Tuesday, January 8, 2008

The Assassination of Common Sense Pt. 5

I was sitting at work today, half doing my job and half day dreaming, when a quick trip to the bathroom ignited a whirlwind of frustration and confusion. In the process of being pissed about this little incident, I, in true me fashion, began to rant in my head about a slew of other things that make absolutely no sense at all. So now I invite you to the running tab of anger in my life that I refer to as "The Assassination of Common Sense".

1. The catalyst of this entire rant: Bathrooms that only have partial automatic functions. I go to the bathroom at my office (as I do numerous times per day) and upon walking away from the urinal and hearing it flush on its own, I start to think of how wild it is that you don't even have to flush the toilet anymore...then i walked to the sink and became ticked off when I realized you had to manually turn on the water, get soap, and churn out a paper towel. The fact that I had to do these tasks manually didn't bother me one bit, but why did they have an automatic urinal and everything else wasn't? If you have an automatic urinal the bathroom MUST have an automatic toilet, sink, soap dispense, and paper towel dispenser? Why? Because if people don't want to share germs with the general public by not flushing the toilet with your bare hands they sure as hell don't want to do it at the sink.

2. Flavored Water: Water should taste like water. It doesn't need strawberries, raspberries, bananas, guava, or whatever fruit flavor you can imagine added to it. When I was 10, I thought Clearly Canadian was the best product ever invented. Until I realized that carbonated, flavored water already had a name...soda. Water is one of the essential elements of human existence and leave it up to Americans to come up with a way to bastardize one of the purest things on the planet (when we aren't dumping toxic waste into it). The next time you see someone drinking a bottle of flavored water, do me a favor and ask if their parents are twins.

3. Rims: I've tried and I've tried and I've tried, but I cannot begin to comprehend the human fascination with objects that shine. I remember when I was a youth and I couldn't wait to grow up and buy a 20 year old car, throw a new paint job and a Corvette engine in it, and buy the biggest rims I could find. Then I was touched by the hand of God and he handed me a box of common sense.

Why do you want big shiny rims? They aren't going to improve your relationship with your significant other. They won't make your kids smarter and more respectful. I've never seen rims pay a mortgage. All rims will do is A) make you feel like you're a high roller B) make other people envy you and then jack you for your rims and C) cost a lot of money. Beyond the temporary ego boost rims are usless, but they shine so I guess they'll be around forever. "And they spinnin' nigga, they spinnin'" © Chris Rock.

4. Phones with MP3 players: WTF!!?? Everytime I see a commercial on television for a new phone the FIRST feature they mention is the MP3 player. Hmm...lemme see...home stereo (check), car stereo (check), Ipod (check), walkman (check)...WHY THE HELL WOULD I WANT TO LISTEN TO MUSIC ON MY PHONE!!!???? I really don't get it. Are we that ignorant as a culture that we can't see the MP3 player phone as just another useless gimmick to get us to buy over-priced products? Besides the fact that I've never seen anyone use their phone for a phone call and the switch over and start rocking out to some Ashford and Simpson on the same device. If you own any of the aforementioned devices and buy a phone with an MP3 player and honestly plan on using it then I'm sure you believe George Bush is going to find those WMDs one day. Which brings me to my next point...

5. Phones with video screens: Again...WTF!!!??? If you bought an Iphone it's safe to say you are a mindless being and an advertiser's dream. What are you gonna watch on your phone? Mash reruns? Porn? The Young and the Restless? Nothing. That is what you're gonna watch on your phone. And if you do watch something on your phone it will most likely be because you've reasoned that you payed all this money for a phone with a video screen so you might as well pay to download something you'll never watch.

What happened to the days when a phone was a *sigh* phone? When you could make calls and talk to people far away and share stories with close friends. If you walk into any cell phone provider store and ask for a phone that just makes phone calls they'll look at you like you're a homeless man begging for change. Trust me, I just did it a month ago. Now a phone is all about image just like all the rest of our transactions. When you show people your new phone now the first question they ask you is "What does it do?". I always answer with "It makes fuckin' phone calls!". Which some people consider rude and I consider the kindest thing I could say at the time.

"Black people, maybe if we didn't spend all our money on RIMS we might have some!" ©Chris Rock

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