Things You Need To Stop Doing (Like, Right Now)

In case the title put you in an an incredibly hostile attitude toward this article, let me begin by saying that I am not just launching into a tirade about things that annoy me that other people do. I'm launching into a tirade about things that make no sense that other people do. Don't worry, the whole switch from "And also with you" to "And with your spirit" thing isn't on here because I don't want to be excommunicated from the Catholic church unless it's for something really good.

Like stealing the Popemobile.

No, these are just things that people do that they are, for some reason, not ashamed of or attempting to conceal from the public, like nose-picking or enjoying the Twilight books. These are things that people are inexplicably smug and/or vocal about:

4. Lambasting Networks For Cancelling TV Shows

This is a rather specific irritation of mine, but it's a problem I have because I am guilty of it all the time. Two of the greatest shows of all time were cut down in their prime because of FOX network, which is unmistakably the Devil. Firefly, the glorious product of a passionate liaison between Joss Whedon and a parallel universe featuring Cowboy Han Solo, was cancelled after only one season, instead of the planned seven.

And at his age, Cowboy Han Solo still isn't as awesome as Malcolm Reynolds.

The magnificently filthy, dysfunctional show Arrested Development was aborted after a scant two and a half seasons. Let the stone-throwing begin! Let's start with how Fox news totally screwed over Firefly by showing episodes out of order and not advertising it correctly. And how it ruined AD by changing the time slot and squishing the last few episodes together.

Except...

The people at FOX aren't trying to hurt us.

Well, not all of them

TV networks just want to make money. They're going to keep on shows that have high viewership and drop the ones that are expensive to make and that are not bringing in enough revenue. Firefly had some obstacles in front of it, but come on, this is a project from frickin' Joss Whedon, who poops better ideas than I've ever had. He had a strong fan base from Buffy and Angel and that should have been enough to kick-start the phenomenon.

We could have voted for Firefly to stay on as it was being aired. But we, as a country, voted with our viewership.

"I'd say this is easier than political voting, but honestly it's about the same."

So with our viewership, we collectively voted for the Sarah Palins of TV--that is, the flashy, moronic ones that feed our love for scandal and people saying idiotic things. Also, murder and public humiliation, respectively.

In 2002, the season Firefly died, it ranked 125th in the country with just over 4 million views. The top-ranked show at the time was CSI with over 26 million. And that's a show that is trying to make science look dangerous and exciting while still focusing on a doughy and possibly Asperger-y William Peterson looking constipated for 45 minutes.

"Do I do a one-liner and take off my sunglasses now? Is this the right show?'

Arrested Development was even worse off. It went under in 2006, when the number one show was American Idol with 36.38 million viewers. AD had 3.3. (Million, but still.) The funniest show on television, that trusted it's audience to following a plot line with inside jokes, that defied traditional narratives, and we didn't want it. Audiences found the characters unsympathetic and the inside jokes alienating.

I can't imagine why.

Fortunately, both shows had a huge revival due to DVD sales, and both projects got movie deals out of the whole thing. Why? Because television producers like money. It's not a secret. We shouldn't be blaming them for taking these shows off the air. It was our fault, not theirs. Just because we pulled our heads out our collective asses and finally appreciated these gems doesn't give us the right to feel superior to those douchebag executives.

And if you're just waiting to insist that you were one of those select few who was totally on board with those shows from the very beginning, that leads me to my next point...


3. Saying "I was there/thought of that/liked it first!"

This is the age of the internet, where posting "First!" in the comments section is loathed by everyone but the person who posted it.

Sort of like Facebook statuses about people's kids

The competitive need to have done something first is an understandably human drive, but why are we, as grown adults, so proud of it? Because the thing is, it isn't attractive behavior. Let's say you're having a conversation with a bunch of people, and someone says something like, a second before you were going to say it. Do you say "Oh my God, I was literally just thinking that!" or "Dude, I said the same thing in my head, only better."

What you want is for people to understand that you were quick and clever. And maybe you were. But there's no way to prove it. You might as well have claimed that Die Hard was your idea first. It doesn't matter, because you have no proof to support your argument.

No, don't show us the napkin. We believe you.

The problem with this behavior is that it's gateway douchebaggery. It leads you from the soft stuff that is just little dickish behavior ("I liked Arrested Development before FOX shut it down!") to the really hard, hipster fuckrake behavior ("I liked Arrested Development before any of you liked it. Now it is so overplayed, and I don't think anyone really understands the Oedipal themes anyway.")

