Aug 30, 2007 10. Considering writing a blog. Write the dumb blog. It’ll only be sand-blasted into the internet forever. Your words will likely be at once un-losable and lost; probably no one will ever read them, but everyone will be able to forever.
9. Considering “becoming an expert” on something (thanks to the internet, I made my cat an expert on pet products, and she’s threatening to book more speaking engagements than me.)
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Aug 5, 2007 Lifehacks are valuable when they not only save you time but improve the quality of your life. This one sure will.
Do this: stop using vocal speech pauses. omit “uh, um, ah, like, so, well, etc.” from your speech.
This is the old argument: people who don’t say “um” all the time sound more professional and more intelligent. Of course quantum physicists say “um”. Of course people on the radio say “um” (but we don’t hear it any more because they’ve got computer programs that automatically edit it out–perhaps the first time in history a computer program is invented to actually make the people seem smarter.) My friend John says we’re always smarter on paper. I sure am. I recently listened to myself on the radio, and I sound like a babbling brook called “Uhhhhhh River.” That’s why I write the jokes before I go on stage.
Aug 3, 2007 At a friend’s urging, I bought and started reading the book Radical Honesty. Now, before you jump to conclusions and think it’s like someone talking up the merits of soap every time you come around or offhandedly offering you a breath mint, I have to disclaim that this friend had just read the book and found it a profoundly upsetting and worthwhile endeavor. So last night I’m reading it in the bathtub and thinking how great it is. “I’m ready! Bring it on! Wow, the truth IS the only way out of the maze of permanent adolescence (nevermind I seem to be stuck at age two)!”
But so this honesty thing has been going really well all day. I woke up smiling. (honest dreams?) I told my roommate’s cat that its farts smell like a trucker at his first diner stop in 13 hours. The cat meowed. I felt great. I told my car that its headlights are misaligned and I feel angry that it’s running down and polluting the environment, and I would like a Prius a lot better. Later in the evening, I was driving my not-Prius down to San Mateo and telling myself (in an act of radical honesty) how great a driver I am, that I can talk on speaker phone, drive with my knee, and eat granola all at the same time. Again, I felt great. Tomorrow, I’m going to try being honest with… people!
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