Kate of Late

Facing up to the Facebook farce

IF ever you feel sadly alone, you needn’t. A band of strangers that you can call your “Facebook friends” is metaphorically circling outside your window, like starving bats, waiting for you to log on.

I find this incredibly creepy. Dinosaur that I am, I don’t “get” the new phenomenon of “social networking,” which of course is unsociably done online via numerous networks besides Facebook. They include MySpace, LinkedIn, Meebo, and Twitter. Unlike most of them, Twitter.com apparently only allows you to ask your contacts one question: “What are you doing?” One can imagine how fascinating the responses to this must be from Twitter’s primarily 18- to-27-year-old demographic. “Watching TV.” “Eating bacon.” “Cleaning my infected piercing.”

Bring on the Pulitzers.

Some people actually belong to several social networks in a desperate effort not to let a single associate elude their grasp. “Forsooth,” I say unto them, “why don’t thou pick up thy quill and parchment and write a real letter to all thine so-called friends?” I’ll tell them exactly why -- because these chummy correspondents aren’t their friends. They’re just strangers they haven’t learned to avoid yet.

If you don’t know what Facebook is, I can explain, because my husband, Stanley, just ran me through his own Facebook profile. Essentially, the profile is a boasty thing you write about yourself online, posting an interesting or ridiculously flattering picture of you beside it. You say whether you are married, what your politics are (if any), what your favourite books are (if any; I have my doubts that most people on Facebook have time to read anything but Facebook drivel); what recent movies you’ve liked; and other meaningless Playmate-of-the-Month-type information. If you wish, you can insert updates about your life as often as you want, i.e. “Stanley has just washed his hands in anticipation of barbecued ribs for lunch.”

I’m not kidding you: this is the kind of thing people routinely post. “Kate is rummaging though old plastic bags because she’s going to take her dog for a walk” is what I would write if I were on Facebook. Anything more scintillating would simply be untrue.

Once you’ve forged a profile for yourself on the network, you send an announcement to everyone you want to get Facebook time with, asking if they’d like to be your Facebook friend. They can choose to ignore you (“Faceslamming”), leaving you out in the cold, or admit you into their hallowed hall with the other 2,000 people they want to alert to their pedestrian lunch plans and imminent mole extractions. Be warned: it’s a touchy situation to take someone off your list once they’re on -- it’s like shutting your door in the face of a would-be visitor.

Stanley made the mistake of sending an invitation to be his Facebook friend to every entry in his enormous online address file, which is like sending a request to everybody in your high school yearbook to send you their grocery lists. Vacation photos, for instance, are high on the list of Facebook fun-to-sends -- you know how insanely boring they can be. It may be vaguely interesting to see the holiday pics of your 10 best buds and a handful of your closest blood relations. But Stanley gets alerted to, for instance, the latest photo posts from obscure people he once gave a speech to in Australia, or his favourite fishmonger.

I’m sorry -- these people are not our friends. A friend is somebody who wouldn’t dream of missing your funeral. One could even choose one’s friends on the basis of how useful they could be at that event -- so-and-so makes terrific sandwiches; what’s-her-name can sing like an angel; artsy you-know-who could make the urn; and like that.

At the same time as Stanley doesn’t have time to regularly contact numerous longtime pals or far-flung relatives and ask how they’re doing (admittedly, nor do I), he’s apparently sharing images of our summer hijinks with the guy who cleaned our carpets. Another dear friend, who claims he never responds to my e-mails because he’s intimidated that I’m a writer, now posts things on Facebook for all the world to see. I’m tempted to join just to publicly mock him for it, but I suppose that would prove his point.

Now, I have nothing against online communications. On the contrary, on an average day, I probably e-mail a handful of my nearest and dearest 40 to 50 times, whether they like it or not. True, these brief missives tend to be notes and jokes, not memorable masterpieces. But I value e-mail highly because, without dropping everything I’m doing to pick up the phone, I can get an update from a friend whose parent is ailing, exchange banter and make plans with another, exchange a few pithy insults with Stanley, find out what my sister’s daughters have been up to, get something funny from my mother, and hear about another friend’s new job.

This, to me, is worthwhile. I’m keeping up with the people I care about and letting them know I’m thinking of them. It’s completely different from posting announcements about my every belch on Facebook, as if anybody has the time or inclination to pay attention. If I knew even a solitary person who was interested in the minutiae of my day, he or she would sink irredeemably in my estimation.

But Stanley says it’s not like that. He doesn’t have to look at Bruce from Australia’s “My Afternoon at Bondi Beach” slide show, unless he wants to, which he doesn’t. I then ask him why the Aussie, if he’s got any brains, would want to see us cavorting in Malibu? Isn’t it boring enough having the “How was your day” exchange with your spouse and kids, without the potential yawner of having it with hundreds of acquaintances?

