Pro Tips: How to Hide Your High at Work

I think we’ve all had that moment of sheer terror at least once, after a little too much baking with our waking. Nothing is more panic-inducing than arriving to work and seeing your demonic red eyes staring back at you in the hallway mirror.

Have no fear! Your ever faithful and quick witted Skuncle has your back, with some sure-fire excuses for looking too medicated:

Allergies

Pollen, dandruff, mold, pet, tree, grass; pick whichever allergen suits your fancy! Allergies are a literal cornucopia of things commonly known to make your eyes red and watery, sneezy, weezy and put you in desperate need of Kleenex! Perfect. The best part? You probably already deal with some form of allergy to begin with! The Oklahoma air is ripe with them. Your workplace environment is likely infested with toxic shit that makes people look this way. Remember, fly casual! Don’t oversell this one.

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SOM’INEYE!

WARNING! This maneuver is very dangerous and only recommended for the role players and theatre buffs amongst us! If you are ever directly confronted, face-to-face, about being high or having red eyes, you should interrupt the interrogation by rubbing your eye whilst complaining about how something has been in your eye all day! Make a huge deal about how you got out of your car just before you came in and the wind blew some shit in your eye! Literal bird shit! If that’s too bold for you, try this: “Fucking Karen from accounting blew powdered sugar off her donut into my face as I rounded the corner.”

I don’t know, you iron out the details! I can’t do everything.

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Sad/Crying

Are you known to be cold hearted? Or just famously unflappable at work? This one may be uncomfortable, but it’s just the excuse for you! Colleagues and bosses soften immediately when the office Ice King/Queen appears upset. So, come up with a sob story of how your girlfriend just broke up with you after your hamster died…on the anniversary of your aunty’s cousin’s baby momma choking to death on some cheese fries at Eskimo Joe’s. So sad. Bonus points if you can shed some real tears and have a tissue, but also fuck you. Just because I suggested it, doesn’t mean you should do it!

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Couldn’t Sleep Last Night

Everyone has those nights where you can’t sleep — tossing and turning on the decade-old burnin’ oven you call a mattress. So you borrow from real life: Tell your coworkers it was another one of those nights where nothing you tried did the trick. Haven’t slept a wink! Make sure to wear slightly disheveled clothing and smell strongly of coffee, not weed. For those of you whose actual lives I have just described, you have my sympathy. Continue napping at your desk; I won’t tell.

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Took the Wrong Pill

Hey old guys, this is the perfect ploy for your 7-slotted lifestyle. So you accidentally took a sleeping pill instead of your waking pill…your boss is lucky you even came to work (lesser mortals and whiny Millennials would have called in sick). You Boomers have it made! This wrong pill excuse for looking high at work is infallible. Color me jealous. Not only did you get to drop acid, sell T-shirts and follow the Dead around, but you also got to enjoy the economy of a post-WW2 America (and ride it into oblivion)! Was that unfair? Maybe I’m still a little grouchy and tired from OKC Cannabis Cup (Thanks Beth!), but at least Sunday was better than Saturday!

—Apologies to Auntie Skunk; next year will be better!