Saturday 30 August 2008

Cynical list

1. leaders
2. followers
3. outlaws
4. lawyers
5. backstabbers
6. brown-nosers
7. yes-men
8. middlemen
9. alpha males
10. women who try to be alpha males
11. good ol' boys who become president
12. bimbos who become celebrities
13. all other celebrities
14. prima donnas
15. dictators
16. people who take dictation
17. workaholics
18. slackers who pretend to be workaholics
19. slackers who don't pretend to be workaholics
20. hypocrites
21. charlatans
22. MBAs
23. mindless office drones who get promoted to management
24. conformists
25. nonconformists
26. poseurs
27. people who use pretentious French words
28. bores
29. boors
30. weasels
31. barracudas
32. pedophile priests
33. leeches
34. internal parasites
35. investment bankers
36. old-money snobs
37. new-money snobs
38. fashion snobs
39. food snobs
40. health-and-fitness snobs
41. "I'm hipper than you'll ever be in your dreams" snobs
42. upwardly-mobile career snobs
43. "team players"
44. negotiators
45. the fine print
46. broken contracts
47. overbooked flights
48. canceled concerts
49. annulled marriages
50. returned gifts
51. recalled automobiles
52. planned obsolescence
53. knowing that your two-year-old $2000 computer is now a mere toy
54. $500 electronic handheld organizers that are almost as efficient as $30 loose-leaf organizers
55. 27-year-old Silicon Valley millionaires
56. computer literacy replacing literary literacy
57. computer viruses
58. software bugs
59. unfathomable computer video games that are instantly mastered by subliterate pre-adolescents
60. the values instilled by video games (if it gets in your way, nuke it)
61. thinking about a future society run by people nurtured on video games
62. watching helplessly as a full day's work is eaten alive by your PC
63. watching the hourglass hang for two, three, four minutes
64. "application has stopped responding to the system"
65. "server does not have a DNS entry"
66. spending three hours on the internet in a futile search for information
67. the fact that you could have obtained the information in three minutes by opening a book
68. the proliferation of websites featuring naked people exchanging bodily fluids
69. the fact that those websites are more popular than yours or mine
70. spam! spam! spam! spam!
71. losing half our free time to internet addiction
72. losing most of our day to meaningless work
73. having to play office politics
74. having to play golf with your superiors
75. the term "superiors"
76. the term "subordinates"
77. cubicles and other sensory deprivation cells
78. people who thrive in cubicles
79. people who thrive on 14-hour workdays
80. people who take their cell phones on vacation
81. "A" students who end up working for "C" students
82. "It takes money to make money"
83. "It's not what you know, it's who you know"
84. the "power words" used on resumes to impress employers
85. the fact that employers are impressed with power words on resumes
86. college graduates who have to settle for a job at Blockbuster
87. the salaries of liberal arts graduates in the business world
88. the miseries of liberal arts graduates in the business world
89. prostituting yourself for less than a prostitute makes
90. staying at a job you detest because the alternatives are even worse
91. people who get promoted on the basis of the right shoes or haircut
92. people who get promoted because they resemble their vice president
93. executive bonuses that exceed your annual salary
94. the "fast track"
95. the "glass ceiling"
96. being underemployed
97. being overworked
98. being reprimanded
99. being ignored
100. being framed
101. being demoted
102. being moved into the hallway
103. watching everyone but you rise to the level of their incompetence
104. the annual incomes of CEOs
105. the writing ability of CEOs
106. multimillion-dollar "golden parachutes" awarded to dismissed CEOs
107. the practice of terminating veteran employees a year before retirement
108. the term "terminating"
109. "leveraging"
110. "targeting"
111. "impacting"
112. calling downsizing "rightsizing"
113. downsizing profitable companies for the sole purpose of wooing investors
114. the fact that investors reward companies for downsizing
115. the fact that companies now exist primarily to woo investors
116. bonuses and stock options for executives who "trimmed the fat"
117. diet plans -- all 2,178 of them
118. joggers who perform ostentatious stretching exercises in public places
119. fitness zealots who carry hand weights when they walk
120. self-infatuated bodybuilders who know all their muscles by name
121. health-food fanatics who faint at the sight of a cheeseburger
122. health-food fanatics who smoke
123. anorexia nervosa (just put the food in your mouth and CHEW!)
