u/longjohnlambert

From Wander This World (1998)

I don't know if this happens to anybody else, but sometimes when I am walking to the pharmacy to get more of that sweet Pax, or to get my wife's boyfriend a pack of smokes from the corner store, I notice that people stare at me... a lot..

Not in a "woah, that guy is devilishly handsome I will admire him from afar" sort of way, but a "wow, what's wrong with that guy" sort of way.

I'm not very physically-imposing; I'm about 5'9, a buck 70, I wear pretty normal-style clothes and then I have my 12 masks, goggles, faceshield, gloves, emergency respirator, taser for plague rats, and a thin layer of cellophane (mainly once a new variant drops). I'm just a guy experiencing this life on the planet, and trying to get through my day, you know

I'm getting a little sick of feeling like some sort of circus freak when I'm just trying to get my wife's boyfriend his American Spirits. Just the other day some maskless lady's maskless kid walked by me on the sidewalk and the little boy started crying in fear at the mere sight of me.

I turned around and said "It's okay fellow terrified child, I come in peace" and he started crying even harder. And then I lectured the mother about how she is failing her child and she needs to teach him more about Science and manners.

I'm just trying to do what I was told to do and make my purchase; 1 pack of American Spirits, 2 bags of jalapeno chips, a 12 oz Red Bull, Mega Magnum Gigachad XL condoms, and "a clue" (I forgot to do my wife's boyfriends laundry last weekend and he told me that I need to buy a "clue" but didn't elaborate much further; I'm guessing it's in the detergent section but I couldn't find it). But I am constantly getting leered at and even laughed at as I go about my day and I don't know why. It's starting to really affect my self-esteem.

Have we lost our way as a society? What's going on? Does anyone here deal with this as well?

After years of searching, I’ve finally found my calling – wedding planning. Everyone loves a good wedding, but in the midst of a global pandemic (as we are all still in), you’ll find that many wedding planners don’t understand Science™ and actually might as well be planning the funerals of everyone who attends. Finger-foods, kissing your new spouse, dance floors without socially-distanced dance zones – all this stuff flies in the face of common sense and what the Science™ says, so that’s where I come along. When I plan a wedding, my goal is not “fun”. It is not about creating a memorable and warm experience - it is about Safety™.

Sandra and Sandoval are a wonderful couple who are very near and dear to my heart. Sandoval is a frequent flyer on my wife’s OnlyFans, so in making him many post-coitus turkey sandwiches I’ve actually gotten to know him very well. He wanted to get hitched, Safely™, and I was the man for the job. He trusted me and knew that I had good taste; a good instinct for style and class, and he knew that I also have a crippling addiction to mRNA vaccines. He knew that nobody was going to die as a result of this wedding.

The venue? Stunning. It was on the oceanfront, a CVS just a stone’s throw away (for the wild & crazy guests who want a mid-wedding bump of the Pax), and the weather couldn’t have turned out better. I’m talking FIFTY. FOOT. MARBLE. STATUE. OF. FAUCI. (MBUH), because I thought it would be a nice touch and my son doesn’t need a college fund anyway.

Now look - Sandoval is my brother in masks, and his family and friends are my family and friends by principle. But his groomsmen gave off red flags the moment I laid goggles on them. I almost resigned my duties when his best man Jake refused to wear a mask for the pre-wedding photo shoot and we actually exchanged a couple of blows, but Sandoval talked me into dropping the beef. He’s my friend, and this was his day, and I’m going to do what I can to make it great.

I take my job seriously; I sit there with my clipboard, walkie talkie, and the taser that I brought from home - and I observe. I observe and pounce on anything and anyone that is shaping up to be a potential issue.

You wanna chin-diaper your mask? Prepare to be tased.

You fancying your date and wanna lean in for the kiss? 20 minutes in the Hole, with taser (The Hole is the storage shed that I converted into a jail cell for people who want to disrespect the Good Word of Science. Don’t worry they’re free to go when the night is over).

What I’m trying to say is – there will be no fun at this wedding so long as my walkie is charged and my taser is hot.

The evening started off lovely – they say their “I do”s, they masked-kiss, and I get up there and tell everyone to go back into their cars for 30 minutes so we can fire up the HEPA filter in the place before we sit down and masked-eat. This is when I get my ducks in order for the night.

I lay out the bracelets for the guests. Red bracelets tell everyone “I have a righteous fear of COVID, so therefore I want everyone to stay at least 6 feet away from me and please don’t touch me for any reason”. Yellow bracelets tell everyone “I am still kind of a pussy and I don’t wish to be touched but if you go to shake my hand I won’t actually freak out”. Green bracelets just mean that you want everyone to die and will accept a hug with no shame, and the people who choose green I keep a sharp eye out on throughout the night, for obvious reasons. The bracelet system actually is merely to inform me who just might deserve to get tased.

I tell Tyrone, my wife’s boyfriend and also my close friend/confidant, to man his station at the plague rat cell/place where they keep the mops. I exchange cell phone numbers with the DJ, telling him that he will receive a text from me later telling him to play Dancing Queen by ABBA, the greatest song ever composed, and to play it loud, because I deserve 4 minutes of pure musical ecstasy for all my hard work.

