Seven Habits

Stephen R. Covey’s book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People outlines some great methods of bettering one’s self. I’ve found that, for the general population, we need to start a little more basic. So, here are my 7 habits of somewhat effective people, also known as, things you should have learned by the time you were four, but didn’t.

1. Check your head – After you have a meal, flip down the mirror in your car or drop by the rest room on your way back to work and give yourself a once over. Check the teeth and your face for residue and sauce. If you douse your shirt in marinara, you’re stuck with a crappy day ahead. If you have a Bloomin’ Onion wedged betwixt your Chiclets, a little fingernail slide may have just saved you a ton embarrassment. I know several people that routinely spend the second half of their day with mustard stuck to their beard and white clumps at the corners of their mouth. Damn that’s nasty.

2. Check your fly – Standard protocol as you leave the restroom. Pretend you are adjusting your shirt and slip an index finger across the tangs ensuring the breezeway is locked down.

3. <Check your eyes and nose for stray boogs – I won’t say much here, but please just try a little head tilt and nasal check in the morning. Who knows what grew in the night? Also, pay attention to those inner corners of the eyes, they are easily overlooked and a nesting ground for some rank debris.

4. Refrain from the “Burp and blow” – You think you are being polite by stifling the noise and bearing down on that belch, but when you blow it out the corner of your mouth, you’re killing me. Worse than the smoker that tries to blow out their smoke up and away or to the side, we have no visible cues here and get land blasted with a wave of stank that could still set off the fire alarm.

5. Wear a belt – This is for men and women, pull up your damn pants and wear a belt to hold them there. The last couple of years have shown me more crack and undies than “Skinny Marie”. (Pretty woman reference that only my sister will get) If your pants rest under the cheeks of your ass, you probably aren’t in the running for head cashier at Arby’s.

6. Say “Excuse me” – I know you are all in a hurry as you barrel down the halls of work and the isles at the store, but when you give me the forearm shiver and crack one of my ribs, at least have the courtesy to say “excuse me.” If you open the door to the bathroom and almost knock me over because you are trying to unzip and shuffle toward the urinal at the same time, throw a “pardon me” my way. If you are talking to someone on your cell phone, while carrying on a conversation with someone you’re walking with, and checking your pager, and stumble into me even though I am pressed firmly against the wall trying to get out of your inconsiderate wake, how about a “perdona me’”? (Spanish for Pardon me)

7. Help a Brother Out – If you see a friend that has any of these problems, take them to a private setting and let them know. I don’t want to go through the day with spinach on my face, if I miss it, tell me. If your friend knocks over people walking down the hall because they are oblivious to the pregnant woman they just hit shoulders with, tell them. If they have a peaked white head, Mt. Vesuvius style, pulsing on their forehead, let them know. A red crustoid beats a white pearl any day. Then again, if you just know them and don’t really like them, let them continue to look like a moron and laugh behind their backs.

If you people can’t do a couple of these, there is no reason to buy any other self help books because you are beyond help and are bound for career and social ruin. If you are not sure, try these things for a day or two, people’s general disgust for you will decrease exponentially. Trust me.

Which Way Wiper?

There are a few private issues that never get much press because most of us don’t even like to admit we do them. I do have a couple of buddies that shy from nothing so this topic arose and I was surprised at what we found. Most of our observations came from our work restroom where foot position and weight distribution on the feet conjured images of what must be happening in the stall next door. We assert that there are only five major ways to wipe after evacuation.

Front to Back: Most common attack although variations include standing, bending, and leaning against the door. I don’t personally feel this is the most effective method because you may have substantial reaching and limited finger control at max reach. This creates a “paper trail” and results in some nasty skid marks. I think this is mainly because the bending forward causes a “pucker” effect disallowing a “deep” clean.

Back to Front: When “Baby got Back” is a fair description of you, then you may be stuck with this method. Because you have limited access due to arm length and cheek girth, you access between the legs and pull forward. This is a danger zone for girls because you don’t want to pull bacteria forward…well, you understand. Advanced finger techniques must be employed involving a middle finger drag, basically pulling forward and away at the same time. I personally feel this is the best way to minimize smearage and keep the cleanest undercarriage. Many disagree, mostly because of the male genitalia to wrist convergence issue. Maybe “bigger boys” have an issue here, I am sad to say, I don’t.

Center Pinch: This is the best method in theory ,gaining the benefits of both of the previous methods. In practice, the thumb is simply too clumsy to be effective….and you can’t pinch anything without a thumb. Also, the small area of paper actually used creates a saturation effect that just won’t doo.

Sawing Lumber: None of us really knows what goes on here, but we have heard many people pull paper from the roll and then go into an ungodly see-saw sound swishing back and forth very vigorously. I’ve never tried this but I think they must be just rubbing and smearing back and forth until they rub most of the residue off, or maybe into the skin. It seems nasty, but we hear the sawing lumber technique several times a week. If you happen to employ this method, feel free to leave a comment explaining your nasty ass.

