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Monday, Feb. 11, 2002
We broke into song today at the jobsite. Not hugely unusual unless you take into account that corporate partner Stu can't sing a note and would be the first to admit it.

At gunpoint.

As the finale to a very successful installation of laboratory cabinets and countertops we were putting in plastic pencil drawers underneath the countertops, in the knee spaces (uh, yeah, where your knees would ordinarily go). About thirty of them as I recall.

For such a production run of items (read: anything more than two), Stu will generally put out a palm to slow the panting Outfoxed and suggest a more practical approach.

Stu: "We need the creeper."
Outfoxed: "What the hell for? Let's get this stuff in."
S: "Well, you're the one who's going to be on his back doing it."
O: "Me? Underneath the tops and screwing the drawers in?"
S: "You betcha, pal. You know how my back acts up."

He had a point, although it was lost in the jumble of conversation that elected me to be the one to lay on my back and drill in thirty pencil drawers while he calmly stood and held them in place above, with crossed ankles and a cigar smoldering.

The creeper, yes. Just a common ordinary mechanics creeper used to get under cars on castors and roll around, the makers of which threw in a little cushioned pillow at the head to give the illusion of comfort.

I was not amused at their levity, that pillow wasn't big enough to make a decent wallet let alone cradle my long suffering cranium.

In short order, the creeper was procurred and the screwing of the pencil drawers commenced. I was given a drill and cup full of screws and we wheeled around the area at a brisk pace. It even became fun. I would shoot my four screws and scorch a path to the next location with knees churning, dropping a modicum of screws, as Stu cheerfully slapped drawer after drawer in place. Production was quick, confidence was high. So in light of our progress, I decided to break the monotony with a little song. To the tune of the old "Slinkey Toy" ad on TV.

"The creeper! The creeper!
For fun it's a wonderful ploy...
The creeper! The creeper!
Keeps geriatrics off of the floor..."

Okay, so I don't rhyme so well.

I rose at the conclusion of our speed run and heard the machine gun snapping of a spinal column and was aghast to realize it was my own. With an eye towards getting someone else to pick up the tools and haul them out to the truck I commenced the moaning and whining typical of one who has been shafted in task preference and is now feeling the aches of his age. The din of complaints rose to such heights that Stu was compelled to remove his stogie and belt out a few lines of his own. To the tune of the "Mickey Mouse Club" theme song, and with appropriate falsetto inflection.

"Martyr mouse! (beat me whip me!)
Martyr Mouse! (whip me! kick me!)
Forever let us weep and wail and cry...
Cry! Cry! Cry!
Come along, sing the song and join the misery...
M-A-R-T-Y-R M-O-U-S-E!"

It's a good thing we drove in separate cars because I needed that blast of Steely Dan in the worst way....

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