Sauntering into 2014


Bender

So I tore through a six hundred page novel, three football games, and two seasons of Breaking Bad over the weekend.

When my wife got home from visiting her friend, the first thing she said was "Thanks for the pile of dishes." and "Has Calvin been wearing the same clothes for three days?"

The answer was yes and no.

They were the same clothes, but there was a point where he had put on jammies, I just didn't notice that he had put the same clothes back on from the day before.

Had he been kidnapped somewhere between the 49ers defeating the Cardinals and Walter White's third new windshield, I would have been hard pressed to tell the responding officer what clothes he had been wearing or really even what he looked like or what he answered to. I'm sure on some level this makes me a terrible parent, but I can't be asked to remember everything especially when the Cowboys are still trying to move the chains in the air when they have a top three running back and they're up against a terrible defense. (Although, I really dig Chip Kelly's approach, so I gots a little mancrush for the Eagles, and sorry Steve, but the Cowboys asked Kyle Orton to throw 46 times, they deserve the "L")

And, in my humble defense, not only had I emptied the dishwasher, but filled it and ran it and the plan was to have all the dishes done by the time she got home, so it's not my fault that her mother drives like a maniac.

But the place is clean. I've washed my hair at least twice. I didn't forget to take the trash out to the street and there were definite meals I made, so no one starved. I am not Ewan McGregor and there were no dead babies crawling on the ceiling.

But wanna know the weirdest thing?

The weirdest part is that over the two days and nights she was gone, I didn't check my email.

Not even once.

And I didn't go on Facebook.

Or check my website.

And I didn't write, and I didn't rehearse, and I didn't add a damn thing to the yellow pad I keep at arms length anytime I have an idea.

I spent a very unproductive weekend.

And I'm in no way sorry about that. Except that I am. I feel terrible. I feel fat and my head is cloudy and my ears are ringing from too much earbud use.

I feel lazy and slightly disgusted with myself because I could have easily added a plate of broccoli to last night's pasta, but I decided that the spinach in the meatballs was vegetable enough. Good god my finger nails need clipping, which I would have taken care of three days ago had I bothered to pick up an acoustic guitar.

I saw an article recently that natural human sleep patterns should be about 10.3 hours per night. Which, yeah, not exactly reasonable, but we currently average 7.5 and I just spent the last thirteen years nestled in the 6 or less area.

Late to bed, early to rise, makes a man grateful for coffee and lies.

So, theoretically, I'm just catching up on some lost hours and I don't feel guilty at all, except for the fact that I do.

In the world I came from, in order to get thing done, you either had to muscle through, delegate it out, or avoid it until it became a non issue.

I'm a muscle through kind of dude. It took me years to learn how to comfotably delegate it out, and a few more years to recognize when avoidence was best. And you may think that avoidence is never the answer, but trust me, situations fall apart with relative ease when no one is fanning the flames and you can be supportive or antagonistic, but there is no greater artillery than indifference.

(That piece of advice should in no way be applied to married life. A display of indifference to a married woman and you might as well throw a handful of mercury fulminate on Tuco's office floor: Season 1 Episode 6, if you need the reference.)

Yet now, the product is me. The situations, my own. And there's no one to delegate to.

So each day, each hour, I can either get off my ass, or update my Netflix queue. 

Both of which I plan on doing.

Tomorrow.

Read any good books lately?



Final Friday Didn't Get it Five

What's the first thing any modern, consumer driven, eight year old capitalist focuses on the day after christmas?

That's right.

All the things he didn't get.

Actually, that's not entirely true. He's just on a consumption bender. Which is kinda like the white middle class suburban version of meth addiction.

We don't have crack whores out here, we've got Target cleavage.

I told him that if I heard one more thing out of him I was going to make him write out Thank-you cards to everyone he's ever met.

It's been quiet for three hours.

I wanted to write a Final Friday Five, since this will be the last Friday Five of the arbitrary 2013, but the category got way too broad. Was I to write about best things that happened, meals I've eaten, things I've learned, things I didn't learn, things I want to learn by this time I write this same blog 365 days from now? Should it be a wish list, a reform list, a resolution list? Should it be alliterative? Friends, Food, Fat, "Eff's I give" and Fantasy Football?

