Sorry or Not

On behalf of life and the universe, and often myself, I apologize or don't. Questions, comments to [email protected]. var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-26595748-1']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })();

[sorryornot-blog]

LARGE WEDGE OF CHEESE I JUST FOUND MELTED INTO THE FLOOR OF MY CAR

Calling you a wedge is kind. You're more like a pile, now that I've allowed the furnace of my Hyundai Elantra to cook you into something horrifying, becoming translucent and hard like a diamond baking in the mantle of the Earth, if a diamond smelled like grundle. 

I got you from my parents, a huge chunk wrapped in saran wrap left over from the catering from a sad family occasion which I will not get into, as it will no doubt depress you, cheese, as you already have many things about which to be sad. Your brethren somehow made the journey from parent's fridge to my fridge, and you were left behind. You will never be eaten, feeling the warm embrace of death as molars turn you into mush to be chemically transformed into energy and fat and poopy. You are now, and will forever be, a pile of weird looking crap, decaying in some landfill, after I gingerly tossed you into the garbage can at the underground parking at my work, hoping no one noticed.

Your lasting contribution to the world will be an odd smell in the nose of people in my car (who will wonder if they forgot to wear deodorant today) and a dark spot on the carpet, an eternal chalk outline, a bloodstain of dairy sweat, marking your final resting place in the back of my car, the useless keyboard tray for my $50 desk and broken MacBook adapter I am too lazy to get rid of keeping vigilance over your grave.

I'm sorry I forgot about you.

[sorryornot-blog]

AN EMPTY BOTTLE OF WINE I DROPPED OUT OF MY BED THAT CLINKED AGAINST ANOTHER BOTTLE OF WINE I DROPPED OUT OF MY BED

This isn't what it looks like.

I mean, yeah, it totally is. I'll be honest: if I were a better person I'd say something like, "No, baby, that other bottle of wine didn't mean anything, you're the only container of detectably fermented grape juice for me," or "I know what you're thinking, but my love for you, and your beautiful balance of oak and vanilla notes with a delicate, dry finish, isn't like any other," or "Baby, I'm in love; for the rest of my life, your kind of yeast is the only kind I want in or on me."

Sadly, there's no romance here. I don't give a shit about you. You're a two dollar bottle of wine I bought at Trader Joe's, one in a box of twelve. I'm not even sure what varietal you are, and I don't care (the cashier at TJ's didn't either; I hadn't picked up a box yet so he didn't have a barcode to scan, and then after a moment he just shrugged, rang me up for a box of Cabernet Sauvignon and said, "Just grab whatever when you leave"). I'm only drinking you because I thought I was getting fat and thought I should replace some of the massive quantity of beer that I drink with something ostensibly less fattening (jury's still out). Plus, I can still drink wine when it's warm, so I can read in bed without having to get up every time I need to get another beer from the fridge.

I know, I know. Wine is meant to be savored and appreciated. Each bottle of wine is a unique, special opportunity for a new experience, a maturing time capsule of the sun that year, the soil, the grape, the feet of the guy who stomped it, whatever. And here I am, sucking you down like Gatorade (although in my defense, I suppose alcohol is functionally an athletic drink, in that it provides me with the endurance to persevere).

This is all to say that, yeah, you don't deserve this kind of treatment, but hey. Sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

THE GIRL WHO CAME IN AFTER-HOURS AND JUST WANTED ONE BEER, JUST ONE, PLEEEEEEEEASE

"Look, I know you're closed," you said, "but I just got off work, and my manager yelled at me and I just need one beer, okay?" You adjust your tank top, lifting your gross little floppy boobies in a sad, conspicuous attempt to manipulate me with (qualitatively prepubescent) feminine wiles. See, that's thing about "wiles," is that they should be "wily." Your wiles should not make me pity you.

I pour you the beer, hoping that by acquiescing I can prevent further discussion on this or any other topic, but you proceed to explain loudly about how being a hostess at the high volume bar/restaurant/mess is so HARD, what with customers coming in expecting the world, saying things like "What do you mean you don't have any seats outside and it's a thirty minute wait, that's not exceptable," like they think they're God.

