THE BRILLIANCE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION

A guy's gotta do what a guy's gotta do—especially when it comes to work. Working at a restaurant has a lot of ups, but one of the biggest downsides is the Food Safety Certification class.

Every two years, one must go through the utter hell of this class and every two years the people attending get dumber and dumber. This time around though, the instructor was even worse than the rest of the class.

This man was batshit insane.

He was dressed in his Sunday best; a pressed white shirt, pinstripe black slacks and a tie that you only buy from the D.I. to complete your homeless man costume on Halloween. You know the one—it's always the last tie on the rack and the one that's not classy but just not quite ridiculous enough, eother. The bottom, skinny side also hung down about an inch below the top. It complemented his slick, white hair and pocket protector nicely.

I didn't take notes on anything that actually pertained to the test (since I've taken it half a dozen times) but I did take notes on some of the worthless drivel that spilled out of his mouth. Allow me to share these things with you.

-- He began by showing a newspaper article of the plane that landed in the Hudson River earlier this year, and went on to talk about how that, 9/11 and the Bubonic Plague were all tied to Foodborne Illness.

-- NASA implemented a safe food program for the astronauts in space no more than a few years ago. I guess before that they just made a sack lunch of the tuna casserole they had the night before they left earth and only recently has that been deemed a bad idea.

-- Even Jesus Christ was prone to foodborne illness. Apparently, not only is the big JC unable to hit a curve ball, but he had a real problem eating undercooked chicken, too. No wonder he died so young.

-- A dangerous mutation of H1N1 (Swine Flu) will be hitting the U.S. this fall. Diseases run on the same schedule as fashion lines. Both of these will be huge topics for the blogosphere in a couple of months. (And I'm telling you now, soon after that hits, Birdswine Disease won't be far behind.)

-- On a family trip to Sea World a number of years ago, he noticed that the penguins were being fed raw fish and was concerned that they may get sick because of it. This man—while on a family vacation—took the time to seek out the trainers and inquire wether or not the fish the penguins were being fed was properly stored/cooked. The penguins. At Sea World.

-- In the late 70s, people in Africa were killing one another and eating the organs. Whichever organs they didn't eat, they ripped from the bodies with their bare hands, packaged them (rather poorly) and shipped them on boats the the United States. What happened because of this you ask?

AIDS.

That is how AIDS made it's way to America—via the poorly harvested, unsanitary shipping of inedible organs across the Atlantic.

*Fun Fact* When I Googled AIDS (That's right, I did my research) a few 'common misconceptions of AIDS' results came up. Did you know that one of those common misconceptions is that sex with a virgin cures AIDS? I sure didn't. So keep in mind that after you contract the disease from your African organ transplant (the organs that weren't deemed good enough to eat, mind you) that you purchase from a boat docked in New Jersey, just seek out a virgin and - BAM! - problem solved.

-- Foodborne illness is the number 2 threat to America right now. The number 1 threat? Terrorists, of course.

Public education at its finest, ladies and gentlemen.