boxing's been good to me

Does anybody know what the deal is with Ronald McDonald? Did he go to a certified clown college or was he home schooled? My guess was he was home schooled. I can't imagine a clown institution set on being as zany as Ronald, and yet being so corporate. I bet clowns at small liberal art clown colleges label Ronald a "sell out" while simultaneously hitting the nitrous, and dying their hair normal colors like hardcore clowns.

Anyways, I don't work at a McDonald’s, not that there's anything wrong with it, but thank god. I'm just saying in the event I am ever given unrestricted access to a Soft Serve machine this country will look a lot different; lactose non-tolerants will be pissed.

Soft Serve pipe dreams aside, I instead spend my time working at art gallery. We own and sell paintings crafted by some of the greatest masters of the 20th century. Some of them are worth over a million dollars, I, however, make boxes. When I signed on to be an assistant curator I assumed for the most part I would be hanging things, painting walls and using a sweet ass electric drill Johnny Wayne style. Unfortunately, I was unaware of the ubiquitous equation of the art world, Art + Dude with College Degree = Doing something with boxes.

It's not that i dislike my job entirely, or that I find box making to be an incredibly tedious activity (I find ways to make it fun). It's just well...only in the art world would they pay an educated man ten dollars an hour to craft boxes—especially when children in third world countries do it for pennies on the dollar. Plus, I mean, I read Pynchon—and understand parts of it, and they expect me to contently make boxes.

The whole thing is bizarre. One would think and institution such as an art gallery, which ships many things of varying size would have a organized fleet of boxes. Perhaps that same institution might also have a box supplier, from which to buy new and specialized boxes. Instead, we have three piles of assorted cardboard and Styrofoam all unclaimed relics for previous pieces, arranged much in the same manner as the background junkyards in those “Save the Children of Africa for Fifty Cents a Day” commercials. It’s embarrassing and intriguing at the same time.

As all good things commence, the whole process generally starts with my boss humming. I've learned this specifically means he's thinking about the relationship of one object to another. More often not, this state of mind is derived from the fact that after we receive a piece, the box it came in always seems to disappear. I suspect this is because we use that box to send off something else we lost the box too, perpetuating a terrible cycle that now dominates my life.

The only reasonable explanation I can conceive of is that the previous box is pinched by Box Gnomes, reputed for their ability to make comfortable and affordable housing out of cardboard. This free source of cardboard would explain the affordability. However, I have played out the Box Gnome scenario numerous times in my head, and thwarting our security system would require a tactical strategy seemingly too complex for any variety of Gnome.

Either way, before actual box making begins my boss and I usually trudge around our three packaging archives (which are essentially the previously mentioned piles of old Styrofoam and cardboard) for about a half hour. We cavil about politics and music while we pick up random scraps of refuse briefly pretending to recognize them as the lost box. We both know this quest is, for the most part, futile. As we begin to hit a lull in the conversation, my boss will usually sit down and eye or perhaps paw a box, or apparatus obviously larger and disparately shaped than the piece we intend to ship. He then suggests that I rig a box for our selected piece of this material. I of course agree, because who complains when they are being paid ten dollars an hour to dick around with cardboard, Styrofoam peanuts, tape, a utility knife, and a painting worth more than their life.

The first real step to box making is perhaps the most important. After my boss leaves the room, and before i cut or touch anything, i grab a beverage or my choice for the gallery's stock of refreshments for shows and place it in the fridge--this will be important later.

Then I return to the work table spend a few moments just staring at the piece. What I'm doing here is interpreting the piece and attempting to conceive what style of box this piece would most enjoy--where the tape should go, the thickness of the cardboard, and how many times I'm should fuck up and cut something vital attachment off.

The crafting then begins. I use no sort of measuring tool, so that means I “eyeball” pretty much the entire thing. Since I usually get things wrong. This equates to a box where the sides are almost assuredly always uneven. I have learned though, that doesn't mean anything. Also, I can pretty much guarantee that parts of the box will be bent, in places they shouldn't be bent, and in a manner they shouldn't be bent. This is also irrelevant. In many ways my box is much like the wang of and scarcely worked male porn star-- Dirk Diggler, the middle years. The said porn star keeps waiting, practicing and wtahcing film for his big day--his big return, and in doing so contorts and twists his man piece into curves and shapes neither known too nor desired by nature. However, while he is stuck his new mangled form; my box has the benefit of tape.

When the cardboard is all cut and set i use this crappy, clearly German, tape dispenser to compress my creation into shape. Since the dispenser is total rubbish, i usually mysteriously cut myself on the knife--that is unable to cut tape, and often apply way more tape than is considered acceptable. The end result often draws skepticism from my boss regarding the structural stability of the box. More often than not, I agree with his misgivings are agree to make the proper modifications. These modifications simply require adding more tape, and in lots of places. After i do this i grab the aforementioned beverage from the refrigerator and chill out for ten minutes, sipping it and staring into space.

Then it’s time to call Fed Ex. From calling Fed Ex numerous times not only have i learned that their hotline is one misdialed number form a phone sex number, but i believe i have also developed a good repoire with the Fed Ex automated answering woman. She really listens to me. Many times it's like she knows what I'm am going to say before I even say it.

After I schedule a pick up for the package i have to label the package with instructions--such as which end is top, and indicate the package as fragile. This is the money shot of boxing. While it seems mundane and simple, no matter what age you are, it’s difficult to not to describe an excuse to sniff markers as remarkably exciting. While many marker connoisseurs would say all permanent markers sniff the same, I personally have taking a liking to RED (readers and gift givers make note, Christmas is coming rapidly).

Also, I forgot to mention that i get to weigh the package. This would be a step of little significance if we had a sensible scale. Unfortunately our scale has a base of about 9 square inches, and many of the packages we send weigh over 50 lbs or where the scale maxes out. So weighing translates into balancing and approximating.

After about an hour Fed Ex usually arrives. By Fed Ex, I mean a small troll lady who always shows up at the wrong door. When she finds out she's at the wrong door, she explodes into a list of excuses. After I tell her it's alright, we'll just have to walk an extra forty feet, and that it’s really no problem she momentarily calms down. This subdued state continues until she's the package or packages, the it becomes the equivalent of the worst Christmas ever. When she sees that perhaps some of the boxes tower over her, it’s like the fucking holocaust just started and she trying to figure out how to get out of Poland. So, again, I become the pacifier and end up carrying fucking 120lbs of packages to the truck, like i fucking work for them, where she waits for me and pretends to do something important.

Granted, this is all I do all day. In true "Office Space" fashion I probably do roughly and hour of good hard concentrated work for every five hours they pay me. The rest of the time is spent scanning the internet, staring at the art pretending to think complex thoughts, and playing with my swivel chair. Regardless, I have college degree. Boxing, while entertaining is below me. I should be something that requires a little more intellect and strategy, like porn.

I learned to box like Lincoln talked,

dr koala dick

ps. you use your semicolons your way, and I'll use mine my way.