As a stranger called Steve Rubel recently wrote in a blog called Micro Persuasion, social networking is redefining friendship, focusing it on quantity and not quality. He knows people who boast about how many Facebook friends they have.

To me, that’s pitiful. These are not your friends, they’re your cling-ons. Except for your handful of intimates, who may also be on Facebook, these people are like lint to your sweater, and vice versa.

No doubt they are perfectly nice, as are you. But would you and this person consider cutting your palms and becoming blood brothers? If not, I’d Faceslam them.

But then, I can count my “social network” on my fingers and toes. Poor, poor, pitiful me.

Let me be more vague about that

EUPHEMISMS were meant to be a polite way of saying something unpalatable, but they’ve evolved into verbal burkas. In fact, maybe we should call them verkas.

The term had religious origins, characterizing words that were used in place of those considered too sacred to say aloud. The Hebrews, for instance, were not supposed to refer to their God as “Yahweh,” but instead use the expression HaShem, which meant “The Name.” To “eupheme” was the opposite of to “blaspheme.”

Another red-button topic, perfect for euphemization, was sex. There was no overt shtupping in the Bible -- women and men “lay” together or “knew” each other and -- surprise! -- out popped the squalling fruit of their loins.

Thousands of years later, a woman who had been “lain with” on a fairly regular basis tended to find herself “in the family way” or “expecting.” That made her sound benign and delicate, rather than lusty and increasingly elephantine.

Of course, some of what was once thought best avoided in “polite company” has changed over the years, and that may, in part, be due to euphemisms. In the past, for instance, disabled people were sometimes shunned by society, but as they banded together into a community, they made themselves heard about how they wanted to be treated.

As a result of that united effort, the astonishing feats of role models, and the changed language surrounding people with disabilities, our common view of them has been transformed. A character like A Christmas Carol’s Tiny Tim would once have been known as “lame” or “crippled.” He progressed to being thought of as “handicapped,” then “disabled,” and now (depending on the progressiveness of the speaker) as “differently abled.” Depicted as a doomed weakling in Dickens’ classic, Tiny Tim would probably play the hero in a modern version of the story.

Such shifts in popular perception are clearly positive. But often we use euphemisms to placate people who don’t actually need our help. This is apparent in the working world, where titles have notoriously evolved to confer false status on relatively humble jobs. Hence, “Canine Relocation Specialist,” for dog-catcher, and “Vision Clearance Engineer,” for dude who washes your windows. I’m thinking of getting business cards printed for myself, claiming to be “Wastrel-in-chief.” (Mind you, I guess that’s not really a euphemism, it’s just the truth.)

Needless to say, politicians and bureaucrats are the worst for fudging or sugar-coating the truth. Meaningless terms like “a coalition of the willing” have paved the way for “engagement” (killing an enemy combatant) and “extraordinary rendition,” otherwise known as sending terrorism suspects for interrogation to countries with records of prisoner abuse. (Until lately, I would have thought “extraordinary rendition” meant trying to extract fat from low-cal bacon.)

In Canada, similarly obfuscating bureaucratese emerged last week when a Quebec coroner investigating 16 deaths blamed on outbreaks of the bacterial infection C. dificile tactfully urged a “culture of prevention” in Quebec’s health care system. If you found that puzzling, here’s a translation: “Hey, doofuses, try cleaning the hospitals!”

The corporate world is on par, though. As you know, it has a long tradition of butt-covering -- “Sorry, you’ve been made redundant” sounds so much less lawsuit-worthy than “You’re fired.” Often, though, its euphemisms are not intended to mask what’s really going on but are just a pointless way of making something simple sound stupidly complex.

My husband, Stanley, works in corporate communications. A female client recently informed him that an idea he’d proposed would have to be “socialized” with her colleagues. In the olden days, we called that “talking about” something. I guess intelligible chats have gone out of style.

Some of our most heavily veiled language, however, revolves around the big D. According to Wikipedia, that’s because it was once thought that saying the word “death” would bring it on. It’s odd that we’re so skittish about mentioning one of the few things that we, as humans, inevitably have in common. Those who are deathly ill are blurrily summed up as “fading fast,” “on the way out” or, still more prosaically, “circling the drain.”

Even people who believe in heaven don’t like to frankly acknowlege the end of a human life. They’d rather swing their eyes suggestively to the ceiling and murmur, “He’s gone to a better place.” It’s too bad they choose that shopworn image, since some of the alternatives are so poetic -- “shuffled off this mortal coil” comes from Hamlet and has a rather nice ring to it.

