Stuff No One Likes

Today, I really wished I had a camera.

I volunteered at a horse therapy center for disabled children and words won’t do my experience justice.  There is a beauty of a huge draft horse with broad, thick shoulders and muscular hindquarters that can pull stage coaches and plow rocky fields cradling a small, underdeveloped child who can’t walk on their own,  and giving them the power to walk with not just two legs, but four very powerful legs.

Today I saw a kid with a heart pump who probably isn’t allowed to run or jump on his own, stand on the back of a horse, spread his arms out like wings, tilt his head back, close his eyes and tell me, “see this is so easy.”

I wanted to tell him that it wasn’t easy.  I would be scared.  I hate heights and the thought of balancing on the back of a living animal who could easily crush me is terrifying.  But you can’t tell that to a little boy who is transformed into superman once he is given the strength of an animal with a thousand muscles.   I wish I could have taken a picture,  but all the film in the world wouldn’t be able to capture how his bravery affected me.  Instead, I just stood there, held my breath, and hoped he wouldn’t fall.  But he didn’t and he got up and stood on that horse a couple times before the lesson was over.

Today I got to met superman.  And his horse.  Why didn’t I have a camera??

In my opinion, interviews are the greatest paradox created by man.  Think about it.

You put two people in a room, make one of them dress up ten times fancier than any normal life situation, have one person stare down the other from across a maple, polished desk and stare.  You then have a complete stranger fire random, useless questions at a nervous, sweating, uncomfortably dressed fellow and then expect a logical employment decision to come out of that discussion. Um…..really?

My worst interview.  I showed up 1. wearing jeans (I was called during class and had no time to change) 2. had no relevant experience and 3. spontaneously hugged the poor girl who interviewed me at the end.  In front of a client.

Yep.  I hugged my interviewer.  The person who was supposed to professionally hire me.

So don’t worry.  No matter how bad you do on an interview.  I’ve probably done worst. The best interview I had (that lead to my dream job)  I left in tears because I thought I didn’t get it.  Basically, I don’t really have that natural intuition for these things.

However, don’t get me wrong.  I have improved.  I like interviews now.  Especially after getting a degree, experience and sticking to my no hug rule.

So whatever you do, don’t hug and you’ll be fine.

When I close my eyes, I can see perfectly.  Sometimes, I just want to shut my eyes and never have to open them to the blurred world that presents itself to me every morning.  In my mind’s eyes, colors are crisp, distant things are considered a view not a blur, and I can recognize a friendly face from more than two feet away.  But when I wake up, I see the real hazy, dimmed version of the world around me.  Objects are doubled in one eye, and faded in the other.  I have a very rare disease in my left eye, that threatens the remaining vision.

It’s so weird that the most microscopic bit of scar tissue and blood vessels threatens to change the way I see my life going.

To be fair, I demand one thing.  I don’t want sympathy.  I don’t like it when people grimace and tell me how sorry they are for me.  It’s not that I don’t have my frustrations or down moments, because, hey,  I do.  I’m human.

But, honestly, I’m not sorry.  It’s just another lesson, another life adventure.  I’m not noble to think that, or brave, or extraordinary, or special.  I’m just Emily who happens to have poor vision and random eye diseases.

I quit the best job I ever had (at least in my short work life that is) in order to take care of my eyes for a bit.  In 2012, I will be having multiple eye surgeries and procedures done.  The worst part isn’t the actual surgeries (I don’t have to do any of the work hahaha); it’s actually the waiting.  I hate waiting.

Waiting.  It’s like pacing in a room for six months to find out whether my life will be one that will include driving, getting my Master’s degree, becoming a CPA, and getting to do “my list” or finding out that my life will be one of fading colors and blurred shapes that has all sorts of restrictions .  I can accept either side, but the waiting….is torture.  I can find hope in either of those situations, but I want to know which one I will be living.

The plan.  I will be flying out to OH to visit a specialist who is the only doctor in the US who is published on my condition and try to get some more answers.  After that, my wonderful doctors here in LA will try to salvage my damaged cornea.  A couple surgeries, a few laser procedures, a couple month’s healing in between will all decide my future.  Well, sort of.

