How to Help Someone See How They Are Perceived

I feel about hugs roughly the way Richard Ayoade does.

Forward to 2:50. For some reason the internet won’t let me auto-start the video there.

It’s funny how people who are huggers, when they find out you are not a hugger, will just smile and inform you that they will continue to hug you no matter what you want, then mock you for not wanting their hug.

No, funny isn’t the word. Infuriating. That’s the word I want.

I’m not against hugs in general, for specific people. My wife, my mother, small children . . . cats? Does picking up a dog or a cat count? The point is, I have never, and will never hug, say, Ric. It wouldn’t feel right, and he wouldn’t know how to respond. He would probably interpret it as some sort of attack, or possibly a physical form of sarcasm.

I once had a guy inform me that he was a hugger as he came in for a hug. I told him I was not, and it did not slow him down at all. I resigned myself to the fact that the hug was going to happen, and out of some weird awkward impulse I patted him twice on the back during the hug. He kept me in the embrace and said, “You don’t have to do the awkward heterosexual back-pat with me.”

I fought the urge to point out that I am, in fact, an awkward heterosexual. I also managed to keep from explaining to him that forcing a hug on me, prolonging the hug when I was clearly uncomfortable, and criticizing me for my poor hugging technique was not doing anything to change my mind about hugs.

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Discuss Business Theory

To sell a printed book you need to write it, edit it, format it, design a cover, market it, tweak the layout page by page to avoid text problems at the page breaks, buy all the paper, print all of the copies, bind them into books, package the books in boxes, store the boxes until orders come in, ship the boxes all over the country (you hope) to bookstores. Then the bookstores have to store them, stock them, stage them, and sell them at a profitable price. If the print run sells out, you do every step from “buy the paper” on all over again. More often, the first run doesn’t sell out and the remaining copies are sold at a loss.

When you make an e-book, you need to write it, edit it, format it, design a cover, market it, and convert it into the proper format, and set a profitable price. Then is sits on a server and is copied and transmitted via the internet for fractions of a penny per copy to any and all purchasers for years to come.

So, is there any logical reason why an e-book shouldn’t be at the most, half the price of a paperback? You tell me.

Missy says: I saw one the other day where the e-book cost MORE than the paper version. Flames. On the side of my face.

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Impart Wisdom

“The stick always wins” sounds like a good slogan for something. Maybe a guy who uses a stick for something, or calls himself “the stick.”

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to be Productive

One of my favorite sketch shows of all time is The Kids in the Hall.

My favorite kid in said Hall was Kevin McDonald.

This is a sketch he wrote and starred in about a guy with a to do list.

I’ve always enjoyed that sketch, but I appreciated it far more after I learned that it was inspired by a conversation he had with Dave Foley in which Foley made fun of McDonald after seeing that he had a beat up, tattered to do list, the final item on which was “Make new list.”

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Talk Nonsense

When I was a kid, I heard the term “hiding your light under a bushel” and couldn’t figure out what it meant. I asked my mom, who explained the concept.

When she was done, I believe the three primary questions I asked were:

Why would somebody do that?

A bushel of what?

 and

Wouldn’t the bushel catch fire when the lightbulb gets hot?

I was a very literal-minded child.

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Recast a Superhero

Apparently Michael Keaton is coming back as Batman in the next Flash movie, which they’re making as I write this. I hope they have to go to Arkham Asylum and question Jack Nicholson’s Joker. I know there’s a continuity problem with that, but I propose the following dialog to fix it.

Flash – He’s still alive? I thought he fell to his death.

Batman – He faked his death.

Joker – That actually fooled you?! It was all done with toy helicopters and cartoons!

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Learn from History

When I was a kid, we used to save all of our pop and beer cans. (The beer inside the beer cans were 100% my parents’ property, but once they were empty, and essentially trash, the cans belonged to all of us. There’s some sort of lesson in that, I think.) We would collect them in giant garbage bags for that one time a year when we would drive down to Oregon to visit family, because you were paid something like 25 cents a pound to recycle aluminum in Washington, but in Oregon you could turn in the cans for a refund of the 5-cents-per-can deposit all Oregonians had to pay. We didn’t pay the deposit, but got the refund anyway.

I often suspected that a lot of Washingtonians were drawn to vacation in northern Oregon by that deposit, but only the cheapest Washingtonians, which might have fed into why Oregonians seemed to resent Washingtonians so much.

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Understand Folk Wisdom

I put a lot of effort into trying to write a male equivalent to “happy wife, happy life.” The best I came up with was: “use the broom, happy groom.”

I’m not proud that I wrote that. Any man who actually uses that rhyme and means it doesn’t deserve a relationship.

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Share Your Vision for Our Great Nation's Future

At the time I thought this suggestion was absurd. Now this sounds more dignified than what we’re probably going to live through in 2024.

Note from Missy: “Ten years before his time” is pretty much the story of Scott’s life. 😆

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).

How to Appreciate Your Favorite Band

The three lead singers of Genesis were: Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins, and Ray Wilson.

I look at that list and I’m honestly not sure if I envy Ray Wilson for being on it with two towering talents, or feel sorry for him for knowing he can never live up to them.

He was a young, talented, good looking guy they brought in for one album when Phil left the band in the late 1990s.

If the actuarial tables are right, there will come a day that Ray Wilson will be the last remaining living member of the band Genesis. That will be a sad day, but if Mike Rutherford was ever mean to him, that’s when we’ll hear about it.

Note from Missy: Heyyy, now, look. Yes, the guys from Duran Duran were (and mostly still are) very attractive. But their debut studio album just turned 40 this year, and they have a new album coming out this year. I think we can all agree that they’re more to them than their (very) pretty faces.

As always, thanks for using my Amazon Affiliate links (US, UK, Canada).