Back when I was shy, unassuming, and noticeably shorter, I received an invitation to join my school's debate team. After skimming it like the speedreader I was, I promptly discarded the flyer into the nearest trash can.  I thought to myself "Recycling will never catch on in states that don't pay!"  Naturally, my primary concern about joining the debate team had nothing to do with any apprehension toward arguing the finer points of international diplomacy, global warming, or the exhorbitant salaries of professional athletes.  No, I just don't like public speaking. Yes, present tense, because I haven't changed that much since in the past fourteen years: I'm still shy, unassuming, and I don't recycle.

[You know you're getting old when you can talk about how things were fourteen years ago.]

Irrational fear of public speaking aside, I still enjoy a watching a debate.  I can argue, too, but if you've been reading my blog for even a week, you can surmise that I'm not the arguing type.  There just aren't enough issues that'll cause me to be upset enough to convince you that you're wrong.  I'm about as likely to debate most things as you are to drive through a "do not enter" section of a one-way street:

"So, I think the legal age of consent should be sixteen, in all states."
"Yeah, well I've honestly never thought about that a day in my life.  And shhh, Sportscenter is on."

That's me, in a lively and heated debate.  Can't you tell?  Yet another reason why I'll never run for office:  not enough time for Sportscenter.

I'm not a fan of arguing until my heart rate skyrockets for a topic over which I have no control beyond having my own opinion, but I sure like to see other people do it.  They seem to like triggering the onset of a heart attack; I can think of better activities that have the same effect.  Now, far be it from me to gain much enjoyment watching other people fight, but I'll make an exception for the portion of the heated debate that is not-so-academic as it is personal and unstructured.  It's that part of an argument - especially between people who dislike each other, or don't have much life experience - when the facts have been uncovered and discussed (or ignored) - and now it's time for name-calling; argumentum ad hominem, galore.  No more statistics, Gallup poll fndings,  or "Well, in my experience..." or even "My brother always says..."

I remember one time in law school, I was shooting the 6 ball into a side pocket at some college bar I'll never visit again, when some debate ensued over... something like... whether John Kerry's supposedly cold-hearted intellectualism would make for bad diplomacy (really, people argue this in their free time, and not even for course credit).  A friend walked up to me asking what was going on:

Yo, what's this about, over here?"
"Well, not only am I having the pool game of my life, but those two having a political discussion while drinking.  Must be an election year."
"Aw, man, that's mistake number one. That's worse than going home with a stranger the same day as a bad break-up!"
"You're telling me.  Hey, I think you're just in time for one of them to insult the other's family. It's all downhill, after that."
"Yeah, I think one of them just said 'your face' or was it 'your mom'? It was one of those. Buy her a drink!"

Why do people resort to name-calling and the like in a discussion over conflicting opinions that are really of no consequence to anyone but the holders of those opinions?

Am I the only one who doesn't think agreeing to disagree is a sign of weakness of conscience or inability to persuade?

Really, though, I'm just terrified of public speaking, that's why I'm not a litigator; otherwise, I could be that guy on Law & Order making defense witnesses cry in court.  I'm capable of bringing out the feelings in people who have them.  Serious.

In other news, "Your Mom" is a fine prosecutor, these days.  It must be that she decided to have her drinks after arguing.

TheBigShowAtUD©

As kids, my sister and I would watch evening television shows with Mom.  Every night, though, she'd put us to bed earlier than we thought other kids had to go to bed.  I think was nine years old before I learned that television shows continued after The Cosby Show.  I definitely remember being thirteen when I asked my eighth grade friends in gym class "Did you guys know that the news comes on, AGAIN, at eleven o'clock?  Crazy!" (they knew, and they felt sorry for me). 

We'd often see bad commercials that left us wondering what was being advertised.  Shaking her head, Mom would look at us and say, "You two could make a better commercial than that one."  My sister and I would look at each other and wonder if she was praising our creative potential, or if the commercial was so bad that two children could do a better job.  We're still unsure. 

That's why I should be an ad executive or copywriter in my next life.  Having learned a few persuasion techniques in this life, I'll convince people that most ads are often too clever for their own good.  The purpose of advertising is to sell a product or a service; not to make me laugh or think "Oooh, that's creative!  Does SHE come with it?!" and then forget it two commercials later.  Commercials fail when they don't make me want to buy whatever the product or service is.  Imagine this conversation during a Monday Night Football game:


"Ha, look, it's that UPS guy drawing stick figures on that whiteboard."

"Yeah, this is my favorite commercial, ever."

"And, this is the best part... it's animated."

"That is so cool.  Oh hey, dude, don't forget to drop off that stuff at the Fed Ex box, down the street."

Low-cost shipping fail.

