Going to bed

I’ll admit it: I’m a Facebook addict. I spend several minutes a day reading status updates. This unfortunately means I waste a lot of time. However, some status updates are more of a waste of time than others.

For example, the other day one of my Facebook friends posted that she was “Going to bed.” Before I deemed this an utterly pointless post that even a dead person would not want to come back to life if it meant reading, I thought of two possible (yet incredibly unlikely) scenarios that would make this post meaningful.

1.) She hasn’t slept in weeks, maybe even months. She’s tried everything. Even doctors can’t figure it out. People keep asking her, “Have you gotten any sleep yet?” Nope, she tells them. Friends and family regularly check up on her. Finally she tells everyone that when she gets sleep, she’ll post it on Facebook. People check her Facebook page regularly for “the post.” Finally, she posts, “Going to bed.” It receives 50 some-odd likes. The media contacts her. It makes front page of her local newspaper. In a press interview, she tells everyone, “I’m just so thankful that I have so many friends checking up on me. Their likes on my Facebook status I truly believe was my cure.”

2.) She recently suffered a concussion or a severe injury/significant loss of blood. She informs people of this, adding, “But don’t worry: I think I’ll be fine.” And then a few hours after the traumatic experience, she posts, “Going to bed.” Several people comment on that post, saying stuff like, “Don’t go to bed! It’s not safe!” and “Noooo! You need to go to the emergency room!” Then she either listens to their advice, later praising God that she posted that status in the first place. Or she goes to sleep, possibly dying, and the media reporting that “she posted right before her death what some refer to as the equivalent of a cry for help.” Many would feel regret that they didn’t do more. Should I have gone to her house to check up on her?, some will ask themselves. It becomes the single most important post of her life and the post many look back on when they’re dwelling on what they consider “their biggest regret.”

I poked around her Facebook page and my assumption was right: she sincerely thought that informing the world of her bedtime was important. No concussion, no sleeping problem. Just a waste of time for all parties involved.

Damn.

My big fat atheist wedding

The groom begins his wedding vows.

Groom: Jenna, I am so grateful that the big bang, a billion years of evolution, random chance, and chemicals such as serotonin firing off in our brains brought us together. This might sound cheesy, but natural selection selected us to be together, and we now have a duty to the blind watchmaker to make this thing work.

I promise to flourish our love as much, and as long, as it helps my survival. If by some off chance nature decides we should be together after you’re too old to reproduce, I’d be honored to enter into oblivion with you. To follow you into that black hole of nothingness we experienced before our birth. Or to put it more elegantly, as Ben Gibbard did, I’ll follow you into the dark.

5 date ideas when it’s cold outside

1.) Complain about the cold together, get real pessimistic, and then celebrate because you guys finally found something you have in common. And then get depressed that your hatred of the cold is the only thing you have in common, and then break up. See what you’re doing cold? You’re breaking people up!

2.) Embrace the cold! See who can stay outside the longest without contracting a severe illness!

3.) Sleep until spring. You and your significant other can sleep this thing out. Some specialists refer to this as a coma, and it’s incredibly rare to have a coma at the same time as your lover. But you know what, I say screw the odds. Do that coma together. If you come out of it alive, it will be springtime (hopefully) and you can start going on dates again!

4.) Move to Florida. Just until the spring. Bring back a Miami hottie to New York in March. Genius.

5.) Uh, stay inside? Don’t be dumb. If you don’t want to be out in the cold, then just don’t do it. Come on…think!

Study shows wishing upon stars to be ineffective

A recent study conducted by the Research Institute of Columbia University (RICU) shows that wishing upon stars achieves nothing. In the study, 63% of wishes failed to come true. And of those that did come true, there was no connection made between the wish and the result.

“This really surprised us,” said Bobby Jenson, lead researcher for the study. “Because here you have this ancient tradition, believed by most, and it doesn’t align with reality. Crazy.”

Jenson began the study six months ago, after a friend triple dog dared him to do it. He didn’t expect that a dare given to him while being “completely hammered drunk” would lead to such appalling results.

Stefanie Dars, biology professor at Columbia University, thinks that this study has changed everything.

