Start Sleeping With Men Who Don't Cheat on Their Wives
zeitgeist \TSYTE-ghyste\ noun, often capitalized
: the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era
Example sentence:
Uncle Jerry reminisced about the free love and political and social activism that were all prominent in the zeitgeist of the 1960s.
Did you know?
Scholars have long maintained that each era has a unique spirit, a nature or climate that sets it apart from all other epochs. In German, such a spirit is known as "Zeitgeist," from the German words "Zeit," meaning "time," and "Geist," meaning "spirit" or "ghost." Some writers and artists assert that the true zeitgeist of an era cannot be known until it is over, and several have declared that only artists or philosophers can adequately explain it. We don't know if that's true, but we do know that ?zeitgeist? has been a useful addition to the English language since at least 1835.
The dentists office called reguarding my appointment on Monday. They asked if I would please call back by 8 pm yesterday. They left this message on my mother's answering machine.
My mother did not call back, but instead called me about 20 minutes ago to tell me about the message. So I went, and I listened, and I called.
They, however, did not listen, but they did go. Out. Until Monday. Monday, when my appointment is scheduled for.
I hope that they were just calling to reconfirm it. Though when some sort of office does that, they usually just say they're calling to do that in the message.
I would really like to get this tooth out of my mouth. On Monday, at 1:30 pm. I've been planning on it for quite some time.
"It's not the mall I dislike. It's the people in it.
I was walking through the mall the other day, memorizing the route, getting ready to be old, when a woman waved from one of the ten thousand shoe stores. “Hey! How have you been?” she bellowed.
“Fine!” I answered, because that's what you're supposed to answer. No one wants to hear about your prostate or that battle with the neighbor over the property line or the fact that every single aspect of your decrepit life is going to Hell in a hand basket. That's not why they ask. They ask because they want to hear you say the word fine. People like hearing that word. “Fine,” I answered.
In truth, I was not doing fine.
I was at the mall.
For me, an ideal shopping day is going out to the backyard, digging a large hole, pulling from the ground an old lamp and rubbing the lamp to make a genie appear, asking for three items from my list then going back into the house where no one cares how I am.
As I said, I'm getting ready to be old.
The woman at the shoe store, not satisfied that I am, indeed, fine, had more questions. Waving me over, she said, “I heard you moved!” There I was, trapped. She had me. Obviously, she was someone I knew, or someone my wife knew or someone my sister knew or someone I went to jail with or someone who listens to the radio show and is delusional and it was becoming more and more apparent that I would not be returning home to where no one cares how I am anytime soon.
God, I hate the mall.
I applied a smile and sauntered past the pumps to look this creature in the eye, as my father taught me lo these many years ago. Nothing. No recognition. No flashbacks to high school. No facial features that rang a bell. I had no idea who this person was and so went post haste into my ultra-polite-and-generic mode.
“It's been so long!” she said. “How do you like your new place?”
“Great,” I replied. “We really like it.” Who is this person?
“See? I told you you would!”
“Yeah,” I said, smiling. “You were right.” Who are you?
“ We're thinking about moving,” she offered.
It was a clue. She said “we”. We're thinking about moving. We. Which one of my married friends had a wife I couldn't possibly remember meeting? None. Which of my lesbian friends had a lover I couldn't possibly remember. None. Which of my sister's lesbian classmates had a cousin who was married to -
“ Bob wants to get out of the city. He doesn't like where we are now.”
He's not the only one, I thought. Bob. Bob. Bob. How many Bobs do I know and which one of them could possibly be married to this? None. It was hopeless. The worst part of the encounter was that had I walked away after “fine”, I would have been, by that point, back to where no one cared how I was. But it was too late. It had turned into a challenge. And just like Rubik's Cube, I knew deep down inside I would never be able to solve the puzzle, but my ego demanded I give it a try.
“So, Bob wants to move, huh?” I asked. “I can see that.”
“Oh, yeah,” she answered. “Have you met Bob?”
There comes a point in every one of these random encounters at which a decision must be made. One has to choose between truthfulness and politeness. The honest path would have been to admit that not only had I not met Bob, but I, in fact, did not recall ever meeting whatever this woman's name might be, per chance.
I chose the other path.
