Wild, but decidedly not wonderful

I know that it probably pains you to read this,¹ but I think it is of vital importance than we finish the Race to Determine the Worst Drivers in America. I have been dreading this update – if only because thinking about all this horrific driving puts me in a downright dark and stormy mood – but I think it’s high time that we combine our powers and end this little endeavor before I lose what remains of my (pretty much already nonexistent) fanbase.

So, no more pomp, no more circumstance. The second worst state to drive in is…

WEST VIRGINIA

I know that I said that ranking Ohio at second was hard, but this decision really really put the heat on me. I drove far more than my fair share of miles in West Virginia this summer, and each time I passed through there was always one question at the forefront of my mind.

How can this not be the worst state to drive? I mean how?

I should preface this by saying that I give West Virginia drivers a lot of credit: the driving conditions in that state are pretty terrible, and the fact that the vast majority of people can make it through that state without dying horrifically is a testament to their baseline driving ability. West Virginia roads are very hilly, very winding,² and there are an inordinate number of 18-wheelers on the road.³ That said, there are a number of things about driving through West Virginia that try my patience, my powers of understanding, my belief in right and wrong, and my very soul.

#1 – West Virginia drivers do not believe in the existence of what we would call the left lane.

Again, I would like to paint a picture for you to illustrate this point. Imagine yourself driving through West Virginia in a place where there is virtually no traffic.⁴ You are cruising in the middle lane of a three-lane highway, and you see a car – also in the middle lane – approaching behind you. The driver gains on you and gains on you until he needs to pass.

At this point, I offer ten-to-one odds that the other driver passes you in the right lane.

This might seem like a minor annoyance, but for someone like me – that is, a person who drives the right way on a highway⁵ – this is unbelievably frustrating, nerve-racking, and dangerous. Cars in the middle lane in West Virginia should be accustomed to be passed on both sides at the same time, which creates what I would like to call “really sucky feelings of being trapped between two psychopaths.” This is noticeably different than what happens in Ohio, however: whereas Ohio drivers don’t believe that the left lane should be used only for passing, West Virginia drivers just don’t believe that there is a left lane. At all.

#2 – West Virginia drivers lurk behind slow cars for no damn reason.

What do I mean by this? I mean that drivers will sit in the right lane behind slow cars and then inexplicably cut over into the left lane – preferably right in front of me⁶ – and then drive at erratic speeds. Just imagine⁷ that you’re coming up on a line of cars in the right lane, all of which seem to be cruising instead of driving in the right lane and waiting to pass cars that are further ahead. Then, when you get a few car lengths away, a crappy minivan that you’ve observed sitting in the right lane for the last two miles⁸ shoots in front of you – which you never expected since said minivan seemed to be content going twenty under the limit in the right lane – and you are forced to sit behind it for an excruciatingly long period of time.⁹

But then once it reaches the front of the cars it is (hopefully) passing, one of two things will happen. The first, which is very annoying, is that the minivan will move back into the right lane and resume its previous speed. This is more so aggravating for other drivers, since you will always witness the cars the minivan just passed switch into the left lane to pass the minivan.¹⁰ Poor bastards.

The second option (which I will never, ever understand) involves the minivan reaching the front of the line of cars in the right lane, pausing for a moment, and then exploding forward at a million miles per hour as if the driver just activated the car’s warp drive. The driver of this car was apparently always intending on driving very fast, but was just sitting behind slow cars to lull the entire universe into a false sense of security. Just thinking about it makes me even more pissed off than I already am.

As someone who tries to drive with a bit of order and decency by using cruise control, this could scarcely be more frustrating. I mean, we’re living in a society here. If I’m going faster than you on the highway, I should be able to pass you. I don’t swoop over in front of faster cars and then change speeds so that they can never pass me. Seriously, I never do that.¹¹

#3 – West Virginia drivers are hill-tards, plain and simple.

“Hill-tard” is a term I use¹² for drivers who refuse to drive at one rate on the highway – which you can probably tell is a pet peeve of mine – and express this hatred of cruise control by driving at a cripplingly slow pace around curves and up hills while flying down hills and along straight stretches at a rate near the speed of sound. The hill-tard is a blight on the soul of American highways.

Now, I realize that I have the benefit of driving a car with good handling capabilities: if I choose to drive seventy¹³ through the WV Turnpike, I can maintain that speed around corners without any issue. I understand that trucks and vans can’t always go the same speed when navigating some of West Virginia’s neckbreaking turns, but there is no excuse for going ninety downhill and braking to forty when going through a relatively standard curve.

All I really want on the highway is to pass cars that are going slower than me and to get out of the way of cars that are going faster than me. When surrounded by legions of hill-tards, this is impossible. The last time I drove through West Virginia, I passed a blue Ford Explorer only to be passed by it again – all the while maintaining the exact same speed – twelve times. This is gross and unacceptable.

Of course, the hill-tards in West Virginia aren’t even close to the ones you can find in the number one worst state to drive in, but we’ll have to save that for another day.

¹ – I really had to resist the urge to say “hear this.” This sort of medium-specific writing is very taxing.