I know God has a plan for me, and it’s my job to bring Him glory regardless of which of the above situations happen.  And I will.  I know I will.  Even as a kid, I knew something drastic would happen in my life where I would always point back and say, ‘that’s the moment.”  What I mean is I knew I am meant to make a difference, as a lot of people are.  Some people are given more opportunities to make differences than others, with all sorts of circumstances and game changers.  Some people can sing their hearts out, go on American Idol and wow a nation.  Others are given lots of money to buy wings of hospitals and libraries for low income school districts.

I was given an eye disease.  But I was always given a God whose grace continues to surround me, friends who support me, a family who will never leave me.

Regardless of what happens six months from now, when my wait in the waiting room ends and I find out the ending of this chapter, I know I have hope.  My hope is that no matter how well my vision is for the rest of my life, I will have a sort of eyesight.  Because of what God is teaching me, I can see how to help people, I can see how to minister to someone who has it much worst than I, and I can see how I can show that in my weakness, God is strong.

There are no clichés or poems to make blurred vision sound good, but when you can’t see very well, sometimes it helps bring other things into focus better.

For now I see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face.  Don’t let your good vision blur what you should really be seeing this coming year.

Accountants.  Basically, the only people who actually  like us are other accountants.  Admit it , if you aren’t one of us you just hate us.

We are the ones who screwed up your bill that one time and forced you to spend three wasted hours of your life on the phone arguing about fees and rates.  We caused your taxes to be  that high  and almost forced your children not to eat for a month.  We are the reason little Jimmy didn’t get Christmas that one year.

You are on to us.  You make it your mission to make sure we know our place.  The billing department is the first place where you can call to unleash your anger pent up from an unhappy marriage and an unsatisfying paycheck.  If you find a mistake of ours, you will act like it’s discovering the constitution was a conspiracy.  We know.  It’s okay.  We can take it.  After all, we never had a good self esteem to begin with.  Why start now.

Accounting.  We are the first to be blamed for anything that goes wrong and we are the last person to be let off the hook.   Sometimes we must act like a negotiator in a hostage situation.   Seriously, try to be the poor accounts payable person on the other end of the phone of “I want my money, I want my MONEY, I WANT MY MONEYYYYYY!!!!”

Sometimes I feel more like a 911 operator.  In one day I got three calls, a voicemail,  two faxes and an email to my boss and myself trying to collect on a $3.60 invoice.  I then had to take this call and say ““Ma’m stay calm and tell me what company you work for…..Okay, hold on, please breathe….yes we owe you $3.60.  I will cut a check next week.  Please remain calm.”

To those aspiring accounting students expect one of two reactions from strangers.

1. “Oh my gosh, you are an accountant?   You must be super good at numbers!  What would you recommend for my long term investment portfolio? ”  You instantly become the one that gets handed the restaurant bill to “figure out that crazy split” and you are expected to calculate tips and percentages instantly in your head.  Apparently being an accountant actually means being able a walking calculator.

Weirdly, people also  instantly expect me to know everything that is going on at Wall Street.  Sometimes I wonder if I have one of those red banner ticker things scrolling across my forehead announcing the latest swells of the financial markets.  Or they come running to me with questions about how to budget or refinance.

2. “Accounting, huh?  So you are really boring, right?  You don’t like having fun or making jokes because the numbers have gone to your head.”

Accountants.  We ruin Christmas and we starve children.  We got 300 correct billing statements out the door this month but we messed up yours and now we must pay.

But.  I warn you.  We know your secrets.  Accountants know things.   Don’t yell at us.  We can ruin next Christmas too.

They say – and I have no idea who “they” may be – that when life hands you lemons, make lemonade.  It’s a great saying and I am sure thousands of gallons of proverbial lemonade have been made by people who have been thrown plenty of curveballed lemons.

To be quite honest, I am horrible about turning my lemons into lemonade.  I usually just throw my lemons on the ground, stomp on them and all the while whine about my problems and de”lemons” (get it?  De”lemons” aka dilemmas:)  I might take my lemons and throw them at mailboxes or a nearby cat – but I never want to add any sugar or maturity to my problems.