“Oh, sure. You didn't know?” I asked. “We met at the thing. How is he?”
She answered that he was fine, avoiding any details about his prostate or the border fight with the neighbor. And then she asked the question that would change my entire day. “How's Andrea?”
I, of course, had no idea how Andrea was, because I, of course, know no one named Andrea. However, this mall person standing before me somehow connected me with Andrea, and whether she was imagining her to be my wife, lover, proctologist or borderless neighbor was unimportant. What was important was that I, indeed, was not as senile as I thought. I did not, do not, never have, known this person or her mall shoe bag.
All bets were hereby off.
I paused for a moment to gather my thoughts.
“You didn't hear?” I asked somberly.
This stranger placed her hand on my shoulder. “Oh, don't tell me,” she said, sympathetically.
I looked down at the South Hills Village linoleum. “Yes,” I replied low as I shook my head slowly.
“No!” she protested.
“Yes,” I repeated. And as I turned to walk away, I added, “Ask Bob. He knows all about it. He knows all… about it. All about it.”
As she stared with a puzzled look I walked down the hall toward the Baby Gap, the exit and my freedom. I gave her a little wave goodbye, whoever she was. And just as I was about to push open the glass barrier that stood between the real world and me I heard her ask, “Have you done something with your hair?”
Look! Up ahead, by the side of the road. There's a guy wearing a backpack with his thumb out. Wonder how many he's killed today.
I saw that most rare of sights today - a hitchhiker. Guys thumbing rides are uncommon these days, banished to a storage room above the garage along with your album collection and Spirograph.
The hitcher I passed by today looked like a throwback - long hair, long beard, down vest and backpack. The look on his long face said, “Please, friend. Give me a break. It's been a long, long life.” Unfortunately for Mr. Backpacker I've seen a lot of scary movies. They all begin when some trusting fool pulls over on the interstate to give the scraggy man a ride. They all end with the scraggy man in a gas station rest room scrubbing blood from his hands.
Have you seen that one?
It seemed that when I was a kid everyone hitched. My oldest brother thumbed his way to work every day. Friends of my sisters hitchhiked to Woodstock. Whenever the family headed out on our yearly summer pilgrimage to the Jersey shore, the Pennsylvania Turnpike seemed wall-to-wall with folks looking for a ride.
If you reach a bit further back in history, the tales my parents' generation told about hitchhiking were even more colorful. My father-in-law used to relate stories about being on leave during World War Two, hitching from the bus station in downtown Pittsburgh to Grove City. The toughest part of that journey, he related, was finding a ride from Butler west. He usually had no trouble getting from downtown to Butler. Route 8 was full of trucks, 24 hours a day. In those days the road from Butler over to Grove City was not what one would call “busy”.
Those were the days now referred to as “B.O.”
Before the Outlets.
I would imagine that roadside violence existed prior to the onslaught of slasher movies, Amber Alerts and the Manson Family. Sometime after the summer of love and prior to my getting behind the wheel in the mid-seventies, the attitude towards hitchhiking changed. Some of that adjustment in approach was sparked not too far from home.
Breezewood, Pennsylvania was the center of a search for the “I-70 killer” in the late 70's and early 80's. Said to have murdered more than a dozen homeless teens, mostly hitchhikers, the “I-70 killer” was never caught, but his (or her) story was widely publicized on shows like “America's Most Wanted”. I suspect that TV alone started many conversations like the one my Dad had with me. It wasn't so much a plea for my personal safety as it was a command. “No hitchhiking. No way, No how.”
And thus the law was commanded.
He never said anything about picking up hitchhikers - at least, I didn't remember that part. What young guy did not fantasize about meeting the beautiful young girl described in Sammy Johns' “Chevy Van”? Come on. You know you did.
Cheesy song.
Great fantasy.
“Like a picture she was layin' there
Moonlight dancin' off her hair
She woke up and took me by the hand
She's gonna love me in my Chevy van
And that's all right with me”
Sing it, Sammy - you cheesy bastard. And so it was that nearly ever guy my age who could not score with women in any other manner dreamed of the day that perfect girl would be standing by the side of the highway with one thumb out and a lifetime to get to know the real man behind the wheel of his air shock-equipped turd-brown Chevette.
