See how it happened from the beginning! These are the first 12 posts of The Point of the Story which were already in place the day we launched. Check them out and make sure you haven’t missed any important contextual clues! Binge the Complete First Season of The Point of the Story now!
- Nevermind For What Rascally Reasons–You’re Outstanding, Can’t You See, Son? 28 October 20245 Min Read
Has an unexpected interstate lawman come a-knockin’ at your door?
Demand they double-check–surely you ain’t the guy they’re looking for…
“Hey, bro, you got some mail from the Baca County Sheriff. Just thought you should know,” my college roommate–the one and only Beautiful Love Muscle (aka BLM)–said as he handed me a legal-sized envelope as I walked in the door.
“Ahh, it’s probably junk mail, asking me to Back The Blue1For the record, I don’t think ‘Back the Blue’ was a thing back in 2004. or some other non-sense asking me for my hard-earned money,” I replied dismissively.
“Hah! Which local ordinance did you violate this time, you outlaw, you? Wait, you’re not the most wanted man in Kansas (again), are you?” BLM said chuckling.
“Har, har. You’re funny. It’s clearly old-school spam–I’m pretty sure there isn’t even a ‘Baca County’ in Kansas. Frankly, it all sounds made-up to me.”
“Let me see that envelope again,” he said.
After a moment of examining the return address, BLM heartily declared, “Yes, ’tis just as I suspected: this letter was sent from Springfield.”
“Well, I did live there for 5 years. So I guess that makes me the most wanted man in Missouri?”
“Bzzzt! Please try again!”
“Most wanted man in Illinois?”
“Nope.”
“Most wanted man in Massachusetts?”
“My dude, have you even ever been to Massachusetts?”
“So that’s a ‘no’? Dang. Seeing as how there’s 67 Springfields, we might be here a while. Can you just put me out of my misery?”
“Colorado, you dummy! Springfield, Colorado! Come to think of it, doesn’t Baca County border Morton County? Didn’t you once almost burn that whole place down?” BLM said, geo-shaming me.
“Colorado! Oh, that makes more sense. I mean, I guess I was there several months ago, yet I have no idea what the Sheriff there would want with me…maybe they want to give me an Outstanding Citizen award or something?”
“Maybe we should just stop hypothesizing and theorizing and just open the ----- letter, and find out what the hubbub is all about,” BLM suggested.
“FINE,” I said begrudgingly as I tore into the dang thing.
I had to scan the enclosed letter several times, trying to digest what exactly it was trying to communicate.
“Well, so is it junk mail or not? Don’t keep me in suspense!” he said excitedly.
“It’s…it’s…it’s a warrant for my arrest.”
“Huh?!?”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s what it is. Says here I wrote a hot check for $200 to Tempel Grain of Lamar. What the hell? I’ve never wrote any checks in Lamar in my life!”
Just then something else fell out of the envelope. BLM picked it up and glanced over it.
“Sorry, bro, but they literally brought the proverbial receipts. This looks like one of your checks from your bank back in Rolla,” he observed.
“Let me see that!” I snatched the check out of from between his sausage fingers.
It didn’t take me more than a split-second of inspecting the signature on what was very much my check to figure out what shenanigans were afoot.
“DADnabbit! I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you with my checkbook,” I muttered.
“Trusted who?” BLM inquired.
I let out a heavy sigh.
“I’m not going to name any names, but let’s just say that there’s a certain family member who could technically claim to have the same name as me. Now, before you go making assumptions, let me remind you that there are an abnormally high number of such suspects in my family–remember: even I don’t get to use my own name.”
“Anyways,” I continued, “this person–who shall remain unnamed–had some very specific banking needs, and conveniently for them, my hometown banking account could meet those needs nicely…”
“Let me guess: it was your–” BLM interjected.
“BOBdammit!” I cut him off. “I think you should Just stop while you’re ahead–AND, no, I will not confirm whethER or not I’m their nephew, cousin, or SON, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.”
“Well, that was suspiciously odd way of phrasing that. But, my bad, my bad. Please, do go on…” he said.
“Well, anyways, their business happens to be in the middle of bankruptcy procedeedings, and so the arbitrator has his eagle-eye trained on all of their financial assets and accounts. Now, since this anonymous person and I basically have the same name, they got the grand idea of using my account–which the arbitrator has no idea even exists–for some, uh, ‘parallel bookkeeping’.”
“Interesting…way too many boring details, but overall interesting nonetheless…”
“Interesting indeed…well, I wasn’t using the account anyways, and they would be depositing their own funds in the account instead of using mine, so I said ‘What the hell? Why not help them out with some light money laundering?’ I should have known better, though…it would only be a matter of time before they started writing checks that I couldn’t cash.”
BLM sat there pensively for a few moments.
“Well, that does make sense…sure does explain a thing or two…”
“Wait, what? What makes sense?” I asked suspiciously. “Out with it! What secret are you keeping?!?”
“So…uh…I forgot to tell you that you got another piece of mail a few weeks ago…” he said sheepishly. “…it was from the Morton County Sheriff…”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, where is it?”
BLM disappeared into our shared bedroom and shuffled through some papers on our shared desk.
“Found it!” he said excitedly.
“Dammit, man, this isn’t a ----- Easter Egg hunt, you knucklehead!” I said, clearly much less excited than he was. “Let me see that!”
And so, for the second time that day I found myself tearing into a legal communique from an officer of the law.
I scanned this new letter, not nearly as surprised as I was last time, though.
