Excising "Like"

Recently, I bought a self-help book.

However, it’s not what you're thinking, assuming, of course, that you’re thinking it’s something along the lines of: Get Rock Hard Abs In Fifteen Minutes A Day While Sitting On The Couch Drinking Bottomless Chocolate Shakes And Eating Massive Quantities Of Buffalo Wings. (Unfortunately, that one was sold out.)

No, what I bought is titled: The Curmudgeon’s Guide To Getting Ahead. (Dos and Don’t of Right Behavior, Tough Thinking, Clear Writing, and Living a Good Life)

As far as I can tell, I bought it for two reasons:

• It has the word “curmudgeon” in it, which is one of my absolute favorite words, one that I simply can’t resist. (For example, if “The Bachelor” was renamed “The Curmudgeon,” I’d have to watch it.)
• It was being promoted by the author, Charles Murray, on the Jason Lewis Show, and it seemed like it might be an interesting read.

This book is directed at helping people who are just starting their careers out of college and have no idea what a corporate work environment is like. Now, those of you who know me will be quick to point out that “fresh out of college” is a term that hasn’t applied to me in several presidential administrations. However, in my defense, I haven’t really been paying much attention to my career as of ever, and in fact, a couple of times I’ve even misplaced it and had a heck of time just finding it again. So I figured it might be a useful read, or perhaps make a good shim if I ever have to level out a coffee table or something.

I haven’t gotten very far into it yet, but there is one section that I found very interesting. In it, the author says you should “excise the word like from your spoken English.” So you shouldn’t, like, use it for, like, no apparent reason in your, like, everyday speech, because your boss, who’s probably a curmudgeon, will think you’re, like, a moron.

And I agree. “Like” has been creeping into our collective vernacular for quite some time now. In fact, it’s gotten to the point where I just heard it being used in a (shudder) Luke Bryan country song, and it sounded absolutely terrible: (“She was like, oh my…”)

I mean, why wouldn’t you just use “and she said” instead of “she was like”?? What earthly reason is there to use “like” in that context? It's not even a shortcut, as it's the same amount of words as the grammatically superior alternative!! AARRRGHH!!!!!

(Another reason why I’m fond of the word “curmudgeon” is because I’m quickly turning into one.)

And so, based on a book and a terrible line in a song, I’ve decided to excise like from my spoken English.

It’s probably not going to be easy; I think I use it a lot without even realizing it. But still, it’s a good goal, and plus, I need something to do until that rock hard abs book gets off of back order.

Wish me, like, luck!

From Point A To Point B (or How To End Up Sharing A Roy Rogers Video)

Today, I’d like to discuss the phenomenon of how two seemingly unrelated points of a person’s life, let’s call them Point A and Point B, are actually tightly coupled, with the key to understanding the relationship being a series of in-between linking points.

Here’s an example:

Point A: My buddy Lurch shows up.
Point B: I share a Roy Rogers music video.

Now, you may ask, how could these two points possibly be related? Also, does Lurch know that you’re writing about him? And who in the world is Roy Rogers, anyway?

Well, continue reading, friend, and all will be revealed:

Let’s begin with Point A: My buddy Lurch was in town for the weekend, and I was charged with the task of trying to keep us entertained. Since we’re guys, and we hadn’t seen each other in months, we were able to spend the better part of three whole sentences getting caught up on each other’s lives:

“What’s new?”
“Nothing.
“Same here.”

After that, there was nothing left to talk about, so we fell back on several tried-and-true activities, including dart gun baseball, reading books while not acknowledging the other person’s existence, and Nintendo R.B.I. Baseball.

Eventually, however, even that lost some of its luster (especially since I’m terrible at dart gun baseball), and I had to come up with something else.

And so, that’s how we found ourselves at Goodwill, perusing the books in hopes of finding some good reading material. This turned out to be an excellent decision, as I scored several paperbacks, not to mention it ate up a lot of time looking through them all.

Once we’d exhausted the reading section, we then turned to the CDs, where I found many that appeared to be elaborate jokes. (“WWF The Music, Vol. 3”, for example, which is a collection of wrestler entrance music.) One album, however, caught my eye: a tribute album to the Eagles by various country artists, which includes Clint Black’s studio version of “Desperado.” I’d been looking for a studio version of that song for a long time, as the album isn’t available digitally, so I snapped it up.