One day, while wheeling down I-77, just outside Charleston, West Virginia, my fantasy materialized. There, up ahead. It was a girl with long, auburn hair, a pair of cutoffs and a smile. She had her thumb out. She had a smile. Sammy Johns, you are a God!
I slowed the car to a crawl, pulled it to the shoulder and rolled the window down. “Where you headed?” I asked. As if I cared. She could have said, “Timbuktu” and I would have stopped for gas. As it was, she answered that they "we're going to the Gathering”. I wondered for a very brief moment which exit that was - I'd never heard of that one. At about the same time the word “we” registered in my brain, she opened the passenger door, pushed the seat up and two greasy guys and a muddy dog came stomping out of the woods near the interstate.
We.
We're going to the “The Gathering”.
Sammy Johns, you liar!
For the next hour or so, the three told me tales of Jesus while the dog did his best to create a masterpiece on my car's white upholstery. I let them out just south of Beckley, moments from being saved and miles from being laid. They left me with nice smiles, several pamphlets and a new attitude about hitchhikers.
I guess, looking back, I did okay. My photo did not end up on America's Most Wanted. The biggest losers in the episode were future hitchhikers. I've passed them all since then, men and women, cute and ugly, and little by little, their numbers dwindled until most recently, when seeing a hitcher is akin to seeing a shooting star.
Sorry, backpack dude.
You could be the “I-70 killer”.
Or the “I-77 born agains”.
Either way, I'll finish this trip solo.
Good luck.
There's a reason for 250 channels available on expanded cable .
The following statement is sponsored by the Obvious Institute, promoting “well, duh” for more than two decades.
We're all individuals with individual, different tastes.
Well, duh.
I don't watch reality shows, talent contests or local newscasts. You, on the other hand, probably don't like the History Channel, professional bull riders or shows about how to rebuild your Camaro. I don't eat fast food, never have gotten the hang of cilantro and am not a fan of sitting with strangers. You, on the other hand, might stop at Taco Bell on your way to Benihana. I am perfectly happy wearing blue jeans 365 days a year and am forever asking someone what time it is. You, on the other hand, may tug on the sleeve of your new tailored jacket to gaze at the $2000 timepiece on your wrist.
We're different, you see.
Just as there are hundreds of personality types walking around, there are an equal variety of products. We all seem to survive breathing the same stale air as we shop for Fords and Chevys, vanilla and chocolate, decaf and Bustass.
Until, of course, someone feels the need to protect us from freedom, shield us from variety or shout warnings about being an individual.
This week, at one of the sixteen theaters in the Cineplex near you, a preview for a coming attraction aired that upset some people so much they felt they just had to jump up and down over and over thrusting their collective hands into the air until someone in the media asked, “Yes, Horshack?”
Horshack is the name I give to the people who feel it is their given duty to protect the world from any bad or questionable product that hits the marketplace. Horshack was the character on the TV show “Welcome Back, Kotter”, who, on the few occasions he knew the correct answer would bounce in his chair and hold his hand up high, making all sorts of noises until he was called upon. This week the media called on a theater-going Horshack, who then proceeded to warn us all.
He gave caution that some insensitive, anti-American bastards from Hollywood have dared to make a movie based on the story of United's flight 93. Flight 93, Horshack reminded us, was the hijacked airplane that crash-landed into a field not too far from where I live on September 11, 2001. Horshack is upset because he was forced to watch a preview for this soon-to-be-released film while he was waiting to see Denzel Washington save the world in Spike Lee's new movie “Inside Man”. Just to make sure that Horshack and all the other Horshacks in the audience could figure out the subtle nuances of the preview, the folks who made the new movie about United 93 have come up with a catchy title for their film.
They're calling it “United 93”.
The movie opens on April 28 th and from now until then we're all going to have to put up with an awful lot of Horshacks, all running around, shoving their hands into the air, making that “Ooo! Ooo!” sound, waiting to be called upon by Mr. Kotter.
“Mr. Kotter! Mr. Kotter!” the Horshacks all shout. “It's too soon for a movie about such a terrible tragedy! Our fragile psyches cannot possibly take it! It's all so insensitive and gross and heart-wrenching and it treads upon the memory of those brave people!”
