Today, I’d like to speak on a topic that is near and dear to all of our hearts: morons.
Once upon a time, mankind created the crosswalk. Apparently, too many old people and kids were getting run over by cars and buses, so a device was made that would regulate foot traffic at the same intersection as vehicle traffic. The idea was a simple one: push a button, and wait for a sign to give you a very direct order. “WALK, moron.”
Empirical evidence shows us that most people have received the WALK or DON’T WALK instructions with great clarity. But the waiting part, that’s where most pedestrians run into a lot of trouble. Granted, out here in Southern California, foot traffic is outweighed by vehicular traffic by about 7,500,000 to 1. And many crosswalks are so vast, it’s common to run into one of those two-parter crosswalks that necessitate two separate buttons and catching your breath after the first leg. So I get that a lot of people who actually do walk around here get frustrated.
But there is absolutely no excuse for these Pavlovian jackasses who jam their finger into the crosswalk button twenty times a second for a full minute before the light changes. Attention morons: just push the button once. The light will not change any faster. This has been proven.
The same goes for the elevator. This one is even easier. I’ll repeat in case the morons saw something shiny between paragraphs. Attention morons: if the elevator button is already lit up, you do not have to push the button fifty more times. We know you have places to go. We all do. That’s why we’re out and about. Otherwise, we’d be at home making tea or crepes or something. Stop pushing the button.
It’s not just that CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK that bothers me, it’s that excessive button-jamming illustrates one of the worst qualities about human beings: an embarrassing lack of patience. These are the same people who risk the lives of every other driver around them when merging traffic lanes to get exactly one car-length ahead of everyone, so that they can get home exactly one car-length sooner.
My dog will sit waiting for accidental carrot slice to drop on the floor for hours at a time. But humans pretty much suck when it comes to stopping and smelling the roses at the crosswalk. So next time you’re waiting for a light to change, just wait. Play Punchbuggy with yourself and hit yourself. Make up an advertising jingle in your head for a product you wished existed, like “Barry’s Teleportation Chamber.” Or just take a freaking deep breath. You’re outside. Just enjoy it. But for God’s sake, just push the button once.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Us Dumb
Apparently, there’s a new theatrical release entitled “How She Move.” Before I saw the poster, I had guessed that it was a movie about dancing. But I could have been wrong. It could have been an inspirational Oscar vehicle that centered around an autistic girl (Dakota Fanning) and her adoration for her single mother (Reese Witherspoon), an international chess grandmaster.
Honestly, I don’t care what it’s about. The larger point is that we are slowly becoming a retarded society. We have the most money on the planet. All races and genders should have access to at least the most fundamental of English grammar lessons. The rule on rules has always been: You can’t break the rule until you know how to use it. I’d argue that none of us know how to read and write anymore, so we have no business calling a movie “How She Move.”
But I’m not surprised. This was brought to you by the same generation that’s learned how to compose thoughts in the realm of text messaging. There was a tween girl I overheard on the street the other day who was gossiping with her friend, and she said, “BTW, he totally has a crush on you.” But she didn’t say the words “by the way,” she sounded out the letters “Bee-Tee-Dubbowyou.”
Now, the idea of internet shorthand is to save keystrokes, I guess. But when you’re actually speaking with someone, it’s fairly counter-productive to verbalize every syllable of a letter, especially if the syllables outnumber the words. Sort of defeats the purpose of shorthand.
No wonder old people don’t know what the hell we’re talking about. They’re forced to use gadgets they never needed, read writing that’s a font size of 3 pt. on a tiny screen, and try to decode what a sentence like “ROTFLMAO!!” means. Poor old people. Do we have to confuse them so much right before they die?
I’m not sure who the cool kids were who decided that we didn’t need any standards of grammar anymore. We’ve moved way beyond convenience and speed. We’re now making up chat and text shorthand solely to confuse our parents and seem cool. Frankly, it’s embarrassing. Act like ya been there before. I can only hope that in a couple decades we’ll be looking at how we used to write to each other and be really embarrassed, like looking at a pair of bellbottoms.
Otherwise, we’re headed to Ray Bradbury “A Sound of Thunder” territory. You know, the time travel short story where the hunters go back in time to shoot dinosaurs, but screw up the entire course of human history by stepping on a butterfly? When they get back, the sign above the time travel hunting company reads: “tyme sefari inc. sefaris tu any yeer en the past. yu naim the animall. wee taek you thair. yu shoot itt.”