Oh, you mean like people who come into a restaurant and expect to be served even though the restaurant is closed? Are you so absolutely stupid, that you do not grasp this insane hypocrisy? Please leave me alone. I'm so tired. I guess I'm sorry your boobs are yucky and weird.

[sorryornot-blog]

GIRLS WHO CALL THEIR BEST FRIENDS "WIFEY"

You have to stop this. Please.

Not sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

GUY WHO JUST SPENT HIS LAST TWO GRAND ON MAKING HIS CAR LOOK EVEN MORE RIDICULOUS

Do you ever wonder why those child support payments are such a pain in the ass? Why you don't have enough money to pay for your freezer to get fixed so you still don't have ice for your generic brand Cola that you drink out of the same red plastic cup you've been saving for the last seven months?

It's because you'd rather spend money on making your car look like it's floating on neon.

I get it. You want to have nice things. It's just...c'mon. It's a car. You get in it, and it helps you get places. The degree to which you've upgraded your car seems pathological in nature. There is not one element of this car that has not been replaced with a flashier, chromier alternative. You need to get a handle on this shit.

I'm sorry buddy, your car is not your dick. If you're not thinking that your dick is dumb and stupid, and your behavior with your car is overcompensating for that, then sorry as well.  If your car is functioning as a dick-surrogate, I think there's a serious issue to consider insofar as how you've attached sharp-looking spinny things to your dick.

[sorryornot-blog]

GUY READING "HOW SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE THINK"

Just looking at you hurts. Before you even get to redefining how you "think" let's start with some basics.

First thing: I'd skip the jumbo caramel ice blended next time. I'm certainly not the world's leading authority on abstaining from overindulgence but please believe me when I say you don't need it. Maybe just say no to the whip. Baby steps.

Second: no sandals. The only "successful" people who might be able to frequently get away with wearing sandals are professional surfers, and in that circumstance, I might argue that the definition of "successful" might need some further clarifying.

Third: chinstrap. Grow a moustache or shave it off. You don't have the jawline for it.

Look, guy. Most successful people don't have any better an idea how they got where they are other than "hard work" and "luck." I'll tell you what does not involve either one of those things: inhaling one thousand calories of sugar in this coffeeshop while absentmindedly skimming a book offering general platitudes on success which essentially amount to the "astrology of self-help," insofar as the techniques that the book espouses are so general that it cannot be said that successful people don't do those things. Astrology tells me that I'm a Scorpio so I'm passionate and stubborn; sometimes I am those things, so it's difficult to prove astrology incorrect.

These are all buzzphrases from that book: "Act on Your Good Thoughts." "Engage in Focused Thinking." "Repeat the Process." Well, yeah, that all sounds great, but any of those are as good at describing what successful people do as a fortune cookie is at describing your future: "Soon you will find great success."

Sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

SUBCULTURES PREDICATED ON LOOKING WEIRD

I've never really understood subcultures that invest a lot of effort into achieving specific goals in terms of outlandish appearance. I get that most people, on some level, put some amount of effort into their appearance, but I'm not talking about groups like backpack rappers, high school jocks, or studious girls. Those are all groups that don't exactly require a great deal of investment into looking the way it's generally agreed that people identifying with that group should look. I am talking about liberty spikes and forty pounds of chains, Jersey Shore orange-skin Bloomin' Onion-heads, furry neon rave vomit, or anything from Tokyo that makes reasonable people doubt the future of humanity. It all looks like so much work.

People that do this: if your idea is that the rest of us are just cogs in the machine, anally systematizing your own appearance doesn't seem like the best way to make your point. We're just slaves to "the man," but you're the guy who spends two hours every morning applying intricate "death-clown" makeup? Sorry if I don't take my cues on societal theory from you, buddy. 

"HYPOCRISY," you say. "Mr. Sorry or Not, are just as guilty as hewing to a subculture's proscribed appearance, what with your thick-rimmed glasses and jeans and potentially amusing t-shirt!"

