Work Meetings: A Waste of Life

They truly are. I do not think there are may people out there that will disagree with the title of this blog. Frequently, we are called into meetings in order to go over things that are deemed "important" by someone who deems themselves "important" and our time, not.

At the company I work for there is a general meeting once every 3 months and, as you will soon see, this meeting can very easily be avoided. Last time we met, we spent half of our two hour meeting listening to one of our mini-bosses read a public web page to us. We all had seen this web page many times before, at the company's request, and most of us happen to be literate. The next 45 minutes were spent on our mini-boss answering questions that had just been answered in the hour long reading - a good chunk of time in these meetings is wasted on the illiterates-in-denial, who are apparently deaf as well. Only the last 15 minutes were spent on new material, such as how the company is doing. In summary, 2 hours were spent on what could have taken 15 minutes to go over, and the information discussed over the last 15 minutes could have been sent via email. Precious minutes I will never get back.

Under scrutiny my meetings seem like a big waste of time, however they do only happen once every 3 months. That's not too bad if you think of it. My sister, on the other hand, sits in conference-call meetings almost all of her day, everyday; and since she frequently works from her home, I have from time to time, while visiting her, sat in those meetings out of morbid curiosity. Let me tell you, most of them could have been condensed; probably into one sentence emails. Unfortunately for her, she too has to deal with illiterates-in-denial, and, since most of them seem to be deaf as well, on top of her 40+ weekly phone meetings she still has to go into the office a couple of times a week to explain things with hand gestures and diagrams. Absolutely amazing. Imagine if everyone learned to read, all meetings were turned into condensed emails, and we all used the saved time for vacations. For me it would not make too much of a difference, but for people like my sister it would add a few of months of vacation time per year.

One can dream.

White Socks: Why Do You Upset Me?

Ever since I could remember, I have had an aversion to white socks. I am not sure why, but I feel like they never match. The only time I do not get bothered by them is when they are worn with an entirely white outfit; if, however, there is any colour or shade in an ensemble, I am against them. Similar to red cars; I do not approve of their existence. 

I had to put it out there. White socks upset me.

Re: Häagen-Dazs®

Dear Mrs. and Mr. Mattus,

This blog entry originally started out as a love letter to Häagen-Dazs® Baileys® Irish Cream Ice Cream, the love of my taste buds' life. But as I started writing it, and it did come easy, I decided that perhaps instead I should be writing a thank you letter to the Häagen-Dazs family for creating this ice cream that I love so much. I proceeded by first researching this wonderful Scandinavian family. If you are reading this, Mrs. and Mr. Mattus, I am sure you know where the rest of this letter is going, but I would like to spell it out for you anyway.

First off, I found that Häagen-Dazs is not a Scandinavian family name. Nor is it two hyphenated Scandinavian family names. Häagen and Dazs are actually two made up words that just look Scandinavian (to everyone except for Scandinavians, who just assume they must be German). I read this, and thought to myself: 'Hmm. Maybe the actual Scandinavian family behind Häagen-Dazs® just wanted to make up an original company name instead of using their own last name. I can understand that.' But at that point a spark of doubt formed in my head and I decided to research further, just in case anything else was not what it seemed. Guess what I found out.

Häagen-Dazs® ice cream was created by a Polish-American family from the Bronx of New York and is produced in North America. In fact, absolutely nothing about Häagen-Dazs® has anything to do with Scandinavia.

What the hell?

I have been eating this magnificent combination of deliciousness, filled with 250 calories per half a cup (minimal possible ingestion at one sitting being four times that), telling myself that 'It's ok. I can eat these Scandinavian calories; they are foreign, so it's like being on vacation. Everyone needs a vacation!'

Ignorance was beautiful beautiful bliss. But now that reality has hit I know that I have been consuming American ice cream calories all this time, a lot of them. Apparently what I thought was a semi-liquid vacation, turned out to be a trap. A delicious American-fat-ass-making trap. Furthermore, since I have been consuming this frozen once-upon-a-time-a-vacation-recently-discovered-trap for so long, I cannot even stop myself from future consumption; although your product is not physically addictive, it certainly is emotionally. I have been tricked, and now I am stuck.

So thank you, Mrs. and Mr. Mattus, for creating this bliss-destroying lie. Perhaps next time you should conceal it a little better.

