Useful Advice - What is dumb?

Think you've come up with a cool, "dumb" idea? Don't dismiss it!

Go run it on Google and see just how cool your "dumb" idea actually is.

Now.

Useful Advice - taking notes

Carry an actual notepad with you. Always.

Useful Advice - public speaking

 

Spread your concern around when speaking to a group.

God bless you, Halliburton

Huh. I guess it is possible to fuck up a fuck up.

Everybody shine, man, everybody glisten!

I've been listening to this track on my daily bike rides to work lately. Powerful shit.

Incensed

A friend stores some great incense in one of his cabinets. It is so great, in fact, that my nose was actually drawn into the drawer containing the fragrant sticks, captivating me for nearly a minute, while I was searching for some sticky notes recently. I could only smile, one eyebrow raised, when he returned from his kitchen with some fresh beers to find my head buried in that lovely piece of antique furniture.

I still don't know if I should be pleased or concerned having heard him remark that he did not find the scene the least bit surprising.

Tibor and Metallica

Since I can’t tell you precisely how to get to a Metallica show at an ice hockey arena somewhere in the middle of Slovakia, the tale of how I almost got there will have to suffice.

With a few weeks to kill between semesters, and having heard stories about the beautiful landscape (and the even more beautiful women) of Eastern Europe, I decided to hook up with a friend of mine out backpacking in Hungary one summer a few years back. My friend loves to travel and, as he had been out that way before, I knew he could help me sample the local flavor.

We connected on the border between Austria and Hungary – I, with my overstuffed backpack, and he in a tiny car already packed with three other guys.

“You must have one hell of a backpack to need a car to help you carry it,” I said, confused and expecting a long hike through some beautiful yet eerie countryside ala American Werewolf in London.

“Toss your bag in the trunk, man,” he grinned, “we’re going to a metal concert.”

I felt my stomach churn ever so slightly as I surveyed the vehicle I was about to squeeze into, and became lost in thought reflecting on the rich history and model diversity of the cars forged by the American automotive industry. Even a few years ago commercials for American cars touted high-tech security systems, computer-enhanced engines and navigation by satellite. Looking at this car, I envisioned its commercial trumpeting “windows” as standard features.

Additionally, craftsmanship aside, EACH of the doors of the car I was about to get into was a different color. Now it might be perfectly normal around these parts, I guessed, to roll around in a pack of Skittles, but, coming from America, a car with even one different colored door gave cause for concern. We’ve all seen that red car in the city sporting some orange or white-ish door, and have held our children just a little bit closer as it drifted by, knowing that it was either coming from, or on its way to, some serious shit.

Undeterred, and ready for adventure, I shoehorned my way in anyway.

The inside of the vehicle turned out to be just as colorful as the outside. Spare, and seemingly unnecessary, parts were soldered to the body, and, aside from my friend in his typical gray jacket and jeans, my fellow travelers all donned some of the freshest, vibrant gear the 80's and 90's had to offer. Incidentally, I actually think Cross Colors jeans make even the pastiest of skin pop! One guy was rocking that logo t-shirt from the first Batman movie while the driver, a man I would come to know, and love, named Tibor, sat in the cockpit with one hand on the wheel and the other tucked deep inside a box of BooBerry cereal.

 (the Eastern Europe of today is the America of yesteryear)

After introductions, my friend revealed that we were on our way to Slovakia to see Metallica. Those guys were clearly bigger fans than I, but I was excited about the adventure and the concert nonetheless. Everyone looked cheerful as we took off.

We got through the border of Slovakia without much hassle and, like magic, some herb appeared in the back seat. Though I didn’t partake, I might as well have considering the contact high I was buzzing from. I immediately wondered about cops on the roads, as I knew absolutely nothing about the country I had just entered, and asked if we were cool. Tibor reassured me that all was fine in his thickly accented English and we got back to our discussion about James Hetfield’s “totally cool” sunglasses.

About five minutes later, just as my early-onset paranoia was beginning to fade, we came around a bend to discover a police car on the side of the road off in the distance. The greenery went out the window and the mood in the vehicle became a little less light. Tibor ventured that if we drove really fast, we might pass by undetected. He was vetoed, fortunately, by my friend who cautioned against being dumb. In the end, we slowed down and approached the police the way all kids doing something they probably shouldn’t be doing do – sitting up, looking straight ahead and smiling.

Nearly upon the parked car, the tension crescendoed as the cops standing beside their vehicle waved us over. Tibor wiped the red from his eyes and decided he’d simply talk with them. He pulled over behind their car, assured us we’d be on our way in no time, and walked over to the waiting officers. We sat in the car for a few minutes as Tibor worked his magic on the police, praying we weren’t headed for some forced labor camp.

