Our irritating nation
So finally… FINALLY… one brave city has stepped up and made it a crime to be annoying.
This is definitely a step in the right direction. But really, Brighton, Michigan has only done what the entire nation should have done back in 1979, before the 1980s blitzed with Human League and Boy George and Flock of Seagulls, desensitizing the populace so completely that Ryan Seacrest is able to be a star today. But it’s a bittersweet victory. I’m glad that assholes are no longer able to operate with impunity in Brighton, but all this story really does is remind me that douchebaggery has reached epic proportions in the rest of the nation, and that it is proceeding unimpeded.
I mean, look at MySpace. MySpace is proof that as much as 90% of the internet is populated by staggeringly annoying dickbags. When you’re in my shoes (which happen to be size 11 Nike Frees) you get people telling you that you need to be on MySpace. But my response remains, “I can’t do that because nobody is yet kicking me in the testicles with ice-climbing crampons until I relent.” And so I remain: on Facebook, on Twitter, and maybe even on LinkedIn if I remember right. But never on MySpace.
I have a longstanding rant about the massive assholery that is MySpace, but I can’t say it as well as Diesel of Mattress Police* said it in his book Antisocial Commentary:
“For those of you who aren’t tech-savvy, MySpace is an ‘online community’ that combines all the worst aspects the Internet into one difficult-to-use and horrifically ugly package. Bad web design; applications that don’t work properly; self-absorbed teenagers communicating in a barely coherent mélange of abbreviations, emoticons, and pop-culture clichés; an endless barrage of desperate singles ads; sexual predators looking for the aforementioned teenagers: MySpace has it all.”
Look: If you’re on MySpace and love MySpace and know all of your friends from MySpace and have pictures of yourself in a popped collar and orange tan making kissy faces to a soundtrack of the Jonas Brothers on MySpace, then this little rant is probably offending you. I could let that bother me and say something like Rodney Dangerfield said to Ted Knight in Caddyshack after defaming a hat that he didn’t know Knight was wearing (”Oh, it looks good on you, though!”), but instead I’m going to let it go because let’s face it: If you’re offended, you’re part of the 90%. You’re annoying.
And it’s time to come face-to-face with that fact, because you probably don’t even know it. It’s like I told this guy I know, who watches SpongeBob SquarePants with his kids and doesn’t understand why straightlaced Squidward doesn’t like the incredibly irritating title character. I told him, “If you don’t understand why SpongeBob is annoying, then congratulations: You’re the neighborhood SpongeBob.”
You. Annoying. Buttweasel.
I like the idea behind this new law. It draws a line in the sand and says that if you mime in public, you’re going to get fined. If you call someone “brah,” we’re not going to stand for it. No longer will we sit idly by while balding men attempt heroic combovers! We will not be slaves to the person who walks on the left; the co-worker who reads for a half-hour in the bathroom; the unfunny guy who laughs snortingly at his own jokes. We will not abide Morning Zoo radio shows!
But still, this is Brighton we’re talking about. And Brighton, home of a ski hill that used to be a massive landfill, is in Michigan.
The land of thieves.
Even though Robin and I steeled ourselves after enduring weirdoes in Michigan over Thanksgiving, they struck again when we went back over Christmas. At the same Borders book store, a woman stood three inches from my right shoulder and leafed through a magazine that was clearly in my possession. And she didn’t even take it. She just flipped pages, breathing heavily into my ear, until she was done. Apparently this is normal behavior in those parts.
Honestly, I don’t know if this new law could have helped me anyway. How difficult will it be to enforce? What is annoying? Is reading over someone’s shoulder in close quarters annoying? I think so. But to others, it may not be.
I mean, most of the world is annoying. American Idol is so irritating that it makes my uterus bleed: hundreds of thousand of deluded idiots singing formulaic bubblegum pop songs in front of an asshole Englishman, a fat black guy, and Randy Jackson. Yet, it’s incredibly popular. And you know who makes it popular? Other annoying people.
I have no conclusion for this post. I’m just going to end it with no ceremony. I realize how irritating and incomplete that is, but what are you going to do? Give me a ticket?
* If you dig the excerpt and the rest of Mattress Police, please visit this page and place your vote because it’s up for a Weblog award for Best Humor Blog. Although personally, I admit to being conflicted because The Bloggess is on the list, and she also makes me laugh so hard that I often pass kidney stones while reading. I’m going to have to ponder hard on this one.
Michigan, land of thieves
I hadn’t been to my mother’s house in Michigan for a while. Part of it was probably due to the fact that I work with her, and end up talking to her several times each week. Part of it is because she’s at our house semi-regularly to visit with her grandkids or to attend family events. Part of it is simply that as you get older, you tend to visit a bit less often.
But mostly, we haven’t visited because Michigan is filled with weirdoes and thieves.
