How to Create an Original Story

It is entirely possible to make a situation worse by attempting to make up for an error in a ham-fisted, overzealous manner. Just ask Missy. I sometimes thinks that she hides it from me when I offend her just to avoid the horrible experience of one of my apologies.

Note from Missy: It’s kind of true. I don’t have to give Scott grief for anything he does, because he always tortures himself with guilt more than I ever could.

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How to See a Friend or Co-worker In a New Light

I have a young relative who lost her hearing at a very early age. When she was in junior high she had high-tech hearing aids surgically implanted. When she told me about them, my response was “Cool! You’re a cyborg!” I’ve always felt good about that response. When in doubt, going positive is almost always the right move, and instead of having the conversation move on to how much the procedure had sucked, instead she told me all about how the implants also worked as Bluetooth headphones.

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How to Resist a Psych-Out

Extend your index and pinky fingers. Curl the middle finger and ring finger downward. If you then press your thumb inward, over the bent middle and ring fingers, you will have made Spider-Man’s web shooters, the secret heavy-metal devil symbol, hook-’em horns, or, what I call here, “the whammy.” All of those could be considered aggressive gestures.

Put your fingers in the same position but extend the thumb outward, to the side of your hand, and you have the American Sign Language gesture for “I Love You.”

It seems that the thumb position is key. Point your thumb in the wrong direction and the meaning and intent completely change. Wars have been started over lesser mistakes.

It also seems to me that the main reason Spider-Man stories all focus on his life as a teenager and young man is that his later life will be spent fighting his greatest enemy: carpal tunnel syndrome.

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How to Achieve a Long-Term Goal

I was raised in a rural part of the United States. As such, it was a major revelation to me when I discovered, in my late teens, that the Guinness company made anything other than their book of world records.

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How to Set Someone Straight

I just think, if you’re going to write a book about vampires, then change every single rule about vampires, why make them vampires in the first place?

Changing all the rules for wizards, however, is perfectly acceptable, and was probably long overdue.

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How to Develop a Personal Alternative to Waving

All greetings are weird, if you think about ’em.

Let me clarify that statement. It’s not that greetings are inherently weird, it’s that they all become weird if you give them the slightest thought. You want your greeting to come off as natural and effortless. That sense of effortlessness will be destroyed by even the slightest doubt in your mind, the kind of doubt that comes from briefly thinking should I wave and say “hi,” or just wave? Or just say “hi”?

Once you’ve given your greeting any thought whatsoever, whatever you do will come off as weird and forced.

Now that I’ve pointed this out, the next time you greet someone, this will happen to you. Feel free to curse me under your breath. That’ll make it even more awkward.

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How to Plan Your Retirement

I’m shocked that nobody has made a movie about an old man who commits some crime in an attempt to use prison as a nursing home, and that Robert DeNiro hasn’t starred in it.

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How to Beat the Heat

As I’ve said a great many times, I do not deal well with heat. However, I’d rather live in a town with warm winters and unbearably hot summers than in a town with warm-ish summers and unbearably cold winters.  

Either way, you end up not wanting to go outside for half of the year. In a town with the unbearably hot summers, the winters are warm, and during the summer, at least the roads are clear.

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How to Tell What Kind of Monster You Are Dating: Vol. 3

The spaceship in the first panel is from the 1953 film version of War of the Worlds. The ship is called the “Martian War Machine.” There’s a guy I know, the guy I drew as the fly in panel three, as a matter of fact, who thought that Martian War Machine would be a great name for a band.

Many of the guys I know have at least one idea for a band name floating around in their heads, even if (like me) they do not play an instrument.

My band name is Foxtrot 101. It’s a Disney cast member thing.

Ric has often said that if he ever starts a jazz quartet, it will be called The New Savage Beatdowns.

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How to Tell What Kind of Monster You Are Dating: Vol. 2

A lot of people don’t know that they made three Creature from the Black Lagoon movies. There was the original Creature from the Black Lagoon, where they come to his lagoon and try to kill him. Next, there was The Revenge of the Creature, where they capture him and take him to a sort of 1950s SeaWorld, which he escapes, causing them to try to kill him. Finally, they made The Creature Walks Among Us, in which they capture the creature and “fix” him by removing his gills so that he can breathe air. They make him wear clothes and keep him in a pen out back. He escapes, and they try to kill him.

I remind you the creature was considered the villain in these movies. The ’50s were an interesting time.

Note from Missy: I think the Graham-blob is one of the cutest things to ever appear in Basic Instructions. I just wanna give him a squeeze.

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