Seriously, at a first quick glance, does that nonsense look any more legible than the stuff you see in instant messages? Sometimes formality is a good thing. It keeps us in check, so we don’t all become a bunch of morons.
I blame Boyz II Men, they started this.
Honestly, I don’t care what it’s about. The larger point is that we are slowly becoming a retarded society. We have the most money on the planet. All races and genders should have access to at least the most fundamental of English grammar lessons. The rule on rules has always been: You can’t break the rule until you know how to use it. I’d argue that none of us know how to read and write anymore, so we have no business calling a movie “How She Move.”
But I’m not surprised. This was brought to you by the same generation that’s learned how to compose thoughts in the realm of text messaging. There was a tween girl I overheard on the street the other day who was gossiping with her friend, and she said, “BTW, he totally has a crush on you.” But she didn’t say the words “by the way,” she sounded out the letters “Bee-Tee-Dubbowyou.”
Now, the idea of internet shorthand is to save keystrokes, I guess. But when you’re actually speaking with someone, it’s fairly counter-productive to verbalize every syllable of a letter, especially if the syllables outnumber the words. Sort of defeats the purpose of shorthand.
No wonder old people don’t know what the hell we’re talking about. They’re forced to use gadgets they never needed, read writing that’s a font size of 3 pt. on a tiny screen, and try to decode what a sentence like “ROTFLMAO!!” means. Poor old people. Do we have to confuse them so much right before they die?
I’m not sure who the cool kids were who decided that we didn’t need any standards of grammar anymore. We’ve moved way beyond convenience and speed. We’re now making up chat and text shorthand solely to confuse our parents and seem cool. Frankly, it’s embarrassing. Act like ya been there before. I can only hope that in a couple decades we’ll be looking at how we used to write to each other and be really embarrassed, like looking at a pair of bellbottoms.
Otherwise, we’re headed to Ray Bradbury “A Sound of Thunder” territory. You know, the time travel short story where the hunters go back in time to shoot dinosaurs, but screw up the entire course of human history by stepping on a butterfly? When they get back, the sign above the time travel hunting company reads: “tyme sefari inc. sefaris tu any yeer en the past. yu naim the animall. wee taek you thair. yu shoot itt.”
Seriously, at a first quick glance, does that nonsense look any more legible than the stuff you see in instant messages? Sometimes formality is a good thing. It keeps us in check, so we don’t all become a bunch of morons.
I blame Boyz II Men, they started this.
Friday, February 1, 2008
Skunks: The Cosmic Joke
I fully admit that I had no idea what the wildlife in Southern California was going to entail when I first moved out here. You really could have told me that any organism I’d ever heard of was indigenous out here and I would have believed you. Armadillos, macaws, unicorns, whatever. I’d heard that there were coyotes out here, just up the Hollywood Hills north of LA proper, that would roam down the hills at night and feast off of the garbage of the “city.” (I use quotes around the word because LA is not a real city, just an enormous suburb with a downtown area built solely because they needed somewhere to film an urban landscape.) Most of my knowledge about coyotes came to me when I was a kid, absorbing the basics, pretty much what everyone already knows: that they chase birds around the desert, walk upright, retain only a cursory knowledge of explosives, and have extensive lines of credit with ACME Products, Inc. So wild animals like coyotes roaming around LA didn’t seem like too much of a stretch.
But the more time I live here, the more I see that Southern California has just about every ecosystem you could imagine, therefore they have about every type of animal you could imagine. When you only watch movies to learn about the world, as so many Americans do, I think you assume that Southern California is lined with beaches and palm trees. Truth is, the beaches run about 200 ft. from the water, and then you’re suddenly dealing with either desert, mountains or forestry. The really great thing about Southern California are these varied environments. They have everything except polar ice caps and rainforests. Skiing, sunbathing, and driving a car through a giant hole in a tree are all about 90 minutes from each other. It’s amazing.
When I first saw skunks in my backyard, I was at first surprised, but then quickly remembered that if I wandered too far from my house I could be attacked by a mountain lion, so a skunk shouldn’t come as any great shock. For those lucky enough to get up close and personal with a skunk without getting the business end of a chemical attack, you notice right away that skunks are a fun animal to watch. I don’t think they have a very high top speed, but I guess I wouldn’t either if I wielded such power. They have a sort of jolly fat-man gait. They lumber from side to side, almost a waddle. The white stripe (nature’s very own Surgeon General Warning) makes them even more likable, like a ’66 Mustang with that double-stripe down the middle.
