Randomness Ensues

On Parentheses

Footnote in one of my homework assignments:

Parentheses may also be nested (generally with one set (such as this) inside another set). This is not commonly used in formal writing (though sometimes other brackets [especially square brackets] will be used for one or more inner set of parentheses [in other words, secondary {or even tertiary} phrases can be found within the main parenthetical sentence]).

Thank you for making my dad a little brighter Dr. Richman. 

On Why The Office Isn’t Funny Anymore

I took a study break today and watched an episode of The Office. Now I love The Office but lately, though I’ve “enjoyed” the shows, I haven’t been laughing like I used to. So I started thinking about why. 

My favorite thing about The Office is Jim. He pretty much became my hero. He is the clever one. The rational one. The likable one. And he is the most clever. He manipulates situations like a puppeteer, he gets off all sorts of snide and sarcastic remarks with impunity. And of course the pranks he pulled on Dwight were nothing short of epic. Oh, and at the end of the day we see him as the “nice guy”. Michael was great because he was an idiot that got himself into a lot of, well deserved, awkward and unpleasant situations because he was so out of touch with reality. 

Aristotle defined comedy as bad things happening to those worse than us. And that’s what made The Office so great, there were plenty of people worse than us and they were made to look like the fools they were. 

Here is what happened in today’s episode:

Short Episode Synopsis:

In today’s episode Robert California forces the office to throw a “welcome party” for Nellie. Nellie is annoying, self obsessed, rude, bigoted, irrational and entirely incompetent employee that somehow ended up as the branch manager. Similar to Michael Scott except that she is far more annoying and far less humorous. No one in the office can stand her so they decide to make the party as miserable as humanly possible. Meanwhile Andy has just won back the girl he loves, but before their relationship can begin she insists he breaks up with his current girlfriend. He drives to her house and attempts to break up with her and tell her he wants to be with Erin but chickens out and claims he is gay to avoid her and her friends hatred. Driving away neither Erin nor Andy are comfortable his lack of forthrightness and he ends up driving back. He confesses, they all hate him, but he did the right thing. Meanwhile Jim is helping Nellie move-in (under orders) and finds   out that she hates magicians. Quick call to Pam. Pam hires a magician for the party. A little while later Jim and Dwight stumble upon a box of her Ex’s pictures. Feeling sorry for her he calls Pam and urges her to cancel the magician and make the party less dreadful. She attempts to but the rest of the people in the office still want to go through with it. Pam and Jim end up ruining the magician’s show and being made to look irrational and hated in front of Robert California in order to make things better for Nellie. 

Bad things happened. But to Pam, to Jim and to Andy. Not Nellie, the one that deserved it. The one worse than us. Not even to the party planning committee who went ahead with the plan to make it as dreadful as possible even when Pam tried to persuade them to dump the idea. The ones like us. Bad things happened to characters that we don’t want to laugh at. Not now anyway. They did the heroic thing. The right thing. When many of us wouldn’t. If Nellie was getting embarrassed or made to look foolish I’d probably be laughing at her. But not Jim. 

That’s not comedy. As a matter of fact that’s one of the ways in which Aristotle defines Tragedy. Bad things happening to those that are better than us.  

Which brings me to another point. 

Why do I laugh at Dwight? At Michael? Why do we as human beings delight in the suffering of those we perceive as worse than us? I believe it is out of a distorted sense of Justice. We want evil to be punished and good to be rewarded. Here we define evil as “worse than us” and good as “better than us”. Coming from a Christian perspective that is pretty distorted already. Good should be defined by an objective moral standard. We of course don’t do that because we fall short of that standard (as does everyone) and it is very difficult psychologically to cope with the idea that we are not one of the “good people”. It gets worse. We don’t evaluate “worse than us” on moral grounds, we do it on social grounds. Thus the person that deserves ridicule is not the jerk but the awkward guy. We lift up the jerk because he is often the one administering the “Justice” we want to see. 

So how does this all play out?

Well, there are people I find annoying. Perhaps it’s the way they talk. Their voices are too high, or they speak maddeningly slow. Perhaps I just don’t see them as intelligent and I am annoyed at their intrusions into conversations with people I actually want to talk to. Perhaps I just find them boring. And I want to be like Jim used to be. I want to pull pranks on them. I want to make fun of them right in their faces without them catching on. I want to make them look stupid in front of people because I feel they DESERVE it. They are worse than me. They are evil. And thus Justice dictates that bad things happen to them. Other people tend to find them annoying too. So when I act on this I’m looked upon favorably. I’m Jim making fun of Dwight. No one feels bad for Dwight.