Naturally, funeral directors (a.k.a. “grief therapists”) have their own unctuous lingo. Most of us, cringing in the face of death, readily adopt it. A person has not “died,” but has “passed away.” We’ve “lost” them. They are now our “dearly departed,” no longer that sour old battleaxe we loathed. (On the other hand, I’ve just learned, a less reverent mourner may joke of the deceased that she’s “assumed room temperature.”)

If the mortician switched careers and became a Raymond Chandler-style private detective he could never get away with referring to the “loved one” exhibiting rigor mortis on the velvet divan. Instead, he’d have to get used to calling it a “stiff.”

Chandler had a spectacularly cynical way of referring to corpses. I read The Long Goodbye last summer and was amused to see several characters use the phrase “he got dead” to explain another’s fate. Maybe Chandler thought “he died” sounded too namby-pamby, and “he croaked” would give frogs an inflated sense of self-importance.

But then, Chandler was a master. (Read him yourself and marvel.) Unlike your humble correspondent, he probably never got his inspiration from the hopelessly mundane. The topic of euphemisms came to me, for example, when I paused in a local mall to admire a quilt that was on display. Beside it was a tag that read, to my wonderment, “Sanctuary throw.”

I knew what they meant by this label -- I’d recently stayed at an inn where my room had a cosy armchair positioned by the fireplace, invitingly draped with a wooly throw. It was a sanctuary; that was a sanctuary throw.

But when I tried to picture my own bedroom, its drab carpet clotted with dog hair and the battered plastic laundry baskets scattered around in it, I couldn’t see a “sanctuary throw” fitting in.

What a shame. A quilt, I could have used. 

Here’s to the joys of June and beyond

IT’S Celibacy Awareness Month.

Now, this appears to be redundant. It seems to me that if you’re celibate, you tend to be aware of it — often, painfully so. And if you’re not celibate, who cares? You’re hardly going to observe a moment of abstinence out of respect to less bootylicious strangers.

But let’s face it. It’s hardly a coincidence that it’s also U.S. National Accordion Month. I think the link is obvious. You’re celibate, so you spend your time playing the accordion. Because you keep playing the accordion, you will always be celibate.

I urge you, break the chain now! Take up a cool instrument, and I don’t mean the zither. If there is a National Zither Month, it likely overlaps Zit Zapping Week. That’s the way these things go. And sadly, once again the two will probably obliterate International Zimmerman’s Day, with its curious lack of focus, purpose or celebration. (I really must do something about that.)

It’s also a perfectly logical state of affairs that both National Celibacy Awareness Month and National Accordion Month occur at the same time as Potty Training Awareness Month; it’s certainly not mere chance. Here’s how I picture it all going down: Auntie, a childless calendar manufacturer, goes over to her sister’s house May 30, witnesses the fragrant disasters that attend potty training, and vows to become celibate, or take up the accordion, thereby keeping future impregnators away. You do the math.

Of course, Auntie’s calendar-concocting decisions must also include things like “hurricane season,” which descends around now on “the Atlantic and Central Pacific Regions,” wherever they are. Obviously, the concept of setting aside a chunk of the year for terrible, life-altering storms is a big scam perpetrated by God, the Weather Network, or whoever is to blame for hurricanes. Hurricane season is a big mess of hot wind, rain, and nastiness, which, it so happens, is also how people might describe Auntie. No wonder she’s not finding celibacy much of a challenge.

June really sounds like a disaster in the making, doesn’t it? You got yer celibates, yer accordion-players, yer toddlers leery of potties, and then you throw in yer hurricanes. I picture June, generally, as something like the Wizard of Oz, minus the excellent soundtrack but plus a lot of polkas; missing the Tin Man, the Cowardly Lion and the Scarecrow yet well-equipped with Munchkin-like incontinent pre-schoolers; but including the hurricane, or the tornado, or the duster — whatever it was that Dorothy Gale used to weasel out of her chores at Auntie Em’s farm.

As if those weren’t enough June-related bummers, you throw in Vancouver’s lousy weather. I’ve been complaining about it all week, only to be reminded in the newspaper that it’s perfectly normal this month for the city to be overcast 98 percent of the time, and that we can’t expect anything better until mid-July. Of course, I’ve planned my holiday then, have lured various relatives here from across the country and over the pond to share it, and it’s suddenly occurred to me that actually, it’s August when the weather finally gets half-decent. That mid-July “better weather” ruse is only there to placate the celibates, who are understandably cranky every June.

I’d actually like a new job, much like the mythical Auntie’s — being in charge of saying which “official” month or week it is. Some outfit puts out a publication called Chase’s Calendar of Events to tell us all what’s legitimately what and when. I was going to buy it until I realized it was over $50 and clearly intended for those on expense accounts, folks who write things like the Social Studies column in the Globe and Mail. Still, imagine paying 50 bucks just to be sure of when National Accordion Month falls.

