Brightest Young Things

In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket is an advice column by Andrew Bucket. If you need advice on anything in the world, email your dilemmas to Unclebucketadvice@gmail.com by Tuesday morning.

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1. Mommy, can I go out and....kill tonight?

Dear Uncle Bucket,

I hate to assume you aren't a parent, but I dont think you are. So maybe you wont be able to answer this question...

But my problem is this:

Does it make me a lame-o if I suddenly turn into some UTNY magazine reading, Whole Foods obsessed, Columbia Heights, bane of white America loser because I want my kid to have an ok life? I found punk when I couldn't stand my parents, hated the kids at school, and wanted to do my life on my own terms. But I almost feel like my kid won't have to do any of that, cuz I want to be a good mom.

Soon to be Full time parent and Part time punk

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Dear FTP-PTP,

I suppose that's a fair concern, though perhaps an incomplete thought. I am surprised you haven't taken this logic just one step further to arrive at the obvious answer to your question:

Well adjusted children and the ethos of "fuck you" are not mutually exclusive.

For one thing, as I've mentioned in this column before--the career path of the past is a huge gamble; the odds of going to college, emerging with no debt, and finding the kind of job that the college-myth alludes to are simply the stuff of risky investment. The only thing college is good for anymore is the critical thinking skills that teach us to problem solve and innovate. It is no longer likely that some company is going to look out for you when you get all old and your butt gland stops working.

In reality, the DIY attitude has never been more important a skill to teach your LiL. You can go ahead and redact the stuff about W33d and shoplifting (or maybe stop stealing altogether if you're a mom). Also, and just a thought, how about not introducing the dumpster at Panera Bread as a perfectly reasonable place to get a trash bag of bagels for free. That can be your big "sell-out" thing you do: not showing your kid how to eat from the trash.

Then, maybe Obama-the-great will actually come through with this HealthCare stuff and you can quit peeling potatos to afford insurance, and finally live the modest DIY-community- lifestyle that you cream-dream about.

You should still send the sprout to school, even though everyone kind of knows that school is just a workforce factory once you've learned the rudimentary subjects like reading, writing, and algebra-- and that the only reason we still do school, since everything is on the internet, is to learn all day about how the world works, while our parents work in the world all day.

BUT LOOK, for now, still send your kid to school, because they need to meet and interact with other people their age so they can get a wrangle on who they are and grow up to be a worthy human being. Don't try and do home-school because everyone knows those kids are the freakish spawn of militia men. But a good thing to do is plan on sending them to community college when they're 16 or seventeen to bust out some credits and instill them with a taste for bucking the system and doing things the smart way.

So don't worry too much and just carry your life on the way you probably do already: obnoxiously-vegan potluck dinners, pube-stuffed co-op sandwiches, local food from Pennsylvania, ugly long cut-off shorts, and that feral-kid-from-mad-max haircut.

thanks (and i AM a parent, i have 8 twin sons named: Pusston, Erection, Rapey, Ringworm, Klansman, Kokane, Urinethal, and Andrew jr)

Uncle Bucket

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2.  Ketching up, on Mustard

Dear Uncle Bucket,

I'm going to the store today, I cannot decide on something: shall I buy Gulden's or Grey Poupon?

can you assist?

Mustarded

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My Mustarded friend,

I myself have been stranded in the isle of Condimentia, and tried to navigate this decision between Gulden's and Poupon.

Poupon is a world class mustard. Creamy and very spicy-- it is both impressive to sophisticated company, and a versatile culinary element. In the market, one can gaze into the dream of prosperity that Poupon represents.

For breakfast, you might lay a healthy (though reserved) smear of fresh Poupon on an egg and croissant sandwich, with maybe a slice of black forest ham...and some...berries...on the side.

and for lunch, a trippy mescaline salad with walnuts and raspberry vinagrette, with blue cheese crumbles....  with the side of pretzel rods, dipped in a chilled ramkin of Poupon. Oh, sweet, spicy Poupon....

....for dinner, steaks on the grill, corn on the cob, lobster tail, and for some "down home flavor" you have deviled eggs (made with Poupon of course). Smiling at the wife as you look out onto the expanse of your huge property in Damascus MD, you know you've made it.