² – I have to admit: I feel that this should be “windy,” but I didn’t want to confuse you. Using a gerund as an adjective always feels a little yucky to me.

³ – Which, if I’m being honest, is enough to justify West Virginia’s ranking. Few things suck more than being stuck in a 65 mph zone doing 35 behind a train of tractor trailers. Also, one of my friends hates to drive in West Virginia because he says that all of the curves on the turnpike are banked the wrong way. I’ve never found this to be the case, but I figure it’s worth mentioning.

⁴ – This might sound familiar…

⁵ – Look, you have to allow for more than a little ego here.

⁶ – That is, preferable to them. In my dream world they would trip an invisible mine and get blown into the sky.

⁷ – I know I keep going to the “picture yourself” or “imagine” barrel, but I can’t really think of another way to put you in the moment here. I guess I have limited storytelling abilities.

⁸ – Yes, I pay attention to stuff like this. In fact, I bet that you that I could pull over at any given point sketch the most recent pattern of cars visible on the highway. By now it’s clear that I think way too much about driving, right?

⁹ – Even if you are on a three-lane road, because the right lane will undoubtedly be clogged with either brutally slow trucks or insanely fast 1988 Berettas (and yes, you’ll see cars in West Virginia that you didn’t realize were still in existence). How fun!

¹⁰ – Which should insult your understanding of human decency. There is nothing worse than passing a bunch of cars, getting in front of them, and then slowing down. Not cancer, not war, not anything.

¹¹ – There is no punchline here. I never do it and no one should. What’s wrong with picking a speed and going that speed?

¹² – See? I told you I think about this too much. My sanity is probably a little suspect at this point.

¹³ – Which I would obviously never do. Speed limits are serious business, kids.

It's not even Christmas!!!!!

Eighth Grade Journal – December 13, 1996

FREE WRITE

(Complaining)

This Is Not A Personal Note To Any One Teacher, Because I Write In My Journal To Calm Myself Down¹ And Not Go Off Like A Bomb.² I Am Never The Only Person Talking, But Always The Only Person Called Down For It.³ Everyone (Including Students) Find It Fun To Pick On Me.⁴ I Have Been Called Down This Year More Times Than All Other Years Combined⁵…And It’s NOT EVEN CHRISTMAS!!!!! I Have Not Been That Bad Of A Student.

Special Bonus!!!⁶ – Nosferatu

NOSFERATU Critique

Nosferatu, a movie with many similarities to Bram Stoker’s Dracula,⁷ is a tale of love, heartache, and great danger. This silent horror film centers around a pair of newlyweds, who are broken up when the husband must go into the “Land of Demons” so that he may sell a house, conveniently right across the street from his, to the vampire Nosferatu.⁸ Of course, the husband is unsuspecting and has no idea of the grave danger he is about to encounter.

The acting in Nosferatu could from some aspects be called less than spectacular. A viewer cannot expect much from one playing the part of a vampire, especially a vampire with buck-teeth like Nosferatu⁹, to have much depth. Nosferatu, however, displayed the best skills for acting his character, and following his motivation, however simple it was. The bride was strictly for emotional complexity, and a target for the vampire.¹⁰ Her part was silly and overplayed, but what can you expect, it’s not like they can talk or anything.¹¹

For the pivotal role the film played in the evolution of horror, this film has left a lasting impression on me.¹² Though primitive compared to film techniques and technology today, Nosferatu is exciting and very enjoyable. The story draws the viewer in, and the acting makes the film a classic.

Guy’s Film Rating:¹³ *** ½ out of 5

¹ – Sure buddy…that’s why you do it. It’s not because you are a young, budding master of all passive-aggressive techniques.

² – I am consistently amazed by the number of things I wrote in these journals that would get me in unbelievably amounts of trouble if written today.

³ – Seriously bro, getting “called down?” What is this, a bad parody of the 1950’s? Ugh.

⁴ – This kind of annoying self-pity really gets in the way of your passive-aggressive training. Focus, buddy!

⁵ – Obviously my memory is not that reliable, but this seems pretty much true to me. I never got in trouble at all until I was in the fifth grade, and even then it was nothing compared to the hell my teachers put me through in middle school. They were not my biggest fans.

⁶ – Perhaps I should explain. Since I am practically out of journal entries (save for the “Annoyance” story you’ve been enjoying and the “Complaining” sections from eighth grade), I thought it would be worthwhile to share the movie reviews I wrote for the cinema class I took in high school. If you’re interested in movies or amused by my general silliness, I think you’re in for a treat.

⁷ – Just a coincidence, I’m sure. Also, I know you dig the combination italics and underline. Groundbreaking.

⁸ – I don’t want to be too hard on the writing of a high school kid, but I’ll give a dollar to the first person who can name all of the grotesque grammar errors in this sentence. I think you’re going to be counting for a while.

⁹ – I really am trying to follow the logic here. You can’t expect much from someone playing a vampire, but you definitely can’t expect much if the vampire has buck teeth? Yeah kid…that makes tons of sense.

¹⁰ – Way to be a sympathetic, understanding, critical viewer. This is the kind of mindset that movie studios try to cater to in this day and age.