And then it occurred to me that I rolled my eyes a lot during this last year. Everything from "Did that just really happen?" to "Is that really what you think?" to "Omg Lmfao!"

So here we go: Top Last Friday of 2013 "I just didn't get." Five.

1. Who actually thinks "Bratty" is sexy?
Duck lipped selfies to televised twerking, the social media sphere is just peppered with girls gone wild imagery as if there is this very well organized campaign to publicize 10th grade pajama parties. And I'm not knocking the viral possibilities of looking like a white hot mess in front of millions (You go, Miley, just go) but Lolita was a metaphor, not a training manual for the sale and distribution of sexual perversion, I mean, thanks for letting me see what you're selling, but my question is, Who's buying?

2. What did you actually think the NSA was doing?
Just so we're clear, any time information is transferred from analog to digital, there's going to be a record available for the taking. This includes your voice, your Facebook photos, and your fetish internet searches. The NSA is tasked with gathering and disseminating that information to try and locate enemies of the state. Enemies of the state are determined by the people we vote into office and the companies that pay for their golf retreat weekends. You are tasked with three very simple things. Vote, spend your money wisely, and don't post personal tweaking videos if you don't want to be retweeted on the senate floor.

3. Were you really surprised that there were IT Problems with the National Health Care Act?
Unless you've been attending Burning Man festivals 24/7 for the past twenty years, then there's no possible way you haven't spent a fair amount of time dealing with IT nightmares. Combine the ridiculous ease with which computers don't work with the endless talent of government bureaucracies to slow things down and I'm frankly a little surprised anything happened at all. Now I'm not pontificating on the Act itself, I have mixed feelings because I'm both a bleeding heart socialist and a 40lb Martin Recurve Bow toting Capitalist, but come on, the speed with which it's all coming together is pretty remarkable. I'm less afraid of the Act itself than I am of the constant barrage of GEICO commercials if they ever get into the health insurance racket.

4. Why couldn't the Buffalo Bills open up more holes for C.J. Spiller?
Getting him out into space could not have been that tough people.

5. When did coffee get so expensive?
I'll admit it, I haven't paid for a cup of coffee since the Clinton administration, but I did something the other day that I haven't done in decades; I microwaved an old cup of coffee. Cause I only wanted a half a cup and that's exactly what was left in the pot from earlier in the morning and we're starting to run a little low. Fresh quality coffee has been my mantra, my mission, my soul for so long that I forgot what it was like to treat it as a commodity. I always felt so good about peddling caffeine addiction as a career choice because the price difference between the good stuff and the terrible stuff was only a few dollars. By percentage, that's like picking up a brand new Mercedes Benz for under $20,000. I didn't even have to sell it, I just had to pour it for you. And don't get me wrong, I'm not broke, I'm just cheap and a little lazy, and going out to get something rather than brining it home, factors in my long term decision making. So I'm going to continue reheating coffee and re-steeping my tea leaves at least until the Google drones begin to deliver gourmet cafe arabica at wholesale prices, or my non-profit status is confirmed and I begin accepting donations, for which I will gladly make the eight year old send Thank-you notes.

Merry Happy Holla New Years, Everybody

Conscientious Christmas Consuming

I am pretty terrible at christmas shopping in that I don't do any real shopping at all. The thing I do is buying. And there's a difference;

When you buy things, you know what you want, you know how much it costs, you know where in the store it is located, you know the quickest routes between each store that you have to go to, and you know the best times in which to go.

Shoppers, on the other hand, think of none of these things before they get into their cars, or buses, or bicycles. This is why Walmart is going to simultaneously take over the universe and create such a convenient  vacuum of price to value that the whole universe will collapse in on itself.

I was thinking today about the big consumer box stores, the Walmarts, the K-Marts, the Targets, which I tend to avoid as much as I can, because, and I know this sounds unusually unlike me, but they do terrible things to the economy and ecology and they are unimaginably cruel in how they squeeze both their employees and their producers for every inch. And it breaks my heart too, cause Walmart has the most fresh and high quality produce in the area (and I live in one of the most fertile valleys in all the world) I can go an entire life time without a pair of sweat shop produced boxer briefs, but I'll nail myself to a crucifix before I ever buy rubbery broccoli at the Whole Foods again.

