Layers of Stupid?

My Grade 5 teacher told my mom, "Lori does not suffer fools lightly." I've tried since then to mitigate that, and have attempted to be open to the less-than-fully-bright in my life.

I'm not that patient.

Got talking to a friend online tonight...she and her kids were watching WipeOut. Oh my.

But I got thinking about a show I used to actually almost enjoy -- partly because I saw it as an amusing observation of the different layers of stupidity.

"What show?" I hear you ask. Ah, well, Street Smarts is the show. Did you never watch it while it was on?

Here's part 1 of an episode for you:



Now, right away, you see the premise: studio audience and contestants (from the studio audience) make fun of the stupid people on the street that the host has interviewed. Will these dumb people know the answers to the incredibly simple questions asked to them?

Ah, but wait.
This episode features Ben the Bronx stud, Molly the future newscaster and Ben the construction worker. These people interviewed on the street know the show, and are thrilled to be on it! Huh? Don't you guys know that everyone is laughing at you?!

But wait...they get some answers right. So they're not utterly hopeless. The contestants, Calysta and Yaron, think they're the shit, 'cause they're the contestants, not the putzes on the street.

But wait...they can 'dunce' each other. That's when one of them challenges the other to answer the question themselves first. Watch Yaron when he 'dunces' Calysta -- he really doesn't know the answer!

So who's really stupid? Who's smart? Those of us watching, laughing knowingly and feeling superior at the absurdity that is this public display of moron-hood? Those in the studio audience, enjoying the excitement and laughing? The person who won the round? The people on the street who got their 15 minutes of fame?

Probably I'm the dumbest, as I've just spent 40 minutes of my life blogging about this.

Enjoy Part 2 (actually, the 'duncing' is in this part):



Do watch the show...I think the host is a hoot!

Lori

Where the line?

Have I created a busy life for myself, or am I engendering chaos?

My day-to-day work is stressful and full...and I often spend the day on the computer, wrenching my brain around concepts, rationales, and budgets.

In my private life

• I bowl on Wednesdays. **Update 2** I'm dedicated to finding us a sponsor for t-shirts this year!
  
• I chair a Board of Directors of the best event in town, the Okanagan International Children's Festival.
• I'm a member of the Board of the networking organization Penticton Women in Business.
• I'm going to be directing a short, one-act play for performance the first week of December.
• I'm helping to organize a local congregation's annual Walk to Bethlehem (a 3-day re-imagining of life in the Ancient Near East, complete with children's pageants and anachronisms).
• I periodically write book reviews.
• I (try to) have a social life.
• I'm presenting at BookCamp Vancouver on Friday.
• Oh, and I'm married, and trying to have a relationship that's more than coffee in the morning.
  

Where can I draw the line? What do I prioritize?

Then there are the things that I want to find time to do:

• Work on my book idea with my buddy who lives in Korea.
• Start work on a MBA.
• Catalogue my movies.
• Spend more time studying French.
• Blog more often.
• **Updated** Organize my photos, make albums even.
• **Updated** Learn to use Photoshop.
• **Update 2** I want to get a conversation salon started in town.
  

It has been an amazing Thanksgiving weekend, where my absolutely perfect turkey was consumed by a small group of close friends. I am grateful for the activities in my life, but I do wonder if I should pare them down.

I would welcome your thoughts and suggestions.

Lori

Donkeys

Do a Google search of the word "donkey" and some delightful stuff comes up:

The Donkey Sanctuary of Canada (who knew?)

Guidelines for Using Donkeys as Guard Animals with Sheep (provided by the Gov't of Ontario of all places)

Lately, I've been hearing the word a lot, as my man Metro is playing poker and is picking up the jargon. A donkey is a specific type of player: a bad one.

Today, a friend of a friend, visiting from out of town, started telling me a story out of the blue...about how, when she was a young girl, she saw the most amazing thing: Donkey Baseball. A fundraiser in her little town. All these years later, this memory has stayed with her, vividly.

I smiled to myself, went to my friend's computer and hit Youtube. Two seconds later I called her over to see this:



I love the Internet.