BUT WAIT,  looking now to the shelf below, how could we forget our workingclass roots, and the sweet home Alabama charm of Gulden's.

Those days in the above ground pool, dad cooking up some dogs and topping them with that spicy brown delight, what he called "ol' reliable". He was younger then, still a  hero to us...he could've won the War on Drugs single handed, with just a tube of Gulden's and his American resolve. The radio playing the golden hits of the day... or as we called them The Gulden Uldies;

That was the America that inspired us, the one where family mattered and Gulden's was always there, topping our dogs, or...otherwise topping....well just our dogs, but we mean American hot dogs, not the family dog. We never put mustard on him. That was for the Europeans and their Dijon mustards.

Take your Poupon and shove it up your Poupon-shoot we'd say.

In reality, I use Poupon, but it's the Harvest Coarse Ground kind, so I feel pretty good about that.

choose life,

Uncle Bucket

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3. Gross and Grocer

Dear Uncle Bucket,

I am starting a new job at a supermarket, and I blew it at my last one. I got fired for something really stupid: got caught on camera weighing my head on the produce scale.  I want to really do a good job this time and get promoted. How can I do it?

Up the Ladder

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Dear Up,

As someone who has held about 31 retail jobs in about 11 years, you have come to the right dude.

My grandfather gave me my first job when I was 12, hauling cinderblocks from the back yard to the front yard of his business-- a mountain of them.

When I was done with the job I thought I had accomplished something EPIC. So when I was given my next task I was shocked and angered to learn that, for the same rate of $5 an hour, my grandfather wanted me to reverse the whole thing and move the mountain of blocks BACK to the backyard, where the next week they would be picked up by a dump truck anyway.

"WHY CANT THE TRUCK PICK THEM UP IN THE FRONT!?!" I yelled "ABSURD!" I thought. "A waste of time!" I mumbled.

I could not wrap my head around the idea of doing something entirely meaningless that caused me such exhaustion. So I went in the house, as I was unsupervised, and watched Ricki Lake, and ate a whole lot of food.

I did not get paid a single Susan B Anthony. That was the lesson I think, though entirely mean and Medieval: my grandfather wanted me to learn that you have to do stupid things for money when you have a stupid survival job.

So quit having your little Baby's Day Out, and wipe your nose, and go to work--or else shut up and collect unemployment-- in reality, in a retail job you're either working hard and hating it, or not at all and luvvin' it.

If you wanna get promoted at any job:

1. When you go in there, learn how everything works.

2. Always try to be taking on more responsibility, and even ask for more.

3. Don't be late, and don't call out. If you do, make a huge deal about it like you reeeallllly care, even though you could give a duck fart.

4. Try to find a weakness in how they do things and then fix it, better if you can implement yourself into the solution. You gotta make yourself irreplacable.

If you wanna cheat the system at a grocery store:

1. Be on your toes during training, and ask around about who the asshole bosses are.

2. Learn the cameras, idiot, most grocery stores have a couple blind spots. I used to hide in the backstock of soymilks when I worked at a grocery. You can chill there for like a half hour at a time.

3. Always pull down expired food, or food thats about to expire. It looks like you're doing work, but you're actually handpicking your din-din.

4. Always offer to take out the trash because you can go outside and call your friend like "yo im at work....yea...sucks...i might quit...i dunno."

5. Sleep with that girl who cuts the cheese. You might as well.

aisle three,

Uncle Bucket

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Andrew Bucket is a regular contributor to BYT, and thinks you're really cool if you're still a fan after reading "ketching up on mustard", but stands behind the joke "gulden uldies."

send your problemos to unclebucketadvice@gmail.com, and save the public from any more food related advice.

Previously in In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket:

• 7/7: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column)
• 6/16: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column For Big Prolumns)
• 6/9: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column of Sorts)
• 6/2: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column?)
• 5/26: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column)
• 5/19: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column)
• 5/12: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column)
• 4/28: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column)
• 4/14: In Reality w/ Uncle Bucket (An Advice Column)