“Well, at least it’s not actually a warrant for my arrest.”
“That’s good…” BLM commented, attempting to match my mood–though he was clearly enjoying the schadenfreude of the moment a bit too much.
“Yeah, I suppose so. But it looks like I owe Bultman’s Farm Supply $300 plus a $25 returned check fee.”
“Well, good thing you’re no longer unemploy–” BLM started before I cut him off with a piercing glance.
“Look on the bright side,” he said, this time trying to cheer me up. “It looks like you’re the most wanted man in Kansas after all…”
The point of the story is, believe it or not, this is my little weird-ass way of celebrating Dia de Los Muertos. I’m still trying to get over the unexpected passing of BLM less than a month ago, so I thought it would be nice to write him into one of my semi-historically accurate narratives about identity theft.
Fun fact, though: when researching this story, I came across the actual receipt of when I had sent the money to Baca County to cover the first hot check, and it turns out that at the time, I hadn’t lived with BLM for 4 months. So…I guess this is some form of reverse-identity theft? You know, where I’ve attributed entire conversations to him that clearly must have been with another friend or roommate of mine…anyways, I digress.
But let’s also not forget about my beloved family member who apparently had no problem with dragging my (our?) good name through the mud, as they too are no longer with us. Despite their deviltry, rascality, and roguery,2Yes, I did indeed just Google ‘shenanigans synonyms’. I still love them and miss them very much. And thanks to my 6-year-old daughter learning about Dia de Los Muertos at school and insisting on celebrating, this will be the first year that we properly celebrate the life of that beloved old fart-knocker.
Oh, and also, one practical point of the story: now you know why I absolutely detest the idea of naming one’s child so closely after another family member and/or one’s self. Turns out, these hot checks were just the tip of the ol’ same-name iceberg…you wouldn’t believe how long and hard I had to tussle with the credit score people to convince them that it wasn’t me who had gone and racked up a shit-ton of debt before my 22nd birthday.
Anyways, happy Dia de Los Muertos, y’all…
Content created on: 29/30 October 2024 (Tues/Weds)
Footnotes & References:
- Privacy Policy 30 June 20194 Min Read
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.) Content created on 28 June 2019 (Friday)
Footnotes & References:
- Lawnmower Man 4 July 20192 Min Read
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.
Content created on: 1 July 2019 (Monday)
- The Alpine Stranger 7 July 20195 Min Read
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… Content created on: 1 July 2019 (Monday)
Footnotes & References:
- A Most Excellent Life Lesson 11 July 20194 Min Read
“About time…about —damn time.”
That was my reaction when I read the clickbait article today confirming that Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure 3 was REALLY, TRULY HAPPENING. Sure, we have to wait over a year before it actually comes out, but we’ve waited 28 years thus far, so who can complain?
I was 8 or 9 when I first experienced Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and I was in love–hello, Joan of Arc! Hello, Bill’s stepmom! Seriously, though, how can one not be ape-shit over a cinematic masterpiece that features none other than George Carlin as Rufus? I wanted to name my hypothetical son “Rufus” because of him, for god’s sake!1I just realized…this whole time I had thought Rufus Wainwright was the inspiration for my Rufus predilection. This makes way more sense now. I don’t think I’ve experienced any of Mr. Wainwright’s catalog… Both Keanu’s and Alex’s acting careers where ripe and in season, good to the last juicy surfer/dumbass drop. Truly, it was a bygone golden age to which Keanu has yet to return. *Sigh* But! There is hope at last…I mean, Alex (aka Bill S. Preston, Esquire) came out of 25 years of acting retirement for this. This calls for a celebration…with a tangentially relevant tale, perhaps?
I wish I could lie and say that I was a true fanboy who has watched it over a 100 times, but hey, let’s be real. This was back when my family had to rent the VCR before we could argue about which movie to rent. So I saw it twice, maybe thrice, tops. Nonetheless, I still think it would be most righteous to count me as a fan. However…
However, I have to confess that I never saw the sequel. Some fan I am, right? Well, that just didn’t happen in a vacuum. You see, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey came out late in the summer before I started fifth grade at Christian Schools of Springfield in Springfield (duh), Missouri. Now during the summers, my brother One Skinny J (aka 1SJ) and I would live with my “easy-going” dad on his farm in Kansas…pretty much the exact opposite of “Christian”, “Schools”, and “Springfield”.
The inferred point being, if we were going to see it, it would be with him. By my estimate, we would have had a 2-3 week window to make it happen. It’s no surprise that we never made it to the theater, with the farm and all…and also because I’m pretty sure that’s about the time we got grounded for stealing $20 out of our step-brother’s wallet. Which, by the way, was complete bullshit, because I was an unwitting accomplice, having been told that it had been miraculously “found under the couch” before I had agreed to help spend it at our local Corner Stop. Injustice, I say! But I digress…
Though I didn’t see the movie then, I, as a fan of modest proportions and an avid reader of the regional newspaper, had at some point picked up this little nugget of trivia: the original title was “Bill & Ted Go to Hell” (a fact true to this day–see Figure 1).
Figure 1. Proof that my memory is at least somewhat reliable. Fast-forward slightly to Mrs. Greene’s 5th grade class a few months later. We had a fun class project where we split up into pairs and each group would write a chapter of a book, and then we would come back together to combine them into a single class story. My guess is that it was a joint English/history project, because the theme was time travel to the past. I was paired up with my best friend-girl, Katie, and we tore that shit up, traipsing all over the old west in our made-up adventure. It was good times.