So don't be that person. Because in your incredibly unnecessary, aggressive tirade about how you so totally read Harry Potter the second it came out before anyone recommended it to you, you think that you're this:

"First to the top of Everest, bitches!"

But you're actually this:

"Dude, Native Americans whatever, I was totally here first. Tell your kids."

2. Bragging About Not Being Cold

Quick survey: how often do you hear people boasting about how tall they are? How awesome their eyes are? How thin or thick their hair is? Okay, I'm sure there are some people out there that are vibrantly aware that they have great genes and are just really pleased about it, and want to let you know.

We get it. Stop rubbing it in.

Okay, but those are people who are just fascinated with themselves and marveling at the lucky hand they were dealt. How many of those people are boasting about their height because they think that being tall means that they tried harder than short people, or that it was a personal accomplishment that they managed to grow a whole lot?

People on acid do not count.

I personally have never witnessed this behavior. You know what I have noticed, though? A lot of people are awfully pleased with their ability to withstand the cold. Like, really pleased.

The next time you are walking outside with someone (and somehow it's always someone from the Midwest,) and you mention that you are cold, you have just made the other person's day. You will immediately be regaled with how where they come from "This is shorts and T-shirt weather," how they once ran through eight feet of snow in subzero temps in a bikini (guy or girl) and how they love the cold so much because it has no effect on them at all (other than arousal, apparently.)

"WINTER IS COMING AND SO AM I!"

This behavior isn't irritating just because it's sheer one-upmanship in the face of a casual statement or complaint (although that is really fucking irritating.) What's so irritating is that this is not something that the person has any control over; nor do they have the right to brag because of it. Note that they are not saying, "Why yes, it is cold, but I am enduring the cold and overcoming my pain, for I am man and I shall not show weakness by allowing my teeth to chatter." I could deal with that. I could go bear fighting with a person like that.

No, what that person is saying is, "This does not feel cold to me." If I put my cold, frozen hands on your bare skin and you say "Holy shitballs, why would you do a horrible thing like that??" it is because you now understand what it is like to be me. I was not being whiny. You were not being brave. You were just not perceiving the cold.

The fifth of Jack Daniels probably helped.

1. Being really offended by some accents (but not others.)

This is a tricky one to nail down, and an especially hard one to address as a white writer with a fairly bland northwestern accent (I'm not sure how it's different from standard American dialect. We say "beg" instead of "bag" apparently.)

And "Hi!" instead of "Fuck you!", which is what differentiates us from New Yorkers.

However, I recently noticed something. There's a small, confusing subset of racism that we, as Americans, are still a little unsure about, and that is the realm of accents. And we're just not sure what's offensive. I've figured out that for the most part, it's cool to mock and mimic Russian, Scottish, Irish, French and German accents. I have never seen anyone get upset over someone going "Is Russian. Is funny. I like." It's mocking the way Russians speak English, but it isn't a problem.

Violence is often implied.

 Okay, so you've got a really good drunken/violent Russian bit going. Then you switch to an Asian accent, or a Spanish accent. Let's say you launch into "Oh, tank you vedy much. You want flied lice with that?" Suddenly the room is awkward. Maybe a few people find it funny. Some people are pissed. And a few people are looking around anxiously. Is Engrish funny? Is it offensive? It seems offensive. You're pigeon-holing a whole culture and mocking the way they speak. This is just from the accent, too. It's not like you're making jokes about stereotypical behavior, food or appearances.

You're not doing this, is what I'm saying.

So what makes the "Engrish" accent offensive but the Russian accent not? Is it because Russians tend to be white and also not horribly stereotyped in America? Possibly. But if you try a Trinidad accent ("Hey, mon") or an Indian accent ("Thank you, come again") you're not going to get any flak. Who decided the rules for this, and when did we all accept them?

I'm not saying that any of these are/aren't offensive, since they don't directly affect me. No one is mocking the way that I speak (except when I tried to say "street" and "road" and it ended up "stroad.")

I'm totally over it now.

I'm just saying that it makes absolutely no sense to get upset and offended at one accent over another if the intent in both cases seems to be "Haha, accents are hilarious!" Be offended by all of them, or none of them, but don't get on your high horse without really thinking about it.

