Business Classless

Dear Business Traveler,

You are a busy person. I understand this. You fly often (although I can assure you that I fly more) and being the frequent flyer that you are, you assume that the rules no longer apply. You also seem to think that it is perfectly acceptable to treat flight attendants like crap.

I don't care if you have heard the Exit Window Briefing twenty times already. I guarantee that I've said it more than you've heard it.

I also don't care that you have important business calls to make. Please don't make me ask you again and again to turn of your phone (to be more accurate, your Treo. It's always a Treo).

Oh and one more thing. When I am walking through the cabin taking drink orders and I ask you if you'd like something to drink, please don't just stare straight ahead until I take your unresponsiveness as a no and move on. Next time you ignore me I will take your precious Treo and drop it into a glass of apple juice.

Ol' Smokey Returns

Ol' Smokey strikes again!

My streak of good luck is over. Ol' Smokey is acting out again. For all of you automotive-minded folks I will imitate the sound that my beloved Ol' Smokey is making. This may not translate well though. He sounds like this; Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. Sort of like what a kitten in a teapot might sound like (please just take my word for this, for the love of God do not carry this experiment out in the name of science).

Ty thinks that it might be a fan belt. I'm a big fan of belts myself, but I don't know what this means. My car needs a new belt? Although in his defence I make a similar sound when I want clothes.

I must say, I'm getting a little tired of this bad behavior. It's probably my fault though, I think I'm reinforcing his acting out by rewarding him with new parts and some one-on-one attention. It's just so embarrassing driving down the street when my car is screaming like a banshee. In any case, it looks like I'm going belt shopping next week.

If you hear faint squeal behind you on the road in the meantime, move over, it's probably me and I'm not a very good driver.

From Haiti to Sock Puppets, Five Things You Probably Didn't Know About Me

Oh mr.poopie, you have forced me into an uncomfortable situation. How will I maintain my mystique if I’m telling the world about my various neurosis? However I am very susceptible to peer pressure so here I go…

1. My happiest time (obviously aside from being with loved ones and playing with a basket of puppies) is when I’m reading the newspaper and drinking coffee early in the morning. I have a love affair with breakfast, but add to that mix some coffee and a newspaper and I’m sold. And it has to be early, early enough that the air is still cold and it’s eerily quiet outside. I imagine then that the perfect day would be waking up to the smell of coffee only to find my family sitting at the breakfast table and a golden retriever puppy handing me the Globe and Mail, I would probably be euphoric.
2. I have a reoccurring nightmare about being stranded in Haiti. This seems kind of weird to me. I don’t know anyone from Haiti, I’ve never been to Haiti, but for some reason I’m terrified of it. In one particularly frightening dream a gang wielding machetes chased me back to my hotel. In my hotel room there were a bunch of little voodoo dolls and broken mirrors. That doesn’t sound all that scary, but I can assure you it was.
3. I have a magical shower. Seriously. I don’t mean magical in the Hogwart’s sense of the word, but magical in that I am able to think more clearly in the shower than anywhere else. All of my important life decisions have been made while showering. I attribute this to the complete lack of distractions and the delightful smell of my coconut body wash. I have written many a paper in my head while shampooing. I think I would benefit from getting some kind of waterproof whiteboard for inside the shower, I worry sometimes that I will forget my ideas before I’m dried off and near a pen.
4. Girls that are taller than me intimidate me (I promise this isn’t a dig at you guys, Katie and Kiki!). I am just used to walking beside girls closer to the five-foot mark. When I am walking with girls who are pushing 5’9 (this usually happens at work) I am noticeably uncomfortable. I don’t like having to look up at them; my neck muscles have fusing in a particular fashion after having looked down at people for most of my life and I prefer not to strain myself. I suppose I also dislike this because I have dedicated so much of myself to making immature (but hilarious) short jokes about my vertically challenged family and I really don’t like it being thrown back in my face.
5. I think I have briefly addressed this in the past, but I don’t think people understand the extent of the issue. I do not know how to talk to kids. I really don’t and this seems a bit odd because I used to be one and I vividly recall talking to my fellow eight year olds at the time. There are always kids on the plane and I usually feel obliged to say something to them. So I will say something like “How are you pal?” to which they flash me a look of pity and contempt and turn away. I have considered the possibility that I may have angered one of them, who has since spread the world to his child brethren. They probably have to take an oath to smite me and make me look completely inept at every opportunity. If anyone has any advice about how to make kids like me I would appreciate it. And please don’t suggest sock puppets and clicky pens, I’ve already tried that.