Then it came time to name our book. Since it was time-travel themed, it reminded me of Bill & Ted, and I casually mentioned Bogus Journey’s original title. The Student Teacher, who was in charge of the project, gave me a slightly stern look, but my comments otherwise went ignored. Name after name after yet another contrived and uncreative name, I grew restless with the democratic process. I decided to finally connect the dots for them. Thinking myself rather clever, I raised my hand and proudly proffered “How about: ‘Mrs. Greene’s Fifth Grade Class…Goes to Hell’? Yeah, pretty good, huh?”
No. It was the opposite of good times.
Now forgive me for thinking that Ms. Student Teacher had plenty of context to understand what I meant: basically, our class <==> time-travel <==> Bill & Ted <==> “go to hell” (used in a semi-literal sense), therefore: our class <==> “goes to hell”. All the pieces were right there. Despite a logical and well-rounded defense on my part, I got my ass sent to the principal’s office and was lucky I didn’t get suspended. Once again, though, I gotta say it was complete and utter bullshit. Injustice, I say.
Anyways, the point of the story is: that’s when I realized that I could never be with someone who has no sense of humor. Cuz I sure the ----- didn’t have a crush on the Student Teacher after that.
On a side note, often I kill two birds with one stone and use my 6 y.o. daughter’s request for a bedtime story as an opportunity to workshop some of my narratives. For example, I was feeling pretty good when Lawnmower Man totally killed it with her a few nights ago.
Well, earlier this evening I decided to run this one by her. When I got to the part where I first mentioned “go to hell”, she asked what hell was. I was actually a bit surprised she hadn’t already been scared shitless by the idea of it a la one of her grandmothers. So I told her it was the “opposite of heaven”–nothing about eternal suffering, gnashing of teeth, lakes of fire, Satanic pitchfork sodomy, etc.–just the “opposite of heaven”. That was it.
It didn’t go over well. She kept plugging her ears, making it difficult for her to hear me trying to share yet another layer of context on top of what you’ve already read here. Needless to say, I bombed.
On top of that, she apparently ratted me out. Later in the evening the Boss Lady2aka my wife chided me, noting that she heard from a little birdie that “Daddy told me a very scary word tonight”.
Oh, for fuck’s sake people…CONTEXT!
Nonetheless, I would say that overall it was a pretty good day. After all this time, the Wyld Stallyns shall finally ride again.
I do declare, I must be in the opposite of Hell…
Content created on: 3 July 2019 (Wednesday)
Footnotes & References:
- Gravity 14 July 2019< 1 Min Read
A fun fact about me: I’m a physicist by training, with several scientific publications in chemistry journals. Good news, though: those factors are surprisingly irrelevant to today’s life-tip. So no worries, Mate; I won’t be spitting scientific deep cuts at you today.
The gravity I want to talk about here is the gravity of the situation when one makes a regrettable life choice by ordering a shitty beer. Especially when on a date, and the one you were hoping to impress asks to try it. At which point the only thing getting ----- that night is your chances of them trusting your better judgment. Which, I might argue, may be the worst possible outcome of the evening.
Fortunately, I have been on many dates,1Albeit with the same woman. #UberMonogamy and [surprisingly] have successfully ordered many a beer. The secret to my dumb luck is really just one stupefyingly simple rule: gravity–maximize it. The hardest part is just identifying the beers on the menu with the three highest ABVs.2ABV: Alcohol by Volume (aka “gravity”).Yes, there is the real possibility that ABVs won’t be displayed on the beer menu. You may not be completely shit out of luck, though. Try to find a Belgian beer or a stout (if that’s your thang) to increase your odds of success. You probably will be good with any of these, but choosing from those three gives you the illusion of free will and the myth of the self-made [wo]man.3Dammit, the Trainwreck of Thought strikes again…
So, here’s to an uncomfortable level of self-honesty and swindling dates into false respect for your judgement. Cheers!
Content created on: 5 July 2019 (Friday)
Footnotes & References:
- Boogie Nights 18 July 20192 Min Read
As a teenager, I, like most normal human beings, would find myself picking my nose as I laid in bed trying to fall asleep. However, I never planned on doing it; it would just happen organically and naturally each time. The problem being, I was never prepared for success in these undertakings, so I never had a Kleenex nearby to cart off the golden nuggets I had just mined.
Being a typical teen inclined towards the path of least resistance, I found the easiest–and frankly, most enjoyable–disposal option was to forcefully flick them into the darkness of the night, never quite certain of their fate.
On the other hand, I was an atypical teen who was into extreme pre-planning (Youths1
these days–am I right?). I mean “extreme” as in I tended to plan for the most extremely unlikely situations–in this case it was the highly unlikely event that I would actually ever find a cute girl hanging out in my bedroom. But, as the Brothers Kratt like to say, “What if?!?”It wasn’t long before the ghosts of all those lost and abandoned boogers began to haunt me. I was just certain that the one time all the stars aligned and said hypothetical female was actually in my room, one of those boogers would rear their crusty heads in an unanticipated location, and upon discovery by SHF, would derail all my good luck and hard work.2See Fuck Bob Ross for more insight. I needed to take preventive measures. I couldn’t risk letting any known unknowns finding me in the Alps.3See: The Alpine Stranger.