My response: "You're so right. Here's why my way makes more sense: all I have to do is put on some glasses and jeans and a shirt. I'm done. Almost no effort at all! AND, I get to look like the best subculture of them all: functional members of society!"

"I don't have to walk around all day looking like a total fucking idiot, wearing my 'understanding' of the fact that 'normal people are squares and nobody really gets it' like some merit badge you got for realizing the pointlessness of everything everyone does. You're squeezing that knowledge up to your chest, wearing your stupid costume like some fucking teddy bear (using your costume as a shield or comfort, like a child's teddy bear, and in some particular situations, you might actually be dressed as a teddy bear as well), but if you really want to get to the next level, forget the ridiculous exterior bullshit and just let everything sink deep, deep into your soul. You won't need the costume anymore! Then, you can save some 'getting ready' time in the morning, not have to get weird looks at the grocery store, and still be able to look at the people around you and go, 'What the fuck is everyone DOING?!'"

Maybe that's not your reasoning. Maybe I'm overreacting (this is a thought that often occurs to me). Maybe you just genuinely think you look good this way. In that event, my question is this: "What the fuck is wrong with you." (I guess since I didn't use a question mark at the end of that question, it's not really a question both in that I don't really have an interest in knowing the answer, and in how it's a statement saying that something's wrong with you.)

At any rate, sorry you look stupid.

[sorryornot-blog]

DOG THAT WILL NOT STOP BARKING

Dog. Okay.

There's no other dog, or a burglar, or a tasty piece of human face you want to gnaw off its owner. But you're a dumb animal, so I get that your overactive sensitivity to threats or the possibility of delicious face may be a little removed from my perception of reality. This brings me to my next point.

It's been hours. You continue to perceive "something is there" and your crappy little brain continues to tell you that you need to bark at it. Why? Nothing has changed. Your barking has accomplished absolutely nothing. Empirical evidence suggests that you, and your endless icepick-stab-yapping, are useless.

I read once about a type of scientific study (called the "forced swim") where "scientists" throw animals (let's call 'em "dogs" from now on) into a pool out of which it was impossible to climb. They let the dogs paddle to stay afloat, until the dogs could no longer continue swimming, and in that moment where the dogs would succumb to exhaustion and let themselves drown, the "scientists" (you see now why I'm using quotes) would extract the dog. They would let the dogs recover for a little bit. And then they'd throw 'em back in. They'd do this over and over again, and they'd measure the amount of time it took a particular dog to stop trying to swim, which would serve as an indication of how "depressed" that particular dog was. Another way of contextualizing the results of this test was not that the dog was depressed, but that it had learned it didn't matter whether it tried or not, because as soon as it stopped trying, it would be removed by the "scientists."

The precise findings of this test don't matter. What does matter to me right now is that in either situation, whether the dog is sad or smart (or both, I suppose), the dog learned something. I'm not talking about a dog learning a trick (yeah, duh), because when we do that, we're makin' it really easy on those stupid dog brains. The dog's experience in training sounds like this: "DO THIS MEANINGLESS THING AND GET A TREAT." No, I'm talking about a dog taking initiative, looking at its context, and drawing its own conclusions.

So, Dog. We know dogs can learn. You're not changing anything with your barking. So, shut the fuck up.

Stop making me fantasize about you in a "forced swim" test with a Tantalus twist: every time you begin to drown, the water level drops, and you're forced to keep swimming forever, your stubby, ugly, limbs weakly and eternally churning, just barely keeping you afloat. Sorry I'm not sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

THESE PEOPLE'S FRIEND RANDY

Dude, what the fuck is wrong with you? All these people can talk about is about how much they hate you, and now I hate you by extension.

This is proving to my own paranoia that it is possible for all your friends to get together behind your back and talk shit about how much you suck.

Fuck you, Randy. I'm not sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

GUY EXPLAINING HOW THE WORLD WORKS

Nope. I'm gonna show my hand upfront on this one. Not sorry. Definitely not sorry.

It's a special type of arrogance that leads someone like you to talk to another person as if they don't wake up and spend time in the same world as you do. To allow you to commit to that thing where you look over the top of your glasses like you're incredulous that the another person could actually have believed whatever thing of which you're disabusing them?

