That Guy

The real-life Creepy Guy at the Office I mentioned earlier didn’t think he was creepy. When he tried to give Miller an unwanted shoulder rub, or when he told another coworker that if she were his girlfriend he’d dress her every morning, or when he cornered another to regale her with a story about his explosive diarrhea, or when he asked another in the men’s room if he wanted some of his old clothes, or when he spent an entire day telling each of us about the woman who told him he looked “cool” on his white rollerblades that morning, he thought he was just being a fun fella. Just making friends with his workmates.

He once called me over to his desk to tell me I had “something on my butt,” and when I responded with a stammered, “Uh, okay, thanks for letting me know,” just before I dragged Miller into the restroom to examine my posterior (where she discovered a tiny white stain on my black corduroys not on my “butt” but in my crotch, which would never have been visible to any but the most scrutinizing eyes), he took my hand and said, “You don’t have to thank me. That’s what friends do. They tell each other the things that no one else will tell them.”

Eventually I managed to recover my skin, which had crawled away with a dismayed howl.

The worst thing about this deranged moron was that he had no idea he was deranged. He thought he was a real likeable guy. Who wouldn’t want him to tell them about the infinitesimally small stain in their crotch? Who wouldn’t want to see pictures of his nephew’s bris? Who wouldn’t want to have him put his scaly, 100x-a-day washed hands on their shoulders for a relaxing massage? Come on—he was a great guy!

We’ve all known That Guy. We’ve all tried to avoid him. But now he’s our president.

[T]his was a G-8 summit. Israel and Lebanon are burning. Iraq is in tatters. North Korea is spitting on the world. Global leaders are gathered to discuss the most pressing and violent issues on the planet, many of which the Bush administration had a clammy hand in exacerbating. Might not be the best time for the leader of the free world to give a cheesy frat-guy neck rub to his German gal-pal in front of the world media. You think?

See, now we get it. This is the bottom line, the final truth, George W. Bush in a nutshell. Bush thinks he is That Guy. The one everybody just loves to have around, the one who sincerely thinks his goofy charm is so appealing and so innocuous and so licky-puppy friendly that he can get away with all sorts of casual infractions and weird gestures no one else would care to attempt lest they appear, you know, dorky as a pinwheel hat.

And you know what? Bush really is That Guy. Just not in the way he wants to think.

In other words, he is indeed That Guy, like the best man at the wedding party, the one standing out in the center of the room, casually and cluelessly telling off-color jokes that offend everyone but which he thinks are gul-dang hilarious and, hell, if you're offended then you're just some gul-dang hippie liberal. Haw.

He is That Guy. The one who thinks he is everybody's bestest pal, the guy everyone wants to kick back with and have a few brewskies and chat about baseball and lawn fertilizer and Jesus. After all, isn't that what we all desire of the man who decides some of the most difficult, deadly, complicated issues on the planet? Isn't that slacked, frat-guy goofiness exactly what you want trying to broker peace in the Middle East and understand global warming and stem-cell research? Sure it is.

That Guy can ruin a party, make you regret ever stepping foot into your backyard on a sunny day as soon as he steps into his next door, or poison an entire office culture. If he’s at your wedding reception, he won’t leave until you kick him out. If he’s neighbor, you’d better hope he moves before you have to. And if he works with you, he’ll never get along with everyone else; he’s just gotta be fired.

(Thanks to Toast for the heads-up.)