So we get some of the new guys from the replacement brigade and the PAO replacement turns out to be an obnoxious nerdy bragonaut who finds it amusing to see just how annoying he can be.
Right off the bat he’s in my face throwing his weight around trying to be pushy and intimidating all the while spouting about how wonderful a PAO he is and how much he knows. If my Army cohort says anything about what we don’t have or can’t get he rambles on about getting hookups and this and that and how he’s the colonel’s right hand man. At this point I want to throw up on myself but that’s the limit of my annoyance with him. I equate him to the “Look what I can do!” guy.
Fast forward to day three with Monstro, as I’ve come to call him in my head, and I’m on the computer trying to mind my own business and his monstrous ass is lingering in the background talking about something along the lines of his godliness and tossing a Nerf ball at the wall. Then he does the unthinkable. He purposefully hits me in the head with the ball thinking he’s being funny. I didn’t know what to say. I was dumbfounded. I had practically been oozing venom in his presence and he thinks this is how to befriend me? My annoyance went up a level and I imagined him exploding violently into a pile of ashes I could just sweep away and be done with.
Now it’s day four and my fantasy of ashes has not been fulfilled. I had come back to the office after standing a mundane headcount watch at the dining facility and I was going into the office to sit at my desk and start working on something but I can’t remember what right now because what happened next made me forget.
So Monstro comes in behind me and just as I’m getting ready to sit down in my seat he comes running in there acting like he needs to use the computer and grabs me by the shoulders as if to move me out of the way and then I lost it.
“Don’t f------ touch me. Don’t ever put your hands on me!” I growled when I turned on him and made it very clear he was crossing the line. He tried to act like I hadn’t affected him but he backed off and started diddling with something on the desk. He then said, “You don’t like me, do you?” The mean girl in me wanted to come out and say “Hell no! You’re an idiot!,” but I listened to the nice girl and said that maybe I just needed to get used to his weirdness but by the time that happened I’d be moving to Kandahar.
You would think that there would now be an understanding between us but this guy can’t help himself. He is who he is and obnoxious is a part of his personality so it is up to me to make do and not allow him to get to me. I think he likes getting to people and I don’t want to feed into his wormhole of victims over and over again.
Even with the best of intentions I walked out of the office cursing the next day. Why you ask? Because he infected my cohort with his selfish self-centered ways.
The story,
The day before, our 1st Lt asked if my cohort and I would take a look at an article he and the Major had written about working with the ANA soldiers and edit it for him. We did but both of us where putting a lot of changes into the article so it would meet AP Styleguide rules for the magazine he wanted to have it published. I also found it difficult to read. It was more like a report than an article.
He asked what I thought and I told him it needed to be rewritten because it didn’t flow well. He seemed annoyed because it was his work but that is what editing is all about, making someone else’s work better and yes it hurts a little.
He and the Major asked if I’d rewrite it for them and I was happy to so I spent an extra hour or so working on it before I went to my hut to chill before standing the other half of my watch. I was up late and the next morning I came in later than usual due to the watch.
Monstro is sitting at my desk and I go ahead and start making myself a cup of coffee before I sit down to finish the article. While I’m making my coffee I come back in the office for something and notice my computer is rebooting and I jump right on Monstro and ask him why he shut my computer down and he said he didn’t. I retorted with “I was just in here and my screen was up and now it’s rebooting so WTF?” He informs me ever so non-chalantly that “she” rebooted it and again I lost it.
I cursed all the way out the door about courtesy and the fact I was standing right in the next room and they knew it and all they had to do was ask me to log off the computer so asshole could use it. I ranted about the article and having worked on it late last night and was planning to finish it this morning but now I’d have to start all over.
Of course knowing the finickiness of computers I had saved it before I left the office but I didn’t tell them that. The point was they had been discourteous to me and I was tired of the Army folks thinking they can just push the Navy chick around. They deserved it and I don’t regret letting them have it.
The 1st Lt and Major were somewhat entertained by it as they heard the whole thing, especially when I walked right from my office to there’s in obvious anger and frustration and started bitching about it. They encouraged me to calm myself and soon enough they had me laughing at their sergeant and his continual addiction to buying gems. Even so I had to leave the office to cool off for a while. When I came back I was past the whole event and finished the article.
I only had the slightest doubt that I hadn’t written it to their liking but that doubt was erased the moment 1st Lt looked up from his computer and said, “You were right, this is much better. It actually reads like a real article. The new guys need to read this so they can know what it is we’ve been doing for the past year and how important it is.” He seemed genuinely impressed. I smiled letting him know that, yes I can actually write and they don’t call me a journalist for nothing. I know I’m a good writer but I don’t have to go around telling everyone I am because the proof is in the pudding as they say.
I know that Monstro is not going to change his behavior because he obviously doesn’t care about friendships or good working relationships among his peers. It’s not often I seethe dislike for someone but I guess I can’t like everyone nor is everyone going to like me. I’m still waiting for that pile of ashes but knowing me I’d feel bad if anything happened to his big ole nerdy ass.
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