Category: Culture

Words Of Advice!

I’m an optimist.  However, I must admit ever since the Millennials began drifting out of the universities and into the general population, I’m losing my girlish laughter.  Seriously! These people are difficult to deal with.  It’s like playing chess with a pigeon — they don’t actually understand the game, but they strut around the board as if they invented it.  Lighten up, folks!  Here’s some advice.  It might not make your lives any better, but it’ll certainly help all the people around you get on with theirs.

1 — Nobody in the real world gives a damn about your feelings.  Being over-sensitive about everything doesn’t mean you’re a unique, complicated or interesting person; it means you’re an emotional train wreck who doesn’t have any coping skills.

2 — I think it’s wonderful that you want a totally cool job that utilizes your intelligence, ability and years of education.  Unfortunately, your diploma in Gender Studies or any of the other 1001 bullshit degrees out there didn’t provide you with any marketable skills.  To get a job (cool or otherwise) you need MARKETABLE SKILLS, so either get some or learn how to make coffee.

3 — If you live in the Western World, you’re already part of the 1%.  Nobody but you — and your Instagram buddies — thinks you’re ill used, abused or downtrodden.  And, like it or not, you’re not oppressed, so give it a rest.  You have the bounty of this very, very wealthy society at your disposal.  Bitching about that is kinda counterproductive.

4 — Just because you’re offended doesn’t mean you’re right.

5 — People who disagree with you are not assholes, morons, idiots, or Satan’s evil twin. They’re ordinary people who are just as smart, aware and informed as you think you are.

6 — The real world does not come with a safe space.  That’s a pretend game the universities made up so your parents wouldn’t sue them.

And finally:

7 — Even though he’s not on Twitter, read Copernicus: he has documented proof you’re not the centre of the universe.

The Future

Nostradamus made a career out of predicting the future, so how hard can it be?  All you really have to do is take a look at the crap that’s going on today and multiply it by the stupidity factor.  Let me demonstrate:

News from the not-so-distant future (cue the news desk with the sensible blonde and the older guy looking serious.)

Our top story.  A cute cat video is going viral on the Internet.  It’s reported that today’s cat is 50% cuter than yesterday’s cat and totally cuter than that stupid puppy who was trying to go down the stairs.  Puppy people have sworn to strike back with a series of beagles in funny hats and a dancing bulldog.

A topless protest by PETA supporters has targeted the National Football League by simultaneously staging demonstrations in Chicago, Philadelphia, Miami, Baltimore, Denver, Detroit, Indianapolis, Phoenix, Atlanta, Jacksonville, St Louis and Charlotte, North Carolina.  A number of fully clothed, has-been celebrity spokespeople maintain that boobs raise awareness of the NFL’s systemic and ongoing insensitivity and offensive Species Appropriation.  “We’re speaking for the eagles and dolphins who cannot speak for themselves,” said one slightly familiar celeb, “And we know exactly what these voiceless creatures want to say.”

In a slightly related story, lawyers from a shadowy group of Somalis are suing the city of Pittsburgh for copyright and trademark infringement. Documents filed in District Court state that piracy is a long and noble tradition in Somalia (which existed long before Pittsburgh had a Major League Baseball franchise.)  The suit also names the owners and management of the Pittsburgh Pirates as profiting from the illegal use of the name.  No one was available for comment because most people in Pennsylvania were saying WTF and the Somalis were “on the high seas.”

In other news, the Kardashian sisters woke up this morning and went to the toilet.  No video is available but fans all over the world are tweeting, “OMG, they’re just like us! #peeperfect.”

The National Weather Service is issuing yet another Temperature Awareness Warning.  Today’s temperature will not be a perfect 22 degrees (72 Fahrenheit.)  It will start out cooler in the morning and rise to 25 (77 Fahrenheit) in the afternoon.  We recommend viewers wear a sweater or light jacket in the morning and take it off when they begin to feel warm in the afternoon.  This ongoing weather pattern is caused by a seasonal condition called “Late Summer.”

And finally, in international news, University of Chicago researchers have discovered that nearly everybody in the world hates us.  They think we’re a bunch of under-educated, over-privileged dicks, so bloated on mindless entertainment it’s no wonder our society is crumbling.  In a totally unrelated story, illegal immigration to the Industrial West is skyrocketing.

We live in a funny old world — don’t we?

The Time When!

Whether you’re 25, 46, 71 or only 15, some days you wake up and just feel old.  You look at the world and realize today is not the day to play because the game of life has gotten too damn complicated.  You remember a simpler time when things were straightforward and you knew all the rules.  A time when the days were long and bright and the nights romantic.  I time when – well, you get the idea – a time when it didn’t seem like an endless fight just to be alive.  Don’t get me wrong: I have no desire to turn back the clock.  The good old days are a myth propagated by grumpy old people who can’t figure out why they aren’t cool anymore.  (Maybe it’s cuz they use words like cool?)  However, on a bright autumn morning when the coffee’s really good and there’s jam for the toast, there’s nothing wrong with being nostalgic.

Here are a few things, from a more elegant age, that I remember.

When people dressed up for important events like wedding, funerals and court appearances.  Women wore their breasts inside their clothes, and men looked like they’d taken a bath – recently.

The days when you could see the pictures in an art gallery and not the backs of a bunch of cell phones and the half faces of morons taking selfies.

When the lyrics to popular songs didn’t prominently feature body parts, sexual positions, robbery, obscenities, weapons or murder — and you could actually sing them to children.

A time when people didn’t scold each other for the sport of it.

A time when young people had all the questions, not all the answers.

The sweet satisfaction of slamming the phone down in some asshole’s ear.

The days when the relationship between men and women was not adversarial.

Irony, satire and wit.

When you could order coffee without reciting the recipe, and you got to drink it out of a real cup.

A time when ladies and gentlemen acted that way.

Lunches that didn’t come wrapped in paper and look like they’d been run over by a truck.

When gluten wasn’t the scariest thing on the planet.

A time when you could ride public transportation without being forced to listen to somebody else’s one-sided telephone conversation – 7 or 8 times.

When the truth was not a moveable feast.

A time when transgender was real and not just trending on Twitter.

When people could disagree like reasonable human beings not rabid animals.

A time when Hallowe’en was for kids and adults had better things to do than hijack a child’s harmless fun to further their social/political agenda.

The days before Jell-o Journalism (I’m looking at you, Oprah Winfrey) when reporting the news was an honourable profession.   

A time when cheating in professional sports was retail, not wholesale, and the people who did it weren’t stupid enough to get caught.

And finally:

The days when you weren’t constantly looking over your shoulder for a politically correct ambush.