Driven (and now also Sad)

The Power of a Crossing Guard

One of my students and I were driving around today, practicing turns at intersections with lights. We were coming up to a red light at which we were planning to turn right. As we got closer, we noticed a crossing guard standing at the corner, observing us. We approached the light, made our stop, and slowly began moving up to see if the lane we were intending to turn into was free. As soon as we set the car in motion, the crossing guard's hand (occupied by a stop sign) went up. We stopped, assuming someone was about to cross in front of us. We waited; no one crossed. A couple of seconds later, the stop sign was lowered. I looked to the crossing guard for an eye-contact explanation, and instead received an intense blank look.

We began moving up again, and immediately the stop sign was flipped up. We stopped; however, this time we made it far enough into the intersection to notice that the side walk was empty, in both directions. Very very empty. No people; no cars. I again looked to the crossing guard, who was now staring at me very seriously while continuing to firmly hold the stop sign up, for an explanation; none was given. My student, slightly confused, looked to me for advice; I, less confused, told him "Ignore the crazy".

We proceed to turn while I continued to stare down the guard who, once we were half way through our turn, faced the stop sign in another direction and began to wave us on as if the only reason why we could even perform the turn was because she was doing us a favour by holding back all other traffic.

Thank you Crazy. Just imagine what a terrible turn my life could have taken if someone insisted that crossing guards had to pass psychological evaluations prior to receiving their Mighty Scepters of Stopping.

Saying "Thank You" On The Road

It is a simple gesture. Just lift one hand high enough so that the driver that deserves your thanks, can see it; similar to when you lift a hand and extend a finger to those that have pissed you off, but without the finger extension.

Why would you do this thanking thing? To show people you appreciate them doing something nice for you, and to encourage them to continue doing these nice things and passing on the love; just like showing those that have done you wrong, that you hate them and to remind them that people will hate them as long as they continue on doing stupid shit.

So now, lets review: Thanking people is just a hand lift; hating people involves a hand lift and a finger extension. Clearly, showing hate takes double the work of showing thanks; so why does nearly every person on the road have the energy for the hate, but hardly anyone has the energy for the thanks?

Because, when it comes to the core of our existence, most humans are selfish pricks who expect respect. Since there is an expectation, when it is given, there is no appreciation; however, as soon as there is a lack of, it is immediately noticed.

Unless we all put in a bit more effort to be nice, eventually everyone will feel the effects of the free flowing hate; and free flowing it is. So, instead, lets try not to be pricks all the time. If you are a driver, try to say "thank you" if someone does something nice for you on the road; start a crazy chain reaction. If you do not drive, try to say "thank you" for some other reason. We do not have to be assholes. I am almost positive.

Cyclists vs. Drivers: The Drama Continues

Most cyclist do not believe that, when they are riding on the road, they are legally expected to follow traffic laws. These laws include stopping at stop signs, obeying traffic lights, going the right way on a one-way street, passing slow moving (or turning) vehicles on the left, etc. Disobeying any of the above, when you are on two small tires attached by some metal sticks while everyone else is inside a metal exoskeleton, is like facing off with an elephant: sounds like fun but, you will inevitably die a squishy death.

Not to stray any further, today, we will discuss passing cars on the left. The breaking of the first three rules I mentioned earlier, is a conscious disobedience; breaking the last rule is mostly just ignorance of the law. To clarify: when a car is making a right turn at an intersection, the cyclist is not legally allowed to squeeze in between the car and the curb to pass. Even when the car has to block a bike lane to make the turn, it is still illegal for the cyclist to try to continue on in their lane. In that situation the cyclist, like any other vehicle, is expected to 1) wait until the car turns or 2) do a lane change to the left and pass. Law aside, it is also very dangerous to perform the act of 'squeezing in', as the car is already watching for traffic coming from other directions and any pedestrians crossing the road; checking for illegally passing bikes is at the end of the list. Even if you are not a fan of obeying laws in general, take a minute to think about the following formula: CAR > bike; therefore, CAR will win.

Most cyclists, who do not know the proper sequence of events, become extremely hostile when a car does blocks their path while turning, and so, as a hateful act of revenge, they try to squeeze in between the car and the curb to show the car who is boss. Yet, still CAR > bike. Hence, these acts frequently lead to someone getting hurt, and it is usually is not the person protected by a metal exoskeleton.

