VIP

Everyone wants to feel important, don't they? Everyone wants to carry weight in the mind of others. It's just something all people desire. No one wants to be perceived as unimportant (although there are a few folks who are so good at it, you have to wonder if they're actually aiming for insignificance). Feeling important is important.

But, oh, throw the adverb "very" in front of "important" and it's a whole new ballgame. It's like a phrase that signifies an echelon sought by most but attainable to few. Once the "very" is tacked on, "important" is no longer a feeling but a social status. People lose their friggin' sense for it.

Very Important People require very important things -- like very important areas, very important entrances, and very important company. An insecure state of mind needs such reaffirmations.

Take red carpets and velvet ropes -- they're hardly just tacky cinema décor or items that can be found next to the zebra-print couch in your sleazy bachelor pad brimming with polyester and shag. Lord, no, they're segregators of privilege, showcases of rank. They snobbishly declare that you, Mr. Tall-Dark-and-Handsome, may step right this way, but please step aside, Mr. Bland-Scruffy-and-Mediocre.

Maybe the most quizzical dimension of this notion of VIP is that the value in being held in VIP regard isn't found in what you get to eat, where you get to sit, or where you're allowed to park, but instead the access to those things. You know, just the fact that you have a privilege that others can merely observe but not partake. That faaaaar outweighs all the bestowed "betters" -- the better tastes, the better views, the better service, etc. People want that social status imprinted across their forehead, large and legible for all to read and recognize. That's the point of VIP: not what you get but what you feel.

A perfect example: At any given professional sports team facility, there's at least one bar or area of bars that's reserved strictly for ticketholders deemed VIP. Those tickets are hot sales -- who doesn't want to be part of the ultra limited inclusion of invitees to the guarded bar? And then walk in there and find what? That, well, it's a bar -- a bar with dimmer lighting, slightly sleeker wall fixtures, stringy copper plants that aren't really plants, and higher-priced beer. The big win here? That I have access and you don't. Cool, thanks for the admission.

The V, the I, and the P are just marketing tactics, guys. The allure is fictionalized. I've been behind the velvet ropes and the tinted doors before -- the food ain't that much tastier. Sure, the interior design is less IKEA and there are fewer peopleofwalmart.com patrons inside, but all you bought was a fleeting state of mind that essentially means nothing.

I guess it's all in what you classify as important. And very important.

B-sides, vol. 6

Yep, you guessed it, some more "Takes on Life" quickies not worthy of a full version:

• Remember those old, recurring Looney Tunes cartoon props? A huge, red rocket; a glass cutter; a box with a spring-loaded, fist-clinched boxing glove? I loved 'em. The fictional distributor of these animated common goods was Acme, but I have no idea where their existence and design was stereotyped. I mean, when was the last time you saw an actual red-painted, white-tipped, U-shaped magnet? Me? Oh, about the last time I came across a long-wicked black bomb shaped like a bowling ball/hockey puck hybrid.


• In speaking of Looney Tunes, I always thought as a little Claude that you could in fact pick yourself up by your shirt collar or the scruff of your own neck, as depicted by Bugs Bunny and friends. I tried this several times in the house -- and failed. I also thought you could actually burrow a treaded circle in your floor if you paced around long enough. I also tried this several times in the house -- and failed. Needless to say I thankfully grew too discouraged to ever try running off a cliff and testing my ability to suspend and return to the cliff before realizing my impending doom.


• I often hear people wondering aloud if God has a sense of humor. I don’t know, the fact that we lose hair where we want hair and gain hair where we don’t want hair seems like a pretty good sign to me.


• If being obese was considered attractive and healthy, how awesome and delicious would life be?


• Recently, while driving on the interstate, I saw a digital, flashing message board that read "Distracted driving is deadly driving" in scrolling text. Oh, you mean like trying to read a warning on a digital, flashing message board that also uses scrolling text while driving?


• I wonder if any Jehovah's Witnesses have one of those "No Soliciting" signs above a door to their house.


• We are such a nosy bunch of people, man. Whenever there's a car accident, traffic stalls. Why? Not because the mangled cars are in traffic's way, but because all the drivers in the traffic want to ogle the damage. They need that payoff glance, so much so that they're willing to perpetuate the delay for all -- as if they've never seen a car accident before. You know, it'd be one thing if the drivers were actually looking to see if any help was needed, but, nah, they just want to tap their brakes, survey the carnage, and hurriedly rush back to 80 MPH. It's like a tour of Christmas lights in the park suddenly popped up on the freeway. I actually make a concerted effort to not look if at all possible. What emergency response teams should do is bring out an enormous curtain stand with the ambulance to wrap around the entire scene like a surgery room so that there's nothing to see.

