People confuse me. There is a reason why I like numbers more than people. 2 + 3 always equals 5, except in those odd instances when I decide to work in base 4 and then 2 + 3 equals 11. But there are rules and expected outcomes. Nothing can really surprise you when you work with numbers. People, on the other hand, tend to operate in a world that avoids all sense of normality.
This dawned on me as I was driving to work this morning. I was late as always though I at least had the excuse that I voted. (I cast my vote for Mike Gravel. I figured he should at least get one vote.) While driving on the flooded streets because despite five years of my protests Kansas City has still not been convinced that sewers are a good idea I saw what has to be the most amazing vanity plate of all time.
The car had a plate that said ENVY ME. The guy was driving an Acura.
Now I’ll have to say it was a nice Acura. Even had tinted windows because that is cool if you’re like seventeen. But I’m supposed to envy someone driving an Acura? There are some cars that would make me go “Man, I wish I had that car” but this wasn’t one of them.
What type of person puts ENVY ME on their license plate? Seriously, how fucked up do you have to be to decide to place that on your car? People call me an arrogant bastard but I have never proclaimed to the world that everyone should want to be like me. It would be a nicer world if that was the case but I’m not openly advocating it. I sure as hell wouldn’t use my car as a billboard for that opinion.
I’m just trying to figure this one out. This isn’t a rash decision like a t-shirt purchase. You have to fill out forms to get one of these. Whoever did this has to think so highly of themselves and their life that they truly feel that they are the ultimate in human evolution. We are beyond the realm of confidence. We’ve even left the world of douchebaggery behind. This is a level of insanity that I have never before encountered. Especially when any rational person would think that putting this on your car would be tempting fate in such a way that you’d expect an asteroid to land on your car.
(It’s also horribly false advertising. You live in Kansas City, why the hell should I envy you?)
I’ve been trying to think of equivalents to this in my life. I remember seeing a car with CMYVET as its plate but that was a Corvette. There is at least some justification for that in a white trash sort of way. The best example was from one time walking to the train station in downtown Chicago. It was a Friday in May, one of those first nice days where you are happy that summer is finally near. Right in front of Union Station was a guy, balding, slightly over weight and smoking a cigar, in a red convertible with the top down and the radio blaring. I looked at him, paused for a moment, and almost yelled “Dude, how small is your penis?”
That’s all this is. Envy Me? If you have to ask the answer is no.
Showing posts with label People are dumb. Show all posts
Showing posts with label People are dumb. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Monday, July 02, 2007
That's it for this planet...
So this weekend was a grocery shopping weekend for me. I’ve ranted about this before but I’m not someone who is very fond of grocery shopping. It is one of the tasks that I would most like to outsource (I’ve had an offshoring offer but the shipping costs from Bangalore are pretty harsh). It’s not as if I’m morally opposed to grocery shopping, more in that it is an hour of my life where I can’t multi-task even though I’ve been buying the exact same things every two weeks for several years.
So, while stumbling through the aisles on Saturday I came across the following and just stopped dead in my tracks. Just stared at it for minutes until I finally decided that I had to take a picture of it, as if to prove that it is not just a figment of my imagination. And yes, there it is, when someone asks me what marked the downfall of Western Civilization I’ll have an answer for them…
They’ve started to sell hot dogs in hot dog buns at the grocery store.
Think about this for a minute. Is the concept of a hot dog that challenging? Is the need to purchase both hot dogs and hot dog buns so confusing that they need to be combined? Maybe people just can’t figure out that they need to go to two separate parts of the store. Or, maybe the entire construction aspect of the hot dog is so mind-boggingly complex. I mean, the instruction manual basically reads Step 1: Take hot dog, Step 2: Place hot dog in bun. That’s obviously one step too many.
Seriously, I’ve never felt so ashamed to be a part of the human species. Apes would have the sense not to prepackage things like this. I know you could make the argument that this is for kids but if a kid can’t figure out how to put a hot dog in a bun he probably shouldn’t be allowed to operate a microwave. Hell, if you have to buy this stuff prepackaged would you even assume that you would have to cook them? I bet you eighty percent of the people who buy this eat it straight out of the package. If you can’t be bothered to take the effort to open a hot dog bun would you even wait the minute for it to heat up in the microwave?
Is there a better symbol for how soft we have gotten as a country than this? We’ve reached a point where even the simplest task has to be prepackaged for us. We can’t act for ourselves and we definitely can’t think for ourselves. Everything has to be pre-portioned into hermetically sealed bite sized packets. There’s no uniqueness anymore because uniqueness would require effort and that is just too tiring. We’ll just go off to the enormoplex to see our movies and the mega mart for our food and having the exact same life experience as everyone else while making the minimum amount of effort possible. If you see anyone buying these things in a grocery store just tell them to stop and look at themselves for five seconds. Encourage people to rejoin the human race.
Ok, I know that I promised that I’d talk about the Royals game as well but we must keep in mind that tonight is the 21st birthday of My Beloved Lindsay Lohan. So I’m off to the bar to celebrate as we must all raise a glass in honor of the greatest actress, nay the epitome of style, of her generation. Appletinis for everyone!
(And just think, now when I meet her we’ll be able to go to the bars without her needing a fake ID.)
So, while stumbling through the aisles on Saturday I came across the following and just stopped dead in my tracks. Just stared at it for minutes until I finally decided that I had to take a picture of it, as if to prove that it is not just a figment of my imagination. And yes, there it is, when someone asks me what marked the downfall of Western Civilization I’ll have an answer for them…
They’ve started to sell hot dogs in hot dog buns at the grocery store.
Think about this for a minute. Is the concept of a hot dog that challenging? Is the need to purchase both hot dogs and hot dog buns so confusing that they need to be combined? Maybe people just can’t figure out that they need to go to two separate parts of the store. Or, maybe the entire construction aspect of the hot dog is so mind-boggingly complex. I mean, the instruction manual basically reads Step 1: Take hot dog, Step 2: Place hot dog in bun. That’s obviously one step too many.
Seriously, I’ve never felt so ashamed to be a part of the human species. Apes would have the sense not to prepackage things like this. I know you could make the argument that this is for kids but if a kid can’t figure out how to put a hot dog in a bun he probably shouldn’t be allowed to operate a microwave. Hell, if you have to buy this stuff prepackaged would you even assume that you would have to cook them? I bet you eighty percent of the people who buy this eat it straight out of the package. If you can’t be bothered to take the effort to open a hot dog bun would you even wait the minute for it to heat up in the microwave?
Is there a better symbol for how soft we have gotten as a country than this? We’ve reached a point where even the simplest task has to be prepackaged for us. We can’t act for ourselves and we definitely can’t think for ourselves. Everything has to be pre-portioned into hermetically sealed bite sized packets. There’s no uniqueness anymore because uniqueness would require effort and that is just too tiring. We’ll just go off to the enormoplex to see our movies and the mega mart for our food and having the exact same life experience as everyone else while making the minimum amount of effort possible. If you see anyone buying these things in a grocery store just tell them to stop and look at themselves for five seconds. Encourage people to rejoin the human race.
Ok, I know that I promised that I’d talk about the Royals game as well but we must keep in mind that tonight is the 21st birthday of My Beloved Lindsay Lohan. So I’m off to the bar to celebrate as we must all raise a glass in honor of the greatest actress, nay the epitome of style, of her generation. Appletinis for everyone!
(And just think, now when I meet her we’ll be able to go to the bars without her needing a fake ID.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)