The only way to truly mitigate the situation would be to devise a strategy in which I always knew the location of those rascally snot-balls. Well, I guess I could have just stopped picking my nose in bed, but where’s the fun in that? Anyways, it occurred to me the safest place for them would be nestled cozily between my nighttime clothing and my skin.4Clearly, I was pretty realistic about the odds of a girl getting into my drawers. Ever since then, I have always tucked them securely in the inside of the waistband of my undies or on the inside of my shirtsleeve.
Its ingenious right? First thing in the morning what would I do? I would always throw my clothes in the dirty laundry and then wash my grubby ass off in the shower. You can think of it as akin to Osama Bin Laden’s burial at sea:5Yup, I’m pretty sure this one is an analogy. the water all but ensuring that they would never terrorize me again.
So, for all the single night-pickers out there who don’t sleep naked…you’re welcome for the life-tip. Feel free to use my methods to enhance the success rate of your romantic endeavors.
Pro tip for all you non-singles out there: make a game out of trying to sneak your biological by-products into your partner’s belly button as they sleep. This useful couple’s exercise will help you quickly figure out whether you’ve committed yourself to someone with no sense of humor. Fun!
Content created on: 5 July 2019 (Friday)
Footnotes & References:
- Fiddy Percent 21 July 20195 Min Read
We all know the famous psycho-analytical question “Is the glass half full, or is it half empty?” Yes, it is the classic put-me-in-a-box-please test as to whether one is an optimist or a pessimest. Now, I had high hopes of illustrating a third option–the realist–by humble-bragging “personally, I see the glass at 50% capacity”. Upon immediate reflection, however, I realized that, dammit, wouldn’t you know that “capacity” implies how full something is. After all, if I said to you “my bowels are at 50% capacity” you would immediately know that I’m half full of shit. Alternatively, one could theoretically describe an arbitrary container as being “at 50% incapacity”…a little dark, maybe, but nonetheless we would all slap a pessimist label on their back.
The point being, I was overly optimistic that I was going to stick the landing on my monologue, but in reality I just got off topic. Now I have to resort to plain-speak, brevity, and conciseness in order to share the thoughts currently banging around my skull. Ugh-triple-ugh.
J.K. Kidding, I’m going to tell a couple of stories instead. Tricked ya!
My body type is such that I would be extremely pleased if I could hit 205 lbs and maintain that for an extended period of time, especially as I enter the Middle Ages. However, I haven’t really been close to that since getting married almost 12 years ago. At this point, just plain stability would be nice, but even that eludes me.
Figure 1: Never ask a man about his weight. He just might answer with historical data going back over 7 years. Anyways, thrice I’ve peaked out close to 250 (see Figure 1). It’s not clear here, but one of those peaks was around the Fourth of July ’14. That particular year I spent the 4th with my brother and his girlfriend in her dad’s beautiful riverside cottage. An irrelavent detail, I know, but it helps set the scene.
The first morning I was there, I got up early, still in my size medium white tee shirt, and was making pancakes for everyone. My brother being a typical older brother, comes in and starts busting my chops about how I really needed to buy larger tee shirts. I looked him dead in the eye and said “I’m a ----- optimist.”
Okay, maybe I wasn’t that gangsta in the moment. If I’m being honest, it was more of a half-defensive “What can I say? I’m optimistic!” His skinny ass probably didn’t appreciate it, but the woman in the room gave me an understanding nod and chuckle.
I like to believe that, despite whatever my current weight is, hope springs eternal for a slimmer self in the relatively near future. Near enough, anyways, that I never get around to buying appropriately sized clothing because, hey, I’m going to be trim any week now, right?
Clearly, my self-perception is that I’m a glass-half-full type of guy. So riddle me this: how in the hell is it that my beloved Natosha swears that I’m a pessimist? Well, after much thought, I think I have figured it out: I’m actually a realist.
For example, when I was finishing up grad school and we were getting ready to move to Hawaii, I got a call from one of my former roommates from Kansas State. It turns out his fiance had gotten into an advanced degree program at UNC, so they were wondering if he could crash with us when she came for her obligatory school visit, and he could look for housing in the meantime.
Whilst hosting them, it occurred to us that if we had loved the quiet little cottage that we had lived in for the past three years, then this young couple might enjoy it for the next five. It was a great plan: we could save our recently widowed landlady the headache of finding new, reliable tenants, at the same time saving my friend the huge pain in the ass of finding a decent place to live. Everyone would win.
So how did I pitch the prospect to them? I spent most of my precious words talking about…mosquitos. The. ----- Mosquitos.
You see, we lived about a quarter mile from one of the town’s water treatment stations, so all the standing water in its reservoir resulted in a rather significant mosquito population emanating outward into the neighborhood. Unfortunately, we were about one house away from where the feast-of-humans zone tapered off into the land-of-tolerance-and-peaceful-coexistence.
All three summers we lived there, I had fancied myself a backyard gardener. It was leading up to that first summer that I learned the hard way that we had a mosquito problem when I stayed out until 9 pm on an early May evening pulling weeds. Despite having a [medium sized] tee shirt on, my profuse sweating made my back an easy snack-target for those little ----- (see Figure 2). Natosha–who is/was a nurse–was a bit shocked that I hadn’t had a much more serious reaction given the many bites I had sustained.
Figure 2. Ignore my impending death by melanoma/mole constellations, and focus on the many welt-like mosquito bites. That is the the point of this picture. In summary, the mosquito situation not only sucked literal blood, but also figurative balls.