Basically, it’s the sort of mammal you could have a beer with. If they didn’t instill such terror in the general populous, I think we could be pretty close friends. But there’s the rub: skunks know their power. They don’t have to run fast. They can take their time eating that cat food I left out there for the stray cat. They can filter through your entire garbage container, picking and choosing exactly what they want like a take-out menu. In fact, the noises they make when they’re outside sound leisurely, like a homeless person rummaging through the recyclables on the curb looking to make a few extra bucks.
I have never seen the skunk in our backyard run away from me. If I’m lucky, it walks away. When I take Daisy the Dalmatian out there to potty in the summer, I have to crack the door and speak loudly: “Beat it, skunks. Comin’ out. Comin’ out, skunks.” On more than one occasion, I’ve had to plant my foot on Daisy’s butt to get her back inside when I see them so she doesn’t get blasted.
Even the single mother skunk who keeps returning with her two little kid skunks is fairly brazen. Like a mother perusing a tabloid magazine at the check-out line while her kids are running all over the supermarket knocking stuff over. The baby skunks would be adorable if they didn’t also carry that same attitude: “My Mom says I don’t have to be afraid of you.”
So they’ve taken over back there. Insult turned to injury when one of them detonated under the house, potentially because of a skirmish with a feline. My wife and I heard a growling down there, clearly a cat, which was then followed by a hissing sound that neither of us recognized. Ten seconds later, that unrecognizable hissing turned into an unrecognizable growling. Still, clearly not the cat. “What is that? Another cat?” “Oh my God, I think it’s a-“
BOOM. Mushroom cloud. We live in one of those old 1920’s bungalows, like a tiny cottage, and they were all heated with those wide floor vents that have at least an inch between each grate. It didn’t take long for the sarin nerve gas to reach the olfactory glands. It was like a Mission Impossible killing.
Only the most unlucky people in the world and several curious dogs that have learned the hard way already know this, but the initial spray from a skunk doesn’t smell like it does when you drive by a roadkill one. That roadkill smell has been diluted by space and time. When one of them goes DefCon 4 under your 500 sq. st. house, it’s more like immersing your head into a vat of hydrochloric acid. It burns. Burns your eyes, your nose, your throat. You cough, you gasp, you feel like you’re going to hurl. I think it took us about three months and 100 scented candles to get the smell entirely out of the air. We never did find that poor cat that decided to start shit with that vengeful skunk, maybe he was dissolved into his original atomic structure.
When a female honeybee stings you, the price for your pain and inconvenience is their own life. There’s almost a poetic nature to the attack. The honeybee is like a buzzing, crawling, literal interpretation of Hammurabi’s Code. They have only one bullet in the chamber, and not the intelligence to use it wisely. Kind of sad.
The skunk is the polar opposite, which is why they’re nature’s cosmic joke. There are no ramifications for a skunk blasting you into a nauseous stupor. They can do it over and over, and they don’t give a Gaddamn what it smells like. It probably smells good to them, like when you appreciate your own potent fart.
Skunks are a bunch of smug sons of bitches, but you have to admire them.
But the more time I live here, the more I see that Southern California has just about every ecosystem you could imagine, therefore they have about every type of animal you could imagine. When you only watch movies to learn about the world, as so many Americans do, I think you assume that Southern California is lined with beaches and palm trees. Truth is, the beaches run about 200 ft. from the water, and then you’re suddenly dealing with either desert, mountains or forestry. The really great thing about Southern California are these varied environments. They have everything except polar ice caps and rainforests. Skiing, sunbathing, and driving a car through a giant hole in a tree are all about 90 minutes from each other. It’s amazing.
When I first saw skunks in my backyard, I was at first surprised, but then quickly remembered that if I wandered too far from my house I could be attacked by a mountain lion, so a skunk shouldn’t come as any great shock. For those lucky enough to get up close and personal with a skunk without getting the business end of a chemical attack, you notice right away that skunks are a fun animal to watch. I don’t think they have a very high top speed, but I guess I wouldn’t either if I wielded such power. They have a sort of jolly fat-man gait. They lumber from side to side, almost a waddle. The white stripe (nature’s very own Surgeon General Warning) makes them even more likable, like a ’66 Mustang with that double-stripe down the middle.
