zombies | delicious juice dot com

People don’t take me seriously very often, with good reason: I am rarely serious. Nearly everything I say is tongue-in-cheek. Even things that have basis in reality and/or are Serious Times are usually made for the funny: I use exaggeration for comedic effect and turn normal situations into a Big Deal for fun.

I think everything is hilarious, which sometimes has repercussions – not everyone gets my sense of humour. It doesn’t help that I often forget that the entire world neither lives inside my head nor knows me intimately enough to discern joke from reality. People who haven’t been reading my blog since day one (so, everyone) don’t always know all the silly little in-jokes or running gags I use repeatedly in my posts, which is fine – but sometimes, like yesterday, it backfires and bites me in the ass and then I am sad (and have a sore ass).

In retrospect, I completely understand how yesterday’s post could have been taken seriously, and how someone who doesn’t know me as well as they obviously should could think I was being completely truthful. I AM annoyed at all the Father’s Day reminders, and I DO wish I could turn them all off so I don’t have to be constantly reminded that my dad is gone. That part was true.

The rest .. well, that was pretty much boilerplate me.

My dad died of stomach cancer, at age 91. I’ve been claiming my dad died of “mysterious causes” for years now, because it makes me laugh. As well, my dad was cremated and his ashes spread in various places across Canada (in his cemetery cubby hole, at Thetis Lake, in Montreal) so when the zombie apocalypse does occur, it’s unlikely my dad will rise to walk the earth again.

I am very sorry if I made you think my “coming to terms” with my dad’s death was anything other than my usual attempt at humour, and I’m very sorry if you are actually experiencing a situation (be it a mystery or an undead invasion) that I applied to my own life for funny.

Seriously, I felt like a complete ass when I realized that not everyone got the joke. I suck.

As penance, here is a ridiculous picture I just took at work:

i am really very sorry!

There needs to be a universal “opt out” clause for things you don’t want to be reminded about. I say this for every person who’s ever lost a parent, or has a dysfunctional relationship with them, or hell even has horrible children who never call or write: we are tired of being reminded to buy mom or dad the perfect gift on their day. For two months out of every year, we are inundated with tv commercials, site ads, email from every site we’ve ever visited, and more – all reminding us not to forget mom on Mother’s Day, or dad on Father’s Day. We don’t forget. We remember every single day, even without you shoving it in our faces. Cut it out.

Every year, I think I’ve finally come to terms with my father’s mysterious death. I get to a point where I feel I can live without knowing what TRULY happened, but all my hard work is undone in June when every form of media seems to exist simply to tell me that dad really would have wanted the complete Stargate franchise on DVD or 43% off a set of self-correcting golf balls or perhaps this keychain with a tentacle on it. I’m sure he would much rather have those things that being dead – who wouldn’t; that tentacle is pretty cool – but since we took extreme precautions to ensure dad would not rise when the dead walk the earth, it’ll never happen. And that sucks. And I don’t appreciate the reminder every fucking year.