The Flippant Philosopher

I mean: “Happy Self Introspection Day!”

No, no. I mean: “Happy Future Failed Resolution Setting!”

Ah, skip it. Just have a drink and get with the happy-making.

-Demonax

1. Bark at them until they start moving the direction you want.

2. Bark at them to stop where you want them to stop.

You don’t even need to provide grass.

-Demonax

Never forget that “we” is the self-referential form of “they”, and is seldom as inclusive as they would like you to imagine that it is.

-Demonax

It’s been almost 15 years, and my college years are receding behind me. Reminiscing about college is a favorite pastime of the white collared and middle aged. There is, though, only one thing I miss about college. (Besides co-eds. They get missed without needing to be specifically mentioned.)

The prime advantage of college (again, besides co-eds) was that every 6 months or so, I had the opportunity to “sift through” another 200-300 people, depending on my class load, looking for those precious few that I could relate to and even form lasting friendships with.

At no other time in the typical American Adult Life will such opportunities present themselves. Once we leave college, we tend to settle down. We get married (which tends to reduce the amount of dating engaged in, co-eds or other age categories), we get jobs, and begin spending more and more time with fewer and fewer people.

Families grow, but you usually have to wait 10-15 years before you really know if you like the new addition. In-laws don’t often require that much time, of course.

Even if you hop between jobs like you’re Indiana Jones skipping from rock to rock across a boiling pool of lava, the number of new people you meet will be only a small fraction compared the college era quantities. And there will be fewer of them at or near your own age.

Work-related conferences, or hobby-related conventions, especially those with national or international appeal, provide one way to expand your personal network, but unless someone else is paying for you to be there, you’re usually limited in how often you can take advantage of these. And even then, it’s not like college, where you had 16 weeks to get know people. It’s a week at most, and maybe some email exchanges afterwards. Any lasting friendships usually require meeting the same person at multiple events.

And that’s what I miss about college: co-eds and sufficient quantity and frequency of people that at least a few of them will match my specifications–and maybe even not think I’m snob for having specifications.

-Demonax

Come January, landfills across the country can be scanned to see how many of the crappy toys, low-end appliances, and other useless shit hawked over the Xmas Holidays have already been thrown away.

(NOTE: “Retail Passive RF Tagging” involves tagging all items for sale in a store with a “passive” radio-frequency receiver and transmitter. The store can then track movement of items through the store for inventory, security, and checkout purposes.)

-Demonax

They know people just like them are waiting to pounce.

-Demonax

As a teenager I stopped saying “Ouch!”, replacing it with “Oww!”

I did this because people constantly assumed I was being vulgar, and thought I was saying “Oww, shit!” (Try it.)

I got in trouble multiple times at the private church schools I attended, protesting my innocence in vain, before finally learning my lesson.

“Oww!” I learned to say, adding, “Fuck, that hurt.”

Much less confusing that way.

-Demonax