Basically, it’s the sort of mammal you could have a beer with. If they didn’t instill such terror in the general populous, I think we could be pretty close friends. But there’s the rub: skunks know their power. They don’t have to run fast. They can take their time eating that cat food I left out there for the stray cat. They can filter through your entire garbage container, picking and choosing exactly what they want like a take-out menu. In fact, the noises they make when they’re outside sound leisurely, like a homeless person rummaging through the recyclables on the curb looking to make a few extra bucks.
I have never seen the skunk in our backyard run away from me. If I’m lucky, it walks away. When I take Daisy the Dalmatian out there to potty in the summer, I have to crack the door and speak loudly: “Beat it, skunks. Comin’ out. Comin’ out, skunks.” On more than one occasion, I’ve had to plant my foot on Daisy’s butt to get her back inside when I see them so she doesn’t get blasted.
Even the single mother skunk who keeps returning with her two little kid skunks is fairly brazen. Like a mother perusing a tabloid magazine at the check-out line while her kids are running all over the supermarket knocking stuff over. The baby skunks would be adorable if they didn’t also carry that same attitude: “My Mom says I don’t have to be afraid of you.”
So they’ve taken over back there. Insult turned to injury when one of them detonated under the house, potentially because of a skirmish with a feline. My wife and I heard a growling down there, clearly a cat, which was then followed by a hissing sound that neither of us recognized. Ten seconds later, that unrecognizable hissing turned into an unrecognizable growling. Still, clearly not the cat. “What is that? Another cat?” “Oh my God, I think it’s a-“
BOOM. Mushroom cloud. We live in one of those old 1920’s bungalows, like a tiny cottage, and they were all heated with those wide floor vents that have at least an inch between each grate. It didn’t take long for the sarin nerve gas to reach the olfactory glands. It was like a Mission Impossible killing.
Only the most unlucky people in the world and several curious dogs that have learned the hard way already know this, but the initial spray from a skunk doesn’t smell like it does when you drive by a roadkill one. That roadkill smell has been diluted by space and time. When one of them goes DefCon 4 under your 500 sq. st. house, it’s more like immersing your head into a vat of hydrochloric acid. It burns. Burns your eyes, your nose, your throat. You cough, you gasp, you feel like you’re going to hurl. I think it took us about three months and 100 scented candles to get the smell entirely out of the air. We never did find that poor cat that decided to start shit with that vengeful skunk, maybe he was dissolved into his original atomic structure.
When a female honeybee stings you, the price for your pain and inconvenience is their own life. There’s almost a poetic nature to the attack. The honeybee is like a buzzing, crawling, literal interpretation of Hammurabi’s Code. They have only one bullet in the chamber, and not the intelligence to use it wisely. Kind of sad.
The skunk is the polar opposite, which is why they’re nature’s cosmic joke. There are no ramifications for a skunk blasting you into a nauseous stupor. They can do it over and over, and they don’t give a Gaddamn what it smells like. It probably smells good to them, like when you appreciate your own potent fart.
Skunks are a bunch of smug sons of bitches, but you have to admire them.
Monday, January 28, 2008
I Like Walking
This is going to sound like a Healthy Living! sidebar from the AARP magazine, but I honestly feel like we’d be a lot happier as people if we just walked everywhere.
Cars seemed like a good idea, but if you were to ask Karl Benz in 1896 whether he thought eventually killing 1.2 million people around the world every year was an awesome thing, he probably would say “Ja…no, zat is less zan awesome.” Actually, he would have said the rest of it in German and not a German accent. You understand.
I’ve already played the faux-Luddite in other posts. It’s older hat than the phrase “old hat,” so I won’t get into all of it again. But speaking as someone who lives on the left coast, specifically Southern California, there would be way worse things than not having cars.
In the old days, you must have actually had to interact with people on your way to wherever you were going. Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to have your own bubble in some ways. Listen to your own music, make your own decisions and not be at the mercy of a stalled train or psychotic bus driver, etc.
But there’s also something to be said for being thrust into other people’s space. It’s not always a bad thing to see how other people are living, for better or worse. A shared smile across the subway car has probably led to just as many marriages as stabbings. I miss getting off the subway in NY and walking to work. There was something a little more human about it.