“Let me tell you something: academia is going to be much different from now on,” Dars said. “We’re going to doubt everything. We’re going to dismiss all superstitious and supernatural claims from the get-go. I bet we’ll even accept macroevolution.”

No future studies for RICU have been announced, but Jenson has expressed interest in researching the effectiveness of prayer, crossing your fingers and throwing pennies into wells.

“I won’t rest until all superstitions have been dismissed,” Jenson said. “And trust me, I will get my rest. And soon.”

Dying alone introduction

So you’ve accepted the facts. Or, at least, the person who bought you this book has accepted the facts for you. Either way, if you’re going to die alone, you need to do it right. The dying part is simple. I have complete faith you’ll pull that one off on your own. It’s the living part people so often fail at. But not you. After I’m done with you, you’ll go on to live a happy, fulfilled, doomed-to-seclusion life.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: who the hell is this guy? You’re wondering why I’m an authority on this issue. Well (and I don’t tell a lot of people this), I’ve died alone before. A few times actually. And against all statistical odds, I live to tell about it. So, don’t worry, you’re in good hands.

In this book, you’ll learn things like: the best places to settle down and die alone in, safe alternatives to the rush love once gave you, pets and their rightful role in your lonely life, how to enjoy the holidays again, and coming out to your parents about your lifelong “decision.” Before long, you’ll be so good at living a single life that you’ll be able to convince all your friends to join you; to parade down failed love life avenue with pride…together…alone.

Studying philosophy leads to dead grocery shoppers

You always hear stories of some person passing out or nearly dying at a grocery store, and someone yelling out, “Is anyone here a doctor?” And of course, against all statistical odds, there’s a customer nearby who happens to be a doctor and he saves the person and becomes a hero. I envy this guy. I would love to be a hero. But I have no skills that set me apart for hero-dom.

Even if a girl was about to drown and she saw me running to save her, she’d still say, “Um, is there anyone else around? No? Alright, fine, let’s just get this salvation thing over with.”

In a grocery store, I can really only think of one scenario where I can be a hero. It is one where some dude is about to commit suicide in one of the aisles and is pleading for someone to convince him that he exists, or else, why live, he says. Someone would yell out, “Is there anyone here who is a philosopher or at least majored/minored in it in college?” That’s when I’d walk up, since I minored in philosophy, and say, “Excuse me sir. According to Rene Descartes, a 17th century philosopher, you exist because you think. You think, therefore you are.” The dude would reply, “Man, why didn’t I think of that? Now that I exist, I have a life to go live.” People would start clapping. I’d bow, humbly saying it wasn’t my argument, just my brilliant summary of it. A couple people would pick me up and we’d parade around the store, them all chanting my name. I’d make it on the front page of New York Times, and laugh at those people who told me studying philosophy was a waste of time.

And then, of course, I wake up from my daydream, wondering why the hell I minored in philosophy and didn’t become a doctor instead. Moral of the story: studying philosophy leads to dead grocery shoppers.

New technology and lemon sucking (5 observations)

1.) Movie-like scene in an everyday situation:

A customer walks up to me and asks where an item is. I tell her I don’t know, but to ask the guy in the next aisle because he might know.

As she’s walking away, I say, “Hey.” She turns around. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

“You too.”

2.) Buying a new technology is like marrying someone who has a year left to live: it was fun while it lasted, but don’t act like you didn’t see it coming.

3.) Is Naked Juice embarrassed?

4.) There are two popular phrases involving lemons that I’m aware of. The first: When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. The second (from “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”): When life gives you lemons, say f**k the lemons and bail. But I wonder how the lemon feels about these. In the first one, the lemon is not good enough by itself, so it needs to be made into lemonade. In the second one, the lemon is thrown out all together. To root for the underdog, I say: When life gives you lemons, suck on those lemons and enjoy them just the way they are.

5.) I want to hear a “that’s what she said” in the wrong situation:

“Let’s make out.”

“That’s what she said.”

“That’s what who said?”

“Umm…you? Just now? Ah crap. I love you?”

(5 second silence)

“Couch tonight?”

“Yup.”