Saturday, April 28, 2012

Stupid People: They're taking over the world

People are stupid, let’s face it.



You might be thinking- “Wait. What? You just said nerds are the sex symbol of the future. Nerds are smart, you are contradicting yourself!”

Yes, I am. And both are true.



Human beings are complex, extremely intelligent, and incredibly creative. Look at how far the earth has advanced in the last 100 years. Even in just the last 50 years. We have so much technology, literature, creativity and imagination that the impossible is becoming possible and miracles occur all the time.

And yet, we’re morons. Seriously.



As we get more advanced, people get stupider. Or maybe they just seem more stupid because we have endless sources to show off how stupid we are.



One of my biggest pet peeves is the inability to spell or use correct grammar. Even using words in the correct context is becoming hard for people.

Just because you have to limit your Twitter characters and want to keep text short, doesn’t mean that before is “b4” and skate is “sk8” in real life. No, just stop it!



Simple words are being misspelled by educated adults and when people point it out, they are in the wrong. No, learn to spell. We’re in America, not a third world country. 


It also infuriates me when people misuse their own shortcuts. “LOL” started to shorten “laugh out loud.” People rarely use it that way any more. Some people I know use it as punctuation, some when they aren’t even slightly giggling and some drive me straight up a wall when they write “lolololololol.” That doesn’t mean “I’m really laughing hard right now and out loud.” It literally means “laugh out loud- out loud- out loud- out loud- out loud- out loud.” That’s just dumb.



And while we’re at it, no one seems to know the meaning of “literally.” I’m not even going to get in to it because this blog would be too long.



Recently on a local radio station, the president of a local Christian University said the following in the ad: “It’s just not about education!” What he meant to say was “It’s not just about education.” Small spelling difference, big meaning difference. 

What he said was “this school is not about education.” What he meant was “this school is not only about education.” 

How does a school, which has an English department, not catch this before using it as advertisement?! (true story, that University was at a Health Fair at work yesterday and I called out the school regarding this to the rep. tehehe).


Now kids are stupider than ever. Have you heard of the new hand sanitizer fad? 



First they were choking themselves to the brink of death to get “high.” Now they are drinking hand sanitizer! DRINKING it! WTF? Seriously. I get that it’s 68% ethyl alcohol, yadda yadda yadda. But what genius said “you know what, I think it would be a good idea to drink this stuff”? And what brilliant friends said “yeah, sounds legit”? MORONS!
 


My brother-in-law, who is only 6 years older than me, used to huff Glade Plug-Ins to get high. What?!



I’ll admit, I smoked pot and drank alcohol when I was a teen. I’m not innocent. But at no point did I look at a cleaning product and go “yeah, seems like a good idea. Totally worth it.”



You know why? I’m not a complete idiot. I won’t say that I don’t have stupid moments- I do, everyone does. But COME ON!!!

True nerds are the sex symbol of the future because they are becoming rare. People who are not smart are trying to seem smart with fake glasses and random facts, but in all reality, they just want to pretend that they know what the heck is going on.



I am quickly losing faith in this society, in my own generation and in future generations. 



Technology may be great and may give us access to so much information, but apparently instead of learning how to be smart, functioning human beings who make good decisions, we watch videos of water skiing squirrels and drink hand sanitizer.



Let me just curl up into the fetal position and cry.

 J

Saturday, April 21, 2012

Weird Names: Introducing Future American President- Hallelujah Cheerio

*Disclaimer- if your name is chastised in this blog, then… well… too bad. You have a weird name. What’s said is said. It’s my blog ;P

As a person with a unique name, maybe I shouldn’t be talking about this. But then again, I didn’t name me, so oh well.

What the hell is wrong with people today? I understand the desire to give your child a unique name, but we’ve taken it too far. Celebrities are the best because we all know of their crazy baby names, but “regular” people are doing it too.

 

From weird spellings of normal names to just straight up insane names, people are torturing their children for their own desire to be “unique.” Apparently there's not enough confidence in your child that they'll be unique on their own, so you take care of it in name.


Let's take my name- Janessa. Despite the fact that my name is just 1 letter different from Vanessa, which no one has a problem with, people have a difficult time figuring out/remembering my name. 


Here’s just a short list of what I’ve been called: Jessica, Janelle, Janella, Jennifer, Jashara, Shaniqua, Samantha, Lisa, Melissa, Courtney, Colleen, Jan, Joan, and surprisingly rarely Vanessa. 