When we’re stuck in our cars for our commutes, we turn into other people. Those people are never our better selves, they’re always our worst. We turn impatient, bossy, and even violent. We get so comfortable behind the wheel, we eventually think of the car as an extension of our bodies. Many people, including myself, take needlessly rude and even dangerous chances with the shell of this 2-ton vehicle that you should never think of taking with your own body. If we start thinking of the car as an extension of ourselves, then by default, we’re just becoming machines.
If two people were walking toward an escalator, and both got there at exactly the same time, there would often be a few seconds wasted as they requested that the other person advance to the steps first. Now switch the situation to a common highway merge, two lanes of traffic into one, and you have an all-out race to muscle your car into the wedge first, even though this would guarantee you would arrive at your destination about .2 seconds before your “opponent” in the other lane. Yes, there are nice people driving, and this sometimes translates to courteous behavior on the highways. But that’s the exception, not the rule.
Worse than the rude behavior in cars is this strange notion some rude people have after they pull an asshole move in their car that if they don’t look at you, you don’t exist. If you cut someone in line at the store, you would have to weigh the risk of having to face that person down and eventually look them in the eye, potentially enduring them dressing you down for being the rude asshole that you are. In cars, people often behave like a child, “If I don’t look at them, they don’t exist.” Similarly, you would thank that person who insisted you get on the escalator first, but in a car, the very common accepted practice of waving thanks for letting you into a lane is substituted for averting your eyes from that kind-hearted vehicle operator and feigning “keeping your eyes on the road” after you accept their waving you along.
Along the lines of dehumanizing, mankind was definitely supposed to run, walk and swim. I’m not a fitness guru, or practitioner, for that matter, but walking should make everyone feel more human. Maybe it’s how vast LA is, maybe it’s living in NY for so long and having walking be an acquired taste, but everyone should do it. And if you roll your eyes at the idea of “taking a walk,” then you’re not doing it enough.
I used to work for a studio in the valley, and during my lunchbreaks, I would take a walk for 45 minutes, then I’d be hungry for my lunch when I got back. The studio’s campus was nestled in a very residential neighborhood, and it made for a genuinely nice, long walk.
On more than five occasions, my fellow employees who drove by and recognized me walking would pull up beside me, roll down their window and ask me “What’s wrong?” I mean genuine concern. They’d ask me if my car was in the shop. I’d say no. They’d look around and ask me where I was walking. I’d say nowhere. They’d ask again if I was okay. I’d say “yeah, I just like walking.” Most of the people would just shrug and drive away at that point, but one of them actually kicked open their passenger door, chuckling as if I was telling an elaborate joke, and say “Okay. No, seriously, get in. I’ll take you back.”
Cars seemed like a good idea, but if you were to ask Karl Benz in 1896 whether he thought eventually killing 1.2 million people around the world every year was an awesome thing, he probably would say “Ja…no, zat is less zan awesome.” Actually, he would have said the rest of it in German and not a German accent. You understand.
I’ve already played the faux-Luddite in other posts. It’s older hat than the phrase “old hat,” so I won’t get into all of it again. But speaking as someone who lives on the left coast, specifically Southern California, there would be way worse things than not having cars.
In the old days, you must have actually had to interact with people on your way to wherever you were going. Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to have your own bubble in some ways. Listen to your own music, make your own decisions and not be at the mercy of a stalled train or psychotic bus driver, etc.
But there’s also something to be said for being thrust into other people’s space. It’s not always a bad thing to see how other people are living, for better or worse. A shared smile across the subway car has probably led to just as many marriages as stabbings. I miss getting off the subway in NY and walking to work. There was something a little more human about it.
When we’re stuck in our cars for our commutes, we turn into other people. Those people are never our better selves, they’re always our worst. We turn impatient, bossy, and even violent. We get so comfortable behind the wheel, we eventually think of the car as an extension of our bodies. Many people, including myself, take needlessly rude and even dangerous chances with the shell of this 2-ton vehicle that you should never think of taking with your own body. If we start thinking of the car as an extension of ourselves, then by default, we’re just becoming machines.
If two people were walking toward an escalator, and both got there at exactly the same time, there would often be a few seconds wasted as they requested that the other person advance to the steps first. Now switch the situation to a common highway merge, two lanes of traffic into one, and you have an all-out race to muscle your car into the wedge first, even though this would guarantee you would arrive at your destination about .2 seconds before your “opponent” in the other lane. Yes, there are nice people driving, and this sometimes translates to courteous behavior on the highways. But that’s the exception, not the rule.