I always boast that I am becoming more mature that I was the day before and that I am starting to get the whole “grownup” thing down more and more – but the slightest wind can knock all my little duckies out of their straight line and maybe even completely out of the water.

Right now, my eyes are being my two biggest life “lemons.”  As I type this, I can only see out of one eye and some might compare one of my eyes to Rudolph’s little red nose – except way less cute and singable.  I went to the doctor yesterday and they warned me that if I didn’t take care of my eyes, I could go blind.

I panicked.  Blindness is not a part of my 1o year plan.  My prayers became a string loop of words “please don’t let me go blind, please don’t let me go blind, please don’t let me go blind.”  My eyesight yesterday was so bad that I couldn’t see more than a glare of light and vague shapes and colors.

Today, I woke up and the eyesight improved ever so slightly.  With that minor improvement, I stopped panicking.  My duckies began swimming back into a line and I relaxed knowing my eyesight would eventually return to their normal state.

However, that whole panic attack left me wondering why I could be so easily shaken.  I could still see great out of one of my eyes and the rest of my health is very solid.  I can still do my job and I have great friends who care for me.  There are many people in the world who have it far worst, and they have pitchers of lemonade.  I had a tiny problem and I turned it into a squashed lemon on the dirty sidewalk of my reactions.

So.   No one likes life lemons.  But you know what lemons are good for? They are great at giving you a big sour punch to the reality of your true self.  I wish I could promise to zest the next life lemon that comes my way- but I know that I am too stupid to mature that quickly.  I need lemons to show me where I need to grow.

Sometimes I need a little lemon to find my paper cuts.

About a month ago, I moved in with an old lady.  I have learned one thing:  never have old women as roommates.   It can get complicated.

Unfortunately, as a young lady, I know that I am in danger of becoming an old woman – watching t.v. at high volumes, listening to talk radio about metapause, reading books about political corruption and talking about “when I was your age”, and treating my dog like a child.

To help further illustrate the horrors of old lady roommates, allow me to share the stories of my pain.

Old women cackle.  Really. It’s not just an stereotype, they really do.  I was sitting in my room, minding my own business, when I heard a sound that sounded like a chicken being harassed.  Turns out, my roommate was watching reruns of America’s Funniest Home Videos.  And laughing hysterically.  Continually.  At every clip.  Now, I totally get a kick out of watching kids hit their dad in the crotch, cats slide across a wood floor, and ice fall on a half naked man.  But I don’t cackle.  I chuckle.  Quietly.

Old women have weird hearing issues.  One minute, I am being told to “speak up, I can’t hear you!”  and another minute I am instructed to “take your phone conversation in your room, I can’t hear my tv!!”  Also, me walking into the kitchen at 7 am in my high heels wakes her up, and “can you please wear slippers instead, even though it’s only for the thirty seconds as you walk out the door to work.”

Old ladies with dogs…..that was a relationship designed to show God has a sense of humor.  My old lady roommate has a puppy.  That she treats like a child.  These are the sounds I hear as I sit my room.

“NOOOOO!!!! You WILL sit!  You WILL stay! NOOOOOOOO! Don’t you dare get up! Eat your dinner!  You are not being a good girl!  I told you to be a good girl!  Now you are going outside!  Think about what you did!”

Yep.

Oh.  And watching old women do a 70s televised exercise class?   It’s better than watching America’s Funniest Home Videos and it is the closest thing that will make me cackle.

Basically, my house rules have been given as follow: I can’t turn on the heater, I can’t make noise, and I can’t cook for fear I will make a pan dirty.

When I grow up, I hope I don’t become an old woman.

After going to the gym for the first time in quite a while, I concluded two things.  One: I am dreadfully out of shape.  Two: I should not be allowed near fancy sports equipment, simply because it’s a hazard to my health.

I began my hour workout by stepping on this rather large, pimped out, remix version of an elliptical.  I am sure that if I had been able to read the brochure on this thing, it would have promised buns of steel, rock abs, and arms that could break cinder blocks  (since that is such a big goal of mine….)  However, as I began to pedal, I quickly became very confused.