When he returned, it was simply to report, luckily, that their car had broken down and that they could use a tow to the nearest station. It was one of those times where it was both nice, and not so nice, to know that the police were rolling in even shittier cars than the general population. I was to learn later that their car was a Lada, a make notorious for giving out on owners. We all breathed a deep sigh of relief as Tibor pulled his car up in front of the cops to hitch the two cars together.

 (A natural habitat on its Lada)

We began driving again at a snail’s pace. It was only a few miles to the closest gas station and it would take over an hour to get there. We inched along at around 5 mph, joined together looking like Voltron after a few rounds with a trash compactor. The mood was happy again in Tibor’s car and everyone’s high began to reappear. Tibor reveled in how smoothly he had dealt with the police and promised to get us all to the concert on time. Everyone sat quietly, watching the scenery, while Tibor hummed some old Britney Spears.

All was cake, for the first few minutes or so, until, all of a sudden, Tibor, having returned to the floating world he'd been snapped out of only minutes earlier, looked up into the rear-view mirror.

“Oh shit!” he yelled, “The police are right on us!!!”

Frightened, he hammered down on the gas. “They won’t catch me!” he vowed, angrily, kicking off the oddest “high-speed” case I’ve ever had the displeasure of being party to.

The rest of us went whiter. It was the first time in my life that I was in a situation I could actually describe, truly, as folly. Believe me when I say that two minutes of madness can really feel like an hour. The police looked equally dumbfounded, waving their arms like mad and trying to stop their car. We hollered at Tibor to wake the fuck up and finally convinced him to ease off the gas just as the chain linking the cars was about to fail.

“I have an unpaid parking ticket,” he said, plainly, coming back to Earth.

“You got that in New York, dumbass!!” my friend shouted.

We slowed back to a crawl as the police hit their lights, and towed the cops back over to the shoulder. Calm as a cucumber, Tibor got out and explained, simply, that his car had malfunctioned. The cops let us continue towing them and were thankful to be unhitched when we reached the gas station. Tibor smiled and waved goodbye to the public servants as we pulled back onto the road.

Probably jarred from the experience, he remembered that the concert we were en route to was not for another week.

“Pass me the BooBerry,” I said, exhausted. “That was enough adventure for one day anyway.”

Shadows and light

Now, I don't mean to hate, but your photograph isn't de facto cool just because it's in black and white.

Our Forefather

I stumbled across an article online not that long ago about the ongoing debate between the theories of evolution and intelligent design. It was, again, being argued that the fact that there is no so-called “missing link” between apes and humans disproves the idea that evolution is the sole mechanism explaining the great biological diversity on our planet. I thought I would settle this issue once and for all with some thoughts of my own.

If evolution occurs gradually, so the argument goes, how can the sudden jump from ape to man be explained? Come back in time with me to some jungle in Africa and see for yourself.

Imagine you are walking along and come to a clearing in the trees. The moon and stars shine down through a perfectly clear sky and you spy a male chimpanzee sauntering up to a potential mate. He’s clearly an alpha and very interested in the flared butt cheeks of the lady he intends to approach. He hoots something in chimpanzee-ese and she hoots back. The conversation is short and in no time he’s in business. Really try to drink in the scene. There is no time for cognition as we know it, and why would there be? Everything is right with nature.

Now, let’s pull our focus back from the happy couple for a minute and concern ourselves with another male chimp sitting on a rock not far from the ape sex. He’s quite a bit lower down on the group totem pole and he, too, thinks of little other than the bitter music he’s listening to. He is also doing exactly what evolution planned for him – not getting any.

Let’s follow this second ape a bit longer and see how he might shift the gears of evolution into overdrive.

Our chimp leaves his rock and ambles his way on down to his usual spot in the river for a bit of a bath. He washes himself but, on this occasion, his hand grazes his apehood and creates a pleasing sensation which takes him aback. He touches himself again, retesting the feeling, and, before long, he’s making love to himself. (Understand that this is a wholly new behavior and will set the stage for the advancement of generations to come.) After about four minutes, he experiences the most intense pleasure of his short life and covers the face of a nearby rock with his seed. Simultaneously, actual thought and language burst forth onto the pages of history. Realizing that he just spent nearly five minutes tugging on his dick he remarks, sullenly, “I really need to get a job.”

The rest, as they say, is history.

Hey! That's me!

Someday I hope to be popular enough to end up as the half-cropped, yet still vaguely recognizable, remnant in someone else’s Facebook profile picture.

iPhonehood

A friend of mine just had a baby and I can’t even imagine what that must feel like. While we can only guess what must be going through the mind of a new parent, there must be some profound switch that occurs.