Or just go back to your bragging, I guess.

4 Incredibly Confusing Things (That Are Meant to Clarify)

Have you ever been trying to do something and every part of the process seems like it was designed to just make you more interesting to watch when God's TiVo breaks?

I'm not talking about when you asked your dad how to spell 'Celtic' and he told you to go look it up in the dictionary.

What the hell is a dict.... is this made out of paper?

No, that's just being purposely unhelpful. What I'm talking about are the things in our daily lives that are supposed to instruct, explain or clarify and just do the frigging opposite. Perhaps you've encountered the following:

4. Food Labels

Don't get me wrong. In general I'm totally in favor of ingredients being posted right on the back of that delicious Hot Pocket. I mean, back when I was eating Hot Pockets that sort of made me the kind of person who would never look at food labels, but hey, it was nice to know I could if I wanted to.

Fun Fact: On the label it tells you that 'Ham' is code for 'Rat Intestines.' Hot Pocket!

Once I became gluten free I thought that I would be grateful for food labels. I had to start checking the sides of cans more often than adolescent boys watching that one scene from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1.

It was a side boob joke. Here, I'm sorry.

The Myth: Anyway, I thought that knowing the ingredients in a plastic bottle of preservatives, meat scrapings and sugar would be nice. I could learn what I was actually eating and make sure that it wouldn't kill me. If it had a lot of words I couldn't pronounce I just wouldn't eat it. If it had gluten, surely it would tell me.

The first thing I picked up did not even test my skills as an English major. It was a bag of peas. On the ingredient list it said "Peas." The villagers rejoiced.

Then, though, I picked up a can of beans. Good old organic black beans, the least offensive packaged food. 

The Reality: It isn't real English on those labels. Can someone please tell me what soy lecithin and calcium disodium edta are? MS Word tells me that these are not real words, and we all know that Microsoft never lies. I mean, I see the words soy and calcium in there, which I guess is a good thing? But what the hell is lecithin?

This, apparently. In what appears to be a hospital bed pan.

The most frightening thing to me, though, is when the ingredient list really tries to help you out. Not in pronouncing the words (just give up now,) but in understanding which ingredients serve what purpose. For instance, after "Calcium disodium edta" they added parenthetically "(to protect color.)"

I ask you, how did that help me?

What color were these beans in the first place? How hard is it for black beans to be black? To stay black? (I swear, I'm not going to make a Michael Jackson joke here. He's dead, folks, let's move on.) What the hell is it that's being used to preserve these beans and what color would they be if not for this tongue twister of an ingredient?

The worst part is that the ingredients do nothing to tell me whether or not something is gluten free. Obviously I look for the word "wheat" first, but you'd be surprised the weird shit in some of these items. You thought caramel was just sugar and...then some more sugar? Me too. Turns out caramel coloring is consorting with the enemy. Who would ever suspect that?

So I've switched back to Hot Pockets. At least I know what's in those. 

Hot Pocket!

3. Footnotes/The Writing on the Opposite Page

Most people will at some point, in either high school or college, read a play or sonnet written by William Shakespeare. If you weren't one of those cheaters who just read Cliff Notes for Dummies, then you probably realized that reading Shakespeare is all about his masterful and poetic use of language.

And that that language is fucking incomprehensible.

"How should I know? No one talked that way in my day either."

The Myth: Enter the most helpful idea in the world: footnotes! See, Shakespeare's plays are meant to be watched (which is why he has little to no stage direction.) When you watch a play you learn a lot by the cadence and inflection provided by the actor. When you read it, it's just the worst kind of words: the ones that you know are referring to filthy sex and badass swordfights but in code.

"'Black ram tupping your white ewe'? Is...is that sexy? Or racist? I'm gonna go with racist."

Footnotes help you muddle through all that 15th century bullshit. You don't need to get absorbed in the poetry of the language, because you've got a bulldozer that will let you know that "canker-bit" means "eaten by worms." Hooray!

The Reality: ...Except, did that really help you understand what was going on in the story? I'm going to go with a big fat probably not. Having the meaning of a word written on the opposite or bottom of the page doesn't really do much most of the time. And it actually makes things worse.

Let's try something. I'm going to give you a line from King Lear. Let's see how helpful the footnote is.