I made a joke that in 2003 we should have dropped Sam's Clubs onto the Iraqi people. Kinda tough to be an islamic fundamentalist when you can get water and baby wipes in bulk.

But today, and more in line with my devil doesn't care capitalist attitude, today I've found a business practice that I hate even more than the systematic destruction of the social fabric, and that is Club Cards.

My wife and I have lived in the same town for over a decade now, and during that time, between the two of us, we have had seven telephone numbers. I've lost my wallet twice, and god knows how many purses are sitting in the garage right now with stacks upon stacks of plastic club cards that have fallen between the seams, never to be thought of again.

Again, that is, until it's Chrismas, and you've been waiting in line for twenty minutes, and everyone around you is tired and angry, and you have just four items: Paper plates, deoderant, and two bottles of wine, which even at the club price is just a little more than you wanted to spend, but that particular red blend goes great with what you're making for dinner tonight, and you haven't killed anyone all day and feel you deserve it. And you get to the front of the line and your asked for your club card.

"Do you have your card, sir?"

"Sure do." you say as you try to find a place to set you basket so you can rummage through your wallet with two hands, fanning out your plastic cards like its the most important game of "Go Fish" in your life. First you sort by color, then by design, then 'oh look' you really need to call that photographer guy back, then you realize you haven't been in this particular store since you lost your wallet at a movie theater in 2009 and even though it's the closest store to your house, their broccoli is terrible.

"Nope."

"Kay, sir, can you just type in your telephone number?"

"Oh jesus, sure, I guess." 

This is when you realize that smart phones have destroyed your brain. You enter in your house phone from memory, which you only remember because you've been quizzing your eight year old every morning before school. You try your cell, you try your wife's cell, both of which you have to look up. You try to remember the phone number you had at you first apartment in town, but you totally draw a blank and all you can think is "Please Missus Checker Lady, please just swipe that blank card you have under the counter, I'll donate the rest of my change to breast cancer awareness if you would please do me this solid."

"Yeah, I don't have it. Go fish"

"Well, sir, would you like to sign up for another card?" she says as she pulls out a pamphlet the size of an insurance claim form.

"Naw, don't worry about it."

"But sir, you'll save an additional $75,000 and get a coupon for .37 off a gallon of gas the next time you're in Texarcana."

And then you look at the actual total in comparison to the Club Card total and your brain goes a little wonky because she wasn't kidding about the $75,000. And then you look back at the line, which now hates you so much that they've sent their children out to the parking lot to find your car and slash your tires. And you look back at the total and then back at the line and then reach for the pamphlet.

"Do you have a pen?" and you've never heard such public profanity muttered under the breath of such a large group of people.

And I get it. I really get it. The profit margin of a grocery store is somewhere between 3% and 5%. Crunchy broccoli not withstanding, they need to do everything within their limited power to create a loyal consumer. One who shops with them and with no one else. I get it. I do.

But I've decided I don't care.

They knew the margins when they started filling their aisles with precut salads and Cool Ranch Doritoes. And I'm sorry, I truly am that Walmart has destroyed your frozen burrito profitability, but you know, be thankfull you're not trying to peddle flat screen TV's or low introductory APR credit lines in this market.

So, not today, but starting January 1st 2014, I have decided to boycot every store that requires you to sign up for a club card in order to receive the posted price. I will empty my wallet of everything but my drivers license, my library card, my Costco Card (cause, you know, baby wipes and frozen burritos), and the business card of that photographer I keep meaning to call but don't.

Everything else goes in my wife's purse. Let her do the shopping.
 

Twas the Five before Christmas

'Tis the five before Christmas.

I had a whole bunch of different five ideas for today, but sadly, and shamelessly, I kept getting distracted, so I'm cheating and doing a holiday themed five cause I know I can knock it out quickly and then go warm up a cup of tea.