124. restaurant patrons who send back perfectly edible food to impress their dinner dates
125. snippy waiters who would rather be snippy actors
126. waiters who tell you their name, call themselves "servers," and expect a 25% tip
127. waiting half an hour for a salad
128. waiting twenty minutes for your check
129. fussy, oily yuppie cuisine
130. anything with pesto sauce
131. "herbed" anything
132. "fruited" anything
133. anything with ingredients that require you to consult a glossary
134. gated communities
135. $600,000 yuppie homes on 1/4-acre lots
136. yuppie parents jockeying to get their child into a prestigious nursery school
137. the growing gap between haves and have-nots
138. doctors marrying doctors
139. lawyers marrying lawyers
140. men marrying men
141. computer geeks marrying computer geeks
142. professional jargon: the Tower of Babel revisited
143. the fact that people expect you to understand their jargon
144. "newspeak"
145. "groupthink"
146. "Big Brother is watching you"
147. totalitarianism
148. mass movements
149. mass media
150. mass murder
151. mass marketing
152. telemarketing
153. the pathetic scripts read by poor underpaid telemarketing agents
154. saying "yes" so we don't hurt the poor underpaid telemarketing agent's feelings
155. junk mail
156. the time we spend sorting through junk mail
157. the fact that junk mail is written by people who wanted to be writers
158. "Urgent: Reply Requested!"
159. "You may already have won!"
160. "If you're the winner, we will say MR. OCCUPANT HAS WON $9,000,000.00!"
161. "A special offer exclusively for Mr. Occupant"
162. "No strings attached!"
163. "FREE GIFT!"
164. "FREE TRIAL OFFER!"
165. televised trials
166. medieval trials (if you drown, you're innocent; if you float, you're guilty)
167. the irrelevance of the truth in all trials
168. jury rigging
169. plea bargaining
170. murderers acquitted because their side had smarter lawyers
171. innocent people sentenced because the OTHER side had smarter lawyers
172. convicted murderers paroled after serving six months of a life sentence
173. prisons that offer free education, VCRs, and complimentary mints on the pillows
174. legal loopholes
175. divorce settlements (both spouses lose; both lawyers win)
176. lawsuits by people who spill coffee on themselves
177. lawyers who encourage lawsuits by people who spill coffee on themselves
178. the absurd amounts of money awarded to people who spill coffee on themselves
179. the absurd amounts of money awarded to lawyers who prosecute lawsuits by people who spill coffee on themselves
180. the cost of private medical care
181. the tyranny of managed medical care
182. the inefficiency of public medical care
183. dying during a tonsillectomy
184. the fact that your death will be referred to as a "negative patient healthcare outcome"
185. health insurance companies that force hospitals to release patients as soon as the anesthesia wears off
186. health insurance being denied to the people most likely to get sick
187. health insurance as a capitalist enterprise
188. health insurance that covers 80% of a $500,000 medical bill
189. having a heart attack two days after your health insurance expires
190. the effects of age and gravity on the human body
191. shrinking from your original height
192. going senile
193. losing control of your bladder as a reward for reaching old age
194. drugs whose side effects are worse than the disease
195. cancer: opportunism incarnate
196. dandruff
197. gout
198. flatulence
199. herpes
200. psoriasis
201. Alzheimer's disease
202. Tourette's syndrome
203. St. Vitus' dance
204. hemorrhoids
205. chronic sinusitis
206. yeast infections
207. athlete's foot
208. gum disease
209. crotch rot
210. mad cow disease
211. elephantiasis
212. crabs
213. male-pattern baldness
214. irritable bowel syndrome
215. having to worry about your blood pressure and cholesterol
216. the fact that worrying about your blood pressure and cholesterol will probably raise both of them
217. the fact that virtually everything that tastes good can kill you
218. subsisting on granola only to find that it contains more saturated fat than two Big Macs
219. the wretchedness of heart-healthy diets (we are not RABBITS!)
