Author, Historian, Storyteller

We all have those days where we would rather be anywhere and doing anything than what we have to be doing.  Today is one of those days for me.  So therefore, here are the Top Ten Things That I Would Rather Be Doing Instead of Sitting at Work.

 

1. Cleaning my toilet.

2. Flossing the puggles’ teeth, after walking them through a field where a flock of geese have been living.

3. Giving Big Bob a sponge bath.

4. Getting stuck in an elevator with a claustrophobic alarmist.

5. Getting a root canal . . . without the drugs.

6. Sitting in a broken down car in the middle of the Small World ride at Disneyland with an obnoxious tourist incessantly taking pictures in front of me and a screaming baby behind me.

7. Hanging upside down by my big toes.

8. Volunteering for Homeland Security to try out their new and improved Chinese Water Torture techniques.

9. Performing a blood ritual while inside a shark tank.

10. Going on a road trip across the country with the guys from “Dumb and Dumber.”

TGIF!!

1. They have their own song by Barenaked Ladies.  I’ve always wanted to have a song by Barenaked Ladies about me.

The Ninjas

2. That obnoxious fly that keeps buzzing around – got it!

3. That whole stealthily sneaking up on people thing is awesome!  Although with how many times people tell me to make some noise when I walk I’m guessing that I’m already pretty good at this one.

4. Black is very slimming. Just sayin.

5. I want to vacation in Ireland . . . you didn’t listen to the song did you?  So this makes no sense.  Go back and listen to the song!

6. Because of this conversation – “I’m in real estate, what do you do?”  “I’m a ninja.”  BOOM!

7. Awesome toys!

8. They’re incredibly graceful and athletic.  I could use a little grace.  I tend to fall off of my own shoes . . . flat ones . . . while standing still.

9. You never have to worry about bad hair days because no one will ever see your hair.  Heck no one will ever see you!

10. They get to hang out on the water and drink rum all day!  Oh wait, that’s pirates . . . okay forget ninjas, I wanna be a pirate!

 

1. Getting drunk is no longer the sole purpose of drinking. Now you like the taste.
2. A pulled muscle or sprained ankle takes significantly longer to heal.
3. Even if you’re exhausted, you will get out of bed when you realize that you didn’t floss and brush your teeth because you have now met people with dentures and the thought of having them yourself truly horrifies you.
4. Perfectly legitimate reason to weep like a baby – not being able to find your tiger balm after a strenuous workout.
5. All of your friends start having babies . . . on purpose.
6. You have a vitamin brand that you prefer.
7. Your fun email address – RockerChic or KatFight82 – has fallen by the wayside in lieu of a more professional address – name@company.com.
8. Not groaning when you stand up after sitting on the floor for more than 30 minutes is cause for celebration.
9. There is not enough coffee in the world to adequately get you through the day after pulling an all-nighter.
10. You’ve realized that staying in with no plans on a Friday or Saturday night is not only acceptable, but sometimes it’s AWESOME.

Okay, I’ll admit that I tend to exist under a rock.  I’m am not up on all of the new trends and slang, etc.  I still use complete words and correct grammar while texting.  I’m that person.  So it is of no surprise to me that I was able to compile a list of trends and slang that were popular in 2013, that I didn’t learn about until 2014.  So without further ado the Top Ten Trends in 2013 that I Didn’t Know About Until 2014.

1. Extreme Selfies – Apparently after you’ve taken 3000 selfies in your bathroom mirror, it starts to get old (personally my limit was 1).  So instead of finding something else to do, we now have extreme selfies.  I wonder how many bathroom doors have died in the pursuit of this trend.

2. Selfie Sunday – Seriously? There’s an entire day devoted to this?  I was aware of Shakespeare Sunday, but Selfie Sunday is a new one to me.

3. Caturday – You take a “selfie” of your cat and post it online on Saturday.  Like you do.

4. Totes – Not just a large bag with handles anymore.  Totes is a shorter more convenient form of the word totally.  Taking out those two letters saves you two syllables.  Totes geeking out about slang over here.

5. Catfish – Refers to someone who is pretending to be someone they’re not, usually through fake online profiles.

6. Guap – A lot of money, like tons of it.

7. Rachet – A diva, mostly from urban cities and ghettos, that has reason to believe she is everyman’s eye candy.  Unfortunately, she’s wrong.  i.e Someone who is “straight ghetto”

8. Straight Ghetto – I was told that this one was self-explanatory.  ?????

9. Salty – Someone or something who is overly pissed off, angry or annoying (my roommate says it totally makes sense, but then again she’s the one that just described a Rachet as Straight Ghetto . . .)

10. Wearing Leggings as pants – Okay technically I knew about this one, but it still blows my mind!  Now if you can find a pair that are the correct size and are of a high enough quality material that they stay opaque no matter what, then strut your stuff girlfriend!  However, if the very act of you walking means that I can tell you that you’re wearing zebra striped underwear, then THOSE ARE NOT PANTS!  Go back home and properly attire yourself for life.  Or, better idea!  Let’s start the first new trend in 2014.  If I can accurately tell you what kind of underwear you’re wearing through your leggings then you have to pay me a dollar.  I live in SoCal, I’ll be rich by next Sunday!  🙂

Let’s be honest.  Our new year’s resolutions don’t always work out . . . or even see the light of February.

So not to jinx myself or anything, but here are the Top Ten Probable Outcomes of my Top Ten New Year’s Resolutions.

 

Resolution #1 – Retire the “fat pants” and move back into the regular wardrobe

Probable Outcome – Technically speaking I wear the “fat pants” more often than the size 8’s in my closet, so therefore they are actually my regular wardrobe thus rendering this resolution null and void.

