Sophmoric Sophistry

"Parting is such sweet sorrow... but meeting you is better than not having met you at all." That line was on an 8th grade girl's folder.

Funny thing, these middle schoolers are. They're children on the verge of becoming young adults. Having said that, they're mostly in limbo. They're learning the norms and etiquette of being an adult, but they're still clinging to, and basing life on, their childhood.

You see, many adults end up dismissing the social behavior of middle schoolers. They feel it is beneath them. Not worthy of adult attention. Much the same way, adults tend to overlook middle schooler feelings and emotions. I once shared a poem written by an 8th grade girl with some friends. The only thing those adults could do was point out how naive the author was. But is it naivete or just a fresh outlook on a future life?

I think one of the wonderful things about my profession is that I get to deal with people who are not yet jaded in society. They haven't been stifled by society's rules and roles. They're still at that stage in life where they wonder just why do they have to wear shoes to a fancy restaurant.

So when you come down from the ivory tower, you can actually learn a lot from a kid. Kids live life with passion. They don't realize that they're doing it, but they are. And that's one thing adults always bemoan. They always wish they had more passion in their lives.

You see, when kids are happy, they're not afraid to show it. They will smile from ear to ear. They will laugh out loud. They will dance and sing. Hoot and holler. All those things.

When they are angry, they let everyone know. They don't hide it. They will scream. They will scowl and clench their teeth. Their hands would be balled up in fists. And sometimes they cry.

When they're sad, they cry. They hug each other for support. They will actually tell you that they are feeling sad.

And when they're in love, that's an incredible thing to watch too. They act awkwardly embarrassed in front of the object of their affections. They will give their favs gifts. They do nice things for each other. And sometimes, they will do those things in front of their friends, risking ridicule.

How many of us adults can say that we live life as passionately as a middle schooler?

The only hearty laugh I recently produced was the result of a girl tickling my ribs. And the only time I heard her laugh as hard was when I tried to smell her feet... and gave her the "Portagee Torture". How sad is my life that I don't laugh like that more often?

Have I been so angry I had to scream? No. OK, wait. I've been frustrated to the point where I did have to scream.

I've also been sad enough that I, a grown man, got teary eyed. But could I do that in front of others? Could I grab my friends and hold them tight and share their pain? Stupid adult male role. Doesn't allow one to be too emotional.

And how about love? Oh boy that's a doozy. Let's just say that I've spoken and acted in ways which adults would consider weird... by their own constricted standards.

I haven't even told you the secret to all this. Just what is it that allows these middle schoolers to live so passionately? Memory. Or lack of it.

They don't think of the future in terms of years. They think of the future in terms of days. They don't think of the past in years either, but in days too. So any consequence, such as ridicule, only lasts a short time. Any hurt that they feel, is but a passing irritant. It's like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. Once he realized there was no future, he lived each day like it was the last day of his life.

The kids do that too. Though not on purpose.

Once again, I've probably gone way off the point. But hey, I felt like writing, so dammit, I'll write. It's my prerogative, and I'm gonna forget all the snide remarks come tomorrow. Heh.

BTW, underneath that bit of philosophy on the folder, the girl wrote, "I poop rainbows."

He's Making a List; Checking it Twice

I've been had. Yup. I've been hornswaggled. I can't believe it took me this long to figure out the conspiracy.

For a long time now I've been getting down on myself. This usually happens when I'm lonely. I try to figure out a reason why my luck with the fairer (though more devious) sex really sucks and I start to nitpick on all my shortcomings. Then usually someone comes over and blows air up my ass. They give me a bunch of false compliments to boost my morale. Of course, I'm so starved for attention, I buy everything hook, line, and sinker.

How bad can my love life be? I asked a girl out once and she turned into a lesbian.

Now someone of my superior intellect can only be duped for so long. (15 years) I was bound to figure it all out. I happened upon an article on building self esteem on athealth.com. There was a suggestion in the article to make a list of your positive attributes and stuff. So I spent a few hours going over the things I possess that could be a positive with the vaginal sex. It wasn't a long list.

OK, here is the list. I removed anything not uncommon. The list should consist of things almost-sort-of-kinda unique to me. Therefore, ten fingers, ten toes was removed.

1: I have broadband. YouTube and porn at light speeds.



2: I own a sports camcorder. It's a nifty video camera that fits in your pocket.