"With him I sent the queen, / My reason, all the same; and they are ready / Tomorrow, or at further space,¹ to appear"

Follow the footnote indicator allllllll the way to the bottom of the page and then find your way back up here. Go on, I'll wait.

And hum the Jeopardy theme song quietly to myself 

Okay, you're back? Good job. Now let's think, did knowing that "further space" meant "later time" really help you understand the text better? Hell, when you scrolled back up did you even remember what the sentence was about? No, no you didn't. In fact, you probably had a better idea of the meaning of just that little bit of text before you jumped down to the bottom of the page.

You're trying to get the idea of the play here, not the etymology of every freaking word (although that's fun, too.) The teacher will probably be testing you on themes, characters and plot before they ask you what what Shakespeare meant when he used the word "happy²."

"Of course it doesn't mean 'happy'! F-."

2. Board Game Instructions


Board games can be fun. Okay, not Monopoly, unless it's been turned into a drinking game, but everything else is good. Most of them are pretty straightforward, like Trivial Pursuit or Candyland.

If you play this game often then you are five years old or suuuuuper high.

But sometimes there are awesome games that aren't self-explanatory. The brightly colored squares have no textual aids. You're thinking you might take a nap instead, or else turn the whole thing into an indoor version of Calvinball, which would admittedly be way better.

In the Calvinball version of "Life," this guy is actually the winner.

The Myth: Fortunately for you and your creatively-stunted cohorts, you don't have to make up the rules to Chutes and Ladders! You just read the simple instruction page and then--bam--you're on your way to doing something about as fun as bowling on a Wednesday.

The Reality: That's not how instructions work. If no one knows how to play the game, you have an extremely boring, frustrating half-hour that leads to hatred, break-ups and bad family talent show nights.

Of course he'll go for the piano. He'll always go for the piano.

Before everyone gives up and moves on to other things, though, there's always one person reading the instructions out loud to everyone else in a very authoritative voice, as though they get it, which they do not. It doesn't matter, though, because no one is listening anyway. The words do not seem to relate directly to the board, so they tune it out and hope that the authority figure will figure it out and put the instructions into plain English.

"And if you get past the gumdrop mountains you get--Jack? You listening?"

If you're this person, you have a lot of optimism. There's usually a lot of "No, wait, guys, guys, guys, this makes sense." Then you slow down, go back over the same thing you just read and they don't know what you're saying. Neither do you.

I was recently playing the Buffy the Vampire Slayer board game (because shut up, that's why,) and the instruction booklet was six freaking pages. That's not a booklet. That's a novelization. As I was reading I realized that none of the information was in the order I needed it. It was set up in categories of sheer knowledge dumps. What I needed was a step-by-step version: "You put your marker on the start space? Good. Step two is to go watch TV."

Meanwhile, everyone else hates you a whole lot. You were supposed to get this down, break it into bite-sized pieces and chew it for them. Instead you're like the asshole that dragged them to the new Michael Bay movie and made them sit through it while you commentated.

Or worse, a Michael Bay movie about a board game.

1. Dictionary Pronunciation 


As an English major, I am often afflicted by the supremely embarrassing condition of knowing a lot of big words and not knowing how to pronounce them when they are actually coming out of my mouth.

As you can imagine, I do not come away from these conversations seeming terribly intelligent. Even if I was using the word "indictment" correctly in a sentence.

My mother and I recently had an argument over the pronunciation of the word "banal." If you imagine the world's upper-crustiest Brit saying it, that's that camp I was firmly in.

Banaaaaal.

My mother was choosing to pronounce it as though it rhymed with "anal," as in "banal sex."

The worst kind of sex.

The Myth: If only we'd looked in the dictionary, right? Dictionaries come with those handy guides on how to pronounce things and then everyone knows and can use the English language correctly!

The Reality: Except we did look, and it didn't help. Seriously, plug it into Google or look it up in the dictionary. This is what you'll get: "bānl." 

(I can't even write that word in regular script in this blog post. I had to copy and paste it. Know why? 'Cuz those aren't real freaking letters!)

Doesn't that just clarify things tremendously? When I see that word, I do not think of "banal." I think of Dutch pastries.

Pictured: ˈbānl.

How is this helpful? Unless you're trilingual in English, Russian and the periodic elements chart, there's no way you're actually getting anything out of this trip to the internet. Wouldn't writing "buh-nawl" have worked, like, way better? Some people might still get it wrong, but at least it won't sound like they have Tourette's.