Pinch it Clean: I hear about this all the time, especially in the case of no TP to be found and they are out of ass-gaskets as well (which can be used in a pinch). No man can actually do this. Extremely hot women on the other hand can, because..let’s be honest, if they do poop….it comes out wrapped in foil.

Poe is God.

I’ve never claimed to be well read in anything that wasn’t a textbook but I’ve got to say Edger Allan Poe kicks major arse. If you have read my other blogs you may remember me bragging about the unremarkable feat of memorizing “The Raven”, his most well know poem. It’s good, and there are some passages in it that are amazing that I have read and reread, stunned by his diction.

“And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;”

Damn… that’s good. Very few will ever write a single passage that compares to the one above but his other works are so much more impressive. If you haven’t read “The murders in the Rue Morgue” you need to drop the channel changer for about 20 min. and crack open a tallboy…I mean a book. You can do it, come on, hoist up that gelatinous meat sack that you call an ass and pick up a damn book for once. You don’t even have to read the whole short story but rather just work through his commentary on “Analysis”. It is life changing. I’ve never read anything that so well encapsulates some of my own personal thoughts on the analytical mind as the start of this story. Good stuff. Here is a nugget:

“The mental features discoursed of as the analytical, are, in themselves, but little susceptible of analysis. We appreciate them only in their effects. We know of them, among other things, that they are always to their possessor, when inordinately possessed, a source of the liveliest enjoyment. As the strong man exults in his physical ability, delighting in such exercises as call his muscles into action, so glories the analyst in that moral activity which disentangles. He derives pleasure from even the most trivial occupations bringing his talent into play. He is fond of enigmas, of conundrums, hieroglyphics; exhibiting in his solutions of each a degree of acumen which appears to the ordinary apprehension praeternatural. His results, brought about by the very soul and essence of method, have, in truth, the whole air of intuition.”

If you don’t get lost in all the “big words” the theme is extraordinary and dead on accurate, and it just gets better from here. By the way, you can download the story for free on the internet, so you won’t really have to pick up an archaic, leather-bound, paper weight. I realize most classic have you nodding off before you get through the TOC (Table Of Contents you nit), but a few are truly classics. Opiates or no, Poe is a God…and remember, “Never Bet the Devil Your Head.”

Profound vs. Complex

I am continually amazed at how moronic supposedly intelligent people tend to be. They take a few college classes, post-grad even, and suddenly they think themselves geniuses. The fact that they don’t know they are nothing special is what makes them morons.

Remember that scene in Goodwill Hunting where the Math professor is talking to Matt Damon and says something like “Only a handful of people in the world would be able to tell the difference between you and me.” I want to expand on this idea a little more. I’ve sat through a lot of classes, a lot, and have worked with many intelligent, learned people. However, there is one concept that most don’t quite grasp. The idea of doing something profound vs. something that is only complex. I emphasize only because really it is the basis for my argument. Complex just means a bunch of steps. I don’t know if it is inflated ego or just ignorance, but “The Learned” give themselves much more credit than they deserve. As a matter of fact, so do the observers of “The learned”. For example, take multivariable calculus; if you haven’t had the class, you may think that someone capable of learning this is highly intelligent and/or gifted. Sorry, it’s just a series of somewhat complex steps that, with practice, can be followed as easily as a dot-to-dot. Remember the steps, a couple of formulas, and you're set. This is only complex as is most higher level math. Now, being the one who invented Calculus, the one that thought of shrinking those little rectangles infinitesimally small to calculate that area under a curve; that is profound. This idea extends to more than just Calculus, it applies to almost everything. Laws, proofs, theorems..all memorization of steps and understanding of profound work someone else did, which to you, is nothing but complex. I give all the grads and post grads props for being diligent and working through the steps, but the truth of the matter is, almost none of you have done anything profound. I am absolutely in this category but the difference is, I know it. I am smart, but that’s it. You may consider it arrogant to call yourself smart, but my definition is nothing to brag about. Smart only means you have learned that with time and resources you have the ability to learn someone else’s work. That’s it. I’ve never been clever or inventive and never had any real talent, but I’m smart so I copy really well, like most people with a BS or MS. I’ll leave the Doctors out of it as I would be speaking out of turn.

I work with engineers all day long and they think reciting some random formula or proof demonstrates the significant brain power that they seem to mask with their daily work. Again, idiots; and I’m the worst of them. I actually memorized “The Raven” by Poe for bragging rights. It is really really long and I am really really smart. Again, anyone, anyone with too much time on their hands and the will to do so can recite someone else’s work. The tragedy is when you realize what you are incapable of doing…writing an original, inventing anything of your own, having an original thought. Unlike the high school student that says they just can’t do math, you know better. You know you can learn and think and work through problems and in doing so you also learn that you really have little more to offer than a copy machine. Sorry moms, those genius sons and daughters of yours are far from genius…you just didn’t know any better.