Halloween

If I may be unapologetically honest, I've really grown disappointed with how holidays have evolved. Commercialism and political correctness have successfully soured everything that was ever fun and personal about any choice holiday.

Except Halloween.

Halloween is one "holiday" that has actually benefited from the marketed hype. It's a day to not be taken seriously in any regard. With free candy, ridiculous costumes, a celebration of pseudo-sadism, and for many an excuse to combine "cute" with "slutty as humanly possible," All Hallows Eve is no longer a day of evil spirits and endless fear but rather just a running gag. It's a day that makes fun of itself -- a self-deprecating joke that never gets old.

That is why Halloween is phenomenal: it will never run out of steam because it only gets more absurd each year. And in Halloween's case, absurdity is the lasting tradition.

Take for example my grocery shopping trip on Halloween this year. While I'm pushing a cart of frozen pizzas around, I scoot past the following costumed people: a black cat, a Bob Ross imposter, and a very obese person in very, very short jorts. (Check that -- I'm not entirely certain that last one was a costume.) And my fellow shoppers' reactions? Complete nonchalance. There is no other calendar day where this happens. Wear an ultra-low-cut Rainbow Brite outfit on October 31 and you're hilarious and curiously sexy; wear it on November 1 and you're a sociopathic whore. And that's the beauty of it. You get one day annually to look, dress, and act as big a fool as your imagination can devise, and the general response from any given passerby is total tolerance. Suddenly the typical freaks are customary and the typically customary are freaks -- and lame.

Imagine working the 11pm-3am shift at Taco Bell or White Castle on Halloween night. Could that not be the greatest gig? Employees must fight for that shift. If I worked there, I'd put in my request for that shift around July. Of the previous year. Think of all the celebrity impersonators, fake blood, outlandish wigs, overflowing cleavage, and costumed innuendos -- most of which reek of booze and other influencing pastimes -- you'd encounter all night. Something about a guy in zombie flesh paint and a mullet made of horse hair sincerely trying to order a beef and bean burrito strikes me as endless entertainment and far better than any Halloween throwdown I've been to.

Which leads me to a shrewd, marketable suggestion to all the late-night joints: throw a Halloween party. Think about that, an all-out Halloween bash at your local Waffle House. Man, they wouldn't be able to cook the batter fast enough.

B-sides, vol. 5

Some "Takes on Life" quickies not worthy of a full version that hit me while on a road trip recently:

• What is the intrinsic interest in adult bookstores when driving on the interstate? Why does everyone feel compelled to look over at the big neon "ADULT" sign and the loudly painted aluminum-sided edifice as they pass by? It's astonishing to me, because I -- and seemingly every other driver and passenger around me -- do this without failure, and usually without commenting. We say nothing; we just look over curiously and nonchalantly. I'm not sure what we expect to see (a spontaneously naked woman running out of the store with sex toys waving in hand, perchance?), but they are definitely eye magnets. Try driving past an adult bookstore one day without looking over. Feels weird, really weird. Unnatural, even.


• There are three types of purveyors of unforgivable evil in this world: terrorists, rapists, and late-mergers in traffic. Seriously, who or what is more despicably sinister than someone who bombs innocent people, someone who forever corrupts the mind and body of another person with graphic nonconsensual force, and someone who flies ahead of all patient drivers by using a highway median, shoulder, or every square inch of the tapering lane because they're too important to wait out the construction or accident cleanup, only to somehow nudge his way into the narrowest of spaces between bumpers? Although there actually is logical rationale for waiting until the last minute to merge into a line of cars (the line will in fact be shorter and somewhat more streamlined), I can assure you with all that is sacred in my life that that is not the guy's reason for his NASCAR move. It's the most selfish non-criminal act I can think of. The hazardousness of the hurried move aside, we all want this guy to suffer like the rest of us. ...Perhaps the fourth type in this list is the sap who ends up letting this late-merger over.


• If during a breast cancer awareness convention a man unexpectedly comes to the stage and speaks about another form of cancer -- say, prostate cancer -- I wonder if he would be applauded or booed. If booed, would that be an appropriate reaction? I mean, cancer is cancer, and awareness of cancer is awareness in general, and a cure for cancer is just that, so... why segregate? Let the dude speak!

