You suffer from automonosis—the tendency to become bored with your own company. If you need to get away from yourself, here's a tip: you don't have to die in order to be reincarnated. People who don't like themselves often find happiness when they become somebody else. Companies that advertise in the backs of magazines are ready to assist in this transformation. If there are compelling personal reasons for not changing your identity, perhaps a trip to a spa for a simple makeover will do the trick.
The book that inspired a website is available from Cedar Tree Books. Written by someone who was actually raised by pugs, Postcards is a welcome addition to any mailbox. Sample chapters:
The Grammar Prick Sticks It to Alanis Morissette
Nov 30, 2011, 10:04
"Be gone ye abusers of language, especially you ugly chicks from Canada."
WEST CHESTER, Penna. - When President Obama said that America had been "lazy" for the past few decades, he was talking about our national language scandal. Americans, the president said, are too lazy to search for the home run utterance; they settle instead for a cheap single up the middle; and that, boys and girls, is why the word ironic has been bastardized beyond recognition.
Before we begin today's lesson, let's find out if you're one of the bastards responsible for the gang rape of ironic.
Does ironic mean a) possessing toxic amounts of iron, b) coincidental, c) an incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs, d) an element with an atomic weight of 55.847?
If you answered a or d, you are incorrect. If you answered b, you might be the sort of rat-fucking, butt-scratching dunderhead responsible for turning the English language into a shit heap.
Ironic means "an incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs." For example, the DeLacey family in Frankenstein values intelligence and virtue, yet they set upon the Creature, who possesses both these qualities, and drive him from their house simply because he is uglier than Nancy Grace
That is ironic, boys and girls: bad things happening to a good Creature at the hands of other good creatures. The following are not ironic: a traffic jam when you're already late or a no-smoking sign on your cigarette break.
"Do I look too much like Tim Lincecum in this shot?"
Those examples of stupidity and several others like them can be found in a song called Ironic by the unforgivably louche Alanis Morissette. That sorry wildebeest appears to have confused ironic with coincidental, and so have countless other fuckwads. It is not ironic if you're late and you get stuck in a traffic jam, because there is no incongruity between what you might expect (a normal amount of traffic) and what actually occurs (a two-mile gaper delay).
By comparison, when the DeLaceys went vigilante on the Creature, there was an incongruity between their behavior and the behavior that might be expected from intelligent, virtuous people who are confronted with the unusual.
Still scratching your ass rhetorically? Let's try another example.
You're driving to the supermarket talking to your friend Bitsy on your cell phone. A while later, as you're standing in the "15 items or less" line (which should be the "15 items or fewer" line), you see Bitsy's brother Barry, and you exclaim, "How ironic, I was just talking to your sister."
That is not ironic. It is simply a coincidence that you saw Barry a few minutes after talking to his sister. There is no incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs, because talking to Bitsy while you're driving does not raise any expectations beyond the expectation that you're more likely to crash the car because you're talking on the goddamn phone.
Got that? Let's see if you really do.
"Doers this angle make my hair look greasy?"
Instead of taking a nap indoors today, you decide to snooze in the hammock in the yard. As you're sleeping, a chunk of blue ice is released accidentally from a plane flying overhead. The ice lands on you, sending you into a near fatal coma. Irony, coincidence, or tough shit?
While you're chewing on that one, boys and girls, The Grammar Prick has to go and delete a few people from his 2011 Xmas card list. He'll probably start with people who don't know the difference between irony and coincidence.
One other thing: there is more than one kind of irony. The kind we discussed today is known as situational (or sometimes dramatic) irony. Its cousin, verbal irony, occurs when your friend falls on his face after tripping over his own feet, and you exclaim, "Way to go, graceful."
Amused? Disgusted? Royally pissed off? Click the Twitter link to share with a friend. Go ahead. It's free.
Former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno did not die of a broken heart, as many of his delusional followers are claiming. He died of a guilty conscience. Anybody who says otherwise is a toadying douchebag.
You suffer from automonosis—the tendency to become bored with your own company. If you need to get away from yourself, here's a tip: you don't have to die in order to be reincarnated. People who don't like themselves often find happiness when they become somebody else. Companies that advertise in the backs of magazines are ready to assist in this transformation. If there are compelling personal reasons for not changing your identity, perhaps a trip to a spa for a simple makeover will do the trick.
Meaner than a powdery, old-hag English teacher, The Grammar Prick will split your head if you split an infinitive.
The book that inspired a website is available from Cedar Tree Books. Written by someone who was actually raised by pugs, Postcards is a welcome addition to any mailbox. Sample chapters:
Strike a blow for freedom.