"The government? Really? You think the government cares?"

"Listen. Let me tell you about big pharma."

"Well, yeah, I guess you could say that, but it's not like that ever happens."

With all your arguments defending whatever position you're taking on what it is that makes everything happen ever, you're definitely proving the way the world works, which is: a person goes through their life not really understanding what anything is, because that is life, an endless series of senseless events, and then assholes like you tell them how they're stupid for not "getting it."

Not sorry. 

[sorryornot-blog]

PARENTS WHO STILL GO OUT WHEN THEIR TODDLER HAS JUST DISCOVERED HOW LOUD HE CAN BE WITH HIS PIERCING BABY SCREAM

When you made this little piece of shit, you gave up your right to exist in public. He is a menace. It's bad enough he's a walking petri dish of bacteria and fecal matter and that he's spreading it all Contagion-style, touching everything he can find with his useless, always damp baby hands, but for him to be constantly, constantly screaming--

I don't believe in a higher power, but I would suck God's dick if he sent a plague of locusts to eat you all alive. I'm definitely not sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

SAD MAN WEARING STUSSY

You wait for the bus, shoulders slumped, head down, curling into yourself against everything, like a human pill bug.

You're also wearing Stussy. I'm trying to figure it out; is that the symptom or the disease? In other words, are you sad because you are wearing Stussy, or is the Stussy indicative of something even deeper? For instance: could this be the first time you've been outside in fifteen years? That's why you're wearing Stussy, a brand that literally not a single human being ever wears anymore? So is that why you're sad? The world you once knew is gone forever, and there you sit, mourning its passing, reckoning with this new world?

If Stussy is your last cultural touchstone, you were probably a teenager that last time you were outside: skateboards and Nirvana and Oakleys and ska and summer camp and rebellion. Being a teenager then had some degree of credibility, but not as good as the eighties, what with metal and D&D and smoking pot in people's basements. Now what is it? Black Eyed Peas and Justin Bieber and Twilight and texting your friend pix you took of your gf's boobs?

Maybe you're right. Maybe we were better off with Stussy.

I'm sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

GUY STARING AT ME

Sipping your coffee, arms leaning on the table, leaning forward, eyes unblinking, you stare into my soul. I want to ask: like me, do you think that hell is other people, but a truly worse hell is yourself? Are you trying to imagine what's going on inside of me, to escape? Are you a kindred spirit? Would you love my blog?

No. When I do it, I glance, and then I use my goddamned imagination. I don't stare at you like we're on a raft and you're turning into a big cartoon chicken leg. You're seriously creeping me out. Fucking stop it. I'm not sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

PERSON WHO BELIEVES THEY'RE SUPER COMPLICATED AND NO ONE CAN EVER BE WITH THEM BECAUSE OF HOW COMPLICATED THEY ARE

You're so deep. The time you like, just sitting there, and like, thinking, you know? About stuff, that's like, sad. Or not, sometimes it's happy, but it's like, what? You know? Nobody could ever be with someone like that. Not someone like, like you.

Like, there's stuff inside you that's like, if anyone ever like, knew, they'd totally think you. were. fucked.

So.

Every single thought, every doubt, pain, everything you've ever experienced, its exact analogue has been experienced by some, if not all people. There are now over 7 billion people just alive right now not counting all the dead ones. You think you're special? That you're fucked up?

EVERYONE IS FUCKED UP. EVERY SINGLE PERSON IS FUCKED UP. Even that super nice guy you always thought was the best, who'd never do anything to hurt anybody, even that guy sometimes thinks about, I dunno, how weird and big the universe is and how little we really matter, or he spends like ten whole minutes deciding which jeans to wear, or he fantasizes about stapling your annoying face to a wall. You're not more interesting. No one is. Get over yourself.

So when you think you're somehow too messed up to be in a relationship with anyone, and there are people out there who actually can't get a date for a real reason, that bugs the shit out of me. Every single person is an island. You will never, ever, fully understand another human being. That works the same in reverse.

