too soon?

His girlfriend was looking at her phone, Twitter most likely, he thought as he stared at her fingers. He moved up to her tits and then her face. Of course, the then went back to her tits. He wasn’t really a boob guy, but he just wanted to look at her tiny ones. He definitely liked ‘em smaller. Asses? Completely opposite.

“I can’t believe that happened?” she exclaimed.

He yawned. The Twitterverse was in a breaking news mode, obviously. He just wished the baffoons of the internet would just let professionals do the news breaking. Nowadays, everyone’s a journalist. So why isn’t there any respect for the profession, if everyone wants to be one? Guess it’s like athletes. Everyone thinks they can play. Everyone thinks “Hey, I could make at least one shot in an NBA game.” Or “Hey, I could at least complete one pass.” Fuck those dolts.

He looked at his girlfriend. She seemed truly upset.

“What is it babe?” he finally asked, more out of duty than true care. He knew it was probably just another oil spill or terrorist attack.

“Someone killed a bunch of people at a movie theater. Twelve of them. They were all just watching the premiere of “The Dark Knight Rises.” So sad.

“Another reason to not go see a movie on the opening night,” he said rather coldly. He was cold and callous now. Too many years of cynicism from being a journalist and seeing murder, death, rape, famine, AIDS every day and night of his life.

“You’re an ass,” she said giving him a mean stare.

She was right. He was an ass. To say something out loud like that will never be “acceptable” behavior as his third grade teacher told him after he called a girl a “cunt” to her face. He’d heard his dad use the word, didn’t know what it meant, but it seemed powerful. He realized that day that sometimes restraint was necessary. Even when you didn’t want to use. It.

Over the years, that ability had been eroded. Now, his face always told the tale and his mouth usually followed.

It cost him many things. Chances at getting laid. Telling a girl you think she’s stupid in a crowded bar usually won’t lead to blow jobs. More likely, it’ll lead to a punch in the face by some other clod. And that guy will end up getting his dick wet.

Jobs? Ha. If you tell a boss what you really think, it should get you promoted. And a good boss will do so. However, the problem with that theory is most bosses are not good bosses. They just lasted the longest. Or made friends or were members of the “Lucky Sperm Club.” This was more evident in newspapers than most places, he found. Yet, he kept going back to them. Until Twitter finally killed most of them.

“Too soon?” he asked.

She glared again.

“Guess so.”

It reminded him of the Virginia Tech sniper killings. He had plenty of friends and “Myspace friends” at that time who went to the school, worked for the school or just liked the school.

Later that day, after the news broke – more on television and newspaper web sites at that time than citizens, but not wholly at all – he put up a gif as his profile picture. Of a turkey in the crosshairs of a gun.

It was amusing to go to friends pages. Many dotted, some covered, with ribbons of “support” for the victims. A really nice gesture, I guess. But if he was a “top friend” there was the turkey in the sights, surrounded by ribbons. It was laugh inducing.

“Too soon?” was response to the criticism.

It got Howard Stern fired. “How much is a ticket to the 14^th Street Bridge?” Ha. That’s funny. And pretty damn daring.

But he had mojo. Getting fired didn’t hurt. It helped.

Being a douchebag to friends and such? Not much of a gain to be had there.

“My goal is to get as many people to follow me, then unfollow me,” a sort of friend posted on his Twitter feed a day before. He messaged him to say “then make fun of the movie shooting victims.”

His reply?

“Too soon.”

Who the fuck are these people. You are either a satirist who isn’t scared to offend, or you’re just another brick in the wall. Another wheel in the machine. Another cliché in a small town sportswriter’s shitty column.

“Guess we have a critic!”

Bad headline idea?

“Too soon?”