I could also get Chase’s 2008 calendar through some mysterious online thing called Kindle. In that electronic format, with no book to leaf through and nothing to fondle, I figure Kindle should be coaxing me awake every morning with a virtual French kiss, a steaming bowl of latte at my bedroom door, and numerous announcements delivered in the honeyed tones of a BBC news reader, along the lines of “TGIF! It’s National Garbageperson’s Day, International Cigar-maker’s Week, and Local Artisanal Soap Hour. Plus, on this day in history, America Ferrera, star of TV’s Ugly Betty, was born.”

Since I don’t currently own Chase’s Calendar of Events, I see no reason to adhere to the facts. I’m going to come up with my own celebratory dates for the foreseeable future. Here are some things that I feel deserve their own special days or months between now and next summer: varicose veins (nobody likes them, which is sad, ergo they deserve a day); brownies; re-runs of favourite sit-coms; thank-you notes; Colin Firth; Doris Day (should there not be a Doris Day Day? Duh!); limes; rhododendrons; Extras’ Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant; barbecue; tomatoes; farmers’ markets; dogs (every day is cats’ day); wine stores; and ethnic food fair merchants awareness.

Think about that last item. What if all the food fair merchants in the land served only bland indigenous Canadian food, such as grilled cheese sandwiches and butter tarts — no Vietnamese, Greek, Italian, Indian, Chinese, Korean, Malaysian, Thai or Japanese? That’s what I’m sayin’! These pro-“flava” entrepreneurs ought to be worshipped for an entire week a year, with the relevant dancers enlisted to perform enchanting good luck rituals outside their stalls.

I know there are groups and individuals with their own agendas, who won’t want to step aside for Doris Day Day; they’ll insist that Brunette Instant or Tofu Year should take precedence. But as far as I’m concerned, my days, weeks and months should be able to align peacefully with theirs.

It’s a free planet, right? If irritable celibates, persistent accordionists, dribbling toddlers and furious hurricanes can get along, surely Saxophonist Saturday can share some of its glory with Foxy Firth Fortnight.

After all, this is Special Day, Week, Month and Year Coexistence Decade. And nobody’s threatening to do away with Father’s Day, June 15.

First up for job-seekers: Buy a dictionary

I don’t know about you, but I’ve shot myself in the foot so many times over the course of my so-called career that it’s amazing I still have to buy my shoes in pairs.

Generally it has been a matter of not pursuing options rather than screwing things up. Still, when I learn about other people’s bad career moves I can always sympathize. There’s a reason the TV series Extras (Tuesdays, the Comedy Network) strikes such a chord, with the hapless Ricky Gervais as an awkward actor cursed with movie star aspirations and Joe Btflsplk luck. There but for the grace of God go the rest of us not-so-smooth operators.

Even so, most of us have not made the following gaffes. We haven’t entered an office for a job interview sniffing our armpits. We’ve never demanded that the person interviewing us leave his own office so we can take an “important” phone call. I learned about these two workplace faux pas from The Globe and Mail.

People in the process of trying to get a job seem to be amazingly hare-brained. A new website called Nothired.com provides glimpses of (nameless) real folks whose search for employment may never end. Nothired.com was the brainchild of a self-described group of “HR monkeys and hiring managers” who found themselves trading war stories about terrible candidates, ridiculous resumes, hopeless cover letters, and nutty Craigslist postings. The website states that it’s “Dedicated to all those who wonder why they were never called for an interview … Now you know.”

Among the not-hireds is the fellow who applied to be a web producer for the British Broadcasting Corporation. Nothired.com doesn’t provide his application — it doesn’t need to. It merely has to print his rejection letter from the BBC, which says, in part: “We heard about your previous internet projects and, quite frankly, you scare us. You may also like to note that calling our head of human resources a ‘skank ho’ does not gain you any plus points when being shortlisted for a position.”

Other things not to say when applying for a job are revealed in the following stream-of-consciousness sample (hint to job-seekers: try editing your consciousness). “I could do all sorts of things to be honest i could probably do your job with enough time and i could probably do it better, we can both be honest here and say that you know its true. I know my way around a computer and surprise i can do work while dicking around on the internet and talking to my girlfriend on the phone….”

I know exactly how I’d respond to that one, if I were the recruiter. “Dear Sir, Thank you for your application. We are sorry but the position of Major-General for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan has been filled.”

Most potential employers would fail to be impressed by the following handful of cover letters, as featured on Nothired.com. One note begins, “To Whom it May Concern: I am looking for a new job because I just realized that everyone around this place sucks.”

“I took this job so I could have personal time to consider how to move forward in my career,” writes a different worker, who has obviously been treading water a little. “After 17 years here, I’m really ready to start my career.”