¹¹ – Yeah, those silent movies always have characters that are silly and overplayed. That’s practically the defining characteristic of the genre. Silent film = Silly film.

¹² – I’ll give you a dollar if you can convincingly tell me that this sentence makes sense to you. You watch a film, and your innate understanding of where that film fits in cinematic history is what leaves a lasting impression on you? I have no words.

¹³ – If you want my advice (and I know you didn’t ask for it), I’d pay particular attention to the ratings I give to these films. There’s real bang for your buck there.

Summer of Redemption!

Two updates in the same month...shocking, I know.

Today, as the first taste of the Summer of Redemption, I would like to talk a little bit about M Night Shyamalan’s fourth film, The Village (all the stuff he made before The Sixth Sense doesn’t count and you know it). I don’t claim to be the founder of the “I Hate M Night” club, but I do know that I was a pretty early member. I was not charmed or amused by The Sixth Sense at all, and went into all of his movies after that with my mind pretty much made up.¹ As I’ve grown older – and wiser, ideally – I’ve tried to curb the instinct that leads to such uninformed contempt.

Nevertheless, it’s hard for me to watch a film and find it redeemable when I know that at some point the rug is going to be pulled out from underneath me. This is one of the reasons why Psycho does so many things well than pretty much all of Shyamalan’s films do pretty damn poorly: Hitchcock’s films do not always have a “twist,” and even then the endings don’t always rewrite the entire movie (as they do in The Sixth Sense). This is also one of the reasons why Unbreakable is Shyamalan’s best film, because I expected a twist that changed everything and was pleasantly surprised when there was none. The twist in The Sixth Sense changes the meaning of every single scene in the film, even if it means making those scenes incomprehensible and otherwise impossible. Unbreakable is not fundamentally changed by its ending, and the narrative of the film is not damaged by the reality of the story. It is unquestionably Shyamalan’s best film by any criteria.² The unfortunate part is that I didn’t see Unbreakable until long after I first watched The Village. If I had, The Village might have had a fighting chance.

In retrospect, I admit that I first watched The Village – to quote myself³ – “like an asshole”: I didn’t give the film much opportunity to win me over and scrutinized every single detail so that I could justify hating it. One of my close friends watched The Village in the theatre and told me that he figured out Shyamalan’s twist seven minutes into the movie.⁴ As a result, I went to see The Village in the theatre myself, and I was determined to figure out the twist as soon as possible and locate every possible moment when that twist conflicted with the narrative of the film.⁵ Like my friend, I figured out the secret to The Village about ten minutes into the movie, but then wrote off that explanation because, frankly, it was just too stupid.⁶ Then when it turned out that I was right, I was completely dumbfounded.

In the end, the verdict went something like this: Bryce Dallas Howard is a very cute but ultimately annoying actress, Adrien Brody is as unwatchable as ever,⁷ and William Hurt is stiffer than he has ever been. The film is visually beautiful but sloppily composed, often feeling like a puzzle with missing pieces that someone is trying to force together anyway rather than a composed picture. And it goes without saying that the film’s ending is a cheap and childish copout that renders the film virtually meaningless and incomprehensible.⁸

So, after years of putting up with dreck like Lady in the Water and The Happening,⁹ I decided to revisit The Village after a friend told me that it was his favorite of Shyamalan movie. I made an earnest effort to watch the movie in a manner unlike an asshole and tried to follow the story and care about the characters without investing that much in the final reality of the movie.¹⁰ The following is the result of that experiment!

This time around, I actually found the film – particularly the first half – to be a genuinely interesting love story and a surprisingly thrilling mystery. I even think that certain scenes border on being something really great, namely the wedding ceremony and the discussion between Ivy and Lucius on the porch the night after the animals attack. Basically, when the story focuses more on human drama and less on a largely unnecessary monster story, it really thrives. The Village could fit nicely into a more standard formula,¹¹ but it can’t because that’s the way Shyamalan wants it.

This is precisely the tragedy of Shyamalan and his “twists.” If The Village didn’t end the way it did, I would consider it one of the best dramas of the twenty-first century. As much as I find the film enjoyable and redeemable now, the fact remains that The Village still has incredible problems because it is burdened with the brutal weight of Shyamalan’s love of the twist. The love story and all the characters are trivialized by the sheer absurdity of the situation they actually live in. In my eyes, this really prevents Shyamalan’s film from being legitimately great and, similarly, from being completely redeemed. The ending is just so stupid and needless – even after multiple viewings – that it undoes almost everything this film works to create.