220. regaining more weight after a diet than you lost during it
221. people who watch their fat intake and keel over at 47
222. people who eat lard, smoke two packs a day, and live to be 97
223. the likelihood that the survivors were also much HAPPIER during their long lives
224. suspecting that you'll be more like #221 than #222
225. the smugness of lucky people
226. the smugness of high-school in-crowders
227. the even worse smugness of art-world in-crowders
228. the empty pretentiousness of most modern art
229. performance artists: street loonies with foundation grants
230. artists who gain attention by exhibiting their own bodily excretions
231. artists who pass off collections of scrap metal as sculpture -- and have them deposited on idyllic college campuses
232. artists who decorate an empty canvas with one horizontal stripe
233. art critics who see profound meaning in an empty canvas with one horizontal stripe
234. movie critics who give rave reviews to bad films so their names will appear in newspaper ads
235. critics who call every passable film or play a "masterpiece"
236. critics who trash a film, play or book for the chance to turn a clever phrase
237. designated bestsellers stacked four feet high in the bookstore window
238. good books going out of print because nobody knows about them
239. nondescript chain bookstores driving out quirky independent bookstores
240. celebrity authors who earn more for one ghostwritten book than 100 editors make in a year
241. the state of publishing today
242. the state of Nevada
243. sleaze
244. bogus fun
245. bogus ANYTHING
246. breast implants
247. sex-change operations
248. bad toupees
249. good toupees
250. blazing white dentures
251. used-car dealers
252. chain letters
253. pyramid schemes
254. people who refer to pyramid schemes as "multi-level marketing"
255. euphemisms like "differently abled" and "mentally challenged"
256. oxymorons like "military intelligence" and "corporate culture"
257. "Catch-22" situations; e.g., "you can't get a job unless you already have a job"
258. millionaire ballplayers who grumble about their salaries
259. artificial turf, polyester uniforms, costumed mascots and other tackiness on the field
260. team owners who fire managers for losing the World Series
261. free agents who jump from team to team like hungry fleas
262. boxers who bite off their opponents' ears or other body parts
263. "great white hopes" = great white dopes
264. college football teams made up of convicted felons
265. pro football players who either strut ostentatiously or pray ostentatiously each time they score a touchdown
266. female sports reporters allowed into men's locker rooms
267. male sports reporters allowed into women's locker rooms (as if!)
268. sports teams with singular names; e.g., the Utah Jazz
269. sports teams with absurdly incongruous names; e.g., the Utah Jazz
270. sports parents who browbeat their kids for screwing up on the field
271. asinine chants of "We're #1!" (Americans always have to be #1)
272. sports fanatics who live vicariously through their teams
273. nerds who live vicariously through "Star Trek"
274. anyone who lives vicariously through any soap opera
275. celebrity worship
276. wealth without taste
277. taste without wealth
278. shamelsss celebrity promotional vehicles like "Entertainment Tonight"
279. John Tesh, shameless composer
280. "Candle in the Wind"
281. eulogies delivered by clergymen who didn't know the deceased
282. how we forget good people after their deaths and remember Attila the Hun
283. Gresham's Law: the bad drives out the good
284. the worldwide triumph of cockroaches
285. the worldwide triumph of rats
286. the worldwide triumph of American popular culture
287. absurd foreign imitations of American popular culture: Russian nightclubs, Czech rock groups, Japanese jazz bands, Turkish soap operas
288. the profitability of bad taste
289. the bad taste graveyard: disco, leisure suits, velvet clown paintings
290. pinkie rings and gold chains on wealthy building contractors
291. bad art in hotel/motel rooms
292. the fact that those bad artists can afford to stay in hotels with GOOD art
293. romance novels with Fabio on the cover
294. Elvis and Princess Diana collectibles
295. the fact that the majority of autographed sports collectibles are fakes
296. the need to purchase separate shoes for walking, jogging, tennis and basketball
297. selling advertising space on anything that doesn't move and some things that DO (buses, stock cars, Olympic athletes)
298. people who sell cemetery plots or penny stocks over the phone
299. ingenious high-pressure sales tactics that make us feel stupid if we say "no" and even stupider after we say "yes"
300. buying things on sale: spending money to save money
301. annual "going out of business" sales
302. people who spend an hour clipping coupons so they can save 87 cents
303. receiving Christmas catalogs in August
304. discovering there's no Santa Claus
305. the ugly, insanely popular, hard-to-obtain toys that parents must buy to appease their children
306. the fact that parents NEED to appease their own children
307. cheap toys with hundreds of dollars worth of accessories to buy
308. toys merchandised as movie tie-ins
309. the licensing of dead celebrities
310. people who gain an identity by wearing t-shirts with commercial logos
311. "As seen on TV!"