In conclusion: learn the laws, because apparently ignorance is not always bliss. In some situations, ignorance is the cause of the end of your genetic lineage.

Rage Block: I Think They Call It Happiness

I have not posted in a few days.

Most of my blog entries are driven by some sort of rage induced event, and rage has been coming in very small doses lately. At first I did not even notice; flags were not raised until I looked at my last post date, and so I began exploring why. After several long minutes of deep thought I have come to the conclusion that lately people have not pissed me off...as much.

I blame it on the weather; it has been really cooling down lately. Maybe cool weather makes people less stupid. Or maybe cool weather tames the ever burning hateful fire within me.

Either way, hopefully this down time will not last too long. I would rather not have to change my name to Driven Insane by Happy! That might slightly affect the entire mood of this blog.

Emo Lexus

The other day, while driving between lessons, I was feeling exceptionally nice and, against my better judgment, made room for a Lexus to move into my lane. We were stuck in bumper to bumper traffic, and his lane was blocked, so I let him in.

About 13 seconds after the Lexus settled into my lane, a van drove up beside it and indicated that he too would like to get into our lane, preferably, in front of the Lexus. Immediately, I realized that this person must be new to downtown driving and is obviously unfamiliar with expensive-car drivers. Lexus drivers, like their Mercedes and BMW cousins, do not "let people in"; it goes against their principles.

The van inched toward the front of the Lexus, the Lexus did not budge. The van inched closer, the Lexus held its position. The van came in closer still, the Lexus moved away by an inch and started honking in a manner that suggested: "How dare you? Do you not know who I am?" The van seemed confused, the Lexus continued on blocking him for several more feet; we were moving at a snails pace so "feet" seemed like eternity.

Eventually, the obstruction in front of the van cleared. The van, although still confused, went on its merry way; the Lexus, it turned out, needed to get back into the now free lane. Unfortunately for him, all of the affordable-car drivers that were stuck behind the van, observing, now felt the need to block the Lexus for being an asshole. The Lexus had to wait until the whoooooole lane cleared before he could go. He even started inching toward the affordable cars to show them that he was in dear need of getting into their lane; this, however, only made them move closer together to make sure the Lexus had absolutely no room to get in.

I was stuck behind the Lexus, but, seeing the revenge unfold in front of my eyes, made the whole experience well worth it.

The Train: What Is More Important Than Catching It After Work?

According to hundreds of downtown professionals, nothing, not even life.

They run across the street like children running for the ice cream truck: with smiles on their faces and oblivious to student drivers that haven't yet figured out where the brake is.

I understand that you want to make that train and get home as soon as possible, but if my student clocks you, home is not where you will go. Unless by home you mean the after life.

Not smart, downtown professionals; not smart at all.

Emergency Vehicles: It's in the name.

If their lights are flashing and they make you deaf, it is probably because they are on their way to an emergency...

I believe the theory behind it is that if they blind you and make you deaf you will have to stop your car, at which point they can sneak by and save a life.

Tricky, tricky, those crazy emergency workers.

I have noticed, however, that more and more drivers are learning to out smart this deceptive system. How, you ask?  Maybe by wearing earplugs and shaded contacts; I can not be sure. What I do know is that often drivers do not stop, if anything they will move over to the right side, keep driving, and cut right back in behind the emergency vehicle. This way they can drive in the wake of the emergency crew and try to get to their very important life event. Cunning and idiotic. You are supposed to stay the fuck back. If you get into a collision with the emergency vehicle, you may cause, whom ever it was trying to reach, to die. Have you considered that they may be going to save your family or friend? No? Well, that is why I may have implied that you were an idiot earlier.

Dear Elevator Abusers,

Taking the elevator from the ground floor to the second floor is NOT OK. Not only are you wasting energy, but you are also delaying the 10 other people who are trying to get up 20 or 30 floors. It will take you longer to wait for the elevator than to actually walk up the flight of stairs.

There are, of course, reasons why you would need to have yourself elevated by one floor; for example, you are moving a stroller/bike, you have health problems, you are carrying something heavy, etc. If, however, these examples do not apply to you, use the fucking stairs! It is one floor.