Nevertheless, The Village is still a visually captivating film: the design and architecture are beautiful, and the color schemes are wonderful and actually manage to add to the movie. I continue to find William Hurt’s performance incredibly wooden,¹² and the mystery of his character’s relationship with Alice Hunt (Sigourney Weaver) continues to befuddle me. I still have tremendous issues with Bryce Dallas Howard’s performance, but I realized this time around that it was more due to the way Ivy is written than the way Howard interprets the character. It’s not necessarily a matter of her being unable to play a blind character, but rather that her character is supposed to do things that ultimately make her look very silly.¹³

My friend told me that he can overlook a lot that goes on in The Village because he looks at it like a fairy tale. I think the context of the first half of the film allows for that, but after Lucius gets stabbed, the ending of the movie¹⁴ (and the setup leading to it) creates a situation that prevents the rescue-and-salvation mission from really being the stuff of bedtime stories. The biggest issue with this film – which is symptomatic of some other Shyamalan films – is that it feels like two different films fused together. Honestly, watch The Village and ask yourself if the second half feels, looks, or even sounds like the first half. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that M Night had ideas for two separate films and then decided to edit them down and try to make them fit together. Well, I don’t think they do fit together much at all, and the result is a film that really suffers from being somewhat scatterbrained and ultimately inadequate.

So, my feeling at this point is that The Village can certainly be watched and even enjoyed, but one has to give Shyamalan a lot of wiggle room and credit¹⁵ to not feel cheated by what the ending does to this film. It’s sad, really. This film isn’t an unenjoyable story as much as it is an example of failed potential. Shyamalan always feels motivated to do his thing, and worst part is that even when he doesn’t – see Lady in the Water¹⁶ – his storytelling falls right on its face. This, again, is why Unbreakable is Shyamalan’s best film: it is the only time when the revelation of Shyamalan’s “secret” fails (thankfully) to render the story that precedes it a stuttering lie.

I hope this little trip down memory lane was as fun for you as it was for me. Coming up soon: some journal entries, some ramblings about driving, and Michael Chabon’s The Mysteries of Pittsburgh. Will it be redeemed? Nobody knows!

¹ – That is, that they would be overwrought, overdirected, sloppily written, and generally unenjoyable. I don’t mince words here: there was nothing I liked about his movies.

² – I really mean it: acting, narrative arc, storytelling, imagery, directing…you name it.

³ – And you can ask anyone I know. I was talking about rewatching this movie for a long time and always said this about myself.

⁴ – He also told me that he pretty much hated it. Full disclosure!

⁵ – Like I said: I watched the movie like an asshole (even though this is an impossibly easy task for one of Shyamalan’s films).

⁶ – You know it, too. Even if you like this movie, you have to admit that the reality of The Village is unbelievably dumb and contrived. No one needs a strong editor more than M Night.

⁷ – And lends a lot of support to the position that there shouldn’t be movies that prominently feature mentally-handicapped characters. Honestly, how many of these performances are not compelling and sensitive but instead derivative and embarrassing? Eighty percent? Ninety?

⁸ – Honestly, how much sense does this movie make once you know the ending? If you go back and watch this film with a focus on what the ending tells you, it is an unbelievably cruel, stupid, and inane story.

⁹ – Lady in the Water is one of the most pathetic movies of the last twenty years, and The Happening (which I only watched for the first time recently) is one of the absolute silliest, most absurd films I’ve ever witnessed.

¹⁰ – This was probably not as hard for me as you might imagine, but it was still probably harder than it should have been.

¹¹ –I know that part of Shyamalan’s supposed charm comes from a refusal to do just this, but it really would be nice if he ever considered something like, you know, genre.

¹² – Yes, I realize that he’s a “man with a secret” and all that. He’s still wooden, even by those standards.

¹³ – Like running around the town and making turns as if she can sense the landscape, or running down the gravel path in the woods and miraculously moving in a straight line the whole time. Actually, most of it is about running. Don’t make blind characters run: it doesn’t make a lot of sense.

¹⁴ – I know I am hammering on about this, but that’s the effect of coming up with these endings that turn the entire film on its head. Just going along with these sorts of things allows filmmakers to cheat you with irrational stuff like this under the pretense of twists that seem “neat.” Fight for your rights, dammit!

¹⁵ – Which, as you might guess, I’m not willing to do.

¹⁶ – As much as I want to call it just another Shyamalan disaster, Lady in the Water doesn’t really fit his pattern at all. In that way, it had every chance to be something great, and turned out to be a real turd.

July 22, 2011 - Big plans and...complaining

As you might be able to tell, I’ve been struggling to keep update the blog regularly,¹ and I am starting to think that part of the blame lies with my decision to create a short series – which has now become a pathetically long series – on the worst states to drive in. I believe this is the case for two reasons:

1 – It is really irritating to just sit and write about the things that piss you off and then analyze why and how they piss you off.

2 – It is not as easy as transcribing a journal entry written by a silly kid.

So, in an effort to make it through this summer without losing my fanbase,² I am going to redouble³ my efforts and get this blog back into fighting shape. I am going to dig back through my journals and find entries for ridiculing,⁴ I am going to finish the worst states to drive in series,⁵ and I’m going to unveil another awesome project…the Summer of Redemption!⁶

This idea came up during a recent discussion when I was telling one of my friends – that is, one of the aforementioned friends who suggested that she has not only read my blog but actually kind of liked it (shocking!) – about how I had been revisiting a lot of movies and books that I had previously read and disliked to see if I still felt the same way. I explained that some of my opinions had changed, and since I am clearly in dire need of a kickstart around here, my friend told me that I should include these efforts to redeem these prior works of film and literature in my blog.

