I Got Nothin'

A long-time aspiration of mine has been to write a novel. To create an original and engaging story filled with quirky characters that readers grow to love and care for. The problem is, it takes a long time to write a novel - sometimes years, and I just don't have the attention span to support that kind of commitment. I've considered trying my hand at short stories, but even that seems too daunting a prospect. And so here I am, writing blog posts: easily digestible bits of drivel that I can spew out in a few paragraphs and be done with.

Embarrassingly, I am often unable to come up with a topic that warrants even a single paragraph of fluff to frame it. Such is the case today. So, rather than making a futile attempt at cohesiveness, I am simply going to regail you with unrelated tidbits of thought. I've done my best to make them sound like wise sayings, in the hopes of one day finding myself cited in the "Quotes of the Day" on Google. After all, what have we, if not our dreams to cling to.

Crack: It’s killing our children and immortalizing our bells.

To everything there is a season. Except spotted owls; they’re endangered.

The surest cure for hiccups is to count to a billion by tenths.

Statistically speaking, you are much more likely to die of a heart attack than in a plane crash. Of course, that’s also true of your pilot.

Roses are red, violets are blue,
They’re eaten by horses, and turned into poo (which is kind of greenish brown).

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. So, before you go grabbing a wild bird with your bare hand, think about the market value of two birds in a bush.

Tofu is like life support. It will keep you alive, but is it really worth it?

All men are created equal. All women are created greater than.

Laugh and the world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone - unless you’re on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.

In business, the whole is greater than the sum of all its parts. In golf, the sum of all its pars is greater than the holes.

In heaven you will sing praises for eternity to the Most High while surrounded by angels. Hell is the same, only the guy next to you will be playing air guitar.

A cry for help from a proud man rarely comes in the form of words; especially if that proud man is tied up and gagged in the trunk of his kidnapper’s car.

Death is the great equalizer, but Sony makes a pretty decent one too.

I lived in Las Vegas for eight years, and never once got up the courage to try my luck at the roulette wheel. I can’t even imagine how the guys in Russia do it.

Problems are like clouds. They can be daunting, and sometimes seem to cover the whole world. But, if you can just work your way up through them, you’ll see the sun again - then fall 30,000 feet.

The ant is the strongest organism on the planet – able to lift up to 50 times its own weight. I can crush 5 ants with my pinky. Step off punk.

Saving Time

Satisfaction Guaranteed*

It has been said that time stops for no man. While that may be true, it does bounce back and forth a lot for most men – and women for that matter.

If you’ll forgive me a rant, I’d like to relate my feelings about daylight saving time.

In general, I have nothing against saving. I think it’s an important discipline that, when executed appropriately, can promote peace of mind and enrich one’s life. What I take issue with is being told how, what and when I must save – and exactly when I must withdraw and use that which I have so judiciously put away.

Once each year I am forced to extract one hour from my day and set it aside for later use. And it’s not just any hour. It’s a 2:00 AM hour. Three times out of four, I am asleep at that time. I sleep too little as it is, and for my own government to swoop in and snatch up one of my precious sleeping hours is just plain inconsiderate. If they insist on taking an hour, they should do it at 4:00 PM on a Friday. I’d be happy to offer up that hour.

Furthermore, most experts agree that the benefits of saving are best achieved by investing in long-term prospects. This philosophy is not shared by those that mandate saving time. While the method of extraction is somewhat cruel and ill thought out, I could overlook the inconvenience if my saved time was being locked away safely and gaining interest. If, in retirement, I had the option of withdrawing my youthful hours as I saw fit, I would happily cope with the hour I find missing one morning each spring. But no, I have to use my saved hour within the year on a specific date at, once again, 2:00 in the morning.

I have, in the past, voiced a strong opinion that daylight saving time should be done away with entirely. My position has changed. I think the idea has merit, but some practicality and flexibility need to be introduced into the institution.

Each of us should have complete control over what time we save, and when that time is deposited. In an emergency, saved time should be available for immediate use. Perhaps a minor penalty might be assessed for early withdrawals to discourage misuse. Also, similar to a 401K plan, a maximum yearly contribution would be appropriate.

To illustrate this plan, I’ll describe a likely scenario:

Jane is a 37-year-old woman. It is midnight on January 1, and she currently has 8,760 hours remaining in her year.

Jane has decided to participate in the time saving program. She can invest a maximum of five percent of her time in the program and therefore has 438 hours this year available to deposit.

Jane was exhausted yesterday and fell asleep at 7:00 PM, but she set her alarm clock for 11:55 PM so she could wake up to celebrate the New Year. Now it is midnight and she can’t get back to sleep. She decides to save the next 8 hours, which makes it immediately 8:00 AM, and she goes to work.