I hope you all feel that much closer to me now that you know five of my quirks (I suppose some of those could be classified as “personality flaws”, but I prefer to call them quirks). As my blogging community has pretty much come full-circle I pass the baton (which I’m sure is now quite soiled) to Jenne. Take her away!

More thoughts by Jack Handy

Too bad when I was a kid there wasn't a guy in our class that everybody called the "Cricket Boy", because I would have liked to stand up in class and tell everybody, "You can make fun of the Cricket Boy if you want to, but to me he's just like everybody else." Then everybody would leave the Cricket Boy alone, and I'd invite him over to spend the night at my house, but after about five minutes of that loud chirping I'd have to kick him out. Maybe later we could get up a petition to get the Cricket Family run out of town. Bye, Cricket Boy.

War Talk

I just finished a book for my Political Dissidence class. I've noticed how the time I allot for reading has diminished with each passing week. I polished off this last one in an hour and a half. I believe it's a new record for me. Anyways, this book that I just finished was absolutely incredible. It's called War Talk by Arundhati Roy. It is four essays that she has written about the political tensions in India, war and living in the nuclear age, the hypocrisy of the American empire and so on. There was one quote in particular that I loved. It actually gave me the shivers when I read it. Basically it sums up my views about the future of our society, only much more articulately than I could ever hope to be.

"The time has come, the Walrus said. Perhaps things will get worse and then better. Perhaps there's a small god up in heaven readying herself for us. Another world is not only possible, she's on her way. Maybe many of us won't be here to greet her, but on a quiet day, if I listen very carefully, I can hear her breathing."

If you ever have the chance to read it I would highly recommend it.

Up next for my class, Noam Chomsky - Manufacturing Consent. I have a feeling this may be a bit more challenging to get through...

One thing kids like is to be tricked. For instance, I was going to take my little nephew to DisneyLand, but instead I drove him to an old burned-out warehouse. "Oh, no," I said, "Disneyland burned down." He cried and cried, but I think that deep down he thought it was a pretty good joke. I started to drive over to the real DisneyLand, but it was getting pretty late.

- Jack Handy

For Hire

Growing up I had dozens of potential careers in mind. I wanted to be everything from a truck driver to veterinarian to a RCMP. As I grew up, I began to see why those probably were not the careers for me (being allergic to horses makes for a rough career as a veterinarian).

I went to university with the intention of becoming a teacher. However, sometime during my second year I realized that I honestly had no interest in actually being a teacher, so I changed my major. Now I am almost finished a degree that I love, but I'm left with the horrifying prospect of graduating without career in mind.

Right now, my best prospect seems to be journalism. I love politics and research and post-it notes, all of which I deem to be important aspects in career as a journalist. But what if I don't like journalism, or worse yet, what if I don't get into to school at all? I don't even have a backup plan.

While I love my degree, I feel like it left me with high and dry, without any practical skills or knowledge for getting a job. Is this the university's plan for keeping students within their scholarly claws? Perhaps...

I've thought a lot about what my perfect job would be. I'm sure that it would involve politics, human rights, Latin America and writing. I would love to work with an NGO, such as the UN, but I don't think that is realistic enough a goal.
Of course there is still a glimmer of hope that I will find the perfect job, but it sure hasn't happened yet.