What this all means is that I can kind of maybe promise⁷ that I’m going to shake things up around here instead of posting every other month. Huzzah!

Until next time, here is a little dose of my eighth grade journal to hold you over. Enjoy!

Eight Grade Journal – December 5, 1996

FREE WRITE

(Complaining)

Jenni Makes Me Soooooo Mad.⁸ She Expects Me To Treat Her Like A Queen. She Says The Reason Why She Steals My Stuff, Cusses Me Out, And Hits Me With Stuff Is Because She Wants Me To Date Her.⁹ She Thinks She Can Make Me Feel Bad By Beating Me in The General Knowledge Test.¹⁰ I’ll Probably Quit The Quick Recall Team Because of Her.¹¹ The Main Reason I’m Leaving Ashland For McCallie (Knoxville, Tennessee)¹² Or Lexington Christian For High School Is To Get Away From Her. Chris K Really Ticks Me Off. Then Jenni Found Out I Was Leaving And Made This Huge Conspiracy Against Me Called The “Idea.” The “Idea” Is Some “Nice” Thing That They Are Going To Do For Me Or To Me.¹³ I Think The Idea Is Something Bad That They Want To Do To Me. A Reason For This Is I Heard Jenni Tell Eileen And Tasha That She Wanted To Play A Big Trick On Me Before I Left. I Was Talking To Chris K And He Swore That He’d Tell Me The Idea If He Found Out. Now He Knows, But He Won’t Tell Me.¹⁴ It’s Like His Word To Jenni Is More Important Than His Word To Me. I Think He Is Secretly In Love With Jenni.¹⁵ Why Else Would He Break His Word To me To Keep His Word To Her? I Hate Jenni. I Hate Eileen. I Hate Tasha. I Hate Jessica.¹⁶ They Steal Stuff From Me, Call Me Names, Cuss Me Out, Write Stupid Notes To Me, And Hit Me With Stuff ALL THE TIME. I Don’t Know How Everyone Expects Me To Like Jenni And/Or Go Out With Her.¹⁷

¹ – Read: struggling to not be a lazy bastard.

² – Which, by the way, I was thrilled to learn that I actually have. Having my friends come up to me and tell me that they enjoy reading the blog really made my day. Thanks to all of you.

³ – I only use this as a turn of phrase. We all know it’s going to take far more than twice as much effort to accomplish anything around here.

⁴ – Because let’s be honest: that’s why we’re all here.

⁵ – Just in time for summer to come to an end…

⁶ – Which, given my dedication to projects, is likely to become the Several Years of Redemption.

⁷ – That’s all the attachment or responsibility I can really muster at this point. Sorry?

⁸ – This is going to be something of a theme for the next 277 words or so. Strap in. Also, if you are Jenni: I am so sorry.

⁹ – In my defense, she did do all of those things. Also in my defense, her attempts to demonstrate her attraction (?) for me can’t be explained in any rational or sane way.

¹⁰ – If I assume this was her plan – which it clearly wasn’t – it appears to have worked.

¹¹ – I doubt it. Bad bluff, kid.

¹² – Or Chattanooga, Tennessee. You know, whichever.

¹³ – This part is hard to explain without me sounding like a huge jerk and/or douche. My friends planned a very sweet going-away party for me (which my Mom spoiled by telling me that I needed to “get dressed up” for what she assured me was a simple errand), but their secrecy made me question their intentions. I probably could have found it within myself to give them a little more credit. I still have the video of the party, by the way. Very touching stuff.

¹⁴ – This is a clear violation of the “bros before hos” policy. And yes: this rule applies even in eighth grade.

¹⁵ – I know it’s easy to assume that this is everyone else’s motivation for every thing they do, but this was an impulse I should have worked on curbing earlier in my life.

¹⁶ – So Jenni was in pretty good company, since I counted the girl I was completely smitten with in the list of girls I hated. Only an eighth-grade boy. Genius, I say.

¹⁷ – Because this was the time in life when there were no really good reasons not to go out with someone?

June 4, 2011 - The Perils of Height

I am leaving for Connecticut tomorrow (and in so doing, have the privilege of driving through the number two state on my list of Worst States to Drive In…the suspense!) and wanted to put together a little one-off that might entertain you. A friend of mine was recently staying at my house and was preparing to go to sleep on a fold-out single bed. I couldn’t help but notice that he managed to fit into this remarkably small bed quite comfortably, and so I asked a question to which I already knew the answer.

“Do you ever give thanks for being able to fit in a bed?”

Here was my friend with ample room in all directions on a pathetic raft of a mattress, and my feet hang off of my queen-sized bed every night (if I sleep on top of the covers, obviously). This brought to mind an essay I wrote in my freshman writing class at UK way back in April of 2005. I am pleased to share it with you, and I hope you find it as entertaining to read and I did to write. You will have to do without footnotes since I dashed this off before my departure, but I think the essay stands on its own relatively well. Please enjoy.