Five Traditional Musts for the end of year festival of lights:

First:
Tree decorating to the Jackson Five Christmas album. I don't know when this became the tradition, but it did and it's awesome. This year we lucked out with a beautiful 9-10 foot tree and it took Joann two full hours to put up the ornaments. I needed a ladder to hang the lights. We're having friends over for dinner tonight and they're going to have to eat at the coffee table because there's no room left in our dining room for dining. A stuffed Pikachu is our angel of choice. It's the best tree ever.

Second:
I will once again brave fantastic heights in order to hang the lights all around our house. During this time I will once again make a joke about how this is the last year I will be doing this. From this day forward, we will either leave the lights up all year, or set fire to the house.

Third:
We will carve out four quiet hours to watch "Its a Wonderful Life" I will cry at the part when the little girl Mary leans over to George's deaf ear and say "Greorge Bailey, I will love you forever." Bawl like I was pregnant and watching a phone commercial.

Fourth:
I have to come up with a different non-secular, non-offensive greetings for the season. This year I've chosen "Happy Merry Holla New Year" It's going viral, I can feel it in my bones.

Five:
Since I'm no longer in Retail, I have decided that it's time to start a new tradition. That tradition is enjoying the holidays. From this day forth, I will no longer dread the weeks between Thanksgiving and January 2nd, I will enjoy the company of people, and when I shop, I will stop and listen to whatever version of Silent Night is playing on the Muzak system and I will be glad, for it is my favorite song. I will smile, and look people in the eye, and my only complaint is that I'll need a bigger box for all the love I have to give.

Happy Merry Holla New Year to All,

And to all, a Happy Merry Holla New Year.

Three Eyed NinjaBread

I'm gonna be the first to admit I'm not much of an arts and crafts fan.

Now that's not like saying I'm not much of a fan of the arts, nor is it like saying I don't admire craft, and I'm not totally dismissive of the sexiness of hot glue and green glitter, but when it comes to quality family time, if there is creche paper involved, it usually means Joann and I doing all this work, one of our children crying, and two or three extra glasses of wine to numb out what could have been a very nice evening.

 And it's messy.

And it never comes out like the picture.

And we already have too many christmas tree ornaments and our garage is starting to look like the warehouse where they stored the ark of the covenant.

So when Joann brought home a box of make-it-yourself NinjaBread Cookies, I was thrilled by how cute they are and desperately praying to the christian god that I was either going to be very busy or very dead when the time came.

And please please please don't mix up the message. Quality family time is nothing less than the most important thing we can do for ourselves as parents and for the future of humanity through the small percentage that is made up by our children.

The fact that it always turns into some frustrating nightmare is irrelevant.

Irrrrrrrelevant.

So, officially, when I don't display any real enthusiasm is only, and I mean this honestly, is only because I'm a negative Nancy who deserves to be mocked and punished.

And the NinjaBread cookies roll out just like I thought they would. First, har, har, they were nearly impossible to roll out. I think it's because the recipe called for eggs, flour and Elmer's glue. Calvin kept disappearing exactly six seconds before it was time for him to press the molds into the dough, requiring Joann to yell at him every four minutes or so to stop jumping on his bed and come back into the kitchen. I don't remember what I was doing, irrrrrelevant, but incredibly unhelpful and I don't think I could have annoyed my wife more than if I too had been jumping on the bed.

So the cookies are rolled, the cookies are cut, the cookies are cooked and the cookies are cooling, and the pretty curly haired girl is officially and forgivably done. She's got other things to do, other things that require some far away-ness, and the decorating is left to Mr. Nancy and his live wire eight year old.

I didn't know this until I started taking part in the pre-tween arts and crafts movement, but there is a conspiracy among confectioners to make sure that the tools, food stuffs, and decorative accouterment designed for the novice market is as impossible to master as, lets say, tuning a fish.

Cause, you know, you can tune a piano, but . . . .
And it makes sense. They want you thinking it looks easy. They include everything you need except for the Elmer's glue. And they know you're going to spend twice as much on the kit as you normally would for the pre-made stuff, cause family time is essential. And they know you have no measurable chance of ever making your NinjaBread Cookies looking anything like anything and because your little princess is crying, you're gonna have to make a special trip to the mall to get the NinjaCookies at Mrs. Smith's wonderful smelling kiosk.

