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When I was in the 8th grade, I went to boarding school, which totally sucked, but that's a story for another day. I just
remembered, as I so often do, how this one girl wrote in my yearbook, "Keep it up with the original thoughts and feelings!"
Not becuase her words touched me in any deep or profound way, but because they were so stupid and mean nothing.
I suppose
people could have original thoughts, or look at things in unusual or different ways. But feelings? How do you have original
feelings? When you get down to it, you basically have three feelings: Happy, Sad, and Angry. Anything else you might describe
is some combination of these three, kind of like how you might have a million different colors but they're still all red,
blue, yellow, or some combination of those three.
And yet, even though it seems really nice, it boils down to nothing.
It's the kind of thing you say to someone like "Reach for your dreams and they'll all come true!" Which first of all is so
totally not true, but also gives people unrealistic expectations. Everyone's so big on self-esteem but no one ever seems to
talk about making actual plans for the future and what we wind up with is a nation of doofwads who think they'll all make
it big on Star Search and hit the lottery any day now. These folks have way too much self-esteem. If everyone could
make their dreams come true this way, we'd all be astronauts and movie stars, and no one would be left to sweep up after,
or make the sandwiches.
Maybe I'm just all cynical and bitter because my life sucks and no one has ever just walked
up to me and handed me a million dollars, which I so totally deserve.
I'm not saying there's anything wrong with sweeping
up or making the sandwiches. It's an honest living. Like take me for instance. My job sucks and offers no challenges. On the
other hand, it gives me time enough to set down here every thought that occurs to me.
Superman's Costume
Like, you know how Superman flies around and saves people, then when he's done he puts his regular street clothes
on and goes around doing regular Clark Kent stuff til he's needed again? And then he just tears open his shirt and there's
that big red 'S' and he's Superman again.
Well, ok, his costume is a skin-tight blue leotard with red speedoes over
top of it, and then this big red cape.
First of all, the cape puzzles me. I don't know why he has to wear it. Maybe
things were different in the 30's, but these days you hear about a grown man wearing a cape and, if you're like me, you think
he must be one of those Las Vegas-style gay white tiger trainers. Does the cape actually serve a purpose? Does it help him
fly? And when he's fighting giant space robots, doesn't it get in the way? What's to stop a giant space robot from just grabbing
him by the cape and swinging him around over his head? But most importantly, when Superman puts his regular clothes back on
and goes around as Clark Kent, where does the cape go? Is it rolled up in his shirt? Tucked in the back of his pants? A cape
seems awfully bulky and hard to manage, for both Superman and for Clark Kent.
Well now, he's also got this skin-tight
blue leotard, which is slightly less freaky than the cape, but not by much. I suppose if you're flying at the speed of sound,
you don't want regular clothes flying all over the place, so maybe it's like how swimmers shave down their whole bodies to
cut down resistance. But why does he wear the speedo outside of the leotard, which you hardly ever see anyone else do unless
they're homeless schizophrenics? And how does he ever pee? And does he have on underpants on the inside?
And finally,
why does Superman wear these bright, gaudy colors like red and blue and yellow? Is it supposed to scare evildoers? I don't
think it would scare me. I mean, the fact that he could literally kill me just by looking at me would be enough to have me
pee my pants, but I think I would at least feel a little superior to someone who dressed like that. I mean, Batman wears all
black and comes out of the shadows and he's all spooky, but Robin wears these bright, gaudy colors and no one's afraid of
him. They just make sissy boy jokes about him when Batman isn't listening.
Superman is supposed to be all powerful
and yet so modest and unassuming. On TV and in the movies, he always seems to have this "Aw, shucks, it's nothing, ma'm" attitude.
And yet his costume seems to scream "Everyone look at me! I'm super powerful, and just a little bit gay!"
Well, anyway,
things like that go a long way towards boosting my self-esteem. At least I feel superior to Superman.
Zuzu The Gremlin Slayer
I'm at work now and just finished printing the nightly reports. There's an older-model laser printer here and whenever
it prints out anything, it makes this loud squealing sound.
****WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEENK!!!!!!****
I mean, it's loud. And it's not just a single tone. It includes a grinding of plastic and metal gears in the lower
range, a single loud shriek in the upper range, and about three or four other various squeals and pops and cracks in between.
It's so loud, you can't even answer the phones when it's on. Two people even quit because they couldn't stand it anymore.
To
me, it sounds like a gremlin funeral. Like there's four or five little gremlins wailing in grief and agony. It's just that
awful. I never believed in gremlins before, but now I'm not so sure. I'm starting to believe that every time I print something,
I kill a gremlin.
It's kind of like the end of It's A Wonderful Life, where Zuzu is so delighted in her childhood
innocence and breathless wonder, that every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings. It's kind of like that, I
mean, if instead of being innocent and sweet, Zuzu was a Slayer. And she just kept printing up page after page just to kill
the gremlins, while their hellish wails drive the rest of Bedford Falls insane.
Jimmy Stewart would be her Watcher,
of course. And Clarence wouldn't be an angel, he'd be a demon or vampire. And I guess Sam Wainwright (the annoying guy who
used to hold his hands over his head and go "Hee Haw!" like a donkey, even though he looked more like he was making a moose
face, and I'm fairly certain that mooses don't go "hee haw" even though I'm not entirely sure what sound they do make), would
be another demon. Or maybe at least Zuzu could think that he was a demon and kill him anyway (disclaimer: I'm in no way
advocating, or in favor of, killing people who annoy you; If I was, I'd be on death row).
The point is....the
printer is really loud. And now you kind of get the idea the idea what I think about late at night here all by myself.
I
actually do work. I mean, I don't sit around doing nothing. If my job was just to sit around and look like a doofwad, I would
so totally ask for a raise. Because I'm really really good at it.
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