C: I own an economy sportbike. Yeah, it's not the top model, but most girls are too stupid to know that.



D: I have an external DVD burner that lets me transfer a bunch of computer videos onto disk. It comes in handy for watching Jdramas.



V: I have a job. A real job that requires college degrees and special licenses. I don't make much money though, so any future brides cannot be whores.



VV: I own a Yaris. Hopefully the same dumb chicks that think SVs are cool will not notice how cheap I am.



X: I own a pair of black leather jeans. They're a motorcycle type of jeans, but they almost got me a callback for the part of the biker guy in a 70's boy band.



Twelvely: I have a ton of DVDs. I have US, Japan, Hong Kong, and Korean releases. I also have the player to play them.



Thirteenish: I have Love Actually and Flash Gordon on VHS.



One Million Dollars: I own a dress. It was for Halloween, I swear. I've never used it to go to the nightclub on a Friday night in order to try and pick up guys so drunk they would have sex with anything. Promise.



12345: I also have a kung fu outfit. My secret kung fu identity is Sum Dum Gai.



3.14159: I have a trumpet. I don't mean to blow my own horn, but I used to be pretty not bad with it in high school. But back then, I was still cute enough to get girlfriends, and I didn't need a trumpet. Or a list. Stupid list.



24/7: I have scars. Not just the wonderful acne scars to remind me of my bad skin, but also battle scars. I have a scar from a gash I received while playing sword fighting when I was a kid. I also have scars on my elbows because I suck at riding bikes. There's also a big one on my knee from a tumor I once had. Even the tumor couldn't stand to be with me and left.



525,600: Helmet ears. Um. Yeah. Ears.



And that's my list. Impressive, eh?

Now looking over this list, I can see for a fact that those compliments people gave me were nothing but lies. Nothing on this list will get me some play except for the broadband. Chicks dig high download speeds. I think I will sue my so-called "friends," for infamation of character. Like that? I made that up. Instead of maliciously destroying my reputation, they've been maliciously trying to bolster it. Those jerks.

Sigh. I hate athealth.com. The list thing really backfired. I'm not feeling much self esteemed at the moment.

You know what? Screw the list. Screw possessions. I will win the heart of a lady with my charm and good looks. Any women interested? Here's my pic:

Blonde Abbegirl of Our Dreams

A friend of mine said, "you should write a blog about why I like blondes."

Yeah. Like I'm going to write something special for him, a guy. If he was more androgynous, then maybe I would consider it. Then again, I don't think he would make a good looking girl. He would probably be worse as a transsexual.

So I was going to forget the whole idea when I realized that I did write blogs for other people before. Plus, I would get to mention Abbegirl once again.

So why do we like blondes?



I'm going to take a guess at my friend's reasoning. He signed a waiver allowing me full control over his written opinions. I've learned my lesson from a previous blog.

I'm betting that he likes blondes because the local girls around here drive him nuts. He's been teased, dicked, and played by many a local girl. He's had his heart broken and toyed with. However, he seems to look back fondly on his previous blonde girlfriends. I guess to him, previous experience shows that blonde girls treat him well.



I forgot that some of you reading this may actually be haole. The original meaning of haole was foreigner. Over the years it has changed and it now refers to Caucasians. (how-lay)

The local girls would be your non-haole. Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Portuguese, Hawaiian, Polynesian would be races considered local.



After listening to my friend, and mentally going over what I know, I think he has a point about liking blondes. What I see at work, with my friends, and in the community are the low standards of the local girls. All they want is a nice piece of man-ass. Doesn't matter if the guy is as dumb as a pile of rocks. If he got a bod, they want him.

Right now the two or three local girls who read this gibberish will start to feel indignant. Doesn't matter though. I meet about a hundred new girls each year. The vast majority follow the same pattern. They all want the hot guy even if he couldn't reason his way out of a paper bag. It doesn't change. Argue all you want. The facts remain the same.



So I think my friend might actually be smart for once. Instead of going for the girls who will just toy with us and dick us over, perhaps we should be looking for someone outside of this established norm. We should be looking at the haole girls. Hey, maybe one of those pretty blonde girls would actually give a troll like me a chance.



I'm sure one of them would. When I'm taking a rest break on my motorcycle, I watch the tourist. I see fat guys, ugly guys, guys with no character, guys who dress like corpses, guys who smell bad, guys with no tact, stupid guys, all with beautiful blonde girls. WTF? You know those girls are actually looking at the soul of the man when they pick their mates, unlike the local girls who look at the schlong.