Then there are the Greek letters, the backwards Rs, the fucked-up, upside-down Es and occasionally letters that have never been near the word they're trying to help out.

Didn't know there was a J in "Prelude," did you? Go back to school, redneck.

Sometimes the sheer lack of order, sense and clarity just makes me want to quit the big book of words altogether. But then I remember that I'm not reading the dictionary, I'm reading the back of a can of black beans.

And everything totally makes sense.


^1"further space: a later time" Now, wasn't that important?

"¹happy: lucky." Seriously.

Why I'd Rather Go to the Dentist Than the Hair Stylist

I'm going to be honest. I do not give anything resembling a damn about hairstyles. I'm not sure if that makes me unpatriotic or what. When people talk about waking up three hours early to straighten or curl their hair, I throw little funerals for the hours of excellent sleep they missed. When my grandmother gives me hair care products I try to see what the chemicals will do to the insects I find on the sidewalk (hydrogen peroxide on slugs...do it.) I think about hair in the way that the average American thinks about Iraq: infrequently, impatiently, and with less interest or focus than I give to the latest diet fad (seriously, soy-free, dairy-free, egg-free, wheat-free food is not food, now is it?)

No. No it isn't.

 However, recently I began to notice that the long(ish) hair hanging in my face all day meant horribly complicated things like brushing, blow drying, and styling. I was having to wake up a full five minutes before I stumbled out the door in the morning (not because I go to work or anything, but because I'm usually still hungover and accidentally in someone else's house.) I found this unacceptable as did, I might add, my mother (although possibly for different reasons.)

Enter the convenient trend that gives tribute to Rosemary's Baby without having to sacrifice embryos to the devil: the Pixie Cut. I love the Pixie Cut. I would like to French kiss Tinkerbell for introducing it to us (but not the one from the Disney movie, where she inexplicably had long hair, since obviously Disney hated freedom.)

Seriously, what is this shit?

The Pixie Cut is all about looking sexy without working at all. It is the simple solution for people like me who have flat, thin, straight hair and yet have never felt the urge to pump it full of steroids and try to get it its own reality show just to make it feel better about itself. Waking up late in the morning? Comb it for two seconds. Forgot your comb? People will think you messed it up on purpose to look cool. Can't find a hand towel? There's a perfect one right on the top of your skull. There is no going wrong.

Except.

Except that for some reason this sort of thing never goes right for me. Let's start at the beginning. Feeling I ought to do it right, I go to a salon where they ask me what I would like as far as a "look." This is what I had feared. A personal opinion of mine that would quite probably lead to tears. I had been hoping that I would walk through the door and be accosted by women in smocks who would tackle me to the floor, grab my hair and say, "This hair has got to go! Get this woman's head under an emergency upside-down strainer or we're going to lose her!"

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but it...doesn't look good."

But no. These people think that I know what I want. If they had known that I am a 23 year old with a B.A. in English, they never would have assumed that I know what I'm doing. So the woman asks, all smiles, what it is that I'm looking for. I, of course, gesture helplessly at my hair and just sort of say: "See this? Less of this."

Then I begin to worry that she might mistake such detailed instructions, so I say, "But not too short. I still want to look feminine." Which is something I haven't remotely resembled since the third grade. So this woman already has a task in front of her.

So then she makes her mistake. She hands me a stack of magazines and asks me to leaf through pictures of airbrushed plastic and ask me which starlet Barbie doll I would like to resemble. This has immediately given me false hope, as though perhaps she'd just offered me plastic surgery instead of four inches less hair. Suddenly the possibilities are endless! Clearly my problem isn't that I don't Photoshop my skin enough or bathe in big bathtubs full of foreign currency--it's that my hair is just too darn long.

Or possibly that I don't move in slow motion enough.

 So I pick a picture of a woman who looks like she spends more time grooming her two inches of hair than I will raising my own children. Perfect. Off we go. The woman gives my scalp an unnecessary and entirely erotic massage. Then I perch in the old sit-and-spin and try not to look in the mirror as the woman gives me an insanely long haircut. I don't look in the mirror because I know that inevitably I will change my mind halfway through, have an enormous panic attack, and start desperately trying to glue chunks of my hair back on. So I don't look, and I keep in mind the sexy, sexy celebrities that I will obviously resemble after a short amount of time.