Ringtones

I've had the same cell phone for three years now. The once-impeccable, once-ground-breaking camera feature snaps only blurred, poorly pixilated pictures due to an unknown injury sustained by the lens at some point; one keypad button is finally beginning to not function properly, requiring multiple attempts to enter a '3'; and while others' phones come equipped with topographical maps of any geographical coordinate in the world, my cell phone's big bragging right is its E-Z Tip Calculator feature, which computes (1) simple money-related math that could be done by any fourth-grader and (2) the same answers for the same math problems that you could have used the regular calculator feature for. Its digital face and diminutive size are about the only things keeping it from being mistaken for a "Saved by the Bell" prop.

However, it gains my respect with its very limited selection of ringtones. All I have are the basics: the standard cell phone ring, a few more uptempo versions of the standard cell phone ring, and something that vaguely resembles the "Happy Birthday" song, I suppose to pathetically and self-righteously garner congratulatory wishes for your day-long celebration with every call received in that 24-hour period.

Personally, I like the standard cell phone ringtone. Why? Because it sounds like a cell phone ringtone. When someone calls me, I can't confuse it for a jack-in-the-box or a youth group trip to the roller rink.

I know this makes me unpopular, but, man, I despise those Top-40 ringtones. It's one of those creative, marketable ideas someone came up with and acted on without first experimenting with it in public. There's no 12-second snippet of any song's chorus that sounds good coming out of a Canadian dime-size speaker. And hearing the same, sudden blitzkrieg of noise repeat three to five times per call wears me out. And it's not even my cell phone on my hip -- I'm just the victimized bystander to the onslaught of noise pollution. I have no idea how that doesn't get on the owner's nerves for each call. Doesn’t the novelty diminish by the third phone call?

I suppose if we were in a club, or it was 1989 and we were playing basketball on a concrete court with chain nets, the ringtone would match the atmosphere. But the "ringtune" and the atmosphere agree maybe 2% of the time; otherwise, it sounds tackier than words can describe. Think of the last time you heard a random chorus blare from a cell phone in/at one of the following locations: church, class, work (especially a meeting), library, wedding, funeral, movie theater, restaurant, or anywhere wooded or outdoorsy. Tell me your blood didn't immediately curdle with animosity at the annoyance of that ringtone. And you're kidding yourself if you say the annoyance isn't worse when it's an actual song fragment.

As if I needed yet another reason to not like the Black Eyed Peas.

Ice Cream Trucks

Allow me, please, to once again find my perch atop my all-too-new old man soapbox, for some terrible carousel tune from afar reminded me the other day of the growing difference between generations, primarily the ever-widening gap between what was once never questioned and is now questionable at best.

For my generation, the ice cream trucks (which actually haven't been trucks for decades but rather retired Dodge church vans with a demented clown's face tattooed on the side) were the trustworthy godsends to summer break afternoons. They drove in like the Messiah on His white horse, redeeming all dollar-bill wavers from the tyrannical grip of the sweltering summer heat. They arrived in style, belting friendly chimes and donning tasty colors that matched the frozen treats they delivered. Like clockwork, the trucks came ringing with sugary refreshments at the most opportune moments, as if their drivers were watching us kids play neighborhood tackle football and sounded the alarm when they saw the game conclude. (Here's to hoping that wasn't actually the case.)

I can only imagine how much better it was for the generations before me, when milkmen and non-suicidal mailmen also visited the neighborhoods.

Now... eh, not so much.

The ice cream truck situation is just creepy today. For several reasons, really. The recent times that I've seen a truck ding-donging around are closer to bedtime than snack time. What are they doing driving around selling Klondike bars after 9 PM? Suppers have been supped. Desserts have been supped. Leave our streets alone now. And these "trucks" are deteriorating by the week; perhaps this is because a sign of success for the ice cream truck business is lasting longer than the first vehicle, so the drivers try to give the impression of success to their fellow ice cream truck-driving comrades by wearing the crap out of that first vehicle. Just a thought.

Those drivers are starting to mirror the roughness of their trucks, too, aren't they? I'm not saying I'd invite any of the ice cream men to play backyard Wiffle ball with us back in my childhood days, but I never felt unsafe around them. Now, I don't doubt a bit it's largely in part due to the rampant pedophiliac turn the news has taken in the past decade, but the idea of a stranger driving a vehicle stocked full with children's chocolaty delights around, targeting this innocent, uninformed demographic, nowadays is a shade unsettling. I mean, the ice cream man is driving a tackle box of bait for eager, helpless children. And it's hard for a parent or otherwise superior to be expected to supervise each extracurricular neighborhood activity, so what shinier opportunity could there be for a child-loving lunatic?