And so, a few days later, that’s how I found myself wondering if there were any other Clint Black songs I should be listening to, which led to me perusing his back catalog on iTunes.

And so, that’s how I found myself being reacquainted with a duet he’d done with Roy Rogers that I’d long since forgotten about, titled “Hold on Partner.”

And so, that’s how I found myself remembering I’d once seen a video of that song, and also that it was purposely incredibly cheesy, which made it utterly fantastic.

And so, we finally arrive at Point B, which is me watching the video on YouTube and deciding to share it in a blog post:

See, it all makes perfect sense now! (Unless you’re still trying to figure out what dart gun baseball is.) Thanks Lurch! I couldn’t have done it without you!

What Was That Number Again?

As I looked at the keypad in front of me like I had hundreds of times before without ever experiencing a problem, I began to wonder if I’d suddenly aged thirty years overnight. This was because the following was happening in my head:

Me: All right brain, what’s my PIN?
Brain: Excuse me?
Me: My PIN? What’s my PIN? I’m trying to get some cash here.
Brain: Why should I know what your PIN is? Sheesh, you woke me up for this?
Me: But you always know my PIN! Why wouldn’t you know now?
Brain: Maybe because you’ve gotten so annoying, what with all of the continual asking for things over the years without so much as a thanks, that I just got sick of it all and sort of lost it? Ever think of that, smart guy?
Me: Um, no.
Brain: Then maybe you should. Now leave me alone. “Ice Road Truckers” is on.

And so, I walked back to my car empty-handed, having forgotten my ATM PIN for the first time in my life.

This is not a fun experience for anybody, because it’s a reminder that eventually you’ll become one of those old, forgetful people who constantly finds themselves asking their brain for information that it refuses to yield, such as:

“Where are my glasses?”
“Where are my keys?”
“Where are my pants?”
“Why am I standing in a carwash in a state that until moments before I’d believed I’d never been to?”

So, as I drove away, I was understandably feeling pretty low. However, before I’d gotten too far, a string of numbers popped into my head! My PIN! That was it! I gleefully turned around and went back to the ATM. Feeling very relieved, I confidently put in my card and typed in the code, which was immediately rejected.

Me: Um, I thought this was my PIN.
Brain: Maybe I just decided to give you your locker combination from middle school.
Me: You’re a jerk.
Brain: Pretty much.

When I got home, yet another string of numbers popped into my head, which I was certain was my actual PIN this time. I wrote them down, and even though they looked a little strange, I still felt pretty confident about it.

Now, you probably don’t need me to tell you that when I tried it the next day, it also got rejected, which basically turned me into a sobbing wreck who could do nothing but stare at the ATM, wondering why life was so unfair.

With nothing left to lose, I decided to try one more time. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, reached out my hand, and allowed my fingers to be guided by what I hoped was The Force, or at least some watered-down derivation thereof.

Suddenly, the screen changed, and I was in.

HALLELLUJA!!! TAKE THAT, STUPID BRAIN!

Anyway, it was a good feeling, and I’m pretty sure that my PIN has been burned so deep into my memory by this experience that I’ll never forget it, no matter how ornery my brain becomes.

The other good news is that I’m pretty sure the reason I forgot it in the first place wasn’t because I’d turned into an old man, but because of simple disuse. Lately, I’ve been using cash less and less – despite anything I may have said in any of my previous postings – which means that my trips to the ATM have become further and further apart, which would easily explain why my PIN had dropped significantly in the priority queue of my memory.

And so, all’s well that ends well, especially when I get a blog entry out of it.

Except I think it’s probably time to change my PIN. The website says I should do so every six months for security purposes.

{Sigh.}

HAGD. Lunboks.

If you were to ask a random person on the street if they thought their family was normal, they'd most likely scoff at you for asking such a silly question. Then they'd probably wonder why you were being creepy and asking about their family, by which point you should probably be running away.

The point is, nobody has a normal family. This is good, however, because normal is also boring. Having an interesting – which is really just a code word for weird – family is much, much more entertaining.

One of the best things about family, especially siblings, is that over time you develop little idiosyncrasies amongst yourselves that would probably make you look insane to the outside world if the outside world wasn’t too busy being insane with their own families to notice.

