Bad Things Happen To Good People

He attached a speedometer/odometer to his handlebars to keep track of how far and how fast he traveled during the Earth Day contest. He even attached a plastic cup holder with some duct tape to hold his favorite morning brew, only he didn't yet possess the coordination to drink and ride one handed. Whenever he wanted a sip, he had to stop his bike, but that was okay because he was always stopping his bike to rest, especially before embarking up a big hill. Sam had so much shit on his bike that if this was a car, it would have been considered loaded with options.

He was hoping to average the 500 miles, the amount he traveled in a week, when he drove his car to work, from work, and around town to do errands. Only, now pedaling instead of driving, he couldn't believe the distances between the places he now frequented with his bike instead of his car. Those places that took him only a few minutes to get to in his car seemed to take him forever on his bike. Still, each day, it took him less time to bike the now familiar route and, each day, he worked to improve his time, as a personal record.

It was then that he realized that if our government was serious about cleaning up the environment and making us less dependent on fossil fuels, at the very least, they'd make more bike paths. He wondered when they built highways, expressways, and roads, why they didn't build bike paths beside them. If more people felt that they could viably ride a bike to work without having to compete with traffic and be run over by a truck or a car, they would.

Then, he figured that if they built more bike paths, more people would be less dependent on automobiles. Only, maybe the powers in charge who manufactured automobiles and who piped in gasoline didn't want people becoming less dependent on their cars. Automobiles were a big moneymaker in the United States economy. Between buying cars, buying insurance, buying gas and accessories, and repairing automobiles, the car business employed millions of people. If everyone suddenly switched to riding bikes instead of driving cars, he believed that would improve the air quality and be beneficial to the quality of life. However, if everyone suddenly switched to riding bikes instead of driving cars, he realized that would hurt the economy by displacing millions of workers.

Sam soon discovered that not only was in not fun to pedal a bike through downtown traffic but also it was dangerous. Between people suddenly throwing open their car doors, to cars and trucks turning left or right when he was going straight and cutting him off without giving a directional, to cars and trucks running red lights, to people jaywalking in front of him, he had to have eyes in the back of his head. Instead of his daily bike trips to work being an exhilarating experience, it was a terrifying one. Just as he now dreaded the terror rides to work, he dreaded the stressful rides home in rush hour traffic. Now, he stayed at work later waiting for the bulk of the rush hour traffic to end.

The last straw was when he left the office late one day and his bike was gone. It had been stolen. To add injury to insult, they left his broken chain. To compound matters, the skies opened up and it started pouring rain. Too long of a walk to the subway, he took an expensive cab ride home.

He felt violated that someone had stolen his bike. He was angry. Now, not only did his Earth Day experiment miserably fail but also he had no chance of winning the money and he was out the $800 that he paid for the bike. Because of what personally happened to him with his bike being stolen, he would forever hate Earth Day.

* * * * *

It was an unseasonably warm day when Charlie read about an impending People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, PETA protest at the swanky fur boutique downtown. Personally, he liked fur and would certainly wear a raccoon coat, if only he could afford to buy one. Except for the inhumane way in which they killed and skinned the animals used for fur coats, whether squirrel, mink, ermine, sable, rabbit, raccoon, muskrat, fox or beaver he justified his fondness of fur with the fact that they were all just either rodents and/or varmints anyway. It took the skins of fifty of the little critters to make a coat.

He knew a woman he had once dated would certainly be there protesting. She was so committed to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals that she sacrificed her relationship with him for PETA, at least, that's what she said and that's what he likes to think was the reason why they are no longer together. Somehow, it soothed his hurt ego to know that he was thrown over for a bigger cause, a charity for the ethical treatment of animals.

She went overboard in her commitment, though. She was the type who stopped women wearing fur coats at the mall, the market, and on the street to argue her point. He never liked that about her, creating a scene. At first, he was enamored with her spunk, but then he quickly grew tired of her argumentative nature and confrontational disposition whenever their talk turned to fur and the slaughter of animals. He still smarted from her rejection of him for her combative and over-the-top organization. Although he agreed with some of their principals, some of the people involved with PETA went to extremes measures, even throwing red paint on fur coats.