I get a lot of hassle for my unique name and it’s really not that odd. So many people can’t spell it or pronounce it or even grasp the concept. And now people are making things worse for their kids!



One frustrating thing is when people have a common name with a unique spelling. Why? Seriously, why? You're just making things more difficult for everyone. Stop it.



Working in the hotel industry I can tell you that a least 50% of the industry is filled with the last name Patel. Yes, the rhyming factor is great- I hope there is a Hotel Patel or Patel Motel somewhere, but I haven't come across one yet.


But there are Patels a plenty! And the best part about Patels is that they have their real name and then their "American name." 

The amount of "Mike," "Andy" and "Bob" Patels I've talked to is ridiculous. But their names are actually things like Mukesh, Ashinder and Baldev.


This past week I got to call people named Babu, Jigs, Zufi, Bozhindar and Malu. But at least they're foreigners and are expected to have "weird" names.

However, my favorite and least favorite (depending on how you look at it) are the really crazy names. Not just the unique spelling, but the jacked up “I-must-have-been-high-when-I-named-this-kid” names.



My sister used to name her eggs every month (and I'm not talking chicken eggs, if you know what I mean ;) ). She'd come up with crazy stuff like Tomato, Hallelujah Cheerio and Geraldine Shesarainbow. Thank God they were just eggs!

Here are examples of messed up names I’ve heard of in real life (not celebrity life):

R’Mani – not only are you not fancy like Armani clothes, but now it looks like your parents couldn’t spell.

Sunshine Daisy Gross- god, I hope you married into the last name Gross. Either way its bad, but if your parents tried to make up for a shitty last name with Sunshine Daisy, they failed.

Lash Clinton- I honestly don’t get this. Every time I think about it, I picture them in the hospital having this conversation:

Husband:  “oh shit! What do we name our kid? Uhhhh…. Think of a random facial feature!” 
Wife: “ummm…. Eyelash?” 
Husband: “yeah, ok, now should we go with “eye” or “lash”?” 
Wife: “Lash. Don't be ridiculous!” 
Husband: “First name, done! Middle name…. think of a former president!”
Wife: “Hmmmm…. Clinton!” 
Husband: “Ok, Lash Clinton it is!” 

Baby #2 will end up being Elbow Bush or something!
 
And then there are the celebrities:

Pilot Inspektor Lee- son of Jason Lee. This kid is screwed. Yes, the full name- Pilot Inspektor Lee- does kind of sound badass. However, who goes by their full name all the time? Pilot- lame. And Inspektor? First of all, not even spelled right. Yay “creativity”! And second, all I think of is Inspector Gadget. 


Pilot Inspektor Lee- Go-Go Gadget Arms! Could be useful, could be fucking annoying.

Apple- Daughter of Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin. Here’s the deal, the name Apple is stupid. Just no. But of all the names, the one thing I like about this one is Gwen says that the nicknames she gives her daughter is the word “apple” in other languages and that’s sort of cool. Can’t do that with Janessa.


Coco- Daughter of Courtney Cox and David Arquette. Um, basically, you want her to be a stripper. End of story.


Sage Moonblood- Daughter of Sylvester Stallone. I mean really, if your S.S.’s daughter, you’re messed up either way. Don’t love the first name Sage, but at least the full on crazy is the middle name. But Moonblood? No. Absolutely no reason can be good enough.


Ocean- Daughter of Forrest Whitaker. My niece named her dolphin pillow pet Ocean. Enough said.


Blue Ivy- Daughter of Beyonce and Jay-Z and Blue Angel- daughter of the Edge from U2- Can we just get something straight, celebrities- we are naming children not dogs! Blue? What’s next? Orange Mistletoe? Purple Devil? Come on now!


Audio Science- child of Shannyn Sossaman. Probably my most favorite of the crazy names, this is straight up ridiculous. It sounds like a class in school and can you imagine introducing yourself “Hi what’s you’re name?” “Audio. What is your name?” Um, you sound like a robot.


Moxie Crimefighter- daughter of Penn Jillette of Penn & Teller. Moxie is bad enough, but crimefighter? 1) stupid 2) no pressure!


And Frank Zappa takes the cake for most children’s lives ruined by name. His children include: Dweezil, Moon Unit and Diva Thin Muffin. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?


Basically, world, stop fucking up your kids by giving them bat-shit crazy names. Kids get messed up enough simply by living and certainly by having you as parents. Why make it worse?

Also, I hope all these parents have started 2 savings accounts for each child. One for college (as that's what parents do nowadays) and a second one for therapy bills. Seriously.

J