The Tall and the Short of It

The True Contrast Between the Non-diminutive and the Height-impaired

More often than not, people view the world in terms of dichotomies: those who see the glass half-full and those who see it half-empty, those who believe in God and those who do not, or those who tip well and those who stiff the server. In these views, all people can be divided into the two classes, each system acting to separate and file all people under one of two philosophies. But there is one view in which the gray area, normally small for other systems of analysis, is composed of a comparatively marginal number of humans. This is the factor of height, which divides the minority: those of gargantuan stature and those of a miniature build. There are many disparities between leviathans and Lilliputians beyond their physical differences: inherent characteristic, psychological, and societal divergences that dictate their day-to-day lives.

On the surface, it can appear that tall and short people have many things in common. After all, the individuals in each group will hear thousands of inquiries about their height over the course of a lifetime. But in reality, their respective struggles could not be less similar. The miniature members of society, being unable to reach all shelves in any given establishment, struggle with all forms of retail purchasing. The loftier humans, however, not only have to deal with the prospect of back pain from reaching things far below their normal reach, but are also constantly called upon to help the same dwarves who cannot reach things they may desire. From the beginning of their lives, tall people are predisposed to hospitality, since they complete their own business while aiding shorties along the way.

Most facets of travel also pose a problem for both giants and pygmies. Pint-sized persons have to struggle with seeing over the dashboard of a car without sitting on phone books or boxes. They also run the risk of being unseen and potentially harmed, since nearly invisible while traveling by foot. Towering individuals, however, live under more extreme risks. Huge humans try with great effort to fit into seats designed for people of average size, but are not afforded the plethora of space that the very same seats offer the squirts of society. And while walking, a behemoth undergoes the slings and arrows of an outrageous mine field. Not only does the above-average-sized person have to watch for obstructions that could easily strike them while being avoidable for all other people, they also must watch out for any passing little (or littler) people, who often fear being assaulted or trampled. Every moment of every day, the goliath must operate with alertness and care as a result of their size. With size comes immense responsibility, because the colossuses are immediately assumed at fault, by both the average majority and the peewees alike, for any incidental contact during transit, no matter how much care is exercised. Walking with no solace on the streets, it would be no surprise if the life of a tall person was lived in fear from day one.

It is obvious to me that the sizes of midgets and mammoths do not vary in magnitude as greatly as their minds. Aware that they are viewed as inferior because of the stature, the pint-sized often develop a sense of ego and self-importance that is often (unfortunately) unsupported by reality. Runts live under the most conflicting of situations: always believing they have something to prove, yet expecting special attention and aid simply because of their lack of enormity. They don’t want the jumbo stranger at the Sav-A-Lot to reach the cereal on the top row for them, they expect him or her to do it and to be innately aware of the presence of the wee shopper. Insecure and often feeling out-of-place, the titan is the perfect victim for the self-confidence disorders perpetuated by the pocket-sized population.

Compounding the personalities and lifestyles embodied by the individuals, both immense and impish, are the views possessed by the standard citizen as well as the thoughts and perceptions of the extremes regarding their polar opposites. The majority view the wee-sized population as cute, threatening, and harmless. Run-of-the-mill people thereby find the tinies to be trustworthy, also finding some strange sort of attraction in the shrimps and their struggles with stature where the oversized instead find the compulsion and expectation to give help. The enormous generally tend to believe that the teensy have things pretty easy. But most interesting is the inexplicable dread they have of dwarfish folks, largely unconnected to their aforementioned sporadic enslavement. Perhaps it is the danger posed by the diminutive (since they can attack body parts at will that the humongous would be hard-pressed to defend) or perhaps it is simply a fear of the unknown, as the giant differs from the gnome in most every facet from physical to attitudinal. And with the growing trend of Tom Thumbs attempting to upgrade their size with “limb-lengthening”, the towering population lives in confusion: why would short people, who seem to have such an ideal system for flourishing and surviving, forcefully (and painfully) rid themselves of the quality that affords them such luxuries?

Sadly, the height-gifted are not viewed in such a positive sense, whether by garden-variety guys and gals or by their abridged antitheses. While there is no equivalent of “tall, dark, and handsome” for the miniscule, the physically formidable are more often than not seen as lumbering, clumsy, and potentially dangerous by most, since their size makes physical self-control quite tricky and also affords them a heightened capability to harm others (even though it would violate their personalities to do so). And since the jumbo are not seen as being trustworthy or immediately approachable (as the minute are), few of the plain Janes and Johns ever learn that these giants truly are, in most cases, gentle and simply seeking acceptance. The undersized population, however, view the overly large as two things: a means of assistance or exploitation (as previously mentioned) and as a direct threat. Squirts do not only fear the physical prowess of their contrasting colossuses, but also see them as a risk to their self-confidence. Therefore, a bantam boy, man, girl, or woman would find and take any opportunity to exert dominance over any and all king-sized companions or acquaintances. And while they believe that life with more size would make everyday tasks simpler to perform, the ability of the half-pints to take advantage of these abilities overshadows any potential envy of a larger lifestyle.