Yet, although the establishment of PETA was a good idea conceptually, it now has become too cumbersome, political, and fattened by donations that don't help the animals that are treated inhumanly as much, but more contribute to the salaries and bonuses of the top administrators and executives of the charitable organization. Now, with their own lobbyist in Washington, PETA is more about collecting money than it is about saving animals.

She lambasted him because he wore leather shoes and occasionally enjoyed eating at McDonalds or Burger King. Once she told him that she was a vegetarian, it was a doomed relationship from the start. He wasn't the vegan or vegetarian type and never bonded with people who didn't eat meat. In his opinion, people who didn't eat meat were always too thin, always too angry, and always ready to inject their opinion on others for the sake of an argument to justify why they didn't eat meat.

Gees, shut up already, it's just a hot dog. There's probably very little recognizable meat to be found in a hot dog, anyway, which is why they call it dog instead of calling it by any other name, such as pork. Truly, he didn't see the harm in eating meat, every once in a while, especially at a barbeque.

"Hey, grille me up some more of those carrots and broccoli," he cringed at the thought of saying that to his friends during a Fourth of July barbeque.

She couldn't even kiss him after he had eaten a hamburger or a hot dog. The day they broke up, he was so angry with her behavior that when she was leaving, he chewed a bloody piece of steak with his mouth open with the juices running down her chin to piss her off. Still, now that enough time had passed, they were on friendly enough grounds, and she loved talking about her cause enough, that she'd give him the inside scoop on what PETA was planning for Earth Day.

Since the weather was warm enough, it was to be a nude protest. On the pretense that he wanted to participate and get naked, too, she gave him the address of where they would strip out of their clothes. The plan was that they would all walk in one unified naked procession to the fur boutique using only their signs to cover part of their nakedness while chanting for the alerted press photographers to photograph them for the daily news and newspapers.

Only, Charlie had no intention of getting naked. He was there just to watch and ogle the women. The women were so committed to their cause that they didn't even notice him standing there nor did they even care that he was staring while lurking in the background and taking pictures.

* * * * *

Finally, the day after Earth Day arrived and the four men met at their favorite local bar to tell one another what they did to claim their right to win the prize.

"Well, who wants to go first," said Charlie.

"I'll go," said Bob pulling out his cell phone. "This is a photo of all the bottles and cans I collected before three homeless men threatened me with violence and took the shopping carts away from me at the redemption center." He looked at his three friends. "I figured I collected about a couple thousand cans and bottles, so I doubled the amount I would have received at the redemption center and sent a check to the local homeless shelter."

"Wow, that's a shit load of bottles and cans. Even if you didn't get to redeem them, at least your heart was in the right place," said Mike. "And you cleaned up the neighborhood."

"Yeah, that was a good idea to pick up bottles and cans and then making a donation to the homeless shelter," said Sam.

"Well, I'm not sure what picking up and redeeming bottles and cans and donating the redeemed proceeds to a homeless shelter has to do with Earth Day," said Charlie.

"Recycling has everything to do with helping to save the Earth," said Bob.

"Whatever," said Charlie? "Who's next?"

"I had a similar fate with my Earth Day contest plan," said Mike.

I collected a mountain of trash at the park around the corner from where I live and was about to bag it all when a couple of drug dealers set it on fire," he said pulling out his cell phone. "This is a photo of the clean park after I picked up all the trash and another photo of the bonfire."

"That's a huge fire," said Sam. "Still, it was a good idea that you had. I just can't believe you did all that work by yourself. It must have taken you hours."

"Hours? I wish," said Mike. "It took me the entire weekend. The worst part of it was when the fire department gave me a $250 ticket for opening burning trash."

"That sucks," said Bob.

"That's not fair," said Sam.

"Again, I'm not sure what collecting trash has to do with Earth Day," said Charlie.

"Are you kidding? Picking up trash has everything with helping to keep the planet clean," said Mike.

"Whatever," said Charlie? "Who's next?"

"Well, here's a photo of my $800 bike that I bought," said Sam. "I nearly had it for two weeks before it was stolen. My idea was to lower my carbon footprint by commuting back and forth to work and doing all my errands by pedaling my bike and enjoying the fresh air instead of driving and polluting the air in my car."

"That's a good idea, Sam," said Mike. "If more of us did that we'd definitely have a better quality of life without all the air pollution from cars."

