Craig Tyson Adams

NAH, THAT COULDN’T HAPPEN TO ME Scammers are people too Amid searching for work online, an email finds its way to the inbox. Since it’s been weeks since the quest got underway, the message blends with the others seamlessly. The opening of missives rolls on and, inevitably, unbeknownst to the opener, the nefarious note makes itself known. By innocently clicking on the offending offering a Pandora’s box will be unleashed if executed upon. Information in it reads like a positive pronouncement of the reception of an inquiry of the application for employment. Human Resources has received the solicitation, along with the resume, and has ascertained that the applicant has met the basic requirement to move forward in the process! As they peruse the details of the offer, a swell of gratitude fills the job seeker. All the aspects of the overture check the required boxes. Remote location, adequate compensation and benefits that are requisite upon examination. They conducted the initial interview ...

  MASTER THE GRIND LIKE A GRIND MASTER Embrace the suck I’m writing this to you because I feel there has to be a need for this message to come to you this way today. Something tells me that a challenge is perplexing you. Don’t worry. A confrontation of this sort is precisely what a well-lived life is all about. Sure, it’s a pain in the nether regions, but the situation you find yourself in needs focus and motivation to achieve rectification. You need those two aspects to find the way out and on to a better time. Nothing can teach you better about failure, and resolution, better than my favorite sport,  baseball . In this most established of all sports, the way of playing is as venerable as the passage of time. It’s a game where success is as elusive as the time that passes as it’s being played. If a baseball hitter’s time at bat is fruitful three times out of 10, that would be 30% of the time. They consider the batter an enormous success! The powers that be would consider the ...

  You don’t know what you’re missing vs. dodged that bullet Ah, children. The future of civilization. We place our hopes and dreams on them even though they don’t deserve it. We make plans for them and when they find out about our plans, they plan on doing something completely different. That’s not to say that we shouldn’t be proud to have them. We are! Our hearts burst with pride when we see how much they look like us. You can spot features and actions that remind us of beloved family members. Your kid may have a gait like a treasured uncle. They may have a smile like a favorite aunt. A twinkle in the eye, like the mailman. All things familiar to us by the sharing of genetics. It gives us a bond that can never be broken until the day they pilfer the car keys and do donuts in the neighbor’s yard and take out the mailbox, or figure out your password and order a trombone and an entire collection of James Bond movies from Amazon. There are pluses and minuses Having one or two children...

  My mother mentioned Elvis so much, I thought he was a relative While growing up in our house,  Elvis Presley  was very much present. We didn’t have the black velvet Elvis paintings and Elvis music wasn’t played that much in the house. The times Mom sent me to the store to get the  Los Angeles Sunday Times  was when her Elvis fixation reared its head. My parents went to Las Vegas a lot.  Three or four times a year, they’d pack up and leave for a few days, leaving me with my grandparents. After a time, I knew when they were going to leave when I heard the name Elvis. She’d be on the phone with one of her friends or family when she’d say  ‘We’re going to Vegas to see Elvis’. I thought Elvis Presley was a family member To my 8-year-old self, this was very befuddling. They were leaving me to see someone that was like a mythical being. Elvis Presley was like Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. Why hadn’t I met Elvis? How come this Elvis guy was some kind of m...

  I write whatever seems to pop in my head whether I like it or not. My humble beginnings began with my parents.  My father was an unidentified astronaut and my mother was Jacqueline Onassis. After the scandal, I was put up for adoption. I found my way to a small town in Southern California called Mira Loma. There I was raised with four other children. Since I was nine years younger than the one before me, they were the ones that told me I was adopted.  The story has it that I was discovered on the front porch in a picnic basket. The nice lady that denied the story and claimed that indeed she was my mother did the best she could. The man that she said was indeed  my father didn’t say much besides that he was hungry.  He also had a prodigious ability to rent beer. I write every day, sometimes twice. I started this thing called writing when sitting on a bench looking out over Santa Monica bay one evening. Pondering my next move, a lobster with the face of  Ja...

  A cubicle cautionary tale It happened in a flash. My hand struck the bottom of the desk and the stapler dislodged and fell into my lap. Before I felt it, I heard a click. As the pain washed over me, I looked down. There it was. The staple. The pain stopped and was replaced by a shivering cold as the shock set in. As I caught my breath, I stood up and adjusted myself. In a panic, I hurried to the men’s room. There was another guy in there. Without looking up, we exchanged greetings, and I went into the stall. There wasn’t any blood, but it was stuck. I couldn’t dislodge it. What the hell? I left there and headed to my boss’s office. I had to find some sort of authoritative guidance. As I opened her door and walked in, she looked up at me, startled. “What’s wrong?” “Uh, there’s been an accident.” I said, closing the door. I couldn’t let my coworkers hear. They’d find out soon enough. I didn’t want to be there when they heard. “An accident? Where? What happened?” “The stapler. Uh, I...