Throughout the year, Jane continues to contribute to her time fund. She is committed to the program and wants to save as much time as possible. She is able to find time to put away every time she is in a doctor’s office, on hold for customer service, turning on her computer, or watching Paula Abdul critique a contestant on American Idol. She is so successful, that by September she has stowed her maximum hours.

The time she has saved is now gaining 3% interest and will be available for penalty-free withdrawal when Jane reaches age 59.

Flash forward to Jane’s 60th birthday. She has decided to treat herself to a day at the spa and is getting a 30 minute foot massage from a 25-year-old Hungarian boy named Matthias. She is in seventh heaven and, on a whim, decides to withdraw 8 hours from her fund and insert it directly into the middle of her half-hour massage. She smiles as she begins to reap the rewards of her practical planning.

Our current daylight saving system has a grain of smart mixed with a sandbox of stupid. If we can just reverse that ratio, we’ll all be able to enjoy multi-hour foot massages in our golden years.

*This blog post is guaranteed to bring you satisfaction. If you feel unsatisfied after reading, simply contact the author for a full three minute refund.

Forever Young

English is a living language. Not living in the sense that it may one day become self-aware and attack the human race, living because it is constantly evolving, growing, and mutating - much like a cancer cell.

Due to its living nature, it’s impossible to say with any real authority what is or isn’t correct English. Grammar snobs argue over things like whether a word beginning with the letter “h” should be preceded by the article “a” or “an”, whether one should say “toward” or “towards”, and so on.

Unfortunately, for those with a propensity toward(s) grammar snobbery, the fact is; since there is no governing body for the language, the correctness of any given part of English is almost entirely a matter of opinion. It could be argued that the only incorrect English is that which does not correctly convey the intent of a communicator to his English-speaking audience. The phrase, “This food ain’t got no salt on it” may make many an English major cringe, but no English speaking person can truthfully claim ignorance as to the intent behind the phrase. Sure, there’s a double negative and a contraction that will keep you out of heaven if you say it too many times, but we are still able to clearly understand that the speaker is voicing concern about a sodium deficit in his victuals.

But, I’m tangenticating. My thoughts today aren’t actually about English grammar at all. They are about English words. The evolution of the words we use intrigues me. For instance, the “world wide web” is thus called because of the logical similarity between interconnected computers and the many intertwined points of a spider web. From this relatively new definition for the word, “web”, we already have derivatives. People started using the “web” as a medium to record and publish “logs” of their lives, but apparently the term “web log” was too much of a mouthful. Someone decided to truncate it and, voila!, “blog” popped into existence. A completely new word derived from the bastardized definition of a very old word.

Having been in the computer industry for over a decade, I could write page after horrifically boring page about new words and acronyms that owe their existence to modern technology. But, before you start clawing your own eyes out, rest assured - I’m not going to.

Rather, I’d like to point out a couple of words whose definitions have evolved in a manner that you may not be aware of; namely the words, “forever” and “never”.

There was a time when the word “forever” literally meant “for ever” or “without end”. As its counterpart, was “never” - which was originally a contraction for the words “not ever”. Unbeknownst to most English speakers, though, both of these words have evolved considerably.

Forever no longer represents an infinite amount of time. As of this writing, forever is about 16 days. This is based on the average length of time it takes for something to cease after it has been declared to last forever. A generation ago, forever was holding steady at approximately 39 months, but in recent years its value has dropped radically. This is primarily due to the advent of millions of personal computers which all take “forever” to boot.

Interestingly, never is much less volatile than forever. Never’s current average length is nearly 18 years. The disparity in values between forever and never can be attributed to the context in which each of these words is typically used. Forever is generally used to denote the presence of something, while never is more often used to describe a thing’s absence. For example, when a shopper says, “I’ve been in this checkout line forever”, he is referring to how long the phenomenon of standing idly in a line has been present in his life – which, in actuality, is probably about two minutes. Conversely, when a 90 year old woman says, “I’ve never been to Paris”, she is referring to how long the phenomenon of being in Paris has been absent from her life – in this case 90 years. In other words, people use “forever” when they are talking about how long something which already exists will continue to exist, and “never” when referring to something that does not yet exist. Obviously, it’s quite easy to speak with conviction when you’re talking about nothing, ergo “never” has a lifespan that nearly allows it to buy cigarettes.

Of course there are exceptions on both sides. Never would be even longer if not for kids whose birthdays are “never” going to get here. Forever might not last five minutes if it didn’t have the help of comets that have been circling the solar system “forever”. As a general rule though, you should always take “never” more seriously than “forever” (please note that the current value of “always” is 57 times out of 100).

