Vending Machines

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Welcome to the next installment of Shit That Can Kill You Fridays!

This week STCKYF features Vending Machines.

Yes, you read that correctly: vending machines. From 1978 to 1995, 37 people died and 113 people were injured while trying to get a snack from a vending machine. That's a little more than 2 deaths per year. For those of you keeping score at home, that makes death by vending machine more likely than a shark attack. You hear that Discovery Channel executives?! Enough already with Shark Week! The people deserve Vending Machine Week! (or at least vending machine power hour brought to you by Famous Amos cookies).

We've all done it, haven't we? We hit, kick, and shake that dumb box full of salty snacks that stole your dollar for the second time this week. I JUST WANTED SOME DORITOS! WHY DOES THIS MACHINE HATE ME?! (*begins to sob*) I'M SO DAMN HUNGRY! (*crumbles to the floor*) THIS IS WHY I CAN'T HAVE NICE THINGS! (*curls into a ball on the floor and cries uncontrollably as coworkers look on and Tracy from sales puts a video of you on her snap story*). Well, all that man on machine violence leads to one thing, a large box full of salty snacks face down on the ground with you between it and the floor.

Remember last night when you planned to get up a little earlier so you could have a real breakfast instead of a power bar? Maybe if you weren't addicted to the snooze button and didn't keep hitting it like those lab mice with an orgasm button, you could've gotten up 10 minutes earlier to make some eggs so you wouldn't be starving by 9:45. You're having a hard time getting up this morning because you had a beer (or five) too many at the bar last night. To top it all off, since you spent all of your cash at the bar, you have to walk out to your car two hours into the work day in the 35 degree weather just to get 75 cents out of that compartment you designated for loose change. Now you're cold and hangry. The triple threat. You hurriedly shuffle to the vending area in the break room where you attempt to feed the coins into the slot, but end up dropping one of them because your hand is shaking from the 4 cups of coffee you drank on an empty stomach. Finally, with all three quarters in the machine you make your selection. You see the coiled metal begin to spin as the anticipation for the Snickers bar you purchased begins to build, and then... nothing. The candy bar doesn't fall. It sits there in G6 mocking you. Your first instinct is to hit the glass with the palm of your hand but that does nothing. It never does. You give the base of the machine a swift kick or two, but still, nada. Well it is only on the second row from the bottom... maybe I can reach it if I can get my arm in, you think to yourself. You position yourself on the floor and begin to reach inside, carefully moving your arm around the door and reach up. The Snickers sits just an inch or two out of your reach. Come on. You can do it. REACH! Damn! You realize you can't make it without dislocating your elbow, which considering how hungry you are, might not be a bad option.

Time for plan B (no not that plan B, like a second plan kind of plan B). You stand up, grab the machine with both hands and put your whole body weight into it rhythmically to get it rocking back and forth. VICTORY! The candy bar falls, but so does a bag of chips and a packet of peanuts. You decide to keep rocking, time to take everything you can from this malicious machine that tried to play you like a fool. After all, it had the audacity to try to steal your dollar... Does this machine even know who you are? You keep rocking it, back and forth, more and more aggressively when Jen from accounting walks in and catches you off guard. Startled, you accidentally lose grip on the machine and gravity takes over. Down goes Frasier. The vending machine and floor have created a you sandwich. You realize in your final moments that instead of playing the machine like a fool, you actually played yourself (don't ever play yourself). Jen will have a helluva time explaining this to HR.

Listen Mikey, it was just a dollar. Let it go. That Nutter Butter isn't worth being flattened like a pancake.

Stay safe out there.

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Charles R Mercer

Amateur Reporter