Football season is almost upon us, and with that comes the sad realization that your team might not always win. There’s no need to spend the next depressing day still hung over barely functioning at work. Let’s be realistic here, they won’t want to see you if you’ll be fucking up your job anyway. So how do you call out without making it obvious?

a. It’s all in the timing: timing when exactly to call out is a bit tricky. If you leave a message a full day before you are scheduled to work, they might know that you are entirely full of shit. Timestamped voice mails can work for or against you. The best bet is to call between the hours of two and six in the morning. Obviously if you’re up at this time, you’ve been up and are presumably sick. Offer little details and stick to something believable. Remember a “fever” can be cured with two aspirin. Explaining that you’ve been up all night throwing up, that’s golden. In the internet age, many people attempt to call out via an email. Remember this is deadly serious, and you want to use as little detail as possible. Avoid doing things like using a email account that is traceable (don’t use your work email to call out, and then ten minutes later invite your best friend fishing) Don’t get caught in things like facebook pics partying on the day you were supposed to be in a six hour training seminar.

Protip: when calling, avoid the “cough”. Not every illness comes with a cough, and you don’t want you oscar worthy performance to blow your cover.

b. calling out: if you call an HR dept odds are you’ll get a either a bubbly blonde, a grandmother, or a mean ex govt worker. Any one of these is likely to wish you well. However, if you get your boss directly, you have to be prepared for inevitable “well take some Tylenol and try to come in.” Unless you’ve mastered faking sick, be prepared to have things at hand that will cover your ass. Name dropping an antibiotic will give you plenty of credibility. Explaining that you went directly from work the previous day to the doctor will also boost your story. (just be prepared to show documentation for these things) For added icing, insist you can’t come to the phone and have sibling/parent/or significant other talk to your boss. A wife conveying her husband is too ill to answer the phone will go over much better than you faking a sore throat.

Protip: In some towns you can literally walk into a walk-in medical clinic, explain some symptoms you had, and get a doctor’s note to cover an absence (it helps if you frequent this clinic for real occasionally)

c. avoid returning to the scene of the crime: If you call out, make use of the day. Either stay in doors, go to the doctor, or go far away. Don’t get caught anywhere near the office or doing something your boss is likely to find out about. As I already said, avoid the facebook pics, and twitter updates of you sitting on your ass getting drunk.

Protip: when using the irish flu pertaining to football or some other sport. Figure out if your boss is a sports fan and is noticing that you called out because the Cowboys made it into the playoffs. This might give you some serious shit, especially when your boss, who roots for the same team you do, shows up at the office.

d. keep it simple.

Pick one thing. Either you’re sick or the car broke down. If the car broke down, make sure that the radiator blew, as that or blowing a gasket is the most believable course of action. I’ve heard urban legends of college professors granting three students an excuse on missing final for a rafting trip because they claimed to have a “flat tire.” The professor nodded, and seemingly sympathized with the students. The following week when they returned to take a make-up in three different classrooms, the final question on the final read as follows “Please indicate which tire it was.” The students, having not seen enough episodes of Law and Order to decide to collaborate stories, each picked a different tire, and subsequently failed the course. Failing a course in college sucks, but losing your job would be much worse. If you and a buddy decide to skip to go see a Metallica concert, you should both decide that the radiator was broken.

Protip: Those that get caught, acknowledge they are doing something wrong, and secretly want to be caught. While you might be able to trust your friends and co-workers, don’t communicate to them anything about beating the system in writing.

For a hilarious example of work related email used for all the wrong reasons, check out this recent cracked article.

http://www.cracked.com/article_16690_6-most-disastrous-uses-work-email-ever.html

Sometimes the big guy upstairs tells us it’s time to take a break from the hustle and bustle from the stresses of the working man’s life. This time is called being sick. But being sick doesn’t always mean the little guy downstairs can’t carry on with his life—‘cause after all, that guy often lives a separate life of his own.

Ladies, unless you’re worried about him being contagious or somethin’, this is the time to take care of your man. Because love, sex, and fun…is contagious.

So how do you take care of your man when he’s down? Try to…get him up. Nothing distracts me more from a whooping cough than a little lingerie. I won’t care about my broken legs if two smooth long ones are lying on top of them. Not scared of vomiting, so long as you’re in my mouth. You get the picture? ‘Cause I could do this all day…

Pee-Wee Herman got arrested for…private reasons…in an adult movie theater showing a film entitled “Nurse Nancy.” The flick was about a nurse (Nancy) who lovingly gives “erotic medicine” to just about every guy—doctor, patient, you name ‘em—in her hospital. Nurse Nancy might have known how to treat her man (and every man in every scene) just right when he was feeling under the weather. This doesn’t sound like a porno, it sounds like something Obama should keep in mind for his new healthcare reform.

What us guys are trying to say to you girls is, there’s no better way to say “screw you” to a nasty bug than, well, screwing you. Stay healthy, and if not, get well soon, and get laid quick.