So if your boyfriend tells you that he’s going to love you “forever”, don’t plan an elaborate party for his next birthday. However, if he swears that he’ll “never” stop loving you, it may be time to brush up on your state’s restraining order laws.

Cereal on My Mind

After reading this, you may think I’m a little obsessive. My last post was about Cheerios, and here I am writing about breakfast cereal again. Well, in truth I am obsessive, but I do have an excuse – or at least an explanation.

I recently started a new job. It’s across town so, to beat rush hour traffic, I decided to start work at 7AM. To get there on time, I have to leave my house by 6:20AM, which in turn requires me to roll out of bed by about 5:45AM. Following this schedule, I usually land at my breakfast table with a bowl of cereal in front of me in the neighborhood of 6:05 each morning.

I’ve been me long enough to know that I will never be a morning person. At 6:05AM, my thoughts haven’t quite yet made the leap from dream logic to reality. I’m still convinced that there is a little green man inside my alarm clock whom I should be able to convince to stop changing the numbers while I sleep indefinitely. It is in this mental state that I find myself staring at cereal boxes. So, as I spew my pre-dawn thoughts about my breakfast at you, please be aware that I do have other Interests.

With that disclaimer firmly in place, I will now proceed with my Post®.

To start, why must the front of every cereal box include some form of the disclosure, “Enlarged to show texture”? It’s a picture for crying out loud! Do they really think we expect everything in photographs to be exactly life size? If so, why doesn’t the image on the back of the box of children playing soccer have a footnote that says, “Shrunken to fit on the box”? Who knows, maybe the absence of said footnote means the children really are that small. Maybe food companies are covering up the existence of a race of teeny people being exploited for advertising.

The fact that the, “Enlarged to show texture” tagline is so ubiquitous makes me wonder if there is an FDA regulation that requires it. If that is the case, then cold cereal is just way too regulated. If the government is going to force food manufactures to make disclosures on cereal boxes, they should at least be somewhat helpful. Maybe something like; “dextrose, galactose, fructose, sucrose, maltodextrin, and corn syrup ARE ALL JUST SUGAR!”

Another common note I see on cereal boxes is, “Serving suggestion”. This, I assume, is to make it clear that we won’t find fresh blueberries, eggs, toast, and a glass of orange juice inside the box. Now, I’m sure that cereal manufacturers are under no delusion that anyone actually heeds these serving suggestions. Still, I think the one pictured on my current box of Cheerios is pushing it (yes, I actually pulled this out of my pantry and scanned it):
I have nothing against strawberries in my cereal, or even eating from a heart shaped bowl. I will not, however, eat my Cheerios with diapers on top of them. Frankly I’m offended that they would suggest it.

Interestingly, the “Serving suggestion” footnote is absent on my box of Raisin Bran: I imagine they didn’t want to be culpable if someone decided to actually try this. It may look great in a photograph, but you should never sprinkle diamond shards on your cereal and eat it from a molten hot spoon.

I Love Cheerios

I’m getting older. I’m fine with that; it’s an acceptable side effect of being alive. I don’t, however, like thinking of myself as ‘old’. The fact than I’m older than I was a year ago is indisputable. Whether or not that makes me ‘old’ is highly subjective – or at least it should be.

See, lately I’ve been getting phone calls from people who, for some inexplicable reason, seem compelled to inform me that I’m now a withered old raisin.

“Hello”, I answer the phone unsuspectingly.
“Hello, my name is Blah Blah, calling on behalf of Blah. Am I speaking with Mr. Hill?”

“Yes, this is Mr. Hill, how may I help you?”

“Mr. Hill, I’m just calling to inform you that you are a withered old raisin.”

“What a hurtful, hurtful thing to say.”

“Mr. Hill, this will only take a few minutes. May I continue?”

Of course I’m paraphrasing, but only slightly. The actual conversation goes something a little more like this:

“Mr. Hill, I am conducting a short survey. Before I begin, I need to ask you a few qualifying demographical questions, starting with your age. Are you a)Under 18, b)18-24, c)25-34, or d)35 and over?”

“Umm… I’m 35.”

“So, d) 35 and over?”

“No, not 35 'and over'. Just 35.”

“I’m sorry Mr. Hill, that’s not an option. I need to enter d) 35 and over.”

“Do you realize that you’ve just grouped me with George Burns?”

“I’m sorry Mr. Hill, I don’t understand that reference.”

“That’s because you’re b)18-24.”

