When all other categories fail (or absentmindedly forget to be assigned), General Cerebral Leakage, fresh off his third tour of duty in the war against wise insurance providers, steps in to save the day!
BREAKING NEWS: In conversations with my expected #1 Fan (Hello, Mother1), I have learned that she is hesitant to visit my freshly launched site on account of not being able to unsee certain 4-letter words. This hearkens back to a conversation we had a few weeks before the launch date.
[Scene: the freezer section of a coastal NC Harris Teeter, ~9pm on an early August evening. A son and his beloved mother are getting supplies for their beach vacation, trying to decide which popsicles best qualify as “organic”, though none are explicitly labeled so. Frustration eventually sets in, and one of the two drop the F-bomb…]
Me: “Soooo…Mom, how exactly does your brain handle it when I swear?”
Mom: “What do you mean?”
Me: “Like, are you so numb to it now that you don’t even notice? Do you hear BLEEPS instead? Or…?”
Mom: ” Well, since you asked…”
Me: “Okay…am I going to regret asking?”
Mom: “Each time I think, ‘I can’t believe I raised this boy!'”
Me: …
Me: “Well, shit .”
Me: “You might want to stay away from my blog…”
For long-time readers of the blog (Hello, all 15 of you!), you will know that this is something I have already considered and hope to mitigate, a la The Alpine Stranger. Alas, I haven’t had time yet to reverse engineer any WordPress plugins for such purposes, so I figured I would try to implement a stop-gap2https://wordpress.org/plugins/censorship/ that would at least make it largely Safe For Mother to peruse my writings.
Unfortunately, it is not 100% perfect…apparently it has difficulty with adjacent punctuation (hence the egregious use of spaces in the title and elsewhere), and it is not well-suited for my penchant to use expletives when forming new and exciting compound words. Also, I have excluded “ass” from the list, because, apparently, that is my favorite word.
The least favorite part of this temporary solution is that it is universal–i.e. the Dear Reader cannot selectively turn this on and off, so until I know it’s safe, all of y’all mother ----- are going to have to endure the M’FCC being five feet up my ass. Oops! I already forgot that my asses aren’t being censored. Sorry, Mom!
P.S. You’re welcome, Mom.
Bonus tale: Later that same trip we found ourselves outside in a lightning storm. At some point I cussed, but, realizing that it would be a prime opportunity for the Good Lord to strike me down for my errant ways, I had to think quick. I grabbed Mom’s arm and directly addressed the heavens. Looking ----- square in the [place where I presumed His] eyes [would be], I dared Him: “You take me out, I’m taking the pious old lady out with me!”
An ode to the original host of America’s Funniest Home Videos and director of acclaimed cinematagrphic masterpiece Dirty Work, “America’s Dad”, Mr. Bob Saget:
Once there was a dad on Full House, thought to be squeaky clean as a mouse. Indeed, 'twas a reputation hard-earned, but from his later career we have learned: You shouldn't trust him alone with your spouse.
I’ll keep my thoughts short and sweet for once. Not out of any sense of respect for anyone who chooses to read this. It’s because I’m really ----- hungry, but I promised myself I would get this post written first. What a foolish unforced error in retrospect…
The point of the limerick is: sometimes you’re better off with your naive picture of who someone is, rather than really getting to know them and recoiling in horror once you do.
For those of you who personally know me, consider this your fair warning. Read on, and you will almost assuredly see things you can’t unsee. You will hear things that really wish you hadn’t. Chances are, you will never think of me the same. Do you really want to put your high opinion of me at risk?
Of course you do.
Because you’re really here in hopes that I will write something about you.
It’s okay, we’re all vain beasts at heart. You are accepted here.
But enough about you. I got a reputation to tarnish.
I love Venn diagram references. Not Venn diagrams themselves, just referencing them. The more asinine, the better, I say.
So why am I talking about them today? Because, my very important thoughts today reside in that magical intersection between the 3 circles comprised of: –Unsung Human Achievements; –Things That Are Best Said Upfront; and –Projects That Are Really Not Worth Anyone’s Time Yet Ima Invest My Time In Them Anyway (see Figure 1).