The great thing about living in a free market society is that we don't really need any Horshacks to warn us about the sky falling, or movies about things falling from that same sky. The market will decide. That's how a free market society works.
You don't need to jump up and down in your seat, hoping to be called on by the media so that you can tell the rest of the class all about how bad clear Pepsi is. After thousands of bottles of that spew sits on grocers' shelves for weeks and weeks, they'll stop making it. We didn't need Horshack to advise us to stay away from Blockbuster Video, non-alcoholic beer or botox. The market decides these things.
If I perform a really bad radio show (and who knows - this might be one) is an early-warning prophet of doom needed to spread the word so that others will not be poisoned?
No.
People will just find something else to listen to (and who knows - maybe they're doing that right now).
The point is that although many of us, myself included, are still too tied in knots over the attacks of September eleventh to consider sitting through the heartache again (this time in big screen Technicolor with an all star cast and dramatic orchestrated music), no one should feel the need to warn us of its coming.
We don't need the Horshacks of the world on this one.
There are those who will watch this movie, the one to follow, a big budget Oliver Stone production to be called “World Trade Center” and the one that comes after that, etc., etc. I'm not quite ready for that theater experience and am not sure if I ever will be. That doesn't mean there are not those who are ready to re-live the events and use these films as touchstones to their feelings about that day.
Horshacks will not determine this.
The market will.
That's called freedom."
bijou \BEE-zhoo\ noun
*1 : a small dainty usually ornamental piece of delicate workmanship : jewel
2 : something delicate, elegant, or highly prized
Example sentence:
Some jewelers believe that women who buy their own bijoux are the next growth market.
Did you know?
"Bijou" (which can be pluralized as either "bijoux" or "bijous") has adorned English since the late 17th century. We borrowed it from French, but the word ultimately traces to Breton, a Celtic language (one closely related to Cornish and Welsh) spoken by inhabitants of the Brittany region of northwest France. Our modern English word derives from Breton "bizou," which means "ring." That history makes "bijou" a rare gem in English because, although the Breton people occupied part of England for many years before they were pushed into France by the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th and 6th centuries, very few Breton-derived words remain in our language (another Breton descendant is "menhir," a term for a prehistoric monument).
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
: the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era
Example sentence:
Uncle Jerry reminisced about the free love and political and social activism that were all prominent in the zeitgeist of the 1960s.
Did you know?
Scholars have long maintained that each era has a unique spirit, a nature or climate that sets it apart from all other epochs. In German, such a spirit is known as "Zeitgeist," from the German words "Zeit," meaning "time," and "Geist," meaning "spirit" or "ghost." Some writers and artists assert that the true zeitgeist of an era cannot be known until it is over, and several have declared that only artists or philosophers can adequately explain it. We don't know if that's true, but we do know that ?zeitgeist? has been a useful addition to the English language since at least 1835.
The dentists office called reguarding my appointment on Monday. They asked if I would please call back by 8 pm yesterday. They left this message on my mother's answering machine.
My mother did not call back, but instead called me about 20 minutes ago to tell me about the message. So I went, and I listened, and I called.
They, however, did not listen, but they did go. Out. Until Monday. Monday, when my appointment is scheduled for.
I hope that they were just calling to reconfirm it. Though when some sort of office does that, they usually just say they're calling to do that in the message.
I would really like to get this tooth out of my mouth. On Monday, at 1:30 pm. I've been planning on it for quite some time.
"It's not the mall I dislike. It's the people in it.
I was walking through the mall the other day, memorizing the route, getting ready to be old, when a woman waved from one of the ten thousand shoe stores. “Hey! How have you been?” she bellowed.
“Fine!” I answered, because that's what you're supposed to answer. No one wants to hear about your prostate or that battle with the neighbor over the property line or the fact that every single aspect of your decrepit life is going to Hell in a hand basket. That's not why they ask. They ask because they want to hear you say the word fine. People like hearing that word. “Fine,” I answered.
In truth, I was not doing fine.
I was at the mall.
For me, an ideal shopping day is going out to the backyard, digging a large hole, pulling from the ground an old lamp and rubbing the lamp to make a genie appear, asking for three items from my list then going back into the house where no one cares how I am.
As I said, I'm getting ready to be old.