This season of The Office has humanized the annoying/awkward characters too much. We can identify with them to some degree. They can feel pain. They aren’t so clearly “worse than us”. So we feel guilty for laughing at them. Maybe only a little bit, maybe only for a little while, but guilt has no place in comedy. This episode Jim decided not to make fun of Nellie. I wonder how many of us hated him for that? Hated him because we know we would have gone right ahead. It would have been funny to go right ahead. Hated him because he was, in some real sense, better than us.

On The History and Pronunciation of Memes

I’ve had one too many discussions about how to properly pronounce the word “meme”. I’ve heard everything from “mem” to “me-me”; in my head I’ve always pronounced it “maim” for some reason. Well ambiguity annoys me so I did some research and found that Richard Dawkins was the man that coined the word “meme” in his book “The Selfish Gene” published in 1976. So here is Dawkins on page 192:

“We need a name for the new replicator, a noun that conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation. ‘Mimeme’ comes from a suitable Greek root, but I want a monosyllable that sounds a bit like ‘gene’. I hope my classicist friends will forgive me if I abbreviate mimeme to meme. If it is any consolation, it could alternatively be thought of as being related to ‘memory’, or to the French word même. It should be pronounced to rhyme with ‘cream’.”

So there we go. Closure. 

God Provides (On Everything Coming Together)

This is going to be long. I just have to get it out. 

It’s been a long week. I feel like I barely had time to breath. Today I had time, and not idea what to do with it. Tjuan was having a date at our place. Which meant I had the choice of either being locked in my room or leaving and finding something else to do. I chose the later. 

Earlier in the day I had talked to my dad, I needed some parts from him. It’s a long drive and he seemed super busy. But he is my dad. Which meant he’d come and try to hide the fact that he really shouldn’t. I also got a sweet voicemail from my mom telling me how much she missed me though she knew I couldn’t come down there. Which got me thinking. Could I? I have a bicycle…

So when I left the house that was in the back of my mind. But only the back. I wasn’t sure if I could actually ride that far. They live in West Broward, I live in East Boca… and I like taking the scenic beach route which would bring me even further east. So I didn’t call them to tell them I was coming just in case I ended up having to turn back. 

When I was almost there I realized “Hey, it’s close to Valentine’s Day, maybe this wasn’t the best time to surprise them…” So I pulled into the Publix by their house and gave my dad a call. They weren’t doing anything, hadn’t had dinner yet, no plans. Perfect. Then I saw a really nice bouquet. Another idea. “Dad, you should really pick up some flowers for mom, it’d be a nice surprise.” (Typically my dad does nothing until Valentine’s Day, and then only the BARE minimum. Like a true Scotsman he goes all out the day after Valentine’s Day when the prices are all cut in half.) So my dad shows up, I surprise him. Tell him “I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d stop by.” So I ride back to his place with him. The first thing he wants to  show me is the garden. He is proud of his ability to put food on the table. Especially when it only cost him a few cents in seeds. Another idea. I’m pretty broke. My parents are always broke. But I wanted to make dinner, and what I was looking at was God providing. 

So when I come in to surprise my mom my dad is carrying flowers and I am carrying a basket full of vegetables, herbs, and fruits. Three huge eggplants, oregano, basil, thyme, garlic, spinach, lettuce, tomatoes, sun dried raisins, grapefruit and key limes. 

This was quickly turned into an eggplant lasagna (my first attempt, turned out well), salad, grapefruit juice, and a key lime pie. And while I was preparing all of this we had some great conversation, looked over old wedding albums and watched the cats attempt to climb the wall in order to catch that ever elusive red dot. 

As dinner was winding down and I put out the key lime pie (with little hearts drawn in it by my dad) I got a text. Perfect timing. “Oh, sorry, I’ve got to get going, my ride is here, have a great evening.” (Maybe a tad deceitful… but hey, Rahab is in Jesus’ family tree.)

And the whole ride back I couldn’t get it out of my head how God works everything out. Getting kicked out for a date. The cool breeze, perfect for a long bike ride. My dad showing up at Publix just as I expected he would. The food that no one had to work for. (My dad’s method of gardening consists of pushing seeds into the ground and watering with a garden hose once in a while) My mom’s call. I would never have planned to do that. The chances of it working out were way to slim. It was too much work. I was mentally exhausted.  I didn’t plan anything. God just kept throwing opportunities at me. And I ended up putting a smile on my parent’s faces and having one of the most refreshing nights I’ve had in a very long time. 

rachbastian:

sometimes it lasts in love

but sometimes it hurts instead

(Source: chickentatum, via tanakaveman)