By Mordechai Schmutter

Having a job is stressful. Not having a job is plenty stressful, too, I suppose, but even when you have a job, you never know when you’re going to do something that’ll get you fired.

“No,” you’re thinking. “I pretty much do know what it would take to get myself fired, and my plan is to try to avoid doing those things.”

But you don’t know everything. It turns out that you can actually get fired for any number of reasons.

For example, take Robert McKevitt, a forklift operator in Iowa who recently got fired for fighting with a vending machine.

Yes, everyone yells at the vending machine, but not everyone actually fights with it.

The fight, of course, was about the fact that the vending machine had eaten his money and not given him a snack. This happens all the time. You kind of have to look at vending machines like they’re those claw machines at the arcade. Sometimes you win; sometimes you don’t. Basically, if you put money in the machine and your snack doesn’t come out, it could be the Ribbono shel Olam telling you that you shouldn’t have chocolate right now. Or your dollar. Or maybe it’s the Ribbono shel Olam telling you that you should put in another dollar and get two chocolates. So that’s what he did. But then the second chocolate got stuck, too.

So at that point, he did what any one of us would do — he started shaking the machine. We’ve all done it. You lift the front of the machine a couple of inches, and slam it back to the ground … lift it again and slam it back to the ground… (In case you’re wondering why the machines never work properly.)

But still, nothing came out. And Robert’s break was almost over. So he went and got his forklift. He then used that forklift to lift the machine two feet in the air and drop it. He did this six times, during which he managed to shake out three chocolate bars. And then he thought, “Great. Now I owe them a chocolate bar.”

So he was fired. I’m not even sure why. Forklifts are actually the ideal thing to use when you want to drop a machine from a height. I worked for an appliance retailer a while back, where I had to periodically use the forklift, and the first day I was there I dropped a refrigerator. It was very effective.

And speaking of misusing company property, in January, two employees were fired from a national sandwich chain for playing jump rope with the bread dough.

Um, what were they supposed to do during recess?

So apparently, this is not how sandwich places stretch the bread for those six-foot heroes. What do they do, then? Just swing it over their heads like a lasso?

Imagine finding out that your bubby does this with the challah every Friday.

OK, so the truth is that you don’t know what your bubby does to the challah. Suffice it to say that she was the rope-jumping champion of her Bais Yaakov, back when the only things kids had to play with at recess were various lengths of rope. But for all you know, this is your bubby’s secret recipe.

And the employees were surprised they got fired. They were like, “What, so you’re saying it’s OK for the guy in the back of the pizza shop to play Frisbee with the dough, but I can’t jump rope?”

Yes, that’s exactly what we’re saying. Jumping rope with dough is disgusting. Especially the way I jump rope. The way I do it in workout class is that, first of all, I’m pretty sweaty, but, second of all, I basically keep my ears open, and the way I know when it’s time to jump is when I hear the rope hit the floor. So I don’t know if I can judge. People would be nauseated watching me jump rope even if I wasn’t doing it with bread dough.

And even lawyers aren’t safe from getting fired. In March, a defense attorney in Miami was giving the closing arguments for his client when he looked down and realized that his pants were on fire.

“I don’t know,” you’re saying. “It sounds to me like he was lying.”

What’s worse, it was an arson case. The lawyer was arguing that his client was in fact not an arsonist when his pants caught fire.

So, um, does this mean the guy is an arsonist? He can’t stop lighting things on fire for two minutes? At least wait until the trial is over before setting your lawyer’s pants on fire.

“You’re fired!”

Not only that, but the judge thinks the whole thing was staged. The lawyer had been arguing that his client hadn’t intentionally set a car on fire, but that it had spontaneously combusted, as some things do, and that’s when his pants spontaneously combusted, as pants sometimes do. That seems a little convenient.

The lawyer, meanwhile, says that it wasn’t on purpose, but we don’t know whether to believe him. His pants are already on fire. He blamed a faulty battery in his e-cigarette, so that’s something to add to the ongoing studies of whether e-cigarettes are just as bad for you as real ones.

But the judge recommended either way that the client get a new attorney, because you don’t really want one who accidentally sets his own clothes on fire. Or uses e-cigs.

Meanwhile, in April, an 88-year-old Wal-Mart greeter in Wisconsin was fired after a wild turkey walked into the store and he didn’t greet it.

Just kidding. He did greet it.

I don’t know. He was fired for not stopping it. But what was he supposed to do? Those things are scary. They name an alcoholic drink after it for a reason.

When asked for comment, store management said that he should have gotten it out of the store. But how? He’d have to walk it all the way to the exit doors, which are not near the entrance doors. And then he’d have to get it through the checkouts, and the cashiers would be like, “Are you buying anything?” And he’d have to say, “I came in with this.”

This never would have happened at Costco. They would have asked the turkey if it had a membership card, and if it didn’t, it would have been intimidated into walking out. Or directed toward that counter where they take your picture and give you a card.

On the one hand, the managers are saying that he should have at least reported it. But on the other hand, have you seen some of the characters that walk into Wal-Mart? That probably wasn’t the strangest thing he’d seen that day. If he had to run and get management every time something weird walked into Wal-Mart, he’d never be near the door.

Also, where’s the guy who’s supposed to be watching the cameras?

And it’s not just humans who are in danger of being fired. In June, a police dog in Australia was fired for being too friendly. According to officials, “He did not display the necessary aptitude for a life on the front line,” especially since one of the things he loved best in the world was meeting strangers, which is definitely not something you want in a dog that’s supposed to be helping catch hardened criminals.

At the end of the day, if you’re supposed to be chasing a suspect and instead you’re rolling over and trying to get him to rub your belly, police work might not be for you. And the same goes for dogs.

The dog’s name, by the way, is Gavel, which is supposed to sound imposing, like he’s dropping the hammer on criminals. Apparently, you don’t have ruach ha’kodesh when you name dogs. His father’s a police dog and his brother’s a police dog, but apparently, nepotism can only get you so far in police work.

If you think it’s hard to get an overly friendly dog to bark at criminals, try getting him to understand that he’s been fired.

But at least this dog landed on his feet. Lest you think Gavel is spending the rest of his days in line at the unemployment office, he’s actually been adopted by the governor of Queensland, Paul de Jersey (lit. Paul the Jersey), and he now holds the official title of “Vice Regal Dog,” which sounds like an official government position that comes with a pension and health insurance.

If he’s the vice regal dog, is there a regal dog? I don’t know how dog politics work.

And Gavel has duties. According to his contract, his job is to welcome visitors and attend official ceremonies. So he’s like the first lady.

My point is that if you don’t want to be fired from your job, it’s not just about being nice and doing your job well. You also don’t want to be too nice, you don’t want to take your job title so seriously that you can’t adapt to new circumstances if they come in the door, but you also don’t want to be too creative, especially during break time. Also, most employers seem to have a problem with you lighting your pants on fire. They don’t love it when you drop refrigerators either.

That said, if all else fails, you can always get a job as vice-regal dog or something. Apparently, those don’t have to be voted in, for some reason.

Mordechai Schmutter is a weekly humor columnist for Hamodia and is the author of five books, published by Israel Book Shop. He also does freelance writing for hire. You can send any questions, comments, or ideas to MSchmutter@gmail.com.

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