“If you want an employee who can work slowly toward a goal, then we should talk as soon as possible,” writes another, probably with a quill pen.

More disturbing generally are those who resort to advertising themselves for hire on the online job board at Craigslist. I speak, of course, of the lady (I picture a dead ringer for Lizzie Borden) who headlines her plea, “Do You Want An Axcellent Nanny?”

Under the rhetorical question “Tired of Hiring Clowns For Your Kids, Parties?” free-form punctuator “Dr. Teaball” boasts that his character “can entertain kids 6 to adult with all sorts of exotic tea samples, interesting stories and show and tell about herbs.” Few could blame Nothired.com for filing this under the heading “Worst. Birthday. Ever.”

A word to the not-so-wise: Capitalization, punctuation and spelling errors loom extremely large on Nothired.com. “why don’t I have a job?? maybe you tell me?” explodes one alleged future Employee of the Month. “I am great with everyone xcept people who think they know everything and wont hold there horses. give me a brake!!!!”

Meanwhile, karma points were probably not awarded to the candidate who noted, “I have volunteered for organizations such as March of Dims.” And ambitious dreams were likely stymied for the person who wrote that ultimately, “I am planning to become a penile corrections officer.”

Of course, there are many reasons—other than sloppiness, arrogance, incompetence, or weirdness—that a person might remain unemployed for an extended period. Under the headline “Maybe Check Where You Last Saw It,” Nothired.com excerpts a cover letter that reads: “High Graduate Looking for Office Work.”

One illustrator keen to increase his (or her) client base refers prospective clients to the myspace page where he’s posted his samples. The scene of a cartoon mushroom, cap covered in peace symbols, smoking a joint under a wasted-looking, pot-inhaling sun may reveal a tad too much about the artist’s daily routine.

Still, I’d guess there are reasonably satisfying positions out there for all of the above applicants, as long as they steer clear of conservative white collar professions. Equivalent options may not exist for this final contender.

“I can keep my mouth shut if needed and dont mind most jobs with legitimacy issues but there are certain requests i may not be able to fulfill," he writes. "i.e. Dont ask me to kill sombody.”

I had no idea Brian Mulroney was out of work.

Incompetence for sale, ‘strategy’ extra

WHO can resist the latest buzz-phrase, “strategic incompetence”?

I caught wind of it the other day on CBC Radio One’s The Current, only to find the term was coined on Seinfeld and has been all over the Internet since.

It figures that I’d incompetently suppose the phrase was new. And, naturally, I managed to listen to The Current’s teaser but missed the actual segment, and later, couldn’t figure out how to download it to listen. Incompetent, yes; strategic, not so much.

Still, I was delighted at the suggestion that incompetence could be thought of as a sly move to avoid unwelcome responsibilities — not just a sign of coordination issues or stupidity, or both. Those of us who really can’t replace the toner cartridge in a printer or turn on the DVD player by remote control would dearly love to be thought of as “shrewd.” Please, don’t stop there. Why not up the ante and call us “Machiavellian”?

It so happens that we’re not strategically incompetent — we’re innately incompetent. If somebody wants to ascribe to us the treacherous conniving of Lady Macbeth just because we claim we can’t change a tire, bring it on!

Personally, I’m flattered. Like many people, however, one of my strategic incompetencies is strategic thinking itself. I’ve never had a strategy in my life, which may be why my career trajectory resembles that of a particularly dependable anchor on its way to a muddy bottom. I’m neither a “big picture” person nor a “small picture” person, strategy-wise – for me and my kind, the screen is simply blank. In addition, the sound is iffy.

It’s not like my fellow non-strategic incompetents and I are proud of this. We all know that in these days of self-actualization, everybody is supposed to exhibit skill in all areas. For women, it’s not enough that we keep a clean and tastefully decorated house — we must also be able to run a 10-minute mile. It’s not sufficient that we have a hit TV show (Oprah, I’m talking to you); we must also run a magazine and a network, keep off that last 50 lbs. of excess fat, and save Africa. And woe is us if we don’t have a visible boyfriend or husband, because that might suggest we haven’t aced everything in the known universe, including intimate relationships.

Similar demands, of course, are made of men. Barack Obama, a so-far astonishing individual, a man who grew up in a fatherless home and got into trouble before completely turning his life around, at a young age stands a half-decent chance of becoming the first black president of the United States. He gets criticized, however, for the fact that he still smokes. OMG, he’s not perfect in every way — you know, like all the other U.S. presidents.

Super-achieving is now what’s expected. I have a few friends who are over-the-top in this area: the high-powered bank executive who, at 40-odd, won the Canadian Triathlon Competition in her age category; the athletic corporate manager who’s also a pilot; the guy who manages a successful small business, plays in a band, and, just for fun, runs to Whistler.