They sold you three times as much, and ruining your marriage was just the icing on the cake, cause now there's two households spending three times as much next year.

So when Joann, in her last exasperated breath, as she raced down the hallway and out the door told me not to decorate all the cookies, I realized she had awesomely delivered my just deserts.

"Ha!" I thought. Calvin's way too busy jumping on the bed. He'll never remember that there is a family project just waiting for him on the kitchen table.

"Ha!" my christian god said. cause that was the exact moment Calvin came tiptoeing down the hallway.

"Dad?"

"Yes?"

"Can we decorate the cookies now?"

"Urrrrrrr. Wash your hands."

"Why?"

"Cause you have to wash your hands anytime you touch food."

"Even cookies?"

"Especially cookies."

Quality Family Time. Quality Family Time. Quality Family Time.

Now Joann was the true hero, for she forsook the part of the project that requires you to make your own icing, and instead, she picked up the pre-made stuff along with several helpful design tips. The fact that it was still like trying to squeeze a whole turkey sandwich through the gap of your front teeth is irrrrrrelevent.

"Dad?"

"MmmHmm?"

"What are you doing?"

"I'm kneading the icing to make it softer."

"It that what is says to do?"

"Sure does."

But, and this is for all the confectionist confederacy, it doesn't work.

Not a jot.

So, good one on you.

I tried to show Calvin how to squeeze the icing with one hand while holding the cookie steady with the other, but even I had a hard time squeezing with one hand, so I had to hold the cookie while he splurted icing up and down the body of the ninjabread.

"It doesn't look anything like the picture." he said.

"Nothing will. My turn." I replied.

We did this back and forth for about six cookies and then I decided I had lost interest in the fascinating array of ninja designs and it was time to go rogue. So I gave my rebel ninja one arm, four legs and three eyes.

"Dad. You gave that ninja three eyes."

"So?"

"You can do that?"

"Of course."

Cause that's where the magic happens.

Poor Lazy Negative Nancy had forgotten that the pre-tween arts and crafts projects aren't about living in Martha Stewart land. They aren't fodder for Facebook or Pinterest propaganda. They're a product, yes, and a terrible product at that, but in the end, they can take your little boys' brains out of the pre-imagined universe and consider possibility if only for a moment.

If a ninjabread man can have three eyes then maybe, just maybe, it's okay to wear winter time pajama bottoms with summer time tops, or resolve a symphony on a suspended fourth.

(actually, no, please don't try that)

But it is possible, however cruel, and stripping the imagination from its shackles leads to all kinds of good things.

Now, I'm not saying go out and spend your money. In fact, kinda don't. But consider, at least, that fun can be kinda fun when you forget about the "how to" and saunter over to the "what if?"

Traffic

Bumper to bumper five:

Breaking the law right now. 

Texting while driving. 

Not going fast enough to kill an ant. 

The back of the new ford fiesta is weird looking. 

NPR pledge drives are killing me. 

Timpanist Available

I've become very fond of Craigslist.

Searching for players, gigs, and gear, somewhere between my first cup of coffee and a cleaner pair of underwear, I feel like I'm going to need a pair of bunny slippers and a robe this winter in order to fully realize my out of work potential.

I stay in the musician section for the most part, but even those ads are littered with nerds, real-estate agents and date rape enthusiasts. It's a great place to be if you're a "serious", "drug free",  22 year old female vocalist with your own equipment. And it's as close as I'm ever going to get to Reality TV.

The searching has, however, paid off.

I now know that there is a Timpanist available in my area for any and all of my timpani needs.

For those of you who don't know what a timpani is, it's those big copper drums used to create that boom boom boom sound of thunder, or an army of invading orcs, or anytime a German enters a room.

Timpani, in italian, is plural.

The singular is Timpano

The affirmative is Timpanyes.

In five short minutes, I have come up with hundreds of uses for a local Timpanist ranging from door bell substitution to following around my neighbor's chihuahuas.

The Timpanist has a card that says he does weddings as well.

My god, how could I have possibly missed that?

But Craigslist isn't all timpani and giggles, I've booked shows, collaborated with some nice people, and learned which marketing scams are worth my time and which are just not. 

