Pretentious Asshole

Yo!
Work is destroying me. Between the grading, planning, calling, emailing, and self medicating, I don't have a lot of time these days. Excuse the delay in my second post. I suck.

I'm in this online class right now about teaching media studies. It's a great class because you don't ever have to see those annoying classmates ("that guy" "old nodder" etc.) face to face. I thought this would be just fabulous but then had an encounter this week that made me realize that there is no escaping them. I had a run in with "pretentious asshole."

I go onto my class blog to see who's been commenting on my posts and this dude has written a comment three times as long as the others. I was mildly annoyed right off the bat because the professor told us that we should make "short comments" not "critiques". I'm not afraid to defend my views on things educational, but this guy overstepped his bounds.

He critiqued my thesis on the portrayal of fathers in sitcoms citing all this stuff about it being entertainment and blah blah blah! No shit, asshole. I know it's about entertainment. I think it's shitty entertainment (I'm talking about shows like "Still Standing", "Home Improvement", and "According to Jim"). He claimed that I wouldn't want to watch a show that had 2 rational people on it that didn't pull humor out of stupid conflicts. Those of you that know me know that that's about all I watch...that and "The Daily Show". To quote David Rakoff, "I would drink Jon Stewart's bathwater."

Anyway, I go to this dude's blog to poke around and see what brilliant ideas he must be pawning off on people. Keep in mind that I'm doing this under the assumption that I have horribly offended him by insulting one of his favorite piece of shit shows or something.

At the end of his latest blogpost, he confesses to having not taught yet so he feels out of place in this class. He then goes on to say that he feels he has done "exemplary" work in the course because he has done every assignment to the letter of the directions. He's right, you know. His blogposts read like my 8th graders' essays "Now I will tell you how I analyzed this section of the news..." fucking brilliant. He wraps up this thread with a comment on how he and his chat partner were the only ones that posted some damn thing on week 3 and even suggested we all go look at it to see how awesome he is. Prick. I didn't bother.

I can only assume that this dude got served on the first grading update from the professor and now feels like a jilted lover who has to watch his former flame knock boots with a douche bag. I say this because I was told that I am doing "perfect work" for the course and mine looks absolutely nothing like his. Asshole. I didn't tell him this nor will I. I didn't even respond to his blogpost last night like I was supposed to because all I could think of to type was "you pretentious asshole."

So, for those of you that are thinking of going online with your classes to avoid those bitch ass students we all hate, don't bother. They will still find you and annoy you. The best part of all of this is I have a mental picture of what I think this guy should look like. I must meet him to see if he, in fact, has medium length dark hair, wears short sleeve button downs tucked into his skinny, tapered, faded black slacks, and shitty shoes. I must know.

Do any of you have stories of dumbass classmates? It's one of my favorite topics of discussion!

The First Post and Karma

Well, after a lot of pressure from people I respect, I'm writing a personal blog. I finally decided it might be a good idea after I did one of those "25 Random Facts About Me" things on facebook. I really enjoyed that process. Now, since I rarely feel I have anything worth saying, I downloaded a list of topics to start myself off. Hopefully, I'll think of more interesting things down the line but this will work for now. Also, at this point, the blog is mostly for me to just have an outlet. If nobody reads it, that's fine.

Karma. I'm not sure I seriously believe in it or not, but I often like to think about the times I did something to bring bad karma on myself. Here are a few of the greatest hits:

1. Back during my senior year of high school, I was in a pre-calculus class with a few of my friends. In the spring time, we took a band trip to Seattle for about a week and were all responsible for having our homework completed upon our return. I'm usually pretty good at teaching myself things from a book when needed, so I didn't stress too much about the test we would have to take the day after the Seattle trip came to a close. My good friend, however, was in a completely different state of mind.

He was rather stressed out about the whole thing, so I told him that the issue he was having was actually quite easy and that I would meet him right before class to explain it all. The problem is that I ended up getting to class late because I was down at the school deli buying a bottle of Fruitopia (remember that stuff? It was awesome...better in glass than plastic but superior to all other juices in either form). When I finally got to class, my friend was, understandably, quite upset with me. The best part of the whole thing was when he whispered to get my attention during the test. When I finally turned around to tell him to shut up, he held up a page of his test on which he had drawn a huge question mark. I nearly pissed myself laughing at him. We now refer to this incident as "The Fruitopia Quiz".

2. In my freshman year of high school, a group of my friends made it a habit to prank call this other dude multiple times a day. They would sometimes call the house directly, but they preferred to do things through a third party. A few times they would call numbers on the ad channel and leave messages. It was a pretty brilliant plan because this other dude would get calls from people about limos, boats for sale, etc. and they couldn't trace the prank back to my friends. I guess the guys got a little desperate for instant gratification so they started calling the house via 1-800-COLLECT thinking that the third party would stop a trace. Apparently, they were right...

One afternoon, I, with another friend, made a 1-800-COLLECT call because we wanted to be in on the action. On that fateful day, our call was met with this response, "Good, now that we have you on our phone bill, we can prosecute you." Oh oh!

About a month later, I got a call from the people we had been pranking. I threw loyalty out the window, ratted out all the other guys and got off scott free because I had only done the one call. Friggin' sell-out.

3. Finally, in college I got a little involved with this girl that I knew from band. I was still living in the dorms at the time and our little "romance" didn't develop until finals week of spring semester while at a cabin in Wisconsin with a group of people. We hung out nearly every night during finals week and then I had to head north for the summer since they boot your ass out of the dorms as soon as your last test hits the turn-in pile. The girl and I decided to stay in contact and then pick things up in the fall.

I went home and worked my shitty summer job while acting in a few shows on the side (much cooler than testing concrete strength). During the shows, I met someone else and didn't say anything to the college girl because I thought news such as that would be better delivered in person. The problem is that when you're in your late teens and early twenties, other people just assume that your business is their business. This other meddling bastard outed me before I even had a CHANCE to do it myself. Let's just say that her reaction was anything but peaceful.

I could tell of more, but I think you get the picture. On a positive note, I learned from these experiences...the problem is that they may have been the wrong lessons.

If you come across this, I encourage you to comment with one of your own bad karma stories. They can be pretty fun to read!