So when I'm done with my appointment, I imagine that I am going to look something like this:

Sexy lips and all.

Unfortunately, as I'm sure you probably could have guessed, the whole thing turned out looking a lot more like this...

Above: My high school yearbook picture

I wish I were kidding. I look like Justin Bieber. I'm not sure if that makes me a tom boy or a really really girly girl. Either way, I'm looking into the most dignified forms of suicide. At least when you go to the dentist you're expecting to be orally violated and to experience a lot of pain. Somehow, with hair stylists, I never see it coming.

Temptation

"If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread."

"Dude. I'm a Celiac."

Breaking News!

Pastafarianism Accused of "Gluten Intolerance"
Associated Press, Chicago


Pastafarianism. Originally intended as a satire against the inclusion of intelligent design in public school curricula, the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM) has morphed into a sect wherein members may unite and oppose the teaching of creationism.

While The Flying Spaghetti Monster has long been considered an ironic parody of the exclusivity and oppression associated with mainstream religious groups, this week it has been accused of a surprising charge: bigotry.

  
Walter Cronkite Jr. reported this week that the Celiac Association of the National Territories for the Elevation of Atheism and Tolerance (CANTEAT) has threatened to sue the church of Pastafarianism for making them feel unwelcome. 

Many members of CANTEAT who attempted to join the Church of the Flying Spaghetti monster felt that they were being purposely oppressed, since they cannot ingest wheat, rye or barley without severe intestinal issues.

"I was really into the idea of Pastafarianism at first," CANTEAT member Pat Douglas said in a tearful interview. "But once I realized that the Flying Spaghetti monster was made entirely out of wheat noodles, I just couldn't support it. How can you worship a deity that gives you a case of the runs every time you even look at it?" 

Douglas admitted that he felt excluded by the FSM members because they would take part in weekly spaghetti dinners, often intoning "This is my body, eat it in memory of me." 

Former FSM member and current CANTEAT chairwoman Mary Feldman admitted to feeling as though there was prejudice against her for her dietary beliefs. "I'm into making fun of religions and mocking their rituals and all that, but the use of gluten-filled noodles seemed really unnecessarily hateful." Feldman added that she felt particularly alone since "atheists don't often have get-togethers."

There is no word on whether the FSM church will pay for emotional damages among its former members, or if they will instead switch to gluten-free noodles made of rice or quinoa. Church president Bobby Henderson was unavailable for comment.

My Sad Attempt at LOLCats

Seriously, this thing lives near me. I'm not trying to make a statement or anything, but dear God, if you're building a church, try not to give it chomping teeth and eye windows that follow you everywhere as you run like hell down the street. The hardest part of this was trying to figure out how to misspell everything correctly. No idea how I did, there, but I think it might have given me a seizure.

There's No Reading in the House

     A few summers ago, my family and I went on vacation to Washington D.C. Having been no farther east than the Mississippi river, I suppose it was unsurprising that I felt like a huge frickin' tourist in a place that should, ideally, feel comforting and welcoming to every citizen in this country. Obviously, this sentiment identifies me as an insanely liberal nutjob, and quite possibly a terrorist.


    For a few days we went along the hamster wheel, riding the metro, visiting museums, waiting in line after line just to see money being made (depressing) and the original C3PO suit (totally worth it.) Finally, we made our way to the House of Representatives.

   Now, let me just say that the House of Representatives must be in constant danger of violation and defilement, because it had on the biggest chastity belt of all time. Only a handful of people were allowed in the building at once, and it had to be at a certain time. We went through airport-level security twice, and my camera was confiscated. Because, as you know, no one has ever photographed the elusive House of Representatives.

Pictured here.

In fact, until I saw it with my own eyes, I was quite certain it was a rumor.

    When we finally got in, the House was empty. Slow day for legislation and all that, or else there was a Congressional kegger we'd missed on our way over. I hadn't exactly expected to see history being made, but it was a bit of a letdown. Still, we sat in the balcony of that capacious justice stadium, just to imagine that we contributed to the way the country was run.