"Not to mention we'd never have traffic jams or have to worry where to park our cars," said Bob.

"Again, I don't get the connection of what pedaling a bike around the neighborhood has to do with celebrating Earth Day," said Charlie.

"Charlie," said Sam, "if we all drove our cars less and rode our bikes more, we'd have a cleaner planet."

"Whatever," said Charlie?

Bob, Mike, and Sam looked at one another. Obviously, they were not only confused by Charlie questioning their Earth Day theme but also a bit annoyed.

"What did you do for your Earth Day celebration," asked Sam of Charlie?

"Yeah, what did you do," asked Mike of Charlie?

"C'mon, we're curious," said Bob. "Tell us what you did to celebrate Earth Day."

"Well," said Charlie leaning back in his chair after taking a long sip of his beer. "What I did was to attend a PETA demonstration. I mean, I really didn't participate, I just watched the demonstrators protest a fur boutique, is all."

"A PETA demonstration? What does watching PETA demonstrators have to do with celebrating Earth Day," asked Mike?

"Yeah, I don't get it," said Sam. "Next you'll be telling us you attended a Red Cross blood drive and watched people giving blood."

"Moreover, according to the rules of our little contest, the fact that you didn't even participate in the demonstration disqualifies you from our Earth Day contest," said Bob with a smug smile of victory.

"Yeah," said Sam. "You're disqualified Charlie."

"Yeah," said Mike. "You lose big time."

"Well," said Charlie. "I didn't participate because they were all women and I would have stuck out like a sore thumb?"

"Women? I don't get it. That's all the more reason to participate in their demonstration. Why didn't you participate? I would have participated in their protest, especially because they were all women," said Mike with a dirty laugh before taking the last sip of his beer.

"Yeah, being the only guy in a woman's protest is my kind of protest, that is, so long as they aren't protesting guys," said Sam. "Had you joined in the protest, you might have hooked up with a hot chick. Some of those PETA protestors are hot. How come you didn't join in the protest?" Sam guzzled the rest of his beer and slammed the empty glass down upon the table.

"Yeah," said Bob, "some of those PETA protestors really are hot. There's always a model or two in the group, even a celebrity. That's not like you to just watch, Charlie. Why didn't you protest, too?" Bob finished off his beer, too.

"Well, because," said Charlie, "I agree with them in principle about how they kill the animals to get their fur, but I like fur and would wear it if I could afford it. Secondly," he said looking from Bob to Mike to Sam and lowering his voice, "they were all naked."

The three sitting across from Charlie all picked up their empty glasses at the same time to take a sip of their non-existent beer. They all stared at Charlie while remaining silent.

"Get we have another round over here," waved Charlie to the waitress.

"You mean by naked that they were all just topless," said Bob. "Right?"

"No," said Charlie, "they were naked, as in not wearing any clothes."

"Totally naked," asked Mike?

"Totally naked," said Charlie.

"And you watched them protesting...naked," asked Sam?

"I watched their naked protest from the beginning to the end," said Charlie with a laugh. "Not only did I watch them protesting but also I was there in the alley with them where they stripped out of their clothes. I got the inside scope from an old girlfriend of mine who was at the protest, too. You could say that I was exposed to the entire event," said Charlie with a laugh.

The waitress came with two pitchers of beer. The men filled their glasses and took a long drink.

"Yeah, well," said Bob wiping his mouth on his sleeve. "How do we know you aren't making this up just to win the Earth Day contest and collect the money from the pot?"

"Yeah, how do we know you are just saying there was even a protest and all the protesters were naked just to win the money," asked Mike?

"Yeah, Charlie, we all know you all too well. What proof do you have that this really happened," asked Sam? "Do you have any pictures?"

"Proof? You want proof," said Charlie. "Sorry, I don't have any proof that I was there. And no, I don't have any pictures."

Bob, Mike, and Sam looked at one another with glee figuring, no doubt, that one of them would win their little contest, and that Charlie would lose, finally.

"Well," said Bob. "That disqualifies you from—"

"Except, I said that I didn't have pictures" said Charlie pulling out his mini cam recorder from his jacket pocket. "But I do have video."

After watching the video several times and all the men asking Charlie to make them a copy, Mike handed Charlie the pot.

Happy Earth Day

THE END