You read about these people in the paper all the time — real folks who out-Martha Martha. I, for one, am sick of hearing about the innumerable things that artist, writer and local-boy-made-god Douglas Coupland does beautifully without even cracking a sweat. At least Pablo Picasso had the good grace to spectacularly screw up his romances. That was a kinder era, however. Today, jerks, slobs and nincompoops are simply out of style.

Over the next few years, we’ll be reading even more about talented, ambitious Canadians as the media’s focus shifts from budget and infrastructure issues to the performing arenas of Vancouver's 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. To these paragons of excellence I say, "Good on ya, my insanely industrious brethren and thithterth" (what is the female equivalent of brethren?).

But some of us just don’t work that way — or, in fact, most ways. And it’s not like we planned not to know how to do anything. True to form, that’s just how we turned out.

We can probably blame it on Adam and Eve. Ordered by God not to eat the forbidden fruit, Eve was offered an apple and, I suggest “absent-mindedly,” took a bite. Then she offered it to the only other human in sight.

Was this the birth of hospitality? Or “strategic incompetence”? I’d say “You be the judge,” but God took that role on Himself. The world’s first couple lost their innocence, covered up, and now we all have to worry about fashion. Hey, I’m sure Eve was good at other stuff, like remembering Adam’s birthday.

Speaking of lost naiveté, I’ve certainly had my suspicions about the innocence of the apparently inept people in my own sphere. The tasks I ask to be done around my house by members of my family are often performed in such a half-baked fashion that it’s obvious they hope that next time, I’ll do it myself. This ruse usually works — it’s strategic incompetence at its finest. When I see that my children’s and husband’s efforts will be no better than my own, and will take 10 times longer to achieve, I’ll pitch in. Then, when the front door-knob once again falls off, they can’t express outrage. I just tape it back on and we’re off to the races, as long as we can get out of the house.

So I suppose it’s possible that strategic incompetence is more prevalent than I thought. While some of us females are highly suspicious of men who say they “can’t” cook and “don’t know how” to do laundry, the long list of things we “can’t” do could certainly be shortened if we were to take even the slightest interest in them.

Why would we, though? There are so many things we really couldn’t do, even if we tried — sorry, tireless life coaches, but it’s true — that we wouldn’t be fooling anybody.

At the very least, the current system lets the people around the incompetents — those sighing, eyeball-rolling eager beavers who are forever changing the toilet rolls and reversing climate change — feel superior.

Making others see they’re needed: isn’t that what life’s all about?

You need an Xmas makeover, Charlie Brown

“GOOD morning, ladies, gentlemen and fellow movie product placement specialists. I’m Moe Rothbart. I’ve asked you here to our headquarters today to hear our pitch of pitches.

“It’s almost Christmas 2007, already, so what better time to tell you about the exciting project we’re working on for Holiday 2008 release? Have an eggnog latte, a bagel, and siddown. Those of you from out of town, welcome to Hollywood, enjoy your stay, and don’t let Phil Spector shoot you on your way out.

“As you know, this is the time of year where traditions are paramount. Or Dreamworks, if you catch my drift! Every December, people like nothing better than what they’ve had in years previous, only more so. You know -- a turkey, but bigger, from a more famous butcher. A stocking, but spilling over with bling. And like that.

“They watch the same shows, read the same poems, sing the same songs, wear the same Rudolph earrings with the blinking red noses. In theory, there’s nothing wrong with that. But we figure Santa needs a brand new bag -- preferably a bag you people will be selling.

“We’ve all seen Dr. Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas turned into a magnificent Jim Carrey picture and a boost in sales for the book, the toilet seats, the what-have-yous. Every time The Miracle on 34th Street gets re-broadcast, Macy’s makes an extra 20 million dollars. We’ve also had the nativity story re-told ad nauseam (no offence), on small screen and big. Sales of frankincense always go through the roof.

“At the same time, there’s one Christmas ‘masterpiece’ that’s not just looking a little hoar-frosty, but frozen solid. It’s like an ancient mammoth. It’s got no remakes, no tie-ins. Nada.

“And it’s 42 years old, for cripe’s sake! I watched it as a kid; my dad, may he rest in peace, watched it as a kid. I speak, of course, of A Charlie Brown Christmas, the cartoon by Charles Schulz about the hapless bald-headed kid Charlie Brown, his bossy neighbour Lucy, and the rest of them, trying to get themselves a half-decent tree.

“Now, this is a project worth updating. Since everybody’s seen the original, they’ll all buy tickets to our upcoming live-action feature -- which we’ve named, ta-da! -- Chuck B.: The Xmas Files.

“And why else will they come? Because of the tremendous cast we’ve got lined up, and the tremendous opportunities for placements and cross-promotions, with you, our tremendous potential advertisers.

