BOO!

Sometimes a guy just can’t win. No matter what he does, he’s gonna get kicked in the slats. Don’t you think that kind of poor soul wakes up in the morning and knows it’s gonna rain on his parade? If not his parade, his glasses which will cause him to swerve his Nash Rambler into a group of senior citizens playing Frisbee with some road kill.

Meet Wade Gallegos of Des Moines, Iowa, a nice guy trying to do his job as a security guard for Neighborhood Patrol. He took his responsibility seriously and always showed up on time and patrolled his beat in a professional manner. If he saw something suspicious he investigated and notified his supervisors. That’s what a security guard is supposed to do…it says that in the Security Guards handbook. “See, investigate and don’t piss your pants.”

Wade’s only problem according to his supervisor was that he called in a report saying he saw ghosts on his beat. Since it wasn’t April Fools Day the supervisor drove over to Gallegos’ neighborhood and checked out the report. He looked around but didn’t find a single ghost. Wade swore that they were there and kept pointing to where he said they were apparently standing. The supervisor even put on his glasses but didn’t see a single spook….nada…zippo…zilch. Nobody in a white sheet. He fired Gallegos five hours later. Now just one darn minute – did it ever occur to Neighborhood Patrol that maybe the ghosts didn’t want the supervisor to see them? Maybe they didn’t like his demeanor – swaggering around yelling at poor Gallegos. Maybe this guy had a funny eye and it scared the ghosts. Where is it written that ghosts can’t be scared? As to the white sheets, maybe ghosts are hipper now and wear designer color sheets.

Before you jump to conclusions, the head office tested but found no signs of drugs or alcohol on Gallegos. He was as clean as Rafael Palmeiro says he is but in Wade’s case it’s true. What did the head office expect, the ghosts to jump up and down and yell, “Boo!” They could have had laryngitis…or were just shy.

Wade applied for unemployment insurance but his former employers challenged the claim, arguing he was guilty of misconduct. The case went before Judge G. Ken Renegar who ruled, “Such beliefs do render the claimant unfit to act as a security guard. The employer cannot have security guards who see ghosts and apparitions and inform the employer, and then the employer sends out patrol cars.” However, the judge ruled, seeing ghosts is not the type of misconduct that can disqualify Gallegos from receiving unemployment benefits.

At least Wade is getting his unemployment checks each week although he still insists that he didn’t make up the story. He knows a ghost when he sees one. Wouldn’t you?