It is not the differences in physical form that truly divide the short from the tall, but rather their actions, personalities, and mannerisms. The wee ones will spend their lives trying to reach the top rung of the ladder by climbing on others; the giants will spend their lives as anyone (regardless of size) should: respectfully, dutifully, and helpfully. This true side of puny people and the contrast between them and the gigantic, sadly enough, should not be a surprise. It would be noble (and rather nice) to see this stereotype overturned by reality, but unfortunately it is hard to believe that this will happen. After all, when was the last time that an evil dictator of Brobdingnagian size started a war, attacked the innocent, or threatened to take over the world? I mean, they don’t call it a Napoleon Complex for nothing.

May 28, 2011 - States! And driving! As promised!

So I’m getting ready to embark on one of my summer whirlwind tours (a result of not liking airplanes¹ all that much), and I thought it appropriate to actually do what I promised to do months ago and fill you in on the worst states to drive in. Since I’ll be driving about 3,000 miles in the next three weeks – several hundred in two of the states on this list – it will probably be nice to think about how much it sucks to drive in certain places before I hit the road. Nothing makes me look forward to a trip like remembering how much certain parts of it will drive me nuts².

After all this anticipation³, it is time to begin the Race to Determine the Worst Drivers in America. The third worst state to drive in⁴ is…

OHIO

If you have ever driven in Ohio, this entry should tell you how serious I am about this list. Being surrounded by Ohio drivers is an absolute nightmare⁵, and a lot of people I know will probably consider this list invalid simply because I don’t rate Ohio drivers as the worst I have encountered. I am not going to justify why I have rated other states as worse than Ohio just yet⁶, but I can explain why Ohio is such a dreadful place to drive in. There are two simple (yet dangerous and annoying) reasons why Ohio drivers are so brutally awful. They are as follows.

#1 – Ohio drivers would rather die a horrible death and spend eternity in a lake of fire than get the hell out of the left lane.⁷

To demonstrate this, I want to paint a picture for you⁸. Imagine that you are driving through the impossibly flat farmlands of Ohio, and there are no cars around you. Then, in the distance, you spot a car a mile or so away. This car is entirely by itself: it is not passing or being passed by any car, and is otherwise completely alone. At this point, I want to issue you a guarantee⁹: it is an absolute certainty that the car you are approaching is driving in the left lane for no freaking reason at all.

This phenomenon is by no means limited to moments when cars are alone or isolated. In the middle of heavy highway traffic, it is beyond commonplace to see dozens of cars stalled in the left lane because of one doofus sitting in the left lane, completely oblivious to the surrounding world. And what’s worse is that said doofus will readily compound this problem by then trying to force his way into the right lane as if trying to get into a stream of passing traffic (which, due to his idiocy, is exactly what he is doing).

In a way, the rules of the road seem to be reversed for most Ohio drivers: “cruising” seems to take place in the left lane, which forces the right lane to become the passing/fast lane. The worst part? Being aware of this means that in order to not be frustrated by it you either have to not care (clearly impossible for me) or to do what they do (a even less desirable position).

Personally, I am at a loss to explain such behavior. Regardless of your response to my ranting, the notion that the left lane is meant for passing is something we must agree upon. Perhaps it is possible that Ohioans do think the left lane is for passing, but think that it is more for passing cornfields and silos than other automobiles. Honestly, I can’t quite say.

With this in mind, I am forced to turn to other sources for explanation. Accordingly, one of my friends has attempted to explain this aggressively annoying habit of camping out in the left lane with the second reason why driving in Ohio sucks more than it should:

#2 – Ohio drivers live in a world where nothing, absolutely nothing exists behind their field of vision.

For another moment, return to the picture I painted for you before. Once you pass this car (which will undoubtedly remain in the left lane as you steadily approach from miles away), odds are very good that the driver will then switch into the right lane after you pass. This makes the way Ohioans drive that much harder to understand, because it suggests that they actually know that they should cruise in the right lane but just decide not to. And you must keep in mind that I’m talking about an entire state full of drivers, not one individual or a small group.

The conclusion reached by my friend is that Ohio drivers are completely oblivious of the road (and possibly the world) as it exists behind them. Of course, this doesn’t really explain why they are in the left lane in the first place (as if anything or anyone could), but instead just makes them that much sillier and stranger. If you think about it, driving must be really frightening for them. What would you make of a rearview mirror if you didn’t believe that there was anything behind you¹⁰?

So, in conclusion, we are left with two explanations for the behavior of Ohio drivers: the first is that they do not believe that the lanes on the road have any real meaning, and the second is that they do not believe in mirrors or that a world exists behind their field of vision. This means that they likewise do not believe in light, physics, history, time, or human decency, but those things are more up for debate¹¹.

If you find yourself headed into the Buckeye State this summer, be prepared to spend more time than you normally would in the right lane. And if you end up in the left lane? Well, all I can do is wish you good luck. You’re going to need it. I know that I’m looking forward to not driving a single mile in Ohio for the whole summer. It’s going to be great.

¹ – Naturally, I assume you know about this. If you don’t, it’s sure to come up again.

² – That is not my real motivation for doing this, of course. The only way I torture myself is by harboring the illusion that people read this blog and are entertained by it.

³ – You’ve been anticipating. Don’t lie, I can see it in your face. Seriously, it’s more than a little silly that it took me almost four months to get this thing started. What a goober.