The Gym: A Sweaty Place

When I go to the gym, I go there to sweat off all of the ice cream I have ingested through out our love affair. I see other people there that are also trying to sweat off whatever they have been recently loving.

Once a big portion of my ice cream intake has been sweat off, I go and sensitize whatever machine I have just used. This makes sense to me; personally, I would not want to use a machine drenched in someone else's sweat. I would imagine that others do not want my sweat there either.

Unfortunately, after thorough observation, I have come to the sickening conclusion that ninety percent of the other folk at the gym, disagree with me. By their actions, they tell me they would prefer I leave my sweat for them, as they leave theirs for me.

Just to be very very clear, I do not want your sweat. I realize you work very hard to cover the whole machine in the smelly liquid; it must be hard to have to destroy the evidence of all that work with the germ killing sanitizer, but its all part of the cycle of going from fat to fit.

Get over it, and stop being disgusting.

Ice Cream: What's Not To Love?

No really, what is it? I have actually met a person who does not love ice cream. I told them that hating ice cream is like hating Mother Teresa, but that statement seemed to confuse them; therefore, in an effort to better understand crazy people, I've decided to explore this ice cream hate idea. So here it is. Step by step, lets explore ice cream hate.

Some possible reasons you may be a hater of the delicious ever-awesome ice cream:

1) you have no taste buds
2) you are lactose intolerant
3) you don't like sweet things
4) you are ugly
5) you don't like cold things
6) you don't like creamy things
7) you are just plain crazy and there is no reasoning behind your silly ice cream hate!

I honestly can not think of anything else that would keep you from loving this god-like food; and, aside from number 4, I really don't believe the other points are reason enough.

P.S. Number 4 can be fixed by eating ice cream!

Signalling: The Dying Art

Once upon a time, in a land right outside your window, drivers used to signal before moving their car to the left or to the right. I am very serious; this used to happen on a regular basis. The purpose of this finely tuned art was to tell all of the other road users where you were about to move your vehicle.  Simple, yet it made a world of difference.

Since everyone could tell where you needed to move your car, they would actually make room for you in that lane. There was no need for cutting someone off when you got fed up with them for not being able to predict that you needed to get into their lane. Honking at someone, because they started slowing down for no apparent reason only to suddenly turn, was not necessary. If someone needed to turn, they would signal and let you know that they were about to do so, giving you a reason for their slowing and time to go around them if you did not want to slow down.

I know all of this seems crazy and illogical, but this ancient system worked. All it really needed to survive was for people to continue moving their fingers over to the signal handle and lightly pushing up or down. Unfortunately, over time, sausage fingers became popular and the tiny amount of force required to turn the signal on was not worth the risk of loosing any finger fat.

Signalling did not get a happily ever after.

Taxi Drivers: The Love/Hate Relationship

Face it. You love taxi drivers when you are in their back seat and they get you from A to B very very fast.

That, however, is the only time you love them. Every other time you happen to run into them they probably cause about 40% of your internal road rage, be you in a car, on a bike, or a pedestrian. If you are in their way, well, you better not be because that A to B situation I mentioned before is A to B, not A to C to D to B. It is A to B. ONLY. I suspect they are not physically capable of going around you. You will be 1) tailgated 2) honked at 3) run over; in that order; every time. Do not underestimate them; they will go to 3.

So there you are, sangry because you were just tailgated, honked at, and run over. You go home, re-think your life, and decide that the best way to drown your sorrows is to see a late night movie; but you need to get there very very fast.

Cycle complete.

Driving School Sign

It is up there to tell other road users that someone is LEARNING to drive. Learning: They know the rules but they are not leet at applying them. Sort of like when you were potty trained. You knew the theory, yet you still dribbled on yourself until you were twelve. That is what the sign stands for, and why it is there. Its is a warning: STUDENT DRIVER BEHIND THE WHEEL! Sometime it takes them two seconds, instead of one, to get the car moving after a red light. Other times they don't turn right on a red because they don't feel they can speed up enough to get in front of the cars that have a green. Why do u honk? The sign on my roof is big and colourful; made specifically to reflect bright light right into your retinas. Right into them. Maybe you drive with your eyes closed? That would be just about the only reason why you could miss the sign; but if that is the case, than I have to ask you, how do you know they should have gone? My point exactly. Your eyes are open; you are just an anus.