Worse than the rude behavior in cars is this strange notion some rude people have after they pull an asshole move in their car that if they don’t look at you, you don’t exist. If you cut someone in line at the store, you would have to weigh the risk of having to face that person down and eventually look them in the eye, potentially enduring them dressing you down for being the rude asshole that you are. In cars, people often behave like a child, “If I don’t look at them, they don’t exist.” Similarly, you would thank that person who insisted you get on the escalator first, but in a car, the very common accepted practice of waving thanks for letting you into a lane is substituted for averting your eyes from that kind-hearted vehicle operator and feigning “keeping your eyes on the road” after you accept their waving you along.
Along the lines of dehumanizing, mankind was definitely supposed to run, walk and swim. I’m not a fitness guru, or practitioner, for that matter, but walking should make everyone feel more human. Maybe it’s how vast LA is, maybe it’s living in NY for so long and having walking be an acquired taste, but everyone should do it. And if you roll your eyes at the idea of “taking a walk,” then you’re not doing it enough.
I used to work for a studio in the valley, and during my lunchbreaks, I would take a walk for 45 minutes, then I’d be hungry for my lunch when I got back. The studio’s campus was nestled in a very residential neighborhood, and it made for a genuinely nice, long walk.
On more than five occasions, my fellow employees who drove by and recognized me walking would pull up beside me, roll down their window and ask me “What’s wrong?” I mean genuine concern. They’d ask me if my car was in the shop. I’d say no. They’d look around and ask me where I was walking. I’d say nowhere. They’d ask again if I was okay. I’d say “yeah, I just like walking.” Most of the people would just shrug and drive away at that point, but one of them actually kicked open their passenger door, chuckling as if I was telling an elaborate joke, and say “Okay. No, seriously, get in. I’ll take you back.”
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
Countdown to Nothing
Do we really need calendars? Most of the time, I'm fine with knowing what day it is, whether I'm close to the weekend, if there's a vacation coming up, if I've missed Mother's Day by four weeks.
But I've gotta say, there is no calendar day more lame than New Year's Eve. There doesn't seem to be any reason for celebrating this day other than the fact that we're happy that the earth has made it around the sun again. For 4,500,000,000 years, the earth has managed to make it, I don't think it needs our help anymore. Since it's pretty old, I don't think the earth even remembers what its birthday is. So can we dispense with this holiday altogether?
If the Chinese calendar is the correct New Year, and ours is way off, that would be a huge embarrassment in the first place. But heaping on all the other traditions on New Year's make me hate it even more. Let's review them all:
1) The Resolution. This barely needs mentioning, because it's so retarded. But we're honestly supposed to think we're going to change our ways for the better because it's a new calendar year? What person thinks like that? Name a doctor that says "Hey, you really should stop smoking, your heart could give out and you'll probably get cancer. Oh yeah, and January 1st is coming up, so there's that."
2) The Pressure to Do Something. I think my fondest memories of New Year's Eve come when I was about 7-11 years old. Back then, it was either a middle finger to the convention of making kids go to sleep earlier than they wanted to, or fighting my inner clock's bedtime and challenging myself to stay up and watch Dick Clark. That's about everybody's peak, I think. Now, there's this strange pressure to do something that night, like everyone is 22. I'd rather be home most of the time, why does this change for an arbitrary 1o seconds? Which brings us to...
3) The Countdown. In the grand cosmic scheme, what do these ten seconds matter? I once wondered if all our math was wrong, and the Gods on the Astral Plane just looked down at us and thought we were completely stupid, or a failed creation. "Len, these morons think 2 + 2 equals 4, why did we let them crawl out of the mud again?" Well, since when do we take credit for the year's birthday? If you think about it, our countdown counts down to nothing. It's a moment that doesn't actually exist, because as soon as it arrives, it's already the New Year. Yeah, confetti drops, Ryan Seacrest gets to tell us how amazing it all is, and Carrie Underwood claps her hands like a seal, but what does that moment really represent? I already have a depressing annual mortality reminder scorched into my memory, it's called my birthday. Do I really need another landmark to remind me of all the shit that I didn't do in my life? Since we've been looking around with blank faces after having counting down to zero for so long, we've now got another tradition piled on...