But! But! But! But, the reason I emphasized it was that once they dealt with and accepted that reality, they could understand that it was the most perfect, adorable, wonderful place to live (and affordable, too!). I mean, we would have lived in that house forever if we could have. And if there hadn’t been mosquitos, of course. And fleas. But the fleas were courtesy of Muffin, our cat–but she’s a story for another time.
Let me break down what just happened with some algebra. We could posit that an optimist and a pessimist might cancel each other out and result in a realist (or maybe a nihlist?), ergo:
Optimism + Pessimism = Realism (and vice-versa)
Now, what happens if we subtract the Pessimism from both sides?
Optimism + Pessimism - Pessimism = Realism - Pessimism -->
Optimism = Realism - Pessimism
Figure 3. A past [skinnier] version of my self models my most favoritest thrift store tee shirt1Size Medium, of course. of all time. Interesting theorem, no? In other words, a realistic perspective acknowledges both the positives and negatives of a situation. Let’s not kid ourselves about what’s really going on, yeah? But, by explicitly acknowledging and processing the negative aspects (often aloud), one is left to fully enjoy the positives. While one may externally be complaining, it is wholly possible that they actually have an annoyingly sunny disposition on the inside. And it’s all firmly based in reality.
The point of the story is, be wary of trusting those who are explicitly optimistic. To borrow from the late Rick James, “Delusion is a hell of a drug.”2https://youtu.be/4trBQseIkkc?t=651
Content created on: 10 July 2019 (Wednesday)
Footnotes & References:
- Shower Tips, Part 1 28 July 20192 Min Read
Speaking of showers and judgy assholes,1See: Lawnmower Man that reminds me…
During my second year of grad school, I lived with three of my fellow physics grad students. They were all [astro]nuclear physicists and my main research tool was Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR), so we decided to lean hard into the whole “nuclear” theme and dubbed our humble abode “the Bomb Shelter”. We thought ourselves modestly clever with that one. Alas, that all has nothing to do with the story; it’s just for reference in the future.
Anyways, at the time, two of us had samurai-length hair, me and Jesus Christ.2Not his real name. But his real initials, though. One fine morning I hop in the shower and find a wad of dark hair on the shower wall. Clearly, it was Jesus’s hair,3We all know that Jesus wasn’t really white. He was Italian. and I was a little indignant about the whole situation. How rude to leave your hair in the shower for your roommates to take care of!
At some point I brought it up in a less than graceful manner, talking about how disgusting it was. I don’t even remember if I was adult enough to bring it up to Jesus–I think I was bitching to one of the other roommates. Either way, he heard me talking about it, and explained that he always does that, so his hair didn’t clog the drain. Then, when he gets out of the shower, he just grabs some toilet paper and easily wipes it off the shower wall and disposes of it properly in the toilet or trash. He offered an unprompted apology for having forget the last step that particular day.
Sometimes, life imitates art. In this case, the art being an M. Night movie, replete with the obligatory twist at the end: he was the one being considerate. I was the asshole.
Oh, and also, that’s a pretty solid strategy for longer hair management in the shower. I still use it to this day–I highly recommend it.
Content created on: 10 July 2019 (Wed)
Footnotes & References:
- ----- Bob Ross 4 August 20194 Min Read
Fuck Bob Ross.
Don’t get me wrong, he was a great guy–may he rest in peace.
But seriously, ----- him and his happy little trees, too.
You may be wondering what the hell is wrong with me, as it is a widely accepted fact that everyone loves The Ross-ster. Don’t worry, I’ll address that in a moment.
Let me first state that I would be slightly disturbed if everyone felt this way about Bob. So, to be clear, this is not a universal ” ----- you” to him–that’s not the case I’m trying to make here. It’s a rather locally-sourced ” ----- you” instead. This is just, like, my opinion, man.1https://youtu.be/Z-xI1384Ry4?t=72
Like many things in my life, I’ve had hints of raw talent here and there from my early days–namely artistic talent, in the case of today’s tale. But also like many things in my life, my attempts at artistry somehow always resulted in half-assery. As Daddy Pig might say, “I’m a bit of an expert at half-assing things.”2https://teeshirt21.com/product/peppa-pig-daddy-pig-im-a-bit-of-an-expert-fathers-day-daddy-pig-guys-tee-b9akW
Anyways, I clearly remember working on my masterpieces when I was young. Usually it was faces that I would draw, and I would always get out to a nice, solid start. Fairly realistic eyes, complete with a little gleam…nice strong bridge of the nose…not-too-caterpillary eyebrows conveying a friendly contenance…decent enough nose and nostrils…and lips that were still fairly human…
But there was always a voice in the back of my head telling me I should stop after the lips. Needless to say, I never listened to that voice. “Just the lips”3That’s what she said. were never enough for me.
Each time, I would witness my Goya turn into a Dali right before my eyes. It’s as if my subjects were the Nazis in Raiders of the Lost Ark, beholding the Ark of the Covenant for the first–and obviously, last–time. It wasn’t pretty. To be fair, I should clarify that 3/4 of the face would be at least serviceable. It would be the chin, the hairline, the ears, the misshapen and disproportionate body, and whatever the hell I attempted to put in the background that would look like it was melting.
(As an inappropriate use of parenthetical statements, I’m just now realizing that there was one exception to this madness: pirates. I guess that’s probably because the whole pirate experience–you know, scars, missing eyes and limbs, parrots, tattered sails and the like–was so ----- up that it was a nice match for my ----- up art skills. But I digress. Enough with the piracy already.)