It's really too bad that the ice cream truck deal has lost nearly all of its allure. They were pretty cool, pun inten--

Wait, is that "The Farmer in the Dell" on a xylophone I hear outside?

I gotta go, I'm sorry...

B-sides, vol. 4

Yes, that's right, still more various "Takes on Life" quickies not worthy of a full version:

• I think we tend to give too much culinary credit to the people in our lives whom we call "the best cook I know" because usually they're making the same foods we make ourselves, only they're merely substituting the main, typical ingredient for something incredibly obscure (e.g. fish enchiladas, chicken burgers, pasta with a red wine sauce rather than a marinara sauce, etc.) or just using double the butter and cooking everything bland but nutritious out of the food. It's not that these people are unbelievable cooks but rather regular cooks who make a particular dish uniquely. You're unbelievable when you throw a bunch of items in a bowl I would have never dreamt up combining and create something entirely original and its taste makes me feel like I'm going down a slip-n-slide naked into a pool of Jell-O cubes.


• The inventor of those laser pointer pens should be thrown in jail for crafting a device that resulted in at least 10 annoying situations for every 1 functional situation. Who didn't see the laser pointers going in that direction? You can't give the public free rein with a pocket-size device that shoots a red dot and expect them to not hide in crowds while aiming it on people's eyes and crotches.


• Sometimes my only motivation for completing my gym workout is the thought of rewarding myself with a pizza for dinner, essentially negating all wholesome deeds I just performed for an hour and a half. I'll actually catch myself trying to cut deals with myself, like, "Look, Claude, if you do 10 more reps, we'll celebrate over a large Hawaiian pizza tonight, cool?"


• Trying to describe my level of disdain for a person who is too lazy and disrespectful to not pee on a toilet seat AND not flush afterwards is like trying to play a word in Scrabble when I have 'J,' 'Q,' 'X,' and 'Z' tiles and no vowels: I'd really, really like to -- believe me -- but unfortunately it just doesn't seem possible.


• I don't care how many songs of theirs you can play on your guitar, lyrics of theirs you can sing from memory, or T-shirts with their logo you own -- don't say you're a real fan of the band if you spell their name "Led Zeplin." Or "Led Zeppilin." Or "Led Zepellin." Or "Lead Zepelin."


• Whenever a news station shows a video clip of a plane dumping that red powder on a blazing forest fire, I find myself suddenly yearning for a pack of Fun Dip powder candy with one of those chalky, white lick sticks.


• You may hear someone described as a "miser," a "cheapskate," a "penny-pencher," or a "cheap bastard," but you’ll never again in your life hear or read anyone described as a "niggard." That word is officially done, man. I almost felt guilty halfway through typing it.

B-sides, vol. 3

Yep, even more various "Takes on Life" quickies not worthy of a full version:

• The fact that there are more than one "Definitive Collection" compilation album of Michael Jackson tells me that someone's lying.


• Call me 12 years old, but it takes everything within me to not laugh uproariously whenever someone is described as being "anal." Seriously, let's just retire any non-anatomical use of that word.


• If your pants have belt loops and you're not wearing a belt, just who the F do you think you are? I mean, really. Put an effin' belt on, even if you have no legitimate need for it.


• How can an item of clothing fit so well in a store, look so good on you in a mirror, but then look no better than a trash bag with sleeves the first time you wear it? It's a retail conspiracy, I tell ya.


• Anyone who uses iTunes will understand me when I say, back off, iTunes! I'll update you when I feel like an update bigger than a new line of text coding is necessary. Until then, just sit there in the corner of my desktop and keep your mouth shut. You're starting to make me wish we didn't begin a relationship in the first place.


• Let's give it up for the firefighters who have to show up at a college time and time again at all hours of the night, each suited up in God knows how many pounds of gear, with fire engines and full-blown lights and sirens, knowing darn well that nothing more than an old, senile smoke alarm battery or a lit candle is responsible. At those moments, they must be momentary misanthropes -- you can tell by their under-the-breath grumbling and lethargic, un-urgent meandering across the campus. Who could blame them? If a college fire alarm system signals help, firefighters should be able to ask, "But has anyone actually seen a fire? Because we'd really like to not wake up right now. Let us know when there's smoke."


• Wearing a seatbelt should probably be an immediate indicator that we weren't really created with the intention to do whatever it is we're doing that warrants the use of a seatbelt.