“You’ll be glad to know that this is an entirely new product. I ask you, who wants to see a bunch of pint-sized shmendricks griping about their lives any more? Who relates to that? What, these kids have problems? They’re, like, eight years old! How bad can it be? ‘Oh, I always choose crappy Christmas trees’ -- wah-wah, boo-hoo. Know this -- in Chuck B.: The Xmas Files, there’ll be no character with a security blanket on his head, lisping, ‘And lo, the angel of whatever, yada yada.’

“We’re gonna humanize this story, make it really mean something.

“First of all, Chuck B.: The Xmas Files is set in Manhattan, the Christmas after 9/11. Chuck is 25, single, he works at a Kinko’s (are you listening, Kinko’s folks?). He’s lonely because the skateboard shop he used to go to every day got demolished in the World Trade Centre attacks. So he’s got nothing to do but wander the city feeling sorry for himself. He’s scruffy, he’s depressed – and we’ve secured Jon Heder of Napoleon Dynamite to play him!

“Anyway, as Chuck B. drifts around, who should he come across but a homeless beagle, which he decides to adopt and call Snoopy (after Snoop Dogg, natch). As he picks up the beagle, which, incidentally, can talk and has the wit, wisdom and voice of Martin Lawrence, a big, bosomy hooker comes rushing up to him, claiming the dog is hers. The dog shrinks away, but this woman, Lucy Van Pelt, played by none other than Queen Latifah, won’t leave Chuck B. alone.

“She follows him all the way to his apartment, berating him about what a loser he is, how the dog will be back on the streets, guaranteed. Chuck B. slams the door on her and brings the beagle in to his demented looker of a sister, Sally -- Nicole Richie -- who’s thrilled. You’ll get a tear, trust me. By the way, the sister’s issues later get resolved with Paxil. See me later about that, Paxil rep.

“Next, Lucy’s brother comes looking for this dog, which Lucy has convinced him is hers. Lion-Us, as he calls himself, is this skinny guy with dredlocks but a heart of diamond-studded white gold -- my friend from De Beers, that’s why I invited you here today. He’s played by Adam Brody of The O.C. He’s a little nutty, goes around in kilts, playing the bagpipes, although he’s not Scottish but a semi-orthodox Jew. He soon sees that Chuck B. is the right guy to take care of this dog, so he wanders off, playing "Mull of Kintyre" in a minor key that makes it sound like klezmer. This soundtrack blows Vince Guaraldi right out of the water, I’m not kidding you.

“Schroeder makes an appearance soon afterward. Played by Kevin Federline, he’s half-pimp, half-nemesis to Lucy, but everybody knows the turkey submarine sandwiches he makes and sells part-time are to die for. ‘Maybe these are the true meaning of Christmas!’ says Lion-Us, a quip that will probably make it into the picture’s trailer. Quiznos, by the way, is already extremely interested in Chuck B.

“To make a long story short, these characters, except Lucy, decide to get together to put on a fund-raiser to pay for Chuck B.’s sister’s Paxil prescription. Chuck B. is in charge of decorating the hall; the tree’s passable, but he can’t find any ornaments. So Schroeder strings up a bunch of his subs, which Snoopy eats, toppling the tree. Chuck B. can’t believe he’s got a glutton for a dog and starts sulking.

“Lion-Us suddenly takes the stage, and the spotlight hits him. Clutching his bagpipes, he explains that after 9/11, people (and dogs) are greedy because they want to prove to themselves that they’re still alive. He raises the pipes to his lips to sadly bleat "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" as Lucy, who’s been shivering outside, barges through the door and joins in. It turns out she has a stupendous voice, and the whole cast follows her outside to croon carols as snowflakes tumble down on their heads.

“An indisputable classic, am I right? Step right up and be a part of the magic.”

Ach, we're a miserable lot

COLD weather surely brings out the peevish.

More accurately, it seems to drive the peevish inside, to their computers, because when you Google “Pet Peeves” this month you will find countless websites featuring people so fantastically irritated they’ve been driven to record their personal gripes for the entire world to see.

It’s actually an amusing pastime, checking out other people’s petty complaints. It makes a crotchety geezer like myself feel almost, I don’t know -- chirpy.

Some people don’t quite get the concept. They’ll list “peeves” such as “cruelty to animals.” Cruelty to animals is not a peeve -- it’s illegal, immoral, and should make you well beyond cranky. It should make you a squealer. Likewise, war in the Middle East. That cannot be characterized as a peeve, it can only be called a calamity and an outrage.

A “peeve,” then, is subjective and often irrational. Certainly, it’s something that provokes a reaction far too extreme for the alleged transgression it embodies. A pet peeve is an action, belief or phrase that for the person in question always produces an overwhelming feeling of revulsion.

