For those of you who have been tracking my career as a photojournalist, I hope you were wearing sunglasses with UV protection because without them you would surely be blinded by its brilliance by now and unable to read this thoughtful and well-written farewell.
As I climbed the ladder from freelance photographer to photo editor throughout the year, I have nearly perfected the fine art of capturing what it looks like when people talk and even host seminars on the subject. I have even had the displeasure of being called paparazzi by several people throughout my tenure, which is an insult to me as a legitimate photojournalist who sometimes has to cover questionably legitimate events.
This is beside the fact that none of the people who have accused me of this are even remotely famous, and I have made very little money taking their pictures.
It’s hard being me.
In actuality, my fame far exceeds that of any of my insulters. How many times have they been recognized for their job on the street? This used to happen to me almost daily when I worked at the Maple Garden – a job that I dutifully carried out for almost five years slinging Chinese food to a wide range of people, from stoners to professors to tables of 10 frat guys who all ordered some variation of Mandarin Chicken. Once I was even recognized as “The Maple Garden Guy” in Portland.
Random people used to come up to me to ask for recipes as if I was privy to such classified information.
“Aren’t you the boss’ son?” others would ask.
Clearly our public education system’s priorities are out of whack if the average person can’t tell that I spoke Mandarin while most of the other people at the restaurant spoke Cantonese. Seriously, there are only four or five tones in Mandarin depending on who you ask, and Cantonese has at least eight. If you don’t know that then you should do us all a favor, stop wasting oxygen and die already.
Despite the fact that I was more famous, paid better, well-fed and given a free application of MSG eau de toilette when I worked at the restaurant, I couldn’t be happier to have worked at the Emerald as the most handsome and talented staff member these past two terms.
I also managed to become “The Culprit” on the Facebook group “I Rock the Hodeo!!!” after I wrote a Pulitzer Prize-winning column about why that bar sucks so much. I’m not sure what I was happier about, pissing off certain members in that group and having my photo added to their page, or finding out that people actually read the paper that we all bust our asses to put out every day.
I think pissing people off wins this round.
As I look back on my illustrious college career, I realize that these last two terms have also been my busiest. I was constantly amazed at how little work it took to pull off decent grades even in some of my 400-level courses. I don’t deserve an “A” if I spent more time masturbating in a term than reading the course materials.
And people wonder why bachelor’s degrees are so worthless now.
Now, I may come off as somewhat arrogant and self-absorbed in this column that seems like it’s about nothing but is really about everything, but I’m actually very down-to-earth and modest. I’m probably the most modest person ever, now that I think about it.
My next order of business is to find a decent paying job so that I can finally afford the ass implants I so desperately need. I can only sit on my tail bone for so long before it too becomes concave like my gluteus nonexistis.
But before I do that, I have one last task before I leave. Though the Yau Dynasty at the Emerald has been short, it will be remembered for far longer than it lasted. And while I ruled the Photo Desk with a jade fist, I can’t help but think that my servants not only think of me as a father figure, but as a deity. This leaves me with a very important decision: should I be standing or riding a horse in my statue, and how many corpses of my slain enemies should lie at my feet?