I Don’t Get It
by Janet Periat

I am an alien pod person. I must be. Because I don’t get a lot of these Earth customs. I don’t get social conventions that are illogical. I don’t understand why I have to do something that doesn’t make sense just because everyone else is doing it. Why would I work eighty hours a week making some rich Ivy League guy richer so I can own a McMansion and an iPod and a BMW and only take four days of my ten vacation days off a year?

Speaking of iPods, I don’t get wearing an iPod everywhere. People wear them to walk in forests, to walk the dog, in shopping malls, at family functions, EVERYWHERE. What happened to talking to people? I like people. Studies have shown that people are more isolated than they were twenty years ago. Well, duh! Everyone is working eighty hours a week, plugged into an iPod, working in cubicles, when does anyone have time for socializing anymore? And if they do socialize, all they do is excuse themselves every ten seconds to answer their cellphones so their bosses can feel important by interrupting their workers during their one hour off a week.

I don’t get women’s fashions at all, period. Most of them are fruity and uncomfortable. I don’t get high heels. Why would you wear shoes that make your feet hurt? Shoes that can cause permanent damage to the structure of your feet? Isn’t the point of shoes to protect your feet? Skirts? Great, one gust of wind and HERE’S MY UNDERWEAR. Thongs? Which should be more appropriately named “Wedgies”. I don’t want my underwear up my butt. Why would I wear underwear that was intentionally designed to go up my butt? Nail polish and long nails. What? How the hell am I supposed to type with all that clicking and clacking going on? Besides, you spend hours getting your nails colored and elongated only to bust them opening up a bag of cat litter. What’s the point? And long hair is just stupid. It hurts to brush, you zip it up in sweatshirts, it’s in your eyes, it falls in your food, you spend most of your time sucking ketchup out of the ends.

I don’t get designer clothes. Why do I have to pay a bazillion dollars for an ugly handbag that some broad named Kate Spade had made in China when I can get a purse that looks pretty close for twenty bucks that was also made in China? Who the hell is Kate Spade anyway? All I know is that she’s someone who was smart enough to scam all the women in America into thinking she was someone special enough to sell her China-made handbags at the same price as a high end bicycle.

I don’t get expensive cars. Why am I supposed to buy a Mercedes for double to triple the price of a Toyota when Mercedes are constantly in the shop and a Toyota will keep going until we all run out of oil? Doesn’t anyone read Consumer Reports? And what’s the point of buying a car to show everyone how important and smart and successful you are? If you were that successful and smart you would know that spending a hundred grand on a car is just stupid. All cars turn into the same car after a month. After that honeymoon period where no one is allowed to eat, smoke or sit in the car, people forget they spent a hundred grand on the car and pretty soon the back seat is full of empty Starbucks cups.

I don’t get car alarms. When they were first out on the market, they worked. People heard one and assumed a car was being stolen. When you hear a car alarm today do you actually think it’s being stolen? No, you think some moron accidentally knocked into the car. You never think, “Quick, call the police!” Personally, I hate them. I live next door to a financial institution and every cubicle-dweller in the place has a BMW with a car alarm. They go off all day long and do any of those idiots come out to see if their car is being stolen? No. They assume it’s some other moron’s car that someone accidentally knocked against. What I want to know is this: if someone was actually stealing the car, just who do they think is going to stop them? Like I’m gonna put my life on the line so some idiot can get their Mercedes back? Sorry.

I don’t get cell phones. Well, in an emergency, fine. Like when your husband is coming home from work and you need him to pick up some chocolate, beer and Pringles. Other than that, they are stupid. I don’t want to talk to anyone while I’m driving. Or walking. Or shopping. Or walking the dog. I hate working. If someone calls you, they want you to do something for them. Why would I want to do anything for anyone other than myself? And contrary to popular belief, cellphones do not make you look important. They make you look needy. Like you can’t go five minutes being alone with your own thoughts, you have to be tethered to another human being? It’s pathetic.

I don’t get people who don’t say hi back to you when you greet them on the street. What? Do they think I want a lifetime commitment to them? No. Just a wave is fine. Actually, I want nothing more to do with them other than an acknowledgment that we are both humans on this planet and it’s a pretty nice place to live and we are happy that there are other nice humans here. But no. Luckily, I get about 95% wave-back. But I do wonder about that other 5%. Like a man I call Snob Boy up the block. He does not like me. His wife likes me, but he doesn’t. When he sees me coming, he makes a point to turn away so he doesn’t have to wave at me. I make it a game now. I try to catch his eye and be as cheery as I can. He never smiles, but I do get wave-back when I catch him. He hates it, but he does it. Which amuses me. Maybe it’s my pink hair. But at least Snob Boy is better than Anal Lawn Boy, another neighbor a couple blocks away. He refuses to say hello back. Absolutely ignores me. I call him Anal Lawn Boy because when I saw him last, he had a ruler out and was checking the length of his lawn. On second thought, maybe it’s good he ignores me.

I don’t get starting off a name of a product or website with a small letter followed by a capital letter. iPod. eBay. sTupid. Why do they do that? Just to annoy me? No, they consider themselves cutting edge. They are breaking the rules. I have no problem with breaking the rules, but with the dumbing down of America, don’t Apple and eBay realize the disservice they are doing to the English language? Kids today are going to think that it’s okay to capitalize the second letter in a proper noun. Kids today don’t read, don’t write, all they do is learn to take some dumb test. All for the great privilege of going to college to learn how to be happy working eighty hours a week in a cubicle for some stupid corporation whose name starts with a small letter followed by a capital letter.

See? I am an alien pod person. I don’t fit in. But I have to say, at least my feet don’t hurt, I know the names of most of the people on my block, I’m not going deaf from wearing ear buds and my underwear is not up my butt.

And people wonder why I’m so happy.

©2006 Janet Periat

This entry was posted on Friday, March 28th, 2008 at 1:29 pm and is filed under Humor Column. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.