⁴ – Keep in mind the terms of this whole project: it’s not about what state has the worst roads or driving environment, but what state is worst to drive in because of the prospect of being surrounded by drivers of that state. I could have probably said that in like half the words I actually used, but we’re sticking with it.

⁵ – Honestly, if you see these (how ugly can a license plate get?) on all sides, it’s probably worth it to jerk the e-brake and shoot for the median. It will hurt your body more, but your brain will thank you.

⁶ – Admit it: you like the tease. Suspense! Only one other person in the entire world (in the world, I say) knows the order. Coincidentally, he is probably the only person reading this. Shit.

⁷ – Or, as I am fond of saying, it takes a bazooka and a court order to get an Ohio driver out of the left lane.

⁸ – Another of my many, many skills. Prepare to be enchanted.

⁹ – I wanted to issue a challenge, but that seemed like too much work.

¹⁰ – Honestly, think about that for a second. You would think that mirrors were like portals into some weird alternate dimension. That explains so much about Ohio drivers.

¹¹ – Although taking the position that Ohioans do believe in those things strikes me as a fool’s errand.

March 23, 2011 - A thief in our midst

I know that I’ve been cruel what with the no updates on the worst driver thing and all, but I promise I’ll fix all that soon¹. In the meantime, however, there is a grave injustice that must be brought to the world’s attention.

As I’m sure you know, I subscribe to a magazine called The Sun, which publishes fiction, essays, poetry, photography, and the like. It’s a great read – albeit a bit gloomy most times² – and is one of the few magazines that spares you the gaudy advertisements magazines are known for these days³.

But then the March 2011 issue arrived, and with it, a little story entitled “The Great Bewilderment: Reading ‘Captain JJC The Feirce’.”⁴

The premise of the story is that Oliver Cooney-Martin, the son of the listed author Gregory Martin, wrote a story called “Captain JJC The Feirce.” The father submitted the 587-word story⁵ to The Sun, complete with explanatory footnotes (or, you might say, annotations). For the record, using my highly developed sense of guessing word counts by eye⁶, it’s safe to say that the father’s footnotes are at least three times as long as the original story itself. Hell, the footnotes to the preface alone are 110 words long⁷. Shameful.

So at this point I’ll tell you what you already know: it is abundantly clear that this Gregory Martin character has unapologetically stolen my intellectual property⁸. Hell, the guy even goes so far as to include all the original typos and strange style elements, which he hilariously points out in the footnotes. What an original idea!

This is a textbook hatchet job. Just because the father⁹ exerts a lot of energy making himself the star of the show¹⁰ doesn’t mean that the theft is any less apparent.

Furthermore, I would like to state that it is abundantly clear¹¹ that no one else in history had the idea to publish documents written by children with footnotes written by an adult. I did what creators usually do: I used thoughts in my brain to manufacture an idea all on my own¹². I’m pretty sure I copyrighted it or something.

Basically, I’m calling on my numerous friends in the Albuquerque area to find this Gregory Martin character and tell him that having a son who writes stories about criminals doesn’t give him the right to be one himself.

Apparently the guy walks his son to school every day¹³ so he shouldn’t be too hard to find. When this “Captain JJC The Feirce” nonsense gets optioned for a Hollywood film, I expect to get a little coin on the side. After all, it was practically my idea in the first place.

But at the very least, this Gregory Smith character – or the intellectual property spy working on his behalf – should make himself¹⁴ known. Stand up and see your accuser! For shame!

¹ – Soon is a relative term.

² – Irony!

³ – Sure, they will pester you for donations, but it is an interesting experience to read a magazine with cover-to-cover content. It makes other magazines – which are already pretty bad – seem that much worse by comparison.

⁴ – Yes, the capitalized “The” and misspelled “Feirce” are accurate reproductions. I’m sure you can see where this is going…

⁵ – The kid’s father actually listed the word count in the preface to the story. What a goober.

⁶ – Admission into the X-Men: Pending.

⁷ – Yes, I counted. My skills don’t extend to exact word counts. I’m not that superhuman.

⁸ – That is to say, the entire premise and content of The Ship of Theseus, with Annotations.

⁹ – Who is also a struggling/failed writer himself…imagine that!

¹⁰ – Say what you will about this blog, I feel that I always make the original artifact the main attraction. Well…exact for posts like this one. And the whole ranking state drivers thing. And the listing of favorite authors and bands. But that’s all.

¹¹ – An example of one of my footnotes in this regard: Repetition is important! An example of the kind of footnote Gregory Smith would write here: There are so many phrases Guy could use here, but he chose to repeat himself. Why? Does this call forth a sense of déjà vu? Is he making the same point, expanding his point, or asking a question of the reader? There is no way for us to know. Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard wrote that, “Repetition is the reality and seriousness of life.” [Honestly, this is pretty damn close to a Gregory Smith-style footnote]

¹² – Ignore the stuff about Plutarch or any of the other influences I may have implied over the years. I was just being nice.

¹³ – It’s quite an act for a thief, I know.

¹⁴ – I assume that the perpetrator of such a heinous act would have to be a man. You’re welcome, ladies.