All I wanted to do was eat my lunch. I sat down at the break room table, spread out my lunch, and opened up my beloved sports page. Then I looked over and saw a coffee mug filled with chew spit sitting in the middle of the table. Gross. Just as I was about to throw it in the trash, my dipshit coworker Bucko rumbled in.

“Is this your coffee mug?” I asked him.

“Does it smell like vodka?” Bucko said.

“Ah, no,” I said.

“Then it ain’t mine,” Bucko said.      

I sat back done to eat my lunch and read my sports page. Bucko sat down across from me, instantly killing my lunch break. In every place of business, the work place lunch/break room is ground zero for employee confrontations. Coworkers leave their leftovers in the fridge, stink and splatter up the microwave, and leave behind a trail of dirty dishes. In the blue collar world, things can get ripe real quick. As I ate my lunch, I tried to read an article about the Minnesota Wild’s recent draft picks. But I could barely concentrate because now I was eating lunch with Chewbacca. 

“I’m so hungry right now, I’d eat the corn out of a buzzard’s ass,” Bucko said. 

He shoveled a fistful of Funyons into his gaping mouth. Then he washed it down by chugging two cans of generic soda that he bought at ALDI.  Bucko tried unsuccessfully to muffle a series of violent belches and blew out the rank onion flavored exhaust out of the side of his mouth.

I set down my sandwich. Do you know how bad second-hand onion flavor smells?

Bucko licked the onion powder off his stubby fingers. Then he opened a plastic bag that contained a frozen burrito from the corner gas station. It was size of a plumping pipe and about as tasty.

“Beans and cheese,” he said, “Just might be regretting this later.”

I grimaced.

He looked up and saw my sarcastic expression.

“Who made you Pope of this dump?” He jokingly asked.

“That’s not even your own line,” I said, “That was in Caddy Shack.”

“Don’t matter. Still applies.”

After a few quiet moments, Bucko pulled out a large hard cover book. He read the book with shocking intensity. He traced a Funyon stained finger across each line of text. Bucko let out several loud sighs, undergoing some great intellectual awakening. 

“What are you reading?” I asked, as I set aside my sports page.

“It’s some sorta medical book. I bought it at Half Prize Books,” Bucko said. “It’s got every condition ever recorded. Even the freaky shit. Like those Mexican kid’s with the hairy faces.”

I burst out laughing. For the rest of my lunch break, we looked at pictures of gout, rashes, and this one guy that had a tiny face in the back of his head. We studied up on yeast infections (note: drink cranberry juice and don’t have sex in hot tubs).

Our break ended and Bucko punched back in. Before he left, he handed the book to me.

“Take it home if you want,” he generously suggested. 

I guess being the Pope of this Dump does have its privileges after all.