In comes Abbegirl. Abbegirl is a very popular contributor to YouTube. I saw her in one of Minouye's videos and I told my friend about her. Since then she has become our new "pinup girl." She's pretty, bright, talented, humorous, and a major firecracker. Of course it could be just her onscreen persona, but we'll take it.





Awesome, eh?

I was kind of hoping to make funny videos like that, but my attempt went over like a lead balloon. Let's just say that from now on, certain things will be off limits on my blog.



So yeah. I guess we like blondes because they simply KICK ASS!

Conan, Subotai and Lane Meyer

I'm going to steal my compadre's mojo here and do some picture blogging while I tell this story. I'm doing this for my buddy because he'd never do it for himself. He's the kind of guy that is heard but rarely seen so he needs his loud mouth buddy, Sockfoot, to shove him into the spotlight.

On with the show.

I'm pretty much a nerd.



Because I'm a nerd I suffer from bad self esteem, nearsightedness and an uncontrollable compulsion to do things like play online video games. In fact the first online game I ever played was one based on Star Trek.



Actually the depth of my nerditude was sadder than that.



Anyway, now that the laughter is dieing down, I can go on with my story. While I was nerding around playing Star Trek I met this other guy. For purposes of identification we'll call him Lane Meyer. You know, John Cusak's character from "Better Off Dead".



In fact the similarities of this guy to Lane Meyer are striking. He's got a car he's not too keen on,



and he wishes he had another one.



He's constantly being hounded by kids,



he's mostly surrounded by strange people,



and he wishes some French chick would come along and teach him the international language of love.



In fact I'm pretty sure that sometimes he wonders if it's all worth while.



Lane Meyer has never admitted it out loud, but I know he thinks he's a nerd too.



After a while Lane Meyer and I got to be friends. (Lane Meyer is the short one on the right with the facial hair).



While it's true we were nerds, we soon figured out that in the world of Cyberspace Gaming we were viewed as bad asses.



So we set off together on a grand adventure through many pixelated lands. This is me in Cyberspace,



(U stop laffing or imma pwnz0r ur cyber-aZZ, beOtch!1111!!!!)



And this is Lane Meyer.



Pretty bad ass, eh?

For six years we've been kicking cyber-booty together. It's been a lot of fun, but sometimes we'd take a break from wreaking cyber-havok and just talk.



One of the recuring themes in our talks was how Lane Meyer seemed to get no action with the ladies.



You see Lane Meyer is constantly surrounded by hot asian chicks.



This might have something to do with the fact that he lives in Paradise.



Well, I don't know if it's exactly Paradise, but the sun shines a lot, it's warm and wet and there are lots of scantily clad women, so if it isn't Paradise it's got to be pretty close.



Ummm ... sorry I lost my train of thought there.

Oh yeah, Lane Meyer is always pretty bummed because he's convinced to an absolute certainty that women, especially hot women, don't notice him at all.



Lately it's really got him singing the blues.



I've tried to talk to Lane Meyer about this problem. I've given him a lot of advice and tried to bolster his confidence in himself,



but for some reason he doesn't seem to hear it.



Truthfully sometimes I think he enjoys suffering,



but he's my buddy so I've got to keep trying to help him.



However this time, instead of trying to straighten him out,



I'm going to try talking directly to the ladies instead.



Ladies, I think Lane Meyer sells himself very short in the looks department, but according to Lane Meyer he looks like this ...



but even if that's the case, which I don't believe, I want you to look past that. Instead I want you to know that my buddy Lane Meyer works a job that doesn't pay him what he's worth,



but he works hard at it because he knows it's an important job.



He's also scary smart,



he's got a college education and a great sense of humor,



he rides a motorcycle,



he views the world in a very unique way,



and he is noble, loyal and trustworthy.



So to all of you hot chicks out there (you know who you are) ...



I want you to take a good long look at Lane Meyer. Really spend some time studying him.



A good way to get to know him is read what he's written here. Maybe he's not exactly built like a greek god,



but I think when you peel away the layers of self depricating humor and knee jerk self preservation mechanisms you'll find something much more rare and worth while.



Very truly yours, Nonwheezer's ... I mean ... Lane Meyer's weirdo friend,



Sockfoot