For example, on one peeves website a ticked-off woman said she hated “hypocrits” (sic) so much she wished “they would all just die. I swear more than half the people I know are like that.” I’m not sure what constituted hypocrisy for this particular contributor -- all I can say is she’s obviously the one to hire when you need to clear out a party.

At www.lacarte.org/tracie/peeves, you’ll find another charmer. Tracie, whom I assume to be female, hates, among an alarming number of other things:
° “Essays that begin in this way: ‘According to Webster…’;”
° “Explanations beginning with the word ‘Again’;” and
° “Shouting ‘drop it’ the moment a conversation veers into an unwanted direction.”

Somehow, when I read that last entry I pictured a lot of doomed dinner parties where Tracie -- again -- launched into her list of pet peeves and her husband started shouting admonitions.

I get the sense that Tracie is easily vexed. The fact that she is annoyed by both “Pants with waistband buttons pointed inward” and “Sneezing or coughing while driving with a weak bladder” doesn’t paint an inviting portrait. Still, who could argue with her objection to “Giving or getting lethal tools or weapons as gifts, especially for weddings, anniversaries”? I’d say anyone giving Tracie a lethal weapon for any reason is pretty much asking for it.

Over at www.peevepile.com, a contributor called Meido (1) has a more urgent complaint, with which many herbivores can doubtless sympathize: “Pescetarians who insist on labeling themselves vegetarians. Thank you for all the fish and seafoods in ‘vegetarian’ restaurant dishes.”

Evany at peevepile.com, however, perplexes the reader somewhat with the cryptic grievance “Pregnancy Misunderstandings.” Since a female either is or isn’t pregnant, there is only one misunderstanding possible on any given occasion. One can only speculate that Evany means the misunderstanding that arises when someone congratulates a woman who appears to have “a bun in the oven,” when her swollen abdomen is simply the result of eating too many buns. Of course, Evany is readily disturbed: she/he also objects to people honking “Shave and a Haircut” in tunnels.

You see what I mean now? Your obsession with how the toilet paper roll hangs in your bathroom is, by contrast with some of these loonies, perfectly sensible. Likewise, you can now regard as small potatoes your assault charge for wrenching a well-used toothpick out of a stranger’s mouth at the Chinese buffet and stabbing him in the eye. Even your persecution of an Iranian restaurateur because you didn’t like the smell of his cuisine wafting into your apartment seems thoughtful and fair compared to people who paw the dirt over those who blast car-horn cliches whenever they come face to face with a tunnel.

After being exposed to the peeves of these crackpots, I’m at peace with myself. I am now comfortable with my loathing for the phrase “chopped salad.” I don’t know why I find it so distasteful. All the term signifies is a dish where somebody chopped up the lettuce leaves, rather than tearing them as one usually does. But when I read the phrase “chopped salad,” I might as well be seeing a vivid, close-up photograph of a chopped cadaver. You “chop” a head off, if you’re Henry VIII; you climb into a “chopper” if you are at war; you chop down a tree that is dying and therefore threatens to crash onto your house. “Chop” is a short, sharp, brutal word, and it is my fervent belief that it has no place in the salad-maker’s lexicon.

My friend Peggy has a list of words she cannot stand. I have to agree with her on “headcheese,” a revolting description of a gelatinous dish that my husband Stanley assures me is very good indeed. To me, it sounds about as delicious as “toe-jam.” Once you’ve swallowed the headcheese concept, can a plate of headcheese and toe-jam with a bellybutton lint garnish be far behind?

Other words Peggy hates are “moist,” “chafe,” and “ointment.” I have a feeling that Peggy, now petite and slim, was once a chubby child whose thighs rubbed together. But she refuses to elaborate. She’ll only add that she can’t stand being asked if a host “fed” her, because it makes her feel like a pig who’s been given slops.

Most of my peeves have to do with being a word nerd. I don’t have the grasp on grammatical regulations displayed by Lynne Truss, the author of the funny British bestseller Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, but certain common terms will probably drive me to commit a bloody murder one day.

Redundancies like “The reason is because,” “the reason why,” and “the reason why is because” make me immoderately nuts. Like many people in my trade -- but nowhere near enough of them -- I also abhor “verbing,” the practice of turning nouns into verbs. Anyone using the words “impacting” or “tantrumming” in my presence is guaranteed to incite an episode of impactful tantrumming.

All this stuff is lazy and sloppy and ought to be excised. Like a crazed codger, I blame the problem on too much MuchMusic and Internet and not enough book-learnin.’

But let’s not call it being peevish -- let’s call it being “sensitive.” Who could possibly begrudge a sensitive artiste her peccadilloes?

Oh -- I’ll bet there’s somebody out there in Peeve Land who could.