Battlecry of the Supermarket

Hey Buddy, you have eleven items on the check out belt. Can't you read? It says clearly... very clearly... ten items or less.

Yes, can you count? Do you see that I have a pair of chicken legs. That has got to count as one. One chicken. One. Got it. One.

No way, Buddy. An item is an item. And my meter is running. You want to pick up your stuff or you want to see what this fist feels like on your fat face.

Hey, the manager saw what I had in my cart and told me to get in this line. He obviously knows that chickens have two legs.

Just like people are supposed to have one brain? Maybe the manager needs to go back to school as well.

Oh, here he comes now.

What's up boys?

Didn't you tell me to get in this line?

Why yes, I did.

Hey, Mr. Boss, can't you count? He has eleven items. What are rules for? What are laws for? Why did I fight in your damn blasted war? Why do I carry this piece?

Men are clueless...

Some men are clueless.

He told me that I'd be so excited.

Why?

He said that he was worried, when he got an occlusal (not ocular!) guard to prevent grinding his teeth at night, he wouldn't be able to talk to me when I'm trying to fall asleep.

Oh... I'm so glad you'll be able to wake me up over and over again, like a Chinese torture, but worse.

Does your guy talk and talk at night? Where do they get that energy?

It isn't energy. It is left-over small anti-brain production. You are lucky that you don't get it all day long.

Paralysis by Analysis

The NYTimes had an article about Andrew Cuomo this am where he was accused of "paralysis by analysis." Milton Friedman said at one time that we don't make better decisions after about ten minutes of deliberation. My dad said "you can't move too slowly." A week later, when I told him that I shared that with my students and they were having trouble understanding it, he said, "I never heard anything so stupid."

So we are back to the Buddhist skepticism about "views" as something that takes us away from experiences. We used to call that "prejudice." If I think I don't like Jackson Pollock's paintings, and I happen on one that I've never seen... will I be open to it? No, of course not.

The worst thing about analysis (especially the kind that goes on and on) is that we never become comfortable with our decisions. We have thought so much about the possible negative consequences of our proposed actions that we can't ever be 100% sure it was the right path.

Someone figured out that our unconscious makes decisions about 1/10th of a second before our conscious mind is aware of that decision. Then we conjure up an argument to defend our heart.

One of the aspects I like about improv theater is that there isn't time to procrastinate. One has to respond now. Right now. Imagine if Mr. Cuomo did that.

A very strange posting.

A very strange posting. I feel like I came in on the middle of the movie.

I'm not sure there is anything else but the middle of the movie. We only walk into conversations, events, experiences. We don't do much else.

We sit on a couch, talk to a person. Both are others.

I'm not sure that there is always a big difference between ourselves and others, though couches can be more comfortable if you are looking for a place to sit down.

And they are always there for you.

Yes, and they never contradict you... or say that they are clueless about what you are getting at.

So you'd like to be hitched to a couch?

Sometimes, until I try to get it to move.

Turn off the Fan

"In reality all of our problems are nothing more than a failure to accept things as they are."

So why change things? Why don't we just accept the shit hitting the fan?

Because we can turn off the fan?

Guess so.

Bodhisattva vow is to save all sentient beings. Seems a whole lot easier to just accept suffering.

Maybe we end suffering by helping people realize that they create suffering by wanting things to be different than they are?

Maybe?

AA got it right, "God, grant me the serenity: To accept the things I cannot change; ... mind to accept that which cannot be changed; courage to change that which can be changed."

Oh!

Especially one who can't fly.

I hear your dog barking.

That's fortunate.

Yes, no one drowned her.

She's a good swimmer, like all bird dogs.

Hound dogs I can understand.
But why would a bird bark?

No, a bird dog is for hunting birds.

Why do you need a dog? Especially one who can't fly.

I can't sleep when the dog barks.

That's why the dog barks. She's alerting you of eminent danger.

I don't want to be alerted. I don't care if king kong is in the yard.
Sleep is more important.

I'll talk to the beast. Maybe she can refrain when just you are endangered.

Thanks.

You're welcome.

Part Salesman

You're a couch and I'm going to sit on you.

Oh no you don't. I'm asleep.

Asleep. You hardly did anything today.

But I get tired lying here. TV makes me sleepy.

Why do you turn it on?.

You left it on, silly.

I can't imagine that.

So how was your day?

You know, same old, same old.

Same old what?

They told me that I needed to sell more parts.

So what's wrong with that... a little motivation?

Can I help it if people aren't losing their limbs as much these days?

You could help things along.

How? By using a machette?