Figure 1: A Venn diagram that I spent way too much time on instead of getting a decent night’s sleep.
You know who I have utmost respect for? Those few lucky bastards whose job it is to “edit movies for content” so they can be shown on regular old TV. Have you ever watched a movie [on TV] where the line spoken is a tad incongruous in relation to the situation portrayed on screen? And come to think of it, the pitch of the voice doesn’t quite match up either… Sometimes, it might be so subtle that it may just sit in the back of your brain, quietly scratching away at your sanity. If so, then those bastards are doing their jobs right.
If you haven’t guessed by now, I’m talking about the thoughtful art of trying to censor a movie without the viewer noticing. This isn’t the brain-dead bleeping and blurring produced by the vast majority of FCC-Compliance Officers. No, this is where obscene words and phrases are gracefully rewritten and dubbed in over the naughty bits. You’ll even occasionally find a master truly dedicated to their craft who will go beyond the call of duty and photoshop frames in the movie to maintain consistency.1https://www.cracked.com/quick-fixes/7-hilarious-ways-badass-movie-lines-got-ruined-by-tv-censors/,2https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePB8ZOv–bE (NOTE: this clip somehow missed the visual censorship. See: 4) The truth is, though, that they usually fail, and when they do, it is wonderfully, stupidly, SPECTACULAR. Personally, I don’t think these achievements are celebrated enough.
For example, do you know what happens when you find a Stranger in the Alps? Take a look for yourself:
Ahhhh! It kills me every time! Anyways, it might be confusing if you haven’t seen the Big Lebowski, but that’s what happens when you ----- a stranger in the ass. (Sorry, mom! #NSFM) Makes more sense, right? Right. Whoever wrote the censored line? A ----- genius. Now at this point, we’re no doubt asking ourselves, “How can little ol’ me make a difference in this world and help this humble hero become more widely recognized for what they have achieved?”
Well, I’m glad you asked that. I’m not going to answer that right now, but I’m glad you asked nonetheless.
Since we all already know the importance of context,3See: Lawnmower Man we can turn our attention to Circle #2 to see what insight it might provide.
Y’all should just know right now: I’m gonna cuss up here on this distinguished website. Hide your children, get out your earmuffs, clutch your pearls. Do whatever you feel you need to do. You’ve been warned.
“But why must it be this way?” you ask. Well, I will answer that one for you.
For the longest time, one of the key factors holding me back from going all-in on being a writer was how to handle the urge and/or necessity to swear. I was seriously conflicted on this point. On one hand, I didn’t want to displease anyone, the least of which my mother–God knows she would find a way to read anything I’ve written that has found its way to the public domain.4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTRKCXC0JFg
On the other hand…well, a key tenant of my whole schtick is unnatural levels of honesty, and to be honest, I cheapen my vocabulary and lose the respect of my peers by spending my cussing currency so freely . (FWIW, my Spirit Animal is most definitely a pirate. But I digress…)
One can’t be lukewarm in such matters; I’ve been down that road before (Figure 2a). My take-away from those early blogging days was that you don’t half-ass this shit. You go for the gold, or you keep your ----- mouth shut. “Friggin”? Seriously, what was I thinking?
Figure 2a: Lessons from blogs past: sometimes you just need to choose a lane…Figure 2b: While we’re here, I just wanted to dispel the notion that I branded this blog on a whimsy.
Anyways, the point of the story being that if I was ever going to truly write at the level of which I dreamt, I had to stop being a panty-waste5https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTRKCXC0JFg (or is it “panty-waist”?) and commit to one side or the other, even if it meant offending the sensibilities of a significant portion of the potential readership. If not for me coming to peace with public displays of profanity, this blog would never have happened, so…you’re welcome?