You think you're super complicated? How often you think about poop and how good it smells (I don't fucking know) is just too weird, and that must say something inside you is fucked? When you go on a date, don't tell them you love the smell of poop. Problem solved.

I'm not sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

GUY WHO SERIOUSLY HAS THE FRONT AND TOP OF HIS HEAD SHAVED AND THE BACK LONG AND IN A HIGH PONYTAIL LIKE SOME RIDICULOUS CROSS BETWEEN BOZO THE CLOWN AND A SAMURAI, AND ALSO HIS DUMB-LOOKING GIRLFRIEND

You're about eight years too late to capture the zeitgeist, Ken Watanabe.

You're wearing one of those ridiculous scarves that makes it hard for me to decide whether you're going for "New York hipster" or "desert nomad," but then you're wearing Timberlands, and your watch looks like something from REI or SkyMall: time piece, compass, water pressure, possibly a grappling hook. Get your shit straight.

Your girlfriend isn't any better. She's got her head wrapped in cloth and a tiny little ponytail is sprouting from the top. She's (of course) not wearing a bra so her hippie-titties are poking out from around where I imagine her bellybutton to be. (I think if an extremely misguided person were to look at her shirtless, her nips and her bellybutton would form a straight line across, and in terms of depth, a sine wave.)

I really hope you guys are happy together, because I can't imagine you'll ever get anyone else to sleep with you when you both look like extras from a movie called THE WORST PEOPLE TO LOOK AT.

[sorryornot-blog]

LITTLE GIRLS WHOSE FATHER BROUGHT THEM INTO THE PUBLIC BATHROOM I AM ABOUT TO POO IN

I wish, for your sake, learning this lesson could've waited until you were older. Maybe your first college boyfriend, or maybe at some point down the line when you and your husband get comfortable enough with each other's bodies.

But no, this is the moment where you find out. And it will be a rude awakening. I was drinking heavily last night, and I fear my bowels will be producing the most gruesome thing you have experienced thus far in your brief life. What comes will come, and we will all experience it together, me, in here, and you two, out there, clinging to your father, who is realizing his mistake. He's got it together; his bowel movements probably just fall out. Barely need a wipe. But this is a public bathroom, and the public at large, especially me, is not nearly so healthy. And so, even I, a veteran of man-shits, after this particular event, will probably have the thought, "I should probably go to the hospital."

Will you remember this day for the rest of your life?

I'm so sorry.

[sorryornot-blog]

TWO DUDES WHO DON'T KNOW EACH OTHER SITTING NEXT TO EACH OTHER AT THE BAR WEARING THE EXACT SAME GLASSES

Oops. Good luck continuing to studiously ignore each other despite the fact you guys are literally elbow to elbow right now. Well, that's the problem with taste; if you have "good taste," odds are the shit that looks good to you is also looking good to everybody else with "good taste." (It's also how people with bad taste can rationalize it. "When I go to the club, everyone is wearing Ed Hardy! I'm right in doing so as well!") I guess I shouldn't ignore that taste is subjective as well. I'll stop referring to "good" and "bad" taste.

See, guys, I never have that problem. Full disclosure, I've bought shirts from Threadless, so of course there's an exact copy of that shirt walking around somewhere, but most of my clothes were bought for less than ten dollars after they ended up in a Goodwill or Salvation Army after their previous owners died (try any locations in West Hollywood for the best stuff, this seems really insensitive but the gay dudes who died in the area have really good taste). Clothes acquired like this tend not to have many duplicates. Right now, I'm wearing a weird plaid jacket lined with...nylon? and a old frayed hoodie from the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer that a friend of mine left in my car probably ten years ago after which it became my property and a too-large stripey t-shirt that makes me look like I should also be wearing a propeller hat and licking a lollipop. Jeans by Target. Shoes by Adidas. Hair by me, an electric hair clipper, and an inability to see the back of my own head. Styling by an absence of a reason to appear like an adult person.

So, gentlemen. I'm sorry. It looks like those glasses were expensive. No LensCrafters for you; I bet you had to go to an actual, honest-to-God department store to get those. It sucks you ended up next to a person who has the same taste as you, but that's the risk you run for trying to look good.