Distraction / This, traction
(UPDATE: I just remembered (a week later) what the original thought was that spawned this post - all of the Nascar stories after Dale Earnhart left his racing team/company/whatever. The thought "why do people care so much about people driving cars in a circle" was resounding through my head, and that led me on to other things I felt like complaining about, forgetting the original in the process.)
Things I have a very hard time comprehending:
- Why anyone likes ska.
- Why women obsess over shoes (ok, I understand this one, I just don't want to: it is because women are taught from an early age that accessories and capitalist consumption lies at the heart of femininity)
- Why no one else in the house can tell that the TV is still turned on even when the cable is off; I can hear the frequency of it being on from downstairs.
- Why people care so much about Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
- Why people think that music gets worse the more other folks listen to it; as if there were a finite number of sound waves, and it is best to hog them all to oneself.
- Why people who supposedly like video games buy Macintosh computers. (Or, for that matter, why anyone who has a basic understanding of how to operate computers feels the need to buy a Macintosh computer).
- Why JP, despite somehow managing to claim strong roots in the mid-west, south, and north-east simultaneously, is the only one still living in Oregon.
- Why anyone cares about what Paris Hilton has done, ever.
- Why there are gay Republicans, black Mormons, or...actually, just why there are Republicans or Mormons (I don't really mean to single Mormons out; any heavily doctrinal religious belief is equally suspect. The only difference is that Mormons somehow got away with the "whoaa...I found these magical tablets" crap centuries after that stopped being an acceptable excuse. Oh well, just fashionably late to the crazy party, I suppose).
- Why people use Twitter (all the fun of having something to update without the hard work of having to think of anything to actually say, I guess)
- Why Walter doesn't understand the brilliance of Arrested Development.
- Why many liberals have fatally confused the maxim "bad judgments are bad" with "all judgments are bad."
- Why people think whiskey tastes better than tequila.
- Why Chelsea Clinton never returns my calls.
- Why so many people in their mid twenties think that it is prime time to get married and start breeding (unless of course they have lots of crops that need harvestin' - which, in all fairness to a number of my former high school classmates, many of them do).
- Why anyone thinks that it is enjoyable to watch the slow grindings of a popularity show unfold over months, and pretend that the American Idol winner will have any meaningful impact on the music world whatsoever (it would be like being in Leadership class for 5 months nonstop - eye gougingly fun!)
- Why people, in lieu of spending every minute thankful for the absurd and inexplicable fact of their existence, make annoying comments about things they don't understand, or devote their lives to petty/vapid goals, or buckle to tradition rather than suffer the pain of reinventing oneself in the fires of possibility...or really do anything aside from stumble around in awe, looking for others to share their wonder with.
- Why I'm writing here instead of on my paper.
3 comments:
women obsess over shoes for more reasons than that. Often, women (and some men) need different shoes to go with different clothes. As a graduate student, I totally understand your propensity to wear the same shoes (or God forbid -- Sandals) with everything in your wardrobe. I also understand the willingness of grad students to grow pony-tails, even though neither of these should be endorsed.
Just as any male whom works, relaxes, parties and postulates needs perhaps athletic shoes, dress shoes (brown and black), and at least one pair of casual sneakers; a female generally needs twice as many. It is hard for many men to understand this, as we tend to wear pants more often (...and jeans more often than that, am I right fellas?) however, women wear pants, skirts, dresses, capris, shorts, etc. sometimes in regular rotation. Think how odd a red dress would look with brown tennis shoes (ugh) now imagine the same dress with red or white pumps, maybe even a festive wedge...see what I'm saying?
Buffy is fantastic, for virtually all the reasons that Veronica Mars is great. It's also (apart from Freaks and Geeks and MAYBE My So-Called Life) the best show about what it's like to be a normal adolescent. All the magic and vampires and stuff lets them deal with all that with metaphors and not have to beat you over the head with it. Also, Joss Whedon is really a pretty great director, and innovates more than pretty much anyone in TV since Twin Peaks.
Macs are good. Maybe not best for lots of things, but definitely best for me, what with the still running after several years.
Ska is good. Bouncy, fun. I mean, you don't like The Specials? Madness? London Calling?
Can't help you with the rest.
Yeah, Buffy's not that bad. I just always found it strange that I adore VM but Buffy never made an impact on me, given that people talk about them as practically siblings in style.
And macs do have their strengths, I just love system building for gaming purposes (even if I don't play all that many games anymore). You ever play any games? I'm real, real excited for Team Fortress 2 coming out (and given how much you used to like q3, I imagine you'd love it too).
Older 70s ska isn't bad, I just can't stand the newer waves of it (I associate it with the stuff the obnoxious trumpet players in high school band would listen to).
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