Forever Young:

Today was my former classmate and current co-worker Shanthini's birthday. I basically discovered this through the magic of eavesdropping in a cubicle environment (which, as everyone knows, is pretty damned easy). Marianli (one of our supervisors) and Shanthini were having the age conversation which led to the topic of being carded. Marianli was once carded at a club or something and basically felt insulted that the bouncer thought she was under 19 (I believe she was around 30 at the time). Keep in mind that she's one of the little Filipino ladies I told you about earlier. Dhimo (another one of Shanthini's friends who got into the company through her) mentioned that she always felt great if she still gets carded somewhere.

So we (myself, Shanthini, Dhimo, Thanujah, Wumi, Joanna, and Tina) went out for lunch at East Side's to celebrate the occasion. While we were eating, we noticed that there was a young-looking kid who was serving a table on the other side of the restaurant. By looks, a person would guess that the kid was around ten to twelve years old. First of all, aren't there labour laws against this kind of thing? Sure, it's March Break right now, but holy crap, it was kind of weird, like eating in a sweat shop. We all figured that he was a family member of one of the employees or something, and maybe they couldn't find anyone to watch him this week. But, again through the magic of eavesdropping, we learned that no, this wasn't a situation where Child Services should be called. This young man was actually nineteen years old, and had cystic fibrosis which stunted his growth. This guy is probably going to be carded for the rest of his life.

"Don't waste your time on me you're already a voice inside my head"