The woman at the shoe store, not satisfied that I am, indeed, fine, had more questions. Waving me over, she said, “I heard you moved!” There I was, trapped. She had me. Obviously, she was someone I knew, or someone my wife knew or someone my sister knew or someone I went to jail with or someone who listens to the radio show and is delusional and it was becoming more and more apparent that I would not be returning home to where no one cares how I am anytime soon.
God, I hate the mall.
I applied a smile and sauntered past the pumps to look this creature in the eye, as my father taught me lo these many years ago. Nothing. No recognition. No flashbacks to high school. No facial features that rang a bell. I had no idea who this person was and so went post haste into my ultra-polite-and-generic mode.
“It's been so long!” she said. “How do you like your new place?”
“Great,” I replied. “We really like it.” Who is this person?
“See? I told you you would!”
“Yeah,” I said, smiling. “You were right.” Who are you?
“ We're thinking about moving,” she offered.
It was a clue. She said “we”. We're thinking about moving. We. Which one of my married friends had a wife I couldn't possibly remember meeting? None. Which of my lesbian friends had a lover I couldn't possibly remember. None. Which of my sister's lesbian classmates had a cousin who was married to -
“ Bob wants to get out of the city. He doesn't like where we are now.”
He's not the only one, I thought. Bob. Bob. Bob. How many Bobs do I know and which one of them could possibly be married to this? None. It was hopeless. The worst part of the encounter was that had I walked away after “fine”, I would have been, by that point, back to where no one cared how I was. But it was too late. It had turned into a challenge. And just like Rubik's Cube, I knew deep down inside I would never be able to solve the puzzle, but my ego demanded I give it a try.
“So, Bob wants to move, huh?” I asked. “I can see that.”
“Oh, yeah,” she answered. “Have you met Bob?”
There comes a point in every one of these random encounters at which a decision must be made. One has to choose between truthfulness and politeness. The honest path would have been to admit that not only had I not met Bob, but I, in fact, did not recall ever meeting whatever this woman's name might be, per chance.
I chose the other path.
“Oh, sure. You didn't know?” I asked. “We met at the thing. How is he?”
She answered that he was fine, avoiding any details about his prostate or the border fight with the neighbor. And then she asked the question that would change my entire day. “How's Andrea?”
I, of course, had no idea how Andrea was, because I, of course, know no one named Andrea. However, this mall person standing before me somehow connected me with Andrea, and whether she was imagining her to be my wife, lover, proctologist or borderless neighbor was unimportant. What was important was that I, indeed, was not as senile as I thought. I did not, do not, never have, known this person or her mall shoe bag.
All bets were hereby off.
I paused for a moment to gather my thoughts.
“You didn't hear?” I asked somberly.
This stranger placed her hand on my shoulder. “Oh, don't tell me,” she said, sympathetically.
I looked down at the South Hills Village linoleum. “Yes,” I replied low as I shook my head slowly.
“No!” she protested.
“Yes,” I repeated. And as I turned to walk away, I added, “Ask Bob. He knows all about it. He knows all… about it. All about it.”
As she stared with a puzzled look I walked down the hall toward the Baby Gap, the exit and my freedom. I gave her a little wave goodbye, whoever she was. And just as I was about to push open the glass barrier that stood between the real world and me I heard her ask, “Have you done something with your hair?”
Look! Up ahead, by the side of the road. There's a guy wearing a backpack with his thumb out. Wonder how many he's killed today.
I saw that most rare of sights today - a hitchhiker. Guys thumbing rides are uncommon these days, banished to a storage room above the garage along with your album collection and Spirograph.
The hitcher I passed by today looked like a throwback - long hair, long beard, down vest and backpack. The look on his long face said, “Please, friend. Give me a break. It's been a long, long life.” Unfortunately for Mr. Backpacker I've seen a lot of scary movies. They all begin when some trusting fool pulls over on the interstate to give the scraggy man a ride. They all end with the scraggy man in a gas station rest room scrubbing blood from his hands.
Have you seen that one?
It seemed that when I was a kid everyone hitched. My oldest brother thumbed his way to work every day. Friends of my sisters hitchhiked to Woodstock. Whenever the family headed out on our yearly summer pilgrimage to the Jersey shore, the Pennsylvania Turnpike seemed wall-to-wall with folks looking for a ride.