312. the bewildering success of home shopping channels ("Who would ever watch nonstop commercials?," asked the cynic)
313. infomercials for psychic hotlines, motivational tapes, exercise machines and baldness remedies
314. people who have nothing better to do at night than watch infomercials
315. people who promise they'll call but never do
316. people who complain because you promised to call but never do
317. people who ask "How are you?" but don't really want to know
318. people who make you miserable
319. the fact that you ALLOW people to make you miserable
320. that luck is definitely a factor in getting what you want
321. that you can make your own luck but nobody tells you how
322. being unlucky in love
323. being unlucky in the stock market
324. stocks that plummet after you buy them
325. stocks that go through the roof after you sell them
326. having to pay your broker a commission on losing stocks
327. the fact that your broker has no incentive to sell you WINNING stocks as long as you pay a commission on losing stocks
328. the fact that the entire economy of the free world is in the hands of gamblers
329. lotteries
330. sweepstakes
331. church bingo
332. casinos
333. Wall Street, the world's biggest casino
334. that American Indians have to operate casinos to survive
335. Las Vegas
336. lounge acts
337. Frank Sinatra after 1970
338. pop music after 1970
339. life after 1970
340. striving
341. giving up
342. promises
343. betrayals
344. excuses
345. prejudice against fat people
346. prejudice against dark-skinned people
347. prejudice against excessively stupid and excessively intelligent people
348. prejudice against people with big noses
349. prejudice against ugly women
350. prejudice against gentle men
351. "all men are created equal"
352. "the pursuit of happiness"
353. chronic disappointment
354. expecting rewards in the hereafter
355. the apparent indifference of God
356. the possibility that God is a myth
357. the possibility that God is a crank
358. the possibility that God is a jokester
359. the prevalence of unbelieving theologians: NOT a good sign
360. the perverse intelligence of inanimate objects that roll just out of reach
361. boxtops that tear as you open them
362. paper grocery bags that tear when they're full of glass jars
363. toilet paper that tears as you use it
364. price labels that won't come off without tearing the product
365. plastic bags you have to open with your teeth
366. "twist-off" bottlecaps that rip your fingers
367. VCRs so complicated that you need an engineering degree to program them
368. 500 channels and nothing you want to watch
369. electronic gadgets that come with incoherent instructions written by well- intentioned Asians
370. major appliances that break down two days after the warranty expires
371. traffic lights that are programmed to turn red as soon as you arrive from the previous red light
372. picking the shortest line at a toll booth or supermarket checkout -- and watching the others pass you by
373. playing by the rules and watching the outlaws pass you by
374. man's treachery toward his fellow-creatures
375. raising and nurturing good-natured cows, pigs and chickens so they can become DINNER
376. killing rhinos for their horns
377. killing elephants for their tusks
378. killing baby seals for their fur
379. killing employees for their productivity
380. the National Rifle Association
381. the fact that it's easier in the U.S. to obtain handguns than Cuban cigars
382. the oil cartel
383. U.S. alliances and wars motivated by the sweet smell of oil
384. the tobacco industry profiting from the slow suicides of smokers
385. people who start smoking to be cool, then sue tobacco companies when they develop lung cancer
386. the fact that tobacco ever caught on in the first place ("Why would anyone stick burning leaves in his mouth?," asked the cynic)
387. the fact that tobacco is more profitable than book publishing
388. the fact that nearly ANY industry is more profitable than book publishing
389. exploitation of resources, including human resources
390. the term "human resources" (we are not BAUXITE!)