My legs were being moved up, down, to the side, and back and forth –all at once.  I am pretty sure that it was invented by aliens who were not familiar with the generally accepted belief that humans usually only move in one direction at one time.  The idea that a human could occupy two places at once was apparently a possibility to whoever invented that machine from hell.

I then got off that machine and moved on to one that obeyed the laws of physics.

After putting in a couple of miles on that one, I decide it was time for me to go do some strength training.  You know, so I can get buff.

So I went over to this little area that was deemed the strength training circuit arena.  Every station was a different machine, all designed to target different muscle groups. The instructions were to do up to 12 “reps” on each contraption, and push each muscle to the “exhaustion point.”   Now when I read the words, “reps” and “exhaustion point,”  I should have gotten a clue on what I was getting myself into.

I walked up to the first machine and sat down.   And waited.   There were bars, and pulleys, and straps and weights sticking out from every which way, and I had no clue what I was to pull, push or shove.  The seat itself was positioned in a sort of astronaut, heels up, butt up, head down way.  I got up and circled the machine.  The directions for the machine were printed on a tiny piece of paper that read that I was to actually push up with my legs, while laying on my stomach.  After ten minutes of looking like a drowning fish…..I just moved on.

After finishing my “reps,”  I moved on to what was one of the more difficult exercises of them all – opening my friends sports water bottle to refill.  I walked over to the water fountain, and in front of the entire gym, began to try to figure out this “new-fangled” piece of equipment.

While beefy men, wearing those thick, leather back supports, grunted up 100 lb. barbells, I groaned as I tried to twist this top off.   However, being a fancy bottle, whenever I twisted the top, the only result I got was a straw would pop up.

After all that effort, I strongly considered just pouring the water down the straw.

Of course I didn’t want to look silly.

Not that I could look any sillier than standing there for all to see, with a water bottle between my knees, arms straining against the top, my neck veins popping out, face red with intensity, teeth grit together in a sort of gorilla grimace.

I finally sheepishly walked over to my friend and asked her to help me get it open.  She barely moved her arms, and the top came off effortlessly.  I went over to the fountain, filled up, and proceeded to pretend to stretch for the remainder of my time there.

No one should ever like gyms.  They make people feel stupid.

No one likes hospitals.

The past few weeks I have spent many hours in the hospital.  Not for myself, but for my mom.  Some of my readers may know that my mom’s health struggles have been chronic and rather debilitating.  She has been in and out of the hospital for years, and this time it was to get a defibrillator implant as  a protective measure against a heart attack.

As I was sitting in her hospital room, listening to the beeping of the heart monitors, the paging of doctors and the rasping cough of her roommate, I started to get depressed.  I felt so human.  I knew that only a few years, a lifestyle of just a couple poor choices or maybe even just a few bad genes separated me from the hospital bed next to me.

To be honest, I hate being around sick people.  I mean, I love the person, but I really can’t stand to see someone suffer.  When someone throws up near me, I gag.  If someone starts to cough violently, I have to leave the room.  I know to some this may seem very insensitive and rather rude, but I can’t seem to see past the germs and bodily fluids.

As I watched my dad take care of my mom, helping her crawl to the bathroom, wiping her nose, and stand by her side as she threw up, I realized something.

This was the “for better or worst” part.

Twenty five plus years ago, my parents stood at an altar and promised “for better or worst.”  While the organ music played and the candles flickered, they promised that no matter what, they would stand by each other’s side.

I am sure that very few glowing couples think about the possibility of that future hospital room, where the sound of a heart monitor is the only indication that the person you love the most is going to make it.  They especially don’t expect it to happen before they hit their fifties.  They might not think about the fact that you may someday be the only person doing the serving because the other person is too weak to even go to the bathroom by themselves or take a shower without assistance.

Fast forward to present day, where I am sitting in the corner trying to maintain my composure as I hear my mom heaving with violent gasps for air. I watch my dad lovingly stroke her head.  He doesn’t care about the spit or the germs or the sobbing.  He is just keeping his promise.