Of course they're all scams. If you're a talented musician, willing to work hard with what it takes to go to the next level, then I've got a five hundred dollar 12 part video course that is going to change your life.

But some scams might backfire with intended consequences.

Let me explain:

Did you know that there are companies out there that will guarantee a certain amount of page views, YouTube hits and Facebook likes for a fee?

Neither did I.

Thank-You Craigslist.

Now the best part about this is three-fold:

First, they do it by creating millions of fake accounts all across the social medias, and then program the fake accounts to check out your stuff. Give 'em a few bucks and you can quadruple your reach.

But, since its all fake, you haven't increased you reach, you've only increased your metrics.

Given enough dollars, my little songs can pretend to be as popular as a kitty playing the piano.

Yet secondly, for obvious reasons, this practice is severely frowned upon by the industry insiders who are very quick to point out that because it doesn't really increase the amount of people who are being entertained by your stuff, then you're just lying to us like the kid who insists he has a girlfriend in Canada.

But the third bit is where it gets interesting:

Actual people might click on something if it looks like it is popular.

Everyone wants to be in the know.

Things go viral by looking like they're going viral.

I will absolutely get booked at bigger venues if a promoter sees that I have 2500 Facebook fans instead of the 87 I have now.

Songs will get heard more, videos will get watched more, nobody likes to stand in line, but everyone wants to know where the line is going.

And if you're asking yourself why I haven't tried this yet, the answer is simple:

I'm not ready.

It's a long shot, and it's a one shot, and I don't have the full line of content in place, but when I am ready, you'll hear it from miles away.

{Cue Timpanist}



Spoti-Five

So my first online streaming revenue statement was made available today.

And Wow. Just Wow.

Now it would be totally gauche and unladylike to talk in specific dollars, but lets just say that bankable rockstars have a lot to complain about.

I feel for them. I really do. I have never seen so many zeros to the right of the decimal point since taking a Pre-Calculas class back in 1994. These are atomic numbers. These are numbers with negative exponents. These are the kind of numbers your mother warned you about, but you just wouldn't listen cause she couldn't possibly know how you feel, cause she's never been in love like this before.

Yet, to be totally fair, I have never once entered streaming revenue in to my budgetary calculations. Performance fees, CD sales, and music licensing are the only (relatively) logical income that one can expect until one is Bono. Spotify, Pandora, and the rest, are part of the mix solely for the egotistical reason of wanting to be everywhere for everybody, all the time.

If it buys me a pastrami sandwich at some point, I'd consider it a wash.

It would be fascinating to get a little peak at the accounting numbers of the major online streaming companies just to get a sense of scale.

But on second thought, that might just make me sad.

And I don't want to be sad.

So let us have a little fun with numbers:

8,253,968
That's the number of songs need to be streamed in order to replace my modest middle class income for one year.

550,264
That's the number of hours of entertainment I would have provided to the listeners who collectively streamed my songs 8.25 million times, in comparison to:

2,080
Which is the number of hours I used to spend making Pumpkin Spice Lattes. And they say musicians are lazy.

58
Which, based on the current trend of streaming, is the number of months it will take before I have enough to buy myself a pastrami sandwich.

0
Is what I'd get if I didn't try.

And if given the choice between nothing and a pastrami sandwich in October 2018, well, I think we all know who the winner is.


Blind in our Blindness

"What do you want?"

"Chow mein, beef and broccoli, and lemon chicken."

"They don't have lemon chicken."

"Of course they do, Taylor gets it all the time."

"No, they don't . . . they have orange chicken."

"Fine, whatever, lemon chicken it is."

"No, orange chicken."

"What'd I say?"

"Lemon chicken."

"Right, that's what I want, with beef and broccoli."

"Orange Chicken?"

"Exactly. Chow mein, beef n broccoli, lemon chicken."

"You need to stop doing that or I'm gonna try to order lemon chicken and they're gonna think I'm an idiot."

"Okay, sorry. Try to grab some chop sticks and hot mustard."

"Why hot mustard?"

"How else can you eat lemon chicken?"

To be fair, this conversation may or may not have happened exactly like this. What did happen was when later, Calvin asked me why I kept calling it 'lemon chicken', my only response was because it was now a thing.

