Fat Man And Lil' Hitler (Part 2)

Moby was very aware of the fact that he was intensely disliked within the district, and he would pretend that this didn't bother him in the least. I think however that our contempt of him affected him more than he would have us believe. But because he had no positive outlets to vent his anger and frustration and self-loathing, he turned to crueler methods of lifting his spirits.









Moby's favorite pastime was baiting other auditors. Often he would let drop oh-so-casually during an inventory that a manager had said you were slow, a bad counter, something hurtful like that. This would be relayed to you with the most innocent of smiles on Moby's face, like he wasn't perfectly aware of what he was doing. But he knew all right. He knew that with just a few choice words he could zap someone's confidence and make them feel as bad about themselves as he did. Even if a person knew the things he said weren't true, and absolutely knew that they had done a good job in that aisle or area of the store, it would still leave that person with a vague sense of dissatisfaction and affect the way they felt for the rest of the inventory. They might begin to doubt their work after a while, as they pondered what Moby had told them. Could it be true? Could they have screwed up that section of books so badly? It had seemed to go all right, and pretty smoothly, but maybe not... When he was able to goad a couple of auditors into this state of doubt and confusion and vague unease, Moby was a happy man. Mission accomplished for him. Now someone was as unhappy with themselves as he was.









An added bonus for Moby by doing this was that he also set some auditors against the managers. By relaying the negative comments he overheard the AM or DM make regarding certain auditors, he would instigate arguments, grudges and name-calling amongst the district. If he overheard DM Kenny say that Sam was taking too long counting in a HABA (Health and Beauty Aids) aisle in Kmart Moby would make a beeline to let Sam know what Kenny had said. "Hey Sam, Kenny said that you were homesteading in this aisle, and you're going to take all day in here." Then Sam, fuming, would stomp off and yell at Kenny for denigrating his work. Kenny would be pissed at Sam for getting mad at him, Sam would hate Kenny for talking about him behind his back, and the two of them would forget all about Moby's role in the mess. Thus Moby would get away with causing all sorts of problems in an inventory. He loved conflict and havoc.









Moby could get away with all sorts of outrageous behavior and even more outrageously poor hygiene because he claimed that: 1. The district couldn't do without his expertise at running an inventory (fantasy) and 2. He had dirt on managers Kenny and Jeff (some truth to that). Moby used to brag that he could never get fired because of these claims. In reality though, I think the reason that he was never fired was because our managers hated having confrontations with their auditors. They much preferred doing and saying things behind someone's back. Getting rid of someone meant that they would have to fire that person to their face, and thus risk tears and recriminations from an auditor. Something like that was much too messy for Jeff and Kenny to have to deal with. Plus, if they fired someone that would cause RGIS to have to pay for the fired auditor's unemployment insurance, and that would make them look bad to the head office. So their method of dealing with most of the personnel problems in my district was to ignore it. And this was how Moby was able to hang onto his job long after he should have been let go.









At the same time that Moby was trying to sink everyone to his own oily level, he was also trying to buy their friendship with free meals and drinks. Many an inventory that he ran would end with Moby offering to buy everyone a round of drinks at a local bar. AM Jeff said that he felt sorry for Moby because it was so obvious what he was trying to do. "He (Moby) never has any money left because he's always buying things for people," Jeff said. "Moby doesn't really have any friends, and so he's always trying to buy some." It never worked though, because Moby was so disliked. People would take him up on the free dinners and drinks, and then ignore and avoid him afterwards. The poor sap never learned his lesson and continued to shell out money in his sad attempts to buy popularity.









His most pathetic stab at gaining someone's, anyone's, friendship came when he bought a brand-new Chevy Suburban that he couldn't afford in a million years. He bought this expensive vehicle just to impress a young girl he had a crush on. It was so sad and absurd and ludicrous for Moby to think that a skinny little girl in her early twenties would look twice at him, a fat, foul, oily man in his forties. He even lent this same girl (an auditor named Ginger) money and his old car just so she would be friends with him. Eventually, Moby was left with huge debts and no cars, since his Suburban was repossessed (after he made $16,000.00 in payments!) and Ginger totalled his old Jeep. Ginger then hightailed it out of our district so Moby didn't even have his 'friend'. Sucker!









Even after Ginger left our district, Moby loved to pretend that he was still a presence in her life. Moby once made a very big deal out of this story he told concerning his crush Ginger. She had moved to Colorado, leaving Moby with empty pockets, no cars, and an oily broken heart. Another auditor she had been dating, a slow, mumbling character named Conor, followed her.









Moby was devastated when Ginger left. No longer could he fantasize that Ginger would one day be his girlfriend and perhaps join him in oily matrimony. Moby lived in a dream world that saw himself as not being what he was (huge, mean, smelly), but what he wanted to be (normal, kind, odorless). So when Ginger called him from Colorado he was overjoyed. She was most likely calling him to borrow more money, but Moby concocted this fantasy that she missed him and not his wallet. He even went so far as to make up this story that Ginger's boyfriend Conor was jealous of Moby, and wanted him to stop calling Ginger so much. Moby repeated this delusion to as many people that would listen, but nobody bought it. I mean, all you had to do was look at him (and smell him too of course, gross!) to know that no girl would ever be romantically interested in him. Sad.









(Coming up: Part 3.)