I’ve never heard my dad complain.  Ever.  And as much as I am sure he hates hospitals as much as I do, he deals with it.  Because he has a promise to keep.

For better or worst.

Man,  times have changed.  I don’t remember the word  ”fun” being defined as, “the cheapest, smallest way to cheat the hungry American public.”  When I was a kid, a fun size of candy  was  a huge bar of caloric goodness crammed into your mouth with the hopes that you wouldn’t choke.    

I guess they started naming the small candies the “fun size” when their marketing team found that “the chintzy size” didn’t sell as well. 

Never fear, I am here to spread the facts.  The facts about fun.

Fact. Me having  to eat twelve candies before I start to  taste any sort of candy-like molecule – that’s not so fun.  A serving size of candy should not be “ten pieces to unwrap individually and carefully place in the middle of your tongue so you can find it.”  Seriously.   No one has time for that.  This is America.  We are a busy culture.    We have cancer to cure.  Schools to build.  Facebook statuses to update.

Fact.  Candy that weighs less than the wrapping around its little chocolatey body – that’s not so fun.  The fact that the company spent more on packaging than on product….that’s just intestinally disturbing.  Yes.  You read that right.  I made up a word.  Intestinally.  It’s going to be huge.  Like colon huge.  (The colon is your largest intestine.  You are  learning just so much, aren’t you?)

Fact.  If you give “fun” candies away, you actually aren’t fun.  You are mean.  And cruel.  And possibly the most uncool person on earth. 

Fact.  If we allow “fun size” candies to actually define “fun,” then amusement park roller coasters better stop after two seconds, engagement rings should be made of twisty ties and jagged pieces of fiberglass, puppies should be drowned, and No Tears shampoo should be infused with acid and bleach. 

So.  Be fun.  Know the facts.  Don’t give out ”fun size” candies.

If you cannot figure out what do to with your life, and if you have ruled out being a doctor, a firefighter, an accountant, a ballet dancer, an astronaut, a professional bowler, or the President of the United States – don’t worry. You can become a life coach. 

What is a life coach?  A person who doesn’t know what to do with their life and instead tells everyone else what to do.  The requirements are very simple:

1. You must have ADD or ADHD.  Or at least drink 20 energy drinks a day.  If you are going to persuade someone to do something that they already HIRED you to tell them but really don’t want to do, you better have an arsenal of on-edge nerves and an ability to convert caffeine to jet fuel in your bloodstream. 

2. You must like and repeat the word “level” constantly.  Your clients will want to hear you say things like “take this to the next level,” “success is only a couple of levels away,” “level with me,” “the five levels of money and success and awesomeness are very simple,” ”levels are like stepping-stones,” the next level is where you want to be.”  

Other words and phrases you must memorize are: 1. success is as easy as paying me $140 an hour to tell you things that you could read in a book, 2. rocket past your doubts and touchdown on the moon of your successful astro-blasting potential, 3. don’t rock the boat of goals when you are floating on river of energy and efficiency and knowledge and power. 

3. You must have the ability to say a bunch of words that sound good, are attached to irrelevant analogies, and don’t mean anything.   ”Success in life is like licking a lollipop and knowing that there is a Tootsie roll in the middle of your ultimate level of life.”  “Live life like there is an alligator chasing you through the swamps of your worst nightmares and inadequacies.” And my favorite corny one: “Be the Smartphone among the Blackberries  with their thorns.”

4.  You must write at least four books with five-step plans.  You must allow two of those books to have titles that contain a play on words.  Like — “Urine for Success: 5 ways that the bladder teaches discipline.”

If you have those qualities, you are ready to be a life coach.   Having trouble getting started?  Contact me, and I will give you the five steps to  launching your dreams into the next level of your buzzing beehive of success. 

Favorite life coach quote:  ”Life.  Live it!”

The almost good song.  It’s like a box of chocolates.  That your boyfriend picked up at the gas station on his way over to your house.  It was a nice thought, but you could have done without the sawdustlike filling and the crumbly, cracked chocolatelike coating.  Just another thing to add to stuff we don’t like. 