Example: Our family is a big Calvin and Hobbes family. We’ve been reading it for years, and one cartoon in particular has permeated our communication methodology. In it, an alien lands in front of Calvin in a small spaceship, and Calvin promptly introduces himself by saying, “Greetings, my name is Calvin.” The alien then uses his powers/technology to take on Calvin’s appearance and says, “Gritings. Ma Nam is Kahlfin.” Calvin, seeing an opportunity in the mimicry, gives the alien his lunchbox and tells him to have a good day at school, then runs off to enjoy his newfound freedom. The alien says, “Lunboks,” and when Susie later appears on the scene, tells her to, “Hoffa Gud Tay Askool.”

My siblings and I found this cartoon hilarious, and at some point we began to put addendums onto our notes and emails to each other that were basically some variation of: “Hoffa Gud Tay. Lunboks.”

If this isn’t weird enough, “Hoffa Gud Tay” has since been shortened to HAGD. So now when I read an email from a sibling and see “HAGD. Lunboks,” I barely even notice it, where to anybody else it would seem that the sender is either a terrible speller, having a seizure, or perhaps both.

The best part is, I don’t see this weirdness ever going away, no matter how mature and responsible we all become. It’s just too fun to give up, and I sincerely believe that when we’re all in old age homes, we’ll be telling each other to hoff gud tays via whatever communication standard has since become prevalent.

How awesome is that?

Also, Bill Watterson is a genius.

Lunboks.

Missing: One Blog

You may be wondering about the reasons for my recent lack of updates.

Had I run out of even the most pedestrian of ideas to blog about?

Had my laziness finally overrun my need to garnish attention via self-involved internet postings?

Had the notorious GTIB (Good Taste In Blogging) society finally gotten to me?

Was my silence part of some sort of artistic stand I was taking?

The answer to all of those questions is: Nope! The real reason for my lack up updates – and you’re going to chuckle when you hear it – is much simpler: I’d misplaced my blog! Yup, I just lost the darn thing. You see, one day a few weeks ago I was going to write a truly hilarious post about spinach when I couldn’t find my blog anywhere! In a panic, I checked all of the usual spots: under the bed, in the cookie jar, on the roof of my car, but it was nowhere to be found!

I immediately sprung into action and distributed thousands of posters detailing my missing blog. However, a week went by with no leads. By this time, I was growing quite concerned. I couldn’t bear the thought of my blog out there by itself, cold and shivering, without anybody to read it a good-night story.

A few days later, I was a sniveling wreck. (I’m usually just sniveling.) I thought of going to the blog store and getting a new one, but that just didn’t seem right. A new blog couldn’t replace the one I’d spend four years building up, with each post getting more nonsensical than the last, to the point where all of the new content not only lacked any shred of literary value, but also displayed a complete lapse of the most basic of logical thinking.

But just when I’d about given up hope, there came a knocking at my front door. I’d long since spiraled into a state of despair, where I was throwing back Mountain Dews like there was no tomorrow, and I opened the door looking disheveled and smelling like I hadn’t bathed in weeks – which may or may not have been the case.

Oh how my heart soared when I saw that it was my blog! It’d come home! I hugged it and it licked my face. What a joyous occasion, what a wonderful reunion!

And so here we are, together again, one happy family! This means that the updates should start coming fast and furious, now. Unless, of course – hey! Where’d it go?!

Yoosta Be A Yooper

 

I yoosta be a Yooper, but that was a long time ago, and occasionally I find myself wondering, just how much Yooper is still left in me?

For example, I can’t recall the last time I used the phrase “you’se guys!” That in itself is a major cause for concern.

Luckily, a rather large snowstorm just rolled through the Twin Cities, and now I feel a little better. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

This morning I was at work, monitoring the weather radar online, along with probably everybody else in the company. The Great Storm was coming. According to the online chatter, we’d be lucky to make it out of this one alive. Two inches of snow? Four? Six? It didn’t matter!! There’s nowhere else to put the snow! We were going to be buried! Mass extinction was inevitable!

The radar showed a giant blob the size of Nebraska slowly making its way northeast, on the collision course with the Twin Cities. I found this to be rather interesting, and I decided that while the online chatter was probably overblown, the storm still wasn’t something to ignore. I quickly made the decision to leave work early, before the commute home bogged down too badly. (During storms in the Twin Cities, the two preferred methods of driving are Going Way Too Slow And Then Into The Ditch, along with Going Way Too Fast And Then Into The Ditch.)