4) The New Year's Kiss. I like kissing my wife. She's a good kisser. Hell, if she wasn't, I probably would have married someone else. You end up kissing that person a lot, so choose the right one. Just a little romantic advice there. Anyway, the Pressure to Do Something is often conflated with the Pressure to Be Next To Someone You'd Like to Kiss on New Year's Eve. If you think about it, this tradition was born out of drunk people in the 19-aughts wanting an excuse to hook up. "Heck, I got to zero...Ethel was standing there...so I tugged on her bloomers and we started necking!" But what about those people who go to a party with a bunch of friends, all of whom happen to have a significant other or prostitute, and when the ball drops, they pretend to know the words to Auld Lang Syne and knock back their swinging champagne glass like they're going to the chair. We've all been that person. We already have a holiday where we have to be reminded that we're all alone, it's called Valentine's Day.
So that's enough complaining. I promise my next post will not be a complaint, but something I like. It is the New Year, after all, and that's my resolution: one post a month will not be a complaint.
But I've gotta say, there is no calendar day more lame than New Year's Eve. There doesn't seem to be any reason for celebrating this day other than the fact that we're happy that the earth has made it around the sun again. For 4,500,000,000 years, the earth has managed to make it, I don't think it needs our help anymore. Since it's pretty old, I don't think the earth even remembers what its birthday is. So can we dispense with this holiday altogether?
If the Chinese calendar is the correct New Year, and ours is way off, that would be a huge embarrassment in the first place. But heaping on all the other traditions on New Year's make me hate it even more. Let's review them all:
1) The Resolution. This barely needs mentioning, because it's so retarded. But we're honestly supposed to think we're going to change our ways for the better because it's a new calendar year? What person thinks like that? Name a doctor that says "Hey, you really should stop smoking, your heart could give out and you'll probably get cancer. Oh yeah, and January 1st is coming up, so there's that."
2) The Pressure to Do Something. I think my fondest memories of New Year's Eve come when I was about 7-11 years old. Back then, it was either a middle finger to the convention of making kids go to sleep earlier than they wanted to, or fighting my inner clock's bedtime and challenging myself to stay up and watch Dick Clark. That's about everybody's peak, I think. Now, there's this strange pressure to do something that night, like everyone is 22. I'd rather be home most of the time, why does this change for an arbitrary 1o seconds? Which brings us to...
3) The Countdown. In the grand cosmic scheme, what do these ten seconds matter? I once wondered if all our math was wrong, and the Gods on the Astral Plane just looked down at us and thought we were completely stupid, or a failed creation. "Len, these morons think 2 + 2 equals 4, why did we let them crawl out of the mud again?" Well, since when do we take credit for the year's birthday? If you think about it, our countdown counts down to nothing. It's a moment that doesn't actually exist, because as soon as it arrives, it's already the New Year. Yeah, confetti drops, Ryan Seacrest gets to tell us how amazing it all is, and Carrie Underwood claps her hands like a seal, but what does that moment really represent? I already have a depressing annual mortality reminder scorched into my memory, it's called my birthday. Do I really need another landmark to remind me of all the shit that I didn't do in my life? Since we've been looking around with blank faces after having counting down to zero for so long, we've now got another tradition piled on...
4) The New Year's Kiss. I like kissing my wife. She's a good kisser. Hell, if she wasn't, I probably would have married someone else. You end up kissing that person a lot, so choose the right one. Just a little romantic advice there. Anyway, the Pressure to Do Something is often conflated with the Pressure to Be Next To Someone You'd Like to Kiss on New Year's Eve. If you think about it, this tradition was born out of drunk people in the 19-aughts wanting an excuse to hook up. "Heck, I got to zero...Ethel was standing there...so I tugged on her bloomers and we started necking!" But what about those people who go to a party with a bunch of friends, all of whom happen to have a significant other or prostitute, and when the ball drops, they pretend to know the words to Auld Lang Syne and knock back their swinging champagne glass like they're going to the chair. We've all been that person. We already have a holiday where we have to be reminded that we're all alone, it's called Valentine's Day.
So that's enough complaining. I promise my next post will not be a complaint, but something I like. It is the New Year, after all, and that's my resolution: one post a month will not be a complaint.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
9 to 6ers
Another kick in the balls to the American employee is the decade-long movement to keep my white ass in a non-ergonomic chair staring at a computer for an hour longer than I really should. I happen to work a job right now that has the hours of 8 to 5. When I took it, I first thought, "Hey, this is great. I don't mind getting up an hour earlier, because I'll get home an hour earlier."