If you reach a bit further back in history, the tales my parents' generation told about hitchhiking were even more colorful. My father-in-law used to relate stories about being on leave during World War Two, hitching from the bus station in downtown Pittsburgh to Grove City. The toughest part of that journey, he related, was finding a ride from Butler west. He usually had no trouble getting from downtown to Butler. Route 8 was full of trucks, 24 hours a day. In those days the road from Butler over to Grove City was not what one would call “busy”.
Those were the days now referred to as “B.O.”
Before the Outlets.
I would imagine that roadside violence existed prior to the onslaught of slasher movies, Amber Alerts and the Manson Family. Sometime after the summer of love and prior to my getting behind the wheel in the mid-seventies, the attitude towards hitchhiking changed. Some of that adjustment in approach was sparked not too far from home.
Breezewood, Pennsylvania was the center of a search for the “I-70 killer” in the late 70's and early 80's. Said to have murdered more than a dozen homeless teens, mostly hitchhikers, the “I-70 killer” was never caught, but his (or her) story was widely publicized on shows like “America's Most Wanted”. I suspect that TV alone started many conversations like the one my Dad had with me. It wasn't so much a plea for my personal safety as it was a command. “No hitchhiking. No way, No how.”
And thus the law was commanded.
He never said anything about picking up hitchhikers - at least, I didn't remember that part. What young guy did not fantasize about meeting the beautiful young girl described in Sammy Johns' “Chevy Van”? Come on. You know you did.
Cheesy song.
Great fantasy.
“Like a picture she was layin' there
Moonlight dancin' off her hair
She woke up and took me by the hand
She's gonna love me in my Chevy van
And that's all right with me”
Sing it, Sammy - you cheesy bastard. And so it was that nearly ever guy my age who could not score with women in any other manner dreamed of the day that perfect girl would be standing by the side of the highway with one thumb out and a lifetime to get to know the real man behind the wheel of his air shock-equipped turd-brown Chevette.
One day, while wheeling down I-77, just outside Charleston, West Virginia, my fantasy materialized. There, up ahead. It was a girl with long, auburn hair, a pair of cutoffs and a smile. She had her thumb out. She had a smile. Sammy Johns, you are a God!
I slowed the car to a crawl, pulled it to the shoulder and rolled the window down. “Where you headed?” I asked. As if I cared. She could have said, “Timbuktu” and I would have stopped for gas. As it was, she answered that they "we're going to the Gathering”. I wondered for a very brief moment which exit that was - I'd never heard of that one. At about the same time the word “we” registered in my brain, she opened the passenger door, pushed the seat up and two greasy guys and a muddy dog came stomping out of the woods near the interstate.
We.
We're going to the “The Gathering”.
Sammy Johns, you liar!
For the next hour or so, the three told me tales of Jesus while the dog did his best to create a masterpiece on my car's white upholstery. I let them out just south of Beckley, moments from being saved and miles from being laid. They left me with nice smiles, several pamphlets and a new attitude about hitchhikers.
I guess, looking back, I did okay. My photo did not end up on America's Most Wanted. The biggest losers in the episode were future hitchhikers. I've passed them all since then, men and women, cute and ugly, and little by little, their numbers dwindled until most recently, when seeing a hitcher is akin to seeing a shooting star.
Sorry, backpack dude.
You could be the “I-70 killer”.
Or the “I-77 born agains”.
Either way, I'll finish this trip solo.
Good luck.
There's a reason for 250 channels available on expanded cable .
The following statement is sponsored by the Obvious Institute, promoting “well, duh” for more than two decades.
We're all individuals with individual, different tastes.
Well, duh.
I don't watch reality shows, talent contests or local newscasts. You, on the other hand, probably don't like the History Channel, professional bull riders or shows about how to rebuild your Camaro. I don't eat fast food, never have gotten the hang of cilantro and am not a fan of sitting with strangers. You, on the other hand, might stop at Taco Bell on your way to Benihana. I am perfectly happy wearing blue jeans 365 days a year and am forever asking someone what time it is. You, on the other hand, may tug on the sleeve of your new tailored jacket to gaze at the $2000 timepiece on your wrist.