To be fair, a year ago I was more than happy to be classified as '25-34', and I hardly ever belittled telephone surveyors about the unfairness of the generalization. Now, though, these meddling callers make me angry and embittered, and I have an irrepressible urge to rant about them to anyone who will listen. Plus my hip hurts.

Conversely, Cheerios make me feel spry, youthful, and giggly.

Why? Coincidentally, it's for exactly the same reason. They too have decided to segregate the population into age groups. They have recently divided the nutritional information listed on the side of their boxes into age appropriate columns.

This makes perfect sense to me. Obviously the recommended daily calorie intake for an adult is going to be different than it is for a child. Everyone should be doing this. And the best part? There are only two age groups: Under 4… and everyone else.

Brilliant! In a single, master stroke, Cheerios has made 4-year-olds feel all grown up, and 90-year-olds feel young.

Frankly, this new Cheerios age paradigm has changed my life. I’ve been marching around like the king of the world asking everyone I see to guess my age. Before they have a chance to awkwardly mumble something about not being very good with ages, I blurt out, “4 AND OVER! HA!”

Totally worth the three hours of musty Cheerio burps I have to endure after breakfast.

History is Made as America Elects Its First Blue President

The world is in shock tonight as Anthony Parrulli has been named President Elect of The United States of America.

Mr. Parrulli, who is most famous for being a member of the popular Blue Man Group, seems equally taken aback by his sudden appointment to America’s highest office.

“During his acceptance speech he didn’t even say anything.” said one supporter who was present at the Las Vegas rally, “He just looked around really fast without moving his head. I could tell he was surprised because his eyes were opened freakishly wide.”

Even many of those who voted for him were stunned by the results of tonight's election.

“WHAT HAVE WE DONE?! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, TELL ME THIS WASN’T MY FAULT!!” commented Justin Sterling, a Kansas resident who admits to having been intoxicated while at the ballots.

Others are more optimistic.

“Sure I think he has the experience needed to rebuild the economy.” Remarked Stephanie Langdon of New Jersey, “Have you seen what those guys can do with PVC pipes?”

Another voter said it was actually Barack Obama who inspired her to vote for Mr Parrulli.

“Obama got me excited about change, but when I looked at his voting record, it was all just down his party line. That wasn’t what I was looking for, so I started keeping my eye out for someone who would bring real change to Washington. That was about the time my family took a trip to Vegas, and well, the rest is history.”

A major factor in this election was voters aged 30 to 35 who grew up during the Smurfs era. 78% of these individuals cast their ballots in favor of Parrulli.

President Parrulli will officially be sworn in to office on January 20, 2009. Due to contractual obligations with The Venetian Hotel and Resort, however, he will only be available to perform presidential tasks on Tuesday mornings before 10AM.

Recession Proof Yourself

I don’t want anyone to panic, but our economy is in trouble. Not just, “Maybe we shouldn’t get the integrated Blu-ray windshield option on our new Escalade” trouble. I mean real “the-sky-is-falling” trouble.

In light of this, you may be wondering, why not panic?

Well, firstly, you shouldn’t panic because it’s a very unoriginal response to the situation. I mean, seriously, everyone is doing it. Trust me, in about 6 months all these people who are so into panicking now are going to be in complete denial, saying things like, “yeah, I may have panicked a little, but I did it before it got huge. Once it went main stream, it was totally lame. You should check out unfounded optimism though. It’s all the rage.”

Secondly, although the financial outlook for our country is undeniably grim, there is still a sure-fire way to “recession proof” yourself.

It’s simple really. All you need to do is pull all of your money out of high-risk areas (e.g. your savings account) and put it in mattresses. And when I say, “put it in mattresses”, I don’t mean you should actually cram your cash into the mattresses in your house. I mean you should use your money to buy a bunch of mattresses.

Based on current foreclosure and employment trends, it is reasonable to assume that by the fourth quarter of next year, 98% of the US population will be homeless. With 295 million people sleeping on the street, where will the balance of power lie? With the guy who owns a crap-ton of mattresses.

Trying to get through this economic crisis by holding onto your cash is tantamount to trying to survive a trip from Earth to Neptune by holding your breath. We’re leaving the oxygen-rich atmosphere of a world brought into existence by the big bang of the subprime housing market, and heading into the vacuum of space. Sure, having a “lung full” of cash will sustain you for a minute or two, but eventually you’re going to have to exhale.

As we stand on the cusp of this fiscal meltdown, saving your money is simply the worst thing you can do. While it’s still worth more than the paper it’s printed on, use your money. Buy Mattresses.

Mark my words, history will tell of the 21st century Mattress Lords who rebuilt a civilized society from the tattered remains of a world torn to shreds by the archaic economic ideologies of those who came before them.