The guests take their seats. On the menu - chicken which has been marinated in Soylent along with a Pfizer injection to give it a little zing, and mashed potatoes. This is when I like to get up and say a few words -

“Hello everyone, my name is Lambert and I am the chief executive presiding master-general wedding planner this evening. Let’s just get a couple ground rules out of the way: Number one - I know you’re all very hungry right now, but I don’t wanna see anyone removing their masks for any reason tonight, OKAY? Take your spoon, get some food on there, dump it into your mask. Simple. Not hard. Don’t wanna have to say it again.”

“Number two - tonight is about Sandy and Sandoval. Let’s keep our tongues in our mouths and our hands to ourselves; I don’t want to see any tomfoolery on the dance floor. You’ll see we’ve done you the courtesy of making dance zones with duct tape over here on the dance floor - I don’t wanna have to go out there and yank you off the dance floor because you’re invading other people’s dance squares, alright? Let’s keep it civil, keep it Safe™, and give it up for Sandy and Sandoval tonight. And no vaping. Thanks everyone”.

The dancing commences. This is when the formalities are mostly out of the way and I have to start surveying the scene for infractions. People have had a few drinks, they’re full, they wanna dance, and then they grow some balls and start breaking rules. That’s where I come in.

Everyone was behaving just fine at first. The dance floor was in full-swing. “Percocet! Molly Percocet!” they chanted. I had to snuff out a conga line that was beginning to form and put Sandoval’s great aunt into the Hole (she pulled down her mask to take her arthritis medication), but other than that & a few other minor offenders, it was shaping up to be a successful evening. My taser was still holstered and unused.

I text the DJ - “It’s time”. He lowers his sunglasses from across the room to signify that he had received my message. The Electric Slide begins to fade out, and the heavenly piano glissando of Dancing Queen thunders through the speakers. The dance floor took on a new energy. I was now the dancing queen, and my dance square was my queendom.

I trot over to my dancing square and begin to totally throw it back. I was throwing it back so hard that I didn’t even realize that Tyrone isn’t even manning the makeshift prison cell anymore, which at that point was near-filled to capacity with plague rats.

I needed to go find Tyrone, but I was dancing, jiving, and having the time of my life - as the song told me to do. But then Jake, Sandoval’s plague rat best man who I could totally take one-on-one, starts sounding off.

“DUDE, WHAT KIND OF GARBAGE MUSIC IS THIS?” He shouted, visibly-inebriated and now-maskless. “MOLLY PERCOCET! PUT ON THE MOLLY PERCOCET SONG AND TURN THIS TRASH OFF!!”

I had heard enough. This is why I suit up. This is why I brought my taser.

“YOUR NIGHT IS FINISHED PAL! PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR BACK NOW!” I shouted as I scuffled with him, risking my life and exposing myself to whatever variant we’re currently on.

The dance floor began to disperse, which was a shame because Red Lights by Tiesto was beginning to play as Jake’s chokehold began to set in and that song is so fun.

Sandoval managed to pull Jake off of me, because he saw that I was moments away from breaking away from his chokehold and actually really hurting him. I would’ve scraped his ass if Sandoval didn’t step in. My taser would’ve went ZIP-ZAP-POW on that plague rat. Luckily I was stopped before I actually could do any real damage. Tyrone had returned from his McDonalds excursion and was instructed to put Jake in the Hole for the remainder of the night. Good riddance.

When I thought it couldn’t get any worse, some other douchebag with a clipboard approached me.

“Hi, I’m Brent - with WBZX 103.9 radio. I don’t know what’s going on here, but we had reserved this venue for 8 P.M. tonight…RFK Jr. is having a Q&A and we need to start setting up. I can show you the paperwork if you’d like. But I need you all to start heading out of here in the next few minutes”.

This motherfucker. This fraud. I BUSTED MY ASS TO GET THIS VENUE FOR THIS DAY, 6 P.M. to 10 P.M., NO MORE NO LESS. HE THINKS HE CAN JUST WALZ IN HERE AND THROW ME OUT? I HADN'T EVEN DONE MY ACAPELLA PERFORMANCE OF "I WILL ALWAYS LOVE YOU" THAT I WAS GOING TO TOAST THE NEWLY-WEDS WITH. I lost my temper--

“Look poindexter, I don’t know if this is a prank you’re trying to pull right now, and I don’t know if you can hear the beautiful musical musings of Gwen Stefani right about now, but we’re not fucking going anywhere, alright bub? You got that? Write that on your stupid clipboard. And where is your mask????”. I meant every word of it.

Maskless MAHA goons began to file into the venue, looking confused and contagious. I brandish my taser and tell them to take a hike, when one of them suddenly beamed a bottle of raw milk at my forehead. I must’ve gone down like a sack of unused Pfizer vials, because that is where my recollection of the night ends; the next thing I remember is waking up in my bed the following morning, with a Venmo request for Tyrone’s McDonalds order and a welt on my forehead.

Sandoval won’t talk to me now. He’s not answering my calls, and his wife has deleted all of their Facebook photos together. I think they might be getting a divorce.

I’m not sure how to handle this. I don’t want Sandoval to be mad at me, but I also think I left my wallet at the venue and I have a feeling that he has it. I need to do my ritual line of Paxlovid before CNN Primetime begins later on tonight, and I can’t do that without my wallet. What should I do? Please, I don't have a lot of friends at this point in my life. I can't lose Sandoval.