We're different, you see.
Just as there are hundreds of personality types walking around, there are an equal variety of products. We all seem to survive breathing the same stale air as we shop for Fords and Chevys, vanilla and chocolate, decaf and Bustass.
Until, of course, someone feels the need to protect us from freedom, shield us from variety or shout warnings about being an individual.
This week, at one of the sixteen theaters in the Cineplex near you, a preview for a coming attraction aired that upset some people so much they felt they just had to jump up and down over and over thrusting their collective hands into the air until someone in the media asked, “Yes, Horshack?”
Horshack is the name I give to the people who feel it is their given duty to protect the world from any bad or questionable product that hits the marketplace. Horshack was the character on the TV show “Welcome Back, Kotter”, who, on the few occasions he knew the correct answer would bounce in his chair and hold his hand up high, making all sorts of noises until he was called upon. This week the media called on a theater-going Horshack, who then proceeded to warn us all.
He gave caution that some insensitive, anti-American bastards from Hollywood have dared to make a movie based on the story of United's flight 93. Flight 93, Horshack reminded us, was the hijacked airplane that crash-landed into a field not too far from where I live on September 11, 2001. Horshack is upset because he was forced to watch a preview for this soon-to-be-released film while he was waiting to see Denzel Washington save the world in Spike Lee's new movie “Inside Man”. Just to make sure that Horshack and all the other Horshacks in the audience could figure out the subtle nuances of the preview, the folks who made the new movie about United 93 have come up with a catchy title for their film.
They're calling it “United 93”.
The movie opens on April 28 th and from now until then we're all going to have to put up with an awful lot of Horshacks, all running around, shoving their hands into the air, making that “Ooo! Ooo!” sound, waiting to be called upon by Mr. Kotter.
“Mr. Kotter! Mr. Kotter!” the Horshacks all shout. “It's too soon for a movie about such a terrible tragedy! Our fragile psyches cannot possibly take it! It's all so insensitive and gross and heart-wrenching and it treads upon the memory of those brave people!”
The great thing about living in a free market society is that we don't really need any Horshacks to warn us about the sky falling, or movies about things falling from that same sky. The market will decide. That's how a free market society works.
You don't need to jump up and down in your seat, hoping to be called on by the media so that you can tell the rest of the class all about how bad clear Pepsi is. After thousands of bottles of that spew sits on grocers' shelves for weeks and weeks, they'll stop making it. We didn't need Horshack to advise us to stay away from Blockbuster Video, non-alcoholic beer or botox. The market decides these things.
If I perform a really bad radio show (and who knows - this might be one) is an early-warning prophet of doom needed to spread the word so that others will not be poisoned?
No.
People will just find something else to listen to (and who knows - maybe they're doing that right now).
The point is that although many of us, myself included, are still too tied in knots over the attacks of September eleventh to consider sitting through the heartache again (this time in big screen Technicolor with an all star cast and dramatic orchestrated music), no one should feel the need to warn us of its coming.
We don't need the Horshacks of the world on this one.
There are those who will watch this movie, the one to follow, a big budget Oliver Stone production to be called “World Trade Center” and the one that comes after that, etc., etc. I'm not quite ready for that theater experience and am not sure if I ever will be. That doesn't mean there are not those who are ready to re-live the events and use these films as touchstones to their feelings about that day.
Horshacks will not determine this.
The market will.
That's called freedom."
bijou \BEE-zhoo\ noun
*1 : a small dainty usually ornamental piece of delicate workmanship : jewel
2 : something delicate, elegant, or highly prized
Example sentence:
Some jewelers believe that women who buy their own bijoux are the next growth market.
Did you know?
"Bijou" (which can be pluralized as either "bijoux" or "bijous") has adorned English since the late 17th century. We borrowed it from French, but the word ultimately traces to Breton, a Celtic language (one closely related to Cornish and Welsh) spoken by inhabitants of the Brittany region of northwest France. Our modern English word derives from Breton "bizou," which means "ring." That history makes "bijou" a rare gem in English because, although the Breton people occupied part of England for many years before they were pushed into France by the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th and 6th centuries, very few Breton-derived words remain in our language (another Breton descendant is "menhir," a term for a prehistoric monument).
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.