Offended Monkey

So, the other day, I went to work with this t-shirt on. I found it in a store for $5, and I thought that it was cute in a Lancelot Link: Secret Chimp sort of way. It also went well with a lot of the other monkey T-Shirts in my collection. I have Bad Monkey shirt, a Rent A Monkey shirt, a See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, Have No Fun shirt, one with two monkeys holding bananas and the caption says "Mine's Bigger," as well as millions of Curious George shirts. I wear them all to work pretty routinely. So, I put on my new Funky Monkey shirt and went into work.

A few co-workers commented on how cute the shirt was because everyone there knows that I'm a Funky Monkey in more ways then one. Then, as I continued working, I noticed a familiar shape from across the bingo hall. I walked over a little closer and lo and behold, there was a "Macy Gray Wanna Be" there. Just like the monkey on my shirt. I darted into the office area and told a co-worker that the Funky Monkey was in line to play bingo today. They went out to look and came back and much gut splitting laughter took place. Another co-worker who had seen my t-shirt earlier noticed the Funky Monkey in line and laughed as he came into the back room only to find us there laughing too. He joined us as we worked our abs in fits of uncontrollable laughter. What are the odds that this would happen?

After an ab cool down period, we resumed our duties. I was a little uneasy about letting this woman see my shirt although my co-workers thought that it would be classic YouTube stuff. I declined the opportunity to go tell her that I was the Funky Monkey's biggest fan and ask her for an autograph while my co-worker held up his cell phone and filmed the whole meeting. I just went back to work and kept busy until the boss showed up. I was so eager to let him in on the joke.

My co-workers showed him the Funky Monkey dotting her bingo card out in the crowd and then the one on my shirt. He wasn't as amused as we were though and he thought that the T-shirt could be very offensive to black people. He said that if he was black and he saw my shirt that he would be offended.

Hmmmmm... I had never even thought about it that way. I just thought that it was cute in a harmless and funny retro 70's monkey kind of way. I changed my shirt and decided to leave work for the day. This supposedly racist monkey had thrown enough of his shit around the bingo hall for one day.

I am really am finding it harder and a harder to live amongst those hypersensitive humans these days.