Last Friday, we went to visit my mom and stepdad in order to get rid of our children. This was the first time that my daughter, Sydney, would be staying overnight, so we decided to compromise on our usual drop-off-for-the-weekend. Instead of leaving them, we’d stay too, in a small guest house. (Don’t go thinking they’re loaded. While comfortable and technically a guest house, the cabin is closer to “Unabomber shack” than it is to “Butler’s quarters.”) That way if things got ugly, we’d be right there to pretend that we couldn’t hear my mother pounding on the door.
But we still got our alone time. So on Friday night, Robin and I went to the Olive Garden — just the two of us. It was very quiet and we immediately realized we had no idea what to do with ourselves.
“So what are we supposed to talk about?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Robin replied.
After an extended period of time, the waitress stumbled over, announced that she “needed more wine,” took our drink order, and then stared at us for a while. Then she left. After another extended period of time, she returned with our drinks. Then she stared at us again and left.
One of the people behind Robin was talking about her favorite TV shows.
“Do you watch House? It’s about this doctor who has like a limp and he solves mysteries but nobody likes him but he’s so good that it doesn’t matter and he has like polio or something. And Wife Swap? It’s about these families who trade the mothers and they’re all totally weird like this one lady who was possessed by the devil or something and like ate fire and then there was this kid? Have you seen Heroes?”
The waitress returned. “Can I get you something to drink?” she asked.
“We already have drinks.”
She stood in place and stared at us. So we decided to start ordering food in her general direction and hope that in some part of her mind, she would recognize our verbalizations as valid inquiries for food.
I decided to call my mother to see how Sydney was doing. I could hear her in the background, screaming.
“She’s playing,” my mom announced.
But really, all I cared about was that she wasn’t “playing” with us for a change. It was nice to have a meal without being interrupted. However, halfway through my plate, the waitress arrived with a to-go box and attempted to shovel my food into it.
“I’m still eating that,” I told her.
She stared at me, then left.
Later, while we were sitting at the local Borders book store and reading, a woman walked up to the endtable between our chairs, moved our coffees, picked up one of Robin’s magazines, appraised it briefly, and walked off with it.
You can’t blame Michigan, though. They live so close to those shifty Canadians that descent into lives of thievery was almost a given.
My mom works with a Canadian man named Greg. I once spent a weekend in a Canadian lake house with a group that included Greg and his wife. Greg did not like the lake house. He was bored and didn’t enjoy the beach. He didn’t care much for quiet, or tranquility. He was too busy complaining about the slow cellular internet service.
“There’s a way you can get satellite high-speed for free, you know,” he chided my mother. “It’s the same with DirecTV. You used to be able to get Dish Network TV here, and you could rig it so that it’s free, but then they changed the way it was broadcast and so we had to switch to stealing DirecTV instead.”
I was intrigued. ” ‘We?’ ”
“You know, Canadians.”
Greg tapped a key angrily, mumbling. “The setup I have at home is so fast that you can get full DVDs in no time at all,” he said.
“I can’t figure out how to burn them,” I told him.
“It’s complicated because sometimes they put copyright protection on them. You have to find the programs to break the protection. It can take a long time. There are times that I really want a DVD or CD and I have to search for hours to find it for free somewhere, and then I end up having to get through some copyright bullshit. It’s really annoying.” He tapped a key angrily again.
“Why don’t you just… I don’t know… buy the DVD?”
Greg shook his head. “I can’t. It’s part of being Canadian. We always want to get stuff for free.” He gestured out the window. “Hell, most of these houses have satellite dishes on them. But look around; most are for services we don’t have in Canada. They’re stealing American signals.”
You learn something new every day. Apparently Canadians steal. It’s like that Seinfeld episode where Jerry learns that all old people steal. I wonder what it’s like to be an old Canadian? Museums in Calgary and Toronto must have dozens of safeguards to hold back the onslaught of geriatric catburglars. Like maybe staircases, or low toilets.
The rest of my time in Canada, I walked around with my hands in my pockets.
Back in Michigan, I called my mom again. In the background I could hear the sound of my daughter screaming.
“She’s listening to Boppa play the guitar,” she told me.
I visited the Borders bathroom. When I returned, Robin told me that several people had tried to steal my clearly-marked seat. Later, she went to the bathroom and more people did the same for her seat. It was like they were circling, looking for weakness. I wondered if they could smell fear.
When we returned to my mother’s house, my mom announced that Sydney had cried so much that she had exhausted herself and collapsed into hypoxia. The house was quiet. Satisfied, we headed out to the cabin for our first night of uninterrupted sleep in approximately sixteen thousand years, and it was good.
When we awoke, we had another 36 hours ahead of us in Michigan. Near Detroit, just a stone’s throw from Canada. I decided it would be prudent to put my wallet in my sock and hang my food from a high branch. You never know, and better safe than sorry. Thieves and bears are everywhere.