Monday, November 19, 2007

The World We Know is OVER

Today, I solved computer issues for not one, not two, not three, BUT four motherfuckers.

It just goes to show, that you can do anything if you put your mind to it.

And it also means haste, makes waste.

And possibly you must conquer your fear or you fear will conquer you.

I dated a guy who would roll his eyes everytime I came at him with a mixed metaphor, or proverb, or Bible passage, or personal anecdote, or actually, I'm going to be honest, any formation of words that one might string together in the form of a sentence. He really hated when I talked. Upon meeting his best friend he told me, "Mind your p's and q's. I want you on your best behavior." Which meant, I wasn't allowed to talk too much.

But why do expressions exist if they aren't to be used? Why do people shun them?

Back to being a computer IT mambo Sambo. I work at a non-profit employment counseling service with a resource center and people come in to use computers and sometimes have snaffus. Part of my job, surprisingly, is to remedy those snaffus. If you were to ask previously mentioned bf if he believes I'd ever end up in this situation, he'd probably manifest disbelief in the form of crapping his pants.

BUT I find that I round out these computer counseling sessions with some sort of malapropism or syntactic blend and people respond by looking at me with a hint of pity.

Situation #1: Man can not upload his resume to a company website and he enlists my help. I come over and notice that he has the proposed file for uploadment open. A major Widows "no-no" and with a click here and a click there, his resume is attached and he is now a candidate to accurately saw concrete. He says to me, "Thanks Sam. I wish I knew computer tricks like that." To which I responded, "If wishes were horses, we'd be knee deep in shit."

Situation #2: Girl can not get keyboard to type anything. I tap on the keys a little and smell something quite Dr. Peppery. I ask her, "Did you pour some of that pop on the keys?" "Guilty," she says, "I'm so sorry." And I said, "A guilty conscience never feels secure."

Situation #3: A woman calls me over because everytime she hits delete within a word or sentence and starts to type it 'overtypes' on words she "meant to stay damn put." I noticed she had "OVERTYPE" and fixed it as I knealt beside her. "You going to injure your knees sitting like that," she said to me. I replied, "You're probably right. My Achilles ankle has always been my knees."

Situation #4: Myspace.com isn't able to display pictures of some girl's baby and it's a "real cute fat picture." (I also have another story to share about MySpace) And I taught this individual how to right click on something and perhaps display a picture. And then I kicked her off of MySpace because computers are for job searching and not recreational uses. "But I'm just looking at a baby's picture," she said to me, and I said "Sharpen your pencil." Which was something my father always said to me that meant shape up and stop fucking around.

***Other Myspace story. MySpace apparently has spyware attached to it. And nothing is more entertaining than to watch two people over 50 debate about what exactly spyware is. I was sober and it was about 2 o'clock. And neither admitted to actually knowing.***

Anyways, figures of speech are cool. A lot of people won't know what you are talking about. But I think they are a little special and I try to work it about 10 or so a day. For no other reason than it helps me talk a little bit longer and maybe cements whatever it is I was talking about in the first place into that person's head.

Next topic, anything titled "Mom's ..."

1 comment:

shaun. said...

"If wishes were horses, we'd be knee deep in shit."

Brilliant.