• How can sand feel so good to your feet but feel so awful anywhere else on your body? It's so soothing between your toes, yet it's like jagging thumbtacks on any other area. Sand has this uncanny ability to find a resting place in every bodily nook and crevice, whether your pits, nostrils, ears, or [use your imagination here]. And regardless of how much sand you think you've rinsed off yourself before leaving the beach, you'll still find it tumbling in your dryer a month later.


• What moron thought of saloon doors? What inefficient carpentry and architectural design those were... It's like someone started making an actual door and then halfway through said, "Eh, screw it." I mean, even tumbleweed that moseyed in underneath was laughing at it.

B-sides, vol. 2

More various "Takes on Life" quickies not worthy of a full version:

• Is prison really that bad? You get free food, free clothes, a free gym, and a free place to lay your head. That seems pretty good. If they'd let prisoners wear whatever they want, I'd probably go kill someone right now.


• I would think the dumbest way to protest something is by setting yourself on fire. Why do people do this? Is this accomplishing something? I mean, if anything, I, your opposition, would probably feel a little victorious thinking, "Alright, there goes one more person against us."


• As I drive by people's houses and observe their scattered lawn ornaments, I can't help but wonder what internally triggers someone to proudly litter his/her yard with such shamefully hideous plastic toys and stone structures. Why would you do this to yourself and your yard? Garden signs, gazing balls, gnomes, flamingos... What did your yard do to deserve this? Sure, a fountain here and a statue there is fine, but several front lawns look like they're constantly celebrating the most God-forsaken holiday all year. The residents are like those people who force their pathetic pets to wear sweaters, only it's their lawn who is the unlucky recipient of its owner's unabashed taste for tackiness. I'm personally embarrassed for the yard. It's never a good sign when, on any given day, your house can be mistaken for having a yard sale.


• On a similar note, aren't bird baths and bird houses an open, cordial invitation for any and all birds to come poop all over your territory?


• Does it strike anyone else odd that all old people drive huge cars? I'm talking big ol' Buicks, Cadillacs, Lexuses -- you know the ones I'm talking about. It's like the more dangerous we become as drivers, the more massive the weapon we get in which to steer.


• If our elbows are wrinkly, shouldn't our knees be, too? Think about it.


• Politicians: You have got to stop dancing. One, it never turns out well; if you're a politician caught dancing on camera for any reason -- unless it's your inaugural party (and, really, dancing at that event should be omitted for these reasons) -- you will be subjected to mass ridicule, and no matter your patriotism, service to country, or acts of charity, your legacy will forever be cemented by your dancing clip accumulating hits on YouTube. Two, it's a direct contradiction against what we elected you to do: read bills, vote, and be wooden.

Speed Bumps

I have a degree in English, so I don't attempt to project that I know a great deal about civil engineering. I respect the mosaic of science, math, and indeed art that it is and produces. But I will say that much of civil engineering seems to stem from and correlate with social engineering. There's a lot of sociology and psychology poured in with the concrete in the cement truck's rotating mixer.

When you think about how many of our decisions in a day involve driving, traffic, signals, and yelling alone in our metal contraptions with windows rolled up, you realize the startling amount of our lives that are directly or otherwise controlled by civil engineers. It's a pretty powerful vocation. So much so that we all at one point or another try to fool ourselves and others that we totally could and should be one.

This is why we have speed bumps.

Without statistical data, I would bet that most speed bumps are not products of an engineer's blueprints or a scientist's studies but rather a regular citizen's outcry for control over human behavior. It's that "electric" idea that comes either immediately after or as a result of multiple experiences over time with someone else’s speeding violation. "Hey, people are speeding here, so lay a speed bump down." Speed bumps are the mindless solution to all parking lot/driveway speeding issues. To prevent people going over eight miles per hour, we have convinced ourselves that the perfect fix is to simply throw a long, miniature blacktop mountain range across the lane.

I'm sorry, speed bumps are the single most overused, most inane, most irritable copout of an endeavor to control behavior. If they slow traffic, they create a nuisance; if they are too high, they scrape cars' undercarriage; if they are too low, they influence nothing; if they are too wide, they hardly slow traffic but do create a nuisance and do scrape cars' undercarriage. And they all give the stink eye to a vehicle'’s suspension. They're basically punishment to all for the behavior of a few.

Look, it's simple really: people are going to speed. People are just going to drive at the miles-per-hour they feel comfortable -- speed bumps or no speed bumps. Rid the world of its speed bumps, folks! Quit trying to play traffic god. The parking lot is not your sanctuary. Unless of course you're homeless.