That's why I'll make ads that get results.  Imagine you've had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day:  Your Xanga traffic is down, no one is voting for your featured weblog submission, you didn't get a mini for your birthday, and your best friend just changed her Facebook relationship status to "It's Complicated" - without telling you, first!  That trollop!  You're sitting there at home, dejected, asking  Revelife "Why me?!" but then comes my obnoxiously loud WIDGET commercial, as a sign from [your favorite deity, the scientific method, or intellectual reasoning]. 

With every widget comes a truckload of promises to make you feel like a winner: your classmates will stop saying "That's what she said!" after everything you say; the love interest you never talk to will tell a friend to tell your friend to give you a note saying that you smell really good, today; and you'll be able to read it til your heart's content, because the field hockey team will stop shoving you into your locker before gym class.  Now, you can stop scaring your parents with obsessive violent video game-playing, all because you just want some real control in your life.

You'll jump up from your Goodwill couch and say "THAT'S WHAT MY LIFE IS MISSING!  A FREAKING WIDGET!"  What's a widget?  I don't know either, but having one will change your life, making you the envy of your school.  And - most importantly - Kanye will let you finish. 

[Can't think of a good ending that doesn't rhyme with "lamesauce."  10,000 credits, if you can.]

TheBigShowAtUD©

Flipping the pages of my new atlas, today, I realized that I can do a better job of meeting more types of people than I currently know.  Carmen SanDiego ought to be a model for us all; globe-trotter and international woman... er, person... of mystery that she is.   Her life is an admirable one, you know, minus the part about stealing artifacts and landmarks and living the international criminal fugitive lifestyle.  But let's assume that she was once just an enormously curious world-traveler, with a sultry voice that makes you want to catch her, and not turn her over to the authorities.  Mmmmmm, aiding and abetting.... no, still not worth it.

Unfortunately, my cultural experience leaves much to be desired.  That's why I've decided to pursue more experience with people who are different than I am and the people I've ever met, thus far - and I don't mean fans of Internet chat rooms.  My extended family includes black and white Americans, and native Americans, but that's it.  And considering, all of the peoples of the world, that's less than scratching the surface, as it were.  Besides that, I had a filipino roommate in my second year of law school (read:  not that long ago), and he was the first Asian person I had ever met.  Not surprisingly, the bulk of my experiences with other cultures is largely culinary.

"Mmm, these burritos taste like Mexico City."
"Matthew, have you ever BEEN to Mexico City?"
"No, but I watch PBS.  Mexico City is right here, in this floured tortilla, dripping with sour cream."
"In Mexico, sour cream isn't used on everything like it is, here."
"If I knew more Spanish, beyond what it took to order this, I'd warn you against raining on my cultural parade, chica."
"Uh huh.  Chica?"
"See?  I try."

It's too bad this sort of "cultural sensitivity" isn't a resume skill.  If it were, I'd have no trouble seeking new employment at a place where people appreciate my attempts to connect with people different than I am.

"Chinese food, again?"
"Yes, authentic, you know.  My choices were this, Burger King, or Panera.  It didn't take long to decide that bagel sandwiches aren't man-food, so here I am."
"And this is authentic, huh?"
"Why, yes.  It's got rice, soy sauce, and came in this lovely box with a dragon on it.  A dragon, Marcy.  And, look, several packs of duck sauce made from real ducks.  Asian ones, I hope."
"Mmmm, none of that makes it authentic."
"What if an Asian guy made it?"
"No."
"It takes a special person to take the fun out of eating, you know that?"
"See?  I try."

It reminds me of the time my parents told me about their date at a soul food restaurant owned by Koreans.

"Korean collard greens and cornbread, huh?  Sounds spicy."
"Matthew, be nice.  Cultural insensitivity may be common, but it's still bad."
"Well Mom, I'm my father's son, too, you know.  I have room to grow, I think."
"Thank God for that."
"Thanks, Mom.  Your cup of kindness runneth over."

I guess knowing is half the battle, isn't it?  "Culturally-ignorant" won't be on my tombstone.

TheBigShowAtUD©

A common thread among the handful of decent motivational literature I've read is the emphasis on the principle that there's plenty of room at the top.  Most people are stuck in or settled around the middle, but definitely not at the top.  I see why.  Between fmylife.com and the proliferation of demotivational posters, there seems to be a huge fixation the "hilarity" of failure more so than the pleasure of success.  Children in other developed countries may be more advanced in their educations, but the President should be half-way pleased to know that our children - for as much as they may fail to learn by the time they're adolescents -  can properly spell words like "anxiety," "dopamine," and "Xanax." 

Welcome to the Facepalm Generation, where entertainment means watching others fail, and being terribly nervous to one day suffer the same fate.

There's more advice on how not to do things than on how to achieve desirable results.  I suppose if there are only a few ways to do a thing right, it's easier to describe, ad nauseum, the million ways there must be to fail at it.  I'd like to say that such advice is comical, but there's so much of it that those who follow it and those who study it must be serious.  If this describes you, then I have the perfect laboratory for your ongoing "research."