Joann and I are starting to become a little terrified that what with all the time we've spent glued to each other for the last decade that we have too many things.

And by 'things' I don't mean stuff. We have too much of that too, but that's a conversation we wait to have until after the holidays.

No, by 'things' I mean inside jokes. Little reminders of shared experiences. Some couples travel, some couples dance, some couples have pets or children or both or neither, some couples finish each other's sentences and some couples bicker at each other from different sides of the house. Most couples do a little of all that.

But Joann and I collect 'things'

And I'm not even going to begin to list, because the 'things' have become so convoluded over the years that you might think the two of us were speaking in code.

Suffice it to say, neither of us will ever pass by a Panda Express without thinking about lemon chicken for the rest of our lives.

Yet the nature of 'things' isn't limited to two or three intimate participants, millions can share in the thingness of 'things'. For example, prior to the VMAs, twerking was a 'thing' for hundreds of thousands preadults with wifi access and a penchant for silliness. Afterwards, Miley Cyrus is a household name and suddenly it's a 'thing' to a billion or more.

And 'things' don't have to be the result of 'Dad Jokes' or ridiculous behavior.

Recycling can be a 'thing', quitting smoking can be a 'thing', buying local or calling your grandmother once in a while can be a 'thing'

Peace can be a 'thing'

Even Waitdad is a 'thing' for some of us. I mean, yes it's a real thing for me and those I write about, but  nothing makes me happier than when it becomes a 'thing'

Calvin walked into the living room and said "Wait . . . Dad?, how far have you gotten on Zelda?"

And Joann, sitting beside me said "It's wierd when he calls you 'Wait . . . Dad?' I mean, I know that's where that comes from, but to hear it out loud is a little creepy."

It's creepy because to Joann, 'Wait Dad?' is no longer the odd way through which Calvin prefaces his questions, it's a 'thing' she reads and mostly enjoys.

Mostly.

And I've been a bit obsessed with how things become 'things'. I've read books on the subject, studied trends, compared statistics and analyzed analysitics and I've come to the conclusion that the universe offers nothing in the way of a road map in making things 'things'

Marketing people will tell you the exact opposite.

They're lying. 

At their very best they can imitate how other 'things' became 'things' and the geniuses in their field will modify trajectories in real time and space. The rest are just alchemists trying to squeeze gold from urine based on the color similarities.

All of them are blind.

Blind in their blindness.

Which is my new 'thing'

Have you had the chance to see/hear the trailer for the new Hobbit movie?

Well, there's a line in the trailer when Gandalf, for no real reason at all, says "We are blind in our blindness."

Which has got to be, by quite some margin, one of the dumbest things ever uttered by Ian Mckellen.

How could a line that stupid have made it through rewrites? Or not be pointed out as stupid on film day? Or not be edited out by the gal/guy who spends days upon days on every minute of film? And lastly, how exactly does that make it into the trailer?

Blind in our blindness.

It's now part of how Joann and I communicate to one another.

Calvin's jumpy in his jumpyness
The sky is clear in it's clearyness.
Instead of telling her she's pretty, she's hot in her hotness.
Instead of getting out of bed, I'm sleepy in my sleepiness.
Making dinner? Cooking in our cookingness.
What am I doing now? I'm writing in my writingness.

 Could have been 'Blind to our blindess' or even esoteric enough to be 'blinded by our blindness', but 'blind in our blindness' is just pathetic, and it's pasted on the audio track for all to hear.

If you haven't heard it, you will.

And now, you will never unhear it.

You will be hearing it in your hearingness.
Annoyed in your annoyedness.
Hate me in your hatingmeness.

And how meta is this?

Now that I've made it a 'thing' in it's 'thingness'?

But there is a bit of shining hope for those of us, blind in our blindess, that work very hard to make things and hope to turn them into 'things' And it's not really anything different than what a marketing directer will charge you to listen to.

Here's how things become 'things'

First, they are discovered, then adopted, then shared, then repeat.

Whether it's a magnum opus, a dance craze, or a terrible line from a mediocre movie. Discovered, adopted, and shared.

That is how you become in your becomingness.