But then it got me thinking...when the hell did this happen? Didn't corporate America and Dolly Parton both coin the phrase "9 to 5?" When did this magically turn into "9 to 6?"
Subtly. That's how. Think about it. We still call these people "9 to 5ers," even though nobody works those hours anymore. No one is outraged that we have to work until 6 o'clock. It's happened so gradually over the past ten or fifteen years that no one blinks an eye. In fact, leaving at 5 pm will often get you the "Half day?" snipe from the receptionist.
Since it used to be the most common dinnertime, staying at work until 7 pm must have once seemed ridiculous. Now it's just working an hour longer. That's barely overtime. I'm positive that people in the 50's and 60's took lunchbreaks, but your day was over at 5 pm. That's when the whistle blew.
But one by one, workers must have felt they were climbing the ladder faster if they showed their commitment to their company. That meant working longer hours, working weekends, taking business trips with that guy you hated whose breath smelled like rotten foot.
Now we have to apologize if we want to get home at a decent hour. To see our wives, our husbands, our dogs, our kids, or just to wind down. People in other countries must think we're insane. We've just passed Japan for the most weekly hours put in by the American worker. Forty percent of our population works over 50 hours a week. And yet, we have fewer vacation days than any other industrialized country, and less time for maternity leave. Hell, we're one of only two industrialized countries that doesn't have fully-paid maternity leave (Australia).
What does it all add up to? If you factor in a normal commute time for an average work-a-day stiff, which might be 30 minutes, you have a total of 10 hours a day devoted to work. And let's say you're lucky and get 8 hours of sleep. That leaves 6 waking hours that you have to yourself, right? Wrong. You need about an hour to eat breakfast and get ready for work. And you need no less than an hour to wind down after a day frying your brain under florescent lights and a computer monitor before making dinner. Without counting any potential exercise regiment, let's just call it 4 waking hours of time for yourself.
Four hours out of 24. 1/6 of your time. Are we happier doing this? Are Americans completely nuts? Even Max Weber would crap his pants over this.
So the next time your CEO nudges you and says you're looking a little tired, just turn around and tell them "You know, Ted, I'd be feeling a lot better if you didn't take all but 17% of my life."
But then it got me thinking...when the hell did this happen? Didn't corporate America and Dolly Parton both coin the phrase "9 to 5?" When did this magically turn into "9 to 6?"
Subtly. That's how. Think about it. We still call these people "9 to 5ers," even though nobody works those hours anymore. No one is outraged that we have to work until 6 o'clock. It's happened so gradually over the past ten or fifteen years that no one blinks an eye. In fact, leaving at 5 pm will often get you the "Half day?" snipe from the receptionist.
Since it used to be the most common dinnertime, staying at work until 7 pm must have once seemed ridiculous. Now it's just working an hour longer. That's barely overtime. I'm positive that people in the 50's and 60's took lunchbreaks, but your day was over at 5 pm. That's when the whistle blew.
But one by one, workers must have felt they were climbing the ladder faster if they showed their commitment to their company. That meant working longer hours, working weekends, taking business trips with that guy you hated whose breath smelled like rotten foot.
Now we have to apologize if we want to get home at a decent hour. To see our wives, our husbands, our dogs, our kids, or just to wind down. People in other countries must think we're insane. We've just passed Japan for the most weekly hours put in by the American worker. Forty percent of our population works over 50 hours a week. And yet, we have fewer vacation days than any other industrialized country, and less time for maternity leave. Hell, we're one of only two industrialized countries that doesn't have fully-paid maternity leave (Australia).
What does it all add up to? If you factor in a normal commute time for an average work-a-day stiff, which might be 30 minutes, you have a total of 10 hours a day devoted to work. And let's say you're lucky and get 8 hours of sleep. That leaves 6 waking hours that you have to yourself, right? Wrong. You need about an hour to eat breakfast and get ready for work. And you need no less than an hour to wind down after a day frying your brain under florescent lights and a computer monitor before making dinner. Without counting any potential exercise regiment, let's just call it 4 waking hours of time for yourself.
Four hours out of 24. 1/6 of your time. Are we happier doing this? Are Americans completely nuts? Even Max Weber would crap his pants over this.
So the next time your CEO nudges you and says you're looking a little tired, just turn around and tell them "You know, Ted, I'd be feeling a lot better if you didn't take all but 17% of my life."
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