If any of you dreams of winning a Nobel Prize (that would undo the focus on failure, now wouldn't it?), I have the social science project for you.  Let my office be your laboratory.  Several of my coworkers can serve as your PETA-approved lab mice... er... highly-intelligent test subjects.  Worry not about compensating them for their time, for they have far too much of it, and managing it is not a concept they know.  Besides, someone around here pays them money for what they do, so they have plenty for daily vending machine raids and funding weekends of alcohol and bad judgment.  Mid-week antics, you know.  It would be too much to expect them to wait for the weekends.

At work, they limit their not-focused-on-winning-in-life time to the usual distracting forwarded emails and kitchenette gatherings to argue the healthiness of non-iced pop tarts.  No sooner than three hours ago, while waiting for an elevator, one of them turned to me and said:

"You know, I was wondering.  How are they all pornstars?  I mean, "stars" would imply that they're famous, right, but the less-famous ones should be called something else, otherwise, that waters down the title, doesn't it?  It kind of bothers me to think about it."

"Really?  Your life is going to so well, and all of your fundamental needs are so well-met, that this is keeping you up at night?  The proper nomenclature of less-famous porn actors?"

"What's 'nomenclature'?"

"GET ON THE ELEVATOR!"

That's why many of them, unless on an elevator, won't reach the top... not the top of Everest, nor the top bunk at summer camp.  Their focus is on things other than succeeding.  Really, though, I don't have a mind creative enough to make this up.  Believe me, I'd brag about it and blog more often if I did. 

As Mom often says "sometimes, the truth is so bad that a lie would only serve to diminish its shock value."

Amen to that.

TheBigShowAtUD©

I'm not much of a team player. 

My report cards never said "plays well with others."  I preferred playing games that only one person could win.  If I won, I could make everyone else solve my favorite riddle: "Only one person can win.  I'm the winner.  Therefore, what does that make you?!"  Mean, I know.  Then, Mom would get a call from Billy's mother asking why she raised such an obnoxious child.  Naturally, she didn't like Billy's mother any more than I did, because everyone knows the correct verb is "reared."  Duh.  Nevertheless, she'd always try to find fault with me.  "Matthew," she'd say, "winning doesn't mean you can be a jerk."  But, like a senile federal judge, I strenuously objected to this line of sage reasoning.  It just made too much sense.  "YES, IT DOES," I reminded her,  "Winners do what they want, including reminding the not-winners that they didn't win."  That's when she'd look at me sternly; her eyes declaring that I ought to change my mind, immediately.  Just when I started to be a gracious winner, Dad taught me to play Monopoly.  The merits of being a humble champion were lost on me faster than you could say "Go Directly to Jail."

When I was older, I avoided classes involving group projects and class participation.  They were never my style, just like viral Xanga surveys that requiring tagging other people.

But, being that it's fall, it's time to turn over a new leaf, as it were.  You're saying "How can this be?!  It's too early for a New Year's Resolution."  You're right, but just like a resolution, I'll probably do this just once, and then revert back to my old ways, but without the guilt.  Actually, Authentic_Black_Dragon tagged me to do this.  He and I go way back, and you just don't not-do what a dragon says.  Ask the bad guys Bruce Lee injured.  They learned the hard way, but I'm smarter.

So, without further ado (because I sometimes over-do the ado), find the one lie among the eight truths.  If you happen to get lucky and guess correctly (yeah, right), I'll do something really outstanding that I'm offering only because I doubt you'll win.  Don't call Mom and tell her I'm a jerk, if you lose.


1.  Check out my passport:  I've got customs stamps from Scotland, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti.  College missions trips, you know.

2.  Oprah and I once made eye contact in downtown Chicago.

3.  When I was in fifth grade, I saw Michael Jordan play.  In that game, he was horrible.  If not for that Come Fly With Me video in 1990, I'd have never been a fan after seeing him, in person.

4.  In law school, I went to a Halloween party as Ricardo Tubbs (the black guy on Miami Vice).  Unfortunately, everyone thought I was Lenny Kravitz.  Fail.

5.  My favorite restaurant is The Cheesecake Factory.  However, I don't like cheesecake, so I just call it "The Factory."  People know what I mean.

6.  I have an autographed copy of Michael Jackson's Thriller.  Too bad I don't have a record player.

7.  I used to watch Grey's Anatomy.  Not to win the affections of a girl, mind you, but because I liked Sandra Oh that much.

8.  I also occasionally watch programs on CSPAN, but I think The History Channel is over-rated. 

9.  I'll be in New York City, this weekend.  And even though Law & Order: SVU is just a television show, I'm seriously afraid of traveling the wrong way on a Manhattan subway, and ending up dead in a deserted alley near Central Park.  You're all witnesses as to where I was before I went missing.  Call the authorities if I haven't blogged again by this time on Friday.

Good luck finding the lie.  You've already lost.

TheBigShowAtUD©