So, pirates and their peg legs notwithstanding,4Its a pun. Pun intended. I could never produce a complete piece of art. Hell, I would have been happy to nail 50% of the drawing without dropping the ball.
I think I might have actually made it to 50% on several occassions, but instead of leaving the rest of the page blank and walking away [mostly] a winner, I never knew when to quit. It’s like a part of me–let’s call him The Back Seventy–would be like “Hey, there Front Thirty, that’s a nice picture you got going there. But we wouldn’t want to be too successful, would we? We can’t have that. Let me fix it for you…”
The point of the story is that pretty much my whole life I’ve had this deeply ingrained sense of inevitable doom, in which all previous hard work/good luck will eventually be trodden over by hubris, incompetence, and/or misguided ambition, if only given enough time.
Come to think of it, this actually is a pretty accurate template for most of my romantic endeavors, but that’s a story or two for another time…
I would like to believe that I’m starting to paint a clearer picture of why Bob Ross can go stuff all those paint brushes up his ass for all I care…but I’m afraid just the mere analogy of painting will trigger The Back Seventy in me to take over and drive this whole beautiful train of thought off the rails and over a cliff.
But ever the optimist, I shall attempt to at least connect the dots. Anyone reading this far deserves at least that much.
Most people I know coo over Bob Ross and how soothing it is to watch him paint, allowing his Zen voice to wash over their semi-clothed beings as they are lulled into blissful sleep. That’s nifty and all, and I suppose I’m happy for all y’all for whom that is the Bob Ross Experience. Congratulations.
Meanwhile, I’m over here projecting all my insecurities onto him, resulting in me being awash in nothing but anxiety.
You know how some people yell at the screen during horror movies, imploring them bitches not to go in that door and instead vacate the premises in a timely manner? Yeah, that’s me, imploring Bob “YOU DON’T NEED PEACEFUL MOUNTAINS IN THE BACKGROUND OR A GROVE OF YOUR HAPPY-ASS TREES! BE CONTENT WITH THE LAKE, MAN. WALK AWAY, BOB, JUST WALK AWAY BEFORE YOU LOSE IT ALL!”
But that asshole never listens. Instead, he just calmly sticks the landing, taunting me with what I can never have…
The point of the story is, embrace the things that bring you joy, but be hesitant to assume that this joy is universal.
You never know, one man’s angel might be another man’s be-fro’d demon.
Content created on: 17 July 2019 (Wed), Revised 24 July 2019 (Wed)
Footnotes & References:
- The Olde Timey Wheelchair 11 August 20194 Min Read
The following is a lightly modified excerpt from an email with a close acquaintance. In full disclosure, it was written with the possibility in mind that it would eventually be shared here. In other words, I was workshopping it.
The context: my friend had some personal writing that he asked me to review, and I was giving him some initial feedback on his work.
And I quote…
Speaking of tangential stories…when I was in college, it was the first semester that I was friends with my perpetual romantic pursuit and eventual former girlfriend, Tiffany Chestnut,1Not her real name. It is, however, her real “porn star” name. along with her best friend (like, I was friends with her best friend, too, but none of the other descriptors apply. I’m not THAT suave). For some reason, one night I found myself pulling an all-nighter with the bff, whom we’ll refer to as ‘K’, alongside my friend Ben who would become my roommate the following year.
K was working on a book for her elementary education class, while I can’t remember what the hell me and Ben were doing. I think we were just being good friends and helping her get the book completed, which was due the next morning at 8 am. A week or so later, she gets the graded book back, and she got a pretty high mark, 97-99 range but not quite 100.
Well, in what I rationalized as an attempt at humor, my dumb ass made some critical comment about getting a point or two taken off. At the time, my comment seemed to be a non-event, and I probably would have never given it a second thought in my life.
Fast-forward to the end of the semester. Tiffany is getting ready to study abroad in Mexico for the summer and fall semesters, and I had stopped at her hometown on the way to mine for the summer to say hi to her family and bye to her for 7 months. This was long before we briefly dated, so naturally, a component of our conversation involved me trying to cajole her into going out with me.
I pressed her on the issue, and she reticently admitted that she knew she could never date/marry me. So I pressed her some more. I should interject here that I was bawling throughout most of the conversation, though I don’t remember the exact point when the water works started. Anyways, even more reticently, she shares with me two anecdotes that shaped her conviction on the matter.
You guessed it: I got dinged for being unduly critical of K in regards to said project. It turns out that my comment really hurt K and deflated what had been very high spirits, as she had worked very hard on the book and deserved every bit of glory that it earned. But no, I thought I had to be the witty one in the moment, or whatever god-forsaken unresolved inferiority complex I had going on when I made that comment.
For what it’s worth, the other anecdote involved a poorly drawn wheelchair by Ms. Chestnut, and my ensuing humorous observation that wheelchairs like that hadn’t been produced for about a century now. In my defense, she was an art major…and living in the year 2001. So she had no ----- excuse for the engineering atrocity that she had created on paper. None. The REAL crime would have been the ABSENCE of ridicule and mockery…
Figure 1: The assholes over at Turbosquid want $79 for the uncensored version of this picture of a “vintage wheelchair”. So it looks like you’ll just have to use your imagination as to what Ms. Chestnut’s drawing looked like. Tip: imagine Picasso tried to paint what you see above. You may be asking yourself at this point “the point of the story is…?” Well, I’m glad you asked! As you can see, I had the rare experience of knowing the exact moments when my chances with a girl in which I was very interested were mercilessly slaughtered–and in true M. Night fashion, I was the murderer. “What a tweest!”