391. billion-dollar sportswear companies that profit from exploiting child labor
392. clear-cutting the rainforests to make room for McDonald's beef cattle
393. excessive hysteria over snail darters and northern spotted owls
394. insufficient hysteria over the approaching extinction of tigers, pandas, gorillas and other first-rate mammals
395. Greenpeace (skip the '60s poetics -- just tell us what you do)
396. war
397. Pentagon spending habits; e.g., $640 toilet seats and $76 screws
398. the contractors who charge $640 per toilet seat and $76 per screw
399. being drafted
400. boot camp: sadomasochism as a character-builder
401. being expected to die for a country you can't locate on a map
402. bombing the wrong village
403. being killed by "friendly fire"
404. being killed one day before the truce is signed
405. being hit by a bus one day after returning to civilian life
406. the raunchy brutality of urban life
407. drug pushers
408. street gangs
409. rapists
410. carjackers
411. slumlords
412. racketeers
413. panhandlers
414. muggers who shoot you for a cigarette or a pair of sneakers
415. welfare mothers raising FUTURE welfare mothers
416. welfare fathers who sire six children by six different women
417. ghetto dwellers blaming their problems on racism
418. middle-class blacks encountering REAL racism when they move out of the ghetto
419. the fact that most stereotypes contain a grain of truth that keeps them alive: emotional Italians; smart, aggressive Jews; hot-blooded Latins; beguiling, hard-drinking Irish; disciplined, regimented Germans and Japanese; inbred rednecks
420. not being allowed to say that blacks have rhythm or superior athletic skill -- despite all the compelling evidence in their favor
421. not being allowed to talk about Jewish cultural influence -- despite the likelihood that the 20th century will be remembered as a Jewish Renaissance
422. the fact that Jewish sensitivities may have been conditioned by 2000 years of nonstop anti-Semitism
423. "Some of my best friends are [fill in the blank]"
424. the fact that every oppressed minority group likes to think it suffered more than every other oppressed minority group
425. Holocaust museums, AIDS quilts and other public statements of victimhood
426. the fact that we still NEED Holocaust museums, AIDS quilts and other public statements of victimhood
427. symbolic protests with live people masquerading as dead bodies
428. demands of amnesty by whining political agitators (if you don't want to be arrested, don't commit a crime)
429. '60s radicals who used the Vietnam War as an excuse to promote Marxism
430. '60s radicals who became Wall Street tycoons
431. '60s radicals who still wear tie-dyed shirts and sandals
432. liberals whose friends are exclusively upper-middle class
433. conservatives whose friends are exclusively upper-middle class
434. capitalism
435. communism
436. socialism
437. fascism
438. commericialism
439. terrorism
440. male chauvinism
441. female chauvinism
442. plagiarism
443. optimism
444. Freudianism
445. psychoanalysts who keep their patients coming back for 20 years
446. patients who still hope for a cure after being psychoanalyzed for 20 years
447. group therapy: a less expensive cure that doesn't work
448. electroshock therapy: a quicker cure that doesn't work
449. finally going crazy
450. psychiatrists who are crazier than their patients
451. finding happiness only after getting a lobotomy
452. being labeled a "former mental patient" for life
453. "sensitivity" training and other forms of brainwashing
454. psychobabble: the standardization of introspection
455. codependency and other pop-psychology concepts designed to sell books
456. the fact that there wouldn't be so many self-help books if any of them worked
457. anyone associated with the O.J. Simpson trial who wrote a book
458. O.J. Simpson
459. 20-year-old Hollywood starlets who form their own production companies
460. Hollywood agents of any age
461. the "A" list for Hollywood parties
462. the people who decide who's on the "A" list
463. Hollywood movies after "Star Wars"
464. blockbusters
465. sequels to blockbusters
466. bad movies based on old TV shows
467. the fact that those bad movies become blockbusters anyway