 Don’t you just love the feeling when you are the first person to discover a good/potentially soon-to-be popular song on the radio?  It’s like being a record label agent and knowing that you have discovered the better stuff.  Like Snapple.

The worst thing to happen to you on the way to work or on the way home?  Discovering the almost good song.  You know, when the DJ comes on and introduces the newest single from The Shizzlites feat.The  Mad Hot Bodies, “Sugar Daddy’s lil’ Shawty.”  

You get excited.  The bass starts pumping and your car vibrates.  Oxygen rushes through your cells.  You mash on the gas petal.  The singer’s voice breaks through your speakers.

Then.   The singing is off.  The chorus doesn’t jump up and demand you dance.  It just kinda sits there like a limp, cold French fry. 

With no ketchup.  

No car dancing.  No hands in the air.  No screaming about clubs and billionaires and G6s and OMGs and beautiful girls. 

Just lameness that goes on for three minutes and forty-five seconds.    

Yep.  That’s the stuff that no one likes.  Which means it can’t be like Snapple.  Please tell me you know what Snapple commercial I keep referring to.  Please. 

You know what’s even worst?  When the commercial songs get stuck in your head.  Don’t tell me you haven’t hummed the “Keyes, Keyes, Keyes  on Van Nuys” song. 

I won’t believe you like I can’t believe it’s not butter.  Tomorrow’s topic? 

Double Negatives.

(p.s. did anyone notice how much food came up in this post?  I must be hungry.)

Let me tell you.  Our society has its priorities mixed up.  Really.  A person could get shot down on skid row and a report may be filed and the body dragged away, but just TRY to say a double negative.  Just try.

I was in a meeting recently.  In this meeting, I was attempting to express my frustration of not being able to resolve a simple database problem. 

Me: “I can’t hardly enter in the text when….”  

Five heads turned on me like I was Harry Potter confronting Voldemort. 

Person #1:  “WHAT did you say????”

Me: “Uh….I said I can’t har…”  My jaw snapping shut as I realized my linguistics error.  “I mean,  I couldn’t figure out how to enter the text without screwing up the pre-programmed formulas….”

Person #2:  “You do realize you said a double negative, right?” 

Now.  Okay.  Yes, I said a double negative.  Iblame it on the fact that my ancestors are all deep-rooted rednecks with no book learning. 

To rednecks, a double negative just means that you are emphasizing the negativity.  When you can’t hardly do something, it means that you really, really can’t do it.  They don’t understand all those scientific reasons why two negatives such as  -x and -y multiplied together will make a positive xy.   All they know is that marrying your cousin will probably give your children six toes.  Or two heads.

But no one in that meeting cares about that.  To them, my double negative gives them the authority to go after me like the Po-Po in the Ke$ha music video.  And shut me down. 

After a five-minute discussion on why double negatives are the reason society is headed to near destruction, I was allowed to walk away from the firing squad.  I don’t know how those entrepreneurs at “I can’t believe it’s not butter” got away with it. 

Double negatives must be why Albert Einstein had crazy hair.  At least, that’s what I am going to blame.  I’ll also blame rusty nails, splinters and cat hairballs on double negatives.  It’s only fair. 

Have you ever said a double negative?

I have a confession to make.  I hate my comfort zone.

I know what you are thinking right now.  Everyone loves their comfort zone, hence the name “comfort.”  If everyone loves it, why does it get a dedicated post on a blog that rants and raves about things that no one likes?

Frankly, things like LA traffic, moldy bread and piles of dirty dishes don’t matter when you think about other things.  Kids in Africa.  Do you ever think of them, at least besides the times that your mom demands you clean your plate of week old leftovers?

The person who sits by himself every day in the cafeteria because he don’t have the courage to go introduce himself to a boisterous table of friends.  Does anyone care about him?  What about the slightly strange kid who slightly bugs you?  Do you care about that person?

A very close friend of mine lives by one simple rule.  Live life with no regrets. Can we really live without having a single regret?  Probably not.  But we can die trying to live the best we can with what we have been given.    I feel like we should live life like a movie trailer, living for the big moments that make the rest of the movie worth watching, and perhaps enjoying the small details along the way.