Now, finally, let me tie this all together. Included in my dreams for this little adventure upon which we find ourselves embarking is the documentation of many an endeavor of dubious value . One such time-sink happens to be the answer to the question which I posed to myself on your behalf a few paragraphs ago. I am moderately hopeful that I will get around to making a handy little WordPress plug-in for all you Parties6The censors missed a spot on the license plate (Figure 3). out there who would find the absence of potty words to enhance your experience here. I envision a button you press in settings that will, thanks to the power of technology, 1) identify the dirty words scattered throughout my writings, 2) compare those found to a database of TV censorship substitutions scraped from the internet, and 3) replace the offender with its Travestic7Yes, this is actually proper use of the word “travesty”. Don’t believe me? Look it up in a dictionary. I’ll wait… Doppelgänger (TM), randomly selected if more than one option is available, of course. Bonus feature of no value: include footnotes citing the source movie. Sound good? You bet it does. So, which of you fangirls wants to get the Kickstarter setup? Thanks in advance!
Welp, that’s all for now, talk to you Melon Farmers later!
Figure 3. The censors missed a spot on the license plate…
One fine Saturday morning many moons ago, I found myself taking a shower with the bathroom door open. Now, the door opens in towards the shower, so even with it open, it would be difficult for anybody in the hallway to actually see you showering.
Anyways, afterwards, as I turned off the water and began to dry myself off, a distant sound caught my attention. Off yonder I could a hear a medium-level buzz as a neighbor mowed their lawn.
Feeling footloose and fancy free (after all, ’twas a fine Saturday morning), I decided to seize the opportunity to test out my pitch-matching skills. Without much thought, I lowered my jaw and let out an impressive “Ehhhhhhnnnnnnn!” Basically what any normal human being would have done in that situation.
I had resumed drying myself off, when I heard vigorous, yet stifled, guffawing coming from behind the crack in the door. I look up to see an eyeball in the crack, undulating in time with the suppressed laughter.
Unable to contain herself any longer, Natosha busts into the bathroom, barely able to spit out “What THE HELL was that?!?” in between irrepressible snorts.
“What? I heard a lawn mower so I was just mimicking it. Duh.” I stated matter-of-factly.
After she finally got done howling in mockery, she was eventually able to calm down enough to tell her side of the story. Which was basically as follows.
“I was lovingly watching you through the crack in the door, when all of a sudden you stopped what you were doing, got a really glazed look in your eyes, and then out of nowhere: ‘Ehhhhhhhhhhnnnnnn!’ You looked either possessed or…special. And we all know you’re a little bit of the latter…”
Believe it or not, we’re still married to this day.
The point of the story is, CONTEXT MATTERS. If you don’t know the full story, maybe don’t be so quick to be a judgy asshole, yeah?
More recently, I was doing fall yard work and needed to blow some leaves out of our driveway. We have an electric leaf blower, so it is a huge pain in the ass to get it out, unravel the cord, get everything plugged in, blow leaves for 90 seconds, then proceed to undo all of the hard work I put into setting it up. Instead, its much more efficient to use the lawnmower to blow stuff around, since I had it out to mow the yard anyways.
Of course, a neighbor drove by and saw me mowing our driveway.
Again, the moral of the story is: sometimes genius looks like a ----- idiot. Don’t judge.
Welcome to The Point of the Story, where shame has no name!
In embarking on this endeavor, one of the key enabling moments for me was when I was assessing my innate talents and abilities. Perhaps one defining trait with which I have had a love-hate relationship my whole life is being too ----- honest. Like, put-George-Washington-and/or-Abraham-Lincoln-to-shame honest.
I say “and/or” because, frankly, I don’t care to pause 5 seconds to search-engine it and get that trivial factoid cleared up. First, whatever you’ve heard about one and/or both of those dead presidents and their honesty is most likely fabricated mythology. The sooner you realize this the better off you’ll be. And lastly, why invest 5 seconds when instead I can seize the opportunity to ramble on for 20 extremely unnecessary seconds? You know, “Short Story Long” and what-not.
But I digress. Which, by the way, is essentially an assumed around here. Digression is par for the course. Expect nothing less.