468. Julia Roberts, highest-paid film actress of all time
469. The fact that the highest-paid actress used to be Demi Moore until Julia Roberts replaced her
470. the fact that it would take the average U.S. worker more than six centuries to earn what the top male stars receive for one film
471. the fact that Michael Ovitz received five times that much when he was fired from Disney
472. the fact that Michael Eisner received more than five times as much as Ovitz in ONE DAY, when he cashed in his Disney stock options
473. the symbolism of Pia Zadora buying and demolishing Pickfair, once the grandest mansion in Beverly Hills
474. overreliance on special effects in mainstream Hollywood films
475. too much @$&#*!% profanity in mainstream Hollywood films
476. knee-jerk contempt for religion in mainstream Hollywood films
477. knee-jerk contempt for Hollywood by the religious right
478. films that depict Jesus as a blue-eyed Nordic
479. "To him that hath, more shall be given"
480. the old-boy network
481. the tendency of high-school in-crowders to become adult in-crowders
482. being snubbed by the in-crowd because of your looks, clothes, taste in music, or weird family
483. being snubbed by a friend in the presence of in-crowders
484. teachers who embarrass you in front of the entire class
485. students who embarrass teachers in front of the entire class
486. homework in every subject
487. teachers' pets
488. the worship of student athletes (except in cross-country, wrestling, golf and fencing)
489. cheerleaders
490. the importance of being selected as a cheerleader
491. parents who murder cheerleaders who were selected over their own kids
492. wanting to be considered cool: the root of all teenage vices
493. the inexplicable vogue for multiple pierced body parts, including tongues
494. peer pressure (ask any lemming)
495. being taunted for being virtuous
496. having to worry that you're gay if you're still a virgin at 18
497. having to think your entire future will be determined by your college board scores
498. being rejected by your #1 college
499. being rejected by your #2 college
500. being rejected by every college except your "safety" school
501. being rejected by your "safety" school
502. going to your #1 college -- and hating it
503. bickering with the college administration
504. crass college students who major in merchandising or finance
505. idealistic college students who major in history, philosophy or French (turn back before the world devours you!)
506. being stuck with a roommate from hell
507. the hell you have to go through to pledge a fraternity
508. fraternities in general
509. sororities in general
510. fraternity boys who become top executives
511. private university graduates who look down on state university graduates
512. state university graduates who look down on state college graduates
513. state college graduates who look down on community college graduates
514. high school dropouts who earn more than all of them
515. mom-and-pop businesses driven out by shopping malls
516. mom-and-pop businesses driven out by designer boutiques and tattoo parlors
517. what it takes to succeed
518. motivational seminars that promise easy success
519. the fact that the easiest way to succeed is to give motivational seminars
520. consulting: the art of succeeding while unemployed
521. the success of writers and artists who sell out
522. the wretchedness of writers and artists who don't
523. tenure for scholars: freedom to be mediocre
524. being denied tenure
525. semiotics, deconstructionism, and similar vehicles for academic obfuscation
526. Afrocentrism (sorry, the Egyptians weren't black)
527. Women's Studies (sorry, women aren't an ethnic group)
528. the shameful exclusion of non-Western cultures from old history textbooks
529. the overemphasis on non-Western cultures in current textbooks
530. the term "Third World" ("How come we never hear about the First and Second Worlds?," asked the cynic)
531. Montezuma's revenge
532. what the Spaniards did to Montezuma
533. trying to convert the heathens
534. selling refrigerators to Eskimos
535. having to call Eskimos "Inuit"
536. having to call Burma "Myanmar"
537. having to call Dave Barry "America's favorite humorist"
