Cast of Thousandths

I went to the school's winter play this past weekend: Twelve Angry Men. I can tell you with certainty that none of the boys will become a famous actor.

The first thing I noticed (well, after the simplicity of the set) was that the bailiff wasn't wearing the right shoes. Then the rest of the cast filed in, and it was obvious they were wearing their own clothes -- except for the kid playing Henry Fonda's character, because he was in a light gray suit, and the other boys were in dark gray or blue sportcoats with mismatching trousers. (One boy even wore white ankle socks.) Obviously, the director was going for cost savings over period costumes or method acting. And, of course, none of the boys got a haircut (I could barely see the eyes of one of them), even though that would make them look a little more appropriate to the period, not to mention adhere to the school's dress code.

As far as the acting itself, some of it was as wooden as the table in the set. When the boys wanted to portray anger, they yelled and hit the table, which then resounded loudly enough to drown out their next few words. In the meantime, I was wondering, "I wonder who played that role and what a real actor could make of it?"

Now to move on to my own supporting cast. I have worked here seven months now, and you might have noticed that I've referred to my coworkers far less often than my previous ones. (Having a positive work environment accounts for most of that.) I've come up with nicknames for most of the primary suspects, so I can list them all now.

Skippy - My new boss, the overall manager of facilities. So named, not because he looks like the cartoon squirrel (although his hair and vandyke are auburn), but because that's what his e-mail program calls him. "Congratulations, Skippy, you've got mail!" (At first, I thought it said "Skinny", kind of as a motivator for him to lose weight, but as time went on, I heard more clearly and noticed absolutely no motivation to slim down.)

Froggy - The maintenance manager (over plumbing, electrical, carpentry, painting, etc.). I named him after the character from The Little Rascals/Our Gang shorts because he looks like a little kid (especially with his cap turned backwards), he's short, and his eyes kind of bug out. (His brother Piggy, for the way his nose looks, also works here, but I probably won't ever mention him.) Froggy has diabetes but continues his unhealthy eating habits in the cafeteria, driving himself toward blindness and amputations -- unless he gets an ulcer or has a heart attack first, since he doesn't handle work stress very well (or at all).

Miss Kitty - Not the character from Gunsmoke, the housekeeping manager (or manageress, if you're so inclined) reminds me of a cat, sitting all prim and proper and "Aren't I a good girl?" one moment and hissing and spitting and baring her fangs and clawing at you the next. Incidentally, she is comparatively as large as the cat in the first photo.

Officer Krupke - The head of (in)security for the campus. He is old and heavy and slow, like most of his employees, although he has lost a lot of weight due to some miraculous diet that he will talk at you interminably about, if you give him the slightest opportunity. He also insists on giving me the weather forecast each day, detailed down to the hour, and he is always wrong. It's a toss-up for his most annoying habit: either how he whines about parking visitors to whatever game or event is on campus that day and indirectly asks Skippy to figure it out for him, even though he has been in his position for 20 years; or how he guffaws loudly at every little thing he says, even if it's not funny (which it rarely is). Froggy, Miss Kitty, and I rarely make eye contact with him because it would only encourage him.

Cold Miser - An employee who retired but never left (even though everyone would like him to). Resembles the character from The Year without a Santa Claus, but with less hair. (The nose is the same, though.) He is a very devout person, but he finally has stopped saying, "I'll be praying for you," every time he ends a conversation with me. He drives me bonkers in two ways. First, he can't finish a sentence, or even a thought, so I'm never certain what he's trying to say, but he uses a ton of words not to say it. Second, he whistles "the hymn of the day" every day. It's bad enough to have a song stuck in my head, but hearing someone else's is excessive. Plus, whistling makes my brain vibrate, which is uncomfortable, to say the least. (This morning, I note that today's hymn is the same as yesterday's. Argh!) Gossip has it that he was supposed to go on some sort of mission to Eastern Europe when he retired, but he couldn't find a church willing to sponsor him because he alienated every church he ever joined. (I suspect that enough of us would contribute toward buying him a one-way plane ticket to Bosnia or Kosovo, as long as we were certain he wouldn't come back.) Speaking of holier-than-thou types...

His Holiness - The part-time, assistant mechanic. If you say "weedwhacker" or "weedeater" within his earshot, he will dodder over (you know, as in "doddering") and sanctimoniously preach at you that the correct term is "string trimmer", as if you had committed a mortal sin. (That's a mistake you make only once!) We only keep him around because he's the father of...

The Client - See this post for a bit more about him. This guy holds the strings to our contract; if he doesn't like us, out we go. Fortunately (I think), he used to work for our company, and he's good buddies with Skippy, so I see us here for a while -- as long as he works for the school, anyway.

George Jefferson - The guy looks like death (see my 10/1/09 post "Death drives a Gator."), not the title character from The Jeffersons, but walks like this, which is enough resemblance for me.

Tweedledee and Tweedledum - Two brothers work for me. They work on two different crews, but during breaks and if they ever work together, they snipe and insult each other constantly. However, they still love each other enough to eat lunch together in the dining hall. (They're also quite heavy, so they physically resemble the characters.)

I have two Roberts. I have two Dons. I even have a, "This is Larry; this is my employee Darryl..." but I don't have a second employee named Darryl.

Hmm, do I have a cast of characters, or a rogues' gallery?