BMW, Lexus, Mercedes drivers, who made you gods?

No one. No one made you gods. You are not gods.

Now that that is cleared up, what I would like to know is why do you feel the need to drive like your face has been replaced with your ass? Not an assface? Perhaps its a problem with your vehicle? Does your expensive car lack turn signals? Perhaps your rear view or side view mirrors don't reflect? You frequently seem to confuse the accelerator for a brake; did the people who made your car screw up the placement of your peddles? I see you heroically swerve into the on-coming traffic lane to pass other cars on a daily basis; is your cruise control malfunctioning? Luckily, I know that your horn works, because I hear it every time you feel someone is following the rules in your presence, so those crazy car makers, who charged you way too much, got something right.

This may come as a shock but all of these car problems you seem to be having makes us hate you. Me in particular. I know, I know. You're just driving around, showing off your pricey bling, looking down at us driving our ~affordable~ cars. Well, for your information, we too are just driving around, much less in debt, looking at your sparkly car, hoping to see you equipped with the finest of Firestone tires.

Intersections During Rush Hour

Blocking the intersection because you need to be standing in traffic on the south side of the street rather than the north side when the light goes red. This happens everyday, hundreds of times. Why? Why do you do this? You will not get home earlier. The only thing you are accomplishing is preventing the people trying to drive perpendicular to you from moving. This makes traffic worse! Yes, you are the asshole that makes rush hour traffic worse. You move to the other side when you can clearly see there is no room for you there because you are worried that some asshole going east to west will block you. Now, replace "east to west" with "north to south", and voilà, there you are. Yes, YOU are the asshole that you are trying so hard to out smart!

Congrats. Prick.

Introductions

You think your job blows? Well, so does mine. I’m a fucking driving instructor.

Imagine road rage. Having a hard time? Let me help. You are turning left at an intersection. The light goes amber. You continue to wait to turn because some asshole decided that a red light doesn’t apply to him. He has some important life event to attend to, and the 17 seconds he would have to wait for another green light might upset his important asshole day, so he blows through the red. You like living, so you wait as King Shit accelerates through the red. This, however, seems like the wrong decision to make to Dick Fuck behind, who is also waiting to turn on the very red light even though he isn’t even supposed to be in the intersection at all, so he honks long and hard to tell you, “Hey if that were me in your place, I would have accelerated towards King Shit to test my ball courage in a friendly game of retard chicken.” Before you know it, there it is: Road Rage. Feel the hate at its purest, running through your veins, pulsing, setting you on fire from the inside. Yum. Now, all you have to do to regain control over your own body and mind in this sudden powerful build up is start yelling profanities to the world; or maybe just to yourself? Perhaps a couple of friendly gestures to Dick Fuck or King Shit will do the trick? A meaningful scream on top of your lungs? Or how about holding the hate in, never to let go, and calmly discussing what could have been done better by the other drivers in a positive way with a smile on your face and a friendly sound in your voice?

“Who votes for the last answer? Anyone? Anyone at all? You, in the last row with the crazy on your face? You choose the last answer. Who the fuck are you and why the fuck would you do that?”

“O hai. I am Crazy Fuck and I decided that the best way to be free and not to have to deal with the stress of working in an office environment was to become a driving instructor. I may or may not have overlooked a thing or two in my master plan so here I am permanently cooking myself from the inside out in the oil that is hate.”

Yep. That pretty much sums up a minute in a driving instructor’s life. Now, let’s do the math! One teaches an average of five students in a day and events akin to this one happen and average of three times per student. So punching that into my trusty calculator, that is an average of fifteen hits of ‘road rage on crack’ per day with no release.

In summary, what the fuck was I thinking? I have always had road rage issues. For years my release was creative hateful words sprinkled with a rude gesture here and there, until one day when I came up with my Invisible Hand of Slapping (An invisible had that slaps people on the back of the head when they do stupid shit on the road…countless perpetrators have become victims to its execution!). Yet, when I saw that job ad, calling for all those who wanted to teach new innocent minds to drive in a cesspool of horrible assholes, I stood up to the challenge. Not even thinking twice that it might actually be a challenge. “Challenge” did not even cross my mind, not even for a split mille-second.

I started a bit crazy before this job. Shit is getting worse. Fuck me.