Lori

Something I've wanted to know...

I've got a lot of cousins, and some of them are 2nd cousins once-removed...or is that 1st cousins twice-removed?

I found a chart (here), and now my life is complete. :-)


So my mom's first cousin is my 1st cousin once removed, and her kids are my 2nd cousins.

I really do feel better knowing this!

Lori

A Group of Individuals

Last week, my man and I were in a hotel in Our Nation's Capital. Yes, thanks for asking, we had a good time. A bit stressful, with all of the visiting-family requirements, but fun. [Note to self: next year, do not combine family obligations with holiday.]

But when I stay in hotels, I watch TV. It's really the only time I watch TV, so suddenly I get to see the underbelly of our culture as something of an anthropologist...with fresh eyes.

This time around, I noticed that the cult of individuality, mutated into a revolting sameness that inspires every young woman to be a slut with a lower back tattoo just like everyone else's, and makes me confuse Christina Aguilera with Paris Hilton (Is it only me, or are they clones of each other?), has now spread to advertising, where what's cool goes to die.

• A car commercial that has cars (and drivers, I assume) coming together for a rally: "It is that which makes us different that brings us together!" yells the speaker. The tag line? "United by Individuality"
• A commercial for a cell phone company which entices potential new customers with "the only thing we have in common is how different we are."
• A(ny) commercial for alcohol that has the whole bar drinking the same mixed drink (following the herd ain't just for beer any more!). My, aren't they having fun.

So, is that it then? Is the cultural love affair with individuality run its course? When it's the theme of 3 oft-repeated commercials shown during the broadcast of one re-run of CSI, could it be that Individuality as the Icon of Cool is dead?

Gads. What's coming up behind us, here in the mainstream? (Yes, RC, I hear you...You, of course, are not mainstream...)

I mean, really, if an idea, a cultural meme (in its original meaning) works its way through the initiators, then the early adoptors, then the rest of the world before becoming noticed by ad execs...then individuality is in its death throes.

Okay, so being an individual is not a short-lived trend, like some. From Jung helping people along the path of individuation, through to today's tattoos and piercings being the norm, this trend has had some real longevity. But I'm throwing these musings out to my clever readers -- What's next? If individuality is old hat, what can possibly follow it?

Lori

Are you careful?

(Source)

I'm not concerned so much about googling someone, I'm more concerned about people googling me. But I do believe that my Internet interactions are as transparent as can be...If I were to suddenly run for office and my Internet dealings were uncovered, I'd be okay. I do attempt to write with an awareness of my audience.

But I must say, I worry about some others. I have Facebook counterparts who write the most obnoxious details of their lives in their updates. I have a friend who tells me that, working in HR in a large company, he regularly googles the people whose resumes he gets -- and has found one guy telling friends on a board somewhere that he peed in the staffroom sink at one job, and another one who bragged about stealing from a former company. I wonder how far they got in the interview?

Is your Internet face the same as your public face? Where do they differ? Curious minds want to know...

Lori

Improve your life (Warning: Low on Absurd Scale!)

I was browsing my Netvibes GTD blog feed this morning (see Az, I really do use it at home!), and I found a really thoughtful post from over at Lifehack.org on 10 Virtually instant ways to improve your life -- every single point was something everyone needs to have tattooed to the back of their hand to remember (figuratively speaking, of course).

For example:

Don’t invent rules. A huge proportion of those “oughts” and “shoulds” that you carry around are most likely needless. All that they do for you is make you feel nervous or guilty. What’s the point? When you use these imaginary rules on yourself, you clog your mind with petty restrictions and childish orders. And when you try to impose them on others, you make yourself into a bully, a boring nag, or a self-righteous bigot.

Now, I do have life rules, but they are lessons learned rules, so I think they're okay.

Rule #1
"Always wear comfortable shoes."

Rule #2
"Never live with your best friend."
[Corollary to Rule #2: "Live with someone who can be your best friend."]

There really are only 2 rules, but I'll jokingly add them as they come up. Like, Rule #23 (in the Travel subset of rules) "Always use the bathroom when you get a chance."

Any to add?

Lori