I think, now, of my friend sitting at his table, and eating some sandwich on homemade bread, like usual, on the day before the birth of his son. I’m sure it is a day much like any other. He enjoys his lunch in the stillness of the afternoon on the mountain where he lives and he savors the quality of the meal’s organic ingredients.

I think of him, again, sitting in that same seat, and eating a slightly different, yet equally organic sandwich, the day after coming home with his new son. I imagine him thinking, “this is an awesome sandwich, but there is a fucking (in the positive sense) baby sitting next to me!” Beyond this general, yet profound realization, I can’t say what his specific thoughts could be, but I’d bet some serious money that, from now on, anything he does, that he hadn’t done previously with a baby, will feel like a whole new experience. While he’s washing the dishes – “I’m washing the dishes next to a real, live baby! Like, my baby!” In the grocery store – “hey, baby, help me find some ripe avocados.” Everything is new and fresh and it will take him quite a bit of time to realize that his baby is real (like for real, for real).

While trying to wrap my head around what this realization must feel like, I’ve gained some interesting insight observing the owners of new iPhones. Having purchased the device, I can tell that their world, as well, shifts. In much the same way that my friend realizes he is doing everything he used to do, but with a little half-copy of himself, I’ve seen proud owners of new iPhones stop, mid-stride, on the 9th green, and reach down in a pocket of their woolen trousers to caress the soft curves of the smart phone they just remembered was there. I can see the twinkle in their eye, and that single tear gliding down their cheek, and can only guess that the realization of owning an iPhone must be one of the most amazing feelings a human could experience. Some day, I hope to experience this feeling for myself. Failing that, I guess fatherhood would be pretty OK, too.

[sic]ly

A guy I know writes a modest newsletter about current events and economic trends. He’s new to the game and isn’t the best editor. I was sitting next to him and reading one article (about two paragraphs long) and found five spelling mistakes. The thing I found most interesting, however, was that at the end of the article, he had gone through the trouble of adding “[sic]” to a misspelling in a quote taken from someone else. The irony was so sweet my arm hurt.

Would you mind taking my picture?

Remember being at some sightseeing spot years ago and someone asked you to take their picture? They handed you the camera and you snapped the photo without even thinking about it. Nowadays you need a brief tutorial on how to use the camera before you can take a picture for someone. Since when did I need to mess with hue and saturation just to take a damn photo?

Krispy Kreme

I was coming back to America on a flight from Korea and sitting next to a jovial, and fairly robust, woman. She began a long and interesting story about how she had been sent to help set up the first Krispy Kreme Doughnuts in Korea. She spoke highly of the company and I could tell she really enjoyed Krispy Kreme’s product line. I mentioned how I, too, was a fan and she offered me some coupons.

As our conversation continued, I asked her how the trip went, and about what it was like opening a doughnut shop in Korea. She replied that the Koreans were such excellent workers and went into great depth explaining how easy it was getting them to do what you asked of them.

“They listened intently, and, with very few exceptions, you only have to explain things once,” she began. “They really listen well,” she repeated, “And they follow instructions so much better than the workers back in America!”

Our conversation came to a close as we began our descent. Living in Japan, I could see where she was coming from. I smiled, thinking it was nice how impressed she had been with Korea and its people. Undoubtedly, she had sung the praises of the character of her new employees back at the store. Damn shame she took out her phone to make a call AS WE WERE LANDING.

Romance

I went on my first “date” during a lunch break back in elementary school. Her name was Sally, and I loved her carefree attitude. She asked to know my favorite color and about what I was doing after school.

I was on another first date with a woman recently and was asked if my sperm was still viable. I kinda miss being asked about geography and my favorite cartoon characters.

Tissue

If your box of tissue is empty, would you (a) replace it with a full one, (b) get a tissue from a box in another room, or (c) use toilet paper?

Logic-Aid

Anyone else think it was odd that the Kool-Aid Man, a tasty liquid protected only by the glass pitcher he was mixed in, was able to bust through brick walls? I remember watching those commercials as a kid and thinking that he should have been in a pool on the floor covered in shattered glass and yelling, not, “Oh Yeahhh!” but, “Oh shiiiiit!”

Fall Cleaning

I was watching a movie at a friend’s house recently. He has a handsome, pea green, antique, faux-pleather couch, but we weren’t sitting on it. I gathered that most guests probably sit on the floor as there was a healthy layer of dust covering the couch. He noticed I was inspecting the dust and commented that he usually makes an effort to keep the place clean and hygienic. Then, compelled by some frantic urgency, he jumped up from the floor, grabbed a tissue, spit into it and buffed the dust clean. The couch waxed, he smiled at me with a certain pride as he tossed the tissue gingerly into the nearest bin. I looked down at the pizza I was eating and prayed he had running water for the dishes.