Yes.  Everyone has their comfort zone.  But I want to call you out on something.  Do you really like it?  I know you think you do, because I have deceived myself into thinking I like mine many times.

However, it has been my experience that the times that I feel alive the most is when I am miles and miles away from that zone.  There is another word for the comfort zone.  It’s called a rut.

You go to work, school, doctor appointments, the gym or wherever else the typical day takes you.  And then you go home.  You watch two hours of some pointless t.v. show that will be canceled after the next season.  You read the news about war, corruption, racism, technology advancement and the latest sport scores.  Then you go to bed.

There may be moments where you tip toe out of your comfort zone for a mere second just to see what it feels like outside of your walls.  But then you step back inside, shut the door and close the drapes.

My purpose in writing this is not to guilt you.  We have all created our comfort zones for a reason.  Life is hard, and sometimes it’s easier to get through the day when you are safe behind the walls of fake smiles, shallow conversations and work that gets your mind off the pain.  Some of us have built bigger comfort zones than others.  We build fortresses and dig proverbial moats to make sure that nothing can get past our masks.  In fact, some of us have done such a good job of building walls that we have forgotten to add a door or window.

The world is full of other things besides yourself.  Sometimes we need that reminder.  If you just step outside that comfort zone, you may find that the smiles that you give and the conversations you have become more real.  Life isn’t about building your zone and making sure the gates are locked shut.  It’s about breaking out of there and living.

You’ve only been given one life.  Don’t spend it locked away, trying to avoid the hurts or pains while missing out on the victories. Comfort zones make very lonely places.

So.  Let’s just be honest.  No one likes their comfort zone.

I don’t believe in evolution.  I just had to put that on the record.  But if I did believe in evolution and cavemen and flintstone bedrock ages, I know for a fact that if cavemen had invented child safety scissors instead of clubs and hammers…..mankind would have gone extinct.  Why?  Because when it comes to cutting paper or any other severing activity, child safety scissors do about as well as Lindsey Lohan does with rehab.  But perhaps the child safety scissors accomplish their goal with less alcohol and more apple juice.

I’ve taught enough children’s Sunday schools to know it’s pointless to even pass out the darn things.  It would take the skill of a surgeon to be able to coax those tiny, dull, plastic scissors to cut anything other than water.  None of the kids can ever make them work and it becomes the Sunday school teacher’s job to saw out fifty-four Jesus’ arms to brass bracket to the lesson sheets so that Jesus can wave to a crayon scribbled crowd.

Of course, the goal in the creation of these pointless scissors was to promote children safety.  But really?  What is this?  Prison?  Are we afraid the children will weld the scissors into shanks and start forming their own classroom gangs, like the Crayon Warriors, the Hell’s Doodlers and the ABC homies?

Let’s just think about what Dwight Schrute from the NBC show, the Office would say.  He would say that we should hand out machetes to all the children.  It would weed out the weak ones from the older ones.  Then he would hand out not paper but boards to cut for beet boxes.  All Schrute children probably had to do this.  And we can be sure that none of them had child safety scissors.

If you are really concerned for your child’s safety and education, you would give your kids real scissors.  The safety ones only cause blisters and fatigue, all of which I am sure are considered child abuse.  Real scissors will teach your kids motor skills and the dangers of sharp objects.  If a few fingers are lost in the process, even more lessons will be learned.  Like how to tie a tourniquet.

Say no to child safety scissors, say yes to learning.

I am declaring a world-wide ban.  No one should like the movie, “Astro Boy.”  No one.  Ever. Liking it is right up there to liking drowning.  Or bacteria.

Now.   I am no movie snob.  I’ll watch just about anything.  As long as there is not too much filth in the movie, I’ll watch it.  To prove my point, I watched three seasons of an 80′s T.V. show about cowboys and Indians and the pony express.   The big drama in that show?  One of the riders was a girl pretending to be a boy so that she could earn money to go save her brother and sister from an orphanage and who got kidnapped by their fake father and she has to go rescue them from a fort.  Then she falls in love with one of the other pony riders.  Oh and all of this was accompanied by 80′s music.  