538. the fact that Tom Cruise is more famous than John Adams or Charlemagne
539. the fact that MTV is more famous than the 3,000-year-old nation of Armenia
540. Planet Hollywood
541. the Hard Rock Cafe
542. gawking tourists who wear Hard Rock Cafe t-shirts
543. paparazzi
544. supermarket tabloids
545. people who buy tabloids and complain about paparazzi
546. Calvin Klein ads (what exactly are we selling here?)
547. reading about the triumphs of the shallow in "People" magazine
548. the term "beautiful people" used without irony
549. chic: the triumph of style over substance
550. 55-year-old celebrities who try to look 30
551. cosmetic surgery
552. Michael Jackson, self-made alien
553. Michael Jackson's marriages
554. Michael Jackson's peculiar friendship with Elizabeth Taylor
555. Elizabeth Taylor's marriages
556. the publicity uses of entering the Betty Ford Clinic
557. alcoholism as a "disease"
558. gambling as a "disease"
559. AIDS as a "civil rights issue"
560. the sad last days of discarded celebrities
561. tabloids that exploit the sad last days of discarded celebrities
562. the woes of former child stars
563. the warped ambitions of stage parents
564. the futile ambitions of would-be writers
565. the fact that nobody reads literature anymore
566. the fact that Walt Disney World is the biggest single tourist attraction in the U.S.
567. the disappearance of classical music radio stations
568. the perplexing success of the ugliest pop music
569. the inevitable triumph of energy over refinement
570. the fact that cultured men today are predominantly gay
571. the fact that heterosexual men today are predominantly uncultured
572. the fact that single men have to feel suspect if they're cultured
573. men who regard women as sex toys
574. smart middle-aged women who regard uneducated young men as sex toys
575. middle-aged alpha males with trophy wives
576. women who praise sensitive men but fall for alpha males
577. men who demand that their women look like Barbie
578. women who demand that their men be "financially secure"
579. crude, lascivious men who leer at women, make jokes about breasts, etc., etc.
580. hip, contemporary women who leer at men, make jokes about penises, etc., etc.
581. the comical ineptness of intellectual men in the real world
582. the shrill fascism of intellectual feminists who denounce our rigid "phallocentric" institutions, like grammar, sex and rocket science
583. the condescension of older businessmen toward the "little ladies"
584. women who characterize flirtation as sexual harassment
585. men who characterize sexual harassment as flirtation
586. the male double standard: it's OK for men (but not women) to fool around
587. female double standards: it's OK for women (but not men) to bash the opposite sex, have their own colleges and clubs, whine, let their spouses support them, etc., etc.
588. the fact that everything ultimately boils down to sex
589. the fact that sex fuels the egos of people whose egos don't need fueling
590. kinky sex (isn't "normal" sex kinky enough?)
591. impotence: nature's way of telling a man he doesn't deserve to get lucky
592. faked orgasms: woman's way of telling a man he's luckier than he deserves to be
593. potential lovers who tell you about the "great sex" they had with a previous lover
594. current lovers who are having "great sex" with somebody else but don't tell you about it
595. current lovers who are having "great sex" with somebody else and DO tell you about it
596. the inventiveness of women's excuses for saying no
597. the inventiveness of men's arguments for persuading a woman to say yes
598. sexual starvation
599. watching people who are dorkier than you get all the sex they want
600. having to practice safe sex
601. having to practice salesmanship to get sex
602. the depth of conversations at singles bars
603. the depth of conversations in online chat rooms
604. the depth of conversations in most marriages
605. spats
606. replays of the same spats
607. breaking up after making up
608. being dumped by someone you love
609. being dumped for your best friend
610. being dumped for your mate's best friend
611. being dumped as part of your mate's latest career move
612. "Can't we just be friends?"