 

Resolution #2 – Work on the puggles’ lack of obedience

Probable Outcome – “Puggles, ignore me . . . Good dogs!”  Nailed it!

 

Resolution #3 – Read more

Probable Outcome – Does my Twitter feed count?

 

Resolution #4 – Eat more fruits and vegetables.

Probable Outcome – I’ll take a pepperoni pizza with pineapple and black olives.

 

Resolution #5 – Work out on a regular basis

Probable Outcome – Okay, this one might actually happen simply because I joined the gym that my roommate goes to on a regular basis and she said she’d bring me along . . . kicking and screaming if necessary.

 

Resolution #6 – Finish all of the dishes every night before going to bed.

Probable Outcome – Start eating exclusively off of paper plates or directly out of the pan.

 

Resolution #7 – Go to bed at a reasonable hour

Probable Outcome – In comparison, 1:00 is definitely more reasonable then say 3:00.

 

Resolution #8 – Do yoga every morning

Probable Outcome – Keeping my legs straight as I bend over to put my socks on has got to be some sort of yoga move.  Right?

 

Resolution #9 – De-clutter my house

Probable Outcome – “What are you buying?”  “A flamingo, feather-duster pen . . . but I need it!”

 

Resolution #10 – Stop calling myself a Dumbass

Probable Outcome – Dumbass . . . Damnit!

1. My dad always said that if something was worth doing it was worth doing right, I apparently took this to heart when it comes to getting sick.
2. That being said, I have the patience to be sick for a grand total of 2-3 days, after which point I start going stir-crazy and decide that I’m not sick anymore . . . my body on the other hand never really seems to agree with this timeline.
3. If I’m actually willing to go to the doctor, it’s because people have started to ask me if I’d like a slide show at my funeral.
4. My voice drops even lower than normal, to the point that I should really start talking dirty and charging everyone that calls me $1.99 per minute.
5. No matter what kind of cold medication I use I will eventually develop some sort of allergic reaction to it including, but not limited to: dizziness, double vision and seeing things.
6. If that Dragon insists on hanging out in the kitchen, the least he could do is wash the dishes and make some coffee!
7. I don’t crave soup, I crave pizza.  So if anybody wants to bring over some pizza I would love you forever.
8. I go from sleeping 5-6 hours a night to sleeping 10-12 hours per night.  Which means I know that I’m finally getting better the first night that I go to bed and lay there WIDE AWAKE all night because I’m still good to go from the previous night.
9. At some point I will swallow a cough drop whole and almost choke and die.  It happens every time.  It’s like I’m still four years old.
10. No matter what I am actually sick with, if you ask me what’s wrong I will tell you that I have the plague.

So apologies for the radio silence this week.  Hopefully we will be back to our regularly scheduled programming next week.  Once I’m over the plague.

I love comedy, and I like to think that I have a good sense of humor.  I take pride in the fact that I can generally make the people around me laugh.  It is my defense mechanism.  My particular brand of comedy falls into self-deprecating humor.  I will make fun of myself to get a laugh more often than I will make fun of somebody else.  Probably because of this I don’t embarrass easily. This being said, there seems to be a branch of comedy that has infiltrated the main stream that no matter how open I try to be, I can’t enjoy. It’s the comedy that goes a step beyond embarrassment and into humiliation. I will go from loving a movie to wanting nothing to do with it as soon as that line is crossed.

Self-deprecating humor doesn’t bother me, if Jim Carey wants to make as ass out of himself to get a laugh, more power to him. I don’t necessarily find it funny, but it doesn’t bother me.  Everything that he does is his choice.  There is no loss of control. He is not being forced to do anything. In contrast, the scene in BRIDESMAIDS where everybody gets sick and there aren’t enough bathrooms to go around, so one woman uses a sink and another winds up taking a crap in the middle of the street, I don’t find that the least bit funny.  In fact I find it in very poor taste.

I know what you’re thinking; you think I don’t like it because the whole scene is about poop. Nope, I have nothing against poop jokes.  Poop jokes abound in Shakespeare and I love his work.  I don’t like it because that situation isn’t embarrassing, it’s humiliating.  The so-called comedy is derived from a situation, that if it happened in real life, the person would be absolutely mortified. They might shrug it off and slink away, or even try to make a joke out of it, but if you looked into their eyes, you would see that a part of them had just died inside. It is a degradation of the human spirit so cleverly disguised, that people no longer see it as such and it becomes acceptable.

In general, I am not an overly empathetic person. I have never lost sleep because of the starving children in Africa or because of the atrocious conditions of our inner cities. Some people are made to be humanitarians. I am not. So why does this bother me so much?  It isn’t somebody I know or me being humiliated after all. I think it is because laughter is one of the most powerful forces in our arsenal, and using the humiliation or degradation of others for comedy, for laughter, is one of the lowest forms of entertainment.

I don’t find that funny.

Embarrassing situations on the other hand I find very funny. I love slapstick, or situational comedy. Give me a guy stepping on a rake and getting smacked in the face and I will laugh until my sides ache.

The kid on the bike delivering papers in WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING makes me laugh so hard I cry every time I watch the movie. For me the difference lies in the semantics. These are embarrassing, not humiliating. If no one were around to be witness you would either continue on with your day and forget that it ever happened or find the humor in it and tell a friend later to share the laugh. If no one is around to witness something humiliating, you thank God up above for your good luck and never tell anyone that it happened, but you will always remember. To me that’s the difference. Humiliation requires judgment from others. Embarrassment can be a solo activity.

And yes, that is very subjective.  I am quite sure that there are things that I would only find mildly embarrassing, while somebody who is more sensitive might find the same thing humiliating.  But my general rule of thumb is that if it is something that you will look back on in ten years and feel ashamed then it belongs in a tragedy.  If no, then it’s fodder for comedy.