    Here I should mention Younger Brother, who is a huge nerd. Older sisters are, by law, required to think so, but Younger Brother is a history buff to a disturbing level. For instance: he gets all of the jokes in Hark, a Vagrant. For instance: His idea of a good game is seeing who can list all the U.S. presidents, in order, in the shortest amount of time. (I got five. To be fair, though, it was enjoyable, because I turned it into a drinking game! Good luck not taking shots when it comes to Taylor!)

Who? Oh, right.

     So, as we lounged in that sacred space of freedom and such, Younger Brother decided that it would Super Awesome to see who could list all the amendments in the Bill of Rights. I agreed to it, even though the House of Representatives' security people made it clear to me that I was not to turn this into a drinking game. As I stammered hopefully through my first guess, ("Thou shalt not... bear arms against Jesus?") Younger Brother whipped out his pocket Constitution (See what I mean? Nerd.) in order to judge me.

    Younger Brother is extremely proud of this Constitution. It goes everywhere with him. It is mostly worn down to tissue paper by now. It has taken on the shape of his butt. He basically has it memorized. What better place to use and peruse it than here? When he pulled it out, I half expected it to glow and for the Zelda "You Did It!" music to start playing.

   Clearly, though, I don't enjoy irony the way that the Universe does. No sooner had the tattered little book made its appearance, then a burly security guard materialized before our eyes. I had a brief, terrifying moment of wondering if the Constitution had been legally banned. In retrospect, that still seems like the least surprising option. The man loomed over Younger Brother with his starched blue uniform, radio, baton, and deep displeasure.

      "There's no reading in the House."

     Seriously, I could not write a better punchline than that. There were a few ill-advised chuckles on my family's part, to which the guard was apparently immune. I knew that Candid Camera had been dead and buried for a mercifully long time, but I still wondered for a moment. Finally, Younger Brother found his words.

      "But...it's just the Constitution. We're looking at the amendments." You know, because they're really important to know. Especially here, seemed implied. He looked at the guard, hoping for some acknowledgement. As though there may have been a misunderstanding, and the guard only came to us because he thought we were reading smutty romance novels, erotic Harry Potter fan fiction, or worse, Twilight. The man stood patiently for Younger Brother's stammered explanations with the unrelenting inflexibility of a cop who is definitely going to give you a ticket but still asks "Is there a reason you were going that fast?"

"Go ahead. Convince me."

     "There's no reading in the House," the guard repeated, and waited until Younger Brother put that Constitution back where it belonged, i.e. closed and in his butt pocket. As the forefathers decreed.

Then he left.

     I suddenly realized that four years of learning to write theses, essays, rhetoric and arguments had not prepared me for illogic of this magnitude. I had found nothing to say to this man to defend our right to read the fucking Constitution. It wasn't that I didn't have persuasive arguments, it was that I knew he was going to be completely unreasonable. Whatever I said would register as a simple, blinking "Noncompliance" on the computer monitor that was his brain. I probably would have gotten us kicked out.

     I guess it's a good thing that I was surprised into silence, because what I probably would have said is, "Way to encourage kids to stay knowledgeable about our government, our rights and our history. Asshole." I kind of wish I had said it, and then maybe round-house kicked him in the face.

As our forefathers decreed.

    I still haven't come up with a reason why the rule even existed. To keep people from hanging out all day in the House of Representatives with a good novel? If you want to prevent loitering, just limit the amount of time a person can visit. I could have asked the guard, but all he would have said was, "There's no reading in the House."

    This will be our downfall. Unlike Orwell's vision of laws being subtly changed to suit the powerful, the laws will remain the same. They will be preserved in beautiful white sarcophagi that we are forbidden to open. The problem with us is that we don't ask questions. I'm sure that guard didn't ask why he had to tell us to stop reading. I didn't ask why we couldn't. We're used to signs that say "No public restroom," "No shirt, no shoes, no service," "Walgreens is not liable for your car being broken into and peed on while you bought milk." Stated rules like this allow people to be unkind and inflexible. They encourage it. It becomes easy to say, "Sorry, it's not my decision. It's company policy."

"Sorry sir, your insurance does cover axe wounds, but not that brand."

   This apathy and rigidness when it comes to basic human courtesy means that you can't be given treatment if you don't have insurance. You can't get that refund if you don't have the receipt. No one will help you unless they are given specific instruction to do so in their employee handbook.

That doesn't seem like the ideal this country was founded on, but then again, I'm not allowed to check. There's no reading in the House.