What I’m really trying to address today is the need for some serious groundwork for what I fancy is about to go down here in these parts of the interwebs. Today’s topic is: piracy. Well, at least I fervently wish it were. Keep an eye on the Forthcoming section, as I have a few thoughts on the matter (unfortunately you might have a bit of a wait). For reals, though, today we’re going to get to the actual topic, privacy.
As I was saying, I can be too ----- honest. My “Aha!” moment was realizing that I could move this fatal flaw from the “bugs” column over into the one labeled “features”. I mean, when it comes to honesty, I have some SERIOUS natural talent. While this is the first post ever specifically written for ye olde T-Pots, I’m sure that by the time you’re reading this, you will have already been familiar with some of the more general content. Ergo, you probably know by now that I’ve essentially commoditized just about any embarrassing thought or deed I have had or experienced thus far in life.
The point of the story is: when it comes to MY privacy, I have no policy. It’s how I expect to make money around here.
Figure 1. A shitty picture of me writing my first blog post at the public library.
But, giving up all self-respect on my part can sometimes go awry. In pre-imagining all the juicy tales I hope to share here, it occurred to me that those of you who have been [un?]fortunate enough to encounter me in this lifetime are bound to end up in my stories. My hope is that the majority of the time you will be proud to know that you’ve been able to persist in my heart and my memories, so much so that I’ve been compelled to share the experience of knowing you with the whole world.
The point of this privacy policy is to cover when that’s not the case. Sometimes I may implicitly assume that whatever collateral embarrassment that you may incur by making an appearance in one of my episodes is at a comfortable (or at least tolerable) level. You know, a fond look-back-and-laugh-at-myself memory.
Alas, I’m well aware that I can grossly misjudge such things. Also, I know that I can lose myself to my #InnerDickhead, or sometimes just get a lazy and be a #CasualAsshat. The point being that there will inevitably be multiple occasions when someone I know and love may not want to be portrayed to the whole world in a particular way. Or they may just really hate the way they look in a picture accompanying a post. Happens to me all the time. And of course, my favorite: they’re part of the Witness Protection Program or perhaps a covert CIA operative and I’m unwittingly putting their life in danger.
IF ANY OF THESE SCENARIOS EVER APPLY TO YOU, please email me with your concerns ASAP at bj@thepointofthestory.com with PRIVACY in the subject line. I am happy to be as accommodating as you need me to be, in a most timely manner.
Changing names to protect the innocent? Consider it done, Assy McSlappikins! Blurring out faces in photos? Nah, but I might Photoshop in the face of your favorite celebrity of the opposite sex over yours if you ask nicely. Taking down a post altogether? That option would be on the table if the situation called for it. Moving a post to the NSFM section and getting a cut of the royalties? Hey, if there’s one life lesson I’ve been able to demonstrate thus far, its that everybody has a price. So no judgment from me if it takes a few coin to make it worth the hit to your reputation. I can really appreciate someone owning their shit–and then learning how to market it for profit.
It is important to note that there is a third pillar to this policy. I reserve the right to embarrass your ass if you deserve it and/or any harm to your precious ego is vastly outweighed by the greater good to be had by widely disseminating a cautionary tale concerning your stupidity or general display of shittiness as a human being. Seriously though, it can’t hurt to at least email me about how pissed you are. Maybe I’ll have a change of heart.
Lastly, these terms are subject to experiencing their own personal growth as human beings, as they inevitably learn their lessons about how their big mouth and lack of common sense can ruin relationships and do all sorts of other interpersonal damage.1It’s an analogy.2,2It’s not. Please, if you know the correct term, “share it in the comments below”.
Now pardon me while I go pump some ----- iron. #HumbleBrag
Figure 2. By taking a picture of the screen of the computer I share with my wife, I inadvertently demonstrate my inherent ability to be unaware of this whole “privacy” concept. (Anybody fancy “a real big ham”? Now you know my family does, whether they like it or not.)
), I have learned that she is hesitant to visit my freshly launched site on account of not being able to unsee certain 4-letter words. This hearkens back to a conversation we had a few weeks before the launch date.
The latest word on the street