. Beyond that, I have about a four-question limit in any context, and the elderly use up all four questions just figuring out how to open the menu. No, I don't know where we catch our fresh Red Snapper. No, I don't think it's too cold in the restaurant. No, I don't think it's too hot in the restaurant. No, I don't know your son Clive. No, you didn't order a big bowl of spaghetti.
NO MORE CHRISTMAS MUZAK
Every year, before I've even picked out my slutty Halloween costume, I'm unexpectedly bludgeoned over the head as I enter the restaurant to hear some band of six-year-olds singing Wham's "Last Christmas" over satellite radio. Fuck me with a candy cane. Seriously? Which moronic music producers have decreed that all barely tolerable Christmas pop originals should be remade by a bunch of prepubescent Disney cherubs? Bing Crosby and Nat King Cole must be flopping like fish in their graves. I'd rather hear a choir of slaughtered lambs than the drivel they pump out for two months during the holidays. Please, Santa, if I have to hear your anthem "Santa Baby," I can stomach one listening of Eartha Kitt's version. But the Hilary Duff version should only be played in Hitler's chamber in Hell.