And so, just as the snow was beginning to come down somewhat heavily, I was on my way. The drive home turned out to not be very bad at all, and I arrived safely, feeling smug and satisfied with my decision.

Shortly after, however, I began to feel the nagging doubts about how much Yooper I still had in me. I mean, I left work early because I was afraid of snow!!! No Yooper does that! And that wasn’t even the worst part! I’d been watching the weather radar! In the U.P., there’s no point in ever looking at the radar. The giant blob the size of Nebraska is always there, from October through May!!!

I glanced out the window and realized that it looked like a typical U.P. winter day. And here I was, running scared!

I decided to redeem myself as best I could.

An hour or so after dinner, while the rest of the Twin Cities was holed up indoors, I put on my boots, hat, and gloves, and stepped outside. (Actually, I put on more than that.) Whoa! Things had gotten worse! The snow was moving horizontally now, and the accumulation was pretty impressive. In fact, it was looking like a worse than average February U.P. day!

Perfect.

And so, striving for some form of redemption, I went for a walk in a snowstorm for no reason, and it was fantastic. It was cold and windy and snowy and blustery and miserable and just perfect. Nobody was out and about. I had the great outdoors to myself. I was pleased to see no other tracks where I was walking, which was where the sidewalk was supposed to be. It reminded me of trekking to the bus stop when I was a kid. I turned around and walked backwards to get out of the wind. I hadn’t executed that move in several decades. As the snow continued to whip around, I began to feel better about myself.

After a while, I turned around ta go back. Dere was snow down my neck, but I didn’t really care. A little snow never hurt nobody. I kept goin’, thinking that it’d been a long time since I had pasty for supper. A couple’a cars drove by, but I don’t think they saw me. I wondered if Mr. Norm was still on WCCY, and when the last time I had Baroni’s spaghetti was. It was pretty tough going there for a while, but I soon got useta it.

‘Bout tirty minutes later, I got back home. I took off my swampers, mittens, and chook, and put them by the register to dry. I wanted a cup’a coffee, but it was too late. That caffeine stuff keeps me awake, you know, and I do hafta work tomorrow.

Anyways, I think I proved a little somethin’ tonight. You’se guys, I think I still got a little Yooper left in me!

Get Rich Quick Scheme

So I figured out how to get rich! And better yet, since I’m desperate for any sort of attention, I’m going to share my idea with you!

As with most get-rich-quick stories, this one begins at Kwik Trip. (Source: Bureau of Imaginary Statistics) I was checking out, and my total came to $8.07. This didn’t seem like a worthy enough amount to break out a credit card for, so I paid with a ten-dollar bill.

Now here’s where things get interesting: The cashier proceeded to give me two dollars in change! Immediately, my mind started spinning, and before I’d left the building, I realized that I’d hit the mother lode. (If I was a cartoon character, my eyes would have turned into dollar signs.)



 

Here’s my line of thinking: People are lazy, and cashiers are people, so cashiers are thus lazy. (Source: Associative Property Of Laziness) Now, as more and more people begin to pay for goods with credit cards, cashiers will have to handle cash much less, and when they do, especially to make change, it will become more and more of an annoyance to them. Thus, over time, they will be more likely to take short cuts, such as giving somebody $2.00 back instead of $1.93, since they're too lazy to count out ninety-three cents in change.

So my plan now is to pay for everything with cash and force the cashiers to make change. This will be a huge annoyance to them, and over time they’ll begin to cut bigger and bigger corners in my favor just to save themselves some work. Think about it! I saved seven cents today, but that’s just the beginning! Cashiers are only going to get lazier! That number is bound to go up! Pretty soon I’ll pay for a $9.99 purchase with a ten and get back a full dollar! Or even a five! It’s foolproof! Hooray for the growing culture of laziness and entitlement in this great land!

Of course, in order for this to work I have to buy lots of stuff, perhaps stuff I don’t even use, such as deodorant. And I’m not really making money on the deal, just paying less. So, in retrospect, I guess it’s more of a go-broke-slower scheme than a get-rich-quick scheme.

But what the heck, I’ll do it anyway. It’s fun watching cashiers get annoyed when they have to count out change!