Now you know why I blog.  To put some sanity back into my life.

But back to Astro Boy.   I work in animation, so I figured that this animated film might be a good way to observe some of the industry techniques.

Allow me to sum up the plot.  The main character is a boy living in a high tech society.    Of course, to make the main character stand out, they make him a genius…..and misunderstood. His father ignores him and his mother is dead. Getting too attached to this poor boy?  That’s okay.   They kill him.  After ten minutes.  With a missile.

Uhhhhhh, WHAT????  That was my initial reaction.  It should be yours too.

They kill off the main character in ten minutes.  Yeah.  Who taught those writers how to craft a good story?  A cracker jack box?  A monkey?  A youtube video?

Then Nicholas Cage, who plays the scientist father, creates a robot boy to replace his son. Why?  Because if he couldn’t have his real boy, he might as well make a robot that looked like him and can shoot bullets out of his robotic butt.  It’s like a modern day Pinocchio without the cute cricket….or any sense and logic.

You might be wondering “how does he give the robot power?”  I’m so glad you asked.     He puts a star in him.  Yes.  A star. Like twinkle, twinkle little star.   Oh and it’s blue.  Because apparently red stars are bad and too unstable.  That’s their big good vs. evil symbolism. 

Of course every story has to have a love angle in it, right?  The boy turned robot falls  in love with a  girl with black and purple hair.  But she doesn’t know he is a robot.  Oh the suspense!!!  When she does find out his oh so dark secret, she decides to love him anyways.  Uh.  Yes, that’s something we want to teach out children….fall in love with robots.

And every story has to have a moral thread, right?  Disney is famous for their “believe in yourself” lines.  Well, guess what this profoundly deep movie was trying to teach.   Robots have feelings.  Yep.  Your coffee pot?  Feelings.  Your lawn mower?  Feelings.

Please.  Never watch Astro Boy.  Because, I’ll save you the moral struggle- robots do not, in fact, have feelings. And the color blue is no more righteous than the color red.  I promise.

That’s your piece of awesome writing for the day.  It was written by Robert Frost, who also happens to be my great, great, great, great, great, great uncle.  Random?  Yes. What does it have to do with this article?  Nothing.  I just wanted to let you read some good writing before I unleash my corny side.

You have been warned.

Let’s just say this is the reason they create a two drink minimum at comedy clubs.  These are all the stupid one-liners I thought would be good to open my article.

1. Convenience charges….what’s so convenient about them?
2. The only person that receives the convenience is the person receiving the extra $4.50 into their bank account.
3. Convenience charges?  More like INCONVENIENT charges!!! (hardy har har har)
4. What else are we going to be charged for the convenience of doing?  Breathing?  (This one was suggested by a friend.)
5. There is a reason that the word “con” exists in these fees.

So.  Now that I have driven you to drinking, and probably vomiting, I suppose I should bring it all home with a rant of why convenience fees are stupid.  Let me lay it all out with a true story.

This last summer I got two traffic tickets.  Bummer.  When I got the invoice in the mail, one of the tickets came to a total of $400.  They generously directed me to their online payment center where I could “conveniently” take care of my “inconvenience.”  Not wanting to get in trouble with the law, I dutifully visited the site and started the process of paying the darn thing.

Lo and Behold.  They tacked on a convenience fee.  To pay something on a site that they instructed me to visit.  How convenient was it?  Uh…..it wasn’t.

I had to search for the ticket by serial number.  And the system couldn’t find it.  So, I searched by driver’s license.  Still couldn’t find it.  Then I had to figure out what department had written me the ticket.  Definitely not as easy as it sounds.  Did you know that they have a LA traffic department, a LA sheriff’s department, a LA Metro Transportation office, a LA public safety department, a LA county traffic security department, and a LA we just want to make another department to write tickets department?

After writing a logarithm to figure out what greedy government department was getting my money, I proceeded to the checkout.  Where they said due to my convenient online experience they were going to charge me $30 over my ticket.   With this injustice, I wonder….

How in the world did California get broke?