October 29, 2010
Brian Explains: Fear
Fears, fears, I just can’t get enough fears. I also can’t decide which fear I like best. It is as if I am choosing an accessory for my personality. Which color goes best with self doubt? This Halloween time, I thought I would examine fears. When you talk about fears, most people think of being trapped in a bank with goats wearing clothes who are trying to kill you. Okay, that might just be me. This article will focus on everyday fears.
I know I worry too much, but if I worry about worrying too much, the universe will implode. I am 40 years old (as of the writing of this article). There is no fear about revealing my age nor do I fear getting old. I do not fear death. Of course, a painful death is another bloody matter. (No, I am not from England. Why do you ask?). A fear of pain is healthy unless you plan on joining the cast of Jackass. If we all drove around with no fear of crashing, the roads would become a free for all crash-fest. I do have a fear of running into invisible cars on the road, but I will go over that subject when I talk about my irrational fears.
Since I’m talking about fear, I have to mention school. Everyone has had that dream where you show up to class naked to take a test you didn’t study for. In my dream, there was also a killer whale/teacher surrounding my desk/boat trying to make me fall in the ocean/classroom so it could eat/fail me. My most horrifying moments in class were during tests. The anxiety was not from the test itself; it was from the silence during the test. My stomach would make noises I couldn’t stop. Sometimes I would have preferred death to the embarrassment of my talking stomach. The rest of this paragraph is going to be filled with toilet humor. When I was a kid, I pretty much never saw the inside of the restroom at school. Grade school and junior high were a series of restroom horrors. One horror was the bullies hanging out in the restrooms while he was ditching class. The other horror had to do with noise. If it was silent in the restroom, I worried about every trickle of water and noise coming out of my body. It is a restroom so there was a definite chance the noise would echo.
Hopefully, this article didn’t sicken you too much. I removed the gross parts about my restroom habits, so be glad. I should have left them in to honor Halloween, but I am too lazy to go back and change it now. This is the final paragraph, so this article is staying as it is. You can always read through it again and imagine the gross things I said so you can get into the horrific Halloween spirit. It will be like a written rerun. If you opt not to do that, I’ll say goodbye to you. If you are reading the rerun of this article, I say thanks for the double read and goodbye.
November 5, 2010
Brian Explains: Complaining
I love to complain, but I do it well so I’m allowed. My wife is also a good complainer. Some might say (me included) she is an even better complainer. What do I mean by a good complainer. Some people whine when they complain. This is bad complaining. This is what most teenagers do. No one wants to be like teenagers. We all want to be like my wife (as opposed to being my wife, which is a thankless job).
The basic rule of complaining well is to entertain while you are complaining. By entertain, I don’t mean you juggle and squirt water out your nose, I mean telling a good story. You make the complaint a joke. An example is: “I waited 50 billion years in line at the store when the lady in front of me pulled out a purse the size of a Buick full of coupons from the 50s.” This is much more entertaining than the following example: “I went to the store, stood in line for an hour, and got sore legs. Can you rub my bunions?” This is not entertainment; this is what my job would be if I was in prison.
Comedians understand the art of complaining. People pay money to watch them complain on stage, on tv, and in the movies. It is a big business. Millions have been made by the top complainers. In some ways, you almost have to be born with a dirt covered spoon in your mouth to be a top complainer. Having things to complain about when you are a kid helps you develop the skills you need for a career in the discontented arts. A miserable kid can be a funny adult.
The other part about complaining is knowing your audience. You don’t complain about waiting in line at the bank while you are still there waiting at the bank. Everyone in line is just as annoyed about having to wait in line, so hearing you complain about it just adds to the annoyance sandwich. When you get home or back to work, you can entertain them with your tales of stressful lingering. Be sure to mention the lady who pulled out her life savings in pennies.
Complaining is cathartic. It allows you to relieve the stress from the difficult experience you had. Just don’t give someone else that same experience by recreating it depressing blow by depressing blow. The rule for good complaining is, if you want to tell someone what a bad day you had, be kind, don’t whine, and entertain. You might get a promising career out of it.
Thoughts from Life 
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