613. watching your ex-mate get lucky while your heart is still broken
614. searching for new mate so you have another chance to experience all of the above
615. the lamentable decline of romance
616. the unlamented demise of Western Civilization
617. the survival of tuberculosis bacilli and political parties
618. big government: a charity funded by legalized extortion
619. taxation without representation
620. taxation WITH representation
621. representative government masquerading as democracy
622. Washington insiders
623. dinner parties for Washington insiders
624. buying an ambassadorship
625. foreign ambassadors with 137 parking tickets who claim diplomatic immunity
626. backslappers and palm-greasers
627. congressmen who sell out to lobbyists
628. presidents who sell out to lobbyists
629. lobbyists
630. political cronies appointed to high office
631. the politicians who appoint the appointees
632. political scandals
633. cover-ups of scandals
634. press coverage of cover-ups of scandals
635. the blindness of the press toward JFK's scandals
636. the bloodlust of the press in covering Nixon's one scandal
637. candidates for the U.S. presidency since 1960
638. candidates for local office in every era
639. selling favors for campaign contributions: political prostitution
640. making impossible campaign promises: political courtship
641. committing impeachable offenses: political adultery
642. being impeached: political divorce proceedings
643. photo opportunities and sound bites
644. spin doctors
645. mudslinging as a viable campaign strategy
646. pollsters' and psychics' predictions
647. corporate earnings forecasts
648. investors who bail out of a company because it earned $1.24 per share instead of $1.26 per share
649. companies that downsize because they earned $1.24 per share instead of $1.26 per share
650. the stock market soaring on news of higher unemployment
651. going on unemployment yourself
652. mortgages and other long-term, life-sapping obligations, like marriage
653. divorce
654. having to pay alimony and child support
655. not receiving alimony and child support
656. staying single because you think the other option is even worse
657. having to think of yourself as "unfit" if you don't propagate your genes
658. looking at some of the people who DO propagate their genes
659. watching a billion years of evolution sputter out when you die childless
660. knowing that all your knowledge and experiences will evaporate when you die
661. being dead
662. being embalmed
663. being displayed at an open-casket funeral
664. decomposition
665. eternal damnation
666. heaven
667. purgatory ("What's the point?," asked the cynic. "We've already been there.")
668. reincarnation (damned if I'm taking calculus again!)
669. past-life regression therapy
670. aromatherapy
671. foot reflexology
672. chakras
673. auras
674. spirit channeling
675. energy vortexes
676. good karma and bad karma
677. gurus
678. false idols
679. pop idols
680. the artist formerly known as Prince
681. the company still known as Microsoft
682. monopolies
683. landing on Boardwalk with a hotel on it
684. not passing "GO"
685. not winning
686. not even breaking even
687. the fact that virtue is rarely rewarded
688. that the rewards usually go to the wrong people
689. that good things don't last
690. that bad things never go away
691. that nothing you do in this life will matter 10,000 years from now
692. that nothing you do in this life will matter 10 years from now
693. that nearly everything you do is dictated by your genes
694. that you'll never have enough time to do everything you want
695. that everything declines eventually, including you
696. the decline of language
697. the decline of art
698. the decline of decency
699. puritanism: lusting to prevent others from lusting
700. searching for happiness
701. searching for kindred spirits
702. searching for love
703. searching for self-esteem
704. searching for the meaning of life
705. searching for a flashlight with live batteries
706. searching for answers
707. never finding the answers
708. not wanting to find the answers
709. realizing that the answers will always elude you if you search for them
710. knowing that you're still clueless after all these years
711. realizing that all the wise men, philosophers and self-help authors were clueless, too
712. knowing that the world is going to fall apart eventually
713. not caring if the world falls apart
714. "whatever"

1 comment:

Alex said...

someone's got some problems with life