Well, let me tell you, failing like that is shit that sticks with you. One is a bit more sensitive to the otherwise subconscious impulse to provide unsolicited criticism after something like that. Know what I mean? Of course you don’t. You’re too kind-spirited through and through. (Stated without the slightest sense of sarcasm)
All that being said…there was one typo in your work that I found particularly amusing. Just search the document for “plum” and you will immediately see the [humorous] error of your typing ways.
Figure 2: “Somebody” made a Freudian Slip… Content created: 5/6 June 2019 (Sunday/Monday) / 22 July 2019 (Monday)
Footnotes & References:
- What About Bob Saget 18 August 2019< 1 Min Read
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.(Click here just in case you need your image of him shattered.1https://www.elitedaily.com/entertainment/these-are-just-a-few-of-the-insanely-vulgar-things-bob-saget-did-on-the-set-of-full-house)
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.
What’s the old saying? A fool seems wise until he opens his mouth?2https://biblehub.com/proverbs/17-28.htm Well, let’s just say I’m about to be silent no more.
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.
Content created on: 24 July 2019 (Wednesday)
Footnotes & References:
- Mistakes Will Be Made 25 August 20195 Min Read
As a toddler, I had my mother rather worried. I was coming up on turning 2 years old, and still really hadn’t talked much. Although I was her fifth rodeo, so to speak, like any good first-world parent she was concerned that I had developmental issues.
Oh, were those fears ever unfounded. I imagine at one point she started wishing that I would begin my verbal journey and put her doubts to rest. And I imagine it wasn’t long after that when she learned the valuable life lesson of “careful what you wish for.”
I started talking all right. And I haven’t stopped since. Once I’m comfortable around someone, I’m like a word fountain with no shut-the-fuck-up faucet handle in sight.
But we all know my verbosity is not on trial here. That’s not the point of the story at all.
The key detail, as recounted by my mother, is that when I actually began speaking, it wasn’t just a broken word here or there; it was full-on complete sentences replete with mostly proper syntax. Apparently, I had been sitting, watching, waiting; learning all the rules before giving the whole verbal communication thing a whirl. I was posing as a harmless observer, all the while plotting my takeover of the English language.
For most of my life, this was a point of pride, often busted out when I felt the need to #HumbleBrag. However, as I grow older and reflect on life more, I realize that there are some definite downsides to this personality trait.
I think the underlying theme is fear of failure (“What if I get this wrong?”), desire for absolute certainty (“I want to get this exactly right”), or a combination of the two. In a sense, it comes down to aversion to risk, and the lack of skill in regards to being able to accurately assess risk well enough and put it in proper perspective. I mean, what’s the worst that could have happened if I didn’t pronounce “ball” exactly right? I’m sure my toddler mind came up with plenty of doomsday scenarios.
Now, I’m sure that this innate reticence has been beneficial at times in my life. But more often than not, leaning into this instinct has held me back more than anything else.
I probably would have picked up Spanish much more quickly had I been like “Ben del Mundo”, happily not giving a single ----- about his butchering of the native tongue of his host country. I would have started wisely investing my money years ago. I would be an accomplished author by now, with 20+ years of experience and multiple published books to my name. I sure the hell would be a better and much more efficient coder. The list goes on.
I’m not here to wallow in my regrets, though I have plenty of plans for that in future musings. No, this is really about identifying obstacles that hold you back from being a better version of one’s self, owning them, and then managing and mitigating them with mindful intention.
I had to wrassle with several mental and emotional barriers before I could even begin to realistic consider the prospect of exposing myself publicly on a regular basis (aka “blogging”, you ----- perv). In due time, I intend to regale you with my in-depth analysis of all of them. But for now I promise to stay on point and only unpack one of them here.
Critical to making this blog a reality, I had to make peace with the fact that Mistakes Will Be Made. If I don’t dive right into something due to worries about figuring every little detail out beforehand, I will never get started in the first place. Sure, I won’t have bonehead mistakes hanging around my neck, but I won’t have any of the awesome benefits of the endeavor to enjoy either.
This personal life lesson has been several years in the making, but it really has been roughly the last two years that I’ve been able to take advantage of this self-realization. I pussy-footed around with travel hacking for a year or so before finally jumping in head-first. Sure, mistakes were indeed made, maybe missing out on $1k of potential benefits. But I wouldn’t say they even came close to rising to the level of regret. And it has definitely paid off to the tune of upwards of $10k, so yeah, it was definitely worth it.
Another example is 3D printing. I’ve had some passive interest in the field for at least 6 years. Yet, despite having access to 50+ printers free of charge for 4 1/2 years in my recent full-time employment, it wasn’t until I realized I might be losing the opportunity that I started taking advantage of it. It helped to focus on just printing anything instead of getting caught up in the details. Not having a perfect product in mind allowed me to avoid obsessing over how imperfect my creations were.
Ultimately, the important thing in both cases is that something was being done. After all, we can’t learn from mistakes we never make.
And really, there is a point to this story here. In fact, it might just be the point of The Point of The Story.
I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. I have many regrets, and many, many, more embarassing moments. And I’m wise enough to know that I have many more to come…hopefully with a minimal number of regrets.
And I have a penchant to talk in overly-detailed prose. Or so I’ve been told.
So how is this the point? I’m getting to it, I’m getting to it. I swear. Sheesh, leave me alone. You seriously didn’t come here expecting to find case studies in conciseness and brevity, did you? Cuz you in the wrong place if you did. You are free to leave at any time; my feelings won’t be hurt.
…but I digress.
All that to say, I’ve struggled much of my life with being self-conscious of the thought that I just might be a mistake-prone Chatty Cathy. A friend once described a mutual friend as “the strong, silent type.” But when he continued musing, considering the opposite personality, i.e. “the weak, gabby type,” I had a moment where I was like “wait a minute…is he referring to me?!?” For the record he wasn’t, but it was a thought that was traumatizing to my self-image nonetheless.
You know what, though? It’s never too late to own thy shit. I’m leaning into what assets I have in abundance, bougie self-respect be damned.
I’m done waiting around forever for my idealized self to materialize. These chains hanging heavy round my neck, weighing me down? Aw, shiiiiit. They made of gold. It’s time to cash in on these god-given gifts.
Sometimes the best opportunities arise from simple reframing of a situation. And I’m so happy I’ve recalibrated my perspective, and I hope at some point it can make you a happier person, too.
Fucking up and shamelessly talking about it at great lengths? That’s not a bug, that’s a feature.
Oh, yes, mistakes have been made, and will continue to be made. They might even be sought out on occassion. But I promise you this, Dear Reader: I will tell you aaaaaaaall about them.
It is up to you what you do with this information.
Be amused. Be inspired. Be like me. Don’t be like me. Be entertained. Be slightly shocked out of your sensibilities. Be introspective, armed with a new perspective.
And above all else, consider yourself be-welcomed to The Point of The Story. Enjoy.
Content created on: 24 July 2019 (Wednesday)
- Hello world! 1 September 20193 Min Read
By default, WordPress pre-populates a new blog with a singular post entitled “Hello world!” It is meant to be deleted or appropriately edited, but I felt so inspired by these words that I decided to instead subvert this post for my own purposes. Joke’s on them, I suppose.
My experience with “Hello world!” is in the context of trying to pick up a new programming language. If you’re not familiar with it, “Hello world!” is the archetypical first coding project for most any language. It’s the most basic of tasks: getting your computing device to display the simple message “Hello, world!” Also, I’m pretty sure there should be a comma in there, so I added it just for all the English teachers reading at home. But I digress…
Now, some people have told me I have a modestly entertaining sense of humor. Well, right off the bat I’m going to ruin that idealized image of me by telling you a bit about how the sausage is made.
Between you and me, Dear Reader, an insane proportion of my humorous thoughts come from an embarrassingly simple line of code in my core system:
Figure 1. Yes, I realize my core code is written in Perl. What can I say? I’m a legacy [machine]. Well, technically that “one simple line” is wrapped up in 47 other lines of code, but hidden in there is Line 22, which is generating potential humorous phrases by simply substituting one or more words with their antonyms. Essentially, I make my living by being a contrarian. That’s it. That’s the secret.
So many things are absurdly funny if you merely pause long enough to consider their opposite. Nearly-free humor, just hanging there, ripe for harvesting. Honestly, I feel like a magician, explaining away all the best magic tricks of the trade, inviting shunning from fellow magicians. I’m just asking to get kicked out of…the Guild of Mildly Humorous Bloggers…? Not really sure who my cohort are here. I wouldn’t be so bold as to claim to be a “Comic”–you know, how comedians refer to themselves when no outsiders are around? But that’s beside the point.
Anyways, apparently such tactics find its way into my own coding work. Recently I came across some old code of mine in which I was clearly supposed to be doing the ol’ “Hello, world!” routine. But of course my stubborn ass refused to be so bougie and write the same overly-cheerful message.
Run my program and what do you get?
Goodbye, cruel world.
Damn that’s dark. Funny, but dark nonetheless.
Now, of course that’s not the end of the story. It’s just merely a waypoint on a longer destination. So, a point of the story, I guess?
At some point, I promise you I’ll put together a few posts explaining how this blog hath sprung forth from the loins of the universe, aka The Story of the Point.1That’s a Spoonerism right there. Better get used to seeing them in these here parts of the Wild Wild Web. Like any good hero tale, it involves me leaving a job with a regular pay check and risking it all to follow my heart.
Yup, my dream job is being a blogger. Because–and listen up, gentlemen–I know that nothing will get the wife more hot and bothered than a man who knows how to bring home the Bacon Bits.
Anyways, marital intimacy tips aside, the key detail buried in those last two paragraphs is that I’ve had the immense pleasure of leaving my 9-5 job behind, something many dream of doing but only a select few ever get to experience.
The point of the story is, I feel another slight modification to Hello World, and we’ll have the perfect way to kickstart this party:
Goodbye, Corporate World.
Your sorry ass won’t be missed.2Well, this is not 100% true. It’s more like this:
https://i0.wp.com/thepointofthestory.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/F_This_Shit.jpg?resize=218%2C300&ssl=1 218w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px" />
“Fuck this shit.” … “Just kidding. Its still Thursday and I need these.”Content created on 27, 28, & 30 July 2019 (Sat, Sun, & Tues)
Footnotes & References:
- Hello Mother ----- ! 5 September 20193 Min Read
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.
[Whispering:] “The Secret Word is…”
(Original source: 3
www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKNsh4dUaKE)
Chairry: “Get. Yo. A$$. Outta my face.” […and the crowd goes wild!]
(Original source: 4https://tenor.com